What's a girl to do

when she has loads of different things to post about, and then when it comes to writing the post they all totally disappear from her brain?
And then, it's ok. She remembers one...

Some of you will remember me writing about how we were going to be having our roor redone. Actually, I can't remember if I wrote much about it on here, but I did say a fair amount in Kathleen's comments back when she was having her kitchen floor redone (so will we ever get to see the finished product Kathleen?). At the time we thought that it would be happening in the last week before Christmas and were frantically emptying out our loft - Although a lot of the work will be done from the outside, we are also having new insulation put inside, and they will floor the loft for us as well. In fact, it should be pretty good when it's all completed.
The original date was just an estimate, and depended on their other jobs. Due to the weather and things like that we were told that they would come in January. So we heaved a sigh of relief, stopped emptying and got on with the Christmas shopping (so we were late with that, as ever, but hey, that was never gonna change!)

We now know that they will be starting a week this coming Monday, and will be arriving to put up the scaffolding next Friday. So this weekend we needed to finish emptying the loft. When I say we, it was actually my Mum and Dad that did it. I was out this morning at a sunday school meeting. We had done most of the clearing, but they have now officially completed the task, apart from some bits of wood that are still on the floor to make walking around up there easier. Other than them it's just the joists of the ceiling below and you have to be careful not to step in the wrong place and put your foot right through.

Unfortunately we never took any before photos, but here are a few 'after' ones. Mostly so that Bekki and HP can see for themselves just what a transformation has taken place. I'll also hopefully take progress photos once the work gets started. As I say, there aren't any before photos, but to give you an idea you need to know we've got rid of at least 8 carfuls of stuff to the dump. We've got boxes and bits in most of the rooms in the house. We've sent loads of things to the charity shop next door, and put quite a lot out for recycling. It'll be great once it's all completed to sort through all the stuff we've got left once more and put it up there, knowing just what exactly is up there. Of course there are always things that you want to keep (like toys that belonged to my Dad when he was a child that he's still attached to) but it's always good if you know what they are!

We'll have to continue to live in chaos for a little while yet, but once that's over it'll be great.
Please remember it's National de-lurk week (see what I wrote here). I'd love it if you said hello. If you want an idea of something to say you could always tell me a joke, what your favourite colour is, or a subject to post on one day next week :-)

Also, apologies for all the spots on the pictures, I think the lens of my camera needed cleaning!

Friday evening

Hello to all you lovely people who have already de-lurked. Remember you aren't under any pressure to do so if you haven't already, but I would love to visit you if you do want to!

I'm off to a prayer meeting in the next few minutes, but I will be visiting people tomorrow, and I'm looking forward to it. See some of you then then...

National de-lurk week

It's official, according to several different blogs I just looked at, it is National De-lurk week. (Bekki, Arwen, Paper Napkin - ok, so that one was just following the link Bekki had, but three references seemed better than two!)

So, please please please de-lurk. I know several people who know me in real life read this blog, but don't comment much, so if that's you I especially want to hear from you. If you really don't want me to drag out a potentially embarrassing photo (like I did to Esther) and say so then I can try my best not to post one.

Secondly, if you don't know me in real life, I would love to have the chance to get to know you. I love reading blogs, and would definitely check yours out if you have one! And if you don't have a blog, well it would still be fantastic to hear from you.

Thirdly, if you already know me in cyber-space, for example any of the one weigh or another ladies, Kathleen, Chaotic Mum, or Rachel who I am just beginning to get to know, then I love it that you read my blog, and if you could spare a minute then it'd be fabulous to hear from you ;-)

Finally, if you feel you're in another category, for instance you just found my blog by googling 'how to put on a duvet' or 'you give a little love and it all comes back to you' then leave a comment too, since so many of you arrive here that way it'd be great to know what you were actually looking for, and maybe I could post that sometime too!

Finally finally, does anyone know why someone (or more than one person) keeps searching for the phrase 'I got my car fixed it's my birthday song' because if that's the lyrics to a song, then I don't know it. And if it's just a phrase picked out of the air then it's an unusual one.

Please leave me a comment (or more than one, if you like). I promise I will come visiting to meet you afterwards. Just say hi, or tell me your favourite colour, or share a joke. Whatever you say, say something. Remember, in cyberspace no-one can hear you read :-)

For Esther

Ok, ok, so I'll write a proper post

I don't seem to be very good at writing proper posts lately, I just try to fob you off with pictures. Unlike Kathleen, who manages to post fantastic photos and write something interesting to go with them. I think I need to stop thinking I need to write specifically about the photo, but just throw it in as extra entertainment value. That is, of course, assuming that you find my blog entertaining.

Hmmm, this blog is called It's My Life, so I ought to write about my life. As most of you know I'm back in London, living with my parents in the house I grew up in. In fact, the only house I've ever lived in in London. That's quite weird if you compare it to people like Blair or Blest with sons who are constantly moving every couple of years because of their husbands jobs. I have lived in lots of different places though, if you count all the places I lived while at university. Hey, I can feel a trip down memory lane coming on...

In my first year at university I lived in a building called West House, which was where the majority of first years at my college lived. I was on the first floor, which was high enough to not have people looking in your windows, but low enough to not have too many stairs to climb. I've got loads of memories from living in that room, but I can't share any here or this post will just be too long.

In my second year at Homerton I was once again in West House, but this time I was up on the top (fourth) floor. We were pretty glad they had lifts as well as stairs. When I think back to my second year I have very mixed emotions. I very very stressed out for a fair amount of the year, for a number of reasons, and developed stress migraines which made me sick. I don't get them much any more, apart from if I'm in contact with very strong smells, for example scented candles or perfume.

For my third year I made the decision to live with three delightful girls in a house out of college, which was also a bit of a stressful decision at the time, but I really enjoyed the time I spent living with Bud, Mucker and Anna (yes, Bud and Mucker are nicknames, in case you were worried). In fact, we got on so well that we continued living in our house in Blinco Grove for our PGCE year.

That takes me up to the summer of 2005. I failed my final teaching placement and was to retake it in the Autumn, so I needed to find somewhere to live, initially for a couple of months. Enter my friend Imogen, and the house she was rentiing in GC, south of Cambridge. IT would be clost enough to commute into Cambridge (which I did for church, and going into college) but also out in the countryside. I made the decision a couple of weeks into my repeat placement that I really didn't want to be a teacher, and then was offered a job at the school I was in. This was only going to be for a couple of weeks, but ended up extending to be for the whole of the school year. Imogen was willing for me to continue to live with her, so I did! That job came to an end at the end of July, so for financial reasons it was time for me to move back to London.

And that's where I am at the moment. My job situation at the moment is a little uncertain (more that I'm not enjoying it much than it coming to an end or anything like that.) However at the moment I'm sticking with it to earn some money, and looking after the little one two days a week as a bit of relief from the school sitaution. I'm not going to say any more about that at the moment.

Wow, look I can write a proper post when I put my mind to it. I'll try not to leave it so long 'till the next one. In the meantime you can always check out the sites on my sidebar. I'm going to be adding a few more site over the next couple of weeks, so do check them out when I do.

Ten in the bed...

There were ten in the bed and the little one said "roll over, roll over"... and he rolled over so far that he was at the end of the bed.

Evening all

I was going to post something (but I won't tell you what it is cos I'll do it tomorrow instead) but then I went out to a church prayer meeting instead. It was great, so I don't mind, I'm just now too tired to think about writing a proper post today.
So yet again I'm afraid you're getting very little from me. I'll see if Ican find a pretty picture to show you to make you feel better. And then I will definitely be back tomorrow.
Since Bekki did the sheep thing, I will too.

a taste of Christmas past

I'm on the upstairs computer which means my photos are all on the other computer, and I've only got old photos. Hence the picture of my cousin Dave looking stupid from last Christmas, and the fact that I'm only writing a short post because I hate this keyboard.

So that's all I have to say. See you tommorrow.

Questions and things to remember

Everyone knows what the big questions of life are. It's things like Why are we here? Is there a God? Why is the sky blue? (ok, I kind of know that one, in fact, I'd say I knew the answer to all of those, but I realise that not everyone necessarily does. I'll try to say more about them at some point, but most of my readers probably know I'm a Christian and have a fair idea of what I believe.)

But then of course there are does other questions. Questions like why doesn't that bit of hair at the back curl under like all the rest? Why do buses always come in threes? Why don't penguin's feet freeze? And they lead me on nicely to telling you about my Christmas present from HP. It's a book called Why don't penguins feet freeze? and it's next on my list to start reading. She has a book that answers the bus question, which I have read, but can't answer off hand without looking at it again. And the hair question? Well that's just something I wondered after blow drying my hair, and all of it going under perfectly apart from the bit at the back.

This things to remember bit of the post - well that's simple. If you take a picture from your car whilst waiting at lights you might want to note that since you're behind the glass you will see all the dirt on the glass, and it may well reflect some of what's in the car as well (look, at the top you can see my fingers on the steering wheel being reflected). But if you think it looks cool anyhow you can still put it on your blog. So long as you write a post a bit like this to explain it to all your readers.

blog birthday

I just noticed that I've actually missed my blog's birthday. I started this blog on the 30th December 2005, a year and six days ago. Here you can see my first and second ever posts (even then I was posting more than once on some days, and then not for several days! But it was because I was so excited to have a comment, and I do still get excited about comments, so nothing much has really changed.)

In my second ever post I wrote
"I wonder what on earth I'll be doing this time next year. Knowing what last year was like, I'm sure I won't be doing whatever seems most likely at the moment - This time last year I was expecting to be a primary teacher by now, however things happened slightly differently."

Yes, things are definitely different. I'm living back at home in London - last year I was living just south of Cambridge with a girl who'd been on a similar course to mine at the same college of the university. (Sorry Cambridge is a bit confusing, there are lots of different colleges, which are all part of the University). This time last year Bekki was only just moving to Cambridge, and I was the one firmly established there, that's now been reversed.

I'm still working in a primary school, but now it's a different one. I'm still supporting children on a one-to-one basis, but now it's in a slightly different role. I'm also back to helping in sunday school at church, which I had been doing in Cambridge before I started blogging, but had stopped because life had got to busy (although not too busy to start a blog, apparently!) The final difference I'm going to mention is that I've lost some weight since then.

So, Happy Belated Birthday to me and my blog :-)

In which we get reintroduced to an old friend

For those of you that may remember Basil I feel duty bound to resume the tale of his life. Although on numerous occasions it has seemed near definite that his demise was inevitable, he lives on to see a another day. He is scarely recognisable to those who might remember his big bushy stems, but he still has new growth appearing, and I feel confident he is not ready to leave us yet. I salute you Basil for your bravery. Long may you continue to be with us.

It worked for me

Ok, so this is going to be a really quick works for me, inspired by a search I just had to make, and failing and needing to come up with an idea quick. Basically we have a huge bottle of PVA glue and a little pot we can put it in, but then you need a glue spreader. And I couldn't find one, and I was too impatient to search for a long time. And then I thought, "hey, a cotton bud could work", and I tried it, and it did :-)
I tried taking a piture of me doing the glueing, but both tries came out blurry, so this is the after shot.Using a cotton bud if you can't find a glue spreader. It works for me :-)
Check out Rocks in My Dryer for more works for me Wednesdays

Cleaning and sorting stuff

I'm having a bit of an ill day today. I woke up a bit wheezy, and my cold is definitely still here. Taking my asthma medicine stopped the wheeze, but I've still got a very nasty sounding cough.
We'd been intending to go out shopping to try to buy me some clothes (I have a feeling this need might drag on a while) but we started doing some serious cleaning, dusting and hoovering lots of different rooms, and it got to the point that it seemed like we might as well carry on with that rather than go out. Especially since I wasn't convinced I felt up to trying on clothes, and that had been the main purpose for going out.

Yesterday I found a whole load of worksheets on the internet to use with the girl I tutor once a week. Today I've been sorting those out a bit and going through the file of stuff I had already, throwing out the things I didn't need anymore, and looking to see what I still needed to plan. I know some weeks I've ended up trying to make stuff up as I go along, so I'm trying to get some session plans sorted while I've got some spare time, and then I won't have to think about it for a while. This photo is one of the sheets I found a while ago on the internet, and printed it off to use, to help her with learning the times table facts. We've done a few of them already, and they just add a bit of fun to the work. After all she's already had a whole day of school work, so I try to make what we do fun as well as useful.

Happy New Year

Sorry, tried to think of an original way to title this post, but this one just had be written.

Having taken many many photos over Christmas I want to introduce to you some of my mad family, and share with you what it was like on Boxing day when we had 17 people in the house. Unfortunately I ended up sitting right by the door (almost outside the room) for our manic present session that day, so there was no way I'd be able to get a photo of the whole room, but here are a couple of pics to share a little of what the atmosphere was like.. (and I still missed off a couple of people)

With regards to New Years resolutions I don't usually make any, or if I do I usually manage to forget them before a week or two is past. However this year I have got a few ideas. I'm not sure I'm ready to share them with the world just yet, but I might do soon. I'll just leave you with a few hints - a couple will be weight loss and exercise related, but at least one will probably be blog related. And on that note, here are a couple of photos taken on our New Year's Day ramble with people from our church.

Mystery revealed

It was the yummy chocolate log (made of sponge cake and butter icing) and that was where it sat whilst it was dusted with icing sugar (probably what some of you would call powdered sugar) before being taken to the table.

I will post something proper soon

but in the meantime, guess what was here:

Christmas Fun

More posting with things to say once we've got the house sorted out and everything unpacked and all the stuff that needs doing done.

Happy Wordless Wednesday. I have to admit I'm cheating this week, and linking to a post I put up last week, but I think it's cool and wanted to share it with you all! I hope that's ok. For more WW check out here.

I'm still alive, just very busy

Hello, just a quick post to say hi, and then I'll be back properly probably on Friday. Chrsitmas day went pretty much as I had imagined. We also watched the Queen's annual Christmas broadcast at 3pm.
I'd meant to post a couple of verses from the book of Isaiah (in the bible) on Christmas day, but time escpaed me. Maybe I'll do that at some point.

Yesterday was the invasion of my uncle and his family (an extra 9 people in total to fit into the already crowded house). It was lots of fun, and pictures will follow in due course. I'd also woken up with a snuffly nose and sore throat and glands. I'm still not feeling great, so I'm just taking life gently!

Today we did a bit of shopping - hitting the sales and managing to try on many many pairs of trousers without any of them fitting me (for one reason or another). I did however find a skirt that I like and a top, so I have got something to wear.

Tomorrow we are leaving my Mum's parents house and driving to my Dad's parents house to go and have Christmas with them. My Dad's Mum is very frail so we won't stay over (we didn't want to give them the extra work of having to sort out beds for five people, just for the sake of one night) but we'll drive back to London tomorrow, probably getting bad fairly late.

And then on Friday hopefully I'll go shopping, or at least in search of some trousers, and get some of my photos loaded onto the computer and onto this blog.
I'll see you Friday :-)

Christmas Eve

I think that we might actually be ready for Christmas in our house. We're staying with my Mum's parents for Christmas and drove here on Friday through lots of horrible fog. Actually the drive wasn't as bad as I had expected - we'd decided that five of us and all our stuff was unlikely to fit in my Mum's car so I got to drive my car and HP came in it with me. At times the visibility was minimal, in places you couldn't even see the other side of the road, but so long as there was a car in front to follow I didn't mind.

We spent yesterday shopping. In the morning I went last minute food shopping at sainsburys with my Mum and HP, and then in the afternoon the three of us hit Cheltenham shops and just about managed to finish our Christmas shopping. We were glad that a lot of the shops were staying open till 8pm, and definitely needed the 4 hours we'd paid for in the car park. However, we haven't yet thought of anyone that we haven't got at least one thing for.

Today the majority of the family went out to church twice. I actually went back to bed this morning to sleep some more. I'm on the put-you-up fold out bed downstairs, and for one reason or another I'd had quite a disturbed night. However a couple more hours of sleep this morning turned me from grumpy Debs into more bearable to be with Debs :-). This evening I did go to church and heard my Grandad preaching and leading the service.

We've just finished tea (it's now 10.20pm) and HP and Bekki are washing up. I was excused from helping with that so long as I just my amazing organisation powers to get eveything back in the fridge that ought to be there! And then I sneaked away to write on my blog - I'm not sure when I'll next have a chance.

Tomorrow morning (and tonight) will be busy as people discuss things of vital importance, such as how much onion to put in the stuffing and when to prepare all the vegetables. HP, Bekki and I will wake up and find stockings on our beds (yes, we may not be kids anymore, but some traditions never change!) and we'll go and open them sitting on my parents bed, taking it in turns to pick one item out each.

At 10.30am it's the Christmas morning service at church, and then we'll come back to finish getting the dinner. I've no idea what time we'll actually sit down to eat, but it certainly won't be before 2pm. After we've eaten, all the washing up is done and people have finished any last minute wrapping, we'll all assemble in the front room for our present giving. Each gift will be given out by the nominated Father Christmas (or two - usually HP and I), and then opened admired, and the giver thanked before the next one can be given out. After the presents things tend to be fairly chilled out. People will probably eat tea at some point, which may just be a cup of tea and a piece of cake, and we'll all just enjoy each others company.

On Boxing day we'll be invaded by one of my Mum's brothers and his family (all 9 of them all together) so it's bound to be a fairly hectic day. And on Wednesday we'll probably go and hit the sales (I really need to get some new clothes, especially trousers, as most of mine fall down at the moment!).

That's about all that I can predict of the week to come at the moment. I'll check in at some point to say if all went as planned. But in the meeanwhile, if you've read this far in my post you definitely deserve to have a very Happy Christmas :-)

Yesterday's post was going to be called 'look, three posts in three days'..

... however, I had nothing to say, so I didn't write that post.

I don't have anything much to say today either, however it's worth noting that BEKKI IS HOME. Apologies for the shouting, but it's very exciting. Only, I also have a cold and nasty sinuses so shouting was the only way I could think of to make the excitement come across.

We Three Kings...

Me

My mind is empty of anything interesting to say. So instead I'm showing you a picture of me in my funky jeans, as taken by HP on Sunday. The jeans used to be white and I dyed them, and then Bekki added the cool extra bits. I like the fact that they are asymmetrical

The wonders of internet search engines

I'm recovering from a nasty sickness bug so it seems a good time to share with you some of my favourite google searches that have led people to my site. (Since that doesn't require much, if any, brainpower).

You could probably guess that the phrase that brings most people here is that much quoted line from Bugsy Malone. I hesitate to write it again here since that would only encourage them to come even more. If you don't know what I'm talking about look here.

Other favourites include...
Blowing raspberries on tummies - yes, it's great fun and the little one I look after is very good at it.

How to put on a duvet - this search takes people to this post, so I'm not sure it's all that helpful. But maybe it makes them laugh?!? And, being serious for a second, I do find that turning the cover inside out does make it easier (the putting it on your head bit is optional!)

Hear cough sounds - well yes, I do cough a lot. But I wasn't aware I'd added audio to my blog.

Christian Salvesen lorries pictures - Well I did go through a phase of perhaps seeming a little obsessed with lorries, however I never actually took photos of any. Maybe one day...

It's almost Friday - No, it is Friday (Or so I'm told - Thursday seemed to escape me somewhat this week).

There are so many more I want to share, but to stop this post getting too long I'll leave you with my favourite so far...
I got my car fixed it's my birthday song - Probably a couple of my more talked about subjects on my blog in the last year - my car, and people's birthdays.

One of the reasons I haven't blogged for a while...

... little one won't let me get near the computer. (He's the boy I look after two days a week in case anyone was confused\worried!)

It's my life

Wordless Wednesday

Check out some more WW here

Works for me Wednesday

I know it's still Tuesday, but since I'm going to be busy tomorrow I'm writing the post tonight, and then I can link it to the other WFMW posts tomorrow.

This week I wanted to share with you what the top of my chest of drawers looks like. "Why?" you might ask - because it's tidy, and all the stuff doesn't fall off every time I walk past.

The flooring in my room is cork tiles and the chest is old and a bit liable to wobble as you go past (with no carpet to absorb the slight movement). I was fed up of things falling off, all the stuff being mixed up, and the noise when metal things rattle against each other. So I invested in some cheap plastic boxes and sorted my stuff into them. Now I know if I'm looking for washing stuff (body, hair etc) I look in the left box, creams and lotions (body, hand - I have eczema so I have lots!) in the middle, and on the right I have sprays (deodorant, sun cream..)
Like this:It works for me :-)
For more WFMW check out Rocks in my Dryer

I just made this, and then this

It's a mat\coaster thing (I found it here)
The main purpose of this post is to show HP what they looks like :-)
And below is the second, smaller version. They're by no means as perfect as the ones I saw originally, but still cute. I'll work on it, maybe...
(Oh, and I know a beaker isn't really the sort of drink you'd put on a coaster, but I don't drink tea or coffee, and it happened to be nearby when I took the photos!)

Prayer Request

I'm trying to make a few decisions jobwise at the moment and would appreciate your prayers. I just wrote a whole post over at OWOA so I'm not going to write it all out here too, but if you'd go over there and take a look that'd be fantastic.
It's here
Thanks muchly :-)

Good Morning, Good Morning, you've slept the whole night through.

Well I did (see title), but it's still dark so it doesn't quite feel like morning yet. And I just left a comment over on One Weigh or Another and that showed up as before midnight, so some of them may not even have gone to bed yet.

However, I have got this song in my head, and it seemed only fair that I should share it with you all, so that you too could go round singing 'Good morning, good morning..'

Back with more later (maybe!)

Evening All

You give a little love and it all comes back to you, da da da.. lyrics

For the benefit of the many people who find my sight by googling the above phrase here are the lyrics: (for everyone else you can skip this post if you want to!)

You Give A Little Love And It All Comes Back To You
(from the film Bugsy Malone)

We could've been anything
That we wanted to be
And it's not too late to change
I'd be delighted to give it some thought
May-be you'll agree that we really ought
Two, three, four)

We could've been anything
That we wanted to be)

Yes, that decision was ours
It's been decided we're weaker divided)

Let friendship double up our powers)

We could've been anything
That we wanted to be
And I'm not saying that we should
But if we try it, we'd learn to abide it
We could be the best at bein' good guys)

Flowers of the earth
Who can even guess how much
A real friend is worth?
Good guys, shake an open hand)

May-be trusting
If we try to understand
No doubt about it
It must be worthwhile
Good friends do tend to make you smile)

We could've been anything
That we wanted to be
Yes, that decision is ours
It's been decided we're weaker divided
Let friendship double our powers)

You give a little love
And it all comes back to you
(Da da da ra da da da)
You know you gonna be remembered
For the things you say and do
(Da da da ra da da da)

You give a little love
Andit all comes back to you
(Da da da ra da da da)
You know you gonna be remembered
For the things you say and do
(Da da da ra da da da)
(Repeat and fade)
I hope thst helps :-)

(nearly) Wordless Wednesday

Last week I showed the world a purple pepper. I posted on how it tasted here. This week I discovered Purple Carrots. And here they are to prove it..
Did you know that carrots were originally purple? (click on the picture to get it bigger to read the writing)

Edited to add: They taste just like normal carrots, just stain things a bit more when you cut them up! Oh, and they're definitely not sausages!

Check out some more Wordless Wednesdays here

If you're looking after one child you might as well look after five, right?

(The fifth didn't want to stand nicely in the line so I'm holding him in one hand and trying to take the photo with the other - it came out ok on the third attempt. Thank goodness for digital cameras!)

Tower

Life is full of trips to the pharmacy if you're a Debbie Monster...
And it turns out that she can't take pictures not at an angle. [Or maybe she's just clever at making her tower stand up even when the rest of the room is on a slant.]

HP is at home, she is at home, she's here

Hp's coming home, she's coming home, she's coming

I'm currently out babysitting four delightful children (two of whom are still not asleep - I think they've been talking to each other and keeping themselves awake). When I get home, or soon after (depending which train they did get in the end - the one they were planning to get was cancelled) HP and her boyfriend Steve will be home from university for the weekend. Sorry, that sentence got long.

One of our cousins who lives in Reading is getting baptised (the full dunking type of baptism) on Sunday and we are all going to be there with her. We'll also be celebrating various birthdays, a wedding anniversary and an engagement - well if you're going to get together you might as well celebrate it all, after all we don't all get together that often!

I'm looking forward to seeing HP - it seems like ages since we last saw her.
Hurrah for HP :-)
BTW Apologies for any major typos, I did try to correct them as I went along, but the eczema on my fingers is really sore so typing is a bit trickier than normal. I saw the doctor today and got some stronger steriod cream for them, that also contains an antibiotic, so hopefully that will do the trick.

Beaucoup de Chilli con Carne

Today my Mum made Chilli con Carne for Alpha - My church is running an Alpha course and each week different members of the church take it in turn to cook. It was our turn this week, and here's what she made. Two big pans of chilli to take, and the third pan (with the lid on) for us to have for our dinner. Yummy, but with a definite 'kick' to it :-)

All you need is love

Any one who has scrolled down to the bottom of my site recently may have noticed that I now have a site meter. It tells me how many people have visited my site and things like where they came from (eg which site they followed a link from, or what search they did and found me).

One of the things the site meter has told me is that an awful lot of people seem to come to my site by google-ing the phrase 'you give a little love and it all comes back to you'. In fact, I just googled that very phrase and the post I titled that came up as the third site. Not bad for a little unknown blog like mine.

This has taught me several things.
Firstly, that it is good to title your posts with words from songs (I've also used I get by with a little help from my friends) because people will find my blog by searching for them.
Secondly, that there must be an awful lot of people out there who want to know the lyrics to that song and are really frustrated because all I put on that post was that line.
Thirdly, never try to come up with more that 2 points because you fingers can't type as quick as you think and you will have forgotten the third point by the time you get to try to type it.
Oh, and finally, it begs the question what shall I call this post? I'm not really feeling inspired. Oh, I know - the people at least coming to, if not reading my blog makes me feel loved so I shall call it... (well you don't need me to type it again do you? Just look at the top of the post - in fact, in a way you knew before I did)

Busy Busy Busy

I don't really feel that I've put anything proper on here for a while. So tonight I was determined to actually write something, and not just fob my readers (if I have any) off with another picture, even if it is something like a purple pepper!

Hmmm, life seems very busy at the moment, and has the prospect of becomming even more so. I'm not sure why, I'm just convinced it will.

I've added a couple of new links to my side bar so maybe I ought to say a bit more about them. 'The King and I' in a fairly new blog and belongs to the lovely Angela who goes to my church. Go over and say hello to her, and it might even encourage her to blog a bit more often (the words pot and kettle come to mind, but hey!)

The other site is One Weigh or Another. It's basically a group of ladies (none of whom I have ever met, but whose blogs I read) who are blogging together and encouraging each other in their weight loss journeys. I commented my way to becomming a member (meaning I commented so much and joined in the weekly weigh-ins and stuff and after a while they invited me to become a memeber), and now I can post on that site too. I was sure whether or not to link to OWOA from this blog as it's a kind of personal thing, but decided to go for it as several people that read my blog already know about it anyway.

Other stuff in my life - pretty much work, work, work at the moment. I'm facing a few issues in the school I work in. I don't want to be more specific than that, but would value prayers for me to work through those, and in making decisions about whether I do change to 5 days a week at school after Christmas and stuff like that.
The other other thing I've been doing is still slowly slowly selling books and a few other bits and bobs on amazon and e-bay. And I would recommend amazon marketplace as a fairly easy way to make a bit of money and get rid of unwanted books (and jiffy bags ;-) )

Red, Green, Yellow, even Brown, but I've never seen Purple ones before

I have to admit I've kind of cheated on Wordless Wednesday this week - I've put the link to go to this post i put up on Saturday, however I thought my purple pepper was worth sharing with the world at large and not just the few people that read my blog all week ;-)

Check out some more Wordless Wednesdays over at Chaotic Home and here

Wordless Wedneday

I think I posted this before, but a long time ago, so I thought I'd share it again!
I've jut got a bit of a thing about electricity pylons and the sky behind them, and Chaotic Mum inspired me :-) Head over and check out some more Wordless Wednesdays...

Beautiful Sky

Our weekend visitor

For several weekends now, and never during the week, we've had a (slightly unwanted) visitor to our garden. This cheeky squirrel. At least we're assuming that it's the same one every time. This morning I managed to rush out and capture him on the fence between our garden and next door (yes, it is falling apart slightly at that point), so I'm afraid it is a bit blurred. Maybe next weekend I'll get a better picture!

Works for me Wednesday - organising your shopping list

This is my first ever Works for me Wednesday, so let's see how it goes!

I want to share how we organise the food shopping list in our house. A while back we sat down and came up with a list of the things we buy most weeks. Once we had that list we thought about the layout of the store we go to and arranged the items in roghly that order. We always go round the shop in the same way so we had a farily good mental picture of what comes where. (If you don't have a regular route it might be an idea to come up with one as it saves time because you're not rushing here there and everywhere to find stuff)

I created a simple spreadsheet with three columns. (I'd put up a pictue of it, but I'm not on the right computer to access it!) We start at the fresh fruit and vegetables so that's what's at the top of the first column. Each item we buy regularly has the name of the item and then next to it there's a little box to tick (very important, I'll explain in a minute). The whole list fits onto an A5 sheet, and has three columns, each with a list of items and then the boxes next to them.

We have two copies of the list on the spreadsheet so that whenever we're started using one list we can print off another sheet and have 2 more ready. (Cut the A4 sheet in half and the same list is on both sheets).

Whenever we realise we need to buy something, for example we've used the last tin of baked beans, we tick the box next to baked beans. Then just before we go shopping we have another quick whizz round the kitchen and tick anything else that we need. Because we've been ticking as we go we generally don't miss off something important. And beause the list is arranged in the order we come to things in the shop it's easy to follow where we've got to and not forget to pick anything up.

I think at all makes sense. If it doesn't or you just want to see our list leave me a comment and your email address and I'll be having to send you a copy of our spreadsheet. I'm going to try to set up a 'contact me' button for people to email me, so have a look and see if I've managed that if you don't want to leave your email :-)

Ordered shopping list - It works for us.
Now go and see Shannon for some more works for me wednesday ideas.

Picnics no more

The poor picnic bench sits alone. No more the beautifully hot sunny days when hour upon hour people lazed upon it. That time is gone, and now the Autumn comes creeping in. So long to sun and warmth, hello to frost and chill and rain. There will be picnics no more until the Spring.

Autumn's Arrival

Friday

As I said in my post earlier in the week we visited my Dad's Parents in Melton Mowbray on Friday. In the afternoon we went to the Melton Country Park and I took control of the camera. This is my Mum, Grandad and Dad as we walked along the top path.

Nothing much about anything

I'm enjoying my half term holiday. On Monday my Mum and I did lots of sorting and tidying out of kitchen cupboards. Just generally wiping everything out and throwing away things that were past their use-by dates. It was good fun and we had a great sense of achievement when it was done.

Yesterday I was looking after 16 month old S and in the afternoon I took him and 3 other children to one of the Lea Valley Park sites near Waltham Abbey. It has rained in the morning but in the afternoon the sun came out and it was beautiful. All four kids had great fun running about, playing football and frisbee. We were only there for about three quarters of an hour as we had to get back to take S home, but it was long enough for them to get a bit of fresh air and have a great time.

Today I am looking after S again, and at the moment he's napping, hence being able to get on the computer ;-). Tomorrow I'm having lunch with a couple of friends from university. They both live in London, but since London is a big place and we all live in different parts we don't get to see each other as often as we would like.

On Friday I'm going with my parents to visit my Dad's parents in Melton Mowbray (origin of pork pies and stilton cheese). I've got no idea what I'm doing at the weekend. I'll just have to wait and see

Things to do, people to see

Ok, so the title of the post possibly made it more exciting than it actually is. I'm going out babysitting tonight = people to see. I want to take something with me to do = things to do. I may take some more pegs with me to decorate as that's fairly gentle on the brain in terms of thinking.

My excuse for not wanting to think is that I'm now on my half term holiday and want to take a proper break so that I can be all refreshed and ready to go for the next half term at school. So I've only had a week at my new job, but I didn't get early nights last weekend, becasue of seeing Bekki, so I was tired at the start of the week. I'm going to try to have lots of early nights and get myself onto a proper schedule so that when I do go back to school it's not too much of a shock. I'll let you know if it works!

Pegs Pegs Pegs

These are some of the pegs that HP and I made Bekki for her birthday. By make, I mean decorated and varnished, rather than cutting down the tree...
We made some for HP to take back to uni (the project I mentioned, but never featured a few weeks ago - cos we didn't want Bekki to see them!)
(It took me about 15 attempts to upload the photos, so hopefully it really has worked this time!)(In fact, this is probably time 16....)

Update: Ok I never want to look at this post again, but I'm determined to get this picture on if it takes all night...

Update 2: see here for a picture of all the pegs before they were put back together.

All of a sudden it's Wednesday. Where does the week go?

Well I started my new job on Monday at 9am (and then was formally interviewed on Monday afternoon - it's a strange world!). It was a lovely way to start to get to know the two boys I'll be working with. I think after we've done a few sessions and they're both comfortable about working with me we (the class teachers and I) will start looking at how I can best help them, and what would work best. In the meantime we'll generally be sticking to what the rest of the class are doing and I will be helping them to access the work (assisting with reading and writing). I think that all made sense!

Today I am child-minding and S is down for a nap, so i thought I'd better stick something on my blog having not had the time for a while :-)
Yesterday I took S and another boy, J, to the park. S is 16 months and J is 2 1\2. They had great fun playing football, at least J is good at kicking the ball, S just wants to pick the ball up and hold it most of the time! We also went in the play area and went on the swings, slide, roundabout and seesaw. I say we, but actually I was the one doing the pushing, lifting, turning, and bouncing rather than actually going on the equipment.

That's about all I can think of at the moment. I could quite happily lie down for a nap as well, but there are several things I want to get on with, so I had better go and do them.

Happy Birthday to my Big Sister

I've been thinking about putting this photo up for quite a while, so what better opportunity than on Bekki's birthday :-)

Proof that I don't find jobs, they find me

I've been child-minding two days a weeks for a while now and that came about through a chance conversation with a lady at church.

Previously I worked as a teaching assistant in a primary school and that was through being in the right place at the right time (I was on a PGCE (teacher training) placement and decided that wasn't the right thing for me. They (the school), however, decided they liked me and offered me a job. Initially for a few weeks, and turned out to be for the whole year).

Through my TA job I got a chance to tutor a girl, M, from that school, and I'm still doing it. I suppose the one job I did do something about myself was working with N the autistic girl and her homeschool program. But even then all I did was reply to an advert in the local paper that was titled "We need you", so even then I'm not going to take full responsibility for getting the job!

And now, starting Monday I'm going to be working the other 3 days a week (weekdays I mean, so no funny comments about that) in the school that my Mum already works in. My Mum has obviously talked to the headteacher there about my current job-less-ness and She knows when she's onto a good thing (sorry, couldn't think how to phrase that sentence without sounding a bit arogant). Today I had a chat with the Head and she wants me to start on Monday. I think she also wants me to up it to 5 days a week in January.

I'm going to be a special needs assistant and support two boys one-to-one. One in the morning and the other in the afternoon in case anyone wondered how that was possible ;-)
Hurrah, a real job with real money (Not that I haven't loved all the babysitting etc that I've been doing, but it would be nice to be able to contribute to things like household costs etc even if I am living back at home.)

And most of all a big Thank-You to God who I know is the real brains behind me getting all these jobs :-)

Music Meme

Here’s how you play - Choose a band/artist and answer only in song TITLES by that band. I picked the Beatles, but freely admit I completed it with the help of the internet and good old google. I've included the album in brackets afterwards.

Are you male or female: Another Girl (Help!)

Describe yourself: I Am The Walrus (Magical Mystery Tour) [Not quite sure what i mean by that, but it just made me smile] Maybe this would be better: Long Tall Sally (Past Masters Volume 1)

How do some people feel about you: Good Day Sunshine (Revolver)

How do you feel about yourself: [right now] I'm So Tired (The Beatles - The White Album)

Describe your significant other: Got To Get You Into My Life (Revolver /Anthology 2)[as in don't have one at the moment!]

Describe where you want to be: Getting Better (Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band)

Describe how you live: Helter Skelter (The Beatles -The White Album)

Describe how you love: I Want To Hold Your Hand (1962-1966/Past Masters Volume 1)

Share a few words of wisdom: Mailman, Bring Me No More Blues(Anthology 3) or maybe Everybody's Got Something To Hide Except Me And My Monkey (The Beatles - White Album)

I tag anyone that wants to do this. Hmmm, Bekki and Kathleen especially, if they've got time!

Oh, and this was the first meme I've ever done, and the first time I've used bold in a post!

Time for a picture...

... we haven't had one for a while. Proof that HP fits in the boot of my mum's car. Hmmm, after trawling through the photos on this computer I think it's time to get the camera out and take some more.

I get by with a little help from my friends

My diary has suddenly filled up. A few weeks ago I wasn't really doing much apart from housework and helping HP get packed for university. During the last week in particular I've suddenly found lots of things to do, and even better some of them will be earning me some well appreciated cash. I'm child-minding the delightful one year old two days a week, and this week I'll be babysitting him one evening as well.
I'm tutoring M again (I was working with her last school year and had stopped over the summer). Today I agreed to babysit for a friend of a lady at chuch so that she can go on the alpha course that our church is running starting this Thursday. That'll be a long term commitment for the next ten(?) weeks - for as long as the course lasts.

On Saturday morning at our church prayer meeting a lady came up to me and said "I've heard you like looking after children" and asked me if I would be able to look after her two children some Saturdays (she works shifts and will sometimes have to work on a Saturday). I agreed that I would.I haven't got any firm dates from her as yet, but I'm sure I will soon.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly the Headteacher of the school my mum works at has asked if I would like to work with a couple of her pupils. She's willing to let me work around the child-minding that I do already, so I'm going to ring her tomorrow to say yes and find out when I can go in for a chat about hours and a contract (the magic word!).

I'm sure there's a couple of other things I'm meant to be doing as well. Oh, this Friday it's Bekki's birthday and I'm hopefully going up to Cambridge to see her and go to her party. I think so long as I remember to write everything in my diary I'll be ok, and next year's tax return shouldn't be too hard [My Dad helped me to fill one in for the last financial year - I'm lucky to have my own accountant on hand :-)]

Home

I'm home, but not awake [it was tiring, but also a certain 2 year old seemed to be doing his best to keep me awake last night]
Will post more soon.

Away

I may not be around on my blog till Saturday. (Away from home and limited access to computer) Enjoy yourselves while I'm gone :-)

You give a little love and it all comes back to you, da da da....

UPDATED TO ADD: Find the lyrics to this song here

I've realised I've become one of those bloggers who does spend a fair bit of their computer time reading other people's blogs, but that I've failed to share many of them with you, dear readers [all two of you, or so it seems sometimes, but hey :-)]
So here goes...

Blogs I like reading

Girl Talk - a blog written by a mother and her three grown up daughters. A great place to go if you're looking for some encouragement, sound Christian advice, or just some 'Friday Funnies'.

Blest with Sons - Blest is just really good at making her readers feel welcome. She's a Christian home-schooling mum of 4 boys, and I just love looking t osee what she's gonna post next!

Random Acts of Reality - This is a blog written by a guy working at an EMT for the Lndon Ambulance service. Can't remember what EMT stands for, but go check out his blog. And he's just had a book published of his blog. He works in London fairly near to where I live and his blog reflects what it can be like round here (but don't let it put you off coming to London ever again!).

I may put up a couple of other links as well, so just go explore.

(Bonus points to anyone who can spot where my title comes from)

Feeling Uninspired

I feel like I ought to and want to post something inspiring and fresh and anyone who reads it would say "wow" and "I've never read anything like that before". Instead I feel unispired to write any much at all apart from sentences that go on and on and have at least 3 uses of the word 'and' and, oh I've forgotten what the end of that sentence was going to be.

So rather than continuing to write rubbish I will ask can anyone guess what\where this was taken?

[BTW I expect most people either knew or guessed that I was doing stuff on miracles in sunday school today, including the feeding of the four thousand (which is similar to, but less well known than, the feeding of the five thousand).]