Sarah's Blog

Nearly ready!

Tim went out yesterday morning and did some banking, came back and announced that the car should probably be abandoned for the day. So, we walked to the local shops in blizzard-like conditions to get some MORE christmassy bits - it was fun really (and felt very festive), trudging through all that snow! Today, we HAD to go out in the car because we needed to go to Castlepoint - had to look in M&S and Lakeland for a pressie for Jill. I also got the last presents I wanted to get for Tim which I then had to hide under my coat (and freeze on the way back to the car!) because the shop gave me a see-through carrier-bag and I didn't want him to know what I'd got!

Anyway, this will be my last post this side of Christmas day so I just wanted to take the opportunity to wish all my readers a happy, happy day and (if I don't blog before then!) a brilliant start to the new year. Take care all ((huge virtual hugs for everyone)). I made you a little Christmas card :)

Nearly Christmas!

Nearly! Nearly! Just look at this - our Christmas tree with the snow outside (and only a few days from Christmas day!) ........ I know some parts of the country got this last year but we didn't. In fact I can't rmember the last time I saw this .... beautiful!

Talking of beautiful, I saw a Bullfinch today! I've not seen one of these in our garden before (although I'm sure they must have been there) - blackbirds, bluetits, dunnocks, green woodpeckers, magpies, robins a-plenty - even a ring-necked parakeet at one point (just the one mind you), but no bullfinches. He (she?) sat there patiently while I took a TERRIBLE picture (several in fact) - look at that front-view - how fat! *laughs* BAAAAD blur going on....

In the run-up to Christmas there is always plenty of good stuff to watch on telly (I have a VERY sad habit of going through the Christmas Radio Times with a red pen marking everything I want to watch heehee!) - last night Tim and I watched Blackadder (the one with Kate/Bob) and followed that with Bridget Jones's Diary. Tonight, it's The 100 Greatest Toys with Jonathan Ross and the NEXT Bridget Jones film. Looking forward to them :)

Christmas begins here

We were going to put up our tree today but, due to being very sad over the weekend (for obvious reasons), decided to go ahead and do it on Saturday to try and cheer ourselves up. It did kind of work and made us smile.

Tim and I had a nice meal Saturday night (a late Birthday meal!) and watched The Matrix (I got him the trilogy for his Birthday. Yesterday we went over his mum's for dinner again for his birthday and, again, put off from Friday for obvious reasons!

It's weird without Hemmy .... he's been with us for EVER and I still keep expecting him to come strolling across the garden or scrape madly on the back door to be let in or do his level best to trip me up when I get something out the fridge! It's also the first time, since we got together, that we haven't had a cat at all and that's weird too. One day, maybe in the spring, we'll get a kitten (I'd love a Silver Tabby but no way I could afford one!) ... a new "baby" for our family. Right now though, I couldn't even THINK about replacing Hem. Don't want to.

I've been "pottering" today - wrapping a few stocking presents, glitterizing fircones for a hallway shelf display I'm doing, making lists of presents I still need to get and food we need to get! I'm going to do one last REALLY BIG tidy up before Christmas but am going to wait until Tim is at work because I get on so much better without his lanky frame in the way heehee! Any case, it will be nice for him to come home to :)

We also promised the kids we'd take them to see the insane "road full of Christmas lights" in Poole like we did last year. Last year we did a little video of them which we won't bother with this year so if you want to see the insane "road full of Christmas lights" go here .... go on, you know you want to ....... *laughs*. Watch the video - it's at the end of it.

PS - Talking of insane Christmas lights you HAVE to watch this! Apparently, it's a charity thing which is just as well because otherwise they're neighbours would just LOVE them. House christmas lights set to some VERY irritating techno "music" (so brace yourself) - very clever though

Hemmingway

Hemmy had to be put to sleep yesterday evening. I shall actually miss him more than I thought possible - his insane antics drove me nearly potty sometimes .... but that's what made him .... him. He was beautiful and silky and had the most amazing huge amber eyes. He was a feisty little so and so right up to the last day despite being (as it turned out) very ill. Yesterday morning he went out for his last walk and STILL manage to pull himself up on to the high fence in our back garden. Despite his bin raiding, speaker clawing, snoring, smelly breath and savaging your hand whilst you smoothed him (whilst still purring!) .... I'll miss him. I've cried buckets over the last few hours.

Join me in a little remember Hemmy compilation of pictures ... only a minute long. I could have used some sad music but, somehow, that wouldn't have suited him and the little jazzy tune I chose was MUCH more him. The very first picture was taken many years ago when Rosie was a baby ... oh how we laughed when we found him sat in the high chair, for all the world looking like he was waiting for lunch! It deserves the LOLCAT treatment really ..... "I'm in ur highchair, eatin' ur babyfood".

Happy Birthday!

xx To Timofee xx

38 Today!

I'm SO lucky :)

.... and I did make him a cake .... and it was a Victoria Sponge!

Festive stuff .... mostly

Have been quite caught up in general "getting ready for Christmas" malarkey recently! We've been doing very well with our present buying and are nearly done - just waiting for a couple of bits to arrive from Amazon and Play and need to scoot to the shops for a few little things (stocking fillers mostly). I've also marzipand (marzipanned? marzipaned?) .... put marzipan on the cake! Oh, it did smell good when I unwrapped it! My cards are finished and just need to be distributed and I need to put the finishing touches to April's pink bunny toy puppet that I started AGES ago.

On Thursday it's Tim's birthday (me and the kids rushed around making cards this afternoon while he was out). I'm going to bake him a cake of his choice (probably Victoria Sponge I bet) - I do this on everyone's birthday now ... but no-one bakes me a cake on my birthday! Boohoo!

Anyway, after his birthday fun, it's time for a mega clean up and then ......

.... up with the pretties aka Christmas decorations! We're doing them next Monday .... so love the decorations going up! :)

Oh, and on a slightly LESS happy note, Hemmy's off to the vet on Friday ..... he's nearly 16 now, getting so old and, well, sad to say I think his days with us are numbered. He's still eating and stuff (JUST - his teeth are knackered) but ... I don't know, he just seems like he's fading :( Anyway, we're taking him to see if they can do anything about his teeth and just check that he's generally ok. We're giving him lots of loves and he doesn't go out much so he's got a nice blanket to sleep on in the kitchen (he likes to be near the cooker I think!) Lovely old cat .... insane, but lovely :)

Sweet 6

April Honey turned 6 today .... aaah! Time flies! She's such a cutey - capable of throwing terrible wobblies when she wants to and does a pretty good line in being a bad loser in games but you can SO ignore those things! This is because, on the flipside, she's massively caring (when I was ill a while ago, she comes up to me and puts her arm round me and rests her little head on my arm and says "why mummy sad?" She'll just sit there and hug you on and on. She'll draw you the cutest pictures, tell the daftest jokes and is always, always full of sunshine.

She did enjoy herself today I think - she had balloons, pass the parcel, books, DVD's and Zhu Zhu Pets (oh how she has longed for Zhu Zhu Pets!) I even made her cake to her exact specification - pink icing with Zhu Zhu Pets on!

Happy birthday little Honey-bunny ... Happy Birthday!

On a different note, a couple more snowy pics for you (are you bored yet?). First, Tim's TINY snowman - wheelie-bin-man! This poor thing got crash-landed on by a pigeon this morning and squashed!

Icicles! It was so cold that we actually had icicles hanging off our roof today ALL day!

Footprints in the snow. This is gorgeous .... April coaxed Tim outside to play yesterday afternoon and this is his big boot-print next to her little wellie print... so sweet :) As an added bonus we also got bird prints!

Wow! It did snow!

Well, we got ours at last :) It said on the weather last night that there was going to be a very heavy snow but, to be honest, there didn't seem to be any signs of it. I was a bit worried because Tim had to go to work this morning - our drive is on a steep slope and, in previous years when it's snowed, he's had terrible problems getting out. I said "baby, perhaps you should park on the road?". So he did and good job too because this is what we woke up to! The tracks on our driveway are actually where he put salt out the night before but ended up deciding not to risk it! The salt obviously worked to keep the snow off anyway :)

So, while he was at work (slip-sliding around in his van!), me and the kids played outside .... here's a very silly little video I made of just that. Rather jerky in places due to the fact that I was having problems keeping my footing and the kids kept chucking snowballs at me! Check out April throwing herself to the ground .... needless to say she came in SOAKED and had to be plonked straight in the bath to warm up! After I'd finished filming, I put the camera indoors and joined in the snowballing .... and tried to make a snowman but it was a bit bish and fell apart :( Oh, and any Nintendo fans, see if you can work out the daft tune playing in this ;)