Rampage

Since taking the house off the market a certain air of urgent sorting out has taken over this household (perhaps its early nesting or just plain venting of frustrations). Each weekend sees the attempted taming of another problem area. Today was the turn of the wild and jungle like pantry. We have done our best (you can now walk into it) and some interesting finds were made.

notably...

1kg dried cannellini beans (interesting cannellini bean recipes eagerly desired)

Brown long grain rice
Italian rice
pudding rice
sushi rice
Thai jasmine rice
express rice
large sack of basmalti rice
risotto rice

Now, I challenge you to go through your cupboards and see how many types of rice you can come up with. Now by the way i can say that with the exception of the express rice and the sushi rice we use all of these on a reasonably regular basis but it is any wonder we find it hard to keep on top of the storage, and that is before we get to the 6 flours and 7 types of dried pulses!! Yikes I am sure life should be simpler. The pantry will be an ongoing nightmare i can tell. Next week is the turn of 'the shelf' and 'the loft' that should be fun.

Milestone

Well its a bit mundane, but Ruby spent her first nappy free night last night and it was completely sucessfull. No little accidents. very proud of her.

well there is not much to say but

We are not moving, house is off the market and that is that. The results of this sudden change in things have been many and various but the less said about them the better. Only now I am on the Rampage. 91 bole hill lane is experiencing the mother of all sort outs, nothing is safe, not even my beloved garden plants!

Seen as I'm not feeling chatty at present I thought we could leave you with a festival of photos, we haven't had many recently. All taken on our recent weekend away down at home for my brothers 21st birthday, fancy that little Jack is 21! Oh heck I'm nearly 30, better get a move on and do something eh.

the girls by the way are still great. Have to choose Ruby's Schools by January! doesn't time fly.

Dishcloth cotton!!

I am dishcloth cotton and Brian is Shetland wool. Humph.

You are Dishcloth Cotton.
You are a very hard worker, most at home when you're at home. You are thrifty and seemingly born to clean. You are considered to be a Plain Jane, but you are too practical to notice.

You are Shetland Wool.
You are a traditional sort who can sometimes be a little on the harsh side. Though you look delicate you are tough as nails and prone to intricacies. Despite your acerbic ways you are widely respected and even revered.

so what are you?

Arrrrgh

My brain is going to explode.... How do you decide where you want to live. I see all these houses and they all spin round in my head till they get all mixed up. At least I know I am looking for a garden with a house not a house with a garden, ie the house is what I am more prepared to compromise on than the garden. But then it gets tough, location? State of house? what we want I just don't know. I see houses that are in need of a lot of TLC or something significant doing and they really get me going and my creative juices bubbling but then every one says no you are in no position to be doing that, and they are right, but they are the ones that get me going. Who wants to move into someone Else's palace. Not me. It is so frustrating.

Loads of people coming to see ours, wish someone would make an offer though keeping the place tidy is slightly challenging with two little whirlwinds, but they are very good.

Ruby has started pre School. She is so chuffed with herself and I am so chuffed with her. But I don't like feeling cut off from what is going on for those two and a half hours. As I walked up to pick her up today they were all singing 'eye eye yippee' inside the room. I new instantly who would have picked that song!

a bit unsettling

Well the house has been on the market for a few days now. We moved loads of our stuff out into mams loft at the weekend, nice cos its all a pain to have around but a bit odd because we were getting our house ready for other people. But the really odd bit was when a i turned around today to find a man with a mallet in mid swing staring into my front room, it was the guy putting a for sale sign up in the garden. I kind of feel like we are camping in our own house now. Every thing has to be prepared for how we think other people would like to see it. I haven't managed to generate a great deal of excitement yet, I am worried that we wont find anywhere we want to live and end up homeless. I love the position of where we live just could do with a tad more space. Hoping to be out by Christmas before the fifth member of the family comes along. Have a look at our house it looks a lot more posh than it does in real life. If you know anyone who may like to buy it pass on the details.

anyway I think I will potter off and do some more knitting, now that is something I can get really can excited about. Where are my priorities!!!

OH NO

So apparently we are not already overtaken by slugs (we are in our garden). It is going to get worse! Apparently it is likely the current infestation could turn into a plague. Well seen as I cant seem to harvest vegetables form my garden as a result of slugs maybe I should harvest the slugs instead and find some delicious recipes.

House went on goes on the market next week. We have signed the stuff and that is that.

Girls are great

Well I am really excited we've just booked the girls their first ever theatre experience. It not until February but I know they will love it. They are off to see Lazy Town live which in in Sheffield only on one day and we managed to get tickets. he he, they will love it. I had thought of taking them to see a pantomime before but worried they would not sit still. This however is a perfect induction and trial as Lazy Town, for the uninitiated, is a both awful and brilliant international TV phenomenon aimed at pre-schoolers and is all about burning energy and eating vegetables so sitting still will probably not be too important.

On a slightly more terrifying note I think we are putting the house on the market tomorrow, we may not even be here for Christmas, that feels strange. Its all come about rather suddenly and I am both daunted and excited by the prospect, though possibly more the former at present. The thought of having to keep the house tidy for short notice viewings feels a bit unachievable. We will try. The end result will be great, my dream house is out there somewhere. It has a large garden with no privet hedges and a large utility room if you see it let me know!

The Birthday

Well the other night we both too tired to anything other than pop the odd photo up. Children's parties are exhausting. But it was a good day, sadly we cant put any other photos of the party up as all the children (due to the presence of the paddling pool) were completely naked in them. One observation from the day would have to be, that it is a sign of age when you cant stand the taste of icing sugar any more. There was a distinct divide between those who would eat and those who wouldn't eat. Any one liking icing should pop round in the next day or two as there is still plenty left!

Ruby's Third Birthday

Here are some photos from Ruby's birthday. I hope you are impressed with her mole cake.

help I need help

I think I am addicted to online scrabble via facebook. I am not very good at it either. Just finished Harry Potter and the deathly hallows and cried my way through the last 4 chapters, I blame my hormonal state, I am not normally so hopeless.

July

Long blogging absence due in part to not having much to say. Not that what I have to say now is particularly riveting but here it goes anyway.

Knitting circle starts tonight and less than an hour. I am so excited. I found this pattern and now three of us are going to knit it simultaneously. It is very gorgeous but will take us I suspect over a year. We intend to drink lots of real (ie made with bitter choc and milk) hot chocolate and do lots of chatting to make the time pass quickly. you may expect occasional updates as to how its going

Also
Just got back form my first pampered chef conference. Really quite determined to make this business work for me. I was getting a bit down with it but now I will give it until the end December (a natural breaking point) to see how it goes. The conference was quite something, lots of loud music bopping and flashing stars! And some really useful information and encouragement, so here goes. Someone ask me in a months time if it has made any difference please.

Well we missed the floods but......
So while Sheffield was gripped by the worst floods in ages and all 5 rivers burst their banks, we were off on our summer holidays! Don't think we were let totally off the hook however we did manage force 8 gales, power cuts and several days of constant rain ourselves (just a few moments of wondering if we wouldn't be better of at home with the toys to entertain the girls). Despite all that it was great to get away and Crackington Haven was gorgeous as usual. The girls were able to venture into the sea on two days when the waves weren't too big due to high winds and although most of our time on the beach was spent in waterproofs and jumpers we downed a number good number of ice creams, clotted cream teas and spent hours in the cottage concocting fine meals instead! A double rib of very fine beef from a local cow cost us only £13, i would eat it more often at that price. Here are a few pictures of our time away

More Photos
Even more photos that you have missed out on in the past month.
5 blogs in one day should make up for our inactivity.

Photos
A selection of photos from the past month we would have blogged about if we had been organised.

Flamenco - Part 2
As promised here are the photos of the girls in their flamenco gear. Enjoy.

Steam Train

Last weekend we took the girls on the steam train from Haworth to Keighley. They loved it. Here are a few photos, the quality of them is not very good as they were taken on my mobile.

Rain

That is pretty much all that has happened in Sheffield for the past few days. Thought that I'd share a photo of the puddle I had to drive through on my way to work this morning. Spare a thought for the poor owner of the Nissan Primera!

Porridge Spiders, a warning.

Half way through my porridge this morning and one of the slightly burnt grains of porridge (there are always a few are there not) began to look a bit suspicious. It was only on very close inspection that i realised it was indeed a spider (dead, well dead). Obviously i picked it out but I have to say i was put off most of the rest of the bowl. What gets me though, is it would have been so easy to miss, I mean if the girls had had it they would have eaten it for sure. And I was very nearly convinced it was just a regular grain. Watch your porridge carefully. they are masters of disguise.

Flamenco

Ruby and Coralie have been given the most lovely Flamenco outfits by their Grandad Noble after his latest trip to Spain (Gorgeous photos will be forthcoming as soon as I load them up). So today I thought I would put them and their Friend Hannah through their paces! Starting on You Tube we found some great videos to watch and soon they were stamping and strutting away. The video below was their favorite, you have to watch it and while you are at it why don't you stand up and do a few moves, if they can, you can. It is very educational, watch the ears dancing as well, I recon if you can do that you really are an expert.

Bananas

And there I was imagining, Giant, life size bananas stalking helpless humans. Never mind, quite amusing.

Oh Yes

I forgot to say, Ruby can draw. She has suddenly developed the skill of drawing people that are recognisable, with heads, eyes, arms and legs sometimes ears, hair, hands, and Brian gets a body and belly button. It was quite a shock the first time it happened. I saw a person on the paper and looked around to see who else was in the room.... but we were alone. It feels like a bit of a milestone, she is now able to express herself even more clearly in another format, very exciting. Today she even managed a snake and a snail although I have to admit that if I had not seen her do it and heard the running explanation of her drawing I would not have been confident of the interpretation.

Last week

Well last week was VERY exciting. I got to go out in the evenings loads (thank you thank you thank you mum for sitting in). Like never before, in fact possibly more than in my pre motherhood days. Its quite good fun isn't it?

The River Cafe was of course fantastic. I don't expect I will ever go again but it was just lovely, pity I couldn't have any of the lovely wine, but the food was scrumptious (pork and tuna thing for starters, pigeon for mains, and a lemon tart that i have to admit was better than the one I made last week).

I got to go to the theatre courtesy of my lovely sister. A fab night out, although getting to the venue i did feel like Sammy country mouse going to visit Johnny town mouse. I have been away from London so long, it feels very foreign to me and i had to keep asking where i was!

The Nigerian wedding (congratulation Wole and Elizabeth) was great too. Lots of dancing and singing, the best bit was when the bridesmaids and groomsmen (including an none Nigerian friend of mine from university) had to dance their way into the reception.

The girls had their first real train experience. In fact a total of four trains that day when we we went to visit Naomi and Joel (me and two toddlers on the train for and hour each way!! I hope you are impressed). Ruby predictably wanted to paint the train pink and was most disappointed that it was yellow.

The list goes on......and now, back to life.....which is OK, nothing special but nice.

First Shoes

Yesterday Coralie was treated to her first pair of shoes by her grandad. She absolutely loves walking around in them. This weekend Coralie has progressed from 3 or 4 steps to 20 + consecutive steps and this transformation happened as soon as she put her new shoes on for the first time.

Profiteroles

I impressed myself last week by making profiteroles. Actually I made 72 profiteroles! it was quite a sight i can tell you and they didn't taste too bad either although probably not perfect, it was my first attempt. The occasion was my friends hen day, which went very well, or at least she was reduced to tears at one point so i think it has to be deemed a success. (I now have very pink toes that Ruby loves after my time in the Spa) This also meant Brian had to look after the girlies form 8.00am- 11.30 pm all by himself (though i did pop back to help with bathing) and he did very well but he is not in the mood to load up the pictures to show you.

I am very excited because on Saturday I am being taken to the River Cafe in London by my dad as part of my birthday present. I am very excited by this as I love using their recipes but will have to try not to order something we cook already so we can compare the two. I may have to write about what it was like later. I am also excited because the following Saturday I will be at a wedding, also in London, which sounds I think like it will be a bit of a university reunion...... and.......wait for it.........mam and Hannah are looking after the girls so we can go as proper grown ups!!! (my friends will have their children but never mind) I am sure I will be anxious and worrying a bit, but not too much. I hope mam and Hannah are prepared for what they have let themselves in for hahahahahah. I do fancy a reunion, and a wedding.

It was an accident

Ruby was lovely this morning, we went to the botanical gardens with a friend and We were full of the joys of spring when we got home ( which may partly account for what happened next). Over lunch Ruby got dressed up in her long ballet skirt and started spinning urgently requesting 'some ballet music mummy'. So I turned on Classic FM, as you do, that was when it all started. It was lunch time requests. I suddenly became possessed by a strange spirit of adventure and did something I have never done before and made an online request. Thinking that was all I had to do that was ok. Well sure only until they ring back! (canny so and so's ask for your phone number when you request), and the next thing I know I am on national radio talking about shepherds pie and requesting swan lake music. I was mildly traumatised to say the least ( I hate to hear my own voice, I sound like an old man with a cold) but I am sure I will get over it. Ruby needless to say danced for ages to classic FM but when the request actually came on was too obsessed by the washing up to dance to it.

And the moral of the story is. When the spirit of adventure takes hold and you decide to go with it then you have to be prepared for the consequences however mundane the adventure may have seemed at first it can be worse than you think.

PINK

At the moment everything has to be pink as far as Ruby is concerned. No other colour will do. So you can imagine how happy she is with her new pink bike. Her parents are also happy with the bike as it was bought for the bargain price of £7 from the Fulwood Church Playgroup sale. She loves taking the bike to the park, but she has not quite learnt how to peddle properly. The bike also has a little seat on the back so that dolly can go for bike rides with her.

After Sunday afternoon's bike ride we went home for a pink dinner. Pink ham, followed by pink milky jelly (surprisingly good, just substitute evaporated milk for half of the water and whisk) and Ruby loved it and ate everything up. Maybe we should colour the rest of our meals with pink food colouring. Coralie also enjoyed the pink milky jelly, so much so her face went pink in her desperation to reach out for seconds.