REVOLUTION

well so much has happened, and suddenly everything is different.  We moved house 4 weeks ago.  Or rather entered into a bizarre but wonderful house swap with my mother.  With approximately one weeks notice an miss F less than three months old we packed up and moved 8 doors down the hill.  I have never seen Brian look as tired as he did that week.   But it was worth it we now have a  garden which the girls and i make great use (I am currently digging up the awn to make way for vegetables having been persuaded that i should not keep chickens just yet).  And a bit more space inside which makes every daily activity so much easier, there is now space for 2 adults in the bathroom at bath time hooray.   Will try and take more photos now things have calmed down as not feeling very wordy at present.  

Finnished!!!!

whey hey, I started this jumper for a boy who is now about 9 years old!  not knitting all that time, mainly it has sat at the bottom of a bag forgotten awaiting the last arm being sewn up.  But now it is all finished.  And in time for Florence to wear it.

We took the girls to see the English National Ballet today.  They were performing Angelina Ballerina who is a very much loved character in our house full of girls.   It was wonderful, they loved it so much  and were completely captivated for the whole thing.  watch a clip of it here.  Just a pity that florence managed to provide an explosion that not only soaked through her clothes but mine as well in a big soggy yellow mess that i didn't discover until the lights went up at the  end.

Looking forward to easter tomorrow the girls made amazing hot cross buns today  which made a lovely post ballet treat.  hopefully the snow sill stay and we can do a spot of seasonalEaster sledging.

Just because they are beautiful

Some important updates

Florence Renee Ann Noble (FRAN)

Life in the fun bus has completely changed since last post.  Things are now even more crazy!  we are please to announce there is now another traveler on this crazy ride she comes in the for of our lovely Florence.  Born 6th January and now 2 months old she is learning to deal with the rest of the family in her own special way.  Its not a great photo of her as most of them are stuck on our old computer but there will be more.  And she is beautiful.  The sisters did not take to her immediately however i feel hopeful that they are getting more used to her and things do seem slightly improved.  Ruby at least now thinks she is the mummy to her even if Coralie still thinks of her as arch enemy.

Knitting, is taking over my like a bit (in a good way).  Our little knit club has moved to an exclusive location in a chocolate shop on Eccelsall road can you imagine once a week i get to go out without any children (thank you brian) to sip chocolate and knit with lovely people.  amazing, you can expect further updated on various projects as i develop my skills.

The moon, our new favorite place to play.  Will post photos of that soon.

BOO

I am back

Blogging absence has been due to a lengthy gloomy period.  Anyway will now attempt to say pah to all that and continue.

(the picture is me in my latest knitted creation a present for my brother harry please someone dont tell him we are back before his birthday or it will give the game away.  It also becomes a hat so he dosent have to be scary all the time).

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.