Reflection.

Catch-up time! It has only been 5 days but feels much longer.
LSNED was a great way to reflect this month.

Stripes.

Easy one for me today, I bought my boys a onesie each. Now I would never have imagined in a pink fit that a twelve year old boy would desire a onesie but he did, it is a trend and I love it. It made his little bruv want one, and to be honest we all want one, except I think we may never leave the house, once we get into them!

If you have followed my photo blog since day 1 then you may know that I often refer to my boys with nicknames; Herberts, poppets, muppets…..and my favourite. Thing One and Thing Two. If you have ever read Dr Seuss then you may know of Thing One and Thing Two. I am a Johnny-come-lately to Dr Seuss. I didn't have him and Louis didn't have him, but I found him by the time I had Ali and so Louis and Lauren have absorbed some of him too.

What caught me in? The Grinch's puzzler speech, which still makes me tear up and no doubt I will be sharing that with you in December. But I love The Cat In The Hat, pure genius nonsense with a superb moral tale. The film is awesome, Helen, if you haven't got there yet, then please go there!

The man is a stone-cold genius.

In The Cat In The Hat, there are two naughty things, Thing One and Thing Two and I invariably call the boys that. 

Here is Thing Two in the by now, in our family, infamous onesie.

Poor Thing Two, he has had to fight me off daily from just nibbling him away. 

Bridge.

Hello, hello, so sorry to be away, life has sucked the energy and time from me and I haven't even got online for a day or two properly (unheard of!!!!). I checked on Anne's blog just to check she was ok, but that has been it. Lauren has some kind of prickly heat on her back (and time of the month) and has been like a bear with a sore head. Louis has been vomiting and Ali has a bad cold and started vomiting yesterday as well. So as well as working 10 hour days, I have had about 4 hours sleep and not all in one go!!!

I stopped for just one minute on the way home this evening to get some fresh air and a photo and so here it is.

I have grand plans to catch up but if not then I have jumped back in.

Haphazard.

I don't know why I always have a pile of stuff. It is always teetering haphazardly.

Muted.

My muted pack of Copics, the only ones I use just about. The others were a waste of money, apart from being happy I have them all, you know, just in case!

Vivid.

Checking in late again!

One of our orchids is vivid, the rest are pale. I bought it for Mum for Mother's Day a couple of years ago and it is flowering in the bathroom at the moment.

One of the instagram filters has made it even more vivid.

Favourite Colours.

Well fortunately Ali's cake had some of my favourite colours, pastels.

He has had a brilliant day and we are snuggled in bed watching a movie, well of course I am blogging quickly!

The cake didn't quite get it's topper so I improvised.

I was going to do hills around the base but I didn't like it in the end so that bit was a disaster!

I was joking to my friends on UKS that the embellies look a bit like nesties :D

You can just see inside that some of the fudge didn't fully bake. Well Mary Berry might not improve and it might not look great but it tasted good with a squiggly fudge bit :D

Lots of lessons learned and I can't wait to try the next one!

The birthday boy himself. He has borrowed a book called Egyptology from the school library. Well he had used his imagination to interpret all the pics and he loves it. I was surprised to learn that The pillars at Karnak were magic and that images of the gods are pics of the werewolf egyptians :) I think we will have to go back and read it together!

We had a nice time chilling out playing new Moshi games.

And yes, that is Fudge in the background with The Birthday Hat on! 

 

On your desk.

Well, it has only taken 6 hours to make the cake and decorate it and I haven't finished yet! Too tired and I haven't finished his card either so I have come upstairs for a sit down and finish the card and the cake toppers and I will finish it off tomorrow.

Ali's friend Kane came over to play for the day, they have been good as gold and so I have been able to get on with the cake. We took a time out to go to the local play zone, I took my laptop with me to occupy me so this is my desk there complete with mocha :) It was a nice peaceful hour and a half!

I cannot believe my baby is going to be 8 :( It seems like a lifetime ago (well it is for him!) and also at the same time about ten minutes ago that I was packing my bag for the hospital and trying to get some sleep as I knew he was coming the next day. Louis' labour went on for about 3 days and ended up with an emergency caesarean so Ali was booked in. In fact I was admitted at 8:30am, he was born at 9:19am :) We were back on the ward, my epidural worn off and in the swing of things by 11am! I generally enjoy seeing the children develop and grow, but there is something about the last one...

One of my managers that I manage at work is on maternity leave, someone came into see me yesterday in the office to tell me she was in the shop with the baby. I was cursing why no-one had told me she had had it and when I got to her she had had her the night before, they had had a good sleep so they thought they would get out and about :) Good on her. Beautiful baby girl Olivia, can't wait to get a cuddle!

A Random Item.

This prompt is always good for me as I tend to link what I have to it anyway!

So my random item is my deodorant. I love this one. It is perfect. It is expensive, it costs between £4.50 and £5.50. The reason I am happy to pay it? Well I have an active job and even by the beginning of the next day I am still smelling sweet :)

It was a bit weird to get used to but now it is my only must have beauty product. I buy one every pay day which is 4 weekly and it lasts exactly that long. It goes on dry and works beautifully. I heartily recommend it if you work hard physically or if you do sport. I lost mine this month and it didn't matter how much of any other product (and I tried loads!) you use it wasn't enough to make me feel great all day and night.

Hello Random :)

Fruit.

Late, I'm late, so late late late. Or so as the Rabbit said in Alice.
Everyday this week, working full time again for this week and knowing I have to do it next week has found me stressy, tired and my head in a vice like state.

And breathe…..

So, on friday night I was so tired, but I did sit in bed and do some crotchet and look fruit of my labours!

Hands up if you are bored of looking at my crotchet yet!
Anyway, it is the fruit of my labour so it will have to do.

Backlit.

Editing photos sitting on the bed for an hour after having a marathon project life catch up!

Negative Space.

I like the prompt today :)
Thinking of Anne today.
I started making the Pork & Apple Casserole for dinner when I realised I was an ingredient or two missing! I toddled off down to the town to get them and I was struck by this view on the way home. I took it on Instagram and I was also struck by the speed that it knew the name of the road before I could even remember lol.

I'll go for the road being the negative space.

Bug.

Well it's nearly midnight and so I am reaching here! A bug? Well if we stretch to an insect, then would a lovely butterfly do? No, I agree it's rubbish but it is a photo. BTW this is a beautiful button I got from my good friend Susi's Etsy Shop!
Cop out and over and out from me!

At Ground Level.

Quick walk with the dogs after work, so I took some shots from ground level.

Fudge is coming :D

Minty has a pine cone she was chasing in her mouth :D

 

Thank you for setting me straight about how many days left, a few more than I thought! Good!

I didn't get it wrong, which believe me I did check, it was Louis doing his homework. He finished it off about 10pm as he got bored of the colouring in. I did help a bit, as he had worked hard and, well, colouring in is a no brainer for me :D

His teacher was happy so that is good. We are on french weather today and tomorrow. He cannot get the difference between il neige and il y a nuages. In fact, Anne will have to check they are right anyway as I cannot really remember lol.

Anyhoo, Ali has done homework this evening and here he is.

He has doing words as spellings and use them in a sentence.

The Moshi Monster helping him this evening is called Scamp, says it all really!

Leaves.

Leaves of paper?

Sunday afternoon homework, not something any of us relishes to be honest. Louis is one of the poor souls that have many qualities, but academia is not one of them. Everything is an effort and he is easily distracted, which go together brilliantly :)
Anyway, here he is, actually engaged for half an hour. He was designing a poster to describe Reggae, which was an opportunity to put One Love on and us all have a head nod.

I just saw on Lynne's blog that it is 300 days, crikey, we're not too far off!

Tree.

I have lost the light to get a shot of my tree so this one will have to do.

It was a stunning morning, but I was in a rush and couldn't stop long enough to check to see if I had a great shot. No I didn't, but it will remind me of how glorious it was, and there is a very small part of a tree in it :D

Fall.

Thank you all for your lovely supportive comments yesterday, I am feeling a bit better today.

LSNED is also about the change of the seasons today. Too bad I didn't have time to check this all out until now as I have nothing resembling fall…..

…Right i'm back with a snap of my new paper for Fall or Autumn as it is round here.

Simple Stories Harvest Lane. I loved their Summer Fresh line that I had for my summer scrapping.

I am looking forward to starting with this :D

Nails.

No nails today. It was a glorious day here. This was a snap I took on the school run, this is just outside Ali's school.

It was taken on instagram.

Here is a shot from the top of the town looking over towards Exmoor and the sea.

The funeral service was beautiful and my friend did so well, she had to be held up a bit but by the time we got to the 'wake' she was smiling and talking again. She has a long dark road ahead of her, but she will make it for their daughter.

It has churned up so many things for me today, so came to bed at 5pm! Just sitting and watching some documentaries now before sleep. Ali and Minty are keeping me company, Louis is playing on the xbox and Lauren has gone to the fair. She has been very upset this week too. Mum has gone to bed too, she has watched Ian grow up along with us all. Life is just rubbish sometimes. Hug your loved ones tight.

 

 

Arms.

A weird one today, on Monday 23rd April I posted this photo for the prompt Cross. I was cross that I had cut my arm so badly.

The weird, if that wasn't weird enough, is me showing you how it has healed so far!

It's taking quite a while.
Enough weirdness from me. Goodnight. xx

Hair.

Look at these three. Minty on the pillow, Ali propped up with Mum's iPad and Fudge, all laid out. Mum called me in to get a photo of them all relaxing.

 

It wasn't in focus I know notice!

Ali's hair, he looked at me as if I was mad.

Goodnight xx

Legs.

Minty's back legs! Like little skinny chicken wings :)

Feet.

My feet shod in my work shoes, they are a very comfy pair of skechers that I have had too long. I am going to have to bite the bullet and get a new pair, and they really ought to be a bit smarter too :)

Gosh they look even worse here lol.

Thank you everyone for the kind comments. It really has made me a bit angry at the world. I'll keep smiling though!

Eyes.

My eyes are sad today, it really is being the most godawful year, last night I spoke to my friend and her husband has died. He was 35 and they have a 2 year old daughter. I haven't been able to do much but to sit and play with Ali and scrap a bit of LSNED.

These will have to count. LSNED today asked us to work on a new skill. A resolution of mine was to learn how to crotchet. If you remember, I did post the first chain I managed back along, but I hadn't got it back out since. Anyway I did today and I found it easier than I did last time. I think this is a trait of mine that if I cannot learn it immediately I give up. So I will persevere this month.

Hands.

A variation on yesterday's theme. Lauren and Louis went back today. They were actually really excited, which was nice. We even set off too early and Ali and I were 15 minutes early so he decided that we would go to the library…at this point my heart started beating wildly. Neither Lauren or Louis would willingly pick up a book to read which I find awful, but you can't force these things. So he found a book he wanted and he has hidden it behind some others so it would be there by the time he has his slot at lunch-time to take it out. I love that he loves the library :D The head teacher was outside as we left and she was pleased as punch that we were using it. It is such a nice school library too that I would be happy in there for a while!

Lauren as you can see has gone from pink hair to brown, and no, I have no earthly idea what would possess her to wear her hair like that!

 

 

Colour.

Blue is the colour of Challenger, Ali's new House in his new school, he has moved from the Infants into the Junior School. He has moved up literally (it is further up the school hill) and metaphorically (he has blimmin aged to a big junior school-boy, in fact they all seemed to have grown this summer).

Blue is also the colour of their hoodies.

I have lifted/stolen the idea from Rachel Elliott's genius scrapbooking and photographing to use AC Thickers stuck to the kids fingers to demonstrate their age and adapted it to their year group age.

Something you wear.

Twisted.

The very attractive arrangement behind our tv.

Outside.

Well I guess I was in a shopping place as I work there but no photos from there today!

All my photos today fit the prompt and you will be glad to know that they aren't too tenuous. I have also been conscious the last couple of days that I have been finding the challenge, well, a challenge over the last month. I don't know if it is because I was away or busy or the change in routine, probably all of it. The change in routine of being at work so much less has been brilliant, but it is an adjustment. Anyway, today I was more curious to take some photos and didn't worry about the prompt too much.

I woke at 05:37 which was a bit early even for me! I went to the loo and noticed a bright light through the window. I opened it and it was the moon through the fog. So I went back to my bedroom to get the phone and climbed up on the sill to get the phone out of the window to take a shot :D Hopefully no-one else saw that bit of madness.

On the way to work, even though I was a bit late I stopped to take photos of the fog bank in the combe of the valley.

And the lovely sky.

This evening I went for a run, poor tarmac must have felt me coming for a mile :)

and this was the sky this evening, uncanny similarity.

Gosh it was lovely and peaceful. 

The evidence of the running and tarmac-bashing.

The outward run, it has been so long since my last run that the app has updated and I haven't used it before and instead of pausing it half-way I stopped it. So I had to restart it for the way back!

As you can see I only managed to match my best speed in a few places lol. Never mind I have been and done it!

Oh and a last shot of my newest favourite app Living Earth HD. Isn't it gorgeous?

I love watching the light come round and go again, very soothing. Goodnight x

Ribbon.

I bought a ribbon maker thing to help me tie them as I am so ham fisted! I used it for this lovely ribbon bow. I think I may use bows in LSNED, which is what I am supposed to be doing now!

Basket.

A basket of my mini books. It makes me very happy :D