29th October - 4th November

This week I have been

Enjoying - the flame red colour of the leaves on the trees. There is a line of half a dozen of these trees in the car park near my place of work and they are a delight to see.

Loving - the fact our bathroom is another stage nearer completion. The lino was laid on Tuesday which means it's an awful lot warmer in there now. I really love the differing shades of grey and silver.

Having the floor down also meant that the new to us piece of furniture which has been sat in the dining room for the past couple of weeks could be put into place.
We found this pine child's size wardrobe on Gumtree for £35. The seller very kindly agreed to deliver to us for an extra £5. G painted it a shade called Stormy Blue and it's now home to our towels, bathroom cleaning products, loo roll and other odds and ends. Perfect.

Celebrating -Halloween with friends. This year we invited our friends G and M over with their two children J and G. S was in charge of helping them dish out the sweets to our treat or treat callers. It was a slow start to the evening but in the end I think we had somewhere between 70 and 80. 
S made these gruesome looking eyeballs for us all to eat

and whilst she did those I used a tube of black icing to paint faces onto marshmallows which I took in to work so we could have a sweet treat there too.

Trying - out a couple of new recipes for breakfast time. During the week it's always two Weetabix but come the weekend I want to have something a bit different. With G on the Slimming World regime I have been looking at ideas on various websites and baked oats is a firm favourite. I made these on Saturday morning, they are flavoured with lemon fat free Greek yogurt. I served them with a blob of jam and natural flavoured Greek yogurt. Warm from the oven they were lovely.

Then on Sunday I made this jammy dodger french toast inspired by sarah_sw_recipes on Instagram. I didn't put in enough cinnamon so I know to increase that the next time I do these. This really filled me up.

Going - out in our, new to us, car.
Yes we are car owners once again. I detest the whole looking for cars thing. Both G and I have zero knowledge when it comes to cars. We have been half heartedly looking for a few weeks but the time had come to make more of an effort. 
The result is that we are now KA owners.
We are in the incredibly lucky position of not needing a car to get us to work. With it just being the three of us these days we now don't need a larger family size car.
Most of the things we need to do can be accomplished (with a bit of forward planning) on foot, with public transport and online shopping, so it is a bit of a luxury having a car sat outside for the convenience of being able to pop out and get us from A to B when we need to do just that.
Considering all of these things we wanted to buy something small and cheap to run and fingers crossed this will fit the bill just nicely.

10th - 16th September

This past week I have been

Listening - to the cricket and hearing Alistair Cook's final innings for England. The test series between England and India this summer made for such thrilling listening and it was made all the more entertaining by the sensational TMS team.

Wearing - a new to me blouse. Bought at the car boot for £1.00 this pretty lightweight long sleeve blouse is perfect for layering on these not quite summer, not quite autumn days.

Spending - a CK voucher I was given for my birthday last year. Can't believe this stayed unspent for so long when there are so many things I love in that shop. But then maybe that's the reason, just what to spend it on when there is so much I'd like. I finally plumped for this sailing boat bag.
Loving the look of disdain on Rocky's face as I use him to model it for me!

Going -  on a night away to Weymouth. This little trip was part of my birthday gift from G. 

G had booked us into a lovely Air BnB property which was a 10 minute stroll from the centre of town. 

As we walked along the front we looked at all the hotels and BnBs on offer. Some places looked very unappealing, dead flowers in plant pots and plastic woodland creatures stuck to walls were two of the things which did not enhance the kerb appeal and then others had little touches like this bunting hanging over threshold and it just made the world of difference.

Feeling - nostalgic for holidays of my childhood when we came across this row of holiday chalets. Love the very CK colours they have been painted in.

Eating - ice cream from Rossi's. I chose the natural flavour whilst G went for the peppermint and chocolate chip. So light and creamy. Delish.

Cooking - on Thursday I cooked a chicken curry using coconut yogurt for the sauce instead of coconut milk and as both G and S liked it that's one new recipe which will find it's place in the new weekly menu. G has lost another 5lb this week and there are many more new recipes still to try.

Walking - around Weymouth trying to see as much as possible during our weekend stay. The area around the harbour was very picturesque.

Hoping - the car was going to pass it's MOT but knowing that it was quite unlikely.

We will now be on the look out for a new one.

Reading - Five Quarters of the Orange. Another Joanne Harris book which did not disappoint. I wasn't sure I was going to like this one but in the end I couldn't put it down and so having lots of train travelling time was a real help.

1st-9th September

This week I have been 

Reading - a Lidl magazine which was posted through the door. Liking the look of these cookie based bats for Halloween.

Cooking - a couple of new things. This turkey chilli was a huge hit and will definitely be made again. G has joined Slimming World and has lost 5lb in his first week. I'm in the process of working out weekly menu plans.

Feeling - proud and anxious on S's first day of the new academic year.

That first morning S was up before me and had a big smile on her face.

She wasn't quite as happy to be called out of bed the rest of the week!

Due to the problems she has had over the past year I was feeling more than a little anxious as the week progressed but I'm thrilled to say all went well.

Drinking - tea from my new teapot and cup.

T rang me on his way home from work. He is back working for a charity and is busy driving to different shops covering for staff holidays in other local branches.

He said he had bought me something he thought I would like. 

'I think you'll like it, it's a bit odd, but I think it's your kind of thing,' he said.

I like it very much and was really very touched that he thought of buying it for me.

Wondering - if it's too early to add the pumpkins to the mantle along with the toadstools.

Loving - my bargain Emma Bridgewater bat mug. Found in a local sale for 50p.

Watching - Strictly Come Dancing to see who got paired up with who and how they all performed in that first team dance. 

Visiting - a windmill for Open Heritage weekend.

This windmill is just a 5 minute drive away from us and yet we've never taken S here. When we got there they were conducting tours but we had just missed the start of one so we wandered off to a stroll in the woods. When we got back the sails were turning and the tours had ended so we sat and enjoyed watching the windmill in motion whilst sipping hot chocolate.

Enjoying - crossing a couple of jobs off the long to do list. I painted the skirting board in the bathroom so now we are one step closer to getting the flooring down and having a room finished. Such a good feeling.

Mario, Mothers and More

A busy few days means it's another 'round up to bring us up to date' post.

Saturday was Mario day.

There have been occasions in the past when I have attempted to play Mario kart but each and every time I have been very bad at it.

The children used to find my ineptitude hilarious.

 I never minded because it was good seeing them laughing together.

I had a distant memory of toadstools featuring in the game somewhere so I went with wearing this brooch.

As we all know Sunday was Mother's Day. 
I received a lovely bunch of flowers, some chocolate

and the next two installments of the wonderful Maisie Dobbs detective series.
My sister T had invited us all round to her for lunch time cream teas.
She hadn't planned on S teaching us some dance moves in her kitchen, that just happened and proved to be very entertaining for those of us taking part and those sat watching.

Due to the rain on Monday when it was Plant a Flower day I cheated and decided to change the name slightly and instead go for 'buy a flowery planter day'. It was either popping a pretty container into my shopping basket or going out in the unrelenting rain, so for a fair weather gardener there really was no contest.

Last Friday we had Barbie day and Tuesday was Ken day. 
As with Barbie Ken's first outfit was beach related. 
He wore red shorts and a red and white striped shirt.
With this in mind I went for a red skirt and teamed it with a blue and white stripy jumper. My beach hut brooch completed the theme.

So all that brings us slap bang up to date with today and Potato Chip day. 
Oh. My. Word.
This is my kind of day.
I know they are so not good for you but I do love them.
I wanted us to try something we haven't had before so I went with a bag of these fairly new Max Strong Hot Chicken Wings. I chose these because G and S like a spicy crisp. I could only tolerate one small crisp so they demolished the rest of the packet between them.
The Chip Shop Curry Sauce flavour were only purchased after leaving work today when I had to stop in the local Co-op for cat food. 
The fact it's potato chip day and these were advertised as chips meant I had to pick up a packet. 
We (well mostly they!) munched on the crisps as we sat at the table, each of us working on our own little craft project in readiness for Friday.
Hope to see you then.

Marie Antoinette

In 1793 Marie Antoinette was tried and convicted in a swift trial in the Palais Du Justice.
Although it is frequently quoted she uttered the famous phrase 

there is no evidence she did actually say it.

As you can see I have a fabulous letterbox red mixing bowl embossed with those 4 words and I used it this afternoon to mix up the batter for these chocolate yogurt cupcakes in readiness for chocolate cupcake day this coming Wednesday. So I've covered two days in one.
These cupcakes are made using greek yogurt and I can report they are absolutely delicious.

Looking at this week ahead and what I've got going on I'm not sure I'm going to have time to bake them on the day so I thought I would grab a head start when I did have the time spare. 
I also have another (no time required) little idea up for sleeve for Wednesday.

Cheers

I thought G would like to do the honours today.

After all International Beer Day is much more up his street than mine.

He was more than happy to take part and indulge in a bottle of beer this evening.

In other news, I have been lucky enough to receive some lovely things in the post recently.
The first was a parcel from Kezzie. 
It was a delightful surprise not least because it contained 2 more books by Jacqueline Winspear featuring her 1920's super sleuth Maisie Dobbs. The third book Kezzie sent because she had enjoyed it so much and thought I may do too. It's the Diary of a Provincial Lady and has the prettiest of covers. The final item is the sheep wreath which Kezzie bought with the seasonal changing of my mantle-piece in mind. So very thoughtful. Thanks again Kezzie.

My second piece of post was an envelope of hand made loveliness from Simone at Linden Grove. I was the lucky winner of her recent 1000th post giveaway. Simone is multi talented when it come paper crafting and that can easily be seen here in the wonderful array of goodies she sent me.
S has her eye on the wish bracelet and I shall be saving those gift tags for some very special presents. Thank you Simone.

The kindness and generosity of bloggers never ceases to amaze me.

Colouring In

Hands up those who remember spending hours as a child colouring in squiggled doodles like the one below.

I would sit with my sisters and our huge selection of pencils and felt tips colouring in these random shapes to our hearts content.

Colouring in for adults has suddenly become a big thing these past couple of years with thousands of books out there to choose from. 
I am all in favour of this. 
I have never lost of my love for colouring in.
I enjoyed it as a shared activity with both my children when they were younger, trying not to get too bothered when they went outside the lines!

Last Christmas one of my friends gave me a colouring in book and some pencils.
She knows how much I value spending my half hour lunch break in the park as often as the weather will allow.
I really treasure the calming effect being outside brings and she thought an added stress busting activity would be for me to do a spot of colouring.
A really thoughtful gift.

With such a pretty book I had plenty of choice when it came to selecting a page to lose myself in on Colouring Book day.

Go and grab yourself some paper and pencils, you won't regret the time you spend absorbed in this most simplest of past times.


I have listed below my list of days to celebrate in August.

A couple may change due to other commitments and as of next week we are away for a few days so my posts may be a bit more sporadic, but it's all supposed to be a bit of fun and I don't want to get caught up in setting rules for myself about these things.

I hope you can join me as August unfolds and if anyone chooses to join in on any given day please let me know, I would love to hear from you.

We've already had

1. Yorkshire Day
2. Colouring Book

and ahead of us is 

3. Watermelon Day
4. Beer Day
5. Underwear Day
6. Jamaican Independence Day
7. Raspberries and Cream Day
8. Cat Day
9. Rice Pudding Day
10. Rhonda Fleming's birthday
11. Pakistan Flag Day
12. Vinyl record
13. Alfred Hitchcock's birthday
14. 3 hour rainbow seen in North Wales in 1979
15. National Day in Liechtenstein
16. Tell A Joke Day
17. Thrift Shop
18. Patrick Swayze's birthday
19. World Honey Bee Day
20. Amy Adam's birthday
21. Usain Bolt's birthday
22. Honor Blackman's birthday
23. Gene Kelly's birthday
24. National Waffle Day
25. Sean Connery's birthday
26. Alison Steadman's birthday
27. Bat Night
28. Bow Tie Day
29. Mary Poppins movie released in 1964
30. Toasted Marshmallow Day
31. Burger/ Eat Outdoors Day

Easter

                         What a lovely Easter weekend we've just had.
Starting back on Good Friday me, G and S took ourselves off into town. For ages now we've been wanting to go and have a round of mini golf on the course in one of the parks and Friday proved to be the day we finally got to do it. We were the first group to arrive and had it all to ourselves for the first ten minutes. This gave us a good head start on the people who followed and meant we could just take our time and enjoy each hole and not feel like we were holding anyone up.

S managed to get a hole in one on her very first go but unfortunately things didn't carry on in the same vein for her!

We all had a really good laugh and it was lovely to spend time together.

A Festival of Colour was advertised as being held at the shopping centre so we wandered on over.

Loved what they had done to the steps.

The colour was continued in people dressed as exotic flowers

and the traditional fairground attractions of the helter skelter

and these gallopers.

A couple of weeks back G and I watched High Society. I love everything about this movie but G had never seen it before. I'm please to say he liked very much.

After watching it I commented that I have never seen The Philadelphia Society, the movie on which this musical version is based.

A few days later a copy arrived in the post, G had been online and ordered a copy and we watched this Friday evening.

I'm glad to have seen it (Cary Grant is in it!) but we both agreed High Society will always be our favourite.

We've now passed it on to G's mum to watch.

G had to work on Saturday and as S was busy with a friend I went to Winchester with him. We went a couple of hours before he needed to start work so we could pop along to the Angie Lewin exhibition at the Discovery Centre.

G was in and out within 5 minutes, he said it didn't so anything for him so he went into the library to see if he could find a book he was after.

I thoroughly, thoroughly enjoyed it. I didn't doubt I would. I love her work.
It wasn't until I was nearly leaving that I realised what I had chosen to wear that day by pure co-incidence, wasn't a million miles away from what I had been looking at.

We had time afterwards to sit by the Cathedral and have a drink and a bite to eat before G had to go on into work.

I then had an hour until my train and spent most it it in a shop called Molly's Den. There are several of these locally. Each one a treasure trove of collectables, antiques and all manner of goodies.
I came home with a new handmade brooch

and some of my money which my mum gave me at Christmas was spent on this cute mini desk calendar. 

Easter Sunday was a strange day. G had to work the late shift again and T and S were both at home all day. That hasn't happened in a while. I busied myself with household chores and in between those S helped me to prepare some games, presents and nests for our family day on Monday.
I cheated and bought the meringue nests to which we added a good dollop of melted chocolate and some mini eggs.

We had invited some of G's and my family over to us for lunch today which is when most those meringue nests were eaten.
Everyone was given a chocolate rabbit. Each rabbit sported a tag handmade by S which read 'You're Some Bunny Special'.

Plus there were some games. We had a round of bunny bingo, an Easter bunny left and right game, a guess what's in the golden egg competition and then we rounded it all off with a messy 'make your partner look like a spring lamb' game.
This involved one person in the team wearing a shower cap which was then covered in shaving foam. As shown here by T.

The shower capped team members lined up on one side and the other team members stood in a line opposite. They were given a bag of cotton wool balls which they had to throw at the shaving foam. They had one minute to get as many balls to stick as possible. As shown here by my sister C, my sister's partner A and by G. 

It was incredibly messy, incredibly sticky and incredibly funny. The winning team managed 34.
S was G's partner and she only managed 6!
I would thoroughly recommend this game, but make sure you have plenty of towels handy for the clean-up afterwards and a black sack for throwing everything away in.