No Take That tickets :( but a successful shopping trip :)

Ah well, it wasn't to be :( We didn't manage to get tickets after all. However, we have had a lovely weekend so that has more than made up for any disappointment :)

Yesterday we went to Shrewsbury, which is about 16 miles or so from here. Before we moved to Shropshire I'd never been to Shrewsbury but we've been twice in the last month and I love it. It's full of lovely old buildings and fantastic shops. The last time we went, we went to a shop called Cornucopia which stocks lovely Cath Kidston and Emma Bridgewater goodies. We didn't have chance to get to Cornucopia this weekend but we found the most gorgeous little shop called Wysteria Lane and oh my goodness I could spend a lot of money in there! Actually, I probably wouldn't spend a lot of money as everything seemed fairly reasonably priced, but you get the idea... I saw so many things that will look lovely in the new house but eventually I settled on a really cute photo frame by Gisela Graham. I also found some little Gisela Graham buckets in TK Maxx but am not really sure what to do with them. I had bought them to put plants in but they have stickers on them saying they are not waterproof?!? They are pretty though so I am sure I will find a use for them :)

I also picked up a gorgeous little "Home Sweet Home" sign from a fantastic little shop in Whitchurch called "Ruby Tuesdays". This shops has so many lovely goodies :)

Whilst we were in Shrewsbury, I also went to the QVC outlet store. It's a bit like a jumble sale in there but I had a good rummage and managed to get the following scrapbooking goodies:
* A cute little canvas album with baby scrapbooking papers and die cuts inside - just £1.99
* Some girly scrapbook papers, stickers, dies cuts etc - again £1.99
* A ginormous scrapbooking kit with a silk covered album, loads of lovely papers, die cuts, stickers, quotations, embroidered embellishments etc - should have been over £30 but was £16.00 in the store and I got a further 25% off making it £12.00. Bargain!

I'm hoping to be able to get to a scrapbooking crop tomorrow night so I am going to take my new kit and start putting together some layouts. I uploaded over 300(!!!!) photographs onto photobox earlier today so I am waiting for them to be delivered. I was really impressed with the price; I paid £24 for 350 6x4" photographs, delivery included :)




The picture above is one of the ones I have ordered today. It shows me and Mr P last year at the Party in the Park with Manchester Camerata Orchestra. It was an amazing day (and night) with amazing music, picnic and fireworks :)

Please keep your fingers crossed.....

.....Mr P has just rung me and there's a chance he can get Take That tickets for us for tomorrow night!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Oh, I do hope he gets them! Will dose myself up with painkillers so my back doesn't give me any gyp :)

Missy Moo

I just had to share this picture of Missy snoozing on the living room floor, it really made me laugh :-) Aren't cats daft? xx

Crochet love

Ok, I admit it, I'm completely obsessed! I've been crocheting like mad these last couple of weeks, when I really should be unpacking boxes. Next time I'll post some pics of the throw I have been working on. It's just a big granny square so it's nice and easy and I can even do it whilst watching the telly :)

Speaking of tv, has anyone else been watching Big Brother (or am I the only one!)? Where do they get those people from?!?!?

Hello again!

Well, that was a long break - I didn't mean to be away so long! Hope everyone is ok and I look forward to catching up on what everyone has been up to whilst I have been away from blogland :)

Things here have been very, very busy since I last blogged. In my last post I showed you all pictures of the snow (!) and talked about crashing my poor little car. The car is now mended, although my purse still bears the scars from the bill! We've also been on holiday to Brussels which was great fun :)

The biggest change has been that we have moved house and (not to do things by halves) we have moved somewhere that is 60 miles from the old house! We moved to Shropshire about 3 weeks ago and we love it. Our new house is in a teeny tiny village (it's not even on the map) with about 12 houses, surrounded by fields and countryside. We've wanted to move somewhere more rural for a while now and when we saw this house it was too good an opportunity to miss so we upped sticks and moved to the country :)

Here is the view from the lane:

I love the archway in the front garden :) The little bit at the front of the garden is a bit of a sun trap and already I'm loving sitting there with my book and a glass of Pimms on sunny afternoons!

This is the view over the side hedge:

And this is the view over the back hedge. It's so peaceful, the only sound you can hear is birds and cows. The first night we lived here I couldn't sleep because it was too quiet! There are no street lights here either so there's very little light pollution. I love standing out in the garden at night time just looking at the moon and stars, I've never lived in a place where you can see the sky at night so clearly :)

Missy and Mollie love it here too :) They've really grown in the last few months and have really developed their own little characters. Just look at them now!

It hasn't taken Mollie long to find herself a new favourite spot - she loves sitting on top of the dresser in the conservatory:

I'm off now to have a bit of a mooch around blogland and see what everyone has been up to - I've really missed reading blogs whilst we've not had the internet!

Take care xxx

The obligatory post about snow...

It would appear that it is "the blogging rules" to have a post about the snow so here is mine!

Living where we live we do tend to get a fair bit of snow if there is any about. The night before last the roads over the tops were closed so we knew it would probably be fairly thick with snow when we woke up and we weren't disappointed!!

I was supposed to be in work yesterday but managed to crash my car into a wall before I'd even got to the end of my road so I abandoned that idea and booked the day off instead! I'm ok, just got a bit of a sore neck but my poor little car has a couple of dints and few scratches. It could have been a lot worse so I'm not complaining!!!

My fiance (!) was also off work so we took a walk along the canal, which seems to have become a bit of a tradition for us when it snows...

If you look carefully, you should be able to see a heart in the snow in the picture below:

There's also a stream that runs alongside the canal. The mill to the right of the picture is now used as studios for artists.

This was the view out the back of our house. Missy was mesmerised by the snow and spent almost the whole day sitting on the window sill watching the snow falling...

Every now and again she would see something that particularly interested her...

And then she would start patting at the windows....

The view from the front was pretty too :)

Again Missy spent a lot of time on this window sill watching the cars try to get up the hill (one got completely stuck at one stage!) and trying to catch snowflakes. Cats are funny little creatures, aren't they? Mollie was completely not bothered by the snow and spent most of the afternoon snoozing by the fire (she's not daft, is she?)

We had some more snow last night but earlier on we had some sleet so the roads are icy and treacherous. I looked out of the curtains this morning to see a car sliding backwards down the hill and decided that I wouldn't be driving today either!

Hope you are enjoying the snow where you are :) If you do have to go out, take care :)

xxx

A Thank you, an award and a tag

Thank you all so much for your lovely well wishes :) Yes, it was a marriage proposal and we are both very excited!!! I will tell you all more about it in my next post as I have a little bit of "bloggy business" to post about first!!!

First up, I have been the very lucky recipient of these two awards from the lovely Rachel the Krafty Girl who makes the most yummy looking cakes and has an eye for a thrifty bargain or two!

I have also been tagged by Pixiedust to post the 4th picture in the 4th folder of my pc so here you go - an incredibly flattering (not) picture of me supping Guinness on mine and Mr P's recent trip to Dublin. 6 euro a pint for this stuff!!! I nearly fell over in shock when the barman told us the price!!!

As I've been away from blogland for a little while, I have lost track of who has already received these awards and tags, so if you are reading this and you have not already received them, consider yourself awarded / tagged!!!

xxx

Mr P asked...

...and I said "Yes!" :-) :-) :-) xxx

Hasta luego!

At the airport now waiting for our flight to Barcelona :-) I'll take lots of pictures and show them you all when I get back :-) Hasta luego (see you later!) xxx

Finally..... some pictures :)

*Gem sneaks guiltily back in*

I know I'm a bad blogger but I have finally got my act together and got some piccies of my thrifted goodies on here so please forgive me!!!

I have been taking some time out this week and have a lot to catch up on. The saga of the tooth continues but the end is in sight and I am finally off the antibiotics (hoorah!)

Ok, on with business. Here is the first of my goodies from last week. Apologies for the naff photos but the light here is terrible :(

This little basket was 50p and is lined with fabric inside.
The floral tin below was also 50p and I love it! The colours are really vibrant in real life and it has a sort of crackled galze effect on it which I think looks really sweet.

This little tapestry was languishing in the bottom of a basket and was just 30p. I couldn't leave it there and plan to turn it into a little sented cushion :)

This shopping basket was £3.00. Mr P says I should use it to go to the farmer's market but I think I might feel a bit daft carrying it around...

Instead I have decided to use for storing my bits and bobs of wool in :) I've been bitten by the crocheting bug and have been obsessed with crocheting flowers recently. Here are some of them below:

This one is one of my favourites:
And I also really like this one too :)

So, I can heave a sigh of relief now I have uploaded my piccies ;)

I'm going to leave you with a picture of my little Mollie snoozing on the back of the sofa. She really is a softy :)

My first ever award - Thank you Mel :) x

I'm so excited today because I have been given my first award by the lovely Mel from Country in the Town :)

Marie Antoinette Award a real person, a real award.

Here are the Rules for the Award:

1. Please put the logo on your blog
2. Place a link to the person from whom you received the award
3. Nominate at least 7 or more blogs
4. Put the links of those blogs on your blog
5. Leave a message on their blogs to tell them

Without further ado I would like to nominate these lovely ladies. Their blogs always brighten my day whenever I pop in there :)

1. Faerie Nuff
2. Vintage Tea
3. A Thrifty Mrs
4. Melmel
5. Mary Poppins
6. Linden Grove
7. Sharie's View to the Hill

I will be back later today with some pics of my thrifting from Sunday (yes Sharie, I did take the rather big hint you left me!!!) so I'll see you then :)

xxx

Thrifting

This morning I got up early and went to a flea market in one of the little towns near to where I live. It's the same place I got the Christmas decorations I showed you a few weeks back and I always find lots of goodies whenever I go there. I'm pleased to say that the flea market didn't disappoint and I came home with the following pretty things:

• a double sized candlewick bedspread (I love these!)
• a wicker shopping basket
• a little piece of tapestry that someone had done
• a pretty tin with flowers on
• a small basket that I'm going to use in my craft room

If I get my act together I'll try and get some photos up on here later tonight :)

xxx

Thank you :)

Thank you for all your kind wishes and sympathy about my dental troubles. I know I've been a bit whingy recently so it has meant a lot that you have taken the time to sympathise and wish me better :) I'm feeling a bit better today and am starting to feel a lot more like myself :) The antibiotics have kicked in and the painkillers I have got are keeping me reasonably pain free :) I'll be back at the dentist on Thursday for my stitches out so fingers crossed I shan't have too much trouble after that. The dentist said I can expect to hear from the hospital in about 3 to 4 weeks so I'll just have to see what they say about the bits of roots in my jaw bone.

Whilst I've not been feeling well I have been reading an absolutely fantastic book that I saw mentioned on http://teawithwillow.blogspot.com/. It's called "Magus of Stonewylde" and it's the first book in a series by Kit Berry. Thank you Tea With Willow, I really enjoyed this book :)

It is not the sort of book I would normally read but when I read the glowing 5 star reviews for it on Amazon I thought I would give it a go and I'm really glad I did because it is an excellent book. It's about a young girl called Sylvie who has been ill for most of her life. Her and her mother are invited to go and stay at Stonewylde, which is a secret alternative community in Dorset who follow a pagan way of life, focusing on nature and the seasons of the year. I don't really want to say too much about the plot because I wouldn't give it justice, but here is a link to the book on amazon and if you scroll down you will be able to read more about it as well as lots of reviews from other readers:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Magus-Stonewylde-Book-1/dp/095514390X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1231596869&sr=8-1

I also finished watching the first disc of the Cranford series and it's now ready to be posted back to lovefilm so I can get the next disc. I really enjoyed it and can't wait for the next one. I might be a little bit sad but I really liked the fact that Cranford is meant to be 12 miles from Manchester as the little town where I live is also 12 miles from Manchester (although in the opposite direction). Cranford was based on Knutsford, which is a place I've never been to despite it being fairly close to where I live. I've heard there are lots of lovely shops there so maybe a visit there will be in order....

xxx

The whole tooth...

Excuse my corny title - the painkillers must be getting to me!

Thank you for all your lovely messages. I'm sorry I haven't been to visit your blogs this week but I have a lot of blog reading to catch up on!

I was back at the dentist today whilst he attempted to do my root canal again. After 20 minutes of drilling and poking around he told me that he couldn't get to the root because it was calcified (whatever that means!) so he said he would have to take it out, which I was ok about because it's right at the back of my mouth and at least if it's out I'll have no more problems (or so I thought). Anyway to cut a long (and painful story) short, the tooth couldn't be extracted normally so he had to do a surgical extraction. I now have 4 stitches in my gum, another lot of antibiotics and enough painkillers to tranquilise an elephant. My face is all puffed out and swollen and it's starting to bruise too :( Good job I don't have any big plans for this weekend because I look a right sight!

To top it all off, I've had to be referred to the dental hospital because the two roots of my tooth are still embedded in my gum - they are stuck in my jawbone and I'll need an operation to get them out :( :( :( The one good thing is that because I've had the tooth out it's costing me a lot less than I thought it would!

Lovely Mr P is looking after me and because I'm poorly I've got control of the telly all night :) We've watched all my soaps and now we're going to watch more Cranford :)

Hope you're all having a better day than me :)
xxx

Checking in...

Hi, sorry I haven't posted in a few days. I'm still having a few problems with the tooth :( I was at the dentist on Monday when he did x-rays and told me I needed a root canal treatment and possibly an inlay or a crown. This will set me back almost £200 which is not what I need right after Christmas :( Today I was back at the dentist for treatment 1 (of 4) and although it didn't hurt at the time, it's really hurting now :( The dentist wasn't able to get to all the canals on my tooth so I'm back there again tomorrow for him to have another go. He said if he can't do it tomorrow the tooth will have to come out. I'm not sure what I'd prefer him to do - save the tooth (and risk more infections and pain) or just have it taken out. Sorry for such a negative post but I'm feeling very fed up and just want it all to be sorted.

On a brighter note, we signed up for a free trial of lovefilm and our first lot of dvds arrived this morning :) I think I might watch Cranford in bed tonight so night night x

Giddy :)

I've just booked a night in London in June for me and Mr P. Travelodge are having a massive sale at the moment so we got a room for £19 at the London Tower Bridge :) Really looking forward to it as it's ages since I've been to London when I've not had to go for work. I'll have to start making a list of all the places I want to go to...

Happy New Year!

Hope 2009 is everything you want it to be. I have a really good feeling about this year! :)
xxx

The verdict :(

Well, it looks like I'm going to need my tooth taken out. The emergency dentist took a filling out to treat an infection under the tooth and has put a temporary dressing on it, meaning I can't really eat anything as I can't close my mouth properly to bite. I now need to find a dentist to extract the tooth as it is unlikely that it can be refilled. Easier said than done. We moved here two years ago and since then I have been trying to get registered with a dentist but none of them are taking on patients around here :( I've got two different types of painkillers and some anti-biotics to take so I'm not going to partying tomorrow night...

Better go and find myself a good dvd to watch tomorrow. Any suggestions?

xx

Sleepless night

i'm off to the emergency dentist after being up all night with toothache. Wish me luck! X

Messy christmas!

Hope you all had a fantastic time, we certainly did and i'll be back to tell you all about it after i've finished cleaning the midden that is my craft room! x

O Christmas Tree

Hello :) I've not been around here for a few days because I've not been very well but I'm feeling a bit better so I thought I'd pop on here before I go and brave the crowds at the Trafford Centre (wish me luck!)

Saturday was great fun. I really enjoyed the concert and was surprised at how many songs I knew. I think Mr P was a bit scared when I started singing along but never mind! The first half of the concert was songs from Jason's new album (which are covers of 50s and 60s songs) and the second half was a bit of a "cheese-fest" with songs like Sealed With a Kiss and Nothing Can Divide Us. Great fun :) I did take some pictures and a little video so if I remember I'll try and post a couple of them on here - judging from your comments on my last post there are a few Jason fans out there ;)

The Christmas Markets were absolutely packed. We didn't stay there long because I was feeling a bit shivery and I'm not very good with big crowds of people as I get a bit panicky. We're going to try and get there again before they finish next week but might run out of time! To be honest, I was a bit disappointed by the stalls we did see as it was a load of tat and very expensive. When they first started doing the markets a lot of the items were handmade and were being sold by the original artists but this year it seemed to be the same sort of mass produed items on a lot of the stalls :(

The craft fair we went to was very good and I got a little felted heart brooch and some fabric badges which were very cute. There were a few bits and bobs I would have loved to have got but it was the wrong side of payday!

I'm still doing JYC but am still behind. The pictures on this post are for the day (can't remember which day it was ) that was about Christmas Trees. I'm off all over Christmas and New Year so there will be some serious scrapbooking going on then :)

So here are some of my favourite decorations on our Christmas tree. We go for the "more is more" look here and there are very few branches on our tree that don't have something dangling from them...

The bell bauble was from Tesco and the snowman came from the church fair a couple of weeks ago:
More Tesco decorations. They had a big half price sale on them a couple of weeks ago and I went a bit nuts!
This one is an iris folded bell that I made a couple of years ago:

This bell came from a flea market at the Civic Centre in Uppermill last year. There were loads of baubles with it which decorate our mini tree on the dresser.
I'm going through a bit of an obsession with owls at the moment and this little guy is very sweet!

And finally, Missy snoozing on "her" chair. I thought cats were supposed to be elegant but neither of mine are when they're sleeping. Mollie's even worse. She lies legs akimbo showing everything. Naughty girl ;)

I took all these pictures on my new phone (I'm still working out all the features on it) and uploaded them directly onto Blogger before coming in on the computer to edit the post and add my writing. It makes it so much easier than having to dig out the lead from the camera and resize pictures etc before posting them. I love technology sometimes!

OK, enough from me, I'm off to finish my Christmas shopping and find a dress for my Christmas do. See you tomorrow

xx

What we're up to today...

Not that you're all waiting on the edge of your seat to find out! lol ;)

Well, for once Mr P is off today so we are going to take a trip into Manchester. First of all we are going to go to a craft fair at Whitworth Art Gallery on Oxford Road. It's on today from 10-4 and tomorrow 10-2 (I think, but I'll check when I'm there today) and hopefully I might be able to pick up a few pretties :)

Next we are off to the Christmas Market to drink some gluwein and scoff chocolate pancakes and maybe pick up some Christmas presents :)

Finally we are going to see Jason Donovan at a concert at the Apollo. I won some tickets on Century Radio a couple of weeks ago and tonight is the night of the concert. My sister (yes the same one I've blogged about before) thinks we are "deeply sad" but I really don't care. It should be good fun, it's something we wouldn't have been doing and it's a free night out :) Always a good thing in my opinion :) When I was about 9 I was the biggest Kylie and Jason fan and managed to convince myself I would marry Jason Donovan when I grew up (either him or George Michael, hmmmm, we all know what happened there!) so it will be like going back to my childhood :)

Mr P has been laughing at me because everytime I win tickets for anything in a concert it is always for some strange thing. Last time it was a Queen tribute act!

Hope you all have a good Saturday

xx

Oh just for the nostalgia, here's Too Many Broken Hearts. Come one, sing along, I know you know the words....

Blogging from my phone

Hope this works!

Excited :)

My new mobile has just been delivered and I am rather excited (shallow, I know)! I've been using an ancient Samsung for ages since my last phone broke but now I am in possession of a nice, new, shiny N96 :) I'm off to have a play with it now :)

See you later
x

Simple pleasures :)

A great book and a brew :)

I got this book this week (Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day by Winifred Watson) and started reading it last night. Absolutely fantastic, I can see this becoming one of my favourite books :) I'd heard good things about it but hadn't expected it to be so funny and you can't help really liking the characters. Miss Pettigrew is the sort of friend that every woman should have. She's so unflappable and always knows what to do. I wish I knew a Guinevere Pettigrew! I'd had a bit of a dull and boring day yesterday and this was like reading a sort of fairy tale for grown ups, if that makes sense? It's one of those books that is so sweet and charming, you can't help feeling warm and fuzzy. The perfect antidote to the credit crunch blues :)

We're being a bit naughty here tonight as we are having takeout pizza :) yum yum! We were supposed to be having a relatively healthy homemade pizza but someone (naming no names but for once this culinary disaster wasn't down to your's truly...) forgot to put the kneading paddle in the breadmaker so after 1 1/2 hours there was still no pizza dough! For a one off it's not going to hurt but we are going to be eating a lot more healthier after Christmas :)

Oh and before I forget, thank you all for your lovely comments about my Christmas cards :) It's something I've been doing for a while but it's something I've been a bit self-conscious about because my sister has been less than complimentary about it in the past. She thinks by making my cards I am being "cheap" and "tight", not realising it costs me more in materials and time and effort than it would do to buy a handmade card in the shops. Oh well, you can't win 'em all :)

See you all tomorrow

x

Catching Up

Well, I managed to do 2 days of JYC on time but then my internet was off so I am a little bit behind! I finally got back onto the internet today and have read all my JYC emails and have an idea what I'm going to do for them so hopefully I'll be able to catch up quickly :)

Today I have been Christmas shopping and have almost done all my shopping but I have had a row with my sister about presents. I much prefer to have a surprise to open on Christmas day but my sister says "you either tell me exactly what you want or I'm not getting you anything", which I think misses the point of giving gifts! I'd rather she gave me something she has really thought about, even if it didn't cost very much. On Friday she made me write a list of exactly what I wanted for Christmas (she's getting me books) but said there was "nothing in particular" she wanted. So today I have been shopping and bought her a lovely (expensive) present which I spent a long time choosing. She then rang me up and said she had decided she wanted a very specific perfume and when I told her I'd already bought her present she told me to take it back. I'm so angry with her. She doesn't know what I got her and I spent ages choosing it. Next time I'm not going to bother. She will get money in a (shop-bought) card. I'm tired of being the only person in our family who actually bothers thinking about what people want so I have decided that from now on I will do the same as my sister and my mam and just give people money in a card. Grrrrrrr. She makes me so mad!

Ok, rant over. JYC Day 3 coming up....

Every year I always make my all my own Christmas cards. I think the last time I bought cards from a shop was about 7 years ago and (for me) part of the fun in Christmas preparations is making all my cards, knowing that each one will be individual and the people I send them to won't get another one exactly the same!

I normally start making my cards pretty early (one year I started them in July!) so that it isn't all a mad panic before Christmas. This year I got a Cricut for my birthday and so I have been using this to help me a lot this year :)

Here is a selection of some of this year's cards:

Hope you like them :) See you all tomorrow

x

Let it snow!

Ok, cheesy title but this was the scene that greeted me this morning when I opened my front door :

We hadn't expected it to snow so it was a great surprise. Even though it has been getting colder these last few days (and we had some snow that didn't stick yesterday), this is the first "proper" snow we've has this winter and I was so excited! I was supposed to be in work today so I got in my car to attempt to drive to work. I didn't even make to the end of my street as the roads hadn't been gritted and my car was slip-sliding everywhere. Luckily I could take the day off work so me and Mr P wrapped up warm and donned our wellies to go for a walk in the snow.

We decided to go along the canal. It was so pretty with all the snow...

A lot of the canal was frozen over completely but there were one or two bits where the ice had started to melt and all the ducks were huddled there. I'm really glad I'm not a duck because they looked freeeeeeezing!

When we walk along here in the summer we often like to stop at this bench and watch the barges go past, but the bench was thick with snow this afternoon so unless we wanted a wet bum we had to keep going!

Although it looks very peaceful in these pictures, we actually met quite a lot of people along the way and stopped to have a chat with them. That's one of the things I love so much about living here - everyone's so friendly. There was an elderly man with his little dog, who was wearing a cute little red jacket to keep her warm, and one man who was clearly a lot braver than us because he was wearing shorts! It was below freezing! They must make 'em tough up here...

We walked along this road to the next village because I wanted to go to the scrapbook store there to get supplies for my Journal My Christmas album. We were talking to the owner there who lives a few streets away from us. She said her road hadn't been gritted this morning (and it's one of the main roads in the area too!) and so all the cars were crashing into the parked cars. Apparently a few drivers just abandoned their cars and walked to wherever they were going. The local newspaper said that one of the other nearby villages was completely cut off and there had been a lot of accidents because of the weather.

So pretty - it's like a scene from a Christmas card. I hope it's like this on Christmas Day but more often it's just cold and rainy!

The clouds were so thick you couldn't even see the tops of the hills!

We stopped at one of the local pubs for lunch and had a Cointreau coffee to help us warm up - yum!

Coming back from the village we saw a snowman that someone had built. All the schools around here are closed because of the weather so the children have all been sledging and playing in the snow. Being the big kids that we are, me and Mr P had a snowball fight before we set off and I'm proud to say I gave Mr P a good whupping :)

When we got back we decided to let the kitties go out at the back to see the snow. This was the first time they've been outside so we put little ribbons on their collars so they didn't get frightened and run off on their own. We are going to let them out when they are a little bit older but they haven't been done yet so we didn't want to take any chances!

Missy was a bit unsure of the snow and didn't really go far from the back door, surprising as she is usually quite adventurous.

Mollie seemed to really enjoy it and even went in the snow. She was funny because every time she took a step she shook the snow off her paws :)

They're both curled up in front of the fire now after their little adventure, snoozing and stretching.

Strangely enough, today's Journal Your Christmas was about the weather, so I am going to use my blog entry for today along with a couple of my favourite photographs from the ones above.

What's the weather like where you are today?

x

Journal Your Christmas

Over the last few months I have really started getting into scrapbooking a lot more. I have made my own cards for years and really enjoy doing it and I think scrapbooking was a natural progression for me (and I get to keep some of my creations - selfish I know but I rarely keep a lot of the things I make!) One of my friends won a scrapbooking kit and she gave it to me so I have been having great fun playing around with layouts. My lovely boyfriend bought me a cricut for my birthday recently so I have been having a lot of fun with that too!

This year I have signed up for the Journal Your Christmas class at www.shimelle.com. The aim of this is document my Christmas by completing a scrapbook layout each day. It was a bit of a last minute thing deciding to do this so I don't have a lot of the supplies I'll need. Also, I know full well I am never going to be able to complete a layout every day so what I plan to do is to follow the journal prompts every day and try to write up on here my responses to the prompts so that I capture my immediate feelings and emotions as the month progresses. I have some time off work booked over the next couple of weeks and I'll be off all over Christmas and New Year (lucky me :) I love my job!) so I'll catch up with my layouts then. See, I've thought this through!

So today's prompt....to write a manifesto about why I have decided to do this project, so here goes...

I love Christmas. It is definitely my favourite time of the year and I love all the traditions and fun associated with December 25th. My aim this December is to capture my thoughts and feelings about Christmas in a creative way. The run up to Christmas can be pretty hectic so I'm looking forward to having some "time out" each day to focus on this project.

At the moment me and Mr P live in a little house in a beautiful little town and it's just the two of us and our crazy kitties. We're hoping to start a family next year so hopefully this will be our last Christmas without children. In years to come our Christmas's will be very different to how they are now so I want to be able to look back at this time and remember how things were.

I have been learning a lot about my family tree this year and one of the things I have found frustrating is that there's no-one round to tell me the little details about what their lives were like. In years to come hopefully my great-grandchildren will be able to look at this album and see what it was that Great-Granny loved about this time of year (as well as the things she wasn't so fond of...)

So there we go, one down, loads more to go! I'm really looking forward to my next prompt :)
x

Christmas Chaos

Ok, Ok, I know I'm a bit early but last night we started to put the Christmas decorations up as both me and my OH are in work all next week. We got the tree up but there are still lots of other bits and bobs to do. Matters are not helped by my two little "helpers" who are driving me nuts! It's their first Christmas and they seem to think that I have put the tree up as an extra-special toy for them to play with. I've already had to fish Missy out of the tree twice this morning and Mollie is showing an alarming interest in chewing the (fake) branches. What can I do to stop them doing this?!?!?


How can you get cross with them though when they are so adorable? (Ignore the bits on the carpet, there were bits everywhere by the time we'd put the tree up!)

We got Missy and Mollie a new bed a few weeks ago because the landing where they sleep is a bit drafty. Don't they look cosy?

Missy (on the left) is doing her "I've done something silly and you don't know about it yet" face on the picture below:




















Mollie is the smallest of the two, but she doesn't stand for any messing! She's giving Missy a cuff round the ear in this picture...
























So cute!

























One thing I am a bit worried about is Missy has decided she likes climbing on top of doors:


















I'm scared she will fall off, especially when she starts chasing her tail!

























Last two piccies now before you all think I'm some kind of demented cat-lady (actually there could be some truth in that....)

Mollie loves to sleep on people, she's so elegant and lady-like:

Missy on the other hand is a bit more independent and likes to bask in the sun (not that we see a lot of it round here!)

I will be back again hopefully tomorrow with lots of Christmas goodies to show you all, I might have been away from this blog for a while but I have been very busy! x

EDIT Can anyone help me with putting pictures on my posts? It took me ages to get it laid out how I wanted it in Blogger and then when I published my post there were lots of gaps between pictures and writing that weren't there before and some of the writing moved to the side of the pictures?!?

New additions to the household...

.....this is why I haven't been around here very much!

Can you believe someone wanted to drown these two gorgeous bundles of fluff?















Meet Missy:














And Mollie:














They like to play fight but always ended up curled up sleeping together....














I will be back soon when I'm not fighting for space on the keyboard with two kittens!!! x

Wasting time!

Messing about on the internet I came across this site: Blogthings which is full of silly quizzes. One of them is "What is Your Name's Hidden Meaning?" and although I thought it would come up with a load of rubbish, it was actually spookily accurate in my case (although I'm not sure about the agression bit!)

What Gemma Means

You are deeply philosophical and thoughtful. You tend to analyze every aspect of your life. You are intuitive, brilliant, and quite introverted. You value your time alone. Often times, you are grumpy with other people. You don't appreciate them trying to interfere in your affairs. You are friendly, charming, and warm. You get along with almost everyone. You work hard not to rock the boat. Your easy going attitude brings people together. At times, you can be a little flaky and irresponsible. But for the important things, you pull it together. You are confident, self assured, and capable. You are not easily intimidated. You master any and all skills easily. You don't have to work hard for what you want. You make your life out to be exactly how you want it. And you'll knock down anyone who gets in your way! You are usually the best at everything ... you strive for perfection. You are confident, authoritative, and aggressive. You have the classic "Type A" personality.

What's Your Name's Hidden Meaning?

Time flies....

....especially when you are mad busy with work!!! Things have been very busy over the last few weeks but hopefully it should all settle down very soon :)

In the meantime, when I've not been in work I have been very busy and there has been lots and lots of crocheting going on here - I think I've well and truly got the bug! I will be back tomorrow with piccies :) x

Lovely weekend :)

Well, thank goodness it's the weekend! Work has been rather hectic this week so I'm relieved it is Saturday :) I have a very busy weekend planned but it is all fun things so I can't wait!

First up I have a concert with band this afternoon and then this evening Mr P and me are going on a date :) The local council near us is putting on a couple of big concerts in the park and so tonight we're going to "Proms in the Park" which looks like it could be pretty cool.

Tomorrow the local farmer's market is on so we're going to get up early (oh yes we are!) and head off to stock up on goodies before going to the second concert in the park which is going to be local bands and Alexander O'Neal. There's also going to be a craft fair and a funfair so it looks like it could be a pretty fun day. Keep your fingers crossed for the weather for us!

I'll leave you with a video of Alexander O'Neal - this song always reminds me of family parties when I was younger so it brings back good memories :)

I saw this over at Sweet Jessie's site and thought it seemed like fun. You have to answer these questions in just one word which I think will be a challenge for me as I'm a bit of a Little Miss Chatterbox!

One Word Meme
1. Where is your cell phone? table
2. Your significant other? Mr P
3. Your hair? wild
4. Your daughter? future
5. Your son? ditto
6. Your favorite thing? books
7. Your dream last night? christmassy
8. Your favorite drink? dandelion and burdock
9. Your goal? happiness
10. The room you’re in? living room
11. Your church? friendly
12. Your fear? flying
13. Where do you want to be in 6 years? here
14. Where were you last night? class
15. What you’re not? quiet
16. Muffins? rolls
17. One of your wish list items? house
18. Where you grew up? Manchester
19. The last thing you did? phone
20. What are you wearing? skirt
21. Your TV? on
22. Your pets? none
23. Your computer? lifeline
24. Your life? fabulous
25. Your mood? tired
26. Missing someone? yes
27. Your car? focus
28. Something you’re not wearing? socks
29. Favorite store? Borders
30. Your summer? rainy
31. Like(love) someone? absolutely
32. Your favorite color? pink
33. Last time you laughed? today
34. Last time you cried? Sunday
35. Who will repost this? you?

As you can see, I didn't quite manage the whole one word thing but I tried! It'd be interesting for other people to play along so I can see if you're able to be more concise than I am!!!