Randomness on Wednesday

Well, I made it five days in a row blogging, I'm quite proud of myself, but there was no way I could do it on the weekend too, it takes me at least an hour to blog with photos!  Anyway I don't have a whole post to write about, so here are a few of my random thoughts.  Also, I've not downloaded my photos recently so I'll post them tomorrow or Friday.

1.  It turns out Chicken loves the park.  The only thing she's big enough (and not even properly then) to go on is the baby swing, and man does that make her laugh and smile.  She also loves watching the other kids, I think we could just sit in the playground watching the kids for a whole afternoon and she still wouldn't get bored!

2.  I lost one and a half pounds this week, 680g in normal peoples amounts, which is 12.5 lb total or 5.5kg.  And the good new is that I now fit into three pairs of three quarters that I didn't fit a month ago!! Can't wait to do some shopping when I get to Vermont.

3.  I am sooooo excited about going to visit Scott and Panda in two weeks, I can't believe its only in two weeks, I've already starting looking at websites for clothes and shoes for Chicken and I!! We're having a week or so in Vermont and then a couple of nights in New York, I love NYC and already have a long list of things to do that we didn't manage last time.

4.  I have to bake some biscuits tomorrow morning for a party.  My friend is finishing her job as a breastfeeding supporter tomorrow so we are having a farewell lunch and then a little party at our group.  I'm  sad shes leaving but I'm looking forward to having mussels for lunch!

5.  My computer isn't working at the moment so I have to borrow Andrew's which doesn't have a webcam which means no skype or skyping using my iPhone, which is super hard because Chicken wants to grab it all the time, and really who wants to look up a babies nose, not even me!

6.  I've joined a reading club online, and I'm really enjoying it so far, its one of the first books (not counting kids books) that I've read since I've had Chicken.

Happy Hump day everyone!

Friday Five - My little bro

I've been thinking about my brother a fair bit lately.  We don't see each other very often, only three times in the last six years actually but I'd say we were quite close and we get on well.  It hasn't always been the case, our late teenage years were a bit tough but on the whole he's a cool little brother.  So my Friday Five today is all about my brother Scott.

1.  He lives in the USA.  Scott lives in Vermont and is the Director of Tennis at Stratton Mountain.  I haven't been to visit him there but we are going in September and I can't wait.  He's also lived in Miami and Indiana.  In 2008 my friend and I went to Miami for a week and stayed with Scott.  We were driving over the MacArthur Causeway from Miami Beach back to his apartment when he decided to stop at Star Island.  Star Island is a private man-made island that loads of celebrities have houses on, Gloria Estefan, A-Rod, Rosie O'Donnell to name a few.  Anyway there is a gate and Scottie just leaned over and asked the guard if we could go and look around since we were from New Zealand, I was sooo embarrassed and was sure we were going to get told to get lost, but no, it worked.  That's my brother for you, bold!

2.  He was the MC at our wedding.  Scottles loves to speak in public, in fact, my Mum, Scott and myself all like to, doesn't scare us.  He told funny stories, made sure everything ran on time and generally did a great job.  He also read a beautiful poem during the ceremony, The Key to Love.  About a month before the wedding I had dream that Scott stood up to speak and to get everyone's attention he clapped his hands teacher style, and everyone clapped back.  He then started to speak just like a teacher, e.g. oh I can see that Bob's table is ready to go and get their food, they are sitting nicely.  Thank goodness he didn't do this, but I was a little bit worried.

3.  He's quite tall.  6ft 5in even, yep my little brother is a giant.  Being tall has lots of advantages, and these two stories show a few of them.  Scott used to threaten to give our mum, Marg G 'The Rack'  The Rack is when you pick someone up by their feet and dangle them out in front of you.  As Marg G is only 5ft 4in it was definitely possible to give her The Rack.  And apparently one day he did!!  NB this may just be folklore, I wasn't actually there.  Sometimes when Scottle Modottle and I used to catch up when I was away at uni he would stand on my feet (without me knowing) and then push me over.  If someone is standing on your feet you can't regain your balance and you fall over, which I did.  I then went to get him and he would put his had on my forehead with his arm out straight (can you picture that?)  Basically because he was so tall and his reach so long I couldn't get at him, rather comic really.

4.  He comes home for Christmas every year.  This is quite a feat really, Vermont is a long way from New Zealand!  He runs a business with some friends selling ice to festival goers in our town and then goes to the festival itself for NYE.

5.  He is incredibly generous!  As a brother, brother-in-law and as an uncle Scott is kind and caring and we (Andrew, Chicken, and I) are  very lucky.  He also buys great gifts!  So far Chicken has been given Crocs, a Dior shirt, a giant bear, loads and loads of clothes just to name a few.  Scott is very excited about being an uncle and can't wait to meet his niece in September.

A list on Sunday

I have a lot of mini thoughts to write about, but none of them by themselves would be a full post, so this morning, we have a list!

1.  Its been quite nice in my part of England this week and today we are having some family over for a BBQ. Isn't it typical that I wake up and the sky is overcast.  BBC says its going to be warm all day with a chance of rain in the evening, stay away rain!

2.  I've been meaning to bake a certain cake for about two months now.  Its a pistachio, lemon and polenta cake, the recipe comes from Sainsbury's magazine about two years ago and it looks good.  Why do I keep putting off making cake?  I mean, I'm quite good at that sort of thing, must do that today, it'll be nice for the BBQ.

3.  We went swimming at the local pool last week.  Now this would normally fill a full post, but since you are not allowed to take pictures in public pools (and cause I don't want photos of me in a swim suit on the net) it wouldn't be as much fun.  We did have a great time and Chicken really loves the water and is becoming more and more confident.  She also has the cutest outfit!

4.  My father-in-law Graham (and MIL Moira) are staying with us at the moment, and we asked him to do some gardening to tidy up a bit.  There is a privet tree out the front of our house and I said he could trim it as it makes me sneeze and it was quite over grown.  This is what he did.  Effective but it will take a bit of getting used to, and anyway, plants grow back.  And I am very pleased that the privet has gone!

5.  We watched Roman Holiday last night with Audrey Hepburn and Gregory Peck.  This was the first time I've seen a Hepburn film, great eyebrows and I love the pixie hair cut, but what big ears!  I got it at the supermarket for £3, and didn't realise till I got home that it was in black and white.  I really enjoyed it, such a restrained love story, they don't make em like they used to!

6.  Because the in-laws are staying I have farmed out my child Chicken is spending quality time with them while I write this, makes things go much quicker.  Thanks guys!

7.  I made ribs yesterday, two different marinades even.  And well, they were ok, I mean ribs, if not overcooked are usually nice, but these marinades didn't quite cut it.  I like sticky ribs and they had potential but ... oh well, I'll keep trying.  Apparently my little brother makes nice ribs, maybe he'll make some when we visit him in September.

8.  Speaking of my brother, his girlfriend Amanda, who make this amazing quilt for Chicken got a kitchen aid mixer for her birthday recently.  I am seriously jealous!  I covet one, sooooooooooo much, shame the voltage is different for electrical things from the US to the UK, I'd put one in my suitcase in Sept!

9.  I am going out this Wednesday coming at night time without Chicken.  Since she now takes a bottle I am going to go scrapbooking for a couple of hours.  I chose this time cause the in-laws will be here to help Andrew if needed.  I'll let you know how it goes, a practice run for the hens party in a month!

10.  I said to my friend Jo the other day (we are new friends btw) "I don't know if you've realised but my brain things about lots of different things at once, which is why the conversation changes a lot" and she said (in a deservedly slightly sarcastic tone, "No Jess, hadn't noticed at all, not!"  She also said she likes it and it keeps her on her toes because she has to pay attention to the whole conversation.  I hope she meant it and wasn't just being nice, I don't think so, she doesn't seem like that sort of person.

So, my point being, this list of ten is really just my stream of consciousness (I think that's what its called) on a Sunday morning.  Hope you have a relaxing Sunday, wherever you are!

Oh wait!

11.  My little girl was five months old yesterday, where has the time gone?

Here comes the sun (doo do doo)

The last five days here have been amazing!  Its been getting warmer and warmer with everyday, but sadly its not going to last so the weather people at BBC tell me.  To be fair we have made the most of it, getting out and about.

On Thursday we went to a sing-along session at the local library which Chicken didn't really like, too many other children and too much noise, we'll keep persevering because I am sure once she gets the hang of it, she'll have great fun.  We went home to ice cupcakes to take to my afternoon coffee group when Chicken promptly did a spit up over the both of us, not to bother because she got to wear this super cute (and cool) dress.

On Friday we went scrapbooking at A Maze of Memories and I completed my first layout of Chicken, the theme was spring or days out, so I used the photos from our first walk with her when she was five days old.  Not exactly spring I know but I'm still quite happy with it.

Friday afternoon we headed to Cookham Moor to go for a walk along the Thames with a friend from my ante-natal group and her son.  We got to Bourne End and found a pub called The Bounty, right on the rivers edge.  It even has its own mooring!  We found another one of the girls from our group there too (I know, that's all us yummy mummies do is hang out at pubs all day, hehe)  We had a drink in the beer garden, and the babies had a nice kick around, while a large group of teenagers hogged the tables playing drinking games, ahh the good old days.  Karen and I decided that even though we were much older we'd still show them a thing or two!  That was also the last time I changed a poopy nappy, yep that's right, its been 48 hours since my Chicken has done a poo!  Poor thing, I imagine it really hurts!  (Thanks for the nappy Karen, I'll start to bring my own stuff soon, I promise!)

Chicken also got her feet dirty for the first time, she was sitting on a mat but managed to dig her heels into the grass, Andrew says its more proof I'm her mother, we both like being bare feet!

 On Saturday a parcel arrived from Scott and Panda, Eilidh is a very lucky girl, they sent her some fab summer clothes (Scott and I have a shopping problem, we got it from our Nana, we also inherited her shoe problem too, but that's not the point)

Sorry about the blurry photos, she was having too much fun to sit still!  We decided to go to Windsor (not to see the Queen) for lunch and a walk, so did every man and his dog it seemed because there wasn't an outside table to be found anywhere for love nor money.  In retrospect it probably was a good thing, it was very hot and we could have had a fried Chicken!  When she woke up from her nap Eilidh was rather preoccupied with Andrew's drink, he was very proud!

Today we walked to the Farmers market, and did jobs around the house.  Now Chicken is three months old, she is beginning to entertain herself for longer periods of time.  Her latest trick is 'talking' which she's done all day

Hopefully your weekend was as nice as ours!