Hello

Hope you are all keeping warm. It's been so very cold here this week with a few frosty nights and biting cold breezes. No snow although we do live in hope.

We've had a fairly good week. Mum is so much better but still doesn't want to get up in the mornings. I don't blame her for not getting up out of a nice warm and cosy bed when she doesn't have to.

Where have I been this week that has been different from the usual? M and I went to my Aunties funeral which was a lovely service. It was a non-religious service (although she was a regular at the local Methodist church) but a celebration of her life. Afterwards we all met up at a quiet pub.

L and I went to a careers convention at her school. L got some great information on the different career paths she's interested in. I did too because in the not too distant future I will be looking a different and more fulfilling job and at the moment I don't know what I want to do or capable of.  The one thing that all the people we talked to said was that L had to work as hard as she could to get the best results she could for her English and Maths. Some things never change do they?

Who have I met? I met up with some of my cousins that I've not see for quite some time. It was so lovely to meet up again although it would have been much nicer had it been under different circumstances. Now we can keep in touch.

We met lots of interesting people at the careers convention. some I knew and some that we've met before.

What else have I done? I bought a dress pattern for L for the Gala and bought her crown from last years queen. She had two because the first one they bought was too big and didn't look right. Looks good on L. She's four years older so I suppose that makes quite a difference.
I've just finished a little blanket for my unborn niece. Will take pictures ready for next week. Some wonderful ladies at the craft club are still making the cuffs for the twiddle muffs so I've been decorating them again and want to finish them for a week on Thursday so that I can drop them off at the hospital's dementia unit when I have my eye check up.

That's my news for this week and now I need to get the roasties in the oven ready for L and M coming back from archery. The hall they shoot in is so very cold even though there is some heating on it just doesn't get warm.

Have a good week

Carolx

Emotional Roller Coaster

Hello

We are now heading into the third week of the new year and Christmas holidays fee such a distant memory.
We, really I should say, I have been on such a roller coaster this past two weeks.  The first week back at work and mum was very poorly and we had to persuade the Dr to come out and see mum as we just couldn't get her out of bed (and we didn't want to). We were so worried that we were loosing her. Anyway the Dr came and it turned out she had a bad chest infection and gave her some antibiotics. Woe they were good, We saw a difference in her after the fist dose. She is much recovered now and is to return to day care tomorrow. Also the same week mum's sister, who also had dementia (different type though) died and the funeral is tomorrow at St Anne's crematorium. Mum and dad are not going so I'm going in their place.

This past week L was chosen as our local Gala Queen and her friend S is Prince Charming. She is well pleased. We've already sorted the theme and design of the float (need agreement from the retinue mums yet) possible colour of costumes and the design of dress and cloak for L. It looks like it's going to be another super busy year, There are a lot more children in the retinue this year so hopefully there will be many willing hands to make the float (fingers crossed).

Oh no just spotted the time, must dash off to mum and dads to help feed mum her tea and give dad a break.

See you soon.

Carolx

Happy 2015

HAPPY NEW YEAR

Hope you all had a very enjoyable Christmas and New Year. Our Christmas wasn't as planned but was very enjoyable all the same. L has had a lot of art homework to do over the holidays and has worked on it every day except Christmas day and Boxing day. Poor thing was so stressed about the amount she had to do so we broke it down into chunks. There is still a fair bit to do but the majority of it is done and there is still two more weeks to complete. It will be done if we keep chunking away.

Here are to pictures of the two bags I made for my baby nephew and niece. They were made from my scraps of fabric I already had and some that I was recently given. The embellishments were hand stitched (whilst watching TV) and then put together by machine. I filled them with age suitable gifts (not hand made)

I haven't made any resolutions again this year but I have made some goals. Last year I said I wanted to get rid of 365 things from the house. I think we made it I forgot to keep my records up to date and I want to continue with this again this year but try and be a bit mire ruthless. I feel I should adopt the motto of "More out, Less in". I have a plan to do, on average, 15 minutes a day on this project starting in one area at a time. I'm 45 mins behind already so my plan is to start today whilst L and M are at archery.

My other goal I want to do is to continue to loose weight. Last year I wanted to loose 2 stone before our holidays. I didn't achieve 2 stone but I still lost some. I'm down 2 dress sizes. My ultimate goal (not during this year) is to come off my diabetic medication. So far I've cut back on all the unhealthy carbs and having a small amount of the healthy ones. This has been hard over the holidays because we have more chocolate than ever before (should last us until Easter) and we didn't buy any of it.

Last year I had a goal of blogging more regularly but that didn't happen and won't happen for the time being (please keep popping by though) as helping dad with mum and working at lunch times (in school) and family life doesn't leave much time to spare. I will try to do at least one post per week.

Best wishes to you all and see you soon.

Carolx