Missing Cake

Seb's birthday turned out good.

Looking back on my blog all the recent posts have been about birthdays.  From July to October we have a birthday every three weeks, its a very busy time of year for us.  Other half kicks it off on the 19th July then there is no rest till all six of us have celebrated our special days (or not as in my case).

I was cruel to Seb.  I didn't bake him a cake or cupcakes, I bought a cake instead but refrained from letting him know.

I waited until the Friday night and I told him that I was so sorry that I didn't have time to bake. He said that was okay and not to worry about it and that he would be just fine.  All day Saturday, which was his actual birthday I dropped in now and again that we didn't have his cake or cupcakes done. Each time Seb was really grown up and gracious about it.   He was given some chocolate from a friend so he even agreed that I would use the chocolate bar and put a candle in it to sing Happy Birthday to him.   We had a nice meal and afterwards I disappeared off to 'prepare the chocolate'.   Everyone was in on the secret.
When I walked back into the room with his cake this is what his face was like ...

You could not have faked that look for a million pounds.  He was thrilled with his cake and not one bit cross that I had tricked him.

We got him a kindle as his main gift, which he was delighted with.  He also got plenty of books, chocolate and a few other bits.

This year we didn't really plan any birthday parties.  Money was a bit tight for a while and to be fair I thought the children could have a choice of what to do now they are getting older.  Each child opted for a day out or a shopping trip.  Seb chose to go to the transport museum, despite visiting the museum on a previous birthday he still loved it.  

Where have I been?

Where have I been? I know, I know, it has been forever since I last updated the blog. I have ran out of excuses, there are none! I was just dead lazy and I got even lazier when I thought of all the other times I apologised at being lazy and reading other blogs where people do the same thing.

I wont apologise, I am here ... I am posting again, for now. Just accept that if I refrain from posting I am either being lazy or I am super busy, or having a crisis in my life, or out socialising far too many hours, or having a baby (probably not but maybe the rabbits are having babies again), or feeding the dog ..wait I don't have a dog. Oh, I don't know, maybe it is raining!

My Baby's Birthday

Did I say my baby? Well she is my baby, Sol now age five and a few days. I cannot believe she is five, its almost as if I went to sleep one night while she was still a new born and I woke up and shes all grown. It is scary how time flies by before you get to catch your breath. Anyway, enough of that mushy stuff just enjoy the photos pf the day. I took loads but I just randomly chose a couple, actually they were the first ones in the folder!

Sol is mad about Hello Kitty, so we just had to get her this delicious cake. By the way its from Marks & Spencer if anyone wants to get one.

Yes, you will have read the trampoline story ... we got a new one. Its smaller and its now round the front of the house so its less likely to get flipped by the wind.

A Star A Star

This is going to be a big brag post!

We home educate as you probably all know! Well my eldest son sat the first two modules of three, for his maths GCSE. The way it worked out he ended up doing two modules in one day back at the start of March this year. Anyhow the results are in, and he did very well. For Module 1 out of a possible score of 108, Mag achieved 101 and that is an A*, on Module 3 out of 162 he got 160 and that too is an A*. All that's left to do is Module 5 at the beginning of June and with a bit of luck he will do well in that one too.

There is always a 'problem' arranging for home educated kids to sit their GCSE exams, well its not really a problem but you have to contact a school and ask them if they will take a child as an external candidate. Not all schools will accommodate external candidates, not that its any trouble, but simply because they don't. So you may need to contact a few schools to get one that will let you sit an exam. Anyhow the school where Mag sat his exams have now come back to us and said he can do all of his exams there, which is a huge result for us. Prior to him getting his two A*s I was under the impression they wouldn't be able to accommodate him for everything so as you can imagine I am really pleased at how this has worked out for him. Mag is hoping to sit his next three GCSE exams starting with the first modules for those in November this year.

Okay another brag ...

Mag goes to a Company Section of the Boys Brigade in a near by town. He missed a lot of last years Boys Brigade due to illness so this was his first full year with that Company. Mag has been in the boys brigade for nine years working up through the various levels. Monday was the parents evening and the last night of this years BB. He received a few badges for various completed projects through out the year and also the award for BEST BOY! Once again, twice in less than a week I have to admit I was really really proud of him.

St Patrick's Day Climb!

Yesterday was St Patrick's Day. After a slow start to the day we decided to go for a walk up to Scrabo Tower. Scrabo Tower is built on Scrabo Hill and you can read more about it on this website http://scrabotower.com/scrabo-tower.html.

No point knocking, there is no one at home!

Its quite a treck up to the tower and around the quarries, this is what happened afterwards.
Worn out.

Resting.

Passing The Time

I am sitting here passing the time whilst I am waiting for yahoo messenger to install. Yes passing the time, on my nice new laptop which I absolutely love already. There is nothing else on it except the antivirus program which I put on before I even looked at it.

Anyway I guess what I should be saying is that I have no damn excuse anymore, none, so I better start blogging again.

Speak or should I say write to you all soon!

Getting ready

Well it’s the 4th of December! Don’t roll your eyes thinking I am stating the obvious will you!

I haven’t updated my blog site for so long people are beginning to think I have fallen off the face of the Earth. So here I am with a summery update for everyone, especially those who asked.

Anyway, there was a series of mini catastrophes happening such as the car breaking down while I was travelling at speed (we were ok), and the roof leaking in, and the car breaking down again, and needing repairs done at our other house and, and, and …oh there is a list.

My eldest child has been working incredibly hard lately, he has finished all his GCSE maths work and is finally ready to do his exam. That exam itself pretty much organised though forms still have to go in but the school who have accepted him are dealing with that. Mag’s first GCSE paper is in February so he has two months to revise and get everything up to scratch, if you take away time at Christmas it really isn’t that long. We have started the practise papers with him, he got an A this week, it was a low A but its still and A and shows that there is room for improvement. He is confident that come February he will be getting an A*, and of course I am really proud of him. The following academic year he will do his sciences exams and contemplate doing the advanced maths exam but we will see how it’s all going in a couple of months as there is no real rush for all this. Anyone who knows Mag will understand why he is doing these exams, he is a bright boy who has always excelled at everything he has done.

I am trying to get organised for Christmas (who isn’t?), and I am going to officially give myself a week off from cooking apart from the main event. We don’t have Christmas dinner on Christmas day usually, it’s just too much as I like to spend time with the kids and not slave over the proverbial hot stove. So I have spent several days cooking, baking, freezing, then cooking some more, vacuum sealing and freezing some more. I now have two weeks worth of prepared food in the freezers, everything from sausage rolls ready to go in the oven to lasagna that just needs finishing off and I am not going to let anyone near it till Christmas week. It feels good, and I have to say I do feel slightly smug about that fact too. Then I decided to get all of the presents done, which they are almost. The cards have yet to be written; I have written a few envelopes and will slip the cards in later. Now back to that week off ……… if only the laundry fairy could come in and do that for me then I would be all sorted.

Seb's Birthday

Photos from Seb's Birthday party in October. We don't usually go for parties away from the house purely from a cost point a view. But we shared the costs with another and had a joint party in one of the near by soft play areas. It was fun and the children all enjoyed themselves, it felt strange coming home to a tidy house too.


In the morning opening gifts.

The party table!



Mag was really getting into the swing of things (NOT).


The food was nuggets and chips!

Toni's Birthday!

Its been a month since I updated my blog! I have lots of photos and probably too many stories to tell ..... I will post what I can over the next few days until I get caught up.



Toni on her birthday way back in September!

SUNDAY SUMMARY, Birthday, desks and sleep

Okay, I HAD planned on doing a "snap Shot" Sunday  but it turned out to be more of a photographic summery of my week .....

Here goes

Monday night the children asked for a sleep over. When we went to check on them this is what we found.


I spent most of Tuesday (between swimming lessons, and running the kids to summer scheme, and childminding) trying to tidy the house.
I have to say my husband has the most annoying habit in the world, his newspapers. He buys the Sunday Times every week but never gets it all read. I don't know if you know the Sunday Times but there are 60 supplements with it, and now he has started buying yet another newspaper. If he doesn't get one read he keeps it, and each week this rolls on till he has stacks. I am not allowed to touch the papers, if I were to throw them out he would come looking for a certain article or something. What annoys me most is the fact he stores them next to the bed, oh and the newspaper print stains our white painted floor. Thing is most of the stuff in the Sunday paper we have already read or heard about during the week on the NEWS funnily enough.

No photos from Wednesday, much to my regret! We had early morning swimming lessons then on to our home education day. It was a tiring day, but very successful so well worth it.

Thursday, after swimming, summer schemes, and child minding, Hollie and I set about making some jewellery. This is the bracelet we made which we have since given to a friend.

Okay, so the desks are not really from Friday but I will share the photo anyway. We got them in Tesco's, reduced from £49 down to £12.25 which is a steal. They are MDF and just slot together in two minutes, the kids love them and they are ideal for their crafts and colouring. I am sure they will enjoy doing their skool at them too.

Saturday was my birthday, 21 again! We had Moet & Chandon champagne mixed with orange juice for breakfast otherwise known as bucks fizz! I didn't do anything else for the day, just sat around and rested after another hectic week.

BIRTHDAY GIRL

Just a few photos of our day. We had our four children, the two children I am looking after plus another. The boy's weren't having their photos taken (rolling eyes) but never mind here's the girls.

My two extras!

BLUE PENGUINS & RAIN

It didn't rain much on Sunday! Well it did but it did not spoil our day at the zoo. Sunday was Roy's birthday and when he woke he announced he wanted to go to the zoo. For those who know Belfast Zoo you will understand what I am going to say - this is the same zoo that I vowed last year to never visit again! It's built on a hill, the little ones have previously struggled to get up the hill and we have only ever seen half of the exhibits in one day. This day being no different we pushed on up the hill first in the hope that the children would find it easier to see the zoo in reverse. Seb was giving off big time shouting out that he thought we were there to see the animals not go mountain climbing. Once we got to the top, after several pit stops sheltering from the heavy rain showers, the kids were great. We did manage to see all the animals and there were no further issues.

A wooden rhino!


A terantula! (it's a big one)


Mag



Sol



Toni

Seb

Oh and this is a blue penguin! HONEST! We were watching the penguins, Mag got noticeably excited and exclaimed he just saw some blue penguins. DER!!