Mag in Uniform

Do you think Mag is handsome? Well I do, this is him in his Boys Brigade uniform yesterday (Sunday 5th April). He was marching in the Battalion Parade through Belfast - we are proud of him.

While we were in Belfast watching him we checked out the town centre, have not been there for ages either so it was a welcome visit.

We could not go to Belfast without visiting the Dome at Victoria square. Last time we went up into the dome it was dark and the city was all lit up so today was the first time in daylight.


Outside Victoria square we saw a strange man climbing through a tennis racquet with no strings. He also juggled fire batons, I could not help laugh when he was loading them up with fuel whilst he had a cigarette in his mouth - DER!

I don't mind sharing ...

I don't mind sharing with anyone. I don't mind sharing graphics I have made, in fact if you ask me to make a graphic, I will. What I don't like are people taking my graphics, then having the cheek to hotlink them. My hosting site I pay for with my own hard earned cash - so if you are gonna use my graphics at least take them away to your own site and not use my bandwidth.

Thankyou!

decorating and gardening

I only wish I had taken some photos the last couple of weeks. Well I did take 'a' photo but I cant share it, its far too personal ... one of me wearing some new underwear that I had got. On that note I shall move swiftly on to the more publishable topics.

The decorating in the hallway continues, we cant go any faster because we are only doing painting at weekends. Well Roy is painting and I am keeping the children occupied mostly. I am hoping we will be done this weekend.

Gardening, we have done lots of gardening. Mostly we have planted things in containers for now, some to be planted out when they are bigger and some to keep in the containers. We would still worry a little about frosts so I think its best for now. We have tended to our trees, cleared the debris from under them and added a little peat. We have a fair amount of trees, some in the garden and a few young trees in pots waiting to be planted.

Summer has been one for funny quotes this week. You will laugh at this one, I was slicing up a pepperoni sausage, Sol our three year old is scooping the pepperoni slices as fast as I was cutting them. "Hold on Sol, we need them for our pizzas", "No mummy, I need them for my mouth!" what can I say.

Just photos!

My Two Girls

just thought I would share the two girls playing with their hamster.

12th March - Entertainment at Ikea

We found ourselves child free last Thursday - its not what you think actually we hadn't escaped and left the kids with a sitter or anything. Roy finished work early and asked us if we fancied a trip out. Roy suggested going to B&Q but I protested a little after the last trip we had to that store, well not really for that reason. Actually I have decided what I want to do in my hallway, I don't need to see yet another tin of paint.

We plumped for Ikea in the end, I love Ikea! You can get lost easily in the Ikea store and spending money is almost compulsory too! Ashley stayed at home because he was not feeling so well. We took the other children with us but had not reckoned on the creche being empty or buck shee. So the children got booked into the creche and we strolled around looking at this bedroom fitment and that. I enjoyed our 45 minutes that the children were booked into the creche for, then even nicer was the additional half hour the girl in the creche let us have because they were not busy. We managed to get a cup of tea and a funny looking bun from the cafe too. When we finally picked up the children it felt like the trip was over, I mean we walked the whole way round Ikea and managed to keep our wallets in our pockets (well Roy's wallet in his pocket). I saw a dining table which would be perfect for us, price was nice too .... maybe I will get it one day.

After creche out we took the children up to the seating area in the cafe, this area over looks the end of the George Best Airport runway. It was fun to see the planes taxing down and then taking off, we saw a couple of planes land also. Then down below the windows you could see onto the loading bays - we watched people going about their business and the trolley guys playing with the trolleys in flower beds.

On the way out of the store we stopped at the clearance section where they have the ex-display stuff or things that have got damaged. Never being able to resist a bargain we had a rummage in there - BIG MISTAKE. I mean we did get the whole wall covered in Toni's bedroom .... perfect for storing all her crates and things (which is an issue). It is a pale pine wood approx 6 foot tall by 6 wide. The price was less than £85 previously marked at £185 so we felt we got a bargain, it was all Roy's idea! The unit itself had a tiny little chip on one of the brackets so that's £100 off just for someone being bit careless when they were building it. It looks a bit like this one, its a nice pale wood which are like strips laminated together.


Getting the unit in the car was another concern. The unit in the store was already erected so we asked if we could dismantle it ... the girl said we could but not until it had been paid for. DUMB STUPID STORE RULES. Okay - trolley - large unit - 3 toddler size children - yeah yeah I hear ya its only stupid people who do stuff like that.
Navigating the unit through the check out was an experience. Waiting in the queue for customer services to get the tools to dismantle the unit was another experience. The people in front were so slow, I mean how long does it actually take to get a price for a vase? "Use your flipping legs and walk into the store to find out" DOH!
Eventually we got a couple of allen keys so we can dismantle the unit. We divided it into two initially because it was precarious stood up on a trolley. Then I parked myself and the two trolleys at the door while Roy and the kids went to bring the car round to the pick up bays. Whilst they were gone I was people watching. I always find it amusing to see people come out of DIY shops and like places with huge 8x4 sheets or something or other then struggle to get them into their little cars. I always giggle at those people and now the watcher was about to become watched and that thought was even more comical. I noticed a lively family struggle their way to their van. The family's 5 foot palm tree blew over in the wind, it spilled compost on the ground and they just left it laying there! The woman held a packet of what looked liked chocolate hobnobs and she just continued to munch away on them whilst the two men wrestled two trolleys worth of flat pack boxes into their van. Oh they did go back and retrieve the tree but not before it blew over again leaving another pile of compost on the path.

Roy and the children arrived back too soon spoiling my entertainment, and then it was our turn to entertain the world. It wasn't that hard really, dismantling the unit - we had to re arrange the seat configuration in the galaxy (minivan to my USA friends) but still after plenty of discussions we got it in and the children seated safely though not without complaint. I turned around when we were finished and I noticed the car behind us, the nice man in there watching - he was smiling at our achievement (at least that's how I would like to put it) ... we almost took a bow there and then.

The unit is in situ now - its still empty because I have not had time to put Toni's toy boxes on it yet. Maybe tomorrow ....

This One Went Wrong

I am sitting here listening to my eldest three children fighting over the placement of the sofa cushions! You would think it would be a pointless thing to fight over but according to them its not. The talk we had earlier about being nice to each other appears to have fallen on deaf ears.

We have had a week off from school this week, well everyone is pretty much up to speed on everything they need to so we came to a family decision to loaf around.

Monday was pretty much uneventful - we took a trip to the library which was cut short for various reasons. One of the cars was in for an MOT test, which it failed on a brake light being out. That meant another £17 for a retest. The evening was spent pretty much doing running about for the children's various clubs.

We have been stripping the wallpaper of our hall so the house was in real need of dusting, and tidying so I must admit I have been really good this week and managed to keep everything at a tolerable level of containment.

Tuesday we had to go to the supermarket I had not planned that trip but little did I realise that we had no night time nappies. Discovered that at 11pm Monday night when we lifted Seb to put him on the loo, the moment after his old pants were ripped off and placed in the bin! We had to improvise ... just lucky we had got a free sample of lady incontinence pants in the post - I never got round to wearing them! I covered them up with two layers of towelling pants. Seb's Pyjamas ware surprisingly dry in the morning which was a first. The rest of the day was taken up by mundane stuff like washing curtains and things you know how it goes. Oh and the car - we got it retested and it passed! The Rainbow's drop off on Tuesday evening was not significant except I couldn't help but notice in the twilight the people hurrying into the village with their beloved daughters, the cars pulling in fighting for parking spaces - and our local shop lit up like a beacon on the dull street. If was a funny moment I had, sort of people watching, maybe I am a little crazy after all.

This morning was nothing more than an exploratory run to the DIY store. I must say I was disappointed by the lack of variety of styles of paper they had for our hallway. Seems there is a fashion just now for big whirly leaf like designs which I just don't want in my hallway - I don't want brown or silver wallpaper either nor do I want a teal blue. HUMPH. The paint - well I decided to go for paint after the lack of inspiration in the paper department. I haven't settled on a colour or shad yet, nor have I decided whether I will have light reflective paint by dulux, durable stuff, dead flat matt by crown, silk, vinyl, suede effect, washable or something else I cannot remember to mention. The colour charts only confuse the issue further - so it looks like I am going to go for cream!

I want to share these videos of the children, we were just mucking around!




And this one went wrong!