Updated

I've updated Emily's photos on photobucket and I've also added in some photos of Phoebe

Sunshine

The sun has got her hat on, hip hip hip hooray!

The weather has greatly improved this weekend, making Sunday to hottest so far and too hot to actually sit in! This weekend we've mainly been indoors - mainly because on Saturday I did my back in and took to bed for the rest of the day with some mighty strong painkillers, and today Drew was too tired after night shift and it was just too darned hot! Hot I tell ya!

Thanks again to some freecycling I managed to get a hold of a small swing for Emily

And this is a picture of Emily's Evil twin... Nasty!

On line

Hurrah Ntl/Virgin managed to sort out our crossed lines and have swopped back our original telephone number! Even though I did have to email 2 MD's from Customer Services and speak to one very nice Michaela (VP's assistant). All we have to do now is ensure that we haven't been charged for the other customers calls over that weekend!

Feh!

What the heck have NTL/Virgin done now - well they've given our home number to some new customer. What a complete shower of idiots! So we apologise to anyone trying to reach us at home but please use our mobile numbers until I blog that we have our original number back!

After a long phone call to customer services - nothing changed in our predicament - we were going to have to wait until the 11th before they could get an engineer out to fix it. In the mean time any calls I make would be on the other customers bill and vice versa.

So kick butt, I emailed 2 MD of Customer Service's explaining what had happened. An hour later I got an email from one of the Directors Assistants saying that she was passing this onto his team. Later on that afternoon I got another call from Michaela, who is the VP's assistant, saying that she is speaking to an area manager and was was hoping to get this problem fixed within the next 24 hours. She also agreed waiting 2 weeks was just ridiculous. We're still waiting...

OMG!

Emily will be 1 in 6 and a half weeks! Can you believe it, time goes by too quickly. Can someone please make a pause button so I can enjoy this phase more?

I'm already thinking about birthday parties, shall we have one at home? Shall we do the Brewster's (yuk!). The only reason I say yuk to that is that Lisa and I had some lunch there last week and Jesus the food was awful, Lisa had a Mediterranean platter which was plastic prawns, cold cooked vet, and some mozzy cheese chucked ontop of cold tomato slices - even those weren't drizzled some some oil and basil!. My soup was ok, but had a thick scum on top indicating that it had been sitting under the heat lamp for some time. Phoebe had been outdone by 2 chicken nuggets on her plate (even though I did point to the large size on the children's menu when I ordered). None too pleasing lunch all round and I certainly wont be recommending Brewers food to anyone. Good thing was I did complain and the manager was very apologetic and removed most of the food items from the bill. But still poor Lisa had very little to eat. :(

On the road to recovery

Well after 10 days of feeling utterly crap I'm finally starting to feel better. Whatever it was it was nasty, damned nasty and I hope no-one else gets it.

So what have we recently been up to - well we had a BBQ on the 7th - which was successful. The kids had a fab time running around playing with the bubble machine, pinata and the chocolate fountain (boy you should have seen the mess). We finally made it to bed at 2am.

Next we took my local pack of Brownies (notice I said pack - as in like a pack of wild animals) off to the butterfly farm. I forget how many times I told them not to run, wait and finally told of them off for running off. Pah kids!

Anyway here are some photos of butterflies, I love butterflies!

This one hitched a ride on my bag, sadly I had to force him to leave as he didn't pay the fare.

This one I managed to photo was outside (a real live wild butterfly!)

3 headed goat

The pack!
OK so he isn't a butterfly but still kinda nice

Still here

This viral thing is still affecting my sleep. but I'm glad to say that the throat spray is helping to alieve the pain. I've lost 2 lbs over the last week as I'm struggling to eat (for once)!

Sick as a parrot

Turns out I have some strange viral infection that has hit my nose, throat and eyes. It's been making life hell as I've constantly have a sore throat, my eyes are now all crusty and my nose feels like some one has taken the cheese grater to it! I now have 3 medicines to take, 1 nasal spray, eye drops and throat spray.

I feel like a toxic dump

Apologies

Normal Service Will Be Resumed...

Shortly

Pout

More BBQ Photos

Emily
Jack - EXTREME CLOSE UP!

Paul trying to deny that he isn't really into kiddies toys!
It's a BEAVER!
The boy who blew bubbles
And the girl who enjoyed them
Gabi and Andrew - mull over the idea of baby-napping (I did say they could borrow her for an entire weekend!)

It's a puppet!

It's Canadian Day! Horrah and that means it's also beaver time. So here is a picture of this years beaver pinata in the making.

This week we also took a trip out to see Tosha and her family
Emily wearing her new sun bandana.

Opinions please

I'm thinking of buying some art work and I've been looking at this guys gallery on ebay. What do you think?

Bad things happen in 3's

First someone runs into the back of my car (3 times in 6 years). I'm still waiting to hear if it has been written off. Next my brand new t-shirt and white underwear have been dyed yellow as the infamous yellow duster got in the washing again! So hey what's it gonna be next?

Phew!

Sorry been busy this week (ha)!

Yesterday I cleaned the house from top to bottom (cleaned all the windows inside and out whilst testing some "new" products, hoovered, dusted, ironed, washing and drying)picked up some toys and books for free from a fellow freecycler, did lots of shopping (which included a chocolate fountain, some clothes and lots of food for our forthcoming BBQ on the 7th July). Is it any wonder I was in bed fast asleep by 8.30 that night?

Freecycling is slowly becoming my friend, I've recently picked up some new baby toys and books from fellow freecyclers and it's been great:

Emily playing with her new stash of toys

It was quite a bundle of toys and books!

I also visited Lisa, Paul, Jack and Mia this week. She is such a beautiful baby that she made me broody. I'm was also really pleased to hear that the pool worked for Lisa and seemed to speed up the whole labour process. Mia was also born in the pool and it was a very calm and serene birth. In fact Lisa's birth story sounds exactly the same as mine!

Anyway I've gotta go, got some beaver pinatas to make :)

She's here (at last!)

Congratulations to Lisa and Paul, their beautiful daughter Mia arrived this morning!

I can't wait to hear the full birth story. Lisa your a star - you've been in pre-labour for 3 days! Also chuffed to say that Mia was born in the birthing pool that we had our daughter Emily in. May the good luck continue as we will pass the pool onto someone else in the future.

Thrills, spills and bellyaches

After a lot of reasearch of hotels and theme parks I've finally got round to booking a hotel for our trip to Alton Towers. We asked Phoebe (last year) where she would like to go for a treat weekend away and she wanted to visit Alton Towers. So using the power of our much saved Tesco Clubcards and having some bellyaches about how to book all these things seperately I've finally got the hotel booked, purchased Alton Tower tickets and some tickets for Cadbury World (well that one is kinda my treat). Once the Tesco vouchers have arrived I should be able to confirm all the details and then look forward to giving Phoebe an exciting weekend of staying in a 4* hotel , the thrills of Alton Towers, and finally a bellyache full choclate at Cadbury World.

As one enters another leaves

Today we headed to Kiddicare in Peterborough to buy a new mattress for Emily's bed, but on the way back we were unfortunate to witness a crash scene where paramadics were battling to save a motorcyclists life. As we sped past I caught a glimpse of the paramedic performing chest compressions and it hit me that this guy was dying as we drove by. I can still remember the paramedic furiously pumping away and I remember thinking gosh that that is what it would be really like to give someone CPR. Not this fake stuff you see on Casualty. And I think to myself would I be able to do this for real? Would I be able to stay calm and perform CPR on someone? I like to think that my previous First Aid training would stand me in good stead but I don't think it would prepare me, or anyone else, for a scene of an accident like that. I have to ask myself that question as I'm seriously considering joining CamSAR, Cambridge Search and Rescue, as a search technician. But that's another story for another day.

On a happier note Lisa is just entering pre-labour (heck I didn't know this existed!). We're all sending happy, positive and pain-free labour thoughts out into the universe for her and her family. I wish Beanie a safe journey, oh and to turn round and face the back, that part's important! xxx

Are we there yet, are we there yet?

At the moment I want to run around my living room shouting "Is she here yet? Is she here yet" for the next few hours - as from the sounds of it from Lisa's blog she has just broken her waters (was that on purpose?). Anyway it's very exciting news and I'm putting all those positive and pain free thoughts out into the universe, because pretty soon whether it's today or tomorrow there is going to be another little angel on this planet. If it's tomorrow that's going to be one fab present for Fathers Day!

Some other news Emily's top 2 teeth have finally made an appearance - hooray to toothy pegs!

Hooray also to Lisa's mum in sending some Baby Mum Mum biscuits for Emily.

Here she is enjoying some!

Baby baby

Early on Sunday morning another little girl was born. Congratulations to Lucie and David, they have another beautiful daughter. Elsie I wish you much love and happiness in your life.

This week there should be another little girl arriving and I have to say I'm anxious. My friend Lisa is due any day and I'm pleased she has opted for a home birth using our birthing pool (don't worry she has new liners for it!)

I won't say my first child's birthing was a pleasure nor was it horrible but being in hospital was just the wrong environment for me. I like to be in my own home, sleep in my own bed and eat my own food. Sleep with the lights off (or dimmed real low), and enjoy the silence where you can hear your new baby gently sleep.

Emily's birth was a totally different experience. Not only was she a much bigger baby, but it was a shorter(no morphine required), less exhausting labour and I healed (hey no stitches) in double quick time after the birth. I can only attribute this to the lovely calm environment along with the birthing pool.

Lisa I can only wish you the same for your forthcoming labour. I salute you as you join the ranks of "the home birthers".