Sticking at things.

Well I have been keeping up with my running.  

We are now on week 7/10 of our beginners group and going well.  I've also been able to manage 1-2 running practices a week in between sessions.  Running with people seems so much easier as there is that element of distraction which inhibits your mind from encouraging you to stop.  Some runs have been easier than others, but I am getting there. I hurt my knee around week 3, and was really disheartened.  My head was telling me not to run on it, but I couldn't bring myself to miss a session.  Thankfully ice and stretching seemed to work and it's been so much better and no pain when running now.  I also treated myself to a snazzy new pair of running trainers (see photo above) to try and reduce the risk of hurting my knee further.  Love them.  I wouldn't have believed the difference a good pair of trainers would make. I did have my gait analysed by doing the run on the treadmill in the shop...I did feel like a wally but I'm sure I looked like a gazelle!  Good job it was a quiet time of day.
I've found a running partner in the village too which helps with practicing and motivation and as of yesterday I have signed up for a 5k Race for Life at the beginning of June.  I'm looking forward and hope this will be the start of many to come.

I have also been to a local free buggy fitness group which sounds less hard core than it is.  But when you're doing your walking lunges, crunches, push ups, planks, sprints etc. you are soon the one that finds yourself wishing you could turf your baby out of the buggy so you can have a sit down and recover!!! 

I have also started a new circuits class that's re-establishing locally.  My first go at circuits and the class was small (just the 2 of us!) so there was definitely no hiding!! My favorite bit was donning some gloves and punching the stuffing out of the instructors pads...what a great stress reliever! 

All this fitness is making me feel a bit stronger in myself...fitness and self esteem.

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Making has been a bit on the slow side here as I feel I've just been buzzing here, there and everywhere.  We often are away at weekends visiting people and it always seems to fall in back to back weekends. It's lovely, but I've had enough now and am sticking at home for a while!  

I've been able to make something (a little commission I suppose) but it hasn't been given yet so I'll keep that under wraps for now.

So other makes have been focused on my little man. We have been having some success with sticker charts.  They never used to work, but after potty training, he was still looking for instant rewards, so the implementation of the sticker chart gave him a longer term goal to focus on.  The first was a pirate ship sailing to the treasure, the second a dinosaur.

He loved the idea that he was getting closer to the star.  He got a mini Haribo bag of sweets for each little star which he loved, and for the pirate ship he got a Spiderman Doll (or action figure as I've been corrected plenty of times!) and for the Dinosaur he got  a big Playdoh factory.  It's quite nice as his birthday is Christmas Eve so he gets one big present drop a year, and this is a way of re-enforcing good behaviours but also giving us a good excuse for us to get him some new toys once in a while.

The current one is a snake focussing on getting washed and dressed with NO FUSS! 

 

 I may be aiming too big as 'procrastinate' is his middle name!  All three year olds are the same I'm sure, but sometimes the battle is so irritatingly frustrating that it deserves a chance to change for the better!  We have had a few mornings/evenings with no fuss whatsoever and all happening in real time which have been delightful (yes three year olds also have no sense of time passing what so ever!).  Some he's still mucking about so he's gone without his reward.  I'm sure with time he might click on to the idea! His reward for reaching this one is a family trip to the zoo so he's quite keen for this one.

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Another little project this week was an up-cycle I suppose. My little man had a very cool dinosaur bag for pre-school which broke, but it was too good to throw away.  So I cut out the leather dino's and re-purposed them into a collage for his room.  I had a spare green Ikea frame kicking around so it seemed the perfect use for it for now.
 I used various bits of fabric, wool, ribbon etc.  and we painted the sun, leaves etc. together.  We did use bubble wrap to make some textured paint but for some reason the paper sort of made it disappear.  When he saw it half made he gasped when he saw it and said he really liked it.  When I showed him the finished one he carried on playing...and my husband laughed.  I'll take that criticism as I think it looks really nice hanging in his room so it will stay there until it grows old.

     The pictures not that clear here...and maybe that's for a good thing.  Every time I look at it it looks more and more pre-school!

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My littlest in now sitting for long periods, weaning is going well, and he is still rocking on all fours!
He is also getting into trouble around the house determined to reach for all of his big brothers toys.

My time on maternity leave is coming to an end with a return to work at the beginning of June.  My uniforms still fit (just).  That will be a whole new phase to adjust to... trying to keep all those balls up in the air.  I could stay off forever to watch my little people grow and learn. 

Enough for today.  I'm enjoying soaking up the warmth in my little sun room, making the most of nap time.  So I think I'll pop some more music on and enjoy some me time.

Love from me and my little men x

Easter

Happy Easter!

I hope everyone's had a nice Easter Bank Holiday.  We've been semi-confined by the pox (which I can thankfully say took a turn for the better on Saturday) which we think is mostly scabbing over, but as he does look ridiculously spotty we were a bit worried of the general public reaction to his smiley spotty face.  We instead stayed local, lots of nice walks, a trip to the seaside including an obligatory ice cream, and some gardening time too.  

I think it was really nice just to be still for a bit, and when the kids are happy we are happy. 

Easter bonnets. I'm not sure where this tradition came from.  It's a bit of a weird one for boys.  For girls you can get pretty bonnets, stick some flowers, chicks, eggs etc. on and they look immediately cute.  Do that to a boy and there's a very good chance he'll get laughed out of the playground!  At only 3, my little man is oblivious to the hilarity of this weird tradition...so lets get the bonnet made and cameras out!

We initially thought we'd go down the decorated crown route.  

This is our effort from last year...

We paper mached a crown which was all a bit gloopy and fun.  Then I made some rabbits and stuck them in the grass at the top (this was a night before jobby as I did think we'd miss playgroup due to the pox).  Here it is...

The crown was a tad small and he did not want to wear it! Oh well...never mind.  I'll try again next year.  But then in the shower I had an epiphany...could I convert my straw hat into something he'd wear?  With 15mins until needing to leave...it was a bit like challenge Anneka!  So with sellotape and wool flying everywhere, lots of giggling and panicking, we transformed the hat from this...

Me modelling the hat in 2013.

....to this.....

He loved wearing it for the bonnet parade around Hythe, holding on for dear life in case the wind blew it off!

Bunnies nestled in the grass...maybe should have used more sellotape...

What a Mess!

But a winning mess all the same!  THIRD prize! So he was delighted with his bag of eggs that he won.  First prize went to someone who had encompassed more of the religious side of Easter. Second to a cute girly hat.  We'll take Third...and now I'm pleased we had the hilarity of the 15minutes of woolly Monday morning madness before playgroup.

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Easter eggs are all well and good, but who really needs all that chocolate?!  After ploughing through the chocolate still lingering from Christmas in an effort to cleanse the house of any chocolate impurities, the thought of another onslaught of chocolate is just a bit sickening.  Especially with the pressing issue of trying to get rid of a post baby belly.  My little man likes chocolate, but he doesn't have it that often, and he would never eat loads in one go, so I thought we don't need to buy big chocolate eggs or anything, but I did want to do an Easter egg hunt.

So a little bit of an alternative egg hunt I suppose.  We had a rock painting craft session, where I painted some rocks in Easter themes with the plan to hide them around the garden for a hunt with a small pressie at the end.

Enjoying the painting session.

The finished rocks.  You can tell who did the monster one...

Finding them around the garden.

The finale was quite fun.  After all rocks collected and counted, he had to lower his prize down from the tree.  He had a great time.  The best part about using the rocks is that we had about 4x different hunts that afternoon.  Then they were used to load in his trucks upstairs.  I found one in my boot this morning, so I guess he still is enjoying hiding them!

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He's been busy in nursery making Easter cards.

At home we made some Easter cakes for ourselves and our two neighbours.  They were delish.

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I'm also working on something a little different...Running.  I achieved couch-5k after my first was born, and now I need to get back on it.  I've joined a weekly beginners running group which started on the 30/03/15.  The people I've met are really nice.  So far I have done 4x runs.  I don't feel as bad as I thought I would, and I'm looking forward to achieving something at the end (hopefully!).   If I lost a little post baby belly along the way I wouldn't complain...

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I hope you all had a good Easter!

Love from me and my little men x

Family Love.

I’ve had a truly enjoyable weekend.  I’ve been spoilt by my two boys for Mothers day. Homemade cards and flowers had my little man busy in nursery all week.  A lovely breakfast and a roast dinner cooked for me, and bunches of flowers brightening up my day.

Usually I am a bit of a flippety jibbet on weekends wanting to clean and then go out and herd the boys to various locations and ultimately feeling like I need another weekend to recover, however this weekend I was very much happy to go with the flow and just chill.  We went out shopping (a trip to Ikea for some bits and bobs), we went walking, we played, and I even had time for crafting.

Delightful. 

 

I am so lucky to have my family and they whole heartedly reassured me that I’m not doing a bad job of being a mummy (and I’m sure that’s something that most parents question at some stage).

Love. Love. Love.

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I had to buy some photo frames from Ikea for some pictures I had recently bought.  On opening the smaller one, I was most surprised to find there were two frames in the pack! That find made me instantly smile, almost like finding treasure. So with all the family love I’ve been feeling this weekend, it seemed fitting for this make.

 

I’d recently seen this Valentines heart card idea on Pintrest, and thought it would look fitting in a frame for a pop of colour in the living room.  I had all the ingredients…a frame, cardstock (cut to the size of the frame), needle, and embroidery cotton in red.  I had contemplated a different shape, but actually I really liked the heart so I forged ahead and traced a heart template on my card.

 

I picked the first needle I came to…Small eye and thick thread – NIGHTMARE!  It was fine, but threading the needle took more time than the project in total probably!

 

So making this evenly spaced, threading the cotton through the outer shape through a centre point and repeating around the shapes outline.  It was a nice one to do in front of the TV last night.  The thread did start to get a bit congested toward the end so I employed some pliers to pull the needle through a bit more easily.  Surprisingly, it took quite a lot of thread to complete. Thankfully I had enough red, otherwise I would have had to do a 2 tone heart.

 

 

TA DAH….

 

 

 

 Here in it’s frame…shot taken at night time so a bit dull…so here’s one in daylight with it sitting nicely in my living room.

 

 

 A simple but effective project.  I’m really pleased with how it turned out, and it makes me smile to look at it

Love. Love. Love.

More things to show soon.

 

Love from me and my little men x

 

PS..I'm not sure what's happening with my blogger but the layout keeps going all screwy...so excuse any bits that look odd!

Festive Fun!

I have found a moment to sit down and put my feet up.  The Christmas tree is twinkling, winter sunshine is streaming through the window and I have a cup of tea by my side.  The house smells divine as I found a last miniature candle in my cupboard which I’d been saving and forgotten about.  It’s my absolute favourite Yankee Candle “Christmas Cookie”.  My large ones burnt down so soon I’m going to have to fork out for  a new replacement one.

So we’ve been doing all sorts of Christmas crafting the last few weeks.  The house has looked like a bomb has gone off, a glitter bomb to be precise!  We are finding shiny sparkly bits on most surfaces, in most of our food, and it has spread into almost every room! 

There are a few crafting bits that are for other people, so we won’t mention those here yet.  We can mention a few though…

Salt Dough – We tried to make salt dough when I was with my sister last year but they didn’t work.  I think we blamed her oven at the time, but the microwave recipe was a disaster too.  I think this put me off having another go, but as an impromptu activity with my boy, I thought I’d try again.  I used this recipe this time (1 cup of flour, 1 cup of salt, 1/2 cup of water – baked at 100^oC for 2 hours or so).  My little man loved emptying the cups into the bowl, and armed with wooden spoons we mixed and mixed until we could get our hands in to squidge it altogether.  A fantastic sensory experience for little ones – although he pulled the funniest face when he tried to eat some! 

We had a little problem with the dough…when rolled out and cut when I attempted to lift onto the tray they all broke, so we had to do them thicker.  Maybe next time I’ll cut them out onto greaseproof so that they are easier to remove.  We cut out a lot of shapes…

They had to have quite a while in the oven to dry out as they were so thick.  I think thinner ones would look nicer.

Another day we spent painting some of them.  Someone likes to mix the colours to make a browney/green gloop…I won’t tell you who that is!

I then decorated a few further…

They really need to be varnished to seal them properly…but I think I will scrap these ones and make some new ones next year.  I started to lose patience with them as I wasn’t really in the mood for painting them.  I have hung a few in the tree…

Snowman – I felt we needed a few more home made items to brighten up our Christmas displays.  So we made our Snowman!  There was a lot of glueing and fluffing…but slowly our Snowman came to life!  I love this one…it was fun to make.

Craft Room – I forgot to blog about my lovely home made birthday present made by my friend.  She has made me a lovely sign for my craft room.  She felted it by hand and I think it it is one of the best presents I’ve had!

How cool is that eh!!!?!!!

I’ve got a little sneak peek for you too… This fellow has been used in something I am soon to reveal!

Hope you are all getting festive!!!!

Love from me and my little man x

Happy Halloween!

I think I prefer more of the treats than the tricks…so we stocked up our sweetie bowl ready for the onslaught of masked crusaders in search of their sugary treasures.  Luckily for us this year we had one (very loud) knock at the door…two boys stood on the doorstep looking particularly un-spooktacular...and that was it!  Lots of sweets for us then…Hoorah!

The nursery had a Halloween party so my little man went as a vampire.  The coat was the only thing that kept him from pulling off his cape, but he did wear it for a good time in nursery with his friends.  I think he looks cute.

In nursery he decorated his own Halloween pot and it was filled with goodies.

We had some pumpkin carving at home, and Wills popped the pieces out to make our friendly, toothy ghoul…

He enjoyed lighting him up in the dark to see him glow. 

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

Love from me and my little man x

PS…I have been busy squirreling away in the Craft room.  Two homemade presents wrapped and sent down to Wales already! One homemade present waiting to be wrapped, and two more imminently starting!  I had a friend to keep me company earlier this week. x

The Easter Bunny brought some sunshine…

Easter has been lovely this year.  We’ve had so much fun along the last few weeks it has truly been non-stop.  My little man made it into nursery for one day before the Easter weekend following him having Chicken Pox, and I’m glad he did as he managed to fit in some Easter craft and an Easter Egg hunt!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My parents came down to spend time with us (and to do a bit of babysitting!) which was very enjoyable.  We fit in a trip to Marwell Zoo on Good Friday which was a good day out.  It was jolly cold, but we wrapped up warm and made the most of it.  My husband and I then shot off to a friends wedding, and my little man enjoyed a trip to Longdown Dairy Farm with his Granny and Grandad.  They saw little chicks, goats, bunnies…  He’s been very spoilt! Along with roast dinners, chocolate cake, trips to the park…he’s a very lucky boy…

From one bitterly cold weekend with even days of snow in the week to…a weekend of sunshine! That Easter bunny had some sunshine dust hidden in his basket for sure!

So this weekend my little mans other Granny and Granddad came down so, to make the most of the sun, we went off to the aquarium at Bournemouth and then we played on the beach! It was most enjoyable and a bucket and spade was the perfect accessory.  I’ve put a few pictures on for you.  We are still finding sand appearing everywhere…but hey…who cares?!

We also fit in a spot of shopping (with some snazzy new shoes for him), a yummy roast dinner cooked by my husband, wine, chilling, walks with the dog…it’s been great.

A little bit of sun has been a welcome respite from the long overly drawn out winter.  A little bit of warmth on the skin and being able to be comfortable outdoors without wearing a million layers gives you a bit of a re-charge to the batteries.  It’s almost like we’re cold blooded lizards searching for somewhere warm to bask in the sun.  The sun’s made a little teasing appearance this weekend, but I think he has also decided it is too cold and has gone away again to hibernate. Hopefully Mr Sun will be back soon….!

We have had a wonderful Easter, surrounded by family and friends…now I think it is time for a rest!…time to squirrel myself away for some more crafting I think…

Love from me and my little man x

Busy Times

Lots of other bits have been happening around here lately.

1) My nephew’s first birthday!  Yes…the year has whizzed around and St David’s Day marked his 1st birthday.  He has grown so much, and the boys are beginning to tolerate each other more and maybe even play together! We bought him a big top circus tent which went down a storm, and they were running in and out, reading stories inside and generally having fun!  The cake my sister made was of a cow and it was very professional.  She also made him a wonderful quilt for his birthday.  Here is a picture of her doing the finishing touches…

and you can find the finished quilt here.

We had lots of yummy food including the essential party rings and welsh cakes…yummy!
There were personalised party bags too with bubbles and all sorts in them…my little man got some funky wooden letters for his door which I’d been eyeing up for ages!






A fabulous birthday celebration!





2) Blinding Conundrums!  After washing the hideous kitchen blinds last year they ended up getting shredded in the washer, so I bought some fabric last year and asked my sister in law to make me some blinds.  She has a background of being a professional curtain maker so I was on to a winner!  The blinds she has made are gorgeous, and good quality.  We got them at Christmas and she was going to come and string/hang them for us, but what with other commitments our windows have been bare for a while! I’d been avoiding getting them out as I was having a blind panic (excuse the pun!) and had no idea where to start. Internet tutorials left me muddled.  So with my mum down we took on the challenge together.  It took us several attempts, but we finally got a blind that goes up and down!  It’s not perfect stringing…but it works (not perfectly) and it will do!  Here’s the pictures…and don’t look at my pile of washing up! 

Thanks Shey! They look fab!

3) Mother’s Day! My mum lives in Wales, and if you don’t know they charge for carrier bags over there! I always get caught out and end up carrying my purchases out of the shop un-bagged…it does make you feel like you are stealing!  She asked me for a carrier bag holder, so I thought I would make her one…but I’d obviously have to fill it for her with free bags! So I’ve been hoarding plastic bags like they’ve been going out of fashion! They don’t photo well as they always look a bit life – less but here is her present…she really liked it. 

My little man has also been busy showing me how much he loves me.  I received two cards, a cute bought card and one home made card.  The home made one is the best of course!  Here they are…















Happy Mother’s Day to all my wonderful mummy friends. You all do a fab job.

We’ve had a busy and entertaining couple of weeks!  I’ve been crafting in the background on and off, and I have a bag holder ready to go and bunting cut out…now it’s snowing (again!) I think my crafting will pick up speed again!

Love from me and my little man x

PS I almost forgot to congratulate my husband on completing the Bath half marathon in memory of his best friend.  His training only consisted of 3 or 4 40minute runs so I am extremely pleased and proud that he completed it. X