Hi everyone,

Sorry not been on much as Ive been having the time from hell.

Car failed MOT, other car has 2 slow leaks and needs 2 new tyres, I chipped bathroom sink with a perfume bottle, solicitors insisting I pay £75 for a boiler service before they will complete on flat, ran out of gas credit so cold showers and no heat until Chris gets paid Tues, he found out he didnt get a job he wanted, toilet cistern broke and was overflowing inside and outside house...............and thats all in the last 72 hours!!!

If anyone needs me I will be drowing myself in a bucket of wine!

I hope your weekend has been better x x

Flat Stanley Project

Back in May I told you about a Flat Stanley Project that we were starting where we had made Flat versions of ourselves and they were going to go travelling around the world.
The project is still ongoing but I thought today I would share with you some photos of some of the visitors we have had so far!

I can't wait to see what adventures Flat Vicky and Flat Aidan have had!

Value Baby Wipes, is there anything they can't do?

My Name is Vicky and I am addicted to Baby Wipes!

There, I've said it.

I LOVE baby wipes, I only ever use a value brand, normally Morrisons Savers, and they cost me the princely sum of 48p for 80 wipes yet they have so many uses. Now I know if I was being money saving I would use a reusable cloth but sometimes you just need the convenience and hygiene of disposable.

Here is just a few of the things I use them for:

• Cleaning Aidan up whilst travelling or after a snack
• Taking my Make up off at the end of a day
• Cleaning up in the car, I grab a wipe and dust the dashboard and gear stick whilst I wait for Chris to finish work or whilst stuck in traffic
• Cleaning the Laminate flooring
• Removing colouring pencil scribbles off of the floors and cupboards
• Generally dusting the Living room
• Cooling down when hot and sticky in summer
• Giving a nice shine to shoes
• Wiping over the Bathroom, sink and loo. For extra hygiene you can pop a bit of Disinfectant on them.
• Removing anything sticky from anywhere! Wipe, scrunch and throw away!
• Wiping down your laptop to remove sticky fingers
• Getting rid of grubby finger prints from light switches and sockets
• Removing cat fur from sofas, rugs and clothes
• Wiping Cats wet paws when they come in from outside to prevent a trail of paw prints
• Cleaning bin lids, again you can pop some disinfectant on them too and then chuck away
• Clearing up spills, especially things like coffee granules
• Wiping the handrail on the stairs, doesnt make it slippy or dangerous and god only knows what germs lurk on there.
• Giving a public loo seat a quick once over before use

And thats just a few!
Now do you see why I always have a pack on me?

Surprise!!!

Yesterday we went to a Surprise 40th Birthday Party for our Good Friend Peter, he knew nothing about it and thought he was just going for a Lasagne at our Friend Michelles house. We all hid in the dining room (let me tell you its hard keeping a 3 year old quiet!) and when he came through shouted surprise, as you can see he was!

Peters Sister had emailed us photots of when he was younger which we printed and
hung around the room.

Photos were taken with all the friends that came, more memories to treasure.

What Birthday party would be complete without presents...........................

....and of course cake!

Later we played on the Wii and chatted, everyone had a really nice time and we spent a fraction of the cost of a night out in town :-)

Valentines Day

This year I am going to make Homemade Valentines Gifts instead of the usual over-priced items and cards that the shops ram in your face as soon as the Christmas items are all sold out.

I thought I would begin Chris's Valentine Morning with a mug of tea. All you need is some drawstring tea bags (which I have some of anyway) and some red paper cut into heart shapes, you can write a little love message if you want to.

I LOVE the idea of sending him his Lunch in a bag as gorgeous as this looks but I imagine he might get some stick from the other men in his office if I did!

I will probably make him some Heart shaped sandwiches using a cookie cutter and I am definately going to wrap a bar of chocolate to look as cute as these, I plan on writing a love note on the reverse of the paper as a little surprise.

Upon his return from work he can be greeted by some tasty homemade fudge Hearts which look lovely but are actually quite simple to make using

• 1 1/4 cups milk
• 3 1/2 cups sugar
• 8 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut in small pieces
• Pink food coloring,

Place milk in a saucepan. Stir in sugar; add butter. Over medium heat, stir constantly, until sugar dissolves and butter melts. Increase heat to medium high, bring to a boil, and cover with lid. After it has boiled for a while remove pan from heat, add food colouring. Let the fudge sit at room temperature without stirring, until the mixture is lukewarm. Stir the fudge with a wooden spoon until it changes from glossy to opaque and is thick and creamy, 2 to 5 minutes. Quickly pour into prepared pan. Use piece of plastic wrap to smooth fudge into the pan, creating an even surface. Let cool completely, 2 to 3 hours, and cut with a heart cookie cutter

To relax from a hard days work, I will give him this sweet message in a bottle. In the bottle you place a handwritten love letter, some heart confetti and some bath pearls.

Finally following a Homecooked meal he can climb into bed to read his book and find his page is marked with this lovely handmade Bookmark.

I can't wait to show him throughout the day how much I love him x x

I wish I could crochet!

"The Donkey Sanctuary is asking its crafty supporters to turn their needles to a new herd of donkey-themed crochet projects to help them raise funds for their essential work worldwide.

The crochet donkey mobile phone socks, pocket tissue holders, keyrings and bag charms will join the ever-popular array of knitted donkey toys, hats and other goodies already kindly created and donated by supporters. The finished masterpieces – which being hand-crafted are all unique, just like the donkeys cared for by the charity – will be sold via the charity’s Visitors’ Centre and online shop www.donkeyworld.org.uk, as well as at a variety of events throughout the year.

Marian Gumbrell, The Donkey Sanctuary’s Community Fundraising Manager, says:

“Due to the overwhelming success of our knitted donkey patterns we wanted to make sure that that there were projects available for crochet enthusiasts as well. The new mobile phone socks, pocket tissue holders, donkey keyrings and bag charms will help to raise valuable funds for The Donkey Sanctuary’s work around the world, and we hope they will raise a smile or two as well.”

To receive a free copy of the pattern booklet with full instructions for making the crochet mobile phone sock, tissue holder, donkey keyring and bag charm, please contact Marian or Ruth on 01395 578222 or email Volunteer Fundraising on VFR@thedonkeysanctuary.org.uk. "

A little extra cash and some fun on the way

If you read my ramblings often you will know I am being made redundant in May, you will also know that I would very much like to be a Stay at Home Mum once I finish work. With this in mind I am always on the look out for extra ways to earn some pennys.

Did you know that you can make extra money simply for giving your opinions, playing games, watching videos or even just shopping? Most sites pay out in Paypal or gift vouchers, a few will pay in actual cash via BACS and you can devote as much or as little time to them as you want to.

A couple of my Favourite sites are:

Swagbucks By completing surveys, watching videos, playing games, doing ordinary searches and answering a daily poll you can redeem for Amazon vouchers. With quite little effort you can redeem once a month easily.

Topcashback This site pays you in cash via BACS. All you need do is go through this website when online shopping with hundreds of stores and you receive a percentage of your total back in cashback. It takes a couple of weeks to track and become payable but in the last year I have had £200 back on products I was buying anyway!

Superpoints Not a quick earner but for spinning a lucky wheel each day you can win points to be redeemed for vouchers.

Toluna Another thats not a quick earner but some interesting surveys means you can redeem for gift vouchers.

Yougov Yougov has a minimum cash out value of £50 which is a lot BUT there are some really, really interesting surveys on there. It is the actual site used for government research and you often see it quoted on the News and documentarys.

Vivatic Is a really useful site as it puts a list of available surveys in one convenient location and then all you need to do is click through. Once completed it adds to your balance, this saves you having a few balances at once.

Thats just a few that I use and as I said before you can spend as much or as little time as you want on them. In the week I will pop on and do the basic clicks and watch a few videos. Once Aidan has gone to bed I will sit and do a couple of surveys. A few people I know have managed to make in the region of £1000 - £2000 in a year, and who wouldnt want that extra!

I just can't believe that my Gorgeous boy is 3 Today, where did that time go?

I remember so well waiting and waiting and waiting for him to arrive, the anxious feeling as I went in to be induced, the floods of tears when they told me he was stuck and I would need an Emergency C-Section to assist him, laughing in the operating room as they played music to make me laugh and the joyous moment that they told me had arrived safely whilst (hilariously) "We've got to get out of this place" by the Animals was playing!! Now he is a huge, healthy, happy lad who will chatter and laugh with me.

Happy Birthday Aidan, Mummy loves you x x

Fancy a Relaxing Saturday?

DANNIE'S 12 HOUR CLIC SARGENT READATHON!

SATURDAY 4TH FEB 2012

Starting at 9.30am GMT

Get yourself cosy, a pile of books organised, snacks sorted and sit back and relax ready to read for anything up to 12 hours in the Great 12 hour readathon!

£5 registration fee – Register online

http://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/dannieadventure or email Dannie for further details. dannie992@hotmail.com

You can get friends and family to sponsor you too if you want to, for however long you choose to read! Payments to be made via http://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/dannieadventure

Prizes to be won along the way, from books to book tokens and signed books.

You can keep up to date on all the goings on on the day at the blog, including further details about the challenge.

http://thailandforclicsargent.blogspot.com

Part of Dannie's fundraising plans for Clic Sargent Thailand trek

CLIC Sargent registered charity number England 1107328

Oh Next, why do you taunt me so!

There was a knock on the door yesterday and I opened it to discover a rather windswept courier delivering my new Next Directory Catelogue. It comes in 2 parts, clothes and then my favourite the Home Directory.

I love receiving the new home book, its hard bound with glossy thick pages that just ask to be turned. There are always such lovely items in there that I have to sit on my hands to prevent me ordering instantly! I can begin to picture where items might fit in my home and of course I am always very jealous of such wonderful, pretty and most of all tidy houses. I know of course my home would never look like this, Toys are the dominating feature in my Living Room, mucky fingerprints are a constant battle and there is something spilt on the laminate flooring daily but a girl can dream!

Here are the gorgeous items I am currently dreaming of:

101 list revisited

I decided to look over my 101 in 1001 list today and see if there was anything new I could cross of or at least mark as a work in progress. I am pleased with how the list is progressing. Theres definately going to be some that I wont achieve before the finish date of 11th Feb but still overall happy, some things I would have never have done were they not on here.

1. Tell my son and my partner I love them every day
2. Try for another baby
3. Move house
4. Send a care parcel to a soldier serving our country abroad.
5. Grow my own veggies
6. Make at least 5 new friends (5/5)
7. Bake a cake at least once a month
8. Make/sew at least 6 material bags to give as presents (5/6)
9. Read the BBC 100 greatest books (48/100)
10. Entertain friends once a month
11. Make someone laugh everyday
12. Complete a Diploma course
13. Visit Edinburgh
14. Adopt a Donkey from Sidmouth Donkey Sanctuary
15. Clear my debts16. Save £10 a month for my sons future17. Recycle more
18. Write a meal plan every week
19. Give blood as many times as possible
20. Write to my elderly Aunties every month
21. Always remember my bags for life when I go to the shops
22. Condition my hair once a month
23. Have a long relaxing bath ALONE once a month
24. Watch at least 10 films I wouldn’t normally watch (10/10)
25. Dye my hair a different colour
26. Go to Occo, the Moroccan restaurant that I always look at but never go into.
27. Have a no electric night once a month
28. Go to PYO
29. Spend a day “visiting” my town with a tourists eyes and go to places I would normally walk past e.g. – museum
30. Research the American presidents
31. Watch the top 25 musicals (11/25)
32. Knit myself a funky jumper
33. Buy some stripy socks in honour of my friend Fay!!
34. Buy locally more often and support the littler shops
35. Go to see a Shakespeare play
36. Buy a pair of flowery Doc Martens
37. Read the work of the poet Laureate each year (2/3)
38. Make a record or scrapbook of my sons life
39. Hold a corn snake
40. Hold a snake skin (wearing gloves!) Glad that ones done!!
41. Improve my credit score
42. Sell my flat
43. Send random friendship cards to each of the 6 houses in the UK with the same address as me
44. Learn how to set up a blog
45. Sit on a horse
46. Visit Warwick Castle again
47. Go back to Shell Island in North Wales
48. Get my £50 pay out from YouGov!!
49. Book tickets to attend a 2012 Olympics event
50. Visit the Library more often
51. Leave a friendly post it note in all the library books I borrow
52. Make my Best friend a 30th Lucky dip
53. Get a water butt and attach it to the gutter
54. Go and see Priscilla queen of the desert in the west end
55. Visit charity shops more often
56. Cook a Thanksgiving meal for friends
57. Talk to at least 1 stranger a week
58. Take the time to write a letter of thanks when I have received good service in a shop/restaurant/hotel
59. Make a snowman
60. Catch little spiders and take them outside rather than squishing them (cant promise to do the same with biggies!)
61. Buy my mum a present on my Birthday
62. Go to a zoo with my family
63. Talk to my Grandparents more
64. Halve my shoe collection
65. Sort through my bedroom chest of drawers
66. Finish Aidan’s Alphabet cross stitch
67. Watch every episode of The Secret Millionaire
68. Buy myself another piece of jewellery from Tiffany’s
69. Visit a Christmas market
70. Have a PJ day once a month
71. Put up a bird table
72. Try Sushi
73. Get a fourth tattoo
74. Organise a reunion with old school friends
75. Attend reunion with old school friends
76. Make myself go somewhere that I really don’t want to
77. Wash up for my Nan at least once a week
78. Check the oil and water in my car every 2 months
79. Clean my car inside and out every 2 months
80. Visit Bath again
81. Visit Wookey Hole again
82. Go to the mountains in the Rhondda
83. Find out more about my Paternal Grandparents who died before I was born
84. Bake Diabetic cakes for my Dad once a month
85. Cook a “takeaway” dinner for my Mum and Dad so my mum can have a night off once every 6 months
86. Feed the ducks at least 3 times (3/3)
87. Organise the photos on the computer
88. Write to my Aussie pen friend once a month
89. Learn to accept help, people wouldn’t offer if they didn’t want to
90. Return to work Part Time and manage to stay Part Time through effective budgeting
91. Knit some squares to do my share
92. Send 20 people a surprise present just because (9/20)
93. Eat chips from the wrapper at the beach
94. Eat an ice cream at the seaside
95. Collect a pretty pebble or shell every time we visit the seaside.
96. Do at least 1 Race for Life
97. Update my CV
98. Get a family portrait done each year (2/3)
99. Sit by a fire talking with my Partner
100. Start to write a Bucket list
101. Visit the theatre at least 6 times (6/6)



Finish Date Saturday 11th Feb 2012


Red = Completed

Blue = in progress

Busy but thinking of you all!

De-Cluttering

From reading a few other wonderful Blogs I can see that I am not the only one who wants to do a bit of declutttering this year.

"But its so time consuming"
"Theres always something more interesting to do"
"I get stressed out that theres so much to do"

I hear you cry! Well thats exactly how I feel but then I found this

De-Cluttering Calendar

Give it a click and you will see that it is a fabulous calendar that gives you just one task a day to do, thereby breaking it down into small manageable chunks. All of the little tasks will only take a few minutes out of your day, leaving you with plenty of time for the things you want to do.

Its a great Blog too with lots of tips so whilst you are there why not pop the kettle on
and have a read.

Welcome to 2012!!

Chris, Aidan and I celebrated with Family, we had sparklers and lit Chinese Lanterns. We also very much enjoyed the wonderful New Year Firework Display in London on the Television, such beautiful colours.








I hope you all had a fabulous evening x x