Hello 30s - Day 204 - 219

A whopper of a Hello 30s update folks! The bank holidays have really thrown me all out of routine, and I don't know where the days have gone... well I know one of them went down the pub ;)

Day 204:
The man in action! Boyfriend does love a good barbecue, and doesn't need much of excuse. The excuse on this occasion, was that the sun was out. He did make some mean kebabs though, with onion, pepper, haloumi, and chilli and lime marinated chicken :)

Day 205:New clothes! Boyfriend took me shopping (yes he really is rather awesome), I came back with a top, a cardigan, some sandles, trousers, and two skirts. A lot of people know that I don't usually where skirts, I think it is boyfriend's way, of trying to make me into, a bit more of a lady :)

Day 206:Now I know it isn't healthy, classy, big or clever, but I really did enjoy my lunch, of chinese take away leftovers. Usually I have soup, every day, so this was a real treat.

Day 207:Work in progress. You may recall I was making a card for my mum, to give to her twin, well she didn't like it, so it was back to the drawing board. I opted for something a little less experimental this time round.

Day 208:I won! A little ad in the next issue of the the online crafting magazine - creative crafting. It is always nice to win something :)

Day 209:I imagine that you are starting to notice a lot of cakes on here. The general rule of thumb, is that I bake, when I am going to stay somewhere. Boyfriend requested coffee and walnut cupcakes, for our visit over to his parents.

We have been over to Boyfriend's parents for various occasions recently, birthdays, and anniversaries. On this occasion it was to meet the new puppy I mentioned last post. Meet Bess, she is sooo fluffy! This was actually a calm, sleepy moment, after she had been worn out over a bit of flamingo tug-o'-war. It wasn't a real flamingo - don't worry.

Day 210:Saturday morning in Diss. While Morag (the car) was in for an MOT, Boyfriend and I went for a lovely, sunny, walk through Diss. We stopped on a bench to look at the view, and to drink our milkshakes, topped with cream and marshmallows.

Back at Boyfriend's parent's house. They have a duck, that has been nesting in their compost. Ducklings have now hatched, and they happily waddle around the garden, between the compost, the pond, and the bird tables. I love the stragglers, they suddenly have to make a dash for it, in order to catch up with mum.

Day 211:It is that fluffy puppy again. How cute is that face? This was a brief pause in between dashing around the garden, trying to eat anything in sight, and digging holes :)

Day 212:Pimm's o'clock! Bank holiday Monday. A lovely 6 hour pub lunch, in great company :)

Day 213:Cheat photo! I took this the other week, after I had finished it, but couldn't put it in here until after my Sister's birthday. I actually have a lot of photos of cards hanging around, that I have had to keep hidden, until they have been received, it can make a 'photo a day' challenge very... well... challenging.

Day 214:Bye BMW. Boyfriend's poor car has gone to the scrapyard in the sky :( Cursed by it's electronics, it is a real shame, as it was a lovely car. I remember the first time my boyfriend came to pick me up, I hadn't known any guys before, that had, had a big estate car, I thought he was a real grown up :D

Day 215:
More cake!!! This time we were going to visit my family. I thought the kids might appreciate chocolate stars.

Day 216:A very chilled out Friday. I watched the whole of the Royal Wedding, I'm not a Royalist, but I do like a bit of history in the making. It was a bit long, and a bit dull, but I thought Kate looked lovely. I also went round my parent's house taking snaps of all the rooms. As you may have read previously, they are moving house, and this might have been the last time that, I set foot in the home where I grew up. These are the family photos above the stairs.

Day 217:Saturday saw us out for a family meal, celebrating my Dad's retirement. As you can see Boyfriend is very popular with the ladies.

We also gave Dad a laptop. He hasn't had a computer before, so it is going to take a while to get used to his new toy - Mum isn't going to get any of those jobs done now :D

Day 218:Sunday morning, and we were about to leave for home. Farewell to the street where I grew up. Bye to the grassy island, outside the front of the house, where I used the watch the hedgehog, and fox, cross over at night, and where I used to watch the boys play football in the day.

Day 219:Boyfriend knocking up some more yummo food. We had spent another bank holiday Monday in Guildford, having a little bit of a shop. We had then driven around, scouting out different areas, that we might want to move to. Later, while I was upstairs buying exciting things, for my jewellery making, Boyfriend was putting together a real treat, meat, cheese, bread, wine, and everything, there were even candles. Did I mention how awesome he is ;)

Hello 30s - Day 189 - 203

Day 189:I was left on my own on a Saturday afternoon, what was I to do with myself? Bake cupcakes of course, from my Hummingbird Bakery book. It is the first time I have tried to make them, and they were so good, I didn't bother to ice them, and I honestly didn't believe you could have a cupcake, without some kind of butter icing goodness!

Day 190:Boyfriend and I took a walk around Virginia Water, it was lovely to see so many things coming into bloom, and starting to flourish :) Can anyone tell me what those big cabbage, lily things are?

Day 191:Ma and Pa have been in their home for over 30 years, up until I went to uni, it was the only home I had ever known. Now they have sold it, and my mum is following her dream of getting a bungalow, she has never understood the point of stairs, and having to clean them all the time, it just seems like extra work :)

Day 192:I made fish pie for the first time, thanks to The Hairy Bikers. Mum's everyday fish pie, except we used smoked haddock, added lots of parsley, and put some nutmeg in the potatoes. We also left out the cheese from the mash, in my humble opinion, adding cheese is what supermarket bought, fish pies do, to make up for there not being enough flavour :) It was yummo!

Day 193:Another Ebay find, I fell in love with this bug pendant, I have a thing about bugs at the minute :)

Day 194:All being well this will be Ma and Pa's new home. I am every excited for them. It is crazy to think that within the space of 7 days, they put their house on the market, accepted and offer, found a place, and had an offer accepted. I just hope everything now goes to plan - fingers crossed. :)

Day 195:We went to see Boyfriend's folks, for his mum's birthday, so after the previous success, I made more cupcakes, but this time I iced them.

Day 196:Boyfriend and I also cooked dinner for his mum and dad, 3 courses, as a birthday treat. Dessert was pecan pie, from the Hummingbird book again :) It was the first time we made it, but it was a huge success :)

Day 197:Happy, happy news! My friend had her first baby, a little boy called Lewis. I am so very pleased for her, and her hubby, they are going to make the most awesome parents :) I made them a card featuring one of my zombie bears :)

Day 198:Easter eggs! This is boyfriend and I, attempting to make up for eating those Lindt bunnies :) We just need to try not to eat these ones too, before we see the little people :)

Day 199:Look what postie brought me! Neon pink leg warmers! So far, this is what I have for an 80s themed party, that I have been invited to. I think it is a good start. Technically, they too are from Ebay, my postie doesn't make a habit of randomly giving out leg warmers... although it would be quite cool if he did :)

Day 200:Boyfriend asked me to make a sketch, of what I would like my web site to look like. I think, I missed the point he was trying to get at, he didn't too impressed by my quick little doodle. After some bickering, and back and forth, I realised he was after style, more than layout - why didn't he say that in the first place? ;)

Day 201:No, I don't have a site yet, this is a mock up in Photoshop. Boyfriend approved, he says that he has something to work with now :)

Day 202:A bit of a cheat, I didn't take this pic, it came from Rob's parents. It is their new golden retriever puppy, Bess. I am itching to meet her! She is sooo flufffffffyyyyy! :)

Day 203:
Out in the garden. I would like to say we did lots of work, but in truth, boyfriend did pretty much all of it, that is him working in the background. He then fired up the BBQ :) I was inspecting the japanese maple, it has scale bugs again, grrrr.

Hello 30s - Day 177 - 188

Day 177:New, one portion dishes, courtesy of ebay :) Now we can cook in bulk, and freeze portions, hopefully, we will waste less, and over eat less :)

Day 178:Another Ebay find, a super cute sugar shaker, sadly it came in two in my hands, as I touched it :( Thankfully, the seller was very apologetic and nice about it, and gave me a refund :)

Day 179:My mum has asked me to create a birthday card for her twin, so here is a scribble of a bird.

Day 180:Eugh! Murky water! This was the point where I decided I should change the water in my sanding tray, so that I could actually see what was in there - some buttons it would seem :) The buttons and the new water are still sitting waiting for me to sort them out.

Day 181:I had been feeling quite sorry for myself, so boyfriend bought us some chocolate brownie ice cream. It is very hard for one, to continue feeling for oneself, when they are eating chocolate brownie ice cream.

Day 182:
Polymer clay lollipops! After sanding, comes glossing!

Day 183:
We were given some lovely fresh eggs by Rob's sister-in-law, so it seemed wrong to open a tin of tomato soup for my lunch. Shame I didn't have any bread, other than bought, sliced, but it still made very yummy cinnamon french toast. I must be careful though, if I look back through this project and realise that there are as many pictures of french toast as there are of next door's cat, I know there is a problem :) I am now, also over half way in my Hello 30s project! Only 6 months to go then :)

Day 184:

Playing with polymer clay, creating some bright pastel extrusions :)

Day 185:
Simple, but effective little flowers made from slices of extrusions.

Day 186:
The card I am making for my mum. Other than the scribble I made, truth be told, I'm not entirely sure what I am doing. I am winging it a bit :)

Day 187:
Well I think it could have been better, or it could have been much, much worse. It isn't finished yet, I'm just hoping I don't mess it up completely during the next stage.

Day 188:
I took a picture for my sister. She wanted a copy of the recipe for oaty biscuits that my nan used to make. Much easier to take a picture than copy it out again :) There was a picture of some of the biscuits, in one of my earlier posts :) Feel free to give them a go, 150ºC normal oven, 130º fan. I also don't put them in for as long as it says, if you take them out earlier, they are still gooey, but cool to chewy goodness. If you put them in for the full time, they will be very crunchy. Enjoy!

Hello 30s - Day 165 - 176

Day 165:Tweet! Working on some little drawings.

Day 166:
Now it is a fact that Rob and I don't buy little chocolate bunnies for ourselves, ever! We only buy them for little people ...so...we didn't? ...Yeah we did, and now we need to stock up again :D

Day 167:
After all that bunny eating, I thought I would make an effort and do some dancing, woo exercise! I am not a good dancer, and if you look carefully I am the collapsed red blob to the right of the little figure :)

Day 168:
I wouldn't say this was my most successful attempt at handmade wrapping paper, but Gayle does love stars, so it was all okay.

Day 169:Spent the evening curled up on the sofa with boyfriend, and he treated us to some Thorntons chocolate dipped caramel flapjacks - yummo! You want some now right? Do it! :)

Day 170:
Lulu bowl and random bead! Oh how I have missed my clay.

Day 171:

Second day playing with clay...some circles.

Day 172:
Third day of playing with clay, and I do love my circles.

Day 173:

I'm sure I am not the only one, that spent quite a lot of time watching the Radio One longest show. I thought it was a great idea, and Chris Moyles and Comedy Dave did brilliantly. I think the longest I have ever stayed awake was 36 hours, and I was like a zombie, so 52 hours was quite astonishing. I know they were allowed to have some sleep, but I'm not sure if they actually took any - there is always that fear isn't there, that you will feel much worse after a little snooze.

Day 174:
Oooh tins, how exciting. 11 tins the be exact, found on Freecycle. I am very pleased with them. I am hoping that next time I feel the urge to have a mammoth bake, my goodies can be kept in a tin, out of sight, rather than on a plate, and that way they might last a little longer :)

Day 175:
Oooh lovely chair...

... I mean lovely steps ... I love our new step-chair! Genius! Collecting it, did mean we spent a very lovely, sunny, Saturday afternoon, stuck in a car trying to get in, and out of Tooting, but we managed not to kill each other, or anyone else, even after the sat-nav took us down many a closed road, and then threatened to run out of battery. We were even in a good enough mood to make a giant, celebratory, gourmet, cauliflower cheese, as a team, on our return, yeay!

Day 176:
It is next door's cat again! Who doesn't love a cat in a box? I love the way they find themselves random places to snooze. On this occasion it was a box full of those air pocket things used for packaging ... they had a little less air in them by the time Ollie left the building though :( :)