Here are my “monsters” now!
One has white fluffy paws, tummy and a fluffy scale down the back..
The other has cute little horns and buttons on his tummy.
Next I am writing a story about them…. What do you think would happen!?
The Versatile Blogger Award
Wow, I’m thrilled!
I’ve been nominated by the very lovely Jacqueline at How to be a Gourmand for The Versatile Blogger award. I met Jacqueline at a Total Greek Yoghurt masterclass. It was a great day where we all had a go at being “master chefs” and tried out some very yummy dishes. At the time Jacqueline was living in London but has since relocated to Hong Kong where her hubbie is working. How to be a Gourmand is a new blog for her and is a great read for foodie treats! We have kept in touch and I am really flattered to have been chosen by her for this prestigious award! Thank you honey 🙂
The rules for the award are:
- Thank the person who nominated you for this award and link back to them.
- Say 5 random facts about you.
- Spread the joy by nominating other bloggers.
- Let the blogger know about the nomination.
Five random facts about me:
1. I am the eldest of four and have two sisters and a brother. They are all secondary school teachers!
2. I did a skydive at 12,000 feet over Lake Taupo in New Zealand
3. I saw Oasis in one of their early gigs in 1994 at Sheffield Leadmill. I can remember it clearly as I was driving that night and was with two friends, Claire and Lou. We were going to go to see Blur but it had sold out so we went to this instead. The band were very clean cut and eager to impress – lol!
4. I have a wierd phobia about ladybirds. I’m not keen on the way their wings come out of their body and when they are u pside down their legs kick. It makes my skin crawl.
5. When I was in my late teens/early20’s I bought most of my clothes from charity shops and virtually lived in crimpelene dresses and coloured leather jackets. Either that or I made my own clothes from fabric bought on the market. It was very disposable fashion!
I would like to tag Sarah, who I have never met in person but who is a top blogger, Kylie, who I met at an event organised by Next last year and who has a very stylish blog and Charlotte who I met recently at this event!
Spread the blogger love!
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How to make a sock monster!
This afternoon I started a course called “Story Bags” run by Surestart.
“Story bags” enrich a child’s experience of a book by featuring elements of the story in them eg a Gruffalo story may have a cuddly Gruffalo or mouse.
The course kicked off with, instead of basing our creativity around an existing book, creating a character to be the hero in our own story! We had two hours to do all this (the tutor thought we could manage it in less than an hour!). High expectations…
To make this character we started off with a sock, a needle and thread, some stuffing and a couple of buttons.
Having two small children who fight given any opportunity (and because I love a challenge!), I decided to be brave and make two! Twins! So took a pair of socks and double the work.
1. First take your sock and turn it inside out.
2. Cut off the toes. Put the “toes” to one side as these will be the monster’s arms.
The heel of the sock will be the monster’s nose!
3. Cut a “V” shape at the end (where the toes were). This will be the monster’s ears so could be pointed, round, thick or thin.
4. Stitch around the edge of the “ears” and turn the sock the right way around.
5. Take a handful of stuffing and push this into the ears. Keep filling up the monster until it is nice and fat, particuarly the nose!
6. When you are happy with the filling stitch a row of running stitch underneath the nose area to make the “neck” but pulling this tight and fastening off.
7. Cut a “V” to make the legs. Turn inside out and stitch around the feet and up the legs. Leave the crotch open to put the stuffing in then stitch this up.
8. Take the “toes”, turn inside out and stitch up the sides. Stuff and sew onto the body as arms.
9. Sew a couple of buttons on to the “face”.
10. Next week we are adding extra bits like hair and other “monster” accessories.
Blog it for Babies, Community Spirit and Luminarium Windows!
Tomorrow (Thursday 4 May) the Blog it for Babies roadshow hits Nottingham! The very lovely Penny who blogs at The Alexander Residence, has arranged a wonderful opportunity for a group of East Midlands based bloggers to create one of the 12 large windows in EXXOPOLIS, the next Luminarium created by Architects of Air.
If you haven’t already seen a Luminarium, it is a large inflatable scutpture (actually it looks like a bouncy castle from a distance!) that you can go inside and explore! It will tour the world providing fun for families across the globe. Here is a picture of Noah exploring the Luminarium when we visited one earlier in the year.
The window will have it’s world premiere in Nottingham at the Wheee! Children’s theatre and dance festival at Lakeside Arts from 2-9th June. Wheee! culminates in a family weekend on the 9 and 10 June, with free craft, art, spontaneous performance and fun in the parkland around the arts centre, plus even more shows to choose from. Book shows now, the weekend attracted over 4,000 visitors last year!
I am very excited to be involved in this project! It will be the first regional meetup for the group and hopefully will help to create a community spirit we can build upon. Also involved are Becky, Amanda, Jen, Rosie and Ruth to name just a few East Midlands based bloggers. We are meeting at Lakeside Arts for a day of lots of cutting and sticking fun!
Mamasaurus and the Blog it for Babies team are also joining as they raise money and awareness for a health care unit for babies in Bangladesh. This will help to save lives and improve services in the country. Did you know one in 19 children do not live to see their fifth birthday in Bangladesh – a situation unimaginable in the UK. We are incredibly fortunate to have medical professionals and reliable equipment to hand when we have our babies.
If you would like to donate to this worthwhile cause you can sponsor us for just £1 by texting XVRL71£1 to 70070
A Mother’s work – A Meme
The meme was started by mother.wife.me. and I have been tagged by the fabulous Catherine at Making It As A Mum.
It’s a opportunity for women to give their personal perspective and experience on modern motherhood.
The rules are as follows:
Post the Rules
Answer the questions in as much or as little detail as suits you
Leave a comment on MotherWifeMe so we can keep track of the meme
Tag three people and link them on your blog
Let them know you tagged them
Tweet loudly about taking part using #amothersworkmeme
Here are the questions and the all important answers
Did you work before becoming a mum……………….
Yes, I worked most recently as an IT Project Manager for a law firm. I had been working in IT for about 10 years, and before that in various jobs whilst studying. I have hardly stopped working since turning 16! I enjoyed the job although it did require a lot of commitment in terms of travelling about the country, to the different offices, and obviously wasn’t something I could do part time. Before becoming a mum I didn’t really think about how I would juggle this with a baby (or two!)!
What is your current situation………….
Pretty much since I found out I was pregnant with my second child I have not worked (in paid employment!) so that is around three and a half years.
My hubbie works full time in a demanding job and commutes over 60 miles a day so it would have been impossible for us both to have continued with our careers. We have no close family who live near to us so the bulk of childcare is my responsibility. I probably knew this would be the case but the reality of it is pretty demanding.
I have looked for work that would give me a break from the routine and some extra cash but good part time jobs and flexible employers are hard to come by. When it came down to it, it was never worth the hassle of rushing about and expense in childcare that would result. I wonder sometimes how I would take to working for someone else (who isn’t under 5!) now I have been away from the system for so long.
Our eldest child is now at full time school and the younger one goes to nursery for a couple of half days (which we pay for). It is really nice having some time to myself and helps me do jobs that I find difficult to do with the little one about. I can then plan our activities so I devote my time to him when we are together. He starts going more in September when we get the funding and I know I will miss him then!
Freestyle your chance to put your own view across on the subject…………….
I totally agree that society does not value motherhood. Good quality childcare is expensive and flexible working isn’t freely available for parents. It is hard for parents to get the balance right and I feel like my husband misses out on a lot of things.
I do miss working or at least having some balance of work and home but overall I like the fact that I have stayed at home with my children when they have been little, although being a full time mother is not something I would have envisaged doing. It is really hard work at times but when I think about being back at work, I know I have got the more fun option and I do feel very lucky for that as it isn’t an option everyone has. We have definitely missed the extra income (and I have missed having my own money) but as your lifestyle changes when you have children we have made adjustments. I am constantly on the lookout for good buys and menu plan to avoid food wastage.
Being at home has given me the chance to explore other avenues that I may not have thought about or had the opportunity to try. I have done lots of courses (with childcare included!) through Surestart and now volunteer at their breastfeeding group as a peer support. I have also learnt more about nail art, sugarcraft, making jewellery with wire, crocheting, photoshop and fancy dress! I also have a network of fab, local mums who have become great friends. Blogging has also come a big part of my life and I’ve met a whole community of lovely bloggers through social media. We keep very busy and are never bored!
I would like to return to paid employment at some point although it would ideally have to fit in around school hours and holidays *puts creative head on…. My family will always be my top priority!
Ok so that is me, I would like to tag.. Clare, Peggy and Susan.
Thought of the day …………….. A mothers work is never done!
Blogcamp UK – 2012
Last Saturday (21 April) I joined 100 or so other bloggers at Blogcamp UK in Birmingham. This was the first full day, national event that has been held by the Tots 100 organisers and promised to be a fab day. Even better it was free! This is thanks to the generous sponsors – Skype and Cow and Gate growing up milk. Thanks guys!
I travelled down to the event with the lovely Sonia. We were both very excited about it, not least having a day off from the kids (just kidding!).
When we arrived we headed for coffee and it was fab to catch up with other bloggers who I have met before at previous events, spoken to on Twitter or be introduced to new blogs! Everyone was very friendly and it was a great, relaxed atmosphere.
The first session I went to was about Vlogging – using video in your blog! This is something I am quite interested in although I haven’t done any research into it. It turned out to really be a session on how to use Microsoft Movie Essentials which is a free downloadable package. It looks intuitive and easy to learn and I would love to take more videos of the boys and put together a mini movie of our days out etc. This is the kind of think I think I will only have time to do when I am retired but you never know!
Next I went to the session on making money from your blog which was run by, the incredibly inspirational Susannah Conway, a former journalist who turned to blogging when she suffered the loss of her partner. She has effectively turned her blog into a business running popular ecourses in photography and blogging. Whether it was the intention or not I left really wanting to try one if her courses!
The final session I went to was how to edit photographs taken on your camera with free tools online. It was focused around using the package picMonkey (which I haven’t come across before). It is being free, intuitive and quick so I will definitely be using it in the future.
Much of the talk at Blogcamp was about changes Google has made essentially meaning bloggers who take sponsored posts and are asked to put in follow links by PR companies, will lose their page ranking. As I understand it this may be detrimental in the success of their blog at getting future sponsored posts. I haven’t done any sponsored posts so this isn’t relevant to me but it was interesting to hear what was happening! I would love to monetise my blog especially when my littlest starts preschool and I have more time on my hands.
It was a brilliant day and we all headed home tired but inspired by the fabulous supportive community that has been created.
My Favourite Childhood Toy!
This post is inspired by a meme over on A Mummy Too’s blog, giving me the opportunity to show off my favorite childhood toy!
Well, I do still have a childhood toy. One, in fact, that was given to me when I was a newborn many moons ago. It doesn’t actually have a name, or at least not a proper one. I have always just called it “Dolly”…
Here s/he is…
;
As you can see – well loved eh!
I wouldn’t say this doll has been with me everywhere but I have always known it was hanging around at my parent’s home. When I had children of my own “Dolly” ended up moving back in and is now one of a contingent of toys that my boys play with.
In fact, my youngest calls it “Igglepiggle” which I guess it does look a little bit like 🙂
If you would like to join in or see more favorite childhood toys click on the button below!
Birthday Meme
I have been tagged by Pinkoddy (thank you!) in this meme so here goes! Learnt a thing or two about my birth date in the process..
When is your Birthday?
28 September
Pick 3 people who share your birthday
Dita von Teese – burlesque artist
Bridget Bardot – actor
Gwyneth Paltrow – actor
All very glamorous ladies!
Is anyone born in the same day and year as you? What do you know about them?
I found one person who shares the same day and year – Patricia Franca – a Brazilian trans-sexual porn star! But I can’t find out much about them as all the websites are in Brazillian.
However I have learnt (Paul) Mackenzie Crook was born the day after me – 29 September 1971. He is most famously known as Gareth from The Office.
List 3 people who died on your birthday and what you know about them
Bit depressing but here is a list 😦
List 3 notable events that took place on your birthday
In 1971 (my birthday!) the medicinal use of cannabis was banned when the UK Parliament passed the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971.
In 1968 The Beatles single HEY JUDE hits the top of the charts, it is over seven minutes long and was the longest song ever to hit No. 1, a record it holds to this day. Love this song!
In 1928 Alexander Fleming discovers penicillin by accident when he noticed that many of his culture dishes were contaminated with a fungus that had a positive anti bacterial effect on multiple organisms providing the basic block for the start of modern antibiotics.
Tell us about a holiday that falls on your birthday
St Wenseslas Day is celebrated in the Czech republic! I gather it involves a lot of drinking!
I would like to tag Amanda, Penny and Becky – lovely bloggers from Notts who I met this week!
mygorgeousboys 