Going Bananas

I've survived another weeked looking after 120 8 to 10 year olds, but only just! Being back at work was a real struggle this morning and I'm remembering why after last year I thought it was a good idea to take the Tuesday as holiday, oh well!

After prior warning to bring wellies I arrived on Friday night to a very muddy site at North 08. As I was once again avoiding the camping by staying at Mum & Dad's then the mud didn't bother me as much as it would if I was having to stay in a tent for the weekend.

Although it was exhausting it was a great weekend, the kids (for the most part) were great and it's about the only time of the year when I do all the actions to the songs! But for another year I'm now retiring the phrase Going Bananas.....We're Bananas and it will not be shouted again until North 09.

A new way to paint

I discovered this evening that there is a faster way to paint a kitchen. As soon as it happened so many blogging titles and comments sprang to mind but I decided just to let the photo explain it to you.

So my dinner was a little smaller than I anticipated this evening....

The Big 3-0 (part 2)

So after a lovely day on Friday, then official Birthday arrived on Saturday. So many people obviously thought I'd forgotten how old I was going to be so they kindly gave me lots of cards with a big 30 on the front to remind me.

Matthew, Charlie and Abi came round after breakfast and we started to get ready for my BBQ in the evening which involved putting up the gazebo that next door had kindly lent me in anticipation that the great English weather in the middle of August is not as good as you might expect. Auntie's Pauline and Sandra arrived after lunch which was lovely and then it was back to preparations. I think we would have planned to be a little bit further on in the preparation by 4pm but we weren't! So there was a lot of hard work put in by Mum, Dad and Sal - Big Thanks!

Then it was party time! Mum & Dad had brought with them some (not too) embarrassing photos of me spanning my 30 years, which were generally quite amusing - I still think the Noddy fancy dress costume was the best! I had a lovely evening so thank you to everyone that made it on the evening and to those who couldn't make it thank you for the messages, cards and presents.

Sunday was a fairly quiet affair, more fun with Abi who decided that at 23 months she is old enough to swig out of the wine bottle (don't worry it had been finished and washed out!) and to try on all of my shoes again, it was obviously so much fun when she'd done it on Saturday that they all got pulled out again!

So this is it, I'm now officially out of my 20s, no major lightening bolts, sudden aching bones, loss of memory...so maybe I'll survive my 30s after all :)

The Big 3-0 (part 1)

It finally arrived, after a year of wishing that my age would suddenly stand still (or start counting backwards), the 30th birthday still happened on Saturday and it wasn't as bad as I was expecting. In fact it was better than I was expecting thanks to lots of lovely family and friends.

Sally arrived on Thursday night so we got an early start on Friday morning with painting pottery at Rainbows Ceramic Cafe. It turns out neither of us are that creative, although I'm a lot faster at it than Sal. I painted a jug and while waiting for her to finish her bowl decided to paint a plate as well and still had to wait a while.... It was a lovely morning though and the painting is fun, I'm going to start planning now what I'm going to do next time!

After that we went for a lovely lunch to Cafe Concerto, there was a bit of debate over whether we should have cake or not but as that was the main reason for going then the decision was to share one.

Mum and Dad arrived in the afternoon and after a shopping trip we went to see The Railway Children at the National Railway Museum in the evening. It was a great performance by all of the cast and the staging was fantastic. The seating wasn't great, although we could see fine it was very squashed. For me being between Mum and Sal wasn't so bad but Sal was a bit squished by the rather large lady next to her...!

The painting gene

I don't have it. It must have missed me, Mum & Dad definitely have it, Sal has it, I don't have it. I hate painting. I knew I wasn't that keen on it because I have been painting before and found I get bored very quickly but I thought that was just a patience thing, but I spent Friday night and Saturday painting the kitchen and I hated it. Even when I thought I was being really careful my roller still managed to hit the bit that I was trying to avoid. The paint constantly seemed to appear on the worktop or the floor when I didn't even notice it dripping and at one point I'm sure there was more paint on my hands than my brush.

In spite of all that I finished it! Except for a few bits that I can see now that I should have sanded a bit more or filled that bit in then generally I don't think it looks too bad. This time I even remembered to take the blind down before I started instead of trying to paint around it! The fridge is now in it's place so the only thing left to do is to have the old fridge taken away which will be done this week.

A lovely weekend

As Mum has pointed out I also had a lovely weekend after leaving Keswick on the Saturday. On my way home I realised that I was driving past Catherine & Chris's house so I popped in to drop off the baby carrier that they had left with us for the remainder of the week. Having not seen or spoken to Catherine since last year at Keswick it was lovely to be able to spend a little bit of time with them this week.

It was then onto home to see Mum & Dad. After lunch I quickly sorted out two loads of washing and left them with Mum while I went to see Mark and Carlie. It was lovely to see them both but more exciting was meeting Noah who arrived about 6 weeks before. They were trying to get him into a bit of a routine which didn't go quite to plan as he fell asleep on me when he was supposed to be awake, but he was just so cute I couldn't wake him up! When I got back home a few hours later the washing was washed, dried and ironed - thanks Mum!

One of the reasons for going to Mum & Dad's from Keswick was because I was going to Katherine's in Dalton on Sunday afternoon so rather than driving back to York then back up to Dalton it made sense to stay in Stockton and go there on the way home. Katherine was having a baby shower with her bump due at the end of August and having just finished work it was a good excuse to have all the girls round. It was great to see her looking so well and it was a good chance to catch up with people linked to ASD that I haven't see for at least a year, particularly Louise who was there with her 8 month old Jack, and Becky and Jenny from Eversheds. Jenny's little girl Lucy was particularly useful when it came to present time, delivering the next present for opening to Katherine and of course helping to open them as well.

After that it was back home to get ready for a week back at work, now to plan the next holiday...

Keswick

I wasn't sure how to write about my week in Keswick so I've decided to go for the easy (but perhaps longer, sorry) option of trying to remember day by day details, so....

Saturday: I arrived at Keswick at 11am, narrowly missing getting caught in the traffic which would have added another 2.5hours onto the journey, unfortunately Helen & Colin weren't so lucky. As I'd been worrying about getting the tents up in the rain, it turns out I had no need to worry the weather was fantastic, so Matthew put my tent up, and then their tent, and then the trailer tent. The rest of the day was sorting tents out before going to the first meeting of the Keswick Convention.

Sunday: Another sunny day and a morning trip to the convention tent for the Family Service. Back to the tent for lunch and then while everyone else either walked Walla Crag or into town I opted for the afternoon in the sunshine on a blanket outside my tent, ending with an ice cream just as Matthew, Charlie and Abi arrived back from town. Again a trip to the main tent for the evening celebration.

Monday: A day I had been looking forward to, Sally and Rob were on holiday in Ambleside so had arranged to come and visit for the day. Starting with the morning seminar at the convention, they then went to town where I met them after the bible reading meeting. Looking forward to lunch at the Wild Strawberry we were disappointed that it was closed for the day, so we decided to go to Bryson's instead which was a great alternative and I recommend the apple pie. After that it was a bit of shopping while Rob stocked up on the things that Sal hadn't packed to bring with them and then Rob beat us both at Crazy golf, a very frustrating game where some holes are an easy hole in one and others were a very difficult 10 - for me and Sally at least! Dinner was a BBQ with lots of people I didn't know at first- Norton people and added extras from Wales. After the evening celebration with Charlie we stayed for the concert with Stuart Townend which ended with my jumper soggy with her tears and us both needing tissues - such girls!!

Tuesday: Another seminar at the main tent with Sally and Rob before they went back to Ambleside, while I stayed for the bible reading. In the afternoon Charlie, Abi and I had a trip to the Wild Strawberry having missed out on it the day before. Another evening at the main tent and then round to the Drew/Arnett house for a cup of tea and a catch up with Catherine before meeting Vicky and Matthew in the pub for last orders, and of course chips after the pub closed!

Wednesday: A lie in this morning while just going to the convention centre for the bible reading. To get a quick start on a walk we had lunch in town, eating sandwiches while sitting on the pavement. Then we set off to walk round Derwent Water. We lost a few on the way but I'm very pleased to say that I made it all the way round, Helen said it was about 6 miles but I'm convinced it was longer so I've done a rough route and calculated it as 8 miles so I'm sticking with that when I tell people about it. There was a strong temptation to get the boat launch back from various stops on the lake but I decided to stick with it and made it all the way round on foot. I took a break from the evening celebration to recover and to keep Matthew company as he spent all week on evening babysitting duty, I'm sure he wanted to read his book more but my constant chatting meant he only had 15 mins reading time before the others got back.

Thursday: Another visit from Sally and Rob for the seminar and bible reading, unfortunately I had to rush off afterwards to go to a work meeting in Penrith otherwise I would have been able to join them for lunch at the Wild Strawberry that we'd missed out on Monday. Meeting in Penrith wasn't too bad and I was back for 4.30pm in time for a little shopping before it was time for dinner at the Old Keswickian. It was then onto the Theatre by the Lake to see The Importance of Being Earnest (....a handbag...!), which was a really good and very funny production, still not sure why we needed 2 intervals though.

Friday: Final day of the convention, just went for the bible reading in the morning. Lunch at not Little Betty's (can't remember what it's called now, something about pickles?). Short shopping trip as it was now raining constantly, the annual purchase of Lemon Cheese from Ye Olde Friars, a visit to the Earthworks tent (the convention mission information tent/bookshop/fairtrade shop/coffee shop). The final evening celebration and as it was the final evening a last visit to the Keswickian for chips.

Saturday: After constant rainfall all Friday evening and overnight we woke to a very boggy field surrounding the tents so it was a quick breakfast of bacon sandwiches and try and get everything packed up and put the tents down as quickly as possible. Not knowing my way around a tent much I stayed in the car with Abi out of the rain. Although she did put up quite a fight to get me out in the rain, every time it started getting worse I'd sit in the car and shut the door only for her to insist "Jenny, Out"!

More photos of the week are here.