A week in review…

Last week was a good week 🙂 The weather get hotter to the point where it was out of control on Sunday.. Work is a little crazy considering we are now monitoring stock in the kitchen closely – I really dont care about this but the company doesn’t like spending outrageous amounts of money on Coffee and Tea – It got to the point where the kitchen was raised during a management meeting… Also still working on my ISO certification project, the drop date being tomorrow for the last of it and with everything going well we should get our recommendation next week Samantha is hella excited about her party that is coming up only 2 and a bit weeks to go now, so each night we have been working on bits and pieces for it – I’m running pretty far behind now on the prep but with a couple of other things which have now been sorted out her birthday celebrations are getting more and more attention Miss Amy is getting married in January and her mum through the kitchen tea on Saturday evening – Fun was had by all and as she says they scored on the gift front, now we are looking forward to her Hens Day/Night next month 🙂 was joking with Amy that I should be going to the bucks party as I did know Daz first 🙂

Friday Afternoon… Can see it was taken at 2:30 – This was just before the storm came through and put most of Liverpool in a blackout

Sunday Afternoon at 4:21pm – 41.5, and this was when the temp dropped a bit still a hot hot hot day

Miss Amy at her kitchen tea

A lesson in life

A friend once told me (more than once) the following statements and in the past i’d given them lip-service and always assumed that they were right but that it would never directly affect me

Some of the more common phrases he would tell me

a) People NEVER change – No matter what happens we can never truly change

b) History repeats itself

c) We just keep going around in circles

d) The past is best left there – it’s there for a reason

But given my last few weeks/months I’m thinking that maybe he has a point and that the above statements are true and can really be relevant, maybe sometimes things should just be left alone and maybe safer not to re-visit them but then if you dont re-visit them how do you know that they really do just belong in the past… because not everything has to stay in the past




Meh, just some interesting food for thought 🙂

Don’t Answer Lists

A friend was recently going through my iPhone and noticed that I have a number of people in my phone book as “DONT ANSWER….”Insert persons name”. This started a rather interesting conversation as to why I would have a group of contacts like that, and why I wouldn’t just delete the people from my phone, and I have a couple of reasons for this.. 1st is well everyone does it – screening calls, if i see it flash up on my phone with a big old picture of them and the name DON’T ANSWER I know straight away to ignore the call and let it go to voice mail, 2nd; if i delete the person from my address book how am I to know who it is & not knowing peoples phone numbers off the top of my head makes it a bit harder if I was to answer it in a rush then get stuck talking to someone i really don’t want to. – I could always take it one step further and chanel Becky from the Shopaholic movie and give them all there own ring tone with “do not answer it’s… Blah blah blah” but that could get me into a little trouble if they were to ring while I’m with other people they know…


And then when is it time to finally delete someone from your phone book if you haven’t spoken to them in a while – I mean what’s a decent time frame? – But that is a whole other kettle of fish…

Awesome

I’ve recently been embracing the reading of blogs/websites and have come across 2 which are really good…

First is Things Bogans Like

An extract….

Twitter

In the past 18 months, the new bogan has belatedly made the switch from MySpace to Facebook as its social networking website of choice. This has caused trendsetters to start making the switch from Facebook over to Twitter. Once the bogan realises that there are celebrities on Twitter, and that no interaction on there is more than 140 characters in length, it will be unable to resist the appeal of broadcasting its every move to its friends via its phone or computer. Even better, the 140 character limit is something that bogans have been training for for years, via generally unintelligible text message abbreviations. The trendsetters, meanwhile, will migrate elsewhere, galled by the flood of tweeted rubbish that the bogan will bring.

The other is called The Crabby Traveler

An extract

What happens when you put a man on a mountain with terrific snow?

Going into Easter weekend, I was watching the weather. The plan had been to do some cycling in Alsace, which I’d done last year. Last year, with Easter a little later in the year, I stayed in Otrott and did some great rides through rolling hills with blooming trees. It was fantastic, and I was nursing my back and checking things out since I’d not ridden a lot since I’d crashed in January.

This year…well, it wasn’t clear what was going to happen. Reservations had been lined up for a hotel, but Tuesday I was looking at the forecast and it wasn’t looking so fine for cycling. Calling for snow, I decided I’d better rethink things. I began checking snow reports in the Alps at various resorts, then looking for available rooms. It wasn’t looking so good, but finally I found something, booked it for three nights, then cancelled the Alsacian hotel.

The drive to Dornbirn Friday was nothing but painful. Starting swiftly from Wiesloch, we cruised at typical Autobahn speeds south. It wasn’t long that we were on the A8 when the trouble began. Now it was raining non-stop, but compounding matters the traffic got nasty. And it stayed nasty. The drive should’ve been about 3.5 hours, maybe 4. It took 7. I was so weary by the time we found the hotel, and crabby in case you were wondering.

However, Saturday things were quickly righted. Take a look at the posted pics. Blue sky. Fresh white snow on the Arlberg. Once on the mountain, I looked around. Here it was, Easter weekend…and no one was there. You’ll see that on some of the pics. I couldn’t believe it! I did a run, then another and returned to the car to drop an unnecessary layer. We then slowly made our way down a couple of runs to St. Anton. That’s where the people were. And a lot of them. Mostly, it wasn’t a problem. Except when two or three groups of ski students were taking up the entire run. Argh.

It’d snowed all night, so the runs weren’t groomed. The blue runs, which should’ve been kind of boring for me, were actually tough due to the moguls that were buiding up. I dug it though.

Sunday turned out to be a gray, overcast day and tough skiing due to the lighting. We’d decided to ski out of Lech, a rather posh town over-run by rich Russians and others who can’t help spending loads of money. I kept trying different lenses — orange, rose — but nothing was helping. But it was better than being stuck in traffic. And it was enough fun that we decided to ski Monday before heading back.

What a fantastic idea that turned out to be. I’m not sure I’ve ever skied in better conditions. It had snowed overnight again, and Easter Monday was a brilliant blue sky, amazing snow, and we went back to Lech and went to a high up run. Scoping it out from the chairlift, I saw a red run that looked cool. So we gave it a go, and it was the best! Challenging, not any ski students, and we ended up skiing there all day. It was that light powder, and there was a good stretch with some fun moguls. Wow it was terrific! I skied it really hard, and finally we called it a day. And paid for our pleasure with a nasty drive home, through a whiteout in a construction zone right after Stuttgart that had me gripping the steering wheel and hoping for the best. I learned Tuesday there’d been a 60 car accident in Austria, so I felt pretty lucky.

Cake Making

In an effort to reduce the costs of Samantha’s Birthday Party, I am going to attempt to make her Birthday Cake myself. In preparation of this I did Wayne’s birthday cake over the weekend – Everything went off okay, apart from the fact that I don’t like the writing icing pens – they are a lot harder to use than I first thought! So providing I dont need to write on Samantha’s cake we are good to go!

Ingredient list

3 x Green’s Cake Mix

6 x Eggs

450ml – Milk

6 x Table Spoons of Butter

Plastic Icing

Yellow Food Colouring

Blue Food Colouring

Butter whip icing

Black Icing Pens

Freckles

Cake cut down to the star shape and all the pieces left over

Half Iced


Completed with the yellow icing



All done…

What a week…

This week will certainly go down as an interesting week, Monday morning started out okay but quickly changed arguements took place, lost a Frenchman, saw an old work friend, hot tempaurtures, a 3yr old who doesn’t want to sleep and a regular time – they were just some of the things that took place.


Last night was a good night though, with putting other things out of my mind I went and did some of the shopping for Samantha’s Birthday Party and stuck to budget! 🙂 Also managed to get the Tule for my skirt, and things for the My Little Pony party aswell… Coffee afterwards proved to be good and to hear that other people were having a crap house week as well made me feel a whole lot better!

Tule for the 80’s Cyndi Lauper Skirt

Life Lessons

I got sent this a while back… An interesting read… and i quite like it

Written By Regina Brett, 90 years old, of The Plain Dealer, Cleveland, Ohio

To celebrate growing older, I once wrote the 45 lessons life taught me. It is the most-requested column I’ve ever written. My odometer rolled over to 90 in August, so here is the column once more:

1. Life isn’t fair, but it’s still good.

2. When in doubt, just take the next small step.

3. Life is too short to waste time hating anyone.

4. Your job won’t take care of you when you are sick. Your friends and parents will. Stay in touch.

5. Pay off your credit cards every month.

6. You don’t have to win every argument. Agree to disagree.

7. Cry with someone. It’s more healing than crying alone.

8. It’s OK to get angry with God. He can take it.

9. Save for retirement starting with your first paycheck.

10. When it comes to chocolate, resistance is futile.

11. Make peace with your past so it won’t screw up the present.

12. It’s OK to let your children see you cry.

13. Don’t compare your life to others. You have no idea what their journey is all about.

14. If a relationship has to be a secret, you shouldn’t be in it.

15. Everything can change in the blink of an eye. But don’t worry; God never blinks.

16. Take a deep breath. It calms the mind.

17. Get rid of anything that isn’t useful, beautiful or joyful.

18. Whatever doesn’t kill you really does make you stronger.

19. It’s never too late to have a happy childhood. But the second one is up to you and no one else.

20. When it comes to going after what you love in life, don’t take no for an answer.

21. Burn the candles, use the nice sheets, wear the fancy lingerie. Don’t save it for a special occasion. Today is special.

22. Over prepare, then go with the flow.

23. Be eccentric now. Don’t wait for old age to wear purple.

24. The most important sex organ is the brain.

25. No one is in charge of your happiness but you.

26. Frame every so-called disaster with these words ‘In five years, will this matter?’

27. Always choose life.

28. Forgive everyone everything..

29. What other people think of you is none of your business.

30. Time heals almost everything. Give time time.

31. However good or bad a situation is, it will change.

32. Don’t take yourself so seriously. No one else does.

33. Believe in miracles.

34. God loves you because of who God is, not because of anything you did or didn’t do.

35. Don’t audit life. Show up and make the most of it now.

36. Growing old beats the alternative — dying young.

37. Your children get only one childhood.

38. All that truly matters in the end is that you loved.

39. Get outside every day. Miracles are waiting everywhere.

40. If we all threw our problems in a pile and saw everyone else’s,we’d grab ours back.

41. Envy is a waste of time. You already have all you need.

42. The best is yet to come.

43. No matter how you feel, get up, dress up and show up.

44. Yield.

45. Life isn’t tied with a bow, but it’s still a gift.”

Friends are the family that we choose for ourselves.

Oatley Park

Some photos I took the other weekend down at Oatley park and then further down are some photos Susan took as well… I think they all came out pretty good, was surprised how behaved Samantha was given Susan kept shoving a camera in her face…

Photos I took…

Samantha taking a photo of me

Samantha Bear…

Susan

Silly people who share the same birthday (Iain & Susan)

Susan

Mirror Mirror on the wall… well table in this case

Samantha

Susan & Jax

Samantha Bear

Photos taken by Samantha

Self portriat – cause everyone needs to learn to do these

Echinda we came across

Susan…

Taken by Susan

Me.. Rarely does she get any photos of me…

Some dude… Obviously he’d been there a while 🙂

Samantha Bear

One month to go….

Samantha’s rockstar party is only 4 weeks out now which is a little scarey given how much I still need to get done, but I have booked in a reptile handler to come out and he will be bringing along an alligator, turtle, lizards and a few snakes for all the kids to look at and touch.

Some of the stuff for the party favours have been bought but a lesson to be learnt is always count how many kids there will be before buying stuff, because I didn’t do that I need to go out and buy some more stuff.. along with all the plates, serviettes, balloons and a pinata!

The song list has changed a little as well.. and what I have come up with now is

1. God gave rock and roll to you – KISS
2. We will rock you – Queen
3. Girls just want to have fun – Cyndi Lauper
4. We made you – Eminem (This one has to go on… its her favourite song, and unbelievably there is no swearing in it.
5. TNT – ACDC
6. Respect – Aretha Franklin
7. Walk like an Egyptian – The Bangles
8. Surfin’ USA – The Beach Boys
9. Come Together – The Beatles
10. Call Me – Blondie
11. Girls & Boys – Good Charlotte
12. Champions – Queen
13. Just Keep Walking – INXS
14. Your the Voice – John Farnham
15. Love Lockdown – Kanye West
16. Celebration – Kool & the Gang
17. Supermassive Black Hole – Muse
18. Smells like teen spirit – Nirvana
19. I love Rock & Roll – Joan Jett

Below is the front of the invite… can’t really show the back for obvious reasons and I dont want to edit the picture before posting it – but since I haven’t mailed Jason’s to him yet I will post his one up…

The birthday cake is going to be a little harder than I first thought, because now I am making the cake myself which will nodoubt prove to be an interesting experience so maybe instead of having a guitar cake Samantha will have a boom box cake which still fits in our theme nicely..
My uncle kindly gave me some tips on how to play with the plastic icing to get it onto the cake without the use of cornstratch, icing sugar. – Now I just need to master the colouring of it and getting the colour even all the way through… The pictures below are of a cake Samantha and I made together on the weekend… (The colour isn’t Orange, it was just the light it was in – it was actually a bright pink colour)

Lazy Lazy

So as I was reminded this morning.. It’s been a long time since i posted anything. So ummm some of the different things that have happened in the past month

• The project I have been working on for the past 2 years is finally coming to the end, with the external auditor arriving a couple weeks ago, and has said that providing we close up the last few gaps he will give us the recommendation to become certified
• Samantha will be attending a new pre-school next year – which will be good as she isn’t completely happy with her current school, her time at “daycare” has now dropped so it’s always good to have extra cashola in the pocket
• I got a new iPhone (well had the old one replaced) – Still trying to get everything back on the new one, just have all my photo albums to move on and that takes some time..
• After having coffee with miss miekea, found my car to have a raw egg on it… Got to love washing a car at 9pm at night… But after a quick wash down and the heavy rain that followed in the couple days after my car now looks and smells normal, just needs a good detail
  
• Hmm and the biggest thing that happened I guess what my crazy melt down last night, which impacted someone else to the point where it was kinda insane. At least that has been sorted out to a point, still dealing with the ramifications from that – but I guess that’s what you get for being a complete crazy person….
• Samantha’s party is still moving along nicely, but I will do a new blog about that one 🙂
• Oh and lastley the new train timetable completely blows… First day of the new timetable and my train is 10mins late… Good work RailCorp!
  

Now I will write more often 🙂