Class of 18. No need for new school shoes

DD has arranged a postal vote for home and has helped some local school friends to the same. The vote for our home constituency will be much more important than their uni ones.

DD3 is mid mocks and spent yesterday morning moving the furniture around in her bedroom. Such a major displacement activity! She saw the funny side though and promises to get back to work today!

Must add, my DD will vote. Just she's so wrapped up in uni world, it's not what she talks about to me.

Oh yes, think my DD missed out a few years ago. Funny though, DD doesn't talk about voting eventhough she's usually so interested. Know she's signed up though.

Did you see TV debates. Very interesting. They really want people to believe services will be better and Brexit is not such a big shout it seems to me. Slight digression here!

Oh that's very good news @NoHaudinMaWheest, hopefully getting that confirmation will help her to start to feel better.
DD has been campaigning in and around the university, encouraging students to register to vote. She's been amazed at the number who haven't, and the excuse is usually "they just hadn't got around to it yet"
So DD and the other campaigners get them to register there and then! It seems to be a successful strategy so far - just have to hope they all get around to actually voting!
Poor DD2 (17) is furious to be missing out by just a few weeks.

So good nohaudin. Sensible uni .

ursula I hope you have heat again and that your dh is continuing to recover.

Dd's application to study part-time has been approved. As the only course she is continuing this term is assessed on assignments only this means that she has no exams this December and is coming home on the 3rd.
She will then have a nice long break to hopefully get some energy and headspace back.

Going part-time means a heap of admin but I can help her with that once she is home.

Knotaknitter, my condolences. xx

knot I wouldn't think it gets any easier We are missing two important people this Christmas (although they were elderly)in memory of one we are doing absolutely everything the same, in memory of the other I think it is too much to even try and do the same things or even be in the same house. I think my cousins are all going to try and organise something completely different. The groups sound good.

What? An app that lets your phone act as a tv remote? Off to search...

Ursula I have an elderly phone that is full of tat and struggling to cope with the sole reason for its existence (Pokemon Go) so that's a no to any surplus apps. I rather like the one that makes my phone double as a tv remote, that one can stay.

Christmas and everything associated with it went down the toilet when my husband died. At some point it will come back but this year it's still on the "meh" list. I've told my inlaws not to bother except for the under 18s (not that they usually do bother but that's another story) so at least I don't have that to think about this year. I have started going to a couple of local groups so have multiple Christmas dinners to look forward to, none of which I have to cook or wash up after.

I detest Xmas Shopping. I love shops but then I cannot make decisions.
I used to love making Christmas presents - I think when the time to do so disappeared, so did my love for the "preparations" which seemed to be a nightmare of juggling priorities.
I'm building up again...little fun parts of Christmas prep to make my heart sing rather than lists of anxious making "to dos"..

Have you got the Premium Bond App on your phone Knitaknitter? I love it.

Your DD sounds good lobster. Don't want too much commitment at a young age. Time for that.

Christmas shopping is so good this week if like me you do not like crowds. I usually do it last week of October. We had a lovely time on Saturday. I usually do a lot online but I enjoyed our shop. So nice DH and I can do a few things together at leisure without having constant demands/ferrying of kids!

DD came home for the weekend and we had a lovely time pottering about. I caught DH just gazing at the three DDs lying together on the sofa. It is hard to imagine what it will be like this time next year with two of them gone.

No Christmas shopping actually done here yet. I have traditionally not started till after DDs birthday at the end of the month. I do feel I may get some in before that this year though.

My contact with pension departments (three of them) would indicate that nothing happens without a national insurance number. I wouldn't have thought that having the same name would have been enough to have killed you off Ursula.

I do National Savings and Investments online now, you can see whether your premium bonds have won without waiting for the letter.

Kitten **
That's so weird though Ursula, must have been a very strange feeling reading that letter!

DD has made a decision about next year - she's told her bf no - she's not ready to live with him and she doesn't want him to re-locate to her uni town.
Phew! I like the boy a lot but I'm so relieved!

She's currently house hunting with a bunch of her course mates - they're hoping to get something slightly closer to town/colleges for next year.

She loves her house this year and loves living with her friends but it's so far (even with the bike!)

Well it seems the cold has done for me. We received a letter on Saturday from Aegon with whom I have a small pension, asking anyone who knew the whereabouts of the next of kin of UrsulaPandress to please contact them. I checked my account on line and there was nothing showing .

I phoned them first thing this morning and the chap had to go off and speak to the Bereavement Team and he then came back to the phone to say there appeared to have been a mistake as someone with the same name as me had died. They will be reinstating my policy.

Can this happen? Sheesh I couldn't even buy extra Premium Bonds the other month without uploading copies of my driving licence and passport and then they still said my address wasn't recognised and returned my money. Despite me having a fair few bonds with them already. They did apologise and gave me £50 for my troubles.

Vietnam for Christmas sounds fabulous.

Brrr - Ursula hope your heating is fixed soon. Weather here has been relatively warm (25 during the day) but dropped today so dd was shocked when she stepped out for track training in her shorts and it was 10 degrees.
We have a mega internet sale (T Mall 11/11) here so have finished all my Xmas shopping. Ds is home on 9th December and we fly to Vietnam on 13th so I expect he is looking forward to some warm weather. I will miss these cheap, shorthaul trips when we move next year.

Hats on in the house then Ursula. If DH wasn't recuperating then it would have been a good excuse for a weekend get away to a dog friendly hotel. Even a local one would do, heat, no cooking....

Your way

Oh Ursula must be miserable! Yay for hot water bottle.
Funnily enough, we're having our old boiler changed in January before it conks out. But only bad is intermittent cold bath water at mo.
Warm thoughts your was Ursula

I found a hot water bottle. Hurrah.