Cosey up, the kettle's on

[BibiBelle]

here we go, before I head to bed

I usually serve dinner at 4.30! Kids are always starving, stops us snacking and it gets it out the way. DH gets his reheated when he gets in.

Hello everyone! Queen I hope the baby decides to come soon, you poor thing, I so well remember the feeling of being frustrated and overdue. Best of luck to you .

Took ds1 ice skating today, v successful but my arches now feel as if my feet have been bound, yikes, horrible.

And that is officially the end of Christmas, we came home from hols on Monday, took the tree down, decorations packed away till next year and the house feels all light and free. A serious spring clean required, going to concentrate for next couple of days while work is still light on the ground.

Bon voyage bbbb!

oh my Lord crispy you have depressed me with your productiveness . Today I achieved:

Getting to work on time (for once),but this was only because O woke me up and got me up at 10 past 4 this morning

Great news re dh's saga with work....they have offered him 6 months salary plus holidays for him to walk away nicely . Here's to good luck in his job hunt!!

queenie hoping baby comes v soon!

star O fights his nap but always has one at nursery - in fact today's nursery nap was 2.5 hours after he fell asleep with his head on the table at 11.15....I forgot to tell them that he was up so early!!

Hurrah for mrCece . Well deserved and good luck with the job hunt. Being 'let go' (for a sum ) was the best thing that could have happened to me - hope it is the same for you guys

My productiveness today merely made up for 3 weeks of doing feck all other than sitting on the sofa eating & drinking with the odd bit of shopping/sledging and visiting slotted in

Nice to see you ursula. Thursday's job is to take a whole pile of stuff to the charity shop (mainly old toys) and piles of cardboard to the recycling. I may even be able to see my hallway then

Well crispy you have inspired me.....to go and have a glass of wine,and instruct dh on what housework he needs to get on with tomorrow!!

Hurrah for your DH cece I hope he gets a great new job as soon as he's cleaned your house from top to bottom

Our house is looking quite nice now too, well the living / dining room anyway, as the decoration boxes are cluttering up the hall / stairs and the bedrooms are still v slovenly, oh, and now the tree and all the other wall decs are gone you can really see where DS has been with his grubby hands and pens .

I have to go to work tomorrow first time since 17 December. Maybe my New Year's resolution should be to find a new job I actually like, or try really hard to get pg and take another year off

Oh, and DS is in the process of dropping his nap at the moment, although he sometimes falls asleep while watching telly like his mother especially at the moment when he's full of cold. They have both been going to bed around 8-8.30pm and sleeping in till 8am some days [bliss]. I do miss that 90 minutes in the afternoon though to come on here get stuff done...

I think I'm going to make breakfast for dinner. Seems scrambled eggs is one of the only things R will eat these days. Today I took the two of them to a cheap pizza place where R sat and licked the parmesan sprinkler the whole time. It was utterly embarrassing. She's been not so happy today. I think she's missing her pacey WHICH I have no intention of reintroducing.

Crisp, how do you make your sheperd's pie?

Tomorrow starts my busy life again. It's been trying to creep in today but I've ignored it. Emails and phone calls about this or that which I'm volunteering my time. Remind me why I do all this.

evening all, I've been keeping up but not really having anything to say Keep up the good chat though

crisp lol, run didn't happen! but, instead i have taken all the decs down, chopped the tree up and put it into black bags, hoovered everywhere (upstairs and down ), dusted mostly everywhere and tidied away all the piles of things waiting for a new home
dh came home to find me, ds and dd sitting on his new bean bag (one of those huge ones) reading stories

pert i've copied you and we now have a basket of books near the bean bag. so much nicer being able to stay all cuddled up whilst selecting a new book instead of having to walk over to the book shelf.
i'll send you a fb message to sort out our playdate ( i hate that expression and i'm very much using it tongue in cheek!)

cc great news for MrCC. Did they admit that it was all a load of fiction?

ursula were you not tempted to take ds2 as well? dh has just got our skates (mine and his) sharpened and the plan is that we're all going
have fun with your big clean. i love christmas but it isn't half great to get the house back to normal again

ooh seem to have crossed with a load of you there!

TS scrambled egg on toast is a perfectly acceptable dinner round here!

hi bibi, not having anything to say doesn't usually stop you

fjghghlorn new year and new job sounds like a plan. shall we help you find a new one?

Tsk hips re run, but pretty impressive on being uber housewife/mum. We took both DD's ice skating at the W Wonderland think. Twas a nightmare

TS lol at R and the parmesan. Both mine would do that given half a chance

Shepherds pie was - lamb mince, diced garlic, onion, carrot, aubergine, lamb stock, 2 tins tomatoes, handful of red lentils, chopped mint, salt & pepper. Think that was all that was flung in . DD1 had it on a jacket spud with peas and tomorrow i will top it with riced potato and bake in the oven. Maybe with a sprinkling of non licked parmesan

Bibi you ok? you sound a bit 'meh'

crisp why was it a nightmare?
your dds obviously take after their mum for cheese!
not sure i was ubermum...i suppose i changed a nappy or two today but don't think that counts! (i'm joking before anyone calls the ss!)

who was it who recommended the biscui teers book? it arrived yday and its amazing so thank you whoever you are!

it was my frivolous spending of the £10 i got back from the cab company on dh's behalf in case anyone remembers and is interested!

Hmmm will have to ponder that recipe. We don't do lamb but I bet beef would be just fine.

Cooking spaghetti noodles with Alfredo sauce for dd1. Boring!

Hips I may start doing eggs more often.

Weeeeeeeell, i didn't realise that DH couldn't ice skate. He went to public school FFS, what DO they teach them?

So there was me trying to coax 3 non skaters round the ice . It was tricky for me to skate with DD2 between my legs as i had to lean over too far to hold her and my back said 'no'. Skating like that with DD1 was ok though. If they have little cars or hold on penguin things you may be ok, or if DH skates you could hold DS's hands. P might be a bit risky in a sling though?

That would be cottage pie with beef TS . Then you need onion, garlic, celery, carrot, beef stock, slosh of red wine, chopped smoked bacon, dash of worcestershire sauce & tomato puree. I have discovered that finely chopped beetroot is good in it, or aubergine and again you can fling in some red lentils to bulk it out

Very good then! Cottage pie!

cottage pie is def what you want TS. lamb is bleurgh imo!

ah ha crisp, i see your problem! my dh is a great ice skater, i'm ok but better on inlines
we were planning on leaving P with her auntie :)

How shameful that I have never been able to work out the difference between shepherd's pie and cottage pie until now

lol star, glad to be of service

hipps you'll be fine then with a 2 good skater to one toddler ratio

ROFL at Eton not teaching Dave to twirl and swirl properly

Hips - was me that wanted the Biscuiteer book I expect some parcels winging this way V soon!

am ok, just aware that I'm about to step back on the merry go round and I'm not quite ready for it. Poor C is very ill so I'm having to step up with the shop tomorrow/thurs/fri before being back on shift on Sat [really REALLY can't be arsed emoticon] and frankly if I never see another cake again it will be too soon

bibi he can't ride a horse either. Pffffft to public education. I can ride and skate having slummed it down the local comp

Sitting in your lovely shop chatting to customers would be fab. Now you just need a fairy godmother to come and take the rest of it away. I will just rub my lamp and see what i can come up with.....

good grief, and I thought he was a keeper

it's not the being in the shop I mind, it's all the hassle I already have this month with child care issues thanks to DH being cited for court on 3 rest days and courses on another 3 - that's £360 extra childcare already - feckers. I can't do this juggling for another year

I agree. You can't. There is being busy and juggling and then there is just 'too much'. I just wish i knew what the answer was for you. Sadly my magic wand has failed to come up with anything