Stage School Report

Here is Sams report from stageschool...

Principals Remarks:
Sam has really grown in confidence, An intelligent worker. A pleasure to have at stagecoach. Well done.

Dance Teachers Remarks:
Sam has continually worked hard this term and the results are evident in his work. He is great fun in class and gives 100%

Drama Teachers Remarks:
Sam has produced some lovely work in drama class this term. He has a good instinct for comedy and has participated very well in all activities. As Sam learns to trust his own decision's, his confidence will improve and work will develop further.

We're in the money!

Ok, so be honest, haven't you always wanted to throw a huge pile of money into the air and let it rain all over you? Everyone wants to do that, right? So that's what we did! And boy was it good. Just look at Steve's face. That say's it all. (Only a tiny percent of that cash is profit, sad to say).

Luke has been well trained by his father to really appreciate money, as you can see here in this photo.

Rain rain go away...

It hasn't stopped raining for days. I really need to get out into the garden to plant out some more lettuces and harvest some of the herbs. Harvesting herbs should be done on a dry day, to help the drying out process. This morning I got out for 10 minutes before it started raining and took some photos. It's amazing how much every thing changes from one day to the next.

The chamomile in the herb garden has flowered and I need to pick the flowers as I want to use them to make tea etc.
The nasturtiums have all seeded and I want to collect them too. They can be used to make a caper, or planted out next year. Im not sure whether picking them encourages more flowering.


Tomatoes which are not genetically modified come in all sorts of shapes and sizes, unlike the ones you can buy in the supermarket.
Luke's sunflowers are now over 8 ft tall! Still no obvious signs of a flower yet although from what I can just about manage to see there is something forming at the top of the tallest ones. (click on the photo to see the larger image with more detail)

Red tomotoes. Yum yum.

The onions are growing huge.

Today I noticed that all the pumpkins plants have flowered with gorgeous huge yellow flowers. There are quite a lot of them so it look's like there will be a bumper supply of pumpkins if all grows well. Now its down to the bees and insects to pollinate them for me.


The peas seem to be growing well too in this wet weather.

Boys Day

Whilst me and Jude worked at the book fair Daddy and the boys all had a boys day. They just basically spent a lot of quality time together. In the afternoon they had a bbq which Sam cooked (his rite of passage into manhood!) Then in the evening they watched a video.


Don't forget to click on photo if you want to see the full size versions.

Girls Day

Whilst me and Sam worked at the book fair, Jude, Daddy and Luke had a 'girls day'. Basically that meant doing whatever Jude wanted. Quality time with her. Steve took them to the soft play area in the town and then spent all afternoon playing with her on the trampoline. They got a video in the evening to watch.




This is nothing to do with the girls day out but I just had to post it. This is the contents of our games box. Luke had a great time emptying it out while I had a snooze. Needless to say it took a long time to get all the right bits back in all the right boxes. I think I need to get a lock on it!

I was half way though writing my blog yesterday when the power went off and I lost everything I'd typed. I was so disheartened that I couldn't be bothered to write it all again.

A few weeks back I finally bought the family a smoothie maker. With all this hot weather I thought it would get the use. We have been experimenting with different smoothies and they have all been a hit with Steve and Sam. Jude has liked some of them and Luke is a little fussy about anything that might actually be good for him. I've been making a smoothie for breakfast many mornings. The one we had this morning was this one in the photo. Peach, frozen blueberries, spirulina, milk, ice and coconut milk. It was yummy.

A few weeks back I finally bought the family a smoothie maker. With all this hot weather I thought it would get the use. We have been experimenting with different smoothies and they have all been a hit with Steve and Sam. Jude has liked some of them and Luke is a little fussy about anything that might actually be good for him. I've been making a smoothie for breakfast many mornings. The one we had this morning was this one in the photo. Peach, frozen blueberries, spirulina, milk, ice and coconut milk. It was yummy.

High heel shoes, nighties and tyres...

Today Luke went to stay at his Nanny's house. He organised it with her all by himself. He told her that he wanted to go and visit on his own, meaning without Sam and Jude. He has never been away without them before. So last night I told him he would need to pack a bag. He wanted the little suitcase on wheels that Mum borrowed when she went to Tunisia. I told him what to pack pyjamas, clean clothes, toothbrush, nappies, etc. He wandered off with the suitcase and came back with a proud grin on his face 15 minutes later. "I packed my bag Mummy". He had packed a pair of pink high heel shoes and a pink and red scarf, both belonging to me, and a few toy cars and some dummies! So I packed his essentials and left his own packing in the suitcase too, as he was so proud of it. I daren't sneak the shoes out in case he was devastated at Nanny's when he wants to wear them.

This morning I discovered that the little man thought he had to walk to Nanny's house (16 miles) because he was "going on his own". Awww, bless him. So I explained what was happening and he was happy enough. I dropped the older two off to summer scheme and then we headed off to Nannys, complete with a car boot full of toys and essentials (mostly things he wanted to play with Nanny). Of course, he packed his Little Shop Of Horrors DVD to watch with Nanny. We stopped briefly at Corbet Lough to get Lukes sunglasses out of the boot. But while we were there we saw a Mummy and Daddy swan with six baby cygnets in tow. They were so cute so we stopped to watch them. Once at Nannys Luke couldn't wait for me to leave, and desperately wanted to watch the film with Nanny. She will be dropping him back home in the morning but I won't be here as me and Sam are doing another 14 hour shift at the book fair.

After dropping Luke off I was free! No kids for a few hours! (That's VERY rare). I was only 10 minutes drive from the book fair so I phoned Steve and asked him to take me out to lunch. He was able to do this as he had another guy working in the fair with him. Steve noticed that one of the tyres on the car seemed bald. We had lunch in Mauds restaurant, by the sea, with the view of the awesome Mourne Mountains. After lunch we went to find a tyre centre. We actually had 3 bald tyres (that's why I felt the car was out of control!?) and it cost us a mere £120 to replace them! There was also a £5 charge for recycling the 3 old tyres which had been removed. Steve didn't want to pay the fiver so the guys loaded the tyres into my boot. Apparently I'm going to make a feature out of them in the garden!?!?!?!


By the time I got home it was time to pick the kids up from summer scheme. Once home it was so humid that I changed into a nightdress! I lay in the hammock in the garden in my night dress. Although the house was possibly the messiest it had ever been, I decided to relax. Without Luke around it would only take me 1/4 of the time to get things done. Now why is it that when Im nicely dressed, and the house is tidy, that no one comes to visit? But when the house looks like a bombs hit it and Im in my pjs at 4pm the neighbours decide to pop round for a chat? I was too mortified to invite the new neighbour into the house (she's been one time before whilst I was decorating and the place was a tip then too) so I stood on the doorstep in my little pink nightie chatting for 40 minutes. I am sure the entire neighbourhood thought 'what a slob getting out of bed at this time of day'. Ah well, I don't really care. It's murphys law.

Finished gravelling

Today I spent all day finishing with the vegetable garden. I had to weed the rest of the muddy areas, put down plastic, and then lug 25kg bags of gravel round to the back and spread it evenly. I'm shattered and hot and tired, but it looks lovely now. Here's the pic...

Ten Thousand Sorrows

This morning Sam and Jude have gone to Summer Scheme in the local leisure centre. Jude wanted to go so badly, but Sam was a bit unsure of it. It's not that he doesn't enjoy it there, but he loves being at home with no restriction on his 'play time'. Tonight they have outdoor archery for 3 hours so he's not going to get much free time today. He doesn't know that yet though.

So Luke is in the living room watching his all time favourite film The Little Shop of Horrors. I'm guessing that he must be one of the few 2 year olds that he seen it, and possibly the only 2 year old addicted to it. I've just ordered the soundtrack for it from amazon, so that we can listen to it in the car (a nice change from either Jo Jingles or the Phantom of the Opera). Luke knows every word to the songs. I had to sit on the sofa with him this morning and sing along with the 3 lady narrators, whilst we both did all the arm movements. Quite often during the day he says "Mummy I'll be Audrey and you be the horrible dentist". He just love the Audrey character. And he finds the dentist (played by Steve Martin) scary but fascinating.

Yesterday Jude and I worked our 14 hour shift at the book fair in Newcastle. Jude was an angel and such a help! The day didn't seem half as long with her there for company. 4 times she walked down to Mauds to buy me a take away cup of tea, and in the evening she found a chip shop and bought us some dinner. She is so much more confident than people realise. I would not have done those things at her age. Then during the day she served most of the customers, charging them, giving them change and packing their purchases into bags. She kept the place tidy and restocked the video boxes. What a great day of work experience for her. I can see her managing a huge company one day!

Whilst Jude was working hard I picked out 3 books to read (also picked out 13 books to take home for our education library). The first two books I read a few pages of and just couldn't get into. The third book was called Ten Thousand Sorrows by Elizabeth Kim. Well, I almost read the entire book while I was there, and I can't wait to get it finished. It's a true story about a child in Korea who was born mixed race and so her and her mother were shunned from society. Her mother is murdered in an honour killing (I'm not giving the plot away, it says this on the back of the book) and the little girl begins her harrowing journey into life as an orphan, and adoption into American society. I found the story fascinating and couldn't put it down. It's the first book I've really enjoyed (and had time to enjoy) for quite some time. It's probably not everyone's cup of tea but with my interest in adoption it really struck a chord with me. The American family who adopted her knew nothing of life in Korea, or the sorrows and suffering she had endured. I've read books about international adoption and the problems that can arise with introducing a child into a world so completely different from everything they have known. It is still in my heart, more than ever, to adopt children from harrowing desperate lives, and offer them love and safety in a warm and caring home. I have no idea how to do it, as the cost is ridiculous. I kind of forgot about the idea, although it keeps poking me in the back of my mind every now and then, and I basically prayed that if this is what I'm meant to do then God would provide the means to achieve it and make it obvious to me. Maybe one day when the kids have grown up this will be the path we will follow.

Our First Completely Home Grown Meal

This evening we ate our first completely home grown meal (apart from a few little bits n peices). The new potatoes were dug from our garden (by Luke) this evening. We boiled them and put a little butter on them. They tasted absolutely divine. Full of flavour, not tasteless like spuds from the supermarket. We had a homegrown salad with that which consisted of lettuce, nastutium leaves, spinach, rocket, home sprouted clover sprouts, sunflower sprouts and mustard sprouts, pepper, cucumber, tomato, hemp seeds, sesame seeds and mung bean sprouts.

Our First Completely Home Grown Meal

This evening we ate our first completely home grown meal (apart from a few little bits n peices). The new potatoes were dug from our garden (by Luke) this evening. We boiled them and put a little butter on them. They tasted absolutely divine. Full of flavour, not tasteless like spuds from the supermarket. We had a homegrown salad with that which consisted of lettuce, nastutium leaves, spinach, rocket, home sprouted clover sprouts, sunflower sprouts and mustard sprouts, pepper, cucumber, tomato, hemp seeds, sesame seeds and mung bean sprouts.

TODAYS LUNCH

We had sandwiches for lunch today and the kids loved them! Home grown lettuce, with a little spinach, fresh basil, cucumber, cherry tomato, beansprouts, and home grown clover sprouts, sunflower sprouts and mustard sprouts. Plus a little mayo. This sandwich was divine!

TODAYS LUNCH

We had sandwiches for lunch today and the kids loved them! Home grown lettuce, with a little spinach, fresh basil, cucumber, cherry tomato, beansprouts, and home grown clover sprouts, sunflower sprouts and mustard sprouts. Plus a little mayo. This sandwich was divine!

I love food. Anyone who knows me, knows I love food. And I love learning more about real food. Proper food. Live food. In our family blog you can read about our attempts to grow our own vegetables in the back garden. But it doesn't seem right to clog up the family blog with photos of food, so I have created this new blog. My food blog.

Over the last year I have made attempts at improving the health and diet of the family. I have read so many books and searched through many sites. Our diet has changed drastically from what it was, but could still improve. Firstly I learnt about wheatgrass. I read a book about its health benefits and then set about growing and juicing our own. Then I started sprouting. We sprout all sorts of things... sunflower seeds, chick peas, lentils, clover, mustard, broccoli, aduki beans, anything that can be sprouted we will try. And the great thing about it is that the whole family like the sprouts. They turn a dull salad into something tasty and exciting! We now make our own bread from our own flour. I try to make bread daily but have been a bit slack with that lately. I'll talk about the benefits of wheatgrass, sprouting and milling at another time though.

Now we have a vegetable garden and have fresh salad to hand at any time. So far we have grown, lettuces, broccoli, pumpkins, potatoes, tomatoes, onions, nasturtiums, marigolds, calendula, herbs, peas, beans, sunflowers, parsnips, carrots, cabbage, courgettes. Some of these haven't matured enough to eat yet but they are well on their way. As well as raspberries, blackcurrants, blueberries and strawberries. I would love nothing more than to be completely self sufficient. But this is fun at the moment and its a huge journey of learning and growing.

I love food. Anyone who knows me, knows I love food. And I love learning more about real food. Proper food. Live food. In our family blog you can read about our attempts to grow our own vegetables in the back garden. But it doesn't seem right to clog up the family blog with photos of food, so I have created this new blog. My food blog.

Over the last year I have made attempts at improving the health and diet of the family. I have read so many books and searched through many sites. Our diet has changed drastically from what it was, but could still improve. Firstly I learnt about wheatgrass. I read a book about its health benefits and then set about growing and juicing our own. Then I started sprouting. We sprout all sorts of things... sunflower seeds, chick peas, lentils, clover, mustard, broccoli, aduki beans, anything that can be sprouted we will try. And the great thing about it is that the whole family like the sprouts. They turn a dull salad into something tasty and exciting! We now make our own bread from our own flour. I try to make bread daily but have been a bit slack with that lately. I'll talk about the benefits of wheatgrass, sprouting and milling at another time though.

Now we have a vegetable garden and have fresh salad to hand at any time. So far we have grown, lettuces, broccoli, pumpkins, potatoes, tomatoes, onions, nasturtiums, marigolds, calendula, herbs, peas, beans, sunflowers, parsnips, carrots, cabbage, courgettes. Some of these haven't matured enough to eat yet but they are well on their way. As well as raspberries, blackcurrants, blueberries and strawberries. I would love nothing more than to be completely self sufficient. But this is fun at the moment and its a huge journey of learning and growing.

A completely home grown meal !

Well, after panicking about the potatoes I decided to dig a few up and see whether they were growing or failing. The ones we dug up were just fine. Luke was so excited to dig them. He remembers planting them back in April and has been desperate to see what was growing under the soil. You know, I reckon he could make quite a good little farmer. Here he is digging them up for me...

We were very proud of our crop of new potatoes. I'm pleased to find that there is something growing under the earth and it looks pretty healthy. Steve has bought me some potato feed as I think they may just be lacking in magnesium or something.

Well, Sam scrubbed them clean in some water and Mum and Hannah turned up. So we boiled up our fresh new potatoes and eat them with an almosty completely home grown salad! The lettuce, nasturtiums, rocket, and sprouts were all home grown. The potatoes were so delicious! I have never tasted anything like them before. Mum and Hannah both said the same thing, and Luke asked for second helpings - he never eats potato. I'm wondering how we will ever eat shop bought food again.

To top if all off Sam and Jude went out to the garden and picked the strawberries, raspberries, black currants and blueberries that were ready, and eat some for desert.
Our dinner :) Check out my new food blog to see more.

Help! Bad Potatoes!

Went out this morning to check the crops and the potatoes are not looking well at all. I've looked through my books but can't work out what the problem is. Does anyone know anything about potato problems???

A bad day for Luke

Yesterday was not a good day, all in all. To start with the neighbours had decided to have a noisy outdoor drunken karioke party that lasted until 4am! I was so cross about it. Some people are just so selfish. Poor Steve is working every waking second at the moment on running this book fair, and his shop, and his mail order business. The sleep he gets is not very good at the moment, but it's made worse by inconsiderate people who think the whole world should come to a standstill just for them. Well as you can tell, I was not amused. The sound of 20 drunken lager louts screaming along to 'Let me entertain you' at 3 am does not put me in good form.

So I didn't get up until 11.30 which was a bad start to the day. Half the day was gone and I had so much to do. We've been out so much lately that the house needs some serious attention in the form of cleaning and tidying. But the garden needed even more attention so I went out to it. I got quite a bit done. I took apart the two tents that had been out all week. That was some fun - really it should have been attempted by two people, not one. But I got there in the end. Then Sam tidied up all the rubbish and toys that were scattered all over the grass. I watered some of the potted vegetables and the garden started to look less like a tip and more like a loved home. I managed to put together the two mini greenhouses which I picked up on freecycle. They were much easier to put together than I'd imagined, especially with Luke's help and assistance. So now our little seedlings have somewhere warm to grow.

But there was no food left in the fridge, so I decided to go to Tesco's for some shopping. I've never been there on a Sunday before as we are usually busy with the fellowship. Sam stayed at home. Luke was in great form and him and Jude were having a laugh all the way round the supermarket. He kept putting things in my trolley that I didn't want, and so I'd have to sneak them back onto the shelves when he wasn't looking.

Whilst loading all my shopping onto the checkout I sent Jude and Luke to sit in the cafe and wait for me. We always do that. Then I heard an almighty scream, from Luke, nothing like I'd ever heard from him before and I left my purse, bag and groceries at the check out and ran to the cafe. The screaming was so horrific that the manager and members of staff all came running too. Poor little Luke had found an injured wasp and tried to pick it up to show me. Of course it had stung him, on the end of his index finger. He was hysterical. Within minutes his finger had swollen to 3 times it original size and he had a red rash (looked like nettle stings - red rash with white raised spots) flaring all the way up his arm to his shoulder. The door man, who was apparently trained to deal with first aid, came to our assistance. They wouldn't let us leave in case he was taking an allergic reaction. He was so hot that they were concerned about him, but that was probably just because he was in such a stage, crying and screaming. One member of staff brought him a packet of Starburst sweets to try and calm him. He wouldn't even look at them (anyone who knows Luke knows what a sweet tooth he has - but he couldn't eat sweets for 3 hours!) They brought over some waspeze spray and sprayed his finger. All 5 of us were sitting on the floor in the middle of Tescos, between the checkouts and the cafe (me, Luke, Jude, the lady and the first aid man). So they took us into the kitchen area of the closed cafe. We washed Lukes hand under some cold water, then we put vinegar on it. He said he wanted a plaster and so the lady got him some. We were there for 40 minutes in which time he was crying uncontrollably the entire time.

Finally they let us leave but we had to sit in the car for a further 20 minutes as Luke was so upset that he wouldn't let me leave him in the back to drive the car. Finally he agreed that I could drive quickly home. At home I went upstairs and lay in my bed with Luke. Sam and Jude were so worried about him (especially Jude who was almost in tears at the supermarket). They both unloaded all my shopping for me. Sam made Luke a bottle of warm milk, and then he loaded my frozen (almost defrosted) foods into the freezer. I lay in the bed with him for an hour and stroked his head and told him stories about members of the family who had been stung, and explained to him what had happened. Eventually he would calm down if distracted by a story, but then the pain would be back and he'd cry again. He told me that he wanted to be a bird so that I could open the window and say "shoo-shoo" and he'd fly away up to the clouds. A fly buzzed past the bed and he was paralyzed with fear, in case it was another wasp or bee.

He cried almost constantly for 3 1/2 hours. All my plans for the housework were out of the window. Sam and Jude made him cards and gave him sweets to cheer him up but he had no appetite to eat them. We all watched the 'Little Shop Of Horrors' DVD, which he is addicted to at the moment. He watches it 2 or 3 times day sometimes, and knows every word to all the songs.

At 7pm I ran him a bath and he actually wanted to get into it. As soon as his hand went into the warm water he began to feel better. After 20 minutes in the bath he said the pain had gone and he perked up to his normal happy self. When Steve and Hannah got home from the fair at 7.30 his finger looked just like normal and he was laughing and showing off, as usual. You wouldn't have known there was anything wrong with him. He did cry a bit this morning when he felt it was sore again. So it wasn't until 7.30 that I started cooking the dinner. At 8.40 I was just starting on cleaning the kitchen up, putting washing on, watering more vegetables, etc. Hannah offered to babysit so that me and Steve could go out but I was too shattered so I suggested that they go and see something in the cinema. They went to see Pirates of the Caribbean. At 11pm I still wasn't done. Luke was in bed but Sam and Jude were still awake. Sam, such a sweetheart, decided to tidy the living room for me, so that I could relax and go to bed. I was really touched that he did it with no asking from me.

So that was yesterday. Hopefully today will be better. I'm working a 14 hour day at the book fair tomorrow so that Steve can relax for a while (relax with 3 kids. Is that possible?)


The veggie garden looks a lot better now that we have finished it off with some gravel and edging.

Book Fair Photos

I've just uploaded some photos which were taken at Steves CD/ book / Video fair last Friday. That was the day Sam and Jude worked at it with their Dad.

Here is Jude tidying some of the CD albums that were on sale.


And this is Sam working at the till. You can see the last of our huge stock of 'Bear in the Big Blue House' DVD and toy sets, which are being sold for an amazing £2 each! We had hundreds of them and every fair they go down in price just to get rid of them.



Jude took this photo of us at Zebedees Cafe in Castlewellan. Aunty Hannah was with us.


Jude, Hannah and Sam enjoying their food in the cafe.

You can tell from Lukes face how excited he was to be eating in a cafe, hours past his bedtime!

Book Fair

I worked at the book fair in Newcastle today (bumped into Sheelagh again at that!) It's running for 10 days. My Dad popped in for a few hours while I was there and we had a good chat. I haven't seen him for ages and we had a lot to talk about. It made the time fly too. The first half of the day was pretty quiet so I wrote 2 letters and read a magazine (yes, I read a magazine whilst surrounded by boxes of books!) I didn't actually get a chance to look through the books myself to see if there was anything to take home for the kids study room. Maybe next time. You meet all sorts of people working at these places. I'll be doing another few days there over the next week.

On the way home I popped in to see Mum with a CD that she wanted. We had a chat and then I made my way home.

Yesterday Sam and Jude worked at the fair. It was a great educational day for them - like work experience. They helped all day long, taking money, giving change, dealing with customers, all with Steve watching over them. They really enjoyed it and are all set to come and do a day with me each. I picked them up from the fair at 6 because they were too tired to stay till 10. Then we went for something to eat with my sister Hannah (photos to follow). We went to Zebedees in Castlewellan and had fish and chips. Sam asked us all to share embarassing stories. We were all in fits of laughter telling these tales to each other. Why do I have so many embarassing stories? Why do these things always happen to me???

I'm sure I've got much more to say in this post but it's 11.30pm and my brain is no longer functioning. I'll get back to it tomorrow.

Mammoth Tomato Plants

I'm just taking a break from the gardening, having a nice cup of tea and a caramel slice. I've decided we really should have moved to the country side! When we were moving house almost 2 years ago we stayed in the town centre for two reasons. 1 - we wanted to be within walking distance of the kids school. 2 - we wanted to be within walking distance of Steves shop. But after moving we took the kids out of school and started educating them at home, and Steve only has 1 year left on his shop lease anyway. But its almost impossible to buy houses in the country now, unless you are very rich. It would be lovely for the kids to grow up in the wild! To be able to grow more veggies and keep some animals. I do miss my hens. I wonder how they are?

So I've spent all day so far in the garden, apart from a 1 hours tidy and hoover this morning. Luke was up at 6.30 after his early night so we were all up bright and early. I've weeded most of the bits around the veggie beds so that I can put the gravel down, but I need to go back to B&Q tomorrow and buy another 10 bags of gravel. I'm currently in the middle of tieing back all our tomato plants, which have grown absolutely mammoth! I broke a long branch containing loads of mini tomatoes. I was annoyed with myself after taking so long to grow them. These things happen.

At 5.30 a lady that I 'met' on the freecycle website is coming round to pick up some chairs that we have in the garage. She is swapping them for 2 mini green houses. How cool is that? Its great to find a website like that.

Well thats enough of a rest I think. Back to it with the gardening. I really must do some ironing as none of us have anything left to wear. It seems immoral to be ironing when the weather is so nice though.

Summer days

Isn't it beautiful weather? It's so nice to get a summer this year. My garden is growing so beautifully with all this sun shine to help it on. I bought the kids a cheap little paddling pool yesterday and they spent the whole afternoon splashing and spraying each other.

Yesterday was spent running errands. A trip to B&Q to buy heaps of gravel, shopping in Sainsburys for food. That actually took the best part of the day. I bought the cheapest gravel they had (£1.98 a 25kg bag) and some plastic edging. A lovely lady (its unusual to find helpful friendly staff at B&Q, from my experience) helped me lift 10 bags of gravel into the car. We are gravelling all the bits of ground between the veggie beds. Its only half done but it looks heaps better already. So much more finished and homely. I'll take a photo when it's done.

We had dinner in the garden last night, chicken pie with salad from the garden. Steve and Sam both said it was the nicest dinner they ever had! Even Luke eat his (although nothing green was consumed, as usual).

Today we took a trip to Heather's house. Primarily it was to pick up a big trolley of Davy's for Steve to use at his book fair. But we made an afternoon of it. The kids spent hours splashing in C's huge paddling pool. Even Luke had fun in the water. I'm thinking of hiring Sam out as an entertainer for little girls parties, as he was fabulous with the girls. They spent the whole time giggling at him and basically having a great time. Luke was happy as larry playing in the conservatory with all C's barbie cars. Heather and I pulled our chairs up to the pool and sat with our feet in the water until it got too boisterous for us. Davy didn't emerge from his office in the 5 hours that we were there (wimp!) Luke fell asleep in the car on the way home at 6.30pm. When I got him out of the car and lay him on the sofa he didn't wake up so I put him to bed. He woke up at 8 for his night time bottle of milk but went back to sleep again. All that fresh air and water must have zonked him.

Steve has spent all evening loading the van with tons of boxes of books. Tomorrow the 10 day book fair in Newcastle starts. That's ten 14 hour working days (5 of which I've been roped into doing!) Tomorrow is going to be such a hard day for him. When he's finished loading tonight he will crash into bed and at the crack of dawn he will be up taking the van to Newcastle. Then he will unload it there, drive back to our house and load up another van load. These boxes of books are VERY heavy. It's back breaking work. He'll drive that load to newcastle, unload it, then spend all day till 10pm sorting the books and getting the fair ready. The fair will run from 8am till 10pm for the ten days. I'm not sure which days I'mpenciledd in for doing yet, but I can't wait (detecting the sarcasm?)

Sam has finally written all the thank you letters to send to people for his birthday presents / money. Tomorrow he has to write a letter to someone at his Granny's work who kindly sent him a heap of football stickers (no Jill, he hasn't forgotten). He also has 2 letters to reply to. His pen pal from the USA sent him a box of goodies from his trip to Disney World. That was very exciting! And his pen pal from the Czech Republic sent a beautiful photo of herself in a picture frame. He's just so popular!

Now its 9.11pm and I'm going out to water my tomatoes and to see if Steve has fallen asleep amid abarragee of banana boxes containing various musty ancient best sellers.

Goodbye Diamond

Diamond the dog went home on Friday after her one week stay at our house. I think she was pleased to go as she spent all day Thursday whining and being rather unsettled. I had to take this photo of her and the kids sitting on our front lawn waiting for her owners. They sat like that for 15 minutes, looking so adorable, until the owners car drove into the cul-de-sac, and Diamond ran to greet them. Jude was ever so upset about her leaving and spent an hour in her room sobbing her little heart out.

We had some home educating friends around on Friday afternoon. It was a beautiful sunny day so me and Deb sat in the garden while the kids played in various locations. We had some good chats and I was able to show off my new found gardening skills by providing Deb with a salad sandwich picked fresh from the garden. I sat chatting in the garden with a bottle of sun tan lotion in my hands, threatening to plaster Luke in it every time he emerged from the house. Later that night I realised I was burnt to a crisp myself! I'm so silly.

Yesterday was possibly the hottest day of the year so far? It certainly felt like a scorcher to me. Steve had the day off (very unusual for a Saturday) and Sam's saturday stage school has finished for the summer, so we had a normal family type Saturday to ourselves. We promised ourselves we would relax and spend some quality time together. I think it was 3pm by the time we started to relax! I thought it would be a good idea to put Hannah's tent up in the garden for the kids. But it didn't come with any instructions, so it took quite a while to do. Once Steve realised that I knew what I was doing and just did as he was told the job was done a lot quicker! (he he). So the tent is up and Sam and Jude actually slept out in it last night. They were pretty scared until about 11.30pm when they just conked out and fell asleep. Steve slept downstairs with a window open so that he could listen out for them.

I spent my relaxing afternoon in the garden writing a letter to my pen pal. On Friday I received a lovely letter from him. It was just one A4 side but it was possibly the nicest letter I'd ever received from anyone and it had me close to tears. He felt compelled to write and tell me how much our correspondence means to him. He told me to think of the happiest day of my life, multiply that feeling by a hundred and then its close to how he feels when he see's that he has a letter from me. That's paraphrasing slightly, but you get the jist of it. Jude took a photo of me writing his letter and then we printed it and posted it with the letter.

Mum and Hannah came round for a barbecue yesterday evening. They are just back from their trip to Tunisia and were full of exciting stories about paragliding and sleazy Tunisian men! They both looked very sunned and radiant. I definitely need to take a trip to Tunisia after hearing all about it. Mum brought me back some saffron, which apparently, weight for weight, is worth more than gold! Wow. Imagine that. Mum and me had a good chat in the kitchen while Steve did the manly thing and cooked the meat. Then we all sat in the garden for our dinner. Hannah spent quite a bit of time chatting with Sam and Jude, which made their day. There is nothing kids like more than some quality adult attention. We all sat in the living room talking until 2.30am this morning! There was lots to talk about with everything that's happening in the family circle lately. Steve and Mum could have talked all night but me and Hannah were getting to the stage where words wouldn't come any more without that slurring slightly drunk tinge to our speech (we weren't drunk - its the tiredness).

Today we are off to Dublin for a fellowship meeting. Luke is hoping that his little girl friend Mishka will be there. He's really looking forward to seeing her so I hope she it there or the poor lad will be crushed.

Vegetable Garden Photos

Sam and Jude have gone to work in Newcastle with Daddy today. So me and Luke have spent the day in the garden, mostly weeding, and planting some new lettuces. We took some photos to update how the veggie garden is growing...


This is Luke less than 5 minutes after I got him dressed. Why do I bother to get him dressed at all?



Lukes sunflowers, which are now almost 6 foot tall, with no sign of any flowers yet.


This is the side garden.



I love this corner. The sunflowers are at the back, beans growing up the poles, pumpkins beneath the sunflowers, and nasturtiums, onions, lettuces, broccoli and rocket salad.



Tomatoes. There is only one tomoto so far, and lots of flowers. The plant on the left has seen better days.


Green lettuce and broccoli at the back.


These are the onions, growing in amoungst some nasturtiums.



This first bed is the herb garden.



Ice berg lettuces and calendula flowers.



Courgettes, cauliflowers and nasturitums.


Red cabbages at the front, and peas at the back, with raspberry plants behind that.



French beans.



Nasturtiums.



Potatoes.


The latge green leafy plants behind the broccoli and lettuce are pumpkins / squashes.