Fifteen Wonderful Years

Love is not a matter of counting the years,
But of making the years count...

Today is our fifteenth wedding anniversary, and I have now officially known Dan for more than half of my life! I have to say that the 15 years spent married to him have been the most content, exciting, fun, memorable and above all the happiest.

15 years ago we were both very young, very different people, still trying to work out who we were and where our place in the world was. But we have grown together and bonded in a way that is precious and, I think, unusual these days. Rather than growing apart we have knitted closer together. I couldn't imagine a life without Dan by my side, and I know he feels the same way. Some people believe in soul mates, and some don't, but I truly feel that I have found the person that I am destined to be with; that there is no one else for either of us, no one better suited, that we are just perfect with each other. After fifteen years we are no less in love than we were the day we married; in fact our love is stronger, more passionate and enduring.

Who would have thought that at the ages of 16 and 21 we would, by chance, meet the person we were destined to spend the rest of our lives with?

Fifteen years later, both a little wrinkly, a little grey, a bit fuzzy round the edges, we have some precious memories and some great stories to tell. We now have 4 adorable, precious children, each of whom are the light of our lives. After 15 years and 4 children we try to spend time doing things together, just the two of us. We have our own interests, and our joint interests.

This morning I woke up to discover a big plate of croissants, a cup of tea and Dan standing with 15 balloons in his hand! Each balloon has a little note inside it, and I am popping one each day for 15 days. Isn't he romantic?? He also made me a plate of 'fifteens' which are my favourite treats! Not just a plate of fifteens, but 15 fifteens! Plus he gave me an envelope full of vouchers, which I haven't opened yet.

I made Dan a book of Love and I was really pleased with how it turned out. Its basically a printed book of all the photos of us as a couple, with little love poems and quotes next to them. It is possibly the most romantic thing I've ever done, as quite honestly, I don't have a romantic bone in my body (yes, I know, it's so unfair that I am married to the most romantic man in Britain!) Dan said it was the best present he ever received, so that made me happy. He keeps reminding me that our anniversary isn't over yet, so I'm not quite sure what else he has got up his sleeve.

Dan,

You are the most amazing man. Every one who meets you thinks that you are an awesome husband and father, and its true. I love you with my whole heart, with everything that I have inside me. You are precious to me and I treasure every day that we spend together. Don't ever change. You are divine just the way you are. Here's hoping we spend another blissful 15 years together.

Love you forever,

Bree

Happy Birthday to Daddy

Barney lights the candle's for Daddy's 37th birthday cake. Happy Birthday Daddy!!!

Emily and Daddy

Daddy and his little baby girl, 16th January 09.

Metallica, Dublin 2008

It was on our travels in America that we heard that Metallica would be playing in Dublin this summer. I was so excited but really didn't think of booking tickets as I'd just found out that I was pregnant, and had no idea if I would be feeling well enough to go to the gig or not. But that didn't put Dan off. He secretly bought two Metallica tickets for us, while we were somewhere in a desert, somewhere in America (the wonders of the internet, eh?)

So this week saw us trekking down to Dublin for the gig of the year. I spent about 5 days building up to it. Some days I feel fine, but other days I feel so rough that I can barely get out of bed, and I didn't want to be like that at the gig! So I spent a few days getting early nights (I slept for 20 hours on Monday!), eating lots of alfalfa and broccoli sprouts, and generally taking care of myself. And it worked!

Our mate D was also going to the gig so we all drove down in the car together. What should have been an hour & a half drive turned out to be a four hour drive, due to the concert congesting the roads, and lane closures. It took us 3 hours to drive 17 miles at one point. Which meant we missed the supporting bands, and arrived just in time for the last song by Tenacious D. I was a bit gutted at missing them as I thought Jack Black would be very entertaining on stage, but at least we were in time for Metallica.

There must have been at least 20,000 people at the gig. That's a LOT of people, in a big muddy field, mostly filled to capacity with alcohol. Dan was very protective of me in my condition and kept me near the back where I had lots of room to myself. Every time anyone came near me he put a protective arm across my bump, which I found very sweet. Perhaps I should have bubble wrapped myself. D went off to the front of the crowd and got lost in the mosh pit. He met us at the end of the gig (minus his treasured hat which he was proud to say died and was lost forever in the Metallica mosh pit, LOL) looking a bit the worse for wear.

And what about Metallica? Well, I have to say that they were absolutely fantastic live. Seriously amazing. I think I enjoyed the intimacy of the Apocalyptica gig more, but for such a huge audience Metallica certainly rocked the place. They played one of the songs, Cyanide, from their new album 'Death Magnetik', plus a set including tons of my favourites including Enter Sandman, Whiskey In The Jar, One, Ride The Lightning, The Memory Remains, Master of Puppets, and ending with Seek And Destroy. I found the whole thing totally shattering, but was just getting past the pain barrier of standing for so long during pregnancy when the show came to an end. They had a display of fireworks during Enter Sandman, and during the song 'One' an amazing pyrotechnic display of mushroom bombs! Which was very impressive.

All in all it was a great gig, and I'm glad that I was able to stand long enough to enjoy it.

Happy Birthday Dan!

The old man is now even older! 36 to be exact. Ok, well not exactly, his birthday isn't until Thursday, but since the kids are going to my Mums for 2 days while we pack, and then we will be on a long flight and arriving in Florida on his birthday, we decided to celebrate it a few days early. So, for the purposes of convenience, Dan's birthday was today.

And after 14 years I finally got the whole present buying thing right, and bought him things he actually wanted! Ok, I'm a bit of a slow learner, but I get there in the end. And he still has the other half of his life to look forward to all the nice presents I can get him in future.

So what did we do? Well, Dan sneaked out of bed before me and took Annabelle to the local high school open day to look round. LOL. But when they got home Barney and I sang happy birthday and called Dan upstairs to the bedroom where an array of presents awaited him.

As is custom in our house, present opening always happens on our big King Size bed, as a family. (I wonder when the kids will grow out of that). This year we gave Dan stuff for the trip, including new clothes, a new windproof coat, an MP3 player, a portable hard drive, a torch, and chocolate. Oh how exciting. LOL.

After all that excitement we took a trip to PC world in Lisburn where Dan didn't actually buy anything in the end, and I went to Argos and bought some holdalls for our trip (and a camera for Jimmie, and a new MP3 player for Annabelle - yes, you'd think I was made of money. Sadly, I'm not). Then we took Dan to McDonald's (or did he take us? Yes, I think he did).

This evening once the kids were in bed we got a DVD from the video shop (something with Jodie Foster in it, the name has gone from my spongey brain) and watched it together in the living room, all cuddled up under a duvet. It was an odd kind of birthday really as we are so crazy organizing this trip. But I think he had a good day in the end.

Here are some photos from the day....

Pic 1) Barney wrapped up one of his colouring books for his Daddys birthday present, bless. 2) Daddy opening his presents with the kids (and sporting his new headphones & mic set!) 3) Dan looking mighty handsome in the new clothes I bought him 4) Annabelle and Jimmie in McDonalds 5) Barney & Dan in McDonalds, 6) Me, being my usually silly self (in public, as always)

Oh by the way, our mate Neil really wants to be mentioned in todays blog post. He has kind of a dull life and nothing much to look forward to so this will make his day. LOL. So hello Neil! (He's single by the way girls, and quite a catch in my opinion - if you like gingers, lol) My blog is turning into a lonely hearts ad site. LOL, "36 YO Male, Birmingham, SGSBM (sexy ginger slightly balding man), Athletic, likes walks in the rain and quiet nights in front of the fire, GSOH, own house and car, fully toilet trained...."

Banbridge Leader Article, Tues 22nd January 2008

Click on the photo to see it in full size and read the article about our wee shop closing.

Vital CD Shop in Banbridge closes down

Our last day as owners of the coolest shop in Northern Ireland. Its been hard work. Its been fun. We have grown quite attached to this place and will miss it. But look forward to new adventures.

Apocalyptica, Live in Dublin - best live band in the world!?

It's Monday morning and instead of getting on with the mountains of housework, or wrapping up of Christmas presents, I'm sitting at my computer listening to Apocalyptica, and writing a blog post about the most amazing weekend we had.

Dan and I travelled down to Dublin on Friday, for Saturday nights Apocalyptica gig. Unfortunately I'd developed a violent cold and was sneezing all the way down on the bus, with two lovely big purple eyes. Apocalyptica are one of my favourite bands (I have many though). They are a cello band from Finland, and consist of 4 cellists, and now a drummer (although he is a relatively new addition). They became famous for their heavy metal covers, particularly their cello versions of Metallica songs. But now days they are as well known for their own music, with the new album 'Worlds Collide' having guest singers from various bands including Slipknot, Lacuna Coil and Rammstein. We knew that this show would be good, different and unique, but we were both totally blown away with the whole evening.

The supporting act were Lacrimus Profundere. The singer from Lacrimus came out at the very end of the evening when there were just a few stragglers from the audience left. We met him and had a brief chat about his band. I think he was looking for groupies (he didn't have any trouble finding them) but I wasn't gonna throw myself at any guy just cos he's the singer on a not yet very famous band, so he soon got bored talking to me. Haha.

The Dublin show was the last gig of Apocalyptica's 2007 European tour and right from the second they appeared on stage we could tell it would be a good night. They looked exhilarated and excited about their last gig of the year and the audience picked up on this straight away. The vibe in the audience was just hiving. The band had a look of almost disbelief as they performed and experienced for the first time the appreciation of an Irish crowd (I've always found Irish audiences, north or south, to be amazing enthusiastic audiences compared to the brits). They promised they'd be back to Ireland.

They played an almost 2 hour set, and their performances totally blew my mind! I've never experienced such a high from live music before. I think they are the best live band I've ever seen, they even blew my cold away! Their performance was energetic, passionate, lively, and totally out of this world. The drummer was obviously from another planet - the amount of energy and movement he put into drum playing was phenomenal. There are four professional cellists who manage to show that heavy metal music is just as valid an art form as any other type of music. There were no singers in the show, purely instrumental, and it lacked nothing.

The band were called back with 3 standing ovations. The Dublin crowd refused to let them leave and chanted "we want more". The first time they came back and performed another 3 songs. Then left and the crowd still wanted more. So they came back and played another 2 songs, with a look of disbelief on their faces. But that wasn't enough and we called them back for one more song and made them play until they all looked like they would faint from exhaustion! The crowd clapped and cheered for the longest I've ever seen anyone clap a band, and Apocalyptica left the stage looking totally exhilarated and mind blown themselves!

When they come back to Ireland I am going to drag everyone I know to their gig so that they can experience this band live for themselves. As amazing as their albums are, they do no justice to the buzz of the live gig.

Daddys Day Out

Since its the last day of the school half term holidays, I worked in the shop and Dan took the kids for a Daddys day out. Daddys days out are always full of wonderful precious memories. When I saw the photos I so wished I'd been able to go too. It looked like they all had an awesome day together. Dan seems to have captured some real good shots as well, you can see the rest of them by clicking here.

They all took a trip to Newcastle and spent the day wandering the beaches and sand dunes. Despite the fact that its almost winter, it was mild enough that they didn't need coats! Little Barney spent the entire day picking things up and examining them - stones, shells, seaweed, dead crabs, you name it he found it. The kids always seem to enjoy a free day out in the fresh air so much more than any expensive day out!

Anyway, I cant say too much about it as I wasnt there, but here are some of the best pics...

The Mourne Mountains, and waffle

Well, life has been hectic as always and I've hardly gotten round to posting anything on the blog. Dan has a week off of work, so this week we plan to chill a bit and spend some family time together. I'm not holding my breath. I'm so used to our busy life getting the better of our free time. And after 13 years of marriage I've yet to see Dan relax.


Today Dan went for a hike up Slieve Donard, in the Mourne Mountains. He has taken to doing that lately on his days off. He also had to take some photos up there for his coursework. I think its 'natural forms' that they are doing this time... rocks, stones, flowers, that sort of thing.









Here are some photos of the views that Dan saw today. Northern Ireland is such a beautiful country. It's the best kept secret of the UK.
I found this other photo of Annabelle and Barney, when Dan madly decided to take them for a drive up the Mournes in the snow, a few weeks ago! (Notice Barney doesn't even have a coat on!)


Last weekend I took Annabelle to the wedding show in the Kings Hall, Belfast, with my sister H (who is getting married) and my sister J. Last time we went I thought Annabelle would love the catwalk shows, so this time I made a point of taking her with me. Needless to say, she took her camera with her, and took millions of photos. Here are two of the best...












The pulsing in my ears is still very bad. One day, about 3 weeks ago, the pulsing suddenly doubled in volume, which it has done many times before, but this time it hasn't ebbed at all. As well as that I've developed a pain in the back of my neck, going up into my head. It's been there every day for 2 weeks and is driving me insane. Its on the right side of my spine, going into my skull. Seen as it's my right ear that is affected by the pulsing, I can't help wondering if the two are connected. Theres still no word from my MRI scan yet. I booked an appointment with the doctor but she's not free till Friday, so I'll have to wait.

I finally managed to sort out the money for Tinkhani, that people donated. I sent it to a church in County Cork. They have a preist working in T's prison. They are putting the money into his account and he will in turn pass it on to T. I know this will make a HUGE difference to his life. He will be able to buy food, and hopefully put on some weight, as well as sanitary items, clothes, blankets and maybe even a little luxury. Not to mention stamps and paper! I would to send out a HUGE THANK YOU to the people who donated money for Tinkhani. I was very touched with the generosity that wsa show, and so was he. You know wh oyou are.