Amber Warning

That's what we've got here in Dorset for the next twenty four hours. Malc has to go to Wareham tomorrow afternoon for a Cubs activity but they have a flood alert for the river there so we'll have to wait and see what happens.
This morning my friend came over with her little boy who was born on Christmas Day.

Clark absolutely adores babies and toddlers so he took great delight in giving Rauri his bottle and winding him. I think I held him for about 20 minutes and Clark had him for the rest of the visit!
Just look at the smile on that face!
This afternoon I did some ironing, it's been the usual round of Friday mayhem for Beavers, Scouts and Youth Club.
I watched the programme on dog food last night and was extremely disappointed, I thought it was going to be informative but it was just raw food feeders slagging off commercial dog food  and visa versa, so I'm none the wiser what would be best to feed the dogs. As we don't have allergies, bad teeth, gums or anything else untoward I think I'll continue with what we're already feeding!
A couple more pictures from yesterday, the terrible twosome, Soloman and Cody,

Chumleigh, one of the puppies who has grown considerably!

Not the best photo, he's seen something there he likes the look of.
Ice Road Truckers starts a new series on Channel Five tonight, so I've just got enough time to make myself a cuppa, get my knitting out and get myself comfortable to watch it.
Slurp,slurp!

A fun day

Today we walked the dogs at Cannon Hill near Wimborne, it's a beautiful place, mainly forest but there are lots of lovely big paths to follow so it wasn't too muddy!
Here's the view from the wooden bench where we ate our picnic.

And here's Malc and Callum sitting on that bench

Don't tell Malc I used this picture, he wasn't happy after I took it because he realised his hat was skee-whiff! Not sure if that's the right spelling or even if it's a proper word!

A picture of some of the dogs just to prove they were with us.
We then went to look around a garden centre, right next to it is a big Hobbicraft store which the boys love so we went to have a look round. The boys had taken some of their Christmas money so Callum has bought some craft sewing kits and a latch hook set. He's sat next to me starting it as I type. Clark bought a couple of pom pom craft kits and some cards with things to stick on for my birthday at the end of next month. He's just made it so I must remember to take a picture of it to put on my post on that day.
Soloman and Cody bought swords!!!
Malc's gone to a Cub leader meeting tonight to plan this terms itinerary.
I'm going to do some knitting and wait for a programme about dog food to come on at 9pm. I don't think I'm going to like what I see!
I'm very careful about what I feed the children so I don't see why I shouldn't educate myself on what I feed the dogs!
Tomorrow my friend who had her baby on Christmas Day is coming round so hopefully I get to cuddle a little baby.

Moving On

Very stressful and emotional couple of days. The young lady who collapsed at Edens party has said she tested positive at the hospital for heroin. She swears she didn't take it but things just aren't adding up. The effects were not of that drug for starters!  This lead to Eden and I having words last night. I'm really not happy about a lot of things but I'm having to let things go as it's not my daughter and we all handle things in different ways. I would be calling the police and trying to find out who gave this to my child if it were me but nothing like this is happening. The girl is back at school and it's like it never happened! Really weird!
Anyway, like the title says, moving on!
More therapy,

I have started knitting a round neck jumper for Soloman, it's an aran color but it's double knit wool and it's knitted in fisherman's rib.

 I've had this wool for ages. I love knitting with a big ball like this as you're not making joins all the time,

I've done another couple of inches since I took this picture yesterday, it looks so lovely but it's so easy, my kind of pattern!
Not a lot of other news, shopping day today, so there is food in the house again!
Tomorrow we're hoping to go out with the dogs and run some errands. The weather is meant to be quite good so I'm hoping to take a picnic. I think a fun day out is long overdue.
I'm going to put a slow cooker on too so we'll have something lovely,warm and filling when we get back.
My favorite kind of day!

Quick post!

Therapy!

It's all good!
Just going to spend the day with the boys who were very much neglected by me yesterday.
Back tomorrow x

Mums seldom worry for no reason!

I have been pondering all day how, or even if, to write this post.
People blog in different ways, some have lots of information, some bare all, some seem to have the perfect life/partner/children.
I certainly don't bare all, I'll put in quips about the children's behavior, I will never blog about disagreements I have with Malc, I will sometimes ask for advice.
As this is real life and Edens long awaited party has been spoken about and well wishes have been sent I don't feel that I can just move on without some mention of the party.
I'm not giving full graphic details and names but will give the basic happenings here and I hope you all understand why.
Edens party was finishing at midnight, some guests were sleeping over, girls only, no boys allowed to stay and the other girls parents who Eden was sharing the party with were upstairs all evening. These were the rules, everyone was happy, there would be alcohol and we were trusting people to be sensible.
About an hour after the party started one of Edens friends seemed to be extremely drunk, they were all surprised as nobody had seen her drink much. They called her Mum  to pick her up, she lives about 25 miles away so they knew she would be a while.
Meantime the girl started being sick, the parents upstairs were already on their way downstairs after hearing the music stop, waiting a few minutes for it to begin again and guessing something was going on.
The girl became unconscious and an ambulance was called. The paramedics stated straight away she'd taken something, probably meyths, which we'd never heard of, otherwise called, speed, skank or ice. ( Crash course on the Internet last night!)
She was taken to hospital along with her Mum.
Eden called us to come and pick her up, the other friends parents had told everyone they had to go home and were very shocked about the episode. We entered the house to be confronted by some extremely upset and shocked teenagers, a lot had already been picked up.
The  other friends parents were mortified by what had happened.
We brought Eden home and we were up until 3am talking with her. She was extremely upset and shocked by what had happened.
I text the Mum of the girl in hospital this morning and she's OK, she was in resus for hours and her heart did in fact stop but luckily they doctors managed to bring her back.
This young lady comes from a loving hardworking family, her Mum is one of the nicest ladies I know.
Everyone is completely shocked, none of her friends knew she took drugs, didn't know she had taken any thing that night and quite a few are blaming themselves for not knowing.
The only thing good that has come out of this at the risk of sounding callous is that this will stay with those party guests for a long time, they will be able to see that drugs are not glamorous, they saw her do some pretty undignified things that she wouldn't have been conscious of.
Today Eden has received so many texts and phone calls from concerned friends that it had sort of taken over the day.
She's at a church choir rehearsal at the moment which she didn't really want to go to but I think she'll be fine when she gets there, I think she needs a little time out from the phone calls.
She's torn between being gutted her party was ruined, being angry and then feeling so sorry for the girl. She can't believe she didn't know her friend was taking drugs and by the stories coming out now could have been taking them for several months.
Hopefully they will all be able to move on from this, I think it's all been a bit close to home for them.
I am very proud of them all for the way they've handled themselves, rallied around to comfort each other and although a few have been a bit hard nosed about the girl most have been very compassionate and plan to be as supportive as they can.
Luckily this incident had a good outcome, many of them don't!
So, in whatever way you send your healing wishes to people, whether by prayer, positive vibes, meditation please send some to this young lady, her family and to all her friends who will be marked by this incident for a very long while.
Thank you x

Mums Taxi

That's what I am today, just a taxi driver! I took Malc and the two eldest boys to Men's Breakfast which is held at our local church, bi-monthly.
Got back hovered the lounge and hallway and then washed those two floors, took Eden and her friend to the friends house where their party is being held.
Got back, literally put the car keys down when Malc texted and asked me to go and pick him up.  So I did that, all this before 11am!
The rest of the day has been quieter thankfully!
Clark and Callum cleaned out the rabbits whilst we had a day of no rain!
I did a basket of ironing.
Then we all sat down and watched a Christmas film, yes, you read that right! One that I'd taped from before Christmas.
I'm going to try and finish the pair of bedsocks that I'm knitting tonight to take my mind off my daughters party which is the first one ( that I know of anyway!) that involves boys and alcohol!
We are all hankered down for the bad weather we have approaching overnight, we've already had our dustbin go over and go gliding down the road!
I also have to say thanks to Jo (Through the Keyhole) I think you could be right, the bird on the spoon does indeed look like it could be a Marsh Warbler
At lastly welcome to a new follower, thrift deluxe. Thanks for following me.

Birthday pictures

Eden walked down the drive to see these in the windows

She came in and opened presents straight away,

She wasn't happy about me taking pictures of her in her uniform so I didn't get many. I can't believe how short her skirt is, it's meant to be no more than five inches above their knee! Any shorter it would be a pair of knickers! It doesn't help that she's got the longest legs!

We had a Chinese take-away as a treat for tea, she had her best friend come home with her from school who stayed the night.

She has a party tomorrow night, her friend is sixteen on Monday so they are having a shared party at her friends house.

Her friends parents will be upstairs and we are not invited! We're embarrassing apparently!

Today we went to see one my friends, Norma, she's 75 years of age, although you wouldn't know it, she looks like she's in her fifties and acts like she's in her thirties! She can hula hoop alongside my boys often beating them with the number of rotations she can do!

Her Mum died at the beginning of December at the grand old age of 97 years. 

Norma has been clearing out her Mums house and found three knitting bags , some wool and needles which she kindly offered to us

She also found this lovely book on Dorset, I  love books like this, I love living in this county, we have the best of both worlds, lovely beaches and great countryside,

She also gave me this spoon to remember her Mum by which I thought was a beautiful gesture

Can anyone tell me what bird they think this is?

I'm not sure if it as sparrow, a type of tit or one of the finch family! Any help gratefully received.

At Beavers before Christmas, Cody and Clark bought home a bulb in a vase they had decorated themselves which I'm very pleased to say have started to flower

Beautiful!

Birthdays

Today our much longed for baby girl is sixteen. Much longed for as it took six years to fall for Eden.
We'd actually given up hope of having a baby and like lots of stories go when you stop trying, you get pregnant!
Her brothers presents to her are here waiting for her to return from school

She's already had our present of money and I know a few people are going to drop by later with presents, that's why I'm posting this early as I know it's going to be chaos later!
Edens favorite flowers are red roses, now mine are yellow roses and as I'm the mother of the birthday girl I received these,

Aren't I lucky?
We've finished the cake, Callum and I did it together, now I love baking cakes but I'm not very good at decorating them but I was really pleased with how this came out.
Front view,

Top view

More tomorrow, with lots of birthday pictures I suspect!

The cake so far!

Thanks for all the comments yesterday. I feel much better today, I had a good nights sleep which always helps.
I've finished the welly tops for my friend, I must remember to take a picture tomorrow as I've put them away already!
I'm now starting on another pair of bedsocks as I've received an order for five pairs, three ladies and two children.
Today has been the usual round of housework and shopping but we've also been shopping for surprises as tomorrow is Edens 16th birthday . I have a huge number one and number six balloon in the dog cage in the back of the van waiting to be brought out tomorrow.
Callum and I have got this far with the cake,

We made the sponge and cut it in half horizontally, buttercreamed it and then I cheated and bought ready made roll out icing and we put that on.
Tomorrow we are going to decorate it.
Our internet has been intermittent today which has been very frustrating. Hopefully it has been sorted now, it did make me  realise though how much we use it and rely on it.

Feeling Flat

That's how I've been feeling these last few days. We were really busy again at the weekend, mainly doing stuff for the children! Lifts to and from places, friends staying and friends to tea. I feel like I'm running around after everybody and nobody's running after me!
To top it all I seemed to pick up a tummy bug late Sunday night, I had to do some stuff for Mum on Monday and I didn't want to let her down but how I did it I don't know, I was so tired!
Last night was Cubs, so Malc, Clark and Soloman trotted off. I managed to watch Winter watch which cheered me up no end.
Today I managed to do my leaflet round before the rain came which again is good news.
Then I attacked an overflowing basket of ironing. that took nearly two hours. We had late lunch, I managed to finish off another pair of bedsocks

They look quite grey , they are in fact a denim blue color.
We then went to pick Eden up from school as she stayed behind to do some extra work for her textiles coursework.
I'm now waiting for tonight's episode of Winterwatch  to come on and I've started a pair of welly tops as part of my friends birthday present as it's her birthday at the beginning of February.
Tomorrow's going to be busy as well, it's Edens 16th birthday on Thursday and Callum wants to make her a cake!

Winterwatch

These three are back on our screen at 8-30 pm tomorrow night on BBC 2 from 20-23 January.

For this,

A firm favourite in our house! It's coming from Scotland so I hope the rain stops and the snow starts so we can get some gorgeous winter pictures.

Shoes

Here's what we've been doing today

The boys had so much money at Christmas that I said it would be helpful if they could buy themselves a pair of shoes and a pair of slippers with some of it.
So off we went to town and walked into the only shop that had a till that wasn't working. Unfortunately we didn't know that until we went to pay! The sales assistant had to write out what they had sold complete with product number and also hand write the receipt! As the boys all paid one by one it took absolutely ages.
When we got home and I asked them if I could have a picture of them for my blog they nearly wet themselves.
I did point out that this is as exciting as my life gets!

To busy to blog

Yesterday I was so busy that I went to bed really early without blogging! That sounds like a confession!
Today has been mad too, I went to Mums to wash and blow dry her hair this morning, did lots of housework this afternoon.
Half of us have just had Toad-in-the -Hole for tea, the other half have their's waiting on the kitchen side for when they get home.
It's the usual Friday night madness with Beavers, Youth club and now Clark has started Scouts so we've also got that in the mix. He has to do Cubs and Scouts for four week to cross over, luckily Scouts is straight after Beavers and he helps out there and it finishes the same time as Youth club, even better is that the scout hut is right next to the church where youth club is held.
I finished these earlier whilst I was waiting for tea to cook.

The colour hasn't come through very well on this picture, it's actually a lovely mint green colour, this looks more blue!
We've got quite a busy weekend coming up too but more on that tomorrow.

Shopping Day

I can't believe how quickly the weeks fly by. Shopping day again!

This morning I did some school work with the boys, I read a book about Pegasus and we talked about having more than one God, pride coming before a fall and the stars as there is a group called "Pegasus"
The boys constantly amaze me with the way they think, some of the things they say really surprise and delight me.
It also got me thinking about the morals of our family as a whole, although I do tell them not to lie, be kind to people and general things like that I realised today that I don't teach "Morals" they just sort of happen. Which in turn made me realise how much our behavior and beliefs rub off on our children.
It would seem that most of Malcs and my morales have been picked up by the boys. ( Luckily we are both quite moral, so they should be OK!)
I did a load of ironing and we had lunch and I figured we had about an hour before we were going shopping so I settled down for a crafty fix of knitting when the phone rang. So the hour was spent catching up with a friend that I'd not seen since before Christmas which was very nice and unexpected.
Then Malc and I managed to go shopping on our own again. Honestly Callum's so cheap, he babysits for a packet of sweets! He'll learn!
We had to pick Eden up as she had an extra class for Textiles this evening.
Tea has been eaten, we are working our way through the rota of baths and I'm now really hoping to get that hour of knitting done!

This and That!

Did my leaflet round this morning, cold but sunny which was good.
We had a lovely walk with the dogs this afternoon, it was extremely muddy, but fun was had none the less. The pups sniffed out every puddle!
On the way home we called round Mums to drop off her fatballs.
Mum has two dogs, here's one of them, Rumbles, he's a Bichon Frise, he was a rescue dog and sadly was neglected and given very little to eat so he's not even half the proper size that he should be.

Clark was very honoured as he only usually sits with my Stepdad.
When we got home I looked through a couple more of the knitting library books that I borrowed and I've found some more lovely patterns.
Look out for the pictures on future posts!

Food for the birds and food for us!

This morning Soloman, Cody and I made some of these.

We melted some lard in the microwave and then stirred in some birdseed and some mealworms.

We put them in the freezer for ten minutes to firm them up and then wrapped them in cling film. We've done twelve for us and twelve for Mum as she got a bird station for Christmas and loves watching all the visitors to it through her lounge window.

Mind you looking at them I'm going to have to make sure they're not mistaken for stuffing balls as they look really similar!

Then we made these, chocolate chip muffins,

This afternoon we went to the library to print of our letters that we wrote on our tablets yesterday.

I also borrowed some knitting books to have a look through some patterns. Now I have got hundreds of patterns but they are quite old, Some of them were my Mums and are about 40 years old. So I wanted to find something more modern. 

I found this,

A snake scarf, I thought this would be lovely to knit for some of the younger children of my friend with the large family. Knowing my boys I'll bet they will want one too!

So I'm off to go and have a browse through some of the other knitting books and see what else I can find.

just finished

Dull day

No rain today but goodness me it's cold down here in Dorset
The day started with the boys cleaning out their rabbits whilst I sorted out all the veg for tea. Roast chicken with all the trimmings.
After a quick lunch, the boys and I sat round to write letters to their Nan who lives in Essex. We usually do this on a Monday and we write them by hand but today I thought we could put their new tablets to better use than playing minecraft!! So we all typed out the letters on our tablets.

Unfortunately we've not got a wireless printer so Malc has had to send the letters to his email account as attachments and we're going on a book changing expedition to the library tomorrow so we'll get them printed off then.
One of this years goals I think, a wireless printer!
I've just put the chicken in, looking forward to tea.
I've done enough for everybody else now so I'm going to sit and do some crochet for an hour.
Before I go though I must say hello to a couple of new followers that I've noticed I now have! So a big welcome to Pam and Helen of The Frugal Knit-wit
I think you started following a few days ago but I'm useless at noticing these things!

Freebies

Today Malc saw an advert on Free cycle for some wool, contacted the lady and went to pick it up.

I don't know how much is there, I forgot to count it all but there's 800 grms of chunky wool in the plastic bag alone!
Most of the balls are new ones.
How happy am I? Like Christmas and my birthday all at once!

Old Age!

Just picked these up

So life starts at forty, starts going downhill at forty-seven though!!

My friends dog

Firstly in my comments yesterday I was asked about crofters pie and I replied that I would put the method on here today.
You need mince, onions,mushroom and carrots. Put it all in a large saucepan to boil with a little water. When cooked add gravy granules to thicken. Make scones using flour and marge. Pour the mixture from the saucepan into a large dish and place the scones on top, cook in the oven until the scones are brown.
This morning I went to visit my friend with lots of children (I'm always mentioning her!)  who has just got a little puppy, she's twelve weeks old and she's a Cavalier King Charles crossed with a Papillion. She's called Candy.

She's so small and twee and incredibly sweet.
At one point I was giving a 2 1/2 week old baby boy his  bottle and I had this gorgeous little puppy curled up on my lap at the same time. Life just doesn't get better than that!

Lots of pictures, not many words!

Last nights tea, Crofters Pie, we had it with veg,

Tonights tea, Shepherds Pie, with broccoli,

This afternoon we went to Wareham Forest with the boys and dogs, we walked for just under two hours which is why I'm absolutely shattered now and posting pictures instead of writing about my day!

Surveying the path we'd just walked along,

Lots of fallen trees to rest on,

Malc has got a Beaver planning meeting tonight, so I'm enjoying the peace as the boys are in the bath, all the dogs are snoozing on the sofa exhausted!

A day of learning

Firstly I have to say hello to Helen over at Frugalknit-wit and pass on some pattern information!
Helen... The pattern is  King Cole pattern number 3459. It uses double wool and is done on ordinary straight needles. It has several patterns for different socks but I knit the short socks with turnbacks and just make the bit of sock between the heel and the ribbed cuff shorter.
So much going on here today, Malc and the two eldest went to work again this morning. Whilst they were out I did some housework, honestly, if I had a pound for every time I've mopped the floor today I would be a very rich lady!
Soloman and Cody also did some schoolwork.

We managed to get quite a bit done. The workers returned at dinner time and we had some lovely hot crumpets dripping with butter!
One of the targets I set myself this year was to teach Cody how to do Granny Squares, at the moment he just crochets endless amounts of chain! So figuring the sooner we get started the sooner he can contribute to our charity knitting/crochet we had a go,

He picked it up pretty quickly, here's his square,

It's actually quite a bit bigger now as I took this picture earlier and he's been going for most of the afternoon!
Back in September my parents asked Callum what he wanted for his birthday and he said some wool, he wanted to crochet a throw for his bed. So he received some green and beige wool to match his bedroom colours. Last night he decided that he wanted to start on it, Clark offered to help. This has continued onto this afternoon, they are doing big Granny Squares to sew together to make the throw.

I'm also in the crochet mood and I'm doing a shawl for my friend that I did the hats/mitts set for.

I made a Crofters Pie for tea earlier, mince, onions,mushrooms and carrots with scones on top. If I remember I'll take a photo for tomorrows post. People call different dishes different names according to the region they are from I think but that's what it's called here.
We  watched Stargazing Live last night, Brian Cox Is a firm favourite in this house. Eden is taking Astronomy as one of the GCE's this year and Malcolm and Soloman are very into stars and planets. It's on for three nights so we will be glued again tonight.
The weather situation is much better here, we actually saw some sunshine this morning, unfortunately we've had rain this afternoon but nothing much.
At least we were able to uncover the rabbits for a while today!