Christmas mark 3!

Our third Christmas day was yesterday when all three of us spent the day with Tim's family in Kennilworth. We had a lovely day filled with lots of fun, laughter and nice food. It was so good to see Tim having such a nice time as we exchanged presents and spent time with his family, although he did find it very tiring. The three cousins enjoyed playing Granny's piano together making lots of noise!

Tom enjoyed doing his new jigsaw, while Sam played with his new lego and Alex ate raisins to stave off the hunger before the meal was ready.

Alex wasn't too sure about having the wrapping paper put on his head.

Lunch was hillarious with Tim making all three boys laugh loads as these photos show!Alex was slightly puzzled by the laughter of the others but enjoyed himself nonetheless.
Lunch was enjoyed by all even if the cracker jokes were groaned at
Granny and Grandpa were slightly bemused by the family howling like wolves

Tom and Fay enjoyed it though.

Alex enjoyed his first ever mince pie...I don't blame him as they were gorgeous!
Finally we had a family photo of the three of us celebrating Christmas. All in all, although we had to leave a little early due to illness and tiredness we had a lovely time and I am so glad that we were able to go. It really feels like we have had a family Christmas now. I hope you all enjoy your New Year celebrations tonight. Have a Happy New Year.

Love,

Caro

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Christmas mark 2!

Well Alex was so much better on Christmas Eve that we decided to chance it and he and I headed down the motorway to Somerset leaving Tim, who was coming down with the flue, to veg out on the sofa for a few days. We had a lovely time seeing my family despite me having no voice and the sorest throat I think I have ever had...I had full sympathy with Alex not being able to eat anything that was remotely acidic. It was lovely to see Alex and Daniel playing together or rather beside each other and fortunately over the time we were down there Alex's rash eased off somewhat which was a relief.

Bath time was good fun as the two boys spent much time splashing and interacting.

Christmas day was lovely, starting with opening of the boys stockings in Grandma's bed.

Everyone got in on the action and fun!

Then the boys were supposed to have a nap, which Daniel, like a good little boy did, and Alex decided that he wasn't going to sleep at all despite our best efforts. While they were in bed we took the dog for a walk and then after Daniel woke up we exchanged presents.

Alex opened his presents while sat on my lap. Alex's favourite present was definitely this pushchair and teddy. He kept taking the teddy out of the pushchair then giving it a hug and a love before putting it back in the chair and taking it for a walk. Alex was shattered by the time we got to lunch so he ate and went to bed whilst Daniel sat at the table with us reading stories etc. After lunch we went outside for a game of football and to give Daniel some fresh air (Alex was still asleep!).
Then it was time to exchange more presents (enormous so called stockings!) for each family and to play with the boys before their bed time and an evening of television and card games. Boxing day saw us heading out for the traditional walk up on the Quantocks. However, although it was sunny it was bitterly cold and despite my best efforts at wrapping Alex up warm he got a bit chilled. We had a lovely warming soup for lunch and then Alex went to bed. The main issue was trying to convince him to drink something as he gradually seemed to get more ill the day went on. My mother managed to get some ribena into him in the evening and that made him a bit better thank goodness so he perked up for his bath. I ended up sleeping in his room to make sure he was OK overnight. Saturday saw Alex much brighter and we packed up and came home in the afternoon. All in all it was a lovely time and I am glad that we went, it was just a shame that Alex was ill and so didn't enjoy all of the time we were there. Since coming home we have taken things very easy and gently mooched around the house as none of us are really well yet. It has been nice to come back home and spend some time with Tim, watching silly Christmas movies and eating nice food. Provided Tim is well enough we hope to do another Christmas day with his family tomorrow. I hope everyone has had/is having a nice holiday period.

Love,

Caro

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Only a partial success

We had our Christmas day for the three of us yesterday and it started with Alex having the worst eczema he has ever had all over his face, wrists and legs. This wasn't too bad as he was in a fairly happy mood and we had a great time opening all our presents, including his stocking presents in bed. Here he is sat on our bed surrounded by wrapping paper and toys, happily admiring his new farm and trying to extricate the tractor from the packaging.

We then went to the under 5s nativity play at church and he didn't do too badly to start off with dancing to the carols and watching all the other children. He was a shepherd this year, but didn't want to wear his hat. However, towards the end of the service he started to get very fractious and unhappy, obviously clutching his ear and being generally miserable. However, it wasn't until his lunchtime nap that we noticed a rash and decided that perhaps we had better take him to A&E. Nearly three hours later we came home having been told that it was a bad throat and ear infection, but was viral so there was nothing we can do about it other than dose him with paracetamol and ibuprofen for the pain, let him eat whatever he can manage, try and persuade him to drink and with some hydrocortisone cream for his face. Needless to say spending the afternoon in A&E was not the plan for our Christmas day, however, we did still manage to have a lovely roast dinner and watch a fun movie in the evening so at least the day ended OK.

Today Alex is still very uncomfortable and his face looks as if he is a burns victim...it is horrendous (although it doesn't show up anywhere near as bad in this photo). I keep praying that he will get better for Christmas, but I think that this year there wont be photos of a pretty little boy and he may spend much of the time unhappy which is a real shame. I hope and pray things improve.

While Alex slept this lunchtime I have managed to play with some of my new crafting goodies from Tim, namely some penny black stamps and oval nestabilities. For a change I decided to colour in the images with pencils rather than water colours and I am quite pleased with how they worked out.

I just love this cheeky cat chasing the butterflies...I haven't put a sentiment on this card yet as I haven't decided when I will use it, but it is a nice one to have in the cupboard for the future and is my entry to the cute card thursday challenge this week. I am off to my parents on Wednesday so don't know if I will have time to upload before then, if not have a great Christmas everyone.

Love,

Caro

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Christmas Eve!

OK, I know that it is only 20th December, but I finished work yesterday, following a fab works lunch, and we are having today as our family Christmas Eve. This is mostly because Tim has decided that he is too ill to travel down to Somerset with Alex and me for Christmas so we are celebrating early as a xfamily. This means I have spent today running around frantically trying to finish off all the wrapping (including stockings), baking (cookies & flapjack), cleaning, tidying, and putting up Christmas decorations all while listening to (and singing) Christmas Carols. The house smells wonderful, I feel really Christmassy and I am looking forward to tomorrow when we will have a roast dinner, exchange presents and go to the under fives nativity service at church. I just hope that Alex is a bit better as he still is full of cold and in obvious pain from his throat and ear. The picture is of him after he had made Tim's tag for his present.

Crafting wise I have made loads of tags for Christmas presents...all the same as these three.

Made more fudge and decorated the empty frerro rocher boxes I put it in with alcohol inks and simple Christmas stamps.

Finally, I decorated an empty box to put the necklace I made for my Mother in...I hope she likes it. Well I am off to bath a little boy and then to have a nice meal and movie with Tim. Have a nice weeekend and I will update you on how our early Christmas day went in a few days.

Love,

Caro

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Strangely quiet

It is strangely quiet around here as poor little Alex has lost his voice. He hasn’t been a very happy camper over the last few days, but has still had fun at nursery and is slowly improving which is good news. He came home from nursery today with a Christmas card he made for us and a decoration for our tree! He is still very much attached to the ambulance we were lent by Abby’s kids, and it is the first toy he asks for in the morning, announced by the word ‘Van’ as he can’t say ambulance yet! Trying to persuade him to put it down when he eats or goes to bed is a little tricky though. He has a number of new words this week including 'glass', 'hammer', 'cot' and 'cook' - this last one is used to tell me to get his food ready!! This lunchtime we had my departments Christmas competition, which this year was sweets (confectionary). I have to say that trying to make fudge was a complete mess...it boiled over, burnt on the bottom of the pan, stuck to the spoon...everything that could go wrong did, but in the end I did produce some reasonable looking pieces of fudge to enter the competition with (see picture above). There were eleven entries to the competition and I have to say that they all looked and tasted very good, with the overwhelming majority being chocolate truffles and only two entries of fudge. Everyone judged it individually scoring the sweets in terms of favourites and giving the top three marks (top one got 3 points, second got 2 points and third got 1 point) and then the marks were added up for each batch of sweets. The resulting chaos was hilarious. Despite all the troubles with my fudge I came third so I was very pleased. Crafting wise I discovered that I needed even more Christmas cards for the local people (work etc) and so had to go on a make some quick Christmas cards spree. All of the ones shown in this post were pretty quick to make...I made the lot in about 40 minutes! I guess that makes them another entry for the Daring cardmakers challenge again. These two used my cuttlebug for the background card and the snowflake and a nestabilities die for the scalloped circle, coupled with basic grey background paper. This one used a Crafty Individuals image, K&Co background paper and a papermania sticker. I do like the vintage feel of this one. My favourite of these cards has to be the one I made for the Cuttlebug Spot challenge this week, which was to make a white card with a black message. I was a bit dubious as to how successful this would be, but was really pleased with the result as the ribbon, the papermania sticker, glitter glue on the background and the clear gem all add to the impact of this mostly white card. I would love to know what you all think of these. Have a great rest of the week.
Love,
Caro
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A weekend of two halves

Yesterday was fantastic as we went to see my best friend Abby and her family. We had a wonderful time and Alex loved playing with the two boys and most especially their cars! They have over 100 vehicles of all shapes and sizes and Alex was in his element. He got so attached to an ambulance that he was allowed to bring it back with him. We had the most wonderful catch up session interspersed with games with the boys, and it was one of the best days I have had in a while, especially as Alex was so well behaved and ate everything put in front of him (a first!). Sadly I don't have a photo as I left the battery for my camera behind. Today was completely different as Alex has developed a cough which meant that he didn't sleep overnight, and he has a high temperature and has been a very tired and miserable little boy all day, not really wanting to play, but not knowing what he wanted to do - poor little thing.

I have managed to do some crafting over the weekend in the form of this candle with a foxglove image. I know foxgloves are not normally blue, but this candle is for someone whose house is mostly blues and creams so pink would not work. I think it has come out OK fortunately, although the photo doesn't do it justice.

I also joined in with the cuttlebug spot challenge this week to use stars on a card...now I haven't used a star on a card for ages, so this was a challenge for me and I nearly didn't join in, but here it is. The sketch is from this weeks card positioning systems ad the large snowflake was cut and embossed using my cuttlebug. Sorry about the photo...Alex was sat on my lap at the time making it difficult to take the picture.

The challenge on daring cardmakers was to make Christmas cards that only take a few minutes to make. These three took a total of 30 minutes to make so i think that they count! I enjoyed using my new nestabilities for them, but definitely need some form of embossing mat in order to be able to emboss the diecuts as well. The images came free with a magazine last year. As usual I would love to know what you think of this little lot! Have a great week everyone... I think we may be going to the doctors tomorrow if things don't improve tonight.

Love,

Caro

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About time too!

Well I finally earned the title of lecturer (4 years after getting the position!) by giving my first proper lecture to first year undergraduate medical students yesterday – all 270 of them! It was somewhat nerve wracking, but it seemed to go OK. I much prefer giving presentations on my research. Work continues to be insanely busy, although I am making progress on all four major projects – you never know I might actually complete them all before Christmas! Only a week left of work before I finish for the holidays and I can’t wait. Following my printer nightmare earlier this week, Tim went out and bought me a new ‘do everything’ canon printer and very sweetly set it up for me. This means that the Christmas card & letter situation is nearly under control and they should all be posted this weekend. Hurrah! Alex has been hilarious these past few days using his new words ‘off, dark and van’ pretty much constantly. His current obsession (alongside the ever present car one) is hats and he had to have his breakfast this morning in his pyjamas and hat! Needless to say with frantically writing Christmas cards and sorting out the printer for my Christmas letter I have failed to do much in the way of crafting...although I did make another of these candles for a friend I am seeing tomorrow. Have a great weekend everyone.
Love,
Caro

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