It's been so long since I last posted I honestly don't know where to start. I guess first of all I want to say thank you for all the comments on my post about Alice's sore foot. She wasn't walking for nearly a week so it was obviously a painful sprain but I'm happy to say she is back to normal now and running around again.
Since my last post I've painted and decluttered the spare room, which had become something of a dumping ground, ready for Norma's arrival.
After nearly30 hours of travelling (including a 10 hour stop over in Dubai) Norma and Caelen arrived in the UK on 23 April. Although it had been a couple of years since Norma was last here and even longer since we'd seen Caelen, once they were here that time disappeared and we carried on where we left off. Caelen is living with Kyle and Emma (his eldest brother and his fiance) and Norma is staying with us.
The last time Norma was here Alice was about 6 months old. Alice has spoken to Norma on Skype a number of times when she's been round here, so Norma was looking forward to meeting her again and getting to spend time with her. She didn't have to wait long as Claire and girls came round the next day. Alice soon warmed to Norma and it wasn't long before they were reading books together.
I love this photo of Alice :o)
Since Norma's arrival we've been busy virtually every day, mainly locally and with family, but we also had a trip to Lewes for breakfast with a friend. Lewes is only a 20 -30 minute drive from here and yet I'd never been there before. It was lovely and although the weather wasn't wonderful we did have a little walk around. I've got a few more photos from that day but will leave them for another blog post.
This is Grump a Lump Alice ;o) There are some days when she doesn't go down for a nap and by a certain time of day things get a bit much and a melt down can occur. I thought I'd take a photo to add to my Project Life to document this, though I doubt Alice will thank me for it when she's older ;o)
Spring made an appearance and we've had blossom on the cherry tree. It always looks so pretty, it's a pity it doesn't last for long. Again, a photo for PL so that I can see when it flowered this year compared to other years.
The 2nd of May saw Norma and me at the local Community Centre so that I could vote in the local elections. This literally took a couple of seconds and we stopped for lunch in the cafe afterwards.
Mandy makes a wonderful homemade soup and her tomato soup was no exception. It was delicious!
However, after her homemade tomato soup tinned tomato soup doesn't taste so good. Norma found a recipe for Roast Tomato and Garlic soup which she made this week, she added a couple of extra touches and it was really tasty. Certainly one we'd make again.
The nicer weather made me want to plant seeds - these red pepper seedlings were my first attempt and started off on the kitchen window sill. They didn't take long to grow and were then repotted into these pots. Unfortunately the snails liked the look of them too and I've lost three of them. I'm hoping the remainder survive. Since then I've also planted sunflower, tomato and basil seeds and the tomato seedlings are ready to be transplanted too. Fingers crossed we get them big enough to get fruit from them.
We've spent time with Mum and Dad who are loving having Norma here. This week we were able to give them something else to look forward to when we told them my younger brother, Robin, will be coming over for a holiday arriving on 06 June - Mum and Dad's Diamond Wedding Anniversary (60 years). We're excited to see him again - I think the last time was about 2007?
Cloud has a skin condition that causes sores on her which burst and take a while to heal. We need to try and keep the area around her scabs trimmed. On this sunny day I was trimming around the scabs but got a bit carried away. I trimmed virtually the whole of one side of her and had no option but to carry on and trim the other side to match. She would normally go to the dog parlour but they don't like to take her if any of her scabs are weeping, so her fur was quite long. At some stage I felt like I was shearing a sheep with a pair of scissors. Fortunately she didn't look as bad as I'd thought she might (for those in the UK, I was thinking the sheepdog in the Specsavers advert!) and she seems more comfortable with her fur short.
Then we come to my beautiful granddaughers, who we've seen quite a bit of :o).
Megan is now 4.5 months. She has cut her first two teeth (both bottom ones) and could possibly be starting on the top ones. There's been lots of dribbling!! She's generally a very happy little girl with lots of smiles for everyone - until she's ready for a feed when her demeanor can change in seconds from smiling to howling until the bottle is in her mouth, haha! Once she's had some food she's back to smiling Megan again. Claie recently started giving her solids as she was waking up hungry at night again. Since she's started on the solids she seems to have gone back to sleeping through the night.
Alice is also growing so quickly and is loving being able to get outside to play. When she comes here she likes nothing more than being able to run around outside, play in the sandpit and water the plants. She also likes going for walks and yesterday walked from their house to ours (probably a 20 - 30 minute walk for her) and Claire said today she walked into town, round town and home again without complaining. So nice to see her getting the exercise and enjoying it. This photo was taken after she'd been playing outside then come in and was watching / listening to Disney's "Sophia the First" talking book. It was only after she'd watched it a couple of times that I realised if you touched the pictures it was interactive (silly Grandma!).
Megan with her sock monkey from Aunty Norma.
Emily had her leavers day on Friday as the Year 11s went on study leave for their GCSEs. She was a bit emotional about the thought of the leavers assembly but, as I pointed out, she's not actually leaving the school as she will be returning in September for Sixth Form. However, a lot of the children in her year will be leaving and moving to other Sixth Form colleges or schools. Fortunately for Emily, her friends have also chosen to stay at their current school so they'll all be together again next year.
And finally, Claire found out on Tuesday that her landlord is selling the house she is currently renting. As things have turned out she saw another house on Tuesday afternoon (4 houses down from my parents and just down the road from us) which she really liked. Mum and Dad have known the owner for a number of years and he's happy for Claire to rent it from him. It's smaller than the one she's in at the moment but is lovely and light with good sized rooms and a garden Alice will be able to play in without Claire having to always be there with her. I think they'll be happy there but, as you can imagine, the next couple of weeks are going to be busy as she needs to pack up her current house, decide what she's not going to keep and move. She hopes to be in the weekend of 25/26 May.
I don't know how blogging will go in the next couple of weeks (especially if the past few are anything to go by) so please bear with me and keep popping back from time to time to see if I've updated. I'm hoping at some stage things are going to calm down a bit and blogging will resume ;o)
Thanks for popping by.
xx
