Month: October 2012

Ok, so going to “daylight savings time” is supposed to give us a lie in with a couple of days’ benefits. Sure, it makes it slightly lighter int he mornings, and cosier in the evenings…
BUT –
NO ONE TELLS MY BODY!!!!

My body likes to do things at the same time each day; it is happy that way! It likes to wake up around 6am, be fed a cup ( well, large mug really) of either tea or hot water and lemon depending on how it feels, have breakfast, lunch and supper at the same time; and now have the two snacks allowed to keep up the insulin levels.
It does NOT listen to me when I tell it we have a lie in on the Sunday, and now it has insisted on getting started at the new 5am by waking me thinking Hubby was late for his train!!

Oh OK, so I’m moaning again…sorry! On the plus side we have a safe morning for kids goingto o school, and I do love “tea” infront of a roaring fire…it reminds me of tea with Mummy as a child, coming in after school for cuddles, tea, cake and Blue Peter. Ahhhh, those were the days!

So, pleas e understand, it’s not me complaining about the time change. No, really, it’s not…..it’s my body!!!

I’m on a train! Read that and imagine me shouting into a phone…no, I am sitting quietly, like a good girl, speeding my way towards the Big Smoke(London) and thence onwards to Luton, for a fab lunch with the other Breakfast Club Trolly Dollies.
Already it has been a little stressful… My own fault, as I have a habit of changing my mind! Tis morning it was about clothes and how to get to the station, and indeed, which station to go from!!

Clothes were decided by the weather, and I still am going to be too hot! But I am comfortable, and that is almost the main point. I am in Purple and charcoal for those of you wondering… (Oh, no-one? Never mind.)

Next was the question of the quickest, safest way to be at Ashford international – to drive and worry about finding a parking space, or take the train from Rye where parking is easy… I know, sound silly, but it is some time since I took a train, and I am surprising even myself at how twitchy I have been over it!
Of course it was decided in the end by the cost of parking at Ashford!! It was still cheaper to park at Rye and train to Ashford! Also this means the car will be at Rye if Hubby manages to meet me for the homeward journey! (Doubtful as he hates to be seen to leave the office early on a Friday despite leaving late Monday to Thursday! )

So here I am on the Fast Train to St. Pancras, along with ladies going out for the day, chaps on business trips, and others. I have no sense of direction so I’m sitting backwards, well, facing backwards-you know what I mean! So in my head I am on my way to Paris… Um, …no, the sign said St.P on the train, stop worrying! Oh, and a very nice lady (Corrie Corfield) has just informed us all its is arriving at Ebsfleet International, so that’s alright. SHe has one of those comforting voices that we can trust!

I have been tweeting with those I am meeting about arriving early and I’m now worried that I will be interrupting their business meeting, despite their protestations!

You see, it would be so much better to make a plan and stick to it!!

Ebsfleet seemed a smart, clean station. Nothing else here though, and Corrie is back with more information. Nice trip this.
Now at Stratford, same as Ebsfleet… A bit impersonal.

Think I’ll read the paper now.. Laters, Babes.

Later, same day (dramatic direction!)

Oh what a fab day! There is nothing better than meeting up with good friends and laughing, discussing, agreeing, eating, drinking (soft drinks!) exchanging gifts, and generally enjoying Life!

I am returning…yep, back on the high speed train to Ashford International,… Refreshed, and invigorated. I am sure I should be tired, but I’m not! I fell I have had an injection of life from the 3 other ladies who I have now known for a year.
W met through Twitter…see my link to The Breakfast Club…and thought that I have learned a great deal about myself and others. I feel I have grown.

Cor, this was going to be light hearted and its getting “Heavy, Man! ”

Now that I think about it, perhaps I am tired… I have another train to take after this and a drive home. It’s funny to think that in a couple of hours Hubby will be on the same trains! Shame we are not travelling together, but I mustn’t be greedy…the day has been a near perfect one as it is.

So I will close this blog now, and read for a bit, trying not to fall asleep and miss my stop!

I love Day Trips Out!

Lx

This blog is promoted by last night’s supper at a friend’s new house…. It’s a dream house, clean, light airy, designed and built for them. Oh my gosh, it was like walking thought a Grand Designs set! But then she is very good at that sort of thing and works with another friend of ours, who is an interior designer, on all her houses she has had. (She moves a lot!)

Looking round her beautiful new home I realised she has pared down her belongings… I walked into my house and especially my bedroom and thought -wow! Too much stuff! Then on opening my makeup draw(yes, it’s that bad) I started thinking about how long one is supposed to keep things?!! Next question – why do I keep buying these things when I really only wear the same make up with slight alteration for night time.

In another friends’s house I was shown her remodelled bedroom and saw her walk in wardrobe. She still has loads of clothes etc despite getting rid of tons.

Most of my girlfriends have a summer and winter wardrobe, which is being changed round at the moment. I sometimes do this, but mor e with clothes I can no longer get into because I am either too big or too small for them. They all end up in one room in vac bags. What? Get rid of them?? But I might get into them again at some point!

See my problem? I am not a huge hoarder but find it difficult not to think that I might need the old tights in my cupboard at some point, or the bits of Ikea draw dividers that we seemed to have ended up with when we did the kitchen over 5 years ago! And what about the outdoor lanterns that will be fab when we have a supper outside on a beautiful summer evening that we just never seem to get? Do I really have to get rid of them??

I know in my heart the answer is -get rid of a lot of it! I don’t need it, I haven’t used it in the last few years, or I no longer can get into it, and it’s only a T-shirt/trousers/skirt that I’m never going to wear again.

I feel a trip to the recycling point coming on, and to the charity shops. Hm, perhaps it’s time to get going….

Chat later, folks!

Lx

I have been debating whether to write this blog or not -after all it does not show me in a good light! You may never want to read anything I write ever again! This is not a pretty tale; it is one of spoilt bratishness and ungratefulness!

This is one of those occasions when my Hormones and tiredness got the better of me.

On Friday night Hubby came home from his first business trip to India with lovely presents for us all. I had jokingly asked for an elephant, so he brought me a silver bangle with smiling elephants on, which is fab! He also brought three pashminas, one each. He had chosen a beautiful red one for himself, an electric dark blue one for our Son, and then I opened mine…

Now, if you opened my wardrobe you would find lots of blue, black, red, purple.. I like bright colours. I love scarfs and pashminas. Hubby had chosen for me a 100% pashmina with a beautiful handwoven patten – in dark beige with a panel of red and blue at each bottom. Writing it now it sounds beautiful. Doesn’t it! It is a dream to wear, so soft, warm, and gorgeous…. I thanked him … Honest! I did!

All was good, we went to bed, we slept… I woke at 5.30 and started to think about the pashmina… It isn’t a colour that I would chose as I didn’t feel he had been thinking of me when he chose it. I started suspecting he had just grabbed it as the last resort… After all, was this how he saw me? A Beige non-entity at home? A middle-aged invisible Person? (Of course he said absolutely not when I asked him later!!)
By the time we woke up I was tired again. Things didn’t get better over breakfast when we were going through a few things and he kept questioning some small decisions I had made whilst he was away… Poor chap was just back from a different time zone so he was feeling fought too!

I could feel my head about to explode with pent up emotions about it all, and so, instead of just taking a deep breath and going for a walk well away form the subject, I opened my mouth!
I tried to not say outright I didn’t like the colour of the pashmina- and I did point out I was very grateful for such a fab present, BUT … Yep, it came out that I didn’t think it was my colour!

Now, my Hubby is a wonderful chap! He didn’t say “you ungrateful cow!” As I bet you are all yelling at me! No, he asked what was wrong with it, and said he had thought it would go well with a blue overcoat, or green, or my blue (summer) blazer. Minor problem I don’t own either a blue overcoat or green one. Because he is such a nice man we were able to laugh about it, and he offered to give me his red one which is fab, and not 100% pashmina, saying ” the important thing is that you are happy with it”

Do you see what an awful prison I am? Don’t shout yes too loudly!!

Then, bless his cotton socks, he said the most annoying thing any husband can say to his wife…

“If you don’t like it, I can always send it to my Mum”

ARRRGH!!!!!!!!!!

Nothing else was said then; we went off to the local hills to walk the dog- without coats so we got very, very wet – SO… yes, you’ve guessed it, whilst laughing at how wet and cold we were I pointed out to Hubby that the one thing a man should never say to his wife is that a present can be interchangeable between his wife and his mother!!! ” A wife is not on a par with a mother, she is above the mother, as the Husband should be above the father”

No, he didn’t shove me off the cliff yelling ” ungrateful cow” as I tumbled to the rocks below! Well, obviously! No, we finished our walk, got into the car and came home.

Then for the rest of the weekend we looked at the pashmina with my clothes whilst I did my best to show him it does go with my clothes…he admitted he had thought of it worn only with an outdoor coat, and had forgotten I wear scarfs etc with everything(!). I have refuse exchange it, as he chose it for me, and so I want to have it.

Yesterday an old girlfriend of mine saw it without me saying anything, and said “oh boy, that’s not your colour!” My response? “Yes! You get it!” I told her everything and she completely understood how I felt… Unfortunately hr hubby walked in and said he couldn’t see what was wrong with the colour.

So, now you know how much of a spoilt, ungrateful cow I am! My dreams since Saturday night have been of Hubby leaving me, and I have eaten too much bread (2extra pieces!) My rational side tells me that men and women see colours differently and think of clothes differently. My Hubby is a very dapper chap, and I can see what he was thinking of when he chose the scarf. In his defence I bet there weren’t that many to chose from in such a high quality pashmina. And he did bring me a beautiful bangle as well!

I will be wearing the pashmina to a very special lunch on Friday. It will go superbly with what I am wearing. I will love it.

Am I a really nasty person?

Lx

I have been sorting out some more of my late mother’s things and have come across this photograph…

I think it was taken at Hastings (very near here) and by the look of my mother it was in the early 30s… She is the one on the far left sitting down with a wicked grin! My three Aunts are on the right, and I’m not too sure who all the others are. I love the little boy on the left, who may be my cousin, he looks as if something really good has happened… A very modern pose! Unless he’s threatening the camera person!!

I also like the look of the changing tents in the background. I am sure you can get these again now, a very useful thing! I used to change under a towling tent thingy Mother made me, and I made my kids one too. You know the sort of thing, it has elastic round one end of a tube, is vast to accommodate width of elbows as knickers etc are removed/put back on. So useful for the shy and gives merriment to watchers!! But perhaps folks these days are so uninhibited they don’t need them!

Looking at my mother she looks so happy, and didn’t change much as she grew older, apart from getting chubbier, and growing grey in later life of course! It is strange to think she couldn’t hear any of the laughter and chatter that was going on around her. She became deaf at 8 after a bout of whooping cough. My aunt Peggy ( in white) died of either a hole in the heart or kidney complications…I know she had both, and I know Mother nursed her. I have a few of her embroidery samples around the house.
Aunt Marjorie, far right, won a place at Oxford to read maths but as Grandfather( a vicar at Hampton Hill, UK) couldn’t afford for her to go she eventually married another vicar, and was wonderful having me to stay on exists from boarding school. She had very auburn hair, which doesn’t show here, and dyed it absolutely bright red in later life! (V embarrassing for her teenage niece, believe me!)
Aunt Sybil, in the middle of the aunts, was the sporty one, playing golf, tennis, and bridge up until the day she died! Mother was 11 years younger than her, and 18 years younger than their brother…I don’t think he’s in the picture, unless he had receding hair at an early age!!

I love looking at old pictures. Obviously it’s more fun if you know the people in them, but just looking at their clothes, shoes, surroundings and working out relationships is fascinating to me. Not to mention seeing the fact the gentleman has perhaps got a bathing suit on!! What a giggle!

I think this picture will go up in my bathroom in a mo!

Lx