Flickr Update

I’ve uploaded some more photos to our Flickr page. I’ve been meaning to do it for ages but haven’t had the time. Here’s a preview:

The Old Boy On A Brig

Chris and I At Rocamadour

And here’s the LINK.
A.

Glen Mhor

C settles into the Glen Mhor

A spur of the moment decision has seen us hit the road and head for Inverness. With our little nephew Samuel being born yesterday, we thought we should come and visit him and the rest of the family. Chris is staying with my parents, so we’ve had to make alternate arrangements. We checked the late-rooms website and managed to get a discounted room at the Glen Mhor Hotel on the river bank.

Stating the obvious

I haven’t seen much of the rest of the hotel yet, but the room itself is great; a huge, comfy bed and lots of nice furniture.

Seriously comfy!

A solitary trainer

Colin is digging it too. Unfortunately he likes it so much that he’s refusing to go to sleep. I hope Chris and Eilidh know what they’re in for!

Sleep? No chance dad!

A.

Bath Time!

Stretching before swimming

A few weeks before Christmas we promoted Colin to “the big bath” because we had bought a support that would enable him to lie comfortably and safely in a few inches of water. He absolutely loved it, and laughed for the first time as Andy poured water over his belly!

Can't stop chewing that hand...

Unfortunately Colin relieved his bowels while in the bath (nice!) and so he’s had to be demoted to the baby bath again for a few days while the support goes through the wash. Even though he is too big to stretch out in the baby bath now, he doesn’t seem to mind as he has discovered the art of splashing and pushing water over the edge while being held upright. Sometimes it seems like I am wetter than he is by the time the bath is over!

Not tears - just splashes

After his bath, I always given Colin a little massage. There were instructions on how to do so in a book that I was given by my Health Visitor, but for the last 3 weeks we have also been going to a Baby Massage class every Wednesday morning. He absolutely loves it – and always sleeps really well afterwards. The class lasts for an hour, but he’s lucky if the massage I give him in the evening lasts longer than 3 minutes! It does seem to have a relatively calming influence on him though, and after all that splashing around he definitely needs it.

All done - and still eating that hand!

Catherine

An Advantage

We knew it wouldn’t be long before Dylan and Jay Jay realised that there are actually advantages to having a baby around the house, epecially when that baby has so many exciting bits and pieces of equipment.

Today, Dylan was the first to cotton on to the shelter that a nicely positioned changing mat and baby gym has to offer:

She's in there somewhere ...

The problem is that she hasn’t quite worked out how to avoid pressing the button that causes the baby gym to burst in to electronic versions of classics by Mozart, Beethoven and Chopin, and gives herself a fright every time!

Peek-a-boo

The other problem is that now I’m going to have to spend hours and hours scrubbing and hoovering the baby gym before Colin’s allowed anywhere near it again. And I did all my hoovering yesterday!

Massive furball generator

I think the baby gym might need to be stored somewhere else from now on …

Catherine

Film Fest

I once wrote on this blog that Andy and I watched at least three films a week. Gone are those days! Now that he has lots of studying to do, our local Blockbuster has probably noticed a massive decrease in it’s profits.

It’s safe to say that we made up for a term’s worth of DVD watching over the Christmas holidays. When we were in Thurso we enjoyed a fine selection of Clint Eastwood films: Unforgiven, Gran Torino and Million Dollar Baby. We also found time for Little Miss Sunshine, Stranger Than Fiction and Rendition.

While in Inverness, Sunshine Cleaning was enjoyed only by me, but fortunately District 9, Dead Reckoning, War of the Worlds, Gladiator, Valkyrie and The Taking of Pelham 123 proved more popular with the rest of the audience.

Finally, we managed to complete The Lord of the Rings trilogy just in time for Andy going back to College. I’m already putting together a list of films I want to get through next Christmas …

Catherine

Birthday Lunch

It was my mum’s birthday yesterday so we met her and dad, and Rachel and Puzz for lunch at The Railbridge in South Queensferry. We all enjoyed our food, although when I saw Andy’s plate of haggis I have to confess to wishing I had joined him in choosing the dish most suited to the date! Saying that, my fish and chips were very tasty.

Big Smiles

Colin was asleep when we arrived at the restaurant, but of course woke up just as our food was served. Fortunately he was in great form, and was very happy to be passed around for cuddles.

Too much!

Seeing as it was a birthday lunch I felt it was necessary to order cake for dessert. (As if I need an excuse!) It was delicious, but hard going … I almost couldn’t finish it! I did, but regretted it for most of the day. There’s a first time for everything …

Baby and Birthday Girl

Catherine

Walkabout

After spending most of Christmas/New Year trapped inside, I have been trying to get out and about with Colin and the pushchair a bit more over the last week. The fresh air certainly seems to help him sleep better at night, which is an added bonus.

All wrapped up and ready to go

Yesterday we returned to part of the Fife Coastal Path for the third time this week. Half way along the walk I became aware that my skirt was falling down! I had mentioned to Andy earlier in the day that it was feeling a bit big, and sure enough it was big enough to slip down from my waist and begin it’s journey down my legs. I had to stop walking and wait for all other pedestrians to disappear around the corner before frantically pulling it back up to it’s rightful position!

The Forth from the Coastal Path

Next time I will make sure I am more suitably dressed.

Catherine

Traybakes

I was on the baking rota for the church cafe this week, and with our oven currently not functioning I thought it was the ideal opportunity to expand my traybake repertoire. I didn’t want to risk everything being a complete failure though, so got my trusty 14s (otherwise known as Canadian Roll) out of the way before trying out some new recipes.

Malteser Slice

First up was Malteser Slice – something I have always enjoyed when made by others. It worked out quite nicely, although I think next time I would perhaps use a smaller tray because there was a scary moment when I thought there might not be enough mixture to cover the base of the tin …

Malteser Slice

I also made Bounties which actually turned out better than I expected, although I decided I better add some sprinkles to prevent them from just looking like poos!

Bounties

Finally I attempted some Fudge Slice but I got the amount of condensed milk wrong (I used a big tin instead of a small tin) so although it’s quite nice to eat with a spoon, it was unfortunately not eligible for distribution at the cafe!

Bounties

I’ll need to attempt the Fudge again sometime, and start browsing the Free Church Cook Books for some more new recipes for me to try in a few weeks time …

Catherine

Home Sick

There is a line in the film Dodgeball where Christine Taylor says “I just threw up in my mouth a little bit.” Well Christine Taylor, try throwing up in your mouth a lot as you desperately try to make your way to the bathroom, getting there just as your mouth reaches capacity and the whole lot explodes everywhere. And try doing that when it’s not even your bathroom!

This is what happened to me last Friday morning. We had checked out of The Queensferry Hotel earlier in the day so that we could meet the plumber at our house at 9am. While he fixed the pipes, Colin and I waited at the Cumming’s house because it was too cold at ours. I hadn’t been feeling great but had put it down to tiredness. Clearly this was not the case.

It wasn’t just the bathroom that was covered in puke. My hair, my face, and my clothes were covered in puke too! I’d already been sick earlier in the day but still thinking it was due to tiredness, and perhaps a lack of food in my stomach, I had just decided to keep it to myself. There was going to be no hiding it this time!

Having cleaned up as much of the damage as I could with toilet paper, I made my confession to Sarah who very kindly gave me some clean clothes to wear, and looked after Colin so I could go and lie down. I’m sure she scrubbed her bathroom too!

Andy arrived to announce that the plumber was finished, the pipes were fixed, the heating was on and we could return home. I was sure I couldn’t possibly be sick again but asked Sarah for a tub to take in the car just incase. The car hadn’t even started before the tub came in useful!

And so it continued. I lay in bed for the rest of the day, sleeping and spewing. I couldn’t keep anything down – not even sips of water. We figured that I probably had food poisoning and are blaming a Marks and Spencer tuna salad that I had eaten the night before. I won’t be eating one of those again!

Finally at 1am I was sick for the last time. By the morning I felt fine, although I was quite weak and it took me a little while to really properly feel like eating. I had quite a lot of time to think about food as I lay in bed. Images of all the things I had recently eaten kept floating through my mind and all of them just made me feel worse.

My main concern throughout it all was that Colin might get sick, but I was assured by my Health Visiting auntie that it was alright to continue to feed him. Then I was worried that because I couldn’t eat or drink, he wouldn’t have much to eat and drink himself. If his food supply was affected at all, then he has not let on because over the weekend he was so well behaved, and this week he has been on great form! He’s a little bit out of routine when it comes to sleep, but that’s to be expected after almost a month away from home in all sorts of different shapes and sizes of travel cot, Moses basket and bed:

Colin chooses king size

Catherine

Thinking of moving house?

Are you thinking of moving? Well, why don’t you consider the kingdom? This mind-blowing promotional video is bound to increase the popularity of Fife!

A.