Movies

Yesterday, I took the boys to the movies to see Mary Poppins.

Yes, our local cinema has started showing some retro movies as they call them. In November they had a 1 off screening of Grease, this month it was Mary Poppins and in January they are showing Dirty Dancing. They have also had a week of The Rocky Horror Picture Show.

The boys have never been to the movies before. They have watched movies at home but never been to the cinema and sat in a big area to watch something on the big screen!

So I think I was very brave taking a 4 & 6yr old for their first time on my own!

Looking back Mary Poppins was probably not the best one to take them too. It has lots of slow parts and they lost interest very easily, however they loved the dancing and animated part (which I had hoped they would). They also liked the chimney sweep scenes.

Several times they both asked to go home, but I managed to divert their attention and we managed to stay until the end. I thought that maybe it had all been a sad loss but maybe not.

Today Alex asked me 'what is was that went on the spoon to help the medicine go down?'

And they both keep trying to do a sidewards jump and click their heels together just like Dick Van Dike does several times during the movie, so maybe a lot more of it went in than I realised and they did actually enjoy some of it.

I have heard there is a Toy Story 3 coming sometime next year? That will definitely be a family outing to the cinema.

P.S I have just discovered that they are putting on a stage show of Mary Poppins in Melbourne in July 2010. One day it might hit the shores of New Zealand. It would be an awesome show to go and see. I think my mum would love to see that too, so if it ever gets here maybe I will go with her and not my husband. Girls night out!

Catch Up

A quick catch up on things that have been happening.

You may remember me mentioning that we had found a camera at the bottom of our garden. Well we haven't heard anything! Not sure if that means the young man was unsuccessful at getting in touch with his mates or just that he thinks some stupid lady came in asked him to help her and he can't be bothered! I will give them a call sometime this week to maybe give him a gentle reminder and see what happens.

I am still off sick. The numbness and tingling in my arm is getting better though, although still getting lots of aching down the arm. However yesterday I suddenly got pain on the right side of my neck. Bad enough to render me useless! I was in PAIN. Steve had to help me undress as I was unable to raise me right arm to get sorted for bed.

I went to the Doctor's today and she has started to try and hurry up the Specialist appointment, or at least to get a referral for the MRI Scan so we can see if anything is going on.

She gave me some strong pain killers, that apparently will knock me out make me feel good, but I am yet to take any because I am at home today with Alex and I really can't get sleepy and zonk out for 2 hours with him here, although my usual pain relief has given me a few hours relief whilst snuggled on the settee watching movies with Alex.

The doctor also gave me a soft collar to wear. Was uncomfortable at first but made life a little easier as I was walking home.

If this all comes back eventually as just a strained muscle I will be very '#%@* off' to say the least, well I will be grateful it is nothing sinister, but frustrated that it is something so simple yet something able to render me useless for several weeks!

My sign off button that was playing up is still managing to work correctly now, so husbands do have their uses!

The Advent Swap is going really well, I have had some lovely cute things in my gifts and am thoroughly enjoying opening a small gift each day and trying to decide what I can make with my new item. I have even found some new blogs to follow from the other people involved in the swap.

So life goes on, but at least you know whats up,

Advent Swap Day 7

On the 7th day of Christmas my Advent swap gave to me...

2 beautiful crochet mats for my table

Advent Swap Day 6

On the 6th day of Christmas my Advent Swap gave to me....

My own little cute angel

And a pendant to use as I please.

Advent Swap Day 5

On the 5th day of Christmas my Advent Swap gave to me

2 lovely posters with cute sayings for my wall.
I love dancing in the rain, so this is precious

Pain

I am currently of work.

Have been now for just coming on 2 weeks.

I managed to slip over at a friends house 2 weeks ago and jerk my neck and shoulder. Also landed on my left knee, but as nothing hurt didn't think too much about it!

However during the weekend of the fall my left arm started to ache and my left thumb became really painful to use.

Now I have had syptoms like this before when Ben was first born. It made lifting a new born baby very difficult and I had splints to wear for the first 3 months of Ben's life whenever my hands got sore, not much fun with your first new born child!

Anyway, part of the problem we worked out back then was due to my neck. It was very tight and so I got treated by a Chiropractor. This solved the problem and soon I was problem free.

Since then I have taken any sign of pain in my hand as a sign my neck is getting tight and off I trot to the Chiropractor.

So this is what I did beginning of last week. He happily saw me and made a few adjustments, however the pain in my hands was now spreading down my arm and I was also experiencing pins and needles in the arm along with a constant ache, almost like I had growing pains in my arm all day long! (remember those from when you were a child? I do)

Anyway, on Monday of this week he decided that in fact there was nothing he could do for me without a scan, because he felt that it was either a nerve or disc problem, so referred me back to my own GP.

So off I trotted.

She did a whole range of assessments and immediately signed me off work for a further 2 weeks, referred me to an Orthopaedic Surgeon, put me on some lovely strong pain killers and said "yes I think you might have a disc problem!"

So here I sit, coming to the end of 2 weeks at home. I am bored and even slightly depressed some days as the uncomfortable feeling in my shoulder and down my arm is continuous and enough to drive anyone to drink!

I have made myself a list of little things to get achieved around the house but I am not getting too far with that list! I have good moments when I think I am being stupid for sitting around the house and then I have a bad moment and I realise why I am sitting around the house!

How long will this go on for? I have no idea, they do say it can take up to 3 months for this to right itself and get better. I am hoping to have seen the specialist by then and maybe had a scan to assertain the actual problem, but with Christmas happening slap bang in the middle of all of this then I will not hold my breath, because as this is also our summer holiday time then everything is well known for shutting up shop for a good 2 weeks over this period of the year!

Of course the schools all finish for the big 6 week holiday in the next week or so and everyone loves to go away on their big family holidays over the Christmas period, specialists included!

So here I sit, spending a lot of time on the computer because I am able to sit and play games with one hand and rest at the same time.

I have managed to finish the 3rd book in the Twilight series again and will start #4 sometime soon, although have started a different book for now to give me a break from the intensity of Twilight.

I can drive, but I ache afterwards so am trying not to do this unless I really need something.

So will keep you all posted on what happens next?

Advent Swap Day 4

On the 4th day of Christmas my Advent Swap gave to me...

A packet of cute Christmas napkins that will look great on my Christmas table this year

New Sign Off Button

As mentioned before, I had changed my sign off button to match the new background but seemed to be having some trouble with it.

Now I am no computer expert!

I love blogging and can do the very basic things to keep it looking good, usually after my darling husband has shown me first. If someone actually shows me what to do then I remember and can do it again when needed.

I am definitely a visual person when it comes to learning stuff, I get lost try to understand things read from a book!

So it was no surprise that he managed to fix my little problem by loking at the html code and telling me where I had gone wrong.

So hopefully we are all fixed now and things should be fine from now on, well until I change the background again and have another new button!

Advent Swap Day 3

On the 3rd day of Christmas my Advent Swap gave to me....

My own little hanging reindeer for the tree

When I put the tree up at the weekend then I will take a picture of this cute guy up there for all to see

Destitute Gourmet

Now I am aware that I have mentioned Sophie before on this blog, that is Sophie Gray aka The Destitute Gourmet

When Ben was little, say about 1 or 2, I was at the library trying to find some cook books to give me some inspiration. I came across some by Sophie. Of course after having them at home and reading them cover to cover and wanting to try several of the dishes, I treated myself to one of the books.

She covered a whole basic idea of creating a menu and only shopping for what you need rather than random, she also explained about essential items in your pantry and luxury items.

I fell in love, here was a simple thing to put into practice that could save me time, thinking time and money!

Ok so it took me quite a while to get things organised, but to this day we still have a menu, when I remember to follow it, and we also have a printed shopping list broken down into weeks and only having things on there that I need to buy for this weeks menu.

I have also had the awesome pleasure of attending one of Sophie's Demonstrations, or more to the point I ended up as a helper in the kitchen for 5 hours with Sophie. It was awesome fun, but very tiring but I learnt so much.

She showed us how to make pizza as one of the dishes she made and  how to raise the dough in the microwave. I still make my pizza like that and it still works everytime.

I still have several dishes that I use from the cook book and they go down very well with my young family.

So I was very happy when a best friend brought me another Sophie book for my birthday a few weeks back. There are some great looking recipes in there too.

Ben's school is also looking at having Sophie down for a demonstration next year sometime, thanks to me. I was involved in organising the one I helped at, so know what is involved and how much fun it can be, so gave them the information and helped them investigate what they needed, sadly we were unable to get it organised for the end of this year but are still hoping for sometime next year.

Will I go to it? Hell yes, and I will tell all my friends and my mum too.

So imagine my surprise when I came across a blog for Destitute Gourmet, and she even posts some lovely recipes on there too, so will be keeping an eye on that too.

She has also put out a book about common sense living, tips on being sensible with how you live and what you do and don't need. It is very interesting reading and again very practicle, so practicle in fact that my best friend still has my copy of it and swears by it!

Advent Swap Day 2

On the 2nd day of Christmas my Advent Swap gave to me....

Some coasters and some make your own curtain pull back holders.
I am going to have fun making these

Sign Off

As you can see at the end of this post I have a new sign off to match the new background on the blog.

Unfortuantely I seem to be having a little trouble with it.

Have changed over the code etc but we will just have to wait and see if it keeps working correctly.

Advent Swap Day 1

On the first day of Christmas my Advent Swap gave to me....

Some black wire and a dice pendant to make into a necklace.
How did she know I liked making jewellery?