I'm Conkers I tell ya'!

It's a good job I love my boys

and a good job I love nature!

Perfect time of year

to combine the two...

CONKERS!

So Mummy,

let me get this right...

I find a huge stick and throw it up at

an ancient tree for an hour,

missing it completely every time,

so then I rummage around in the undergrowth

for these prickly, nuggets of green treasure?

Which I then prise open, without spiking myself,

 to reveal the gleaming precious gem

hidden inside?

I then take upon the very dangerous task

of stabbing a screwdriver or the likes

through the centre of my shiny jewel?

Steal a shoe lace and spend forever trying

to thread it through the hole,

forget to tie a knot in the end and have to do it all over?

THEN...

I get to totally SMASH my Brothers gem stone up

with mine, whilst swinging it very closely to his knuckles????

...and this is allowed Mummy?

WAHAAYYYY!!!

Although...

I am led to believe,

some schools have banned this

DANGEROUS SPORT (???)

Well it's not banned at this house.

We love it!

The boys have been entertained for endless hours,

haven't stabbed their hands,

knocked each other out with sticks.

Nor have they damaged ancient

Horse Chestnut trees,

or damaged each other with accidental

whacks from conker missiles.

The only danger is...

This guy!!!

He runs off with your stick.

He steals your stash.

 He chews them up, but soon spits them out...

(how does he know he'll get a bellyache?)

Then, when your 'two-er' is about to

triumph once again,

he jumps up and

snatches the trophy conker right off the end of your string!

BASIL!!!!

Hee hee.

Hope you've enjoyed playing

'Conkers'

with me.

Love Claire. x

P.S.

Look what treat we had this evening...

Where troubles melt like lemon drops.

...away above the chimney tops

That's where you'll find me!

xxx

On the orders of 'Bookworm Beki!'

Beki from

'The Ramblings of an Everyday Mummy'

wrote a post about her favourite books,

and suggest a few of us did the same.

Now my choice of books can be a bit 'rum'

(that's a Northern saying for being a bit daft/weird)

and I know after publishing this post I will

think of loads of others I should've put on here,

but here goes.

If I start off with when I was a kid,

 this was my weekly read back in 1978

Every week, my lovely Mummy

would buy me this and my brother

'Shoot' magazine!

My other brother would probably have been

reading The Guardian and Private Eye!

Then, being totally pony mad,

I moved quickly on to

ANYTHING

by the

Pullein-Thompson Sisters

Moving on to this as I got a bit older...

My love for Roald Dahl

is enriched daily with my lovely job,

but his

'Tales of the Unexpected'

always terrified me.

I'm reading this with my class this week...

(complete with character voices and sound effects)

 

Whilst I did my training, this book

helped me to understand a little of how it is to live with

Asperger's Syndrome.

A great read even if it is aimed at the teenage market.

 

Now next up is a whole series of books

that I absolutely adored and couldn't put down!

I even researched a forum about them and

posted about how I loved them and 

NEEEEEDED the author to write another.

The Earth's Children series,

by Jean M. Auel

I am led to believe there WILL be

a 6th book and will be due for release next year...

I wait with baited breath!

(I may have to read all the others again though,

just to remind me of why I love them so)

 

Next a book that won't come as such a huge

suprise to my regular followers...

Basil is the spitting image of the gorgeous

but mad yellow lab Marley.

This is the moment when I say

it's so much better than the film...

John Grogan had me rolling around with laughter,

then weeping buckets!

Don't bother with the film.

Finally, I leave you with the book I am reading

at present...

Nothing much I can say on it yet, as I've only just

started it.

So, there you go...

What would have been MORE

interesting is what Finn is reading...

The Wickes Catalogue!?!

He loves it and has it under his pillow every night.

Don't dispair though, he is partial to

The Argos Catalogue

The Beano

and the odd bit of Dahl too!

Oh, before I go...those of you who may be of a similar age to me,

with children like mine, you may enjoy

finding on Youtube

JACKANORY

episodes from

'our era'

We are listening/watching

Tony Robinson

reading the

Fat Tulip

stories at the moment.

A blast from the past for me

and fun for the boys too.

I hope you managed to get to the end of all this,

and possibly enjoyed it.

Love Claire. x

Roald's shed.

September brought with it

a new term and a new school year.

For those of you who don't know

me well, I am a Teaching assistant in

a primary school.

I love my job.

I've had many in the past,

usually 2 at the same time so

I could feed the horses I used to own!

But none have been as perfect as this one.

Yes it has it's tough moments,

VERY tough moments!

Working with children who have

major behaviour problems can

be trying at the best of times but

I'm part of a fantastic team and we

seem to have it down to a fine art

and provide our pupils with

a safe and creative learning enviroment!

What I am hoping to get round to here is my

OBSESSION

with

Roald Dahl

...and hopefully linking my

love for Dahl to my last post

which mentioned

SHEDS

Are you still with me ?

(Bear with me...)

Well I have a small,

run-down, old shed.

For which, I asked in my last post,

ideas on how to paint it.

Now Roald had a shed too...

His writing shed.

I would LOVE this!

Although it's doubtful I could create

fantastic creations like Roald in my shed,

one can dream.

He also had another kind of shed...

Beautiful isn't it?!

This really is in the garden where he lived,

and became the inspiration for him

to write

'Danny Champion of the World'

I shall have to make do with

keeping the gardening tools and camping gear

in mine...

...and use his wonderful imagination

to inspire my class with displays

such as

'The BFG!'

So...the shed,

thank you for all your ideas

on how to paint it...

...if I get time to paint it that is!

I think a shade of yellow may be in order,

like Roald's door.

With a bit of a Dahl theme going on

hopefully I will be able to inspire my own

children to be creative writers,

or just to be my very own little

'Champions of the world.'

Love C. x

In The Dog House!

HELP NEEDED!

Don't worry...

Basil is not in the dog house as such,

but we do have a Kennel!

A very kind friend

has given us this very sturdy

very large,

and VERY blue kennel.

So...

any of you clever ladies

have any ideas for a makeover?

Red?

Get your thinking caps on girls.

I've been quite into 'shed makeovers'

of late and over the Summer

this tatty corner of the garden

got a tidy up...

I'm thinking that disclosing

photos like this should be embarrassing,

but it's real life, and i'm sure the

'Mothers of boys'

out there, will understand.

After an exciting trip to the

reclaimation yard

we came home with a scruffy old window

from what would've been a part of

a gorgeous sash window

once upon a time.

We cleaned it up and gave it some

shiny paint...

Then fastened it onto the old shed,

after it had been 'shoved' over a few feet

into it's new spot in the corner, onto some

newly laid flags,

and given a fresh lick of paint.

A lack of plants and flowers

and the hedge needs a trim

but Rome wasn't built in a day eh?!

So...

have you come up with any

fabulous ideas for this yet?

Seeing as it will be sat next to

the other shed, in the back garden,

should they match???

A double makeover

for you to think about...

Better get cracking you lot!

Love Claire. xxx

How did that happen??!!

Not sure how but I've lost 2lb!

I'm not meaning the £££ kind...

...it's the wobbly bits poundage kind that I'm on about!

I let slip the other day in a post

that I'd enrolled at

Slimming World

last week, and how I hadn't dieted

AT ALL.

So when it came to my first week

weigh-in this morning I started to panic a little.

The excuses (ahem! lies) running round my head

went something like this...

I've been ill.

Back at work so I wasn't able to do it.

No time.

The children make it too tricky too diet.

I did it, but it doesn't work for me.

I was a tad worried...

Next thing is,

I'm there,

no excuses,

I just said it how it is

'I haven't done it'

No problem,

all the girls offered me comfort and support

and I hopped on the scales anyway.

(yep, that's me!)

Eek!!!

Now really sure how but I managed to be

2lbs lighter than I was this time last week.

You know who I'm going to thank for it?

This little guy!

Come on, lets go on a walk...

We've come to Macclesfield Forest.

Somewhere Basil and my boys take me quite often

these days.

Not the sunniest of days,

but beautiful all the same...

less busy and more peaceful in my opinion.

I spy with my little eye,

something beginning with

beer...

oh, sorry,

I mean P! ;o)

Is that the sun trying it's best to peep through?

Lovely.

Hope you enjoyed the gentle exercise...

EXERCISE??????

Oh my...

...and there's me thinking I don't do any!

I'm thinking now

that if I couple up this

'so called exercise'

with the Slimming World diet,

maybe I could be on to a winner...

...if I manage to drag Baz past that lovely pub that is!

Hee hee!!!

Love Claire. x

Oh...P.S.

If I never mention this dieting thing again,

it's because I've been a piggy.

(again!)

Come a car booting along with me.

Bit of a daft one this...

Again, the quality is rubbish when you enlarge.

I feel a posh new camera coming on,

or maybe seeing as it's only

108 SLEEPS until Christmas,

YAY!

I can start writing my list?!

Anyhow, enjoy!

     

Hope you enjoyed coming along with us, hee hee!

Love Claire.x

Lucky Lucky...!!!

A couple of weeks ago,

during one of those mornings

in the holidays

when you lounge around in your jim-jams,

the boys and I were lay on my bed

enjoying looking at Floss' holiday photos together.

One of her sons had enjoyed

making up a little competition

where you had to guess what the

picture is of.

We had a giggle guessing and

sent a comment with our suggestions.

WE WON!

I did tell Floss that we didn't need a prize.

That we had just enjoyed guessing.

But...

the little minx!

Sent this today.

With it's French stamps and

labels on, I thought there is

only one person who

could've sent this!!!

We opened up this exciting parcel together.

More lovely-ness French-ness...

Beautiful and colourful maps,

in French!

(which Finn has whipped away,

upstairs to keep!)

Floss has obviously been reading

my last few posts,

seeing how I have gone

'Dog - Mad!'

You tinker you, Floss!

(CK - eek!)

Thank you so much. xxx

A prize for the boys too!

How did you know,

they're science experiments and bugs mad!

Oh yes, you have 2 boys of your own,

I guess you just

 'get to know these things.'

So there they are.

Here in Blighty,

all very gratefully received,

and now living at the foot of the peak district,

in my little (untidy) home.

Fankoo!

Next...

Another little Tinker

has given me an award!

by

'Dollytub Cottage'

Fankoo!

I have to share it

but...

I tell you what...

If you love it

and I follow you

then please

allow me to award you with it,

as all the blogs I follow and read

deserve it!

You have to say 7 things about yourself

so here goes,

I...

• 
  
   love marmite
• 
  
  and olives
• 
  
  once had 42 pet rabbits!!!
• 
  
  took my driving test in deep SNOW at 17, and passed!
• 
  
  have just realised it's less than a month until my birthday...eek!
• 
  
  enrolled at Slimming World last Thursday but haven't started the diet yet...oops!
• 
  
  always use too many of these !!!!!!!!
• 
  
  and have just been racking my brains trying to think of another one but then realised I have already done the neccessary 7.  Durr!

So there we are.

Love Claire. x

Messing about on the river.

If you ever have that feeling of being just a bit

'fed up'

try my 'tonic' and get outside,

find lots of space...

Get away from the hustle and bustle of life

 and honestly it'll help you to try and

forget all those troubles you may have worrying you.

(Excuses excuses!!!

I'm taking you along on one of our lovely walks, but i'm not sure if it's my lack of photography or technology skills, probably both, but when you watch this in large screen please imagine it's perfect

...alas, 'tis not.)

Hope you had a good time,

and all those troubles?

What troubles?

Love Claire. x