The normal winter thing!

We have been really ill for the last week. Michael was in bed for nearly a week, followed by exams the next week - he feels like he did okay despite only being well and alert from the Sunday, so not much revision happened there. As well as he could expect to anyway! Then Peter got a cough, which is about when my parents paid us a little visit. We met at the temple in the pouring rain - Michael and I really couldn't have gone to the temple without Peter without absolutely major disappointment on Peter's part though! We enjoyed the visitor's centre for a little while, and then had lunch in a little out of the way room, and then Mum and Dad took the children to their Primary party while Michael and I spent some time TOGETHER in the temple for the first time in a very, very long time. They were there for the children's sacrament primary presentation the following day too. Rebekah gave the first talk with a little help from Mummy and seemed to totally enjoy it, and even totally enjoy being up there the whole time. No shyness at all. They all gave a talk and joined in with the singing and seemed to really enjoy themselves. :o)






Well just after that Rebekah became very poorly with flu. We've all had a share of it now - some worse than others. You can't not share things in families can you, or at least you don't seem to get much of a choice with the nasty things like that! After being in bed for three days, and not even seeing downstairs for more than two of those, I was well enough to get up this morning and take Rachel, Hannah and Sarah to church. They all really wanted to go, and Rachel and Hannah were keen to sing the song on their own in sacrament meeting that we were supposed to be singing as a family. They did a verse of another one on their own too and sang with the choir for the rest of it. They seemed to enjoy it. The quartet I should have sung in sounded great as a trio luckily! I had so been looking forward to this Sunday, and especially all of the singing we would be involved in. Talking has been more than enough until today though. I stuck around during sacrament meeting in the relief society room which is right at the back of our chapel (so I wouldn't be near anyone), but it exhausted me so much that I needed to go back to bed to rest a while before going back to pick the girls up at the end of church.

Peter, Michael and Rebekah watched church videos for most of the day, with Michael and Rebekah falling asleep in turn (Peter and Rebekah had seemed to get a bit better later i the week but then came right back down again yesterday). We watched a few videos in the afternoon together, and decided in the end to watch a Christmas Mormon tabernacle choir show for our family home evening, so everyone could join in. A bit too much video watching for one day! (Peter fell asleep during that in the end though. He hadn't fallen asleep until midnight the night before after crying for hours that his ear was hurting, but not letting us give him any medicine. When we finally got some into him, he was straight asleep and slept straight through.) We finished off by watching a video on You Tube of the angel Moroni being put on the London temple during the last week. We're hoping the scaffolding will be off so that we can see it properly when we are finally well enough to go back there and see the Christmas lights, etc. This week, or next week I suppose it might be now. Then we sang a carol by the light of the Christmas tree and the candles I had finally restocked from last year, and listened to a lovely christmas story from the Friend magazine the year Michael was baptised. Hopefully everyone will be asleep soon (illnesses depending)! That finish to the day should have been happening for a while now, but illnesses have somewhat got in the way of everything. It's nice to have started it though. It'll feel a bit Christmassy from now on hopefully.

Michael, Rebekah and Peter stayed in their pyjamas and rested all day today. Actually Peter has been in his since Friday night - all weekend. :o) Rachel looked at Michael this afternoon and laughed though because she said he looked like a fisherman! I could totally see it when I looked at him. As well as the pyjamas he has been wearing his winter hat and a scarf round his neck for most of the last two days. I'm sure the stubble helped a bit too though. :o)




So anyway, while the camera was out, I had to take a few other pictures too. I had been putting a few more decorations up in the living room (something that has happened in tiny bursts in between feeling really ill!) while the children watched a video this afternoon and Michael slept - he said he was fine not going to bed, so ended up looking very strange lying on a settee instead. I think it was to block off all sound and light!



I couldn't work out where to put the last bit of tinsel I had in my hand, so ended it up with it tied in a bow on me. I do look rather silly, but Sarah did want to take a photo and I've let Michael look silly on here so...




Then here's bump at 17 weeks (pictorially is probably the best way to show bump we figured, and we've never taken many pictures of me pregnant before, or of me at all really, so I get to be in the family a bit more for a while too!) ...



... and the children in their Christmas clothes, and of course the obligatory pyjamas. :o)







Maybe some of the things we had planned for Christmas will still happen. I hope so. We do hope everyone else is well this winter, especially this Christmas, and in case you don't look at this again before then, or I don't put anything else on here before then, we hope everyone has a really especially celebratory wonderfully HAPPY CHRISTMAS!!

Balloon Modelling

Here are a giraffe, a humming bird and a dog that I made. I like making them a lot.
it is fun to make them.

The first video

I have only been trying to upload these two videos for more than a week and every time, no matter what I did, it failed. I thought I'd just try it again tonight, and it's deciding to work - one per post, but it works. Yippee!

This was Michael telling the children about the baby. It had been a calm(ish) devotional until just before this. Hannah was certain the reason we read the scriptures we did that morning was because of her cousin who would be born the following day. So in response it got a little more playful and manic. :o) You can't miss Sarah's response, and the others showed theirs gradually, but all very excited after a few minutes had gone by and the news had sunk in!

The second video

My little bit of time with Peter afterwards. He showed that he clearly understood!

Happy things

I hope those celebrating Thanksgiving this week have found a lot to be grateful for. It was lovely some of the things our children said they were grateful for. Peter is grateful for Joey bear, of course. We made a Be Grateful beehive in our Family Home Evening and have filled it with things we are collectively thankful for as well as our own little ones for our own personal thoughts. It's nice to stop and think about those things sometimes - most of us probably don't often enough.

One thing that we have all felt very excited about for a while now is that we are expecting another baby next May. He or she is due the end of May, so may actually end up being the beginning of June. So far Rebekah has been the latest past the due date - 14 days over - but they all have been, so you never know. Peter also understood when we told the children about a month ago, and started telling me that he had a baby (his toy one) and Mummy has a baby in her tummy. He gives my tummy cuddles sometimes, and of course fairly regularly wants to see the baby. I think he'll be amazed when he sees or feels the baby kicking. Sarah couldn't stop laughing and jumping up and down! Rachel now calls the baby Samuel, as most of us feel like it is probably a boy, but Sarah really wants a girl - she and Rebekah would rather we didn't find out though. At the moment Samuel David is pretty much set if little dot does turn out to be a boy (we only chose that name before Rachel was born!) We'll have to see otherwise.





Our thanksgiving meal was nice (no we're not American, but we decided a few years ago we wanted to share in that tradition and so we do!) None of us had had the best of days, but it was lovely to sit down together in the evening by candle light to a yummy roast dinner. I was especially grateful to be able to eat it! My food options are extremely restricted at the moment, apart from when it comes to fruit (which is very good at raising my blood sugar fast enough when needed to help the sick feelings on their way. I have recently been wanting roast parsnips though, potatoes have been good throughout, just like with my pregnancy with Peter, and certain other foods I could cope with. I did manage to get some chicken down too for a bit of protein - hidden by a load of gravy. The idea of meat is not funny, but I have to get the protein from somewhere and when I do get enough regularly I'm not ill. I'm so glad I know how that all works now - I've never before known how to eat to not be ill during a pregnancy, and although I feel ill a lot because I'm not eating quite enough, and have been sick a few times, I can normally stop it in it's tracks! Anyway, I know the ideal and can at least head towards it, and the days when I get the closest to eating what my body needs the better I feel. Knowledge is power! It's also one of the things I am very thankful for.

Well enough of that. I had to rush off to a Young Women activity before we'd all quite finished eating, but we enjoyed the time anyway. My calling in Young Womens is good. The young women are lovely, and it's nice getting the programme going a bit more with them than has been possible for a little while. It's fun.

Hope everyone else is having a lovely time doing whatever you're up to. Take care. xxx

Darling rodents

Do you remember those troughs of bulbs I mentioned? Before they got filled with soil, and before they got cleaned out ready to be filled with soil, they first got filled to the brim with rainwater for a few days. Michael had to get rid of two little shrews that had fallen in and not made it in that time. Maybe they were after a drink?

Last week, after the squirrel incident, and after someone had forgotten to shut the shed door one night, I noticed that the doorway into the shed we bought on moving here had been chewed quite a bit. I figured it was the squirrels again.

When Michael had got to looking at it, he also discovered a little hole that had been knawed further back in the floor of the shed. It certainly wasn't big enough for a squirrel to get through - more shrew size. Well, he covered that up with a bit of wood, and put the not-yet-sorted troughs on the top. So the next day I noticed new sort of sawdust on the floor just outside the shed door. Michael had noticed another hole, but hadn't realised it was new until I pointed out the new remnants. Very kindly, these dear little animals had decided to make a new hole in the corner of the door frame - part door, part frame so that they could get in and out. We have wondered if they're actually in the shed and so made a hole they could get out through, or wanted to get back in and so made a hole to get in by. Whichever, I suppose they need finding ideally before they decide to shred any of the contents of the shed, just like a shrew did where we used to live. Just another thing to take up a load of time and be a bit frustrating along the way! Dear little animals.

Squirrelly escapades

The children and I had been watching the squirrels for a while in fascination this morning from my bedroom window. It's always fun watching them scamper along the fences, pinch berries from the tree just by our window, and scamper up into the trees at the back. We saw three in the end, one of which had something rather large and red in its mouth which we're pretty sure the others also wanted as they were chasing it about whenever they could. This red thing became white after a few minutes - clearly had been shelled. Not long after we saw this same squirrel sitting on a post in our garden, eating away at another one of these white things, and then with another reddish one not long after that it sat on the decking, very easily shelling and munched away at the white insides. I thought when I went outside later that I would take a look at the shell to see what kind of nut it could have been!

The squirrel activity in our garden was massive this morning. We'd never before seen them actually exploring the garden, hopping around the outdoor toys, etc. It was only one that did. The other two kept to the edges as they normally do.

Well, when I did go outside some time later, I had a look at the white remains left under the post, and the "shell" left on the decking, and thought how it looked just like red onion! I smelt it though - no smell of onion. That's when I figured they'd found somebody's stash of yet to be planted bulbs. It only took a second for me to check the big tub we'd just planted a few in in case they'd unburied them. No. Fine.
Then I turned around and saw the beautiful mess this darling creature had left under the garden table where we had stacked the planters all of the other bulbs had gone into. There were some daffodil bulbs lying on the top, and clearly the squirrel had preferred the tulips. I haven't explored just how many yet as I was a bit too annoyed right then to get digging and resorting it, but judging by the number of times we had seen this dear squirrel duck behind the wall where these planters were (not thinking what was there of course!) then I wouldn't expect to see many left. We had had the bulbs for weeks and weeks, and they had cost really more than we could afford, but I knew we could take the planters with us wherever we went and use them again so it also felt like a little investment. It had taken weeks though for us to be able to get out and plant them, having cleaned out the tubs, and had lots of wet and also a few not feeling too well days. The children all joined in, and Rachel had especially enjoyed arranging and planting them with me to make some nice looking displays for the spring - a nice bit of colour for a bit of a lifeless garden. The children were just as frustrated as I was and dutifully warded off the squirrel from further attempts until Michael could move them out of harms way! They had been intended to go away in the shed for the winter, but Michael is yet to hang some things up in there to make a bit more space, so they were stacked I thought safely out of harm's way outside!

Well, I'll get over it soon, and hopefully will find the time soon to rearrange what's there and try to have it not spread too thinly! I know many people when planting veggies plant enough for them and enough for the birds. I hadn't thought the same went for flower bulbs though. I'll know better next time!

Peter's days

Peter is really fun to have around. He's just been plodding around with his flashing Bob the Builder slippers and 18-24 month pyjamas that he has just grown into (at the age of 28 months!) - he's very diddy, and we wonder whether he will stay that way or have a growth spurt when he's older and become as tall as at least some of his sisters!

He has also been playing with a handful of toy cars, as he always does - driving and parking them all over the place. He wasn't happy to go up to bed tonight until Michael and Hannah had moved off the settee where they had been reading scriptures so that he could park his cars in their parking spaces, which apparently were they were sitting. His most fun parking spaces he has found for them I think are in between each group of black keys in the piano - while I am playing of course! They love to drive along the bumpy road made by the keys and turn into their parking spaces that fit them just perfectly. A wider car gets to park at the very end where there is a little more room. I tend to have to bargain for enough space in the middle somewhere to reach all of the notes in the music I am playing. He normally can be persuaded to keep clear by a note or too, sorry ... by a parking space, but yesterday there just weren't enough spaces fpr his handful of cars, so my practise stopped there, and he enjoyed the piano in the way any little boy knows it is really meant to be used. :o)

One of the things that he really loves is the temple. Almost since we first got here whenever we were in the back garden and he climbed up the step to by the shed at the top, he said it was where the temple is. He builds temples out of food, and torn paper, and blocks, and anything he can stack into a tall enough and sort of pointy tower. So when I saw a tall stack of plant pots up in his dedicated spot for a temple I guessed what he had done. That was a few weeks ago, and I haven't felt able to put them back just yet he loves his temple so much. He gets up and rearranges the pots on occassions and sometimes just goes up to the temple. He's very sweet.

Here he is with his temple and Joey bear - THE most important bear in the world! He sleeps with Peter every night and goes everywhere with him on many a day. Other bears are also wonderful in Peter's eyes, but Joey bear is clearly his best of friends. :o) He did have a more fancy name to start with, but has always been called "bear" by Peter until fairly recently when he decided he really did want a proper name and Peter and I went through a few different names before we found the right one! There's also a picture of the back of our house that I just thought to take at the same time as taking these ones of Peter. I'm looking forward to the really filthy windows getting a good clean this week. We couldn't work out how to get to the windows above the conservatory without making a hole in the conservatory roof, and these one's aren't possible to reach out of and clean. We just found a window cleaner that uses a very long pole from down on the ground to clean with though, so gratefully he says he can reach them. Sarah and Rebekah are looking forward to watching him doing that later next week.





He also loves to ride his/Rebekah's scooter (admittedly quite slowly) around the garden, play catch or kicking a ball with me whenever I can, do jigsaw puzzles (best method at the moment is tip them all out at the same time to form a huge mountain, but when he's doing on at a time he loves to put the together properly) draw (especially with felt pens when he's allowed them out - washable ones only!), make train tracks and playing with the trains, push his baby places in a little pushchair, do gardening, read books, dance to music (sometimes doing the galloping or side steps he has seen the girls doing in ballet - even choosing to put littlish ballet shoes on at times), play with lego (duplo), run and jump, make food for people from play food, play doctors (especially on Mummy), play in the sand pit, watch a DVD when he's allowed (Bob, Little Red Tractor, Postman Pat, etc. although we don't have many now since passing on all of our videos when we moved and just using DVDs on the computer now), oh, and plenty of other things but I think those would constitute his favourites.








Peter favours being outside and whenever the chance comes he wants his shoes on and to be out. Michael was clearing the little patch of grass we have at the front of the house this morning, which was pretty overgrown and was also half weeds and ivy. When Peter realised he was outside in a flash, walking along the stones that edge our drive to start with while I was there to hold his hand for a bit of balance. Then when I asked him to please stay at the top by Daddy because I was going inside he came with me and asked for the shed to be opened. He rummaged around, and got out a child-sized rake and went to do what Daddy was doing in the front garden. He struggled a bit with the clumps left behind on the lawn, but just loves to do what someone else is doing, and especially if that someone is Daddy. :o)

Pumpkin fun

We bought a few pumpkins pretty cheaply a week or two ago as the girls had enjoyed making lanterns last year. When we went to decorate them on Wednesday of last week, Peter got up to the table and said "Where's Peter's?" Silly me, I didn't think he'd be able to do one - thought he'd just enjoy seeing them lit! He really did want to join in though, so Michael took him to the shop to choose one with him. Unfortunately they'd all gone, so I suggested they get a couple of butternut squashes. I'd already been thinking they'd make really nice looking lanterns. He apparently picked a little one and stuck with it, politely declining all others! By the time they got back we were well underway, have scooped out the middles and were working on patterns. Peter's (and mine - I got the other squash) were a lot harder to scoop out than the pumpkins, being solid half the way along, but we did get a yummy addition to tea that night from them. Peter chose a star in the end, and I did an alternative one on mine. Rachel and Hannah, the only ones who had decided to work together on one, had a hard time deciding on their design . In the end they scrapped the original, Rachel drew out the new one and carved a few stars then she'd had enough. Hannah carved the rest, and did well I think. Here they are...












Rebekah did well being in that group picture, as she has hated having photos taken for a while. She decided in the end she wanted to show you her new Christmas sticker book, which she loves, as well as her pumpkin.

We don't actually celebrate Halloween, but we enjoy the creativity of making pumpkin lanterns and the beauty of seeing them lit. Of course it helps that the pumpkins are not expensive to buy just before Halloween! We have Rebekah's pumpkin and the two squashes in the living room on a shelf, and the other two are in their bedrooms. They have been having them lit once we go upstairs each night, and go to sleep by the candlelight. They've been enjoying that, but having noticed a couple of them starting to go mouldy tonight this will probably be the last night of it.

A day at the temple

We went to the London temple last Saturday. The children enjoyed the newly developed visitors centre there with its own Christus, touch screen displays, and pictures of inside that actual temple (they were amazed at that). We'll explore it more another time when we're there for longer. It's a relief to have an indoor place to be now the weather is getting freezing. Talking of freezing, it has apparently snowed in some parts of the country this week, including in Coventry where we just moved from. The children were quite disappointed that we were here instead! It's certainly freezing enough here for it to be snowing, but it's partly the wind that's always there that makes it feel so cold I think. We hadn't quite made it down to 0 degrees in reality.






While I was in the temple, Michael and the children managed to find a fairly sheltered bench to have their lunch. They were joined by a very friendly duck who seemed to want to join in their picnic.




Later on while Michael was in the temple, Hannah got creative. She had already made a flower from some beautifully coloured autumn leaves, then while trying to hold more leaves to make more flowers, she decided she could really do with a basket. Hannah's obvious solution to that would be to try making one! She didn't get as far as a basket, but she did a pretty good job at weaving some grass/reeds together. She didn't really know how to weave having not done it before, but it didn't take her long sat on a bench on her own to work it out, and be very pleased with the result. Whenever we are at the temple Hannah's mind and hands get busy and she creates something or other. It was a boat to float in the pond last time. :o) She seems to find it an inspiring place to be, and no wonder with the lovely grounds there.






Michael and I also went round taking quite a few photos of the temple as requested by Debbie to give to somebody. It wasn't the best weather for it - very grey for most of the day. These are our favourites from what we managed to get though. Hopefully one for them will be fit for the purpose, but if not Deb, then we'll try again soon, hopefully on a brighter day!