Monthly Round Up (February '10)

February being the shortest month of the year, would ordinarily mean it whizzing by at a rate of knots, wouldn't it? But this year it hasn't. I don't know whether it was the cold (and snow, hail, howling gales, sleet, and rain ... etc.) and general yuk-ness of the weather; or just me remaining a bit of misery guts, but it didn't go as quickly as I'd thought it might. Never mind, I've still managed to find lots of stuff from this month about which to chat, and on the positive side I received a Valentines Card for the first time in years! From a friend, it had the desired effect of cheering me up. Thank you - x.

●●●●●●

Let's start off this month with the Wrinklets.

No.2 has, for some time, been keen for his football coach to try him out in a midfield position rather than his usual place of left back. At his age group, it's quite unusual to find a boy who will listen to what his coach is telling him, and stay back to defend rather than chasing the ball; but No.2 does all that, so I'm sure that's part of why he's remained a defender for so long. Anyway, at their away game on 6th Feb, the coach gave him a run out in midfield - hooray and hurrah. And guess what? He played his socks off! In fact, he played so well, he ended up with this:

The next week he was asked to play half the game in midfield and the other half in defence, and if the coach carries on with that kind of 'balance' I think No.2 will be happy. His team are playing really well at the moment, but just not getting the results, and are therefore not doing too well in the league. Let's hope luck starts going their way soon.

●●●●●●

No.1 completed an interesting Design & Technology project this month. It was centred on The Oxford Natural History Museum, each student being required to make something edible (Food Tech) and present it in appropriate home-made packaging, complete with relevant labels (Graphics). This was a project made for No.1, who researched the ONHM, and then thought about what she might make.

She decided she wanted to make butterfly cakes, and a funky bag or box for them to go in. The bag/box was fine in theory, but how would we achieve it? In the end we (yes, I might have been the assistant on this project) ended up using an empty Rice Krispie box, cut to size. She covered it in wrapping paper, and inserted some acetate in the top to make a 'window':

The butterfly cakes were easy enough, although she wanted to put coloured icing butterflies on the top, rather than cut 'wings' out of the actual cake. More than that, she wanted to 'paint' her own butterflies with food colouring on white icing, rather than use coloured icing. A short baking session resulted in these:

Which were placed in the box (which had labels attached, to detail all the ingredients, and a sell-by date), and taken to school where they were unceremoniously scoffed. I wish we'd had homework like that when I was at school!

●●●●●●

Still on family matters, my mum hasn't been at all well this month with ongoing dental problems. A really nasty infection under a tooth (which needed THREE courses of antibiotics, and eventually removal of the tooth itself) resulted in her having to pull out of a planned holiday in Las Vegas, the poor thing. Thankfully the other 'girls' still went, but Mum was naturally upset and disappointed to miss out. Pain of any kind is horrible, but pain in one's mouth (which of course affects eating, talking, even smiling) can be so debilitating. She's quite literally down in the mouth; and I hope she bounces back soon.

●●●●●●

I'm sure I'm not the only blogger who occasionally receives emails asking me to 'plug' products on my blog. The latest one asked if the people concerned might purchase some advertising space in my sidebar. Thus far I have never accepted any of the free products, or an offer to promote anyone's business. I'm happy to give a big shout to companies with whom I'm impressed, and equally ready to report cruddy customer service - but it's all based on personal experience.

Thus this month I would like to give a big 'up' to a company called 'Pennine Industries'. It all started one night when I was lying awake (not sleeping well at the moment) and could hear Herbie Hamster downstairs making a weird noise. I got up and came down, only to find he'd gnawed his water bottle to the extent that the metal 'feeder' bit had fallen out of its plastic housing. The water from the bottle had of course leaked out over his bedding, and he was trying in vain to get a drink. I had to sellotape the metal bit back into the plastic bit until I could find a new bottle. I visited the local garden centre to get a new feeding bottle, bought one, and brought it home. It didn't fit the 'hole' in the side of Herbie's cage (which doesn't have bars on the sides onto which I might have hung this other bottle). I visited a local pet shop, to find they only stocked the same ones as the garden centre. Hmmmmm. A bit of investigating found that Herbie's cage (and water bottle) was made by Pennine Industries; so after finding their website, I fired off an email explaining my problem.

A very nice lady called Kelly replied that it wasn't a problem, and she'd put a couple of replacement bottles in the post to me. Did she want my card number to cover the cost of the bottles and postage? Nope. Did she want me to send a cheque by return of post? Nope. The bottles were sent free of charge, and incredibly quickly. So Herbie now has access to water again and is a happy, if aged, hamster. Now that's what I call customer service!

Herbie Hamster being an old man in his house

●●●●●●

Whilst I think of it, I would like to mention in this round up, how much it meant to me to receive such lovely comments from my fellow bloggy pals, after I'd posted about coming in joint fist place in the Camera Club competition at the start of this month. You're lovely people, and your words made the pleasure of doing well, all the more enjoyable. Thank you - xxx.

●●●●●●

I had some very sad news this month when an old college friend of mine emailed to let me know that our Secretarial Tutor had died. Mrs D was a funny old thing - I don't think I will ever forget the image of her stood at the front of the class whilst we all attempted to get our fingers intimately acquainted with the precise layout of a keyboard. She would watch us closely and tell us off if we looked down at the keys. It was she who taught me shorthand, that bizarre phonetic language which looks like squiggles, dots and dashes, but which actually very cleverly makes short work of any word. I still use it today if I want to make a note of something I don't want the kids to understand. :-D

Mrs D and I had kept in touch over all the years since I left college, and exchanged letters in our Christmas Cards. Just this last Christmas she sent me a lovely newsy letter telling me all about what she'd been up to during 2009. Anyway, Mrs D fell in the snow we had in January, and plainly hurt herself very badly. She was taken to hospital but died there a few days later. She had been a widow for 10 years, and I guess the blessing is that now she is with her husband again. She was extremely active and busy, and I'm sure will be missed by not only her daughters and their families but also the people who were in the many groups and clubs to which she belonged. Thanks Mrs D ... you taught me well.

Another bit of sad news was learning that one of the bosses for whom I worked as a secretary, had died. In this instance it wasn't such a shock, as a man at Camera Club had told me a couple of months ago that Peter (my ex-boss) was very poorly indeed. He was a really bright, cheeky character of a man, and I can honestly say that there was never a dull moment during the time I worked for him. We were both gobby spirited individuals and appreciated each other's humour from Day 1: At Friends Reunited I wrote on my profile 'Would love to hear from anyone who remembers me' and he left a comment saying 'How could I bloody forget?!' :-D

There was of course a door between our offices, but we also each had a door on to the main corridor. He was forever popping out of 'his' door without telling me, and I would put calls through to him (sometimes quite important calls) and end up not only looking a prize chump, but also exasperating the person on the other end of the line. Despite me mentioning it to him several times, he continued to do it. However, one day I'd had enough, so went and locked his office/corridor door from the inside. A little while later there was a large 'thump' noise as he walked into his door and banged his head on it, because it didn't open like he'd expected it to. A couple of Welsh expletives might have passed his lips, but the point was made, and thereafter he always let me know if he was going out of the office for any reason.

He was such a huge personality, that there must surely be a gaping hole in the lives of his family and friends. Thanks for being a great boss Peter - and for the many laughs.

●●●●●●

I haven't been doing much crafting of late - what with all the photographicals and everything, but I thought some of you sewing types might like to see a table runner Mum completed this month. I've only got a photo of one section of it, and I'm not sure it does the whole thing justice, but it gives a general idea. It's an absolutely beautiful piece of work - appliquéd, embroidered, and quilted by hand:

It is now gracing her rather large dining room table and looks fabulous.

EDITED TO ADD: The pattern for the table runner can be found on this page. It is the Flower Garland Table Runner.

●●●●●●

At the very beginning of February (or was it the very end of January ... too late to go in January's Round Up?) the kids and I had the pleasure of spending some time in the company of my lovely forum/bloggy/facebook pal Lily-Wren, and her other half. I'd never met Mr Plum (aka 'Ticharu') before, although we had exchanged the odd message and comment or two in the past. Meeting him continued my experience that bloggy peeps met in real life are just as fabulous as they seem on their blog(s); and that whilst I completely understand the natural concerns we must all have about meeting 'strangers' first encountered on the interweb, it really can be a wonderful way to meet new friends.

Mr Plum and No.1 bonded over her guitar (Mr P having been away from any musical 'doings' for a few days, and therefore experiencing the severe withdrawal typical of a musician separated from instruments). Lily and I talked photography - you can see her fantabulous images on her Flickr stream - and munched lunch. Then No.2 initiated Mr Plum in the ways of the Wii. He bowled, he bashed moles, he skipped, he karted ... and went away no longer a Wii Virgin.

Thank you both for visiting - it was lovely - xx.

●●●●●●

I'll leave you with an image. This photo was taken on 10th February when we had snow blizzards, hailstones, sleet, and sunshine all in one day. It is of hailstones on the shoots of some bulbs (can't remember what) which I planted on the day of my friend Tracy's funeral last Autumn, so we'd have some plants by which to remember her (not that we need plants to remember her).

Hopefully we are now edging closer to spring, and some sunshiney warmth. According to press reports: "England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland have all had their coldest winter season for more than 30 years. ... this winter is the third coldest in the last 50 years and 10th coldest in the last 120 years." Let's hope it's at least another 30 years before we get another one like this, eh?

●●●●●●

© Author