Tuesday, June 29, 2004
Well chuffed!
The flu turned to bronchitis, so I'm still coughing my lungs up and going all feek and weeble when I try to do too much! Yesterday I climbed on the scales for the first time in ages and found that since I'd made the decision to lose weight, I have lost a stone. Happy dancing all over the place, nevermind all the rest to go!!
One thing I've found is that sweet things really have no appeal anymore, or to be more specific, they tempt, so I take a mouthful and find them so overbearingly sweet that I don't want to eat anymore. Not a bad thing of course! ;o) Last night for the first time in ages, I had a cup of hot chocolate. It's the 'lite' version, but again, far too sweet and sick making!
School finished on Friday, so there are seven lonnnnnng weeks of undiluted kids ahead and the "I'm bored" song started to be sung on Friday afternoon!
Yesterday I took them all ice-skating and then we met Gary when he finished work, treated them all to McDonalds and then made our way home. They thoroughly enjoyed themselves and it was great to have a 'normal' family outing for once. I've promised them I'll take them out once a week during the holidays and they'll also take turns coming shopping with me on Wednesdays. (The treat is going to the pub afterwards and getting spoilt by their Gran and Bill.)
Robert and wee Gary both have programmes arranged by the schools, Roberts' is a wee bit more sensible as it's one day a week for the entire holidays, whereas wee Garys' is a whole week and then that's it.
I've finished the card for Norry ... very proud of the thistles, they worked out beautifully. I've finished the embroidery of the first card and started another. I've decided to do all the embroidery first and then have a mammoth card-making session. Norry's going to be away for a month, so I'll make up a pile while he's away and he can take them down when he gets back.
Moo
One thing I've found is that sweet things really have no appeal anymore, or to be more specific, they tempt, so I take a mouthful and find them so overbearingly sweet that I don't want to eat anymore. Not a bad thing of course! ;o) Last night for the first time in ages, I had a cup of hot chocolate. It's the 'lite' version, but again, far too sweet and sick making!
School finished on Friday, so there are seven lonnnnnng weeks of undiluted kids ahead and the "I'm bored" song started to be sung on Friday afternoon!
Yesterday I took them all ice-skating and then we met Gary when he finished work, treated them all to McDonalds and then made our way home. They thoroughly enjoyed themselves and it was great to have a 'normal' family outing for once. I've promised them I'll take them out once a week during the holidays and they'll also take turns coming shopping with me on Wednesdays. (The treat is going to the pub afterwards and getting spoilt by their Gran and Bill.)
Robert and wee Gary both have programmes arranged by the schools, Roberts' is a wee bit more sensible as it's one day a week for the entire holidays, whereas wee Garys' is a whole week and then that's it.
I've finished the card for Norry ... very proud of the thistles, they worked out beautifully. I've finished the embroidery of the first card and started another. I've decided to do all the embroidery first and then have a mammoth card-making session. Norry's going to be away for a month, so I'll make up a pile while he's away and he can take them down when he gets back.
Moo
Friday, June 18, 2004
Feeling rotten
Thursday, June 17, 2004
The wedding, et al.
It's been ages since I last wrote anything, but now all the sewing and fittings are over my time's my own again! Having previously said that I'd decided to make up a jacket that I'd done before for myself, I changed my mind again and used the pattern that I'd originally bought for the wedding. Despite losing weight, I still feel like the side of a house, but got a lot of compliments on my outfit!
They always say that there's nothing like a man in uniform, but Gary looked so handsome in his kilt, he makes me go quite weak at the knees!
The wedding on Saturday was well worth the wait. The bride was beautiful, her dress was stunning but she was halfway down the aisle before she realised that they'd forgotten to put on the veil!
The service was a wee bit weird, almost like a registry office although in a church. There seemed to be an awful lot of talk beforehand with the actual ceremony bit almost glossed over as it was so brief!
After all the confetti was thrown, the family retired to the garden behind the church for photos. Gary picked up Tracys' train so it wouldn't drag on the ground, but unfortunately we weren't fast enough to get a photograph, so we got him later playing pageboy when he went to straighten it out again.
The reception was in two parts. A dinner followed by a disco. When we arrived at the hotel, we were asked to wait in a private bar until the wedding party arrived. There were seating plans dotted around on the tables, so we could all see where we would be sitting before going into the hall. Gary, I and the 2 youngest boys were at a table with Pauls' (the groom) paternal uncle, maternal aunt and her husband and the other three of our children were at another table with Garys' elder brother Norman (Norry).
There were names at each seat and inbetween courses wee Gary kept disappearing, reappearing with various nametags. When I asked him what he was up to, he informed us that they were the names of the people he was going to dance with later!
We were meant to socialize, but whew! what hard work. William, Pauls' uncle was fine, but his aunt only answered in monosyllables and her husband didn't say a word to us the entire time we were at the table.
As Garys' parents are divorced, Bill (their "stepfather") gave Tracy away. Unfortunately, he is deaf and difficult to understand, so Norry was asked to do the father of the bride speech. (Alan read a lesson and Gary was an usher, so they were all involved in some way.) When it was announced, we all sat there clapping, Norry included, until Tracy mouthed to him "That's you!" He literally jumped off his seat, which made everyone laugh.
The kids behaved brilliantly. The younger boys were thrilled with their kilts and spent quite a bit twirling around. Wee Gary only stopped when he lost his balance and landed on his bum!
Wee Gary was true to his word and did his best to dance with every woman in the room. Gary and Norry gave up counting at 32 apparently! Norry was completely gob-smacked and wanted to know "How on earth he does it?" Looking extremely cute had a lot to do with it I think!
The girls looked very grown up and elegant and like the boys, spent most of the night on the dance floor. We all thoroughly enjoyed ourselves, finally leaving at about 00:45am. The children all came home to go to bed, while Gary, Bill, Norry, Craig (Garys' stepson) and I went up to Pats' (Garys' mum) house to unwind.
On Thursday, Kim and I got into a slanging match, because I objected to her hitting wee Gary. When Gary came home from work, I told him what had happened and why, and so he told her that if he ever heard of her speaking to an adult like that again, or even repeating her behaviour, he would punish her severely.
After dinner, she went along to her maternal gran and told them that I and Gary had hit her and that she was 'scared for her life'! They of course swallowed it all hook, line and sinker (after all, I'm a complete brute and shouldn't be allowed to stay here at all) and wouldn't let her come back home. Gary phoned up, but Craig wouldn't let him speak to Kim, nor would he listen to reason, telling Gary that he is going to go to court and get custody of all the children. Gary phoned the police, to see if they could force her to come home, but while they were very sympathetic, they weren't able to help.
Friday after school, madam came wandering in as if nothing had happened and except for asking if she was home to apologize, nothing else was said. However, we'd been lulled into a false sense of security.
Early Sunday morning, having spent a pleasant few hours at Pats, Craig decided to go home. Gary went to see him off, whereupon Craig climbed into Gary and started to argue all over again. Despite Gary trying not to argue with him, Craig ploughed on, even bringing up his mothers' death.
Gary finally came back into the lounge and started to tell us what had happened, when he got a terrible pain in his chest and then started 'jumping'. I've noticed that when he gets upset or stressed he gets a nervous tic that makes him jump and lately pain in his chest as well, but nothing as severe as this. All we managed to get out of him was "They're going to take my children away from me", so Pat, Norry and I spent a good while trying to calm Gary down and reassure him that nobody was going to be able to take the children at all. Once we'd managed to calm him down, we then sat and discussed what best to do about the situation, as it cannot go on like this, with that mob along the road constantly causing trouble in our house.
Ideally, we'd liked to stop the children going there at all, but while a ban works on the younger three, John and Kimberley still go along. We decided that Norry should talk to the children, explain what had happened and ask them not to go along. He was also going to go along to the Spencers and tell them that they were no longer going to see the children and if they persisted, then we would go to court to get an injunction to prevent them legally.
We eventually left about 06:00 and anyone seeing us walking home would've thought it was us that had just got married! All dressed up, with me carrying a huge bunch of balloons with Just Married on them, as well as a bowl of flowers, that looked more like a bouquet!
Norry came down later to speak to the children, but told us that he was going to hold off speaking to the Spencers for the meantime as he wants to speak to an old friend, who was a social worker for years, first to find out what our legal posistion is. Whatever he said to them worked a charm, as all the children came into the bedroom (Gary'd stayed in bed, because after all the prolonged jumping, he woke up feeling like someone had given him a good 'doing' as they say here in Glasgow) to give Gary a hug and when I got back from the front door, having said goodbye to Norry, John gave me a hug and apologized for being "such a wee a*****e"!
So far so good. Life here seems to have changed for the better. I know life won't be troublefree from now on, but at least I don't feel like I need to be on the defensive against whatever new accusation makes it's way along the road. It's no longer just us, it's the whole Miller family behind us now!
I embroidered a card for Tracy and Paul (unfortunately my "b-i-l" Alan didn't transfer that photo onto the disc, so it's still in the camera) and so have now received a commission from Norry. He's off to the States in 3 weeks and wants a card for his friends mother who celebrates her birthday a few days after he gets there. He was saying that I should make them to sell, but I don't really know where to start. He lives in Lanark, a small town not very far from Glasgow and so volunteered to go and see his local gift/craft shop and see whether they would be prepared to sell them for me. Last night he sent me a text saying that he'd spoken to them and they'll be happy to sell them, so to get busy!
I've made a start on Norrys, he wants thistles, so I've made up a design with a couple of sprigs of heather, so he gets the whole 'Scotland' thing!
Moo
They always say that there's nothing like a man in uniform, but Gary looked so handsome in his kilt, he makes me go quite weak at the knees!
The wedding on Saturday was well worth the wait. The bride was beautiful, her dress was stunning but she was halfway down the aisle before she realised that they'd forgotten to put on the veil!
The service was a wee bit weird, almost like a registry office although in a church. There seemed to be an awful lot of talk beforehand with the actual ceremony bit almost glossed over as it was so brief!
After all the confetti was thrown, the family retired to the garden behind the church for photos. Gary picked up Tracys' train so it wouldn't drag on the ground, but unfortunately we weren't fast enough to get a photograph, so we got him later playing pageboy when he went to straighten it out again.
The reception was in two parts. A dinner followed by a disco. When we arrived at the hotel, we were asked to wait in a private bar until the wedding party arrived. There were seating plans dotted around on the tables, so we could all see where we would be sitting before going into the hall. Gary, I and the 2 youngest boys were at a table with Pauls' (the groom) paternal uncle, maternal aunt and her husband and the other three of our children were at another table with Garys' elder brother Norman (Norry).
There were names at each seat and inbetween courses wee Gary kept disappearing, reappearing with various nametags. When I asked him what he was up to, he informed us that they were the names of the people he was going to dance with later!
We were meant to socialize, but whew! what hard work. William, Pauls' uncle was fine, but his aunt only answered in monosyllables and her husband didn't say a word to us the entire time we were at the table.
As Garys' parents are divorced, Bill (their "stepfather") gave Tracy away. Unfortunately, he is deaf and difficult to understand, so Norry was asked to do the father of the bride speech. (Alan read a lesson and Gary was an usher, so they were all involved in some way.) When it was announced, we all sat there clapping, Norry included, until Tracy mouthed to him "That's you!" He literally jumped off his seat, which made everyone laugh.
The kids behaved brilliantly. The younger boys were thrilled with their kilts and spent quite a bit twirling around. Wee Gary only stopped when he lost his balance and landed on his bum!
Wee Gary was true to his word and did his best to dance with every woman in the room. Gary and Norry gave up counting at 32 apparently! Norry was completely gob-smacked and wanted to know "How on earth he does it?" Looking extremely cute had a lot to do with it I think!
The girls looked very grown up and elegant and like the boys, spent most of the night on the dance floor. We all thoroughly enjoyed ourselves, finally leaving at about 00:45am. The children all came home to go to bed, while Gary, Bill, Norry, Craig (Garys' stepson) and I went up to Pats' (Garys' mum) house to unwind.
On Thursday, Kim and I got into a slanging match, because I objected to her hitting wee Gary. When Gary came home from work, I told him what had happened and why, and so he told her that if he ever heard of her speaking to an adult like that again, or even repeating her behaviour, he would punish her severely.
After dinner, she went along to her maternal gran and told them that I and Gary had hit her and that she was 'scared for her life'! They of course swallowed it all hook, line and sinker (after all, I'm a complete brute and shouldn't be allowed to stay here at all) and wouldn't let her come back home. Gary phoned up, but Craig wouldn't let him speak to Kim, nor would he listen to reason, telling Gary that he is going to go to court and get custody of all the children. Gary phoned the police, to see if they could force her to come home, but while they were very sympathetic, they weren't able to help.
Friday after school, madam came wandering in as if nothing had happened and except for asking if she was home to apologize, nothing else was said. However, we'd been lulled into a false sense of security.
Early Sunday morning, having spent a pleasant few hours at Pats, Craig decided to go home. Gary went to see him off, whereupon Craig climbed into Gary and started to argue all over again. Despite Gary trying not to argue with him, Craig ploughed on, even bringing up his mothers' death.
Gary finally came back into the lounge and started to tell us what had happened, when he got a terrible pain in his chest and then started 'jumping'. I've noticed that when he gets upset or stressed he gets a nervous tic that makes him jump and lately pain in his chest as well, but nothing as severe as this. All we managed to get out of him was "They're going to take my children away from me", so Pat, Norry and I spent a good while trying to calm Gary down and reassure him that nobody was going to be able to take the children at all. Once we'd managed to calm him down, we then sat and discussed what best to do about the situation, as it cannot go on like this, with that mob along the road constantly causing trouble in our house.
Ideally, we'd liked to stop the children going there at all, but while a ban works on the younger three, John and Kimberley still go along. We decided that Norry should talk to the children, explain what had happened and ask them not to go along. He was also going to go along to the Spencers and tell them that they were no longer going to see the children and if they persisted, then we would go to court to get an injunction to prevent them legally.
We eventually left about 06:00 and anyone seeing us walking home would've thought it was us that had just got married! All dressed up, with me carrying a huge bunch of balloons with Just Married on them, as well as a bowl of flowers, that looked more like a bouquet!
Norry came down later to speak to the children, but told us that he was going to hold off speaking to the Spencers for the meantime as he wants to speak to an old friend, who was a social worker for years, first to find out what our legal posistion is. Whatever he said to them worked a charm, as all the children came into the bedroom (Gary'd stayed in bed, because after all the prolonged jumping, he woke up feeling like someone had given him a good 'doing' as they say here in Glasgow) to give Gary a hug and when I got back from the front door, having said goodbye to Norry, John gave me a hug and apologized for being "such a wee a*****e"!
So far so good. Life here seems to have changed for the better. I know life won't be troublefree from now on, but at least I don't feel like I need to be on the defensive against whatever new accusation makes it's way along the road. It's no longer just us, it's the whole Miller family behind us now!
I embroidered a card for Tracy and Paul (unfortunately my "b-i-l" Alan didn't transfer that photo onto the disc, so it's still in the camera) and so have now received a commission from Norry. He's off to the States in 3 weeks and wants a card for his friends mother who celebrates her birthday a few days after he gets there. He was saying that I should make them to sell, but I don't really know where to start. He lives in Lanark, a small town not very far from Glasgow and so volunteered to go and see his local gift/craft shop and see whether they would be prepared to sell them for me. Last night he sent me a text saying that he'd spoken to them and they'll be happy to sell them, so to get busy!
I've made a start on Norrys, he wants thistles, so I've made up a design with a couple of sprigs of heather, so he gets the whole 'Scotland' thing!
Moo
Friday, June 04, 2004
Back online at last!
In the last 2 weeks we've had this infernal machine into the shop twice. First time we got it back, we got online and then it all froze up and wouldn't work at all, so touch wood, everything is fine this time!
In the meantime I've been busy sewing. I've finished Kelly-Annes' outfit and she's thrilled with it. She's got the typical Scottish creamy white skin, with dark hair, so the red off the shoulder dress sets it off beautifully.
Kims' is just waiting for her shoes, so I can finish the hem. We're going shoe shopping this afternoon. As it's pink, I'd thought white sandals, but her gran told her that white shoes were 'shagging' shoes, so obviously she's no longer keen! It's not an expression I've ever heard before, but suppose we'll now have to look for pink, or maybe silver.
I've still got my jacket to make and have begun to swing towards making up one I've already made before, rather than the pattern that I originally bought for the wedding. Fitting is going to be a pain, I used to go visit my mum when I needed to do a fitting on anything new. I tend to have a couple of skirts, a blouse and a shirt-waister ... or variations thereof, that I always use when making something for myself. I can't really see Gary being too much help, although to give him his due, he'll try his best!
Last Saturday I went to my first 'hen-night'. Completely different to any kitchen tea (the SA equivalent) that I'd ever been to. To be perfectly honest, the main aim seemed to be to consume as much alcohol as possible, so I prefer the kitchen tea. Besides which, at a kitchen tea, each guest brings a small kitchen related gift, so as a bride, you get far more out of it!! Mind you, I don't know that Tracy (my 's-i-l') would've taken all the ragging and forfeits that would also have been part of it!
On the embroidery front, I've been doing a bit on the cottage and am now working on a card for Tracy and Paul. As they already have a house, she's asked if we can give money rather than a gift. It's a bit of a pain, as what we could spend on a reasonable gift will look pathetic as a cash amount, especially as I'd originally intended to get some linen and embroider on it.
My veggies are growing apace, the tomatoes plants are enormous and have flowers on them, the spinach is multiplying nicely, the strawberries are ripening and the peppers are plodding along slowly and I've just sown some lettuce. We bought a small greenhouse, so we now have lots of room on the balcony, with room to spare on the shelves, which no doubt will get filled pretty quickly. There's still those beans I wanted to get!
Moo
In the meantime I've been busy sewing. I've finished Kelly-Annes' outfit and she's thrilled with it. She's got the typical Scottish creamy white skin, with dark hair, so the red off the shoulder dress sets it off beautifully.
Kims' is just waiting for her shoes, so I can finish the hem. We're going shoe shopping this afternoon. As it's pink, I'd thought white sandals, but her gran told her that white shoes were 'shagging' shoes, so obviously she's no longer keen! It's not an expression I've ever heard before, but suppose we'll now have to look for pink, or maybe silver.
I've still got my jacket to make and have begun to swing towards making up one I've already made before, rather than the pattern that I originally bought for the wedding. Fitting is going to be a pain, I used to go visit my mum when I needed to do a fitting on anything new. I tend to have a couple of skirts, a blouse and a shirt-waister ... or variations thereof, that I always use when making something for myself. I can't really see Gary being too much help, although to give him his due, he'll try his best!
Last Saturday I went to my first 'hen-night'. Completely different to any kitchen tea (the SA equivalent) that I'd ever been to. To be perfectly honest, the main aim seemed to be to consume as much alcohol as possible, so I prefer the kitchen tea. Besides which, at a kitchen tea, each guest brings a small kitchen related gift, so as a bride, you get far more out of it!! Mind you, I don't know that Tracy (my 's-i-l') would've taken all the ragging and forfeits that would also have been part of it!
On the embroidery front, I've been doing a bit on the cottage and am now working on a card for Tracy and Paul. As they already have a house, she's asked if we can give money rather than a gift. It's a bit of a pain, as what we could spend on a reasonable gift will look pathetic as a cash amount, especially as I'd originally intended to get some linen and embroider on it.
My veggies are growing apace, the tomatoes plants are enormous and have flowers on them, the spinach is multiplying nicely, the strawberries are ripening and the peppers are plodding along slowly and I've just sown some lettuce. We bought a small greenhouse, so we now have lots of room on the balcony, with room to spare on the shelves, which no doubt will get filled pretty quickly. There's still those beans I wanted to get!
Moo
