Well I hate to be boring Dunc, but....

189 sleeps!

And with that out of the way....

I had already done half of this blog about 2 hours ago, but managed to save my 'reflective journal' (course work) instead! Thought probably not a good plan to publish that, so am forced to go back to the drawing board! Second set back, thought that I would publish some before and almost after shots of the house - but can't find the befores!! Suspect they may be at work - so I'll wait to publish 'the afters' too!

BUT... since doing the girls rooms (still need carpet, notice boards and book shelves!), we have done the spare room (still needs carpet and decent lampshade), and the spare en suite (minus shower screen and splash backs), as well as the main bathroom (except for the gib stopping - (do we have gib stopping in the UK? or even gib?!) (do you know what Pink Batts are?) tiles and painting!) Oh, and the wardrobe - (except it's not been gib stopped painted or got any fittings in it yet!) So basically - we haven't finished anything at all, but it's coming together quite nicely! Mind you, price of paint down here is shocking! I bought 8L of "high traffic"enamel paint and 10L of wall paint and it set me back $382 - and that was after a 20% discount!! Probably same equivalent in UK but we earn bugger all down here! It felt like at least 382 quid!

Anyway, house is getting there! Mark is learning a whole new raft of skills. His friend was going to do the gib stopping but then bought a 'do up' and we'll probably not see him till it's done up - except at football and in the bar afterwards of course! So Mark is now getting very spiffy with the plaster - and we will only worry about it if it falls off. If you come and stay, try not to notice the bumpy bits! His carpentry is also getting quite funky - beautiful skirtings, scotias (think that's the same as coving! - only not, cause not coved!)

Just as an aside - someone explain to me why this blog is now AUTO SAVING every 2 minutes - but earlier this afternoon it failed to save for 10 mins and then ate my words of wisdom when I tried to save it manually!

Moving on!

Today was a study day - which would have been fine, but for the fact that the DVD of sample Careers Counselling sessions was so dull that I fell asleep through quite a lot of it, missing entirely the outcome of session - oops! Guess I could try watching again, next time I can't sleep at night. Meantime the course is progressing. Confess that it is a little like, or maybe a lot like wading through thigh deep treacle. It's probably not helped by the fact that I decided I wanted to do the course post-John and pre-Mark and at the time, I needed to work towards a career rather than picking up peanuts just doing a job. Now, unexpectedly and rather wonderfully life is much easier, much nicer, much more fun and quite a lot more comfortable than it has been for quite a long while which makes it kind of hard to retain the enthusiasm and the focus. That said, probably the main problem with the course is that we have 3.5 hours of Role Play weekly! However sad it is that I am 42 and still hate it - I still hate it - with passion. My effort last week actually made me question whether my brain had entirely shut down for the duration - and after such an abysmal performance....

now it's saving every 40 seconds!!!

.........I spent the whole week from Monday dreading Thursday's class!

Apart from anything else, if I am completely honest, what I really want to do on a Thursday is to go and pick the girls up and watch Lou play her netball. I know the course is only for another few weeks - but I miss watching her play.

Anyway, grumble grumble, ramble ramble - there are only 5 more weeks and two assessments till the end of paper 2. After that I will take a view on it and try and figure out whether I hated the paper or whether in fact Careers Counselling ain't my bag after all! Certainly not doing paper 3 next term - am going to spend time watching netball, being Mum, Christmas shopping and packing! Hopefully that will be laid back enough that I might be able to squeeze in a bit of snogging the yumster as well!

So what's been happening here on the flipside?

Lou is absolutely loving Intermediate. She's been foul to live with for the last 3 weeks - I suspect there are rather too many hormones flying around and within not very long at all we are going to fall headlong into the cowpat of puberty! That said, she has improved in the last few days and I may keep her for a while longer! She's now officially reffing Becs weekly netball games, which she does very well. Tomorrow however, she'll be at flute and so I get to try out my newby reffing skills - sadly I suspect that by comparison, I will probably look pretty shabby!

Her flute is going really well - this is not surprising to Mark and I, as recently practicing has become rather more regular. You can guarantee that pretty much every time I ask her to go and tidy her room / get her washing / make her bed / brush her hair / go to bed or any other task that takes her anywhere near her room, you'll wait for approximately 8 seconds and there'll be a blast of The Entertainer or an English Country Garden or When I'm 64 - have to say until recently this particular trait had been driving me to the brink of my sanity - Mark, however, chuckles. He says it's as if every time she walks into her room she thinks "Oh, there's my flute...." and away she goes - fortunately for Lou, I now chuckle too - mostly!! I have told her that we are going to bring her flute to England - so Gramps, Grandad - be warned! 8 seconds.... Oh, there's my flute!....

Her netball is going well too. Her team recently got promoted from 3rd team to 1st team! No idea how that works, but she's chuffed as! Currently playing Goal Shoot and ? can't remember cause I haven't seen her play for ages!

Netball brings us neatly to my little pink girl! She weighs 24kg (which is approximately the amount of weight that I hope to have lost by the time we come to England! I will be a whole Rebecca smaller!) but she has grown upwards a fair bit recently so we've junked a whole bunch of Gymboree, Gap and M&S stuff that we brought over from England! (just thought: actually, will be very little packing to do before trip as we can bring empty suitcases and just fill them up when we've been shopping?!)

Her netball is going well too. Did a bit of a Prima Donna thing yesterday when she took exception to being placed as Wing A - which is no good if you want all the glory from shooting goals! Fortunately she recovered from that little paddy and is looking forward to her match tomorrow - despite the dodgy ref!

Latest fad is Belly Dancing. The deputy head at school is, I think, a bit of an ex hippy. She's often seen wandering around the playgrounds and the office / classroom shoeless and in spangly floaty skirts. Any opportunity for fancy dress and she whips out the sewing machine and runs up an extravagant little number that will bare some resemblance to an explosion in a paint factory! Anyway, belly dancing is her latest thing and Becca is right there with her!

Both Boo and Becs are coming up to school productions. Lou's doing Annie. She got into the last 4 hopefuls for some of the main parts (was like Idol!!) but in the end she is going to be an orphan. Becs is going to be doing Belly Dancing, she thinks, in Troy Story! Either way, Mark and I are waiting with baited breath!!

Oh and Topol! Absolutely bloody marvellous! The whole thing was just brilliant - and Topol, who is in fact .....70 (first in the London production in 1967 age 30) was fab. Still has that lovely rich voice, maybe not quite so light on his feet - but amazing. Girls were entranced (had forgotten there were so many things to explain - like the persecution of the Jews, the Tsars, Communism etc etc!! All in hushed whispers - and probably much of it completely incorrect!) Soph came with us too. Soph still has that wonderful ability to surprise me. She was late, she arrived, all smiles and just as we got to the door to the theatre she whipped out a Thai take away that she was planning on eating once we were in our seats! What I always love about her in these situations is that she is always so dumbfounded by my outrage / confusion that I begin to wonder if it is me who is off base not her! Anyway, the Thai was bolted, quite delicately and we finally took our seats and enjoyed - half way through Soph asked why they all kept calling him Tevye - and wasn't it remarkable that the guy playing the lead sounded exactly like the guy on Mum and Dad's LP........ TOPOL!??!!!!!!

Ho hum! Was a very pleasant evening. Loved sharing it with the girls - lovelier to have Soph there too.

This is looking a bit short at the mo! Must have been more going on here than this - my reflective journal was much longer!

Well, it's now Saturday morning. Becs team lost at netball - but I survived my debut as ref. Sod's law that we were playing a team with the loudest most obnoxious / intimidating coach I have ever come across. In the end I had to give him a warning! (how embarrassing?!) Not sure what I would have done if the game had gone on any longer.... maybe sent him to his room for time out?!! Complaints were lodged though, so hopefully the git will reign it in a bit next time we play Murray's Bay!

Lou and Becs are off to see Pirates of the Caribbean 3 this afternoon. Becs is being taken with a friend. Boo is going to a different showing with two friends - on their own!!!! I am dropping and picking up, but Oh my God my daughter is growing up! I remember when I was about Lou's age being allowed to go, on the bus, to Windsor, Christmas shopping one year. Vaguely remember wearing a fake leather trench coat (my detective coat! - very 70s!) and buying an awful lot of tat in the souvenir shops. I think that was the year that I bought Dad an LP for Christmas - it was by Micky and Grif! who the Hell they were I didn't know then, and I am none the wiser now! I think I worked on the theory that Dad liked music and the woman on the front of the LP cover was wearing trousers a bit like some that Mum had!! Excellent purchase reasons, obviously! Think I just wandered off there, but back to the cinema trip... Lou made me laugh when Becca asked why Lou and her friends were going on their own, Boo answered in a very patronising manner, "that's what people at Intermediate do" - yeah, like having showers without a fight, washing and brushing hair, teeth etc etc!!!

Anyway, it has been enough of an incentive that behaviour has improved significantly in the last few days. Now I have to think of an incentive for next week!

Other than that, think I have run of blurb. Mark is up ladders masking the hall up. Boo is scurrying around making sure that she looks cool - Becs is standing at the front door tapping her foot - and I'm finishing my blog ready to go to the gym after my taxi duties.

Except... gym going well - lost 6cm off boobs and am now 7kg lighter than I was 5 months ago - 5kg since starting the gym 5 weeks ago. Mornings continue to be dark - and now are significantly colder. And as the winter comes on it means that sun up behind Rangi doesn't even start till I have finished my work out and am back at home in a place where I can't see it! Roll on summer!!

Big snogs all round. Would like to say back later, but really need to take advantage of a quiet house and get on with essay.

Hugs - lots of love

xx