29/04/2011 by Aileen.

We had a really lovely time at Ali and Eric’s. All the family there. We had a lovely roast beef meal on Sunday, went to the Burrell Collection for lunch on Monday, and chilled on Tuesday. Alexander took lots of steps for the first time. ALi is such a good hostess. She’s vergetarian, but cooked us a wonderful chicken piripiri on Monday. We had a chinese take-away on Tuesday. Liam and Kieran on excellent behaviour. Ashamed to say I only really took photos of Alexander. I did take some of Kieran washing down his bike, but they’re not worth uploading, and I don’t want to make Liam jealouse. Well, that’s my excuse. He wouldn’t care.

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23/04/2011 by Aileen.

Seriusly though, the poor little thing has been singing for five days now, and he’s still Billy-Nomates. It’s upsetting me the way I get upset if I hear a baby cry. A sort of negative feeling that could almost be annoyance, but it’s not. It’s more frustration that I can’t put it right.

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22/04/2011 by Aileen.

No. I haven’t got any. Free as a  bird. I’m going to the 3pm Good Friday service this afternoon, and need to check, cos I might be leading the 7pm Stations of the Cross. I’ve been doing it every Friday throughout Lent, but maybe Fr Neville is doing it tonight. FATHER Neville. I hadn’t called a priest Father for years until I came up North. It seems so old-fashioned. Every time I see him it’s on the tip of my tongue to say, ‘Can I call you Neville?’ A bit of reality in the church, please!

Anyway, a lazy few days, then up to Ali’s on Sunday. M, F, and A are coming too, so it should be great. We stay at a hotel just round the corner from them, so we can both drink. The Oxford contingent are staying with Ali and Eric.

Talking about drinking, I’ve lost nearly half a stone in two weeks. I wanted to lose a pound a week ;-). I have been cutting down on biscuits and cheese, but the main difference is no wine! So many calories in a glass, and I would share a bottle with John two or three nights over the weekend.

I unexpectedly got my TMA off two days early,  so went shopping on Wednesday. I really do need some plain black  easy to wear summer sandals, but I just can’t find any anywhere. In the end I bought a pair of tri-tone M&S footglove sandals, and on the way back to the car I went into Stead & Simpson and bought a really lovey pair of denimy blue very casual sandals. Might have to call it a day as I bought a pair a few weeks ago, and I’m not reallya shoe-aholic.

Anyway, grass cutting today. It’s looking better since I wed and fed it, or weeded and feeded it. I’ve planted up some yellow, orange and blue perennials in one place where the gardeners have weeded. Hope they take.

Only sad thing at the moment (you realise I don’t discuss things like Libya on this site) is a willow warbler in Sharon’s garden. I was so glad when I heard it three days ago, as I’ve never heard one from our garden before, but the poor little thing has been singing his heart out for three days now, and hasn’t been able to attract a mate. Don’t birds get sore throats? He flies into our garden now and then, but prefers Sharon’s enormous willow tree. I’m trying to get a photo of him, but can’t locate him in the willow, and when he’s in our garden he flies off when I go out.

Bye all. John calling.

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18/04/2011 by Aileen.

Not sure about that, but I’m having a change today. No Monday housework. I need to finish reading Mortal Engines and get on with my TMA. I’ve lots of notes under the headings of the three books I’ve chosen, but I need to cut and paste them into a beautifully crafted essay. By the way, here is the title of the TMA

 Rachel Falconer states that ‘it is important that the books and films [young people] read and watch should address the reality of their lives’ (Reader 1, p. 375). Is this view borne out by contemporary writing for children? Discuss with particular reference to three of the Set Books in Block 6.

So. No housework today. Finish the book this moring. Write this afternoon. (Might have to skip Viewfinders) Finish it tomorrow. That leaves Wednesday for putting in all the bl**dy referencing, which takes me a day, believe me. Then, into cyberspace on Thursday, which is the day it’s due in. I’ve never left it so late.

But then, the Easter Triduum from Thursday evening to Sunday morning and off to Scotland on Sunday for a few days for a family get-together.

Bye.

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16/04/2011 by Aileen.

And I just don’t get headaches. Never. ‘Wot, never? No, never.’ Well hardly ever. But it’s been a beautiful day and I’ve been stuck in studying. Up at 5.58 this morning, as I had been awake since before 5.30. John was awake too, so we had breakfast very early. Then I began studying. At about 9am I went down to the shops for the paper, milk, and meat for the weekend. Oh this is so boring. Think I’ll give up this blog. Do I really want to remember what I did today in twenty years’ time when I’m 86? Anyway, I have been getting to grips with a 2,000 word essay on whether children’s books should reflect the society of today. We need to refer to three books. I’ve chosen Junk (Melvyn Burgess) The Other Side of Truth (Beverley Naidoo) and Mortal Engines (Philip Reeve) It’s ages since I read Mortal Engines, so I am re-reading it when I’m tired of writing. Really miss the fresh air, but I finish studying in May, and then I’ll have a BA (Hons) Lit. I will continue to study with the OU, but just do short 10 pointer courses for interest.

John has just signed up for an OU course - Exploring Fear and Sadness. It starts in May, so I’ll try to learn alongside him, and choose a course for myself next October.

He’s talking about going to New York for a week this year. Not sure if I want to make the effort.  No place like home. Except I wish I had got out today. Not New York. More North Cave Wetlands.

M and F skyped us today. Alexander is growing so big. We’re meeting up at Ali’s next week for Easter. Can’t wait.

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11/04/2011 by Aileen.

I think that’s the expression. Anyway, we had a great week with the grandchildren. I know I’m biased, but they are so good. They really entertain each other. Giggles all round. We have two three seater settees in the Swinton (don’t ask) and we put them close together facing each other. Three big blankets and they had a camp. Or an office sometimes. I thought their best memory would be The Deep, as they were fascinated by the sea creatures. But when we met mum and dad on Saturday they said the best bit was seeing Hop (film about the Easter Bunny) and the chinese in Mr Chu’s afterwards.

For the handover we met at the Rheged Centre, Penrith.

http://rheged.com/

Had a surprisingly good meal there, and sat in the sun while the kids played in the adventure playground. The previous week, we met in The Black Swan,

http://www.blackswanculgaith.co.uk/

and I was treated to a slapup meal for Mother’s Day. Life is good.

Monday now, and I have my usual New Week’s Resolutions. But this time I have a serious intention to slim. So has John. I’m just under 11st 7 and it’s too fat. I’m living in stretchy trousers. A while ago I went through all my clothes and put away the ones I can’t get in to. Well, I’m going to get into them soon. I don’t intend to buy a whole lot of new summer clothes when I have some perfectly good ones hanging up in the spare bedroom.

Still haven’t bought my sandals. Think I mentioned that the ones I live in are coming unstitched, so I’m having to wear smarter ones when going out in case they break. I did look for a replacement in Sheffield, but I don’t know the town well enough and couldn’t find a good shoe shop. In the end I bought a quite high pair of open toed heels, but I still need SANDALS. So that’s on my list, but probably not for this week.

John has ten clients this week. Think that’s the highest ever. He has two a day, so we can’t ‘do’ anything together. Well, I mean we can’t go out anywhere. Gardening is high on the agenda. At last I’ve got myself psyched up for it. I’ve cut all four grass sections and wed and fed them. John’s powerwashed the top patio, and weeded this section along the north side of the house that we never use, so are inclined to forget about it. The side along the south is used as garden access, and I have my eye on it. There’s a narrow strip of earth there, and there are some violets growing again, but the hebes seem to be dead. Nettles doing well though!

The gardeners have cleared one of the three slopes out the back, and I’ve gone for a yellow and red theme there. That’s cos there are orangey daylilies there already, also alstoemaria if it comes back, and I think some irises. A lovely creamy rose too. And at the back is a wisteria, so hopefully that will survive. There’s lots of muscari out at the moment. Daffodils on their last legs, but some nice tulips (although I don’t like tulips particularly) Anyway, when I said I’m going for a yellow and red theme I mean to have little bits of blue there too, as a contrast. I’ve bought and put in some baby daylilies in a gold colour, yellow potentilla and doronicum, and orange geums. Still need to put in some pulsillata and a white rock plant whose name escaped me at the moment.

This woman who’s meant to have really unusual plants in her nursery came round, and is meant to be bringing round ten to twelve shrubs to put in (she said perennials were hard work) but she hasn’t been back and that was well over a week ago, so she’s toast. I’ll get my own ordinary shrubs.

Well, yesterday I finally planted up two large tubs for outside the french windows. Centrepiece of butterfly plant (for the butterflies!) surrounded by three pinks (for the smell) and three trailing ivies. Think I might have crammed too much in. We shall see. Today, I need to finish weeding the veg plot (started it with the kids last week) and put in my King Edwards and Charlottes. Hope they behave better than Basil and Rosemary when they shared a bed.

Bye, foks. Will upload some photos soon.

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02/04/2011 by Aileen.

Grandchildren coming today. Sitting here with sunlight streaming through the windows. Overnight the blossom on the plum tree has erupted, and some lovely white blossom on a sort of breakaway bush on what should be the vegetable patch. Might be hawthorn, but if it is it’s a bit worrying because the big hawthorn next to it looks dead. What’ll the birds do if it falls down? It’s their favourite post.

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01/04/2011 by Aileen.

The shock shock was that I got another 90% for my TMA. The question seemed straightforward, and I answered it without too much trouble, but I felt something was missing. It had no sparkle. I just seemed to be regurgitating the course material, and had put nothing of myself in it.(Can’t remember the question, but we had to talk about Peter Rabbit and Voices in the Park. Something about the best picture books have something intangible and invisible to them). This was my favourite part of the course so far. The bit we’re doing at the moment is about do books reflect or influence society as far as I can see. Tutor says it allows us to give an overview of the course (instruction/delight, intertextuality and stuff) The books are realist fiction. (Junk by Melvyn Burgess, The Other Side of Truth, by Beverley Naidoo, and Mortal Engines by Philip Reeve). The latter is a sort of science fiction, about London on wheels eating up the surrounding towns, but it related back to Colonialism. Yes, it does. Really it does. And there’s lots in it that relates to life today. I could have chosen Coram Boy - a historical book  - but I’m saving time and skipping it as we only need to refer to three books. We’ve done a fair amount of historical books, but no science fiction, and many people on the forum say it’s a bit boring.

The horror horror was when I idly looked at the church website on John’s Mac. I had designed it on my laptop, which has a large screen for a laptop, and tested it in various browsers, and it looked fine. But on John’s Mac the background image stopped half way down, and the colours looked completely different. A few other things wrong too. So I have spent ages putting the site right, and now it looks okay I hope.

www.sacredheartstjoseph.org.uk

Peace and quiet today. The grandkids (not Alexander!) are coming tomorrow for a week, so ‘let the rumpus begin.’ I’m about to whip off the ivory ironed bedlinen on their bed and replace it with unironed coloured sheets. Not wasting all that ironing on kids! We’re meeting up tomorrow at a pub near Penrith, and Ali is treating me to a Mother’s Day meal.Looking forward to i, but disappointed it clashes with an OU get-together in Manchester. I wish I had insisted we pick up the kids on Sunday, but Saturday suited Ali better. Can’t remember why. They’re probably doing something on Sunday.

Anyway, bye bye. Have a good weekedn.

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