First day at school

No, not mine (although I do remember it!), but little Joshie started school this week. Technically speaking it's "reception" but for all intents and purposes we'll call it school given that he has to wear a uniform.

Here he is on the first morning, buzzing with excitement and very proud of his new school bag :)



He pulls one crazy grin whenever the cameras on him! I've told him it'll stick like that if the wind changes :p Anyway, it didn't last long as he was in tears when it came to the crunch time of being dropped off. He soon got over it though (as he usually does) and by the end of the week he was enjoying it. 1 week down, 13 more years to go ;)

Can't post about one without the other so while the camera's out, here's little Amy cuddling up behind a towel. 2 more years and you can join your brother at school!




Kids eh!

Bikes, Cars and Accidents

Bikes
Finally, after about 2 years of threatening to buy one, I've got myself a bike. It's nothing special in terms of value, in fact it was one of the cheapest as I certainly wasn't looking to spend in the hundreds as some of them were costing, but it will do for what I want it for... a bit of excerise now and then. Mainly I intend to use it to get to work (only on nice days! :p ) when we have to start using both cars to get around once Josh starts attending school.

I've been out on it already when I made my first work trek on it on Sunday. There's a canal that runs from the bottom of our estate and it takes you literally right to where I work which is handy. The journey is roughly 3 miles and despite having to get off for a couple of low bridges, it's quite a pleasant trip. I've got to change the saddle though as it's a bit thin and got a bit uncomfortable after a while, was like sitting on a razor blade!. I'll also be adding a bike computer for distance & speed measurement this weekend. They say you never forget how to ride a bike and given that it was around 17 years since I last rode one then the adage is true as I had no problem getting into the stride of the things. The gears are a little bit more complicated than they used to (why on earth do you need 18 gears!!) but I'm totally looking forward to riding this as often as possible.


Cars
With the sale of the old house eventually going through and Josh starting school in less than 6 weeks (doesn't time fly!) it was time to get Lisa's new car.
We were looking for something bigger than the Ford Focus which we currently have and had a shortlist of either a Ford Mondeo, a Volkswagen Passat or a Renault Scenic. After a little while looking around we eventually settled on the Scenic, or to be more precise, an 04 plate Grand Scenic which means that in the boot there are a couple of fold-a-away seats which can turn this into a seven seater!. It's nice car with plenty of space inside and it's definately bigger than the Focus. Unfortunately, this is where things went a little wrong....


Accidents
Our drive way has two brick posts either side of the entrance and because we on the sloping part of the crescent, the drive can be a little awkward to get into.

So, given that you've just driven it straight from the garage, it's been yours for less than 20 minutes and you are now going to park it up on the drive, how do you approach this? do you:
A) Think to yourself "this is a much bigger car than I normally drive so I'd better take it slow into the drive, checking the sides at all times"?
or
B) Think "I've done this a million times before, I know how much room I have, the cars not that much bigger"?

If you think A then pat yourself on the back as you still have a car that looks like it's come from a show room. If you thought B (and I mean really, who would go for B eh?? ) then the above pic is what your car now looks like after being scraped along the drive post by the wife when swinging it in to park it.

I was not a happy bunny. I've calmed down somewhat since it happened and I know it was an accident (albeit an avoidable one) but it doesn't help the fact that as well as looking battered before we've even had it a day, we're now going to have to shell out x amount of pounds to have it all fixed up. You can't really see it in the picture but the wheel arch is totally crumpled up and some of the scratches go right through to the metal. I just hope it can be repaired without costing a lot of money. Still, sh*t happens and what's done is done, and as numerous people pointed out, I'll be reminiscing and laughing about this in years to come. A bit like the time when I threw up all over Lisa's bed whilst drunk when we weren't even seeing each other (She wasn't happy about that at the time either but it get's raised and laughed about once a year or so now*!). I digress...

Anyway, in order to stop this from happening again, I've had some improvements made to the brick posts to minimize damage should contact occur again:
I think that might do the trick ;)

Even the kids are giving advice...

And on that note, I think I'd better head on over to www.makeawill.com as this may be my last blog post!!

All is forgiven now, love you honey really :)

* when Lisa is not around!

Home Improvements

In the last week or two we've finally got around to making a few improvements to our house since moving here late last year.

The Garden
Firstly, we wanted somewhere that the little uns could play safely and although the back has a nice raised and fenced area, the ground was completely paved with pinky looking slabs. So the decision was made to take it all up and to replace it with a grass lawn which should provide the ideal playing area for the kids come summer. The work was started a couple of weeks ago, took a couple of days to complete and now looks great.
Here is the transformation:

1)2)3)4)

1) The back how it was when we moved in. Nice pink slabs!
2) Slabs removed, ground soil laid and the turf being placed. It was a very dreary and rainy day and certainly didn't make for pleasant work I guess.
3) The garden immediately after being laid.
4) Three weeks later looking lusicously green and being used for what it was intended :)


The Bathroom
The second most needed change was the bathroom with it's ugly sit down shower bath thingy-ma-jig (you need to see it to know what I mean), it's broken shower and the ridiculously small basin shoved in the corner. We decided that it would be best to completely gut this room and so all bar the towel radiator was replaced. The work was completed by a builder who handily lives just 5 doors up and took around a week to complete. Once completed I painted the untiled areas a new color and finished off with a new roller blind. We're very pleased with how it's turned out.
Pics of various stages:

1)2)3)4)5)

1) The bathroom when we moved in. Stupid bath...
2) The walls had to be replastered as the tiles seemed to have been put on with crazy glue resulting in the wall coming apart when they were removed!
3) Bath and basin out. The floor we thought was lino was actually mosaic tiles. Looked like lino to me, lol.
4) Walls boarded and bath installed.
5) The finished article and straight in with the rubber ducky :)

So, two of the biggest jobs now complete and we'll probably leave it for a little while now before undertaking further change which will either be the kitchen or the windows/doors.