Romanais Blog

Friday xx

27/2/2015

Roman was at school for breakfast club for 8.15am so I went straight to Aldi, never known it so quiet in there. I was home and unpacked by 9am!

I bought this mdf pen pot last year when we were on holiday, not sure but I think it was from a charity shop in Wells for £1.50. It has been in the cupboard for almost 12 months as I didn't know what to do with it - until I discovered it is the perfect size for holding the fabric pens and haberdashery scissors.

Today I gave it a coat of PVA glue and then sanded it down.

I painted it pale pink with some old paint I found in the shed.

A coat of paint, left to dry, a coat of paint, left to dry, sanded and a coat of paint later, here it is drying in front of Fred.

Here it is finished and finally dry late this evening.

Roman asked to make a giant jaffa cake for this weekend. Yesterday we stopped off at Sainsbury's for the ingredients. Anais made the jelly before school so it had time to set ready for this evening.

Anais was late home from school today as she went to film club so Roman finished it off.

A flan case.....................

...............put the set jelly in the flan case.................

..............mix whipped cream with two bars of melted chocolate. We used one bar of dark chocolate and one bar of milk chocolate as Anais doesn't like too much dark chocolate.

Spread the chocolate cream on top of the orange jelly and voila.................

a giant jaffa cake!

Here it is cut open.....................

Well done to Anais who had a postcard sent home from school today with the comments "Anais' work continues to be excellent, really well presented and detailed. Keep up the excellent effort Anais!"

Anais finished blogging about her holiday in this blog post.

Anais has finally spent her Christmas money and bought herself a new DS which Mark picked up earlier. He also took Cassie to the garage before it closed for her oil change :-)

Sunday at Weymouth xx

26/10/2014

Another lovely day again today.

After breakfast we went to Greenhill Beach, Weymouth and used Anais' metal detector to find treasure.................

Want to see our treasure finds?

Various metal objects, two pennies, a bolt, a ring pull, three bottle tops and two screws!

After that we went for a walk around Brewer's Quay.................

Pictures of the harbour................

We ate lunch in the car at Sandsfoot Beach and then went for a walk down the beach. The tide was out so we walked around the bottom of Sandsfoot Castle. Part of it had collapsed in 1954 and was on the beach.

We walked to Sandsfoot Castle. The views from here are stunning.

Anais and Roman have been swimming. They are both old enough now to go in the pool by themselves leaving us to relax by the side of the pool!

We have also been to the arcade's and ballpit tonight too.

Anais did some marbling..................

Here is the plane so far.....................

Here is my blanket so far..................

Happy Father's Day! xx

15/6/2014

Happy Father's Day to Mark and my dad - love you both loads xxxxxxx

Mark was at the tip for when it opened at 8am to take the last pieces of the old shed - he saved a side piece to build a log store under the side of the house. Breakfast was boiled egg and soldiers each.

We went to the cinema to see "The Lego Movie" again (we first saw it in March). Everyone loved it - we picked up on things we didn't see first time around.

Mom and dad came for lunch. We had the bread Anais and Roman made yesterday, cold gammon, pork pies, salad, pate, crisps, pickles, olives etc........

I made a cake for pudding and we also had the fudge Roman made on Friday.

Mark's cards off Anais and Roman. Anais made an origami heart. Romans card says "ges whats your favret musik - we are the champions"

The tool boxes Roman made on Tuesday and Wednesday were to put the Father's Day present's in...............

Anais made grandad a bookmark. They also made fat cakes for the birds in grandad's garden.

Mark engraved a whisky glass for dad. We bought a plain glass..............

...........he stuck a piece of paper inside the glass that he had traced the word dad on. He used his multi tool to etch the glass.

Once the paper inside the glass had been removed he could see "dad" more clearly. He also wrote "grandad" on the other side of the glass but we forgot to photo that, oops.

Last year Mark had "The Hunger Games" DVD for Father's Day. This year he had "Catching Fire" which we watched tonight. We are now on countdown for "Mockingjay - Part 1" to be released at the cinema on 20th November 2014.

Thursday xx

5/6/2014

A busy day today though as it has been sunny I have been more motivated to do things.

Firstly the washing done and hung on the line. Secondly a trip to the cinema to get tickets for the weekend and food shopping in Morrisons for a change.

When we were on holiday last week we went to Watchet and we saw this crochet heart picture in the window of a shop for £15, I said "I could do that!" and Mark took a photo to remind me. I said all I needed was a deep frame and I know for a fact we haven't got one of those hanging around anywhere so I would have had to wait until the next trip to Ikea (probably before Christmas) or improvise. If I waited for the next trip to Ikea I would have forgotton so today I thought I would improvise and just go with what we had in the house!

Nine crochet hearts made in shades from white, cream, pale blue, light aqua, light blue, medium blue, light teal, dark teal and dark blue.

Pattern -
magic ring
chain 3
3 treble crochet
3 double crochet
1 treble crochet (to make the point)
3 double crochet
3 treble crochet
chain 3
slip stitch in the heart
fasten off

Mark found an old frame out of the loft (we have every kind of frame except the one I needed - doh!) We took it in the garden and sprayed it white using the car spray paint I brought from Poundland in February.

Positioning the hearts and fixing with double sided sticky tape..................

FINISHED!

Now on the look out now for a white deep frame until the next time we can go to Ikea to buy this one which looks like the one they used in the shop. Am thinking of doing another for the conservatory or Anais' bedroom in shades of white to dark pink.................

While in the loft Mark also found out a new cellophane wrapped pack of four wooden frames (it really is like an Alladins cave up there!) so using the offcuts from Anais bedroom wallpaper I made another four pictures.................

Anais stayed after school today to practise with the school orchestra again.

Roman had swimming lesson this evening.

Look what I found in my bed when I went up to bed last night!

"To Mom
How mush I love u
A LOT!
Love from Anais"

Thursday xx

15/5/2014

Today I did another three silk painting picture's.........

We had another two postcards in the post today to say Anais had been nominated for another two homework stars for outstanding homework for R.E. and maths! WELL DONE ANAIS!

Mark had a new windscreen put in his car this afternoon after it cracked on Tuesday.

This afternoon Roman had swimming lesson. Still no space available to move him to the next class up.

Anais stayed at home while we took Roman to swimming lesson and when we got home I found this on my computer..................

Wednesday - Silk Painting xx

14/5/2014

Last night I spent AGES updating the following tabs with picture's of all of our recent makes -
* knitting
* jewellery making
* crochet
* latch hook
* other crafts
* kids crafts

Wow it has been lovely and warm today.

Remember the silk painting kit I brought for £2 from the charity shop back in December. I thought today I would give it a try out. I was waiting in for the shed to be delivered................. which didn't come :-(

Firstly I found a Youtube video of "how to do it" and then set the frame up and got everything prepared. The gold gutta that came with the original kit had gone off. Luckily when I opened the box it came with extra's - including a white gutta and box of additional ten silk paints!

It said on the instructions each handkerchief (it came with three handkercheif's and one HUGE silk scarf) will make five small picture's.

Want to see what they look like? I only did two today as I had to wait each time for firstly the gutta to dry and then the paint.

I am really pleased with them and really enjoyed doing this. I will have another go tomorrow and go and raid the kids art stuff to see if there are any colouring books I can trace designs from! I can then cut them out and mount them on the front of birthday cards etc........

One thing I will say is that the original kit only came with four colours (left of picture). If you need additional colours it says in the instructions you have to mix them and gives colour mixing instructions. Luckily for me the box came with an additional ten bottles of colour (right of picture) which made it a lot easier for me as I didn't have to mix colour's. I just need to buy some more gutta now as the white tube I won't have won't last very long. The bottles of colour will last for aggggeeees and I still have two handkercheifs and one huge scarf left!

It came with this design sheet. I think it goes without saying I won't be using the scary fish picture!

Also today the new shed that was supposed to have been delivered didn't turn up. It is now due to be delivered on Friday.

Anais stayed after school today to go to "Film Club" and watched the second half of the film "The Hunger Games - Catching Fire". N.B. to self buy on DVD soon

Tonight Mark took Anais to swimming lesson while me and Roman stayed at home.

Wednesday xx

2/4/2014

My New Years resolutions were -
* to read more - so far I have read at least one book a month
* do my tapestry - tapestry was completed in 14 days
* be able to use my sewing machine competently - still got to work on this one

I am not there yet as Mark had to set the machine up for me, I had no idea how to, but.........................

..........today I turned the curtain up in Anais bedroom so it now sits below the window sill but above her desk. It took quite a while and I got quite frustrated as my maths ins't the brightest for calculating the turn up, first I pinned it too long then unpinned it and pinned it too short so went for somewhere in between and third time lucky it was the right length and I could sew it up.

I left it on the same stitch and tension as when I did Anais' crochet roll before Christmas as that seemed to work OK and meant no messing around with it.

I am very pleased with myself. Next sewing project.......new door curtain for the door to the drier room in the conservatory.

I brought this double duvet cover from Asda a while ago it was reduced to £5 as the pillow cases were missing. I thought it would be pretty to make a curtain for the conservatory door, it has little birdies and pink flowers on it. Unfortunately though it is too short for the door so I need to make a strip for the top of it, maybe using the pink polka dots on the other side of it?

Last year I had a go at making my own gift bags (in this blog post). When I was in Homebase last week they had rolls of wallpaper for 50p so I brought some to have another try.

This afternoon I used this tutorial to have another go, very fiddly but.............................

......................they look very good!

Mark took Anais to her swimming lesson this evening, she said it was very strange coming out at 7.30pm and it was still light. Roman decided he wanted to go with them again so I stayed at home to read my book.

Roman is "Star of the Day" tomorrow!

27% of the way through Frederick Forsythe "Avenger"

The Lakes - Day 2 xx

16/2/2014

I am loving having WIFI to blog with as it means I can be picture heavy (sorry!) My dongle would have not have coped with uploading this many photo's. Mark paid £5 for the week which meant that two devices could connect to the WIFI.

Pictures with Anais and Roman on have been uploaded to Facebook. x

We woke up this morning to Anais bringing us a cup of tea and coffee in bed! We then heard a commotion coming from the kitchen which forced us to get up and see what was going on. Anais had set the table for breakfast, opened the curtains and was making toasted soldiers as she wanted a boiled egg for breakfast............

Roman looking out of the window at.............?

..........but the commotion was because she could see a family of three deer's out of the kitchen window! A lovely way to start the day!

View from our bedroom window........

Pics for mom and dad - Anais and Roman's room.........

Our bedroom............

After breakfast we walked to the lake to feed the ducks and Roman sailed his boat.

We took a picnic lunch with us and sat looking at the views over White Moss Common eating lunch. We then drove to Grasmere where went to the Sarah Nelson Gingerbread shop and brought some gingerbread. We sat in the Wordsworth Daffodil Garden eating gingerbread and reminiscing about when the kids were little, Anais would feed the ducks by the side of the river and when Roman was a baby he would sit in his buggy sucking on the gingerbread. We also had a lovely walk around Grasmere.

Love Grasmere, such a pretty little village.

This afternoon we borrowed some films from the DVD library in reception and sat watching "Cool Runnings" and "Spiderman" while we all made something..........

Roman - Roman had a rocket making kit for Christmas, when he opened it he said "I'm going to faint!" He has been saving it to do on holiday. He had to give it two coats of paint as the white paint was quite thin, he was impatient and kept asking to put the stickers on while it was drying. Here he is making it start to finish.

Anais - Anais had this hanging heart set for Christmas (picture pinched from Amazon as she had opened the box before I had chance to take a photo of it). I thought she would struggle with this and keep asking for help, I also thought she would do approx one per night. The only thing I had to help her with was sewing the button and flowers on as she struggled to get the needle through all of the layers of felt and through the button hole. She made two today (just has to sew the hanging loop on the second heart). Here she is making them start to finish.

Mark brought a model car to make.......

I finished the purple scarf and started knitting another in Rico Loopy colour - slate.

Before tea Mark took Anais and Roman swimming. They tried to go several times this afternoon but as the pool is only small there is a limit to ten people at any one time. I'm not fussed about going swimming (contact lens wearer) and Mark isn't fussed about going swimming so he was happy to take them and sit on the side observing while I stayed in the apartment to watch while tea cooked.

Thanks Mark who brought me some Cath Kidston scissors. He put them in my crochet roll yesterday thinking when he gave me the wool I would do some crocheting. I only opened my crochet roll today though as Anais was after scissors to cut the cotton to make her felt hearts and he had replaced the ones that were in there with these very sharp and very pretty Cath Kidston ones! Pretty scissors today and 15 balls of wool yesterday! Thanks, very kind and I love them! xxxx

EDIT - Forgot to say, Anais and Roman say "thank you nanny for our pocket handwarmers which have kept our hands lovely and warm while we have been out today! xx"

Friday xx

14/2/2014

Happy Birthday Richard! xx

Last year we made Richard some cufflinks with picture's of Brendyn and Olivia in. Mark suggested something different this year so this was his project. He made some "Lord of the Rings" cufflinks! They each have a different quote from the book in.

Today is also my neighbour's birthday.

I made her a scarf and gave it to her today. I love this brown wrapping.

As you can see from last year nothing was mentioned about Valentine's Day, we don't really celebrate it. I am grateful for the lovely things Mark does for me the rest of the year, like bringing me flower's and Cadbury's Dairy Milk home and going to put diesel in Cassie at silly o'clock in the morning before he goes to work. I can't remember the last time I had to do it myself and he does it as he knows I don't like petrol stations and he knows I am grateful for it. He is also grateful for the little things I do for him like nice clean and tidy house and nice packed lunches for work:-) It is nice to do nice things for each other all year not on one day of the year!

I used the pattern from this blog to make a crochet heart for his car.

Today I started knitting this scarf to be finished tomorrow......

We must have Absolute 80's radio on too much as Mark lit Fred tonight and Roman started singing the chorus to Billy Joel "We didn't start the fire" and made us all laugh! Fred was welcomed tonight, the weather has been awful.

My Valentine's heart off Roman.....

"Mom I love you because you are the sweetest mom in the world, love from Roman"

Sunday xx

9/2/2014

Busy morning this morning running around before we picked the kids up -
* trip to the tip to take the boxes and off cuts of wood from the shelves
* Asda for cake making ingredients for tomorrow
* Poundland for spray paint
* car parts shop for windscreen wiper blades (Cassie MOT tomorrow)

I love these jam jars on Pinterest. The lids have a small plastic animal stuck to them and then they have been spray painted. I thought I could have a go!

We popped to Poundland earlier and brought some motor spray paint, they had white and black so I got white. Also, one clean empty jar, glossy accent's to glue an animal to the lid and various plastic animals. We should have more plastic animals than this but these were the only ones the kids could find.

Once the glue was dry I put the lid and animal in the milk box carrier (the box that holds 6 cartons of milk) and tried to spray one in the box in the kitchen. Not a good idea as Mark came running down stairs saying it was toxic, flammable and the over spray would go on the cupboards, ooops! So he took them in the back garden and spray painted them outside instead. We then left them in front of Fred to dry.

Here is one.......

...........and another................................

I thought of lots of possibilities -
* a bunny on the lid at Easter and the jar filled with Mini Eggs
* an animal on the lid and the jar filled with little girls hair slides like what I made for Olivia's birthday
* a Lego character stuck to the lid and the jar filled with a small Lego set
* an animal on the lid and the jar filled with buttons, ribbons, cottons, pencils, sweet's etc........

Only one doily made today, I am making up a little set for someone.

This afternoon Anais and Roman have been playing with the Domino Rally game. Neither of them had any homework to do this weekend which makes a change.

This evening we all sat down to watch "Dancing on Ice".