Amie's Party

Amie and her friends had a great time at Haa Hoos Pottery studio today for her party!

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A lot has happened since the last time we posted. Both children have had birthdays, so Noah is now 5 and Amie is 7. Noah's also started at Amie's school and has settled in really well. And Amie has won the Chess Championship for the second year running.

We've had a trip up to Cumbria and York during the Easter break, and dug the annual passes out for a trip to Legoland. We're busy preparing for Amie's party tomorrow and are going to make some rice-Krispie cakes :)

Amie opening her cards on her birthday, Easter Sunday. She was ill on her birthday so we had to save the cake for the next day.

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Amie trying out the new bike she got for her birthday.

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Noah trying out the present he bought Amie, a gross science set. That's him with a wound and maggots on his hand, no wonder Amie felt ill!


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Amie finally getting to have her cake the next day. We've just bought a Moshi Monsters cake for her party tomorrow.

Amie bought this puppy called Benji with her own birthday money while we were in Legoland.

Noah enjoying his party back in February.

Amie and Lily, dad's friends daughter in York enjoying a stroll.

Amie and Noah in York Jail... they managed to get out.

Noah's happy to ride Amie's 16inch old bike, and doesn't seem to mind that it's pink. We're trying to sell his old one and will buy him a boy's bike with the money.

However going on a girls bike seems to have had a strange effect on him, as we couldn't get him to take off Amie's hairband later that day!

Amie makes the paper

Santa dropped into see Amie's football team

http://www.getwokingham.co.uk/news/s/2105868_santa_drops_in_to_see_reeves_rangers_youngsters

Happy New Year

Here we are again, at the start of a New Year. I don't make New Year resolutions,if you want to make a change in your life why wait till the calender says it's a certain day. So this year I'm not making resolutions, just putting plans into action for improvements. So improvement #1: Stop impersonating a pregnant woman. I didn't look this fat when I was pregnant, so why I'm suddenly looking like I'm smuggeling cushions under my jumper is anyone's guess. It's certainly not connected to the habit of drinking cider and eat a packet of crisps every evening. Still, nothing like your 4 year old telling you you look pregnant to get the ol motivation going.... Weight watchers here I come (again) for the ritual humilation and patronisation that eventually leads to you eating less just so that you don't have to listen to your leader simpering on about "Why do you think you might have gained 2lbs this week?" as though she expected any other answer than "Um, I ate my bodyweight in pringles".

Rich and I on the start of our walk today. You can tell it was at the start of the walk as we are both smiling.

So today the kids were both back in school, and Rich had the day off work. What were we going to do with ourselves for 6 hours of freedom? Wipe that smirk off your face, we are married now in case you'd forgotten and besides, I said 6 HOURS (not six minutes). Rich came up with the idea that we should go for a nice country walk. I wasn't paying attention so when he looked up a walk online and shouted to me "Do you want to go for 6 miles or 4?", I thought he meant did I want to drive for 6 miles or 4 to get to the start point, so being a rebel I said 6. He actually meant 6 miles, or tracking through fields in the middle of nowhere and ploughing through fields full of sheep and horses.... 2 hours later we arrived at the pub at the end of the trek which only served Courgette Risotto as it's veggie dish. I hate courgettes so we drove back to Wokingham where I had a nice plate of cheesy Nachos (looking forward to telling the leader THAT on Saturday)

Kendal

Kendal

We went up to Cumbria and to Bolton over the New Year to see Rich's sister and his parents.

OK so improvement #2 is to try to improve the children's sleeping habits, as although they go to bed early they mess about every evening till around 9:30. We've sort of just let them get on with it as long as they don't come downstairs and annoy us, but it's not really good for them so have been policing them a bit more and also have stopped them watching tv for an hour before they go to bed as apparently watching tv changes their brainwaves and makes it harder for them to sleep. We shall see how it goes.

This policing is in direct opposition to improvement #3: Stop policing the children all the time. I get sick of hearing myself nagging them about how much tv they are waching, computer time, psp time, game on camera time. I think these things are great for short distractions but hate to see the children on them for too long as I have this urge to think they are somehow either damaging their eyes, or stunting their development (This is how bad it gets!). Ok, I realise that this is not the reality, so I'm easing up a little but also making an effort to set up some other things for them to do. Screen free Sunday is going to be making a MAJOR comeback. If I had my way there would be a Snoopje Saterdag... where they get to eat sweets on Saturday only, but that is just not going to happen. Our friends in Sweden did it and I thought it was a great idea.. but I think I've let the sweets and treats in the door.. so cutting them back will be a bit harder. But it can be done, right? At the moment I'm contenting myself with limiting their chocolate to after dinner treat..will see how it goes.. everyone needs a treat eh?

Moving on... not literally unfortunately

I've already got a new EA in my life. Tom is popping round this morning to value the house. He's part of an internet only EA... so that means lower fees. I guess you could say I found him via internet dating...sort of.

Anyway, we shall see. Had a couple round on Thursday that the current EA said had lots of positive comments, but haven't heard back from them so still haven't sold this house!

Breaking up is hard to do

Relationships are complex things. When they work they involve two people achieving common goals in a way that brings happiness to them both. When they don’t work, they usually bring frustration and anger to the surface, until the point that it gets too much and one of the partners calls it a day. I’m sad to say that I’ve reached this point. After a few weeks of uncertainty, frustration, anger and complaining to anyone who is unfortunate enough to be within earshot I’d finally reached the point where I could see it wasn’t working. Now I just had work out how to tell him….

So here’s the sorry tale of how I finally worked up the courage to break up with my estate agent. He’d arranged to come see me at home to discuss how things were going. I was tempted to cancel the meeting, I knew what he was going to say and I’d no interest in hearing it. But at the end of the day I thought it would be best to tell him to his face. I’d been taking longer and longer to return his calls, and speaking to him no longer filled me with hope but like most men, he obviously had failed to read into the signs. He arrived at the door full of vim and vigour, his little briefcase clutched in his sweaty hand, full of printouts to show just how much he’d been thinking of selling this house and how hard he’d been working.

I had to be blunt, better to be cruel to be kind. Before he’d even sat himself down on the sofa I told him I’d decided to hand in my 2 weeks notice, as and from the 28th Nov we’d no longer be together. He did seem a little taken aback when I thrust my handwritten (the printer was broken) letter of termination of contact at him. And he may have had the right to feel a little hurt when I got him to sign the (also handwritten) letter saying that he’d received notice of termination. Where’s the trust? he must have been thinking.. do I mean nothing to you?

What followed was a ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ conversation, where I assuaged his feelings that I wasn’t happy with him or the amount of work he was putting in. It’s me, I said. I’m tired of having to rush home at a moment’s notice to clean the house from top to bottom so some person can walk round it for 5 minutes and decide it’s got the wrong aspect and they don’t want to buy it. I’ve got exams coming up in December, and it’ll soon be Christmas. I just don’t have the time to invest in this anymore.There's nothing out there that I want to buy, and I can't sell this place. I'm sorry, but it’s over.

His little face looked so disappointed I had to resist the urge to pat him on the hand and say “Don’t worry, you’ll find someone else with a better house, a bigger house with more commission to be earned. You'll soon forget about this place".

Rich of course made me feel like the female Alan Sugar, for handing out the ”you're fired” letter so soon into conversation. But I didn’t want the poor man to be lead on now did I ? Better to let him know there’s no hope.
Now all I have is his little print outs of the statistics of how our house is performing on Rightmove (above average clicks … but no bidders). What use is it to me to know how many bored people are gawping over our property details? I need someone to come here and give us a half decent offer. That’s why I told him I’m leaving him for someone else. Someone who won’t require so much effort and money, someone who can deliver on their promise. Someone who can sell our house.. I just need to find them.