The original Elf

And here is the original owner of the elf clothes - plus Carl

Christmas Elf

It had to happen. Someone bought clothes for Gromit - well for Saffy, so it is a borrow really. Look how happy he looks!

Random generation

Well, I hope you all had an excellent Christmas. One of the guilty pleasures I enjoy in the run up to Christmas is Strictly Come Dancing. It takes me to a better sparkly sequin filled place. In fact I am a little obsessed with it. However I am not alone in this obsession as Erin (and Trev, actually) share it with me.

Anyway after the series final and the Christmas special Erin and I had reached a new pitch of enthusiasm and decided to try for tickets to the live show that is touring at the beginning of the year (without success!)

Here is the strange thing. When Erin checked for ticket availability on line the website asked her to type in the random letters that it showed. As blogger and various sites do - I believe to prove you are not a machine. The first time it was a collection of random letters. The next time it spelt Loser and the third time it spelt Bumboat!

Talk about adding insult to injury

Bridesmaid Diet Update

Some of you may remember at the start of the year I embarked on a quest: The Bridesmaid Diet. Despite abandoning my blog updates, you'll be pleased (hopefully) to hear that I did not abandon my quest. Said wedding was postponed from November '07 to June '08 which was a in some ways a blessing as it gave me more time to shift the pounds, but also a bad thing as it allowed me a real hiatus at the end of the summer/early autumn where I basically ate everything in sight :(

However, I have managed to maintain my weightloss, albeit at a painfully slow rate and am now a stone and a half lighter than I was at the start of 2007 :)

As I approach Christmas with some trepidation (how to avoid all that food and booze?), I thought I'd post on here to say that I will be pursuing my quest with renewed vigour in the New Year as we will be going shopping for bridesmaid dresses at Easter. My overall goal is to lose 2 and a half stone. So I shall be posting regularly again and even if you're not that interested, it acts as a kind of confessional for me to stop me cheating!

Merry Christmas one and all and have a mince pie for me.

Love Kate xxxx

Garfield and Odi

We just stopped off at a local shop to buy a paper. There was a terrier like dog tied up outside gazing at the door with devotion. Not unusual you will agree. However what was strange was the cat next to it. It kept rubbing itself against the dog - and I mean it's bum against the dog's face but the dog continued staring at the door. Eventually the cat sat down companionably close to the dog who continued to ignore it. I can only conclude that they had been introduced on a previous occasion!

Rome

This is me outside the tiny little studio flat we had in Rome where we have been for 3 days. It was minute but great as we had our own little kitchen, table and chairs and sofa to lounge on, as well as immaculately clean bathroom and very comfy bed (once you negotiated the very steep very narrow stairs to the mezzanine where the bed was). It was so small I couldn't get a picture of the inside. However it was brilliantly situated and we really liked it. We crammed in a day in the Vatican, did some of the Vatican galleries, Sistine Chapel and St Peters. St Peters is really hideous - that very chopped liver look you get with lots of marble never has done much for me. However the view from the top when you have climbed the steps is well worth it.


This is the front of the Temple of Saturn and then Brian in front of the temple and the rostrum. It is extraordinary to stand where Julius Caesar strolled around. I was really impressed with Rome and found it a much easier city to navigate around than I expected -
much more compact and less "big cityish" than I though it might be. We walked miles!! By then end of day two my feet were starting to complain in earnest, but well worth it.

This is a view of St Peters which is quite nice outside, just ugly from inside.

We didn't see everything on our list, as we ran out of time and the Bernini sculptures will have to wait for another time (fingers crossed), but we did thoroughly enjoy it.

On another note I have heard from Nicky and she is enjoying her job in Denmark, and has fallen in love with one of her horses. They are at a big Christmas show this week on the mainland bit of Denmark, and then in the spring they will be going to shows in italy!! Not bad is it?

I am having an operation on my right wrist for carpel tunnel syndrome on Thursday so won't be typing for a week or two (or at least one fingered and left handed which will be about the same thing - I can't type one handed) It is done under a local and doesn't sound as though it will be any worse than some dental treatment. Fingers crossed (while I still can!). love Helen

Southampton

This weekend we went to visit Kieran and Alice who now live in Southampton. Over the months that he has lived there we have made enquiries about what is the best thing about Southampton and everyone has said that it is near really nice places like Winchester and the New Forest and is easy to get out of. Even the brochure in our hotel said pretty much the same. It would appear it has been the victim of Nazi town planning; a difficult look to master and one that poor old Southampton doesn't quite manage. So who are we to argue with general opinion. On Saturday we took ourselves off to Portsmouth which has managed the Nazi town planning a little more attractively! Here is the Spinnaker tower. Amazing views!
Here are Alice and Kieran on HMS Warrior. I'm sure her aiming a cannon on my eldest born is nothing to worry about.
Here is HMS Victory. We also went to look at the Mary Rose but it is constantly sprayed with waxy solution to stop it dissolving. It looks like an atmospheric ghost ship but the photos were rubbish.
So. That was Saturday. Maybe we gave Soton a chance on Sunday. No way - we popped into Winchester on our way home which is very pretty and the Cathedral cafe had some seriously yummy cakes! (Oh and the Cathederal is very beautiful! No pictures it was pouring)