Just thought I'd share a few pics of me being welcomed as a Freeman of the Worshipful Company of Smiths in Lichfield.  It was a lovely evening, Janet is a friend from work and she very kindly took the photographs, Hugh is a friend from work and he sponsored me and presented some of my enamel work to the Smiths.  They obviously liked it.  It was lovely to see so many people that I knew, Norma the Mayor wife is a governor at school and I've known her for years so it was lovely to see her and Brian at the evening meal.


Janet, Jean, Hugh, Mayor's Lady and Mayor of Lichfield



After being presented with my certificate

Gosh it is such a long time since I blogged I've forgotten what I'm supposed to do.  I've just had a new computer and can't quite believe how much stuff there is on here.  My son commented welcome to the 21st century mum when I was up and running.  I've got skype, apps things, things I've not heard of and the screen on this computer is just soooooo big.  It will probably take me some time to get used to things but hopefully I'll be able to get on more often and start getting pics uploaded that's if I ever work out how to get them from my phone, but again I'm assured it's easy. 

Fun Day Out

Fab day yesterday with my three darling grandchildren. We were going to have a look round Shugborough Hall (yes even after Livvy's meldown there I was going to take all three) but it doesn't open until March so we went to Amerton Farm again. Ben, Tom and Livvy all love it and it's a great place to take the kids, costs a fortune but worth it to see the smiles on their faces. They got to go on the train and then they made a mosaic picture. Ben and Tom have done it before but it was a first for Livvy and she did greally good putting the little mosaic tiles on her board to make a ballerina - angel as she kept calling it. They then went into the play barn for an hour so too and just ran off some of that excess energy they had from the sweets I'd bought them (silly Nana).

Livvy is just so cute at the minute, wants to give you a cuddle all the time and then tells you she misses you. We drove past the power station and she just said 'do be careful Nana, do be careful'. I guess they just looked so big to her and the boys were saying they were going to climb up the outside of the chimney stack to see how high they could get and to see if it was hot, so maybe she just thought I'd better be careful when driving past in case something happened. One of these days I'll get a camera that loads pics quickly or maybe I should just get a new computer as this one is sooooooooo old I think it's on it's last legs. I can't even get my emails through at the moment. I get six of them and then the seventh just seems to crash the computer and when I turn it back on I get the same six again and the sevenths crashes again - any bright ideas of how to fix it would be most welcome or is it time to put the whole thing in the recycle bin.

Happy New Year

May you have a Happy and Blessed New Year. I wonder if this will be the one when I can post more and get more pics up now that I have a new phone. We'll see!!
Had a lovely Christmas day watching my beautiful grandchildren opening their presents and Marc and Sam cooked a lovely Christmas dinner - it may even have been Marc who cooked most of it. Boxing Day saw me driving up to see mam and my family up North and we had a lovely time at Brenda's day after boxing day when all of the family came round and Michael caught it all on video. It's a great reminder and such a laugh, especially playing back all of the old videos we have of family Christmases.
New year was spent quietly at home with mam. At 86 she is doing great but sometimes the noise gets to her so we saw in the New Year and I spoke to my sis in Texas (yep that's you Niecy) and my Aunt Freda in Canada and to my son and grandsons and to my sis over here (yep that's you Nenna). It was a nice night and I drove back this morning through torrential rain but made it safely. Back to work Tuesday so a day of rest tomorrow, well after my grandchildren have been to see me.

A lovely day - the melt down

Well it's half term so a week off work and it started with a sore throat, ugh!! Anyway it wasn't so bad today and it was grandmother and granddaughter day as Marc, Sam and a whole host of kids were off to Alton Towers for the day.
Livvy and I spent a lovely day together, apart from major melt down but I'll tell you about that later.
First of all it was into town and ofcourse the day isn't complete without buying a toy so Dora the Explorer came along with us as this is what we bought. Livvy was so cute carrying it around with her all day and talking to it too. She told me to close the car door quickly when we were getting in 'because Dora is cold' she said.
We headed off to Shugborough Hall http://www.shugborough.org.uk/as I heard they had a farm and Livvy wanted to see the animals.
Well now that I'm a senior citizen I got in for quite a lot less, infact it only cost me £3 and Livvy got in free. The lady did give me an orange sticker to wear so that I didn't have to get my ticket out of my purse if I wanted a discount off any meals I had. I did wonder why - because do I really want to be reminded that I am now over 60.
It would have been a cheap day out if it hadn't been for buying lunch and the other little niceties that go along with a day out oh and the presents she wanted to buy for her brothers and mom and dad. This sweet little 2 year old knows exactly what she wants and it made me smile to see her stand back and look along the shelves to see what she could get them. Thankfully she didn't pick anything too expensive.
Shugborough is a beautiful place but if I'd paid the full price I wouldn't have been too happy as there wasn't really a lot happening today.
Everything was going well - but then 'melt down'. We were going through the kitchens, Livvy trying out the old fashioned scrubbing brush on the washing and then we went upstairs - sadly it fell apart after this - sweet little Livvy was obviously getting tired, wanted to be picked up but she was just too heavy for me so when I put her down that was it. She screamed - and I mean screamed and lay there on the floor shouting for 'daddy'. I just walked away in the hope she would have followed - but NO she still lay there screaming. I was determined not to go back for her so stood my ground while people looked at her, tried to talk to her, walked round her, almost climbed over and looked at me as if I was the monster from the black lagoon. She was just routed to the spot and was not gonna move for anyone.
Well after waiting as long as I could she finally won and I lost it - big time, I marched over, picked her up and then, heavy as she was, had to try and find my way out of the place going from room to room until I finally found the stairs down. My sweet little granddaughter just continued to scream.
Finally we got outside and I was absolutely drained. I could feel the tears nipping at my eyes but I told her I wasn't happy with her. She knew she'd won but continued crying and finally we made our way back to the car. I didn't want the day to end on a bad note and when she saw I was nearly in tears she calmly said 'you alright nana' then said 'sowwy'. We'd missed the animals first time around so I got the buggy out of the car and off we went to see the animals. She fed the rabbits, that were very few, we looked at some really smelly pigs and I mean smelly - I can stand most things but this nearly made me sick. Mommy pigs had just given birth and were feeding their young. We saw some guinea pigs and chickens and that was about it for the animals. There was a little play area which Livvy loved so she played on the slide and went on the swings. It was certainly a full day and we made it back to the car. I sat for a couple of minutes and when I turned round she was fast asleep.
Will I do it again - most definitely Yes, she is adorable and it's the first time she's done anything like that to me and she wont be doing it again.

Surprise

Well, I realized I couldn't get the book uploaded that I'd made for mam but I'll keep trying.
Had a lovely surprise the other my son and daughter in law decided to decorate the hall and stairs for me. It's my birthday tomorrow and they thought it would be nice to do something different and I just love it. They chose some wallpaper which was my favourite colour and a beautiful flower pattern in a soft green and brown. It's gorgeous.
I'm off to Shrewsbury for the day then I'm babysitting at night so no big celebration.

Mam's Birthday

It was my Mam's 86th birthday on 15th September and I created a book of memories for her. I hope you're able to view it. She is just so sweet and I never know what to buy her but she just loved her book even though it arrived after her birthday.