Oh Dear

Like the title says Oh Dear! I've not done very well at keeping this blog updated, only 8 posts in 2009. Well again I will promise to update this more regularly and hope that 2010 will see more than 8 posts.

A lot has happened since my last post, we have just had Christmas and this year I've been a good girl so Santa brought me presents and some lovely ones too. I got a new Nikon Coolpix camera in Pink, Take That Circus tour live on BluRay, A cake piping set, Cupcake book, Clothes, PedEgg, smellies, DKNY Delicious perfume, Lets Dance for my Wii, Chocolates, Michael Buble Cd, True Blood books box set, Bag and lots of other nice goodies that I can't remember. We went to Mum-in Law's for Christmas dinner which was nice and got to watch our 5 yr old nephew open his presents, then boxing day went to my Mum's for another Christmas dinner and some more opening of presents.

*Wedding Update* I have picked and ordered my wedding dress back in Oct so hopefully I will be getting a phone call in the new year to say it's arrived, also quite recently we have bought our wedding rings which are really nice. So all the wedding stuff is coming together I'm currently in the middle of making the invites, we ordered all the card and paper from a company in Nottingham and so now all we have to do is print, cut and stick. The only problem is that we are going through UHU glue rollers like there is no tomorrow, but with half done it's not too bad.

Back in October I decided to have a break from my studies, with the wedding and work commitments it was hard to balance them all so I decided to temporary withdraw from my masters, and I'm glad I did there is no way I would have coped with it all. Hopefully I will pick it back up in September 2010.

I think I've brought you up to date. Happy New Year and my first New Years Resolution is to update my blog more regularly.

Blockbuster

We have decided that we are having Marks and Spencer Strawberry and Vanilla cupcakes as our wedding cake, but I'll need 25 packs of them but M&S have said they can do this but obviously not until nearer the date, which makes sense as they will go off. My decision for this is that with the cost of buying the ingredients and the time etc and the fact that I'll be mega stressed, plus I'm not convinced that I'll do a good enough job, it will be cheaper in the long run. The ones in M&S are amazing with a dollop of strawberry jam in the middle...Yum.. yes we had to sample first.

We have also decided on Tankersley Manor for our Wedding Breakfast and Reception, just got to save for the deposit now.

I've also joined Blockbuster video store this week, they have an offer on at the moment rent 4 movies for 4 nights for £10 so I got the following Blu-Ray movies over 8 nights. I have also rated them.

17 Again ****

Marley and Me ***

Role Models ***

I Love you Man **

Frost/Nixon ***

Bride Wars **

New in Town *

He's just not that into you *

I think the only one that I will watch again is 17 Again all the others we ok but not fantastic.

To try and get into shape for my wedding I have started the Davina dvd, so for the first 30 mins I did Pump. I have never been so exhausted in my life and my face was the same colour as a beetroot, it took the same amount of time to cool down as it did to do the exercise, and omg did my thighs hurt for the next two days after. It was agony just getting up and down from my desk at work, I felt like an old woman. So three days later I embarked on my next 30 mins session, for this one I did Cardio Box. Again my face was very red but I think I like this one better, it involves lots of punching which I like and skipping with an imaginary rope. So back to Pump on Monday or Tuesday.

Here comes the Bride Pt2

Well back in July 2008 I mentioned that I was getting Married, this is still the case but it's now more final. The ceremony has been booked at Sheffield Registry Office for the 15th April 2010 at 2pm, and we are looking at nearby venues for the Wedding Breakfast and Reception. So far we have looked at Tankersley Manor and The Garrison in Hillsborough. They are both really nice but very expensive. So at the moment I'm looking around a bit more. My invitations have been designed by myself, as I'm making them and I've decided on my cake which I'm hoping that my cousin is going to help me make, I'm wanting individual cupcakes tiered and a medium sized cake at the top. My theme colour is Cream and Apricot and my Grandad has offered to buy my dress I've just got to get to my weight goal to fit into it, so I've bought Davina's 30min workout to help me. My partners brother is going to do the photography so that saves a bit of money and that he is really good at taking photos so I know he will do a good job.

Nothing much else to report just really busy at work and getting myself prepared for starting my PostGrad Diploma in September, I passed my PG Certificate, but I was in two minds over whether to carry on, but work pay for it and next year will be easier as I know what to expect and hopefully will be able to manage my time a bit more and organise my wedding, so I thought it was silly not to carry on.

ET Phone home

Again yes it's been three months since the last post, I will give myself a slap later. We now have a carpet in the bedroom which is a blue/grey/brown colour, it is very nice and doesn't get mucky as much as the cream one did.

We had our annual trip to London back in June, which was for the @media conference that K goes to, and a shopping/sightseeing trip for me. As I have been going to London for the past 4 years I have done most of the Museums that I'm interested in but have never been to the British Museum so on one of the days that K was at the conference I took myself off to the BM, it was handy that it was about 5 minutes from the hotel so I stopped in for a Starbucks coffee first, they are everywhere in London, we have about 10 in Sheffield but London must have about a trillion. So off I went camera in hand to the BM, I was really impressed with the museum but was a little disappointed at the lack of British stuff, yeah there were Roman stuff and a few British monuments but after seeing the 20th Mummy or the 50th Greek Vase I was quiet bored, plus I think I must have got lost about 15 times. The main highlight was having a argument with a German man, he was stood in front of the Rosetta Stone and was taking like a million photos, all I wanted was one then I could get on with looking at all the other crap, but would he move.....nope so I made myself very clear and barged my way in, I think he was quite surprised by my actions, what is annoying is that when I look at my photos of the stone, I can see his ugly face in the glass reflection.

The other day that I was free to please myself in London was spent mainly on the stupid London's Docklands Light Railway, in my attempt to get to Greenwich. all was going well on the journey from the Strand to Blackwall on the bus, then after finding that there isn't a bus from Blackwall to Greenwich all i was left with was the DLR, this started off well making my way to Poplar then the man over the tannoy said cross over to the other platform for trains to Lewisham and Canary Wharf, which was the way I needed, what he failed to tell me was that there were also other trains that went to Stratford, so I got on the first train that appeared only to realise I was going up instead of down, so after about 5 stops I decided to get off and get on the next train going back down, but this was easier said than done, there wasn't any trains going to Lewisham, but ones going to All Saints so I got on one of them, so in the end I made it to Canary Wharf and at this point I had been travelling over an hour from when I left the hotel. I was about to give up ever getting to Greenwich Maritime Museum when a train with Lewisham came, so off I went, got to the Cutty Sark and started to feel a little ill and couldn't find any signs for the museum so I gave up that, got on the river boat as I wasn't going on the DLR ever again in my life and made my way back to the London Eye. I'd never been on a riverboat on the Thames so was pleasantly surprised, to my annoyance though the boat was full of french foreign exchange children, which was quite amusing to listen to their conversations.

The rest of the holiday was really nice, the weather was fine and much food and drink was consumed. My only celebrity spotting, and it wasn't anyone that famous either, was sitting next to one of this years Big Brother contestants Sophie I think her name was, (the one with Lupus) in Eat on the South Bank.

Prior to London I upgraded my phone to a iphone 3GS which I love and it did prove very useful in London, being able to check my Oyster Card credit and get access to the Internet was a god send.

Oh I was on the Leicester Square Web cam, I came across the web cam a few weeks ago and when I told my colleague at work she said "oh my god you so have to go on that" so I was stood there phoning back to my friend in the office saying can you see me? when I got back in the office I had waiting for me was a print out of myself stood in Leicester Square, which was rather cool.

Things that are broken

This past month it seems as though everything we own has broken, it started with the smoke alarm at stupid o'clock beeping and beeping, I took out the battery but still it beeped, forgot it was on the mains too, so as to not cause annoyance to the neighbours I disconnected it, making a mental note to get a 9v battery the next day, so the next day came and we went food shopping only to forget to buy a battery the one thing we needed. So it was another shopping trip to get the battery and all is well with that.

The second thing to go wrong was our water cooler, that decided it was going to get hot instead of cold, then totally give up the ghost so that got binned, I ordered another one from Amazon, and received the usual series of emails, you order had be placed, our order has been verified, your order has been dispatched etc etc. So there I was eager awaiting my purchase the estimated delivery date came and went no red ticket in the mail, nothing. It was only when I checked amazon it said it had been delivered, and gave me the tracking number, well I went to the delivery companies site and there it confirmed that it had been delivered, but I had been in all day on the day it said but there wasn't any buzz at the door or any knock. So where was my purchase, I thought one of our neighbours had taken it in, but still no-one came, it was only till later that night I checked outside our door that I found my purchase, just left there no note, no knock or anything. Thankfully we live in a block of apartments and there is only 2 apartments on the ground level, but we don't use the front door very often as we come in the patio doors as the main front door is up stairs off the main road, but it all ended ok.

The next thing to brake was our hot water heater, I was on my way to bed around midnight to find my bedroom carpet soaking wet, at first I was unsure where the water was coming from until I realised that it was coming from the heater. What do you do at Midnight? well I rung my insurance company thankfully they have a 24hrs hot line and our management company who also have a number for emergencies, well the guy on the other end of the phone was almost helpful, I think he was a little pissed off I was calling him, and disturbed his peaceful night, well he helped me turn off the water then all we could do was get some sleep and call the insurance people the next day, they were really good and sent someone straight away to sort out the carpet, we then got someone in to sort the heater, thankfully we could get cold water but no hot, but the only annoyance was the amount of money it was gonna cost, apparently we were meant to have the heater serviced every year but we weren't told this so the build up of gunk has cause it to brake, and it wasn't claimable on the insurance, at least we were covered for the carpet, the wardrobe and chest of drawers, which were also water damaged, but at least the new one doesn't have this anode thing on it so it is guaranteed for 25 years which is good. The only issue now is that the people who installed it haven't tightened the thermostats enough and it is slightly leaking, not major thankfully, towels are stopping it, and they are coming out on Wednesday to fix it. At least I now have hot water yippee. All I need to do now is go and choose a carpet.

Cinderella went to the Ball

To be more precise Sarah went to the Masquerade Bad Taste Bear Ball. Didn't manage to get the dress but went in Gold sparkly tights, black skirt and a new top. My mask was finished in time but the bloody glitter went everywhere, and why after 2 weeks I'm still finding bits even in the most unlikely places where the glitter didn't touch.

The event was held at Bramall Lane where Sheffield United play, now I'm a Sheffield Wednesday fan so this wasn't going to be the perfect venue, but the room was ok and the food was slightly edible, a selection of wraps, sandwiches, potato wedges, tortilla chips and a selection of nice desserts. We still felt the need to visit the chippy afterwards though.

The event bear was called Fanny and she was a Burlesque dancer. I did well at this event as I only got a further 5 bears for the collection, we haven't been purchasing as many this year, due to the credit crunch and the fact there hasn't been many bears that we both like.

The entertainment for the night was two Burlesque dances going by the name of Missy Malone and Lola. They both did 2 dances each then a dance together at the end. Miss Malone was ok, a former belly dancer she looked the part with nipple tassels intact but the other girl Lola wasn't that good, she was too skinny and for a burlesque dancer you would have thought that she would have had a decent pair of boobs, but no they were flatter than a pancake. Maybe Miss Malone was making up for the pair of them.

I entered by Mask into the mask making competition but didn't even come close to winning, but I'm not really surprised as they were quite a lot of really good masks, and you could tell that more than 2 days worth of engineering had gone into them. At least mine has pride of place on the bookshelf in the office.

The next Bad Taste Bear event is in the summer at Warwick Castle, which also co-insides with the 10th anniversary of BTB so there will be a special bear to mark the occasion. We haven't decided if we are going yet, but we probably will be.

Egg tastic

Again I've fallen into that trap of not updating, but fear not I will try to do this more often.

So what I have been doing? mainly writing essays for my masters which is slowly doing my head in, trying to study, work and all the house/family stuff is taking it's tole. I wouldn't recommend distance learning, it is pants. Thankfully I've only got 2 more essays to write and that's the first year done, I will have a postgraduate certificate, and to be honest I'll be glad to finish with just that, forget the diploma and the masters just give me the cert, but I'm guessing that my family won't let me. It will be like the rest of my life, doing stuff for other people and not for myself, don't get me wrong I enjoyed doing my degree but the added pressure to do well from my family wasn't enjoyable.

Happy (belated) Easter to all, thankfully I only got 2 Easter eggs this year, which I'm glad about as I've been experiencing a slight blip in the weight watching front. Don't worry I've not put it all back on, but I now weigh the same as I did Christmas week, so in 4 months I've been up and down more times than a yo yo, so stating this week I'm back onto pointing big style, so hopefully in a couple of weeks I'll have hit the 3 stone barrier, and I'll be back on the right track.

As mentioned in my last post I was seeking a dress for the ball, well this Cinderella story isn't happening, yes I am going to the ball, but it won't be in a dress, probably the trusty black skirt and a new top, if I can find one that I like. I have started on my mask though I will post a picture when it is finished.

Frosty the snowman

Well it has been snowing all last week and tonight we have more of the fluffy white stuff. It was fun for a while but now it's just damn annoying, all the world stops for a bit of snow. Schools were shut, trains and buses cancelled but thankfully the Supertram was still in action. The only thing that has been the most annoying is that I've been able to still make it into work, it's taken that little bit longer but still I've been there, whilst other people work from home (well they try to log on then give up and go back to bed or to the TV) I'm not bitter honest.

This weekend was the two local football teams clash in a Sheffield Derby. These teams are well known for hating each other and already this year Wednesday have been the better team and won one clash, but this weekend they did the double. Sheffield Wednesday beat United 2-1 at Bramall Lane. This, on the back of a 1-0 victory for the Owls at Hillsborough earlier in the season, gave Wednesday their first double over United since the 1913/14 season. Well deserved as well.

Another good thing that has happened is that the next Bad Taste Bear mini event is to be held in my home city of Sheffield, it's about time really I was getting a little sick of travelling all over the country for these little fellas. The only issue, well 2 issues really. One it's at Sheffield United football club and being a Wednesday supporter it's not ideal but having done the double as mentioned above it will be bearable (no pun intended). Two the theme of the event is Burlesque / Masquerade Ball. Although fancy dress is optional, this event is smart dress too. So I've got to find a cheap ball gown in fat size, good luck I here you cry. What would be perfect is that if I looked like Jennifer Connolly in Labyrinth and had her dress, but that's not going to happen between now and the 18th April. I'll keep you posted on the costume hunt.

let it snow..let it snow

This weekend has been the mammoth of all weekends, we cleaned the flat from top to bottom and I did all my ironing. The thing is I hate ironing so I tend to leave it all in a pile in the bedroom, but I was sick of seeing it, and to be honest the bedroom was getting very messy with pile of clothes that need washing and lots of ironing. So all the lot had to go, not throw away no, the ironing had to be ironed and put away and the washing washed. Well I did in total about 4 hours ironing split into 2 sessions, one Saturday night and one Sunday night. The rest of Saturday comprised of sorting out the Office, getting rid of boxes and cleaning what must have been the entire dust mountain in the world. What I can't understand is how can such a small apartment like ours get so dusty, oh well it is now free of dust for the time being. Sunday was pretty the same cleaning and dusting the bedroom, living room, bathroom and kitchen. I even had time to bake some butterfly buns and have a shower.

What I did find quite interesting is the fact that whilst I was cleaning and hoovering usually I get very hot and sweaty, but now I've lost weight I was fine, no red and sweaty face or wet hair. I was truly amazed, plus I didn't get out of breath once. This is a big thing for me, I'm almost normal. The only downside is that my back is paying for it today, but not as much as would have been, had I not have been 2 stone lighter.

Talking about weight I've lost another 2lbs this week. I had a little blip over Christmas, but I'll let that one slide as it was the festival of food and niceness, but we are now back on track on the lard busting front.

On another note, it is snowing in Sheffield, now where I live we don't usually get that much snow, as we live in a dip but I was shocked this morning when I woke up to see about 2 inches of white fluffy snow, so out came the boots and off I went to work. Now we haven't got it half as much as down south where even all the London buses have stopped running, we just have delays and suspended services. But wait, it is forecast for more white precipitation overnight, so tomorrow might be a stay at home in the warm day hopefully, but I'm not holding my breathe because as I type this entry the snow has stopped and the existing snow on the cars etc is melting, so we will have to see.