Day 149 - Tools

I took today's prompt literally and took a photo of dh's carpeting tools :) he had fun made of him last week when he took his new (very cheap) replacement toolbox and was asked if he had brought a packed lunch. Bless him, he actually turned round and said "no, should i have?". He was only going to fit one carpet in a bedroom in a friend's house, so didnt think he would need a packed lunch. It was not until he was on his way back that his friend explained that the was talking about his toolbox :). I think for Father's day i am going to treat him to one of those posh stanley toolboxes. Maybe it will also encourage him to keep ALL his tools in one place rather than scattered all over the house.

Day 145 - 148

Catch up time AGAIN.. as always, i took the photos but couldnt be bothered to write a blog post...
Day 148 - Unfinished

I could have chosen a million and two photos for this prompt, the unfinished gardening, the unfinished ironing, the unfinished painting, the unfinished.. well you get the picture here. It gets me quite down at times and i get overwhelmed by all the half done jobs and then dont know where to begin, so get all panicky (especially when a visit looms). I would so love to have a finished, nice, always presentable house but i guess with my four plus all the animals, that will always be wishful thinking and probably bring me to an early grave. The most pressing unfinished at the moment are my mum's 80th birthday invitations.. initially she had given me quite some time to finish them off, then once she had decided which one she wanted, i was told she needed them by monday, so i had exactly 2 days to make 80 invitations, needless to say, i didnt get it all done in time.

Day 147 - Cleanliness

How i would LOVE to have a permanently clean house! i spend my days cleaning up after people and animals and never seem to make any headway.. it is quite embarrassing really! i envy those women who can manage to keep a proper, tidy, nice house.. my mum's house always used to be and still to this day is spotless. I hate housework, but i do it because i dream of having a beautiful, clean, tidy house one day. To make my cleaning a little more cheerful, i bought these scourers

Day 146 - boring

I don't to get bored quickly, there is always "something" i can find to amuse myself. One thing that does however bore me to the point of sleep (without fail) is TV! To think that we have 100s of tv channels and i still cant find anything i want to watch. I enjoy the odd episode of NCIS or Bones, but even those test my patience, especially with all the, often cringe worthy, adverts.

Day 145 - Soft

Day 144 - artificial

Another great word with many different interpretations! I almost took a photo of my artificial flowers, but im too proud of the real life growing ones that i seem to be keeping alive at the moment. If i were closer to my Mum, i would have taken a shot of my uncle's artificial leg :D or my mum's dentures :D alas, there's a good few hundred miles and a great big channel between them and me, so you are all spared my dark humour. So i had to look were artificial fit into our life, we try to stay away from all those horrid e numbers in foods, autism and artificial colouring dont work well together :) so i had to resort to my vice... Canderel! i hate proper sugar in my drinks, i cannot stand "full fat" anything, it has to be diet! and of course, my beloved coffee is no exception.. two sweeteners and milk, or black if i have a terrible headache or need to wake up sharpishly!

Day 143 - Restful

Rest is not something easily come by in this household.. in fact were all pretty highly strung, hyperactive, always on the go type people, so really the only household members found to be catching a nap are of the furry kind.

Day 135 - Day 142 Playing catch up again

So, ive been good at taking my photos, but bad at keeping my posts up to date, so i gather i should start catching up again. Here we go:

Day 142 - Ornament
An easy one for me :) although i hate the dust gatherers, i seem to have collected quite a few new knick knacks over the last three years. I love dragons, elephants and frogs, so whenever the df see one of those, they pick it up for me. I chose my current favourite.. my little frog. He had miraculously disappeared a couple of months ago and everyone pleaded ignorance! No surprise there. I did find Kermit in the most unlikely place and in a very poor condition the other day! Dh had apparently knocked him off his pedestal one night and hurriedly cleared the crime scene with the intention of covering up the murder at a later date! Poor Kermit was broken into 8 pieces, it took quite some patience to bring him back to life, but my Prince Charming once again sits in his rightful place.

Day 141 - Minimalist

This word actually gave me quite a headache.. although i would LOVE LOVE LOVE to live in a minimalist environment, the df have a different viewpoint and seem to enjoy cluttering up any and all nooks and crannies in the house! It drives me insane, i LIKE clean, tidy and no frills and fuss.. i was stuck with this word as i did not want to copy some of the ideas on the blog, i wanted something that was "me". I then remembered my tiny little lucky bamboo charm dh bought me some time back. It is quite minimalistic all on its own in its' little capsule.

Day 140 - Group
I knew which little group to choose for my photo straight away! I love my Mummy elephant with the babies in tow!

Day 139 - Interior
What an interesting word! And so many different ways to interpret. Unfortunately, i found one of my tropical snailies dead in its' house today, so i took a photo of the interior of his now vacant house...

Day 138 - Flower

Day 137 - Candid

My df gave me quite the run around to get a "candid" photo... not even the dog was in the mood to play today. So i sneaked a quick snapshot of DH...

Day 136 - Portrait of a Stranger

I have NO idea who this bloke is

Day 135 - Faceless Portrait

I could have taken so many photos for this prompt! But i settled for this one.. a bag of Pick'nMix, no its not me ;)

Day 134 - Portrait of a woman

Oh a nice change for today i see :) not only is the sun out, but i also knew instantly which photo to use for today.. although ill still have to find a "random" one as the portrait im using was done years and years before i was even born. I always amaze my mother by my very vivid memories of my grandmother, who died when i was only 3 years old. I used to (and still do) adore this woman. She had the patience of a saint with me and i remember the little sandpit my dad put out the back of her flat, where she would sit for hours and hours and make little sandcakes and, dare i say it, cemeteries with me. She always had a forbidden sweet in her apron pocket for me, she would take me across the road to the little corner shop and let me choose any penny sweet i wanted. One time, she offered to change a whole load of copper change i had for a shiny 2 DM coin, i dutifully handed over ALL my pennies and promptly burst into tears, although she had given me far more than my pennies were worth, to me, i had given her "all that money" for "only one coin in return". She had a hard life, bringing up 9 children on her own as my grandfather was executed in a Concentration Camp as a traitor and deserter for hiding Jewish family members throughout the war. I gather from my mother, the only surviving daughter as her twin sisters died, that my grandmother was a very strict mother.. but, as a grandchild i never saw that side of her. To me she was all about hugs when i had been shouted at, somebody safe to hide behind when i knew i had been naughty, a playmate and a constant source of unconditional love. I dont remember much about her dying, she went into hospital and just never came back home.. and as i didnt go to the funeral, i dont really have any recollection of saying goodbye to her. To this day i often "meet" her in my dreams, she will just be there, standing in a corner of a room or quietly sitting at a kitchen table.. but i know that whenever i dreamt of her, things will turn out ok.

Day 133 - Selfportrait

Isnt it amazing how a tiny little word can instill such terror in a person? when i saw this prompt, i threw a right old hissy fit, made the most preposterous noises you can imagine and SULKED for the better part of today... Im sorry, there wont be any photo of me.. i look positively deranged and dangerous in every single one.. add to that the middle age spread and constant gravitational pull and i promise you all i am NOT a sight you want to see. ever. period. no discussion.. but i missed not following my word, so i drew myself.. or rather how i would like to look... nice and thin with a big smile..

Day 132 - unforgettable

where to even start? weve had so many firsts over the last couple of years, so many new memories being made that it really is impossible to pick one.. then there are all those old memories (and not ALL of them were bad either) to take into consideration too.. so i just went for the obvious one again, the wedding day.. although strictly speaking, it was rather a forgettable day as i dont remember much about it, i was way too nervous and excited and i still get the dates mixed up and have eagerly presented the dh with his card/present two days too early last year. this year however, i set all my idevices, the viewpad, google calendar and any other electronic timer gadget to alert me on time! anyway, these are just some little bits that i dug out of the drawer, the ring cushion luckily passed inspection, i have no idea where the heart thing came from or what it is used for.. and the wallet, now that IS a day i remember clearly!! it contains the receipt for the registry office! oh and the spoon thingy is a Welsh tradition and was a wedding gift, along with a horseshoe that seems to have been dislocated. In other news, Leo has recovered from her early excercise routine (you can see that she is getting a bit podgy, so chasing her snacks around is good for her) and is friends with me again. I am not sure how much that has to do with the wax worms i put on offer last night as a way to make up for the irritated hoppers...

Day 131 - Sandy

I was bound to get lucky one of these days again... an easy word for me as we have our own personal little desert in the living room. The desert dwellers were a bit confused by the early desert cleanup routine, but dutifully played their part.. leo was not best pleased that i woke up her dinner and made her chase it back into the cave, but im sure she will understand the importance of the 366 challenge! i have been driving the dh nuts all day as i have been trying to hunt down a little sandy beach kit in a box i bought him a couple of years ago for fun.. but it seems to have gotten lost when we moved. It had a little bucket, spade, flags and sand to make a sandcastle..

Day 130 - Woolly

This would normally be a really easy word for me :) especially if we were due to visit the inlaws... Wales is full of fluffy, woolly SHEEP.. but no such "joy" is in the calendar, so i have snapped the macro lens again (do you see a pattern emerging here?) maybe i need to broaden my horizon with the wide angle lens a little over the next few days) and snapped a close up of my favourite new snuggly blanket. i have a hard time relaxing, so having a blanket that says "chill, snuggle, relax" etc is supposed to remind me...

Day 129 - Prickly

Haha... NICE try!!!!!! but i still managed to get around the word :P When the family asked, with baited breath, what the word for the day is, i innocently answered "prickly" and they ALL burst out laughing! i mean every single one of them, even the dog was smirking... my even more innocent question of "what" was answered with yet more hilarity from all quarters and the suggestion i just put a photo of MYSELF up for today. Well, ok i may at times be prickly, thats why my dad used to say "its the inside of the hedgehog that matters", but really? thats the best they could do for a serious photography challenge? I of course ignored the ruccus and went in search of my own prickly! But soon had to realise that we didnt have many prickly things (apart from myself) lying around and, as it was chucking down with rain, a traipse outside was not on the top of my agenda. It was when i decided to play around with my new little macro lens and looked at my harmless tomato plants that i noticed the prickly spikes all over the stems!! Im sure my little plants feel all big and scary, so i didnt mention that it took a magnifying glass to see their defenses!

Day 128 - woven

Seriously??? WOVEN??? that word gave me a headache... there is nothing woven in this house was my favourite wail for the day.. until 23.54!! when i glanced at the rug in the living room and inspiration struck in the form of Cooper being mischievous and rearranging the rug into a more suitable position, i.e. UPSIDE down. So, there right in front of me was my "woven" and a confused coops because he got a "good boy" for all his efforts for once, at long last his dense owner sees things HIS way.

Day 127 - bumpy

If i didnt know better, id be wondering if Suzie is desperately trying to get me to run out of ideas and put a photo of me up!! Bumpy... i guess thats what every woman can hope for at best after having had 3 babies! but no you are all lucky enough for me to have found a suitable victim in the form of some Mr Kiplings minicakes! I am not a great fan of these overly sweet things, but the kids and dh love them.. so here are some bumpy cakes.

Day 126 - rough

Thats how ive been feeling for a couple of days now... i dont know whether its the fall out from physiotherapy (she DID warn me that id be incredibly sore) or "something" else.. i guess time will tell! I was not willing to chance any of my camera lenses with photos of me, so i pondered this quite some time, when i realised that id been walking around with "rough" in my hands most of the afternoon. So, out came the shiny new iphone with shiny new macro lens and this is what i got:

Day 125 - smooth

Day 124 - Beautiful

I am seriously starting to embrace the fact that i must be different! every time suzie says "an easy one today" it turns out to be HARD.. and every time it supposedly is a "tricky word" it just clicks into place for me. beautiful is another one of those a million and two possible choices words! 124 days into the challenge and i still cannot make decisions! its been tipping down ALL day, i have been running around like a headless chicken (where does that saying come from? headless chickens surely dont run very far or fast for that matter? maybe twitch a little before their head catches up with the fact that it has lost its body, but running without a head?), ferrying the kids from one appointment to another, while picking up or dropping off one or the other two... to find that the town center was evacuated due to a major bomb threat. Needless to say, the photos of the beautiful things i took didnt turn out too beautiful.. so i am going to use an older photo that i didnt even take. Still, it takes my breath away... and many people have since commented on "how beautiful she is"... and i truly am stunned whenever i look at this photo! how did that little "scrap of humanity" (as an elderly lady unasked for described my beautiful baby girl) into a stunning young lady... where did all that time go? hard to believe that she is "only" twelve when you look at this shot of her!

Day 123 - Futuristic

This word gave me a lot of food for thought... again, the obvious interpretation went straight to electronics and how those have changed our lives over the last 20 or 30 years. Thinking back to the first computer language i learnt (Pascal for any other retros out there) and the size of the main computer in our uni, and then looking at my tablet pc, laptop, iphones, ipods, the kids gizmos and gadgets, it boggles my mind how we now take for granted to have a library of books, a telephone directory on the go, an entire map collection for wherever we are, more music than anyone could listen to in an enitire year in our pockets at all times. I caught one of the very early episodes of Star Trek (remember the original one.. with Captain T Kirk, Mr Spock and Dr McCoy??) and i nearly fell about laughing when they whipped out their "communicators", which looked suspiciously like an early 1990s flip phone :D ... now if only we could find a way to "beam" people and maybe have a replicator or two in every kitchen, my life will be made! For my word today i snapped a pic of dh's new motherboard, well obviously its not FOR dh, but his pc, as that looked pretty futuristic! To think that this small bit of plastic with some soldering on will be the brain and central nervous system for something that can calculate the most complex equation, let us instantly communicate with someone on the other side of the world and do a million other things is just amazing.

Day 122 - grungy

I am still playing catchup... lots is happening here, in fact so much, it is starting to scare me! Im glad we have the long weekend to look forward to so i can recharge a little bit! But before then we have still 2 days packed with appointments and lots of running around and trying to be in three places at once. Grungy was an easy word for me, i do grungy extremely well :) in all interpretations of the word! I like the grungy gravelly indie sounds, i usually look rather grungy in my comfort clothes, the house is in a despicable grungy state most of the time because i never get round to finishing all the 1000 things i need to be doing. I took my first photo with my shiny new iphone4... of my most comfortable, worn in, grungy trainers!

April - a recap

Day 121 - Dessert

Ok, it is official.. i have the best husband in the world! He was quite naughty really as he had told me that he had only bought me "something little" for our wedding anniversary, i suppose technically he IS right, it is little.. but expensive! I am the most spoilt wife in the world, and now a proud owner of an iphone 4S!!! with a set of lenses to match and a snuggly case i have now officially joined the kewl kids club again! You would have thought id been snapping photos all day long with my new toy, but i have to disappoint you all... i was kind of overwhelmed by the whole thing and just speechless.. so im resorting back to our great dinner on Saturday and give you all a selection of the desserts we sampled!

Day 120 - lights

I found this word quite hard, as we already had a light prompt and i have given you all a tour around our lights back on day 56, next thought was "candles" as we have loads of those dotted around the house too, but that rang a bell as well and sure enough, that was way back in January! So i had to resort to my next favourite light in the house: my lightbox also called my happy rays. It is funny how the camera lens captured the green/yellow, as to the human eye, the lamp is white and constant. It wasnt until i looked at the photo, that i noticed the bars and flickering.

Day 119 - Handmade

I am playing catch up again... but i did take my photos! And i have a very valid reason for being late... it was our wedding anniversary on Saturday (today) and we spend a nice together. In the evening we went out for a nice meal at a new local restaurant that serves meals from 10 countries, we had gone in there with the intention of sampling EVERY dish there was, but we both gave up after our third plate as we were feeling overstuffed and quite sick by then. We both agreed that it wasnt the most romantic of places (so it suited me just fine, but dh had hoped for a candle lit affair), but it certainly made for it with the choices of foods and desserts available. There were lots and lots of cooks behind the stations, preparing the food for you right there and then. So, for my handmade, i chose to take photos of the dishes just made for us!