I Bought A Party Dress.

I like my colours, I LOVE patterns but I seem to live in jeans and a top. Sometimes, I wear joggies and a top but my style is pretty much tomboy with a touch of pink and flowers.

However, as party season is drawing near, I felt a change from the same old same old.

I have bought myself a dress for Christmas. It is completely different to anything I own and the weight loss is bringing out a new form of confidence so I have actually bought my first ever SHORT dress.

I tried it on in a shop yesterday and it chose me rather than I chose it. On the hanger I wasn't too convinced but it fit perfectly and looked beautiful on. It felt a good quality. It fitted to my good bits giving me good shape and flared out over my hips and bottom just where I needed it to.

Due to me not being of model height, the  dress ends at my knee and I will be having knee high boots with it as I venture out to a Christmas meal and disco and the same for new year. I also treated myself to a heart necklace and black rose corsage to finish off the look.

Apart from my wedding dress, hubby has never really seen me done up all glam and ready to party in style. Yes, I do want to impress him and want him proud of me.

I will be posting photo's of said nights out so watch this space.

Ouch

Todays headlines are as follows.

1) Hubby's grandad is out of hospital and doing well again. He has lots of pills so we are hoping he doesn't have another bad side effect like last time. He came out on Tuesday but went back on Wednesday due to his medication making his blood pressure too low.

2) Hubby had a little slip on the stairs yesterday. Bruised bum, scraped thigh. Nothing too serious.

3) Hubby's step-mum had a fall on Thursday, She's not old but had a trip whilst shopping, put her arm out to balance herself and ended up with a broken shoulder.

4) I crashed the car. Yep, me, big bad me. Accidentally touched the accelerator rather than the brake and hit a stationary car in a supermarket car park. Minimal damage to my car but a bump and 2 nice lines down the back passenger seat of other car. No-one was about for the car and after 20 minutes I left the car park as I had to collect Liam for school. Fear not dearest readers, I do actually have a conscience and have sent my details off to the supermarket in case anyone wants to claim on insurance. I also phoned the police as I know it's a crime to "hit and run" though I personally don't think waiting 20 minutes for someone to come out is exactly running away from the scene of a crime. Anyway, I don't the rules of car parks and prosecution nor do I know if there were security cameras or witnesses so I've covered my arse so to speak. If I get fined and points on my license I deserve it. I was entirely at fault and fucked up. End of. I was so cool and collected it was unbelievable. Even owning up to the police was fine. I work TOO well under pressure, maybe I should become a spy...... Anyway, that was Friday. I couldn't hide the damage so I told hubby someone else hit me and didn't stop. I was generally feeling very down and upset with myself. We had to fix part of the bumper back on and there was a little paint damage but on the whole all was fine. I eventually told him the truth this morning. He was cool with it.  Told me that car parks often work on different laws as private land and that I could have probably gone immediately and not owned up without any repercussions. However, I am an honest person and I know how I would have felt if that was my vehicle so I owned up. I didn't sleep hardly at all that night through feelings of guilt and paranoia of police turning up etc. My conscience is too huge.

5) Liams school application is in. I submitted it all online and got an email back instantly to say my admissions application had been received.

6) I have now lost 33lbs with Weight Watchers this year. I want to lose 9 more by Christmas and new year so I can say I've lost 3 stone this year.

7) My kids (the little ones) have learnt how to play movies through the tv.

8) It's only 6 more weeks until the schools finish for Christmas. That's CRAZY! Where has 2013 gone? Not that I'm particularly gonna miss it. It's been a bit of a forgettable year.

9) Hubby and I are going out for dinner by ourselves tonight. I think I deserve that large glass of wine that I have my mind set on. No idea what to eat, but boy, do I need wine.

10) Happy Week ahead to one and all.

Five

On Friday, the youngest member of the T family turned 2 years old. Here he is with his proud birthday sharing cousin a few days before he turned 5.

Time goes so fast when you have kids. You get through each week. Each weekend. Each half term, each term. Each major holiday. Each birthday. Each anniversary. Each festive celebration. As humans we always seem to be looking ahead to the next event and before you know it you have kids that are growing up at such a surprising rate.

Not just dealing with the fact that my middle baby has turned 5, today I received the official paperwork for Liam to attend full time school in September next year. Oh. My. God. This really is getting real that within a year I will be semi redundant. I will only be doing the school run TWICE a day for the next 5 years and then I will have three secondary school children.

Speaking of the youngest little man, he was sent home from school today after bumping his head at nursery this morning. It resulted in a little cut on his scalp and a bit of a bump but he seems happy enough in himself. He came home, promptly ate two jam doughnuts, helped himself to some biscuits asked for squash and perched himself in front of the tv. After a couple of hours he had a nap but woke up to find that I had switched channels as he slept and kicked up a fuss over it. This HUGELY suggests that Liam is in fact completely normal despite the bump to the head.

Hubbys grandad was released from hospital yesterday. However, a phonecall from his nan in the last hour has said he's not doing well at home and is going to be admitted back in. She was waiting for the ambulance but didn't tell me much more than that. So now we just wait again to see what happens and what the problem is this time. For now we just have to hope for the best for him.

This Unlucky 13 Year Is Beginning To Grate

They say "Thirteen" is an unlucky number and the past few weeks really have been a mixture of highs and lows though it tends to be the lows that have the most impact.

This week the kids have been off school. I've learned of a new pregnancy and a loss. We've celebrated birthdays, we've also had worrying news.

There appears to be something for our T family about the early hours of November 1st.

Early November 1st 2008, James was born into the world.
Early November 1st 2011, Nelson his little cousin arrived.
Early November 1st 2013, Hubby's Grandad was rushed into hospital suffering from a heart attack.

He's doing ok. Family are all a little shocked but he's being kept in for observation over the weekend.

He's around 90, he does well for his age but he's feeling the strain a bit.

The years always seem to follow a them, this year, certainly the latter part of the year seems to revolve around the delicate subject of mortality. From my cousins suicide attempt, to my friends ruptured ectopic and now grandads health, it's all incredibly real that none of us are infallible, invincible and none of us know what the future holds.

I don't often look forward to new year but this year has been emotionally and mentally tiring!

Speaking of which, I am doing something VERY different this new year. I am actually going out for new year!

This will be the first time in at least eleven years that I have had the opportunity to do so. Ten new years eve's ago I was days away from giving birth to my oldest son so it was the year before that or possibly the year before that when I last celebrated the change of the year.

This year hubby and I will be going to the village hall which has been taken over by our friends at the Indian Takeaway who are putting on a Bollywood night. Complete with food and entertainment, this will be a very different night and I am incredibly looking forward to it. I might even, get this... wear..... a.... dress..... I have my eye on a couple of dresses I like but I want to try them on. I LOVE one dress but it looks a little short. My legs aren't designed for the above the knee cut dresses but I'll give it a go if I can try on and it looks good. There's the Christmas meal a couple of weeks before so the dress will get two outings over the festivities, so I just need to choose wisely then I have the dilemma of shoes! I want stylish, ideally heels but I want to be able to dance (and walk) in them. Now that IS a challenge!

So that's it, trying to look forward to things as current times have been a little up and down but James had a lovely birthday despite the fact we were worried about Grandad, getting lots of Disney Infinity Figures, having fish and chips, chicken nuggets, and cake for his birthday dinner.