Flooding near grandma's

There's been very heavy rain near my grandma's flat.  Fortunately she is safe in a respite home.  We had to drive the long way around to her house as we made two separate attempts which were blocked due to flooding.

Finally we got to her flat and managed to move all her furniture and precious items up high enough so that any flooding doesn't damage them.

Darth on the hearth

I think this is the earliest we've ever decorated for Christmas

A lovely time with the girls

L looks like The Fly on our shopping trip, hahaha

Later, I went on a lovely evening walk with B.

Holidays

We've had a brilliant holiday in Wales, in a beautiful country cottage about 7 miles from the coast.  We had a fantastic time.  In fact Squidge loved it so much she's obsessed with buying a small-holding out there.  We are apparently going to have ducks, chickens, dogs, ponies and some llamas.  Squidge is also learning Welsh, in preparation, bless her.  For those of you who don't know, the Welsh have their own language which is very different from English - they all speak English too, but some areas prefer to use Welsh.  It's Celtic language.  I love words so I find it fascinating.

We went on a steam railway, climbed down 300ft of steps at a place called Devil's Bridge, go rock-pooling, watched dolphins and seals, visited a farm, visited some friends at their small-holding, and visited a National Trust house.

Well, I'm not sure how much blogging I'll do this week, but I'll have to see :)

Family walk

We had a lovely family walk around a local reservoir today.

God's creation is just beautiful!

Out and about again

We love our walks out and about.  I popped out with my gorgeous Chatterbox in the beautiful countryside that surrounds us.

We are truly blessed.

Seven Quick Takes - Rotting beans, teenagers and tender mercies

Visit This Ain't the Lyceum

1.  If you read any of my other posts you will note that on Monday I proudly stated that I was soaking some beans and lentils for a homemade soup.  On Thursday I announced that on Wednesday I realised I'd forgotten that I was soaking the beans.  Thursday I went out to go give my Grandma a shower and clean her flat, on my return G announced that he had found the beans in the microwave and the slimey bean-water had overflowed all over the microwave.  He refused to throw the beans away, such was the smell.  And he was right - they smelled like feet and vomit.  How on earth did I manage to recount the beans tale and then forget to actually throw them away?  How?  It's a mystery to me to be sure.

I think I need to point out that I am not disgusting, we just don't use the microwave much and the beans were hidden. I do clean! :D

2.  My plans today are to do some cleaning and some ironing whilst I wait for a friend to let me know that she has the keys to their new house and then I'm going to go and help scrape some wallpaper for them.

3.  My eldest daughter has reached a peak of teenageryness.  Anyone who has teenagers will understand what this means.  But G and I mostly look like this:

Well, especially G what with him having a beard and all...and the fact that I would be wearing a top... haha

4.  I am waiting in trepidation for the washing machine to finish.  It has our bedding in and I just KNOW that it is not going to like it.  We got the washing machine with the house.  It's a small top-loading machine and for some reason, especially when it's doing our bedding it decides to announce that it needs servicing (well it doesn't announce it, a little red light comes on) and then it seizes up for half the day.

5.  We visited some friends at their caravan on Wednesday.  We had a lovely time chatting whilst the girls played with their daughter and some other kids from the campsite all day...well except for a time of teenageryness from Chatterbox who sat in the car for about three hours reading her book.  She did emerge when they announced they were going to play hide and seek.

6.  Whilst we were chatting we talked about various things and one of the things is forgiveness.  If Jesus died 'once for all' do we need to keep asking for forgiveness?  I say, "Yes".  I won't go into a big theological treatise as to why I believe this, because this is seven QUICK takes and would defeat the object of this meme.

7.  I've been thinking a lot about selfishness, self-less-ness, etc.  I read this Gentle Selfishness.  I'm not sure but they suggest that the Spiritual fruit of Gentleness can 'kill' gentle selfishness because it is 'not weakness but controlled strength'.  I always think of godly gentleness more like tender mercy, I think if I look at it like that, then mercy does kill selfishness.  Something to ponder.

Happy weekend!  

Poo covered cats and memory issues

I'll tell you about the poo covered cat in a minute.  But first my memory issues.  I noticed via email notification that I'd got a comment from the lovely Pom Pom on my Happy Homemaker post.  I logged in through my mobile phone and scrolled through the post to get to my comments.  It was there that I saw it,

"I am soaking some beans and lentils for a homemade soup though."

Oh cr*p, I said to hubster, my soup!  Yep, I'd forgotten. There they were, still soaking in the bowl, two days later.

I do not exaggerate when I say cooking isn't my thing.  Oh, I do try to cook decent meals for my family, but I just have some kind of brain 'off' switch when it comes to cooking.

I have sat in my living room and idly said, "What's that hissing noise?"  With the sudden realisation that I am cooking sausages!  If the smoke alarm goes off the family all shout, "Tea's* ready!" And they think that they are hilarious. Herumph.

[*Tea - northern English term for evening meal (as well as the leafy beverage)]

I have burned three lots of cheese-on-toast in a row, even setting fire to one set when I've sat staring at it under the grill, only to go off into a daydream and being brought-to by the smoke.

It's either that or I forget to defrost the meat.  So I'll decide in the morning that we will have say, a chicken curry.  Forget to take the meat out of the freezer and have to ring G on his way home from work to pick up something from the shop.  In fact G is so used to this that if I do ring him on the way home from work he immediately says, "What have you forgotten to take out of the freezer?"

And don't get me started on baking...

So, don't tell me to start a meal plan...because I forget to look at the plan...don't tell me to put reminders on my phone...because I see the reminder, look away from it and STILL FORGET!  What is that all about?

Poo covered cat...

Onto the delightful story of our poo covered cat in a moment, but first a bit of back-story.

So, our cat is possessed.

We got her from a cat rescue place in a nearby town in 2006.  She was so friendly and that's why we chose her, she came to us rubbing up, etc.  Her sister was also in the rescue shelter, so we offered to take her too because we didn't want to split them up.  I should have discerned a potential problem when the nice shelter lady said violently, "NO!...ahem...no, they don't get on".  I should have thought, "These two cats have such issues that even an overcrowded shelter won't release them together".

Anyway, we got her home and put her in the kitchen to get her used to one room before introducing her to the rest of the house.  And she disappeared.

She disappeared for 3 days!  Just vanished.  I had floor boards up and everything.  Tins of tuna left here there and everywhere.

When on the the third day I found her [it obviously has deep theological spiritual significance that I found her on the the this day], I pulled a plinth off the bottom of a cupboard that was next to our tall fridge-freezer and I saw a foot.  Yes, for three days she had been wedged upside down behind the fridge-freezer - back legs and tail pointing to the ceiling, forelegs and head stretched to the floor.

And she hadn't even meowed once.

She did finally settle in and we discovered two things:

1) She will snuggle down on your knee, purr, enjoy being fussed, then this wild look will take over her and she'll attack you for no reason.  (It was after she attacked my Bible that I asked G to get a priest in.  He thought I was going over the top, but I'm not sure. Ha.)

2) Then the fighting started.  Her paw was against every paw in the neighbourhood.  Her ears are a mess of scars.  Her back legs have been ripped open twice.

Remember I said I chose her because she was so friendly, rubbing up against me at the cat shelter?  When the vet saw her his first words were, "This cat is very territorial".  The rubbing is not friendliness, it's Boots saying, "This is mine. This is mine.  This is mine.  This is mine.  All this is mine. DON'T TOUCH".

When we moved house we hoped she'd settle down.

But no.

We've had another ripped back leg followed by hideous infection.  A split tongue.  I opened the curtains the other day to see blood splattered all up the window.  The window cleaner spent the following morning surreptitiously looking for bodies in the back garden...haha I jest, I jest.

It's always at night.  My new neighbours regularly see me running around the street in my jammies yelling, "Get inside you stupid cat!" and then chasing other people's cats up the road hissing like a maniac.

We've tried to make her a house cat, but she goes literally insane trying to get outside.  We've tried a Feliway plugin that supposedly gives off happy-cat smells - it failed.  She'd been prescribed cat-valium - failed.

An aside:  Boots has just appeared on the windowsill staring at G and he has just made a rude gesture at her.  I do so love her despite it all. Ha.

So, Tuesday night, G and I were just settling down for the night, it was about midnight and we hear it. YOWLOWLWOWOOWOWOWYOWLEEEEMEEEEEOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWW!!!! And the sound of the bins in the back garden being knocked over.

So I run outside in my jammies - and I'm wearing my old jammies that have shrunk in the wash so that the trousers flap at half-mast between ankle and knee - calling quietly because I don't want the neighbours looking at me: "Boooooots!  Bootssssssss!"  Then Boots suddenly careers past me wildly followed by a stripey cat, which I chase off up the street hissing at it like a wild woman.

Boots has gone into the back garden and is sat on the outside kitchen windowsill looking at me.

I pick her up with "You bad cat, what's wrong with you".  I get inside and I smell it.

Poo.

In the light I see it.  She is covered head to tail in poo -  with blood gently dripping from her ear for dramatic effect.

What is this?  Some kind of cat self-defence reaction?  Like an octopus squirts ink, is she now squirting poo at her enemies?

What do I do?  If I put her down she'll run off into the house trailing cat-poo everywhere.

"G!"

Right now I don't care if she fights every single cat in the neighbourhood and keeps us awake til two.  I am not letting a wild-eyed poo-covered cat in my house.  So, I check that her ear is OK, it is - just a tiny scratch - and G opens the door again and I deposit her unceremoniously outside.

I think I need to burn those jammies.

Really late seven quick takes -

I decided that I was going to really get back to some serious blogging and regularly post etc etc and one of the things I wanted to do was to do a Seven Quick Takes every Friday.  But here we are Saturday...anyway...

This Ain't the Lyceum

1. I've been so tired and headachy and grumpy this week

What is that?  Is it early menopause?  I keep dropping things and tripping up and banging my elbows too!  So frustrating.

2. Said tiredness and headachyness (haha I'm just making up words now) caused a minor meltdown

You know, one of those where your husband tells you what he thinks is good news and somehow five minutes later you're shaking your fist at the sky at the unfairness of it all....I'm going with early menopause

3. I'm in that horrible place between boredom and apathy.

I'm so bored, I think because I was ill for a couple of weeks and then it's school holidays and Bible College is on summer programme (only three days a month lectures).  So instead of getting up and proactively finding useful and absorbing things to do I've been surfing the net and generally procrastinating about all the things that need to be done.

4.  No, not menopause, I've decided that this must be a virus

The hubster feels exactly the same.  He's back at work after his gallbladder op and has a similar 'can't get motivated no energy life is dull' thing going on.

5.  Next week is going to be better

Next week I am going to be wonder woman, super-mum and Mrs Amazing all rolled into one.

6. Prioritise

Prioritising is what I need to do.  What do I want to get out of my week?  So I'm going to make a list of what I want to get out of the week in order of most importance.

7. But first...I'm going to do some internet surfing and general lazing around...

It's my birthday...and other general chit chat

I'm 42 today.  I'm like WELL old...as Chatterbox would say.  Although, yesterday whilst I was cleaning at my Grandma's flat (she lives in sheltered housing) one of her very elderly neighbours came out to see why one of her windows was wide open (Grandma never opens her windows for fear of wasps and burglars), I was distressed to see this little old lady wearing exactly the same jacket as me!  A jacket that I thought was very hip and young looking! Perhaps I need to update my wardrobe? LOL

Hubby bought me a lovely bottle of single malt whiskey.  I am slightly suspicious that really he's bought himself a little present there!  But he did take the time to find an oak aged one, which I love.

The girls are having a sleepover at their nana's tonight and me and hubby are going out for a meal. Should be lovely. Yay!

Mum and Dad are coming around later for cake and coffee - two of my most favourite things - mmm cake and coffee.... The cake must be large and the coffee must be strong and black.

Well, I'm not sure I've ever shared a tour of pictures of our new (ish) house.  We moved here in November, so perhaps I'll take some time to take some photos later.

I mentioned in one of my other posts that I've been ill recently.  We think it was e coli and one of the places I could possibly have picked it up is cleaning out the cat litter tray.  So I'm slightly very paranoid about getting sick again because I was really, really poorly.  Hubby took a sneaky photo.

Hahaha, lookin' goooood! :D

Have a lovely day. xxx

Moving Forward and Staying the Same

"Around here, however, we don't look backwards for very long. We keep moving forward, opening up new doors and doing new things, because we're curious... and curiosity keeps leading us down new paths."
- Walt Disney

I'd been thinking about the direction of this blog and what to do with it and what I wanted out of blogging when Sandra (one of my most favourite bloggers) wrote this post: Do Yourself a Favor, which is a brilliant post, just pop over for a read.

She writes:

"So I'm making a conscious effort to maintain what my blog is about, to never change it, whether its look or the content of the posts, it doesn't matter. I want my readers who have been here from the very beginning in 2006 to feel like this is home, familiar, not like a completely different blog they stumbled upon."

This is why I love Sandra's blog.  She is not ashamed of who she is, she writes beautifully and her love of her family and home are just so evident in her writing and photographs.

But for me, blogging has been a bit up and down over the years.  Since I started blogging in 2005, I've had numerous blogs, off the top of my head they have been: Seeking His Glory, Faith, Hope and Love, A Bend in the Road, Another Bend in the Road, Verity Grace, Like Sunshine in the Home and this one now. I've been known as Mrs. Blythe (named after my favourite book character), Verity Grace and now my real name Sarah H. Sadly I've lost everything prior to September 2009 because of changing blogs so much, but I did import things from my last three blogs to this one.

Looking back I wondered why I changed blogs so much really.  I think it's because I wanted to 'find myself' - perhaps thinking that the blog is always greener on the other side haha :D.  Perhaps because I belonged to a crazy church that tried to mold me into what the leadership wanted me to be I was almost a split personality and couldn't settle on who I wanted to 'be' online because the church wanted me to be a perfect clone.

The funny thing is, every time I've changed my blog they've all morphed back into being very similar.  A mix of devotional, day-to-day family life, homemaking, and occasional angst about something...oh and funny pictures of cats and my obsession with words and etymology.

I set up this blog in reaction to leaving that crazy cultish church.  I think subconsciously I wanted to be like those spiritual abuse bloggers who help others in similar situations to escape the clutches of controlling and damaging churches.  Perhaps I saw myself with a huge group of adoring followers and a book deal. Hahahaha.  But of course this blog has done what all my other blogs have done, morphed back to type...and I have very few followers. LOL.

Symphony of Love, Flickr

I'm glad in a way.  Of course I will still share my experiences and rants about struggling with church stuff, but I'm glad it's not just about that.  I don't want to dwell in perpetual victimhood.  It's all about moving forward in my life and enjoying it!  I've lectured about spiritual abuse at our local bible college and people have been helped by it, so I can use my experiences to help others.  I don't want to name and shame, that's not what my blog's about, instead I want to document how I personally am moving forward.  And, of course, continue to share my day-to-day life and thoughts about this, that and the other.

I've learned that It's OK to Fail and it's OK just to be me.  Not perfect.  Not a clone.

I'm moving forward, but I'm still being me.

I started this post with a Walt Disney quote which is quoted in the film Meet the Robinsons.  Here's another from this film:

- You failed!
- And it was awesome!
- Exceptional!
- Outstanding!
- I've seen better.
- From failing, you learn.
- From success, not so much.

Four lessons I've learned:

• You do learn from your mistakes.  
• God does use messy people.  
• You only find out who you are by moving away from who you're not.  
• You can enjoy life while you're doing all this.

Let's hope that I stick with this blog from now on...but I can't guarantee it ;) hahaha

Big hugs and happy blogging!

Hahaha

Chatterbox this morning *breathlessly*:

"Mummy! Oh my gosh, I just had the WORST dream. I was making my breakfast and I went to the fridge and it was like SKIMMED MILK! Awful."

Hahaha, they really make me laugh.

Long time no see..

...for want of a witty post-title.

Wow, is it really April since I last posted?

What have I been up to?

Well, I've lectured at our local Bible college on spiritual abuse, I've preached at our church about 'Oaks of Righteousness', I've been looking after Grandma more often because my mum's been poorly, hubby after he had his gallbladder operation, and then he was looking after me when I caught what was most likely an E Coli bug that I am still recovering from.

The girls have both finished school now for the summer holidays. Yay!  Squidge has finished primary school for good, she's 11 now and will be starting high school in September.  She was so emotional leaving primary school as all her friends are going to a different high school.  I must say I got a little emotional too, my baby is growing up far too fast.

So some rest is in order.  I need to get healthy after this bug and to just get right and enjoy my time with my girls.

Resting, B Higham

Then I have numerous jobs around the house that needs doing.  Sort out the garden. Reorganise our filing.  Sort out some drawers that are just full of stuff.  Tidy out a cupboard that is full of boxes that I haven't gone through properly since we moved house.

I'm hoping to do some blogging too.

:)