Happy Homemaker Monday

The weather in my neck of the woods:
Snow/sleet, so very damp and the roads are trecherous.

One of my simple pleasures:
A quiet time in the morning with a book and the cat on my knee.

On my bedside table:
The Stripping of the Altars and The Book of Common Prayer and my Bible.

Edit: Just been to the library and also got some cook books: From My Mother's Kitchen, Food on a Budget, Gorgeous Suppers. Also: You're Coming With Me Lad: Tales of a Yorkshire Bobby

On my TV:

• I've been really enjoying Got to Dance on Sky1, it's really good. I really like Ashley Banjo who is the choreographer and dancer with the dance group Diversity who won Britain's Got Talent last year (the Susan Boyle year!).He comes across as a really nice bloke.
  
• We watched a DVD my Dad lent us called The Insider*, which was the true story of a whistle blower from the tobacco industry. It had some choice language in it, but was very moving. *The link takes you to the website of Jeffrey Wigand who was the whistle blower the film was based on. It is quite sickening what these awful companies can do just because they have so much money even though they promote a something, which is dangerous for health.
  
• We're looking forward to the new series of CSI coming back on this week and Criminal Minds is on soon too.
  

On the menu for tonight:
Spaghetti Bolognese

On my To Do List:
Catching up with chores after the weekend.
Clean the fridge.
Some washing and ironing.
Taking the girls to dancing.

New Recipe I tried last week:
No new recipes.

In the craft basket:
Nothing at the minute.

Looking forward to:
Going over to some friends from church who record and write music and 'jammin' with them! :)

Homemaking Tip for this week:
On a Monday set a timer and spend just 5 minutes in every room working your way round the house. First, tidy if the room is tidy then clean, if the room is clean then organise, if the room is tidy, clean and organised then sit down and have a brew you deserve it! If you have lots of time you could spend 10 minutes in every room. It's a good way to start if you don't know where to start or if your house just needs a bit of a fettle before visitors come round.

Favorite Blog Post of the week (mine or other):
The Care and Feeding of Children by The Bookworm. It really made me think again about the food I prepare and feed our family, and also modern attitudes to food. And it also made me want to get back to making some good hearty breakfasts rather than cereal and toast constantly!

Favourite photo from last week:

When Geese Attack!

Lesson learned the past few days:
That the love of Christ conquers all. That my church is like WAY cool.

On my Prayer List:
My dear friend who has cancer and is being put onto an aggressive cancer treatment. However, she is a walking miracle confounding doctors, they cannot imagine how she has carried on with her life. She is an inspiration - but does suffer so needs lots of prayer.
My Dad who has been made redundant and who finishes in March.
My family, my church and my friends.

Devotionals, Scripture Reading, Key Verses:
[W]hoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. Matthew 18:4 NIV

Hosted by Sandra at Diary of a Stay at Home Mom.

Words, word, glorious words...

Slice of Life has just passed on a couple more words...

US English: hutch = British English: dresser (welsh dresser)

US English: credenza = British English: sideboard

That's funny. For me a hutch is something a rabbit lives in.

Has anyone got any more interesting transatlantic differences?

Far too much internetting

Well in between playing bejeweled on facebook and idly reading a variety of blogs and websites I am starting to go boss-eyed. So I need to go do something constructive, like reading! :) I'm still enjoying The Stripping of the Altars.

I want to start incorporating some extra cleaning now that Christmas is over, the things that get missed like the inside of cupboards, etc.

If you like to do a big project then here are a couple of links to a New Year cleaning plan (Hat tip to Sandra):
2010 New Year's Cleaning Grand Plan
Complete text: Grand Cleaning Plan

I'm not sure if I am going to go all out for a grand cleaning plan or just put in a couple of 15 minute projects a day. Depends whether I'm feeling overwhelmed or not. If the weather stays bad and I can't get to church/the village during the week (I do a bit of voluntary work at church on the phones and sometimes in the coffee shop and I help out at Grandma's) then I can plunge into something major but if things start to clear up then I think a bit here and there would be better.

Well, now I've bored you all with my cleaning plans, here is some excerpts from a song our Music Group leader sang this morning:

Still Your Soul in Silence by Don Francisco

So many turns, so many ways, so many voices cry
Standing at the crossroads watching time go flashing by
Indecision paralyses, it's the fear of choosing wrong
But waiting is a step itself and you're wondering too long
So again you search the scriptures and again you ask your friends
But last of all the One Who knows the beginning from the end
In the clamour and confusion, and the blindness of your choice
Still your soul in silence, and listen for His voice.

That is quite beautiful and I feel a deep truth to these words. "The fear of choosing wrong", I think that is a little of where I was at yesterday. Christianity is vibrant and varied, but at the heart of it is Jesus Christ - He is the One we all seek; and if we do genuinely seek then we will find. At the end of the seeking, we will know that our seeking is actually the Lord drawing us - as the Good Shepherd the Lord finds the lost sheep and carries him home.

You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. Jeremiah 29:13 (NIV)

No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him, and I will raise him up at the last day. John 6:44 (NIV)

See I'm still on the internet! Must go xxxxx

Hi-de-hi, ho-de-ho

I spend far too long reading these sites...

There may be? Perhaps just a peek...arghhh!

Oddly Specific

Intriguing!

The next cartoon made me laugh because it's so true.

Cartoon Church

However, sometimes church members can be just a tad too enthusiastic about visitors and newcomers.

This next picture just made me giggle.

see more Lolcats and funny pictures

And if you ever get fed-up with your spider monkey, just swap it. They're authorised.

see more Engrish

Geese attack! Cat attack!

After school (yes school was open!) I agreed to take the kiddiwinks up to the lake (about 150 yards from our house so not really a strenuous trek) to feed the ducks. Two of the neighbour's children came with us too.

Well, there weren't many ducks, but there was a fair outbreak of Canada geese.


Yikes!

So we fed them. The poor goosies and duckies (and three swans) haven't got much space for swimming, so they milled about, "honk, quack, honk, hiss, honk quack". The whole lake, barring a water hole here and there, is frozen. I've seen photos from Victorian times of ice skaters and even horse and carriages going across the lake. But I wouldn't chance it myself. Not that I have a horse and carriage mind you, or ice-skates for that matter. I wonder if I could drive a Citroen Saxo across it? Perhaps not.


The sun was starting to set, turning the sky pink. It was quite beautiful. And peaceful. There's something so quiet and peaceful about snow. Unfortunately, some of my photos are a little blurred, I'm not sure if the camera has condensation problems or whether I'm just useless!


My beloved hills.




The geese took umbrage at us leaving and chased us...creating screaming children left, right and centre.
On the way back we picked up Squidge's friend from school to take her to play at our house for an hour. Squidge was pretty chuffed about that and got rather excited. Lol.

Here is the final nativity on Epiphany yesterday. Wise men n' all. Next year a wooden nativity is essential. If only for protection against the local wildlife...our cat.


Chatterbox trying to restrain the cat. Who is officially snow-crazy.
So she just walked about on our Epiphany story pages. Why do cats so love to sit on pieces of paper?



I've had a lovely day today. Mum and I walked into the village. It was simply beautiful with the sun sparkling on the snow. I finally got to the post-office and we visited my Grandma, who at 90 is housebound and doubly housebound with the snow. Mum and I had some good chats as we walked. Thoroughly enjoyable.

On the way home we passed the girls' school and I saw Chatterbox having a whale of a time in the snow with her friends. "KISS!!", she bellowed through the fence, puckering up her lips. Lol, she's so cute.

We are most amused

I am a fan of these daft websites (Oddly Specific), it all began with lolcats and has extended to quite a few others. We are most amused.

Oddly specific

Do you think it's Treebeard?

"I am an Ent!"

I bought hubs Treebeard for Christmas. It talks and scares the living daylights out of our cat.

Oddly specific

I seriously lol'd and lol'd at this one. To put up a sign to tell people not to touch said sign is truly amazing and intriguing all at the same time.

Oddly specific

The Magic Roundabout (click on image to get a better look). We Brits love our roundabouts, here is an artistic piece of urban planning. Mini-roundabouts forming one big roundabout. It's quite mystical in its madness.

Church Times

I remember once hubs missing an important council meeting at church because we went sledging...although we did genuinely forget.

So here I sit

surrounded by pine needles.

I've finally removed the tree and have lost the will to clean. Carrying the tree out of the living room and through the hall has left most of the tree on the floor. The remaining twig is in the back garden and I need to sweep up the tree.

School is closed today due to the inclement weather. It's a bit brighter today, although we are getting an occasional snow flurry. So there is a cacophony symphony of children's voices upstairs. My grand plans have once again been foiled. I really need to get into the village today but I'm not walking 2.5 miles in deep snow with whinging delightful children. Lol, it's Squidge, she does not do cold feet. No amount of thick socks and wellies will protect her delicate little toes and after about 15 minutes she moves into auto-moan. And after another 15 minutes she starts skriking.

'Skriking' now there's a word. Pamela mentioned it in my comments the other day. It's a dialect word used round the Lancashire area, which means crying. "Stop tha' skriking tha's bein' a reet mard!" It's an Old Norse word, the language spoken during the Viking age. There were various settlements around the north-west of England and some words have stuck as dialect. Skriking in Norwegian also to mean to cry or shriek.

So, back to the snow. Here are some pics taken the other day when went out sledging:

Chatterbox setting her sledge up

Yesterday we had one of Chatterbox's friends over for tea. Her mum was telling me that they went sledging on this hill. Chatterbox's friend whizzed down and took her Dad clean off his feet, up into the air, and landed on his shoulder and ended up having to have a week off work. Lol - but a sympathy lol of course.

The canal

There's a couple who live in a canal boat who have visited our church a couple of times. I wonder how they're doing with the canal all frozen up?

So I must be away to vacuum and then the wise men are making their appearance.

They shall bring gold and frankincense, and shall proclaim the praise of the LORD.
Isaiah 60:6b (RSV)

Collect:
O God,
who by the leading of a star
manifested your only Son to the peoples of the earth:
mercifully grant that we,
who know you now by faith,
may at last behold your glory face to face;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.