My son finished school on May 20 and then finished his exams on June 20 having therefore had several weeks of nothing to do for the lst few weeks but on the whole he has managed to amuse himself.
My daughter has been home for 2 and a half weeks and she claims that she is bored. She has had a 5 day visit from her boyfriend, squabbled with her brother, been out with her friends, bickered with her brother, celebrated her birthday, squabbled with her brother, read a lot of books, bickered with her brother and today she is so bored that she is emptying her bedroom of all the detritus acquired over the last 20 years. For that last reason I am rather delighted that she is so bored.
I on the other hand am in danger of losing my mind - this is only the beginning of the summer break - can I take the squabbles for the next two months?
Tuesday, 19 July 2011
Monday, 4 July 2011
There is so much going on just now that I may have to split the blog into several parts.
Last week was my son's high school prom. Oh my he looked so handsome, so grown up and sooo smart. It warms a mother's heart to see a teenaged boy looking so smart and tidy. Such a shame it was only for the one night. I must add that he isn't sneering in the photographs but struggling (and failing) not to squint because of the sun in his eyes.
He and his friend went in a BMW 730d driven by a friend from church.
The next day when I asked him how the evening was, his response was "the car was amazing!" He then went on to tell me all about how it felt, how smooth it was and all the other features of the car, hardly a word about the prom. Our friend also volunteered to go and pick them up at the end of the evening so that they could leave in the same style as they had arrived in, unlike their colleagues who were standing around waiting for parents to pick them up in the family car.
My husband came home for the weekend - and a very busy weekend it was too. I drove to Lancaster on Friday to help our daughter to get her flat cleaned and packed up at the end of her first year of university. I had booked myself into a hotel for the night to enable me to get an early start the next day. It was quite a treat to have a hotel room to myself - usually when we stay in a hotel there are either 3 or 4 of us in the one room, so it felt huge and I was able to use the bathroom at my leisure. Such a shame I left my nightie behind! My husband and son came over the next day to help with the packing and transporting. It is a good thing they did, there is no way we could have got it all into one car - both cars were packed to the roof with her belongings - and that included the back seats - think I will hire a removals van next year! There were four of them sharing a flat (self contained study bedrooms with en-suite bathrooms and a large shared kitchen). Most of them were very good about cleaning up behind themselves but just one of them was a lazy little madam who thought she shouldn't have to clean anything and didn't. Whilst it may have seemed like pandering to her idleness to do the cleaning, we didn't want to lose any deposit - she didn't care. I spent hours cleaning a filthy oven - the girl couldn't be bothered to buy a baking tray so she just put things on the shelves. She left food to go mouldy in the fridge, staining the plastic in the process, she couldn't even be bothered to empty her frozen food out of the freezer so that I could defrost it. She just told me to throw it out. By 2pm having cleaned the kitchen thoroughly and washed the floor I warned her to be careful about walking on the wet floor at which point she was just beginning to pack up her clothes. Now we are awaiting her first year results which will be posted online in a couple of weeks.
Sunday
We were planning to make this Father's Day as it was going to be the first day we were all together since before the official Fathers' Day but we had forgotten that Christopher was going to be paintballing all day for his friend's birthday. So it was just the three of us for most of the day. The weather was very hot and we were not really up for much more than vegetating in the cool of the sitting room. As David was not going back until this evening we just moved the day from Sunday to Monday.
Monday
We went out for lunch today to a Chinese restaurant which does a buffet style presentation so that we could all have a little of whatever we fancied. It went down very well. David was very pleased with his presents and he enjoyed the day and in fact pronounced the whole weekend a great time. We spent the morning finishing off getting Elizabeth's possessions put away - a mammoth task in itself - and clearing up so that we could make space in the spare room for her boyfriend to come and stay tomorrow in time for her birthday on Wednesday. David has now left for London again in preparation for going back to work tomorrow. It is always sad when he goes away but we are grateful that he has the work. We are praying hard that the contract will be extended again to give him some work over the autumn and winter periods.
Well I seem to have managed to condense it all into one post and have brought the blog up to date - I wonder what I have missed out?
Last week was my son's high school prom. Oh my he looked so handsome, so grown up and sooo smart. It warms a mother's heart to see a teenaged boy looking so smart and tidy. Such a shame it was only for the one night. I must add that he isn't sneering in the photographs but struggling (and failing) not to squint because of the sun in his eyes.
He and his friend went in a BMW 730d driven by a friend from church.
My husband came home for the weekend - and a very busy weekend it was too. I drove to Lancaster on Friday to help our daughter to get her flat cleaned and packed up at the end of her first year of university. I had booked myself into a hotel for the night to enable me to get an early start the next day. It was quite a treat to have a hotel room to myself - usually when we stay in a hotel there are either 3 or 4 of us in the one room, so it felt huge and I was able to use the bathroom at my leisure. Such a shame I left my nightie behind! My husband and son came over the next day to help with the packing and transporting. It is a good thing they did, there is no way we could have got it all into one car - both cars were packed to the roof with her belongings - and that included the back seats - think I will hire a removals van next year! There were four of them sharing a flat (self contained study bedrooms with en-suite bathrooms and a large shared kitchen). Most of them were very good about cleaning up behind themselves but just one of them was a lazy little madam who thought she shouldn't have to clean anything and didn't. Whilst it may have seemed like pandering to her idleness to do the cleaning, we didn't want to lose any deposit - she didn't care. I spent hours cleaning a filthy oven - the girl couldn't be bothered to buy a baking tray so she just put things on the shelves. She left food to go mouldy in the fridge, staining the plastic in the process, she couldn't even be bothered to empty her frozen food out of the freezer so that I could defrost it. She just told me to throw it out. By 2pm having cleaned the kitchen thoroughly and washed the floor I warned her to be careful about walking on the wet floor at which point she was just beginning to pack up her clothes. Now we are awaiting her first year results which will be posted online in a couple of weeks.
Sunday
We were planning to make this Father's Day as it was going to be the first day we were all together since before the official Fathers' Day but we had forgotten that Christopher was going to be paintballing all day for his friend's birthday. So it was just the three of us for most of the day. The weather was very hot and we were not really up for much more than vegetating in the cool of the sitting room. As David was not going back until this evening we just moved the day from Sunday to Monday.
Monday
We went out for lunch today to a Chinese restaurant which does a buffet style presentation so that we could all have a little of whatever we fancied. It went down very well. David was very pleased with his presents and he enjoyed the day and in fact pronounced the whole weekend a great time. We spent the morning finishing off getting Elizabeth's possessions put away - a mammoth task in itself - and clearing up so that we could make space in the spare room for her boyfriend to come and stay tomorrow in time for her birthday on Wednesday. David has now left for London again in preparation for going back to work tomorrow. It is always sad when he goes away but we are grateful that he has the work. We are praying hard that the contract will be extended again to give him some work over the autumn and winter periods.
Well I seem to have managed to condense it all into one post and have brought the blog up to date - I wonder what I have missed out?
Tuesday, 21 June 2011
A quick catch up
I had forgotten how long ago I started this blog - I think I thought it was sometime last autumn but having looked back I see it was in May and so many things which I blogged about back then have moved on. My daughter was taking her A Levels, hoping to secure a place at university and she has now just about finished her first year at university. My son headed into Year 11 and GCSEs and has now finished them and has left school. The anniversary of my great-nephew's death has been and gone and today is the anniversary of his funeral. The pain doesn't get any easier for his parents and siblings but life goes on and they have to do so too. Back in August my daughter went off at short notice to help out at camp and she loved it so much that she is planning on heading there again this year. She was sharing a tent with another girl who it turned out was already at Lancaster University which was a great blessing to her as it meant that when she arrived at university she already knew someone. Next year they are even sharing a house!
Monday, 20 June 2011
Work and Exams
Gosh - so long since I posted. In my last post I mentioned that I had got a job but that it was having detrimental effects on my knees and feet. Sadly those detrimental effects got much worse and eventually I had to heed medical advice to give it up. My right knee was becoming so painful and swollen that it was almost impossible to stand on it at all. I had a course of Ostenil injections which gave me one week of blessed relief - or could that have been down to the fact that I was off work for a week. They should have given me a lot more weeks of relief but unfortunately the damage is too severe and I am now awaiting a knee replacement operation.
In addition to that the standing on my feet meant that my arches dropped and I now have flat feet, which means that my feet have spread and I now need shoes a size larger - not good news when you already take a size 8.
Nothing much has changed in our lives, work is still an issue. I am struggling to find something I can do which isn't affected by my knee and my husband is still on temporary contracts, although the current one is for 6 months. He is working in London (but not the job he went for in all that snow - they didn't even get back to him - so rude!) and only gets home every other weekend and sometimes not even that. We don't want to complain though - it is work after all.
Over the last few weeks we have been suffering examination fever - my son has been doing his GCSEs and my daughter had her last 1st year examination at university this morning. Thank goodness they can both relax now. My son - my baby - has now left school - where did the time go? Now we have the long wait to August for his results. Fortunately Beth will get her results within a couple of weeks. In the meantime Christopher has his prom in a couple of weeks, his tux is hired and shoes bought, now all we have to do is get his hair cut - major event! He looks so wonderful in his tux - it does a mother's heart good to see him.
In addition to that the standing on my feet meant that my arches dropped and I now have flat feet, which means that my feet have spread and I now need shoes a size larger - not good news when you already take a size 8.
Nothing much has changed in our lives, work is still an issue. I am struggling to find something I can do which isn't affected by my knee and my husband is still on temporary contracts, although the current one is for 6 months. He is working in London (but not the job he went for in all that snow - they didn't even get back to him - so rude!) and only gets home every other weekend and sometimes not even that. We don't want to complain though - it is work after all.
Over the last few weeks we have been suffering examination fever - my son has been doing his GCSEs and my daughter had her last 1st year examination at university this morning. Thank goodness they can both relax now. My son - my baby - has now left school - where did the time go? Now we have the long wait to August for his results. Fortunately Beth will get her results within a couple of weeks. In the meantime Christopher has his prom in a couple of weeks, his tux is hired and shoes bought, now all we have to do is get his hair cut - major event! He looks so wonderful in his tux - it does a mother's heart good to see him.
Monday, 29 November 2010
A Job!
Goodness - I hadn't realised that it was so long since I last posted on here. It has been a very busy time for me. On one morning a few weeks ago I had the urge to visit a local shopping centre - one of those Designer Outlets. There are often little notices in shop windows saying that they need staff, the first place I went to had one of those and when I went in they wanted someone part-time in the middle of the day. I walked in for a chat and came out with the job. I have been there for over three weeks now and although it doesn't pay much every little helps. I have really suffered for it, with blisters and sore feet - oh how my feet have hurt! My legs have hurt and my knee has swollen, but it is (almost) worth it - my feet & legs are just about getting used to it and the (pitiful) income has been a great help. My family have a habit to feed - it is called "eating" and my income pays for it.
There have been times when I really have not wanted to go into work, there have been times when I have been there when I just wanted to be at home, but on the whole I enjoy it. It is not, and never will be, my dream job but it is good to have a job to go to, to be able to interact with other people and to have a challenge.
My husband has his first interview in months tomorrow when he has to get himself to London by mid-morning. Typically the weather has taken a turn for the worse just as he needs to travel, so he decided that it would be wiser to go by train and after all there is a London train from the station around the corner from us, all very convenient and helpful. This morning however he discovered that most of the London Trains on Grand Central were cancelled today and with more snow forecast this evening and overnight we are not hopeful that they will be running tomorrow. We will need to pray that things work out for him.
Temperatures have plummeted here and the snow is causing many problems but we are not too badly affected just yet. Beth is not impressed that they have had only a light dusting of snow on the West side of the country - she is hoping for more snow - silly girl.
There have been times when I really have not wanted to go into work, there have been times when I have been there when I just wanted to be at home, but on the whole I enjoy it. It is not, and never will be, my dream job but it is good to have a job to go to, to be able to interact with other people and to have a challenge.
My husband has his first interview in months tomorrow when he has to get himself to London by mid-morning. Typically the weather has taken a turn for the worse just as he needs to travel, so he decided that it would be wiser to go by train and after all there is a London train from the station around the corner from us, all very convenient and helpful. This morning however he discovered that most of the London Trains on Grand Central were cancelled today and with more snow forecast this evening and overnight we are not hopeful that they will be running tomorrow. We will need to pray that things work out for him.
Temperatures have plummeted here and the snow is causing many problems but we are not too badly affected just yet. Beth is not impressed that they have had only a light dusting of snow on the West side of the country - she is hoping for more snow - silly girl.
Friday, 29 October 2010
Jehovah Jireh
As I said in my bio I am definitely a "work in progress" as far as allowing God to be in control and am finding it very hard to deal with the fact that events are happening in our lives which we cannot control.
My husband has been in and out of work for around 18 months. He works as a contractor and in the past went from contract to contract with no difficulty but these days the contracts are few and far between. Last year he finished one contract at the end of October and didn't get any work again until February. This year he has worked for around 4 months on and off. His last contract should have been for 6 weeks (the shortest ever) but he and the team he was working with were just too efficient and they got the work done in 4 weeks. Since then he hasn't worked and when he doesn't work he doesn't get paid. We have been trying to find work but during these recessionary times it is just impossible. My husband has proved his willingness to go wherever the work is, he travels all over the country, staying in bed and breakfast hotels or whatever accommodation he can get just so that he can earn something, of course a great deal of it has to go on his accommodation costs. Usually he comes home at weekends for some family time but the last contract was in Plymouth which meant he was unable to come home as it was just too far.
We don't get social security and because when he was made redundant he took contracting work rather than making a claim on our mortgage protection insurance, it appears that our insurance is now invalid and they won't pay out. All our savings are gone, our overdraft is maxed out and we have no source of income. At a time like this we have great anxieties about or future, we have only two years left on our mortgage and to lose our home at this time would be a nightmare, it is heartbreaking to be unable to meet our financial commitments and to provide for our children. We don't know what is going to happen but we are sure that our Heavenly Father, who loves us more than we can know even to the point of giving His own beloved Son for us, knows what we need and will provide for us. Last week our son came home from school with the soles of his shoes separating from the uppers and we just didn't know what to do or how we were going to buy new shoes for him. The next morning we got a call from someone who wanted to give us a gift to help out. When we saw him we thanked him and said how grateful we were to be able to buy some shoes for our son, the next thing we knew the gift had been increased to cover the purchase of shoes. We just give thanks to God our Father for His loving concern. In my last posting I shared two passages of Scripture which God was impressing on my heart, and this week I have had two people who don't know of the existence of this blog have texted me to share exactly those passages. I think God is trying to tell me something! I firmly believe that God provides for our needs but sometimes He takes us very close to the wire. For me that wire is a line of trust, I have to believe that He will continue to provide for us despite all that seems to point to the opposite. I often think, and sometimes say to my husband, "it will be interesting to see how God gets us out of this one" Sometimes the trusting is so hard to do and I confess to feeling very down at times as our situation seems so hopeless, but one thing I know with absolute certainty is that however this situation turns out, I would rather go through it with God than without Him.
My husband has been in and out of work for around 18 months. He works as a contractor and in the past went from contract to contract with no difficulty but these days the contracts are few and far between. Last year he finished one contract at the end of October and didn't get any work again until February. This year he has worked for around 4 months on and off. His last contract should have been for 6 weeks (the shortest ever) but he and the team he was working with were just too efficient and they got the work done in 4 weeks. Since then he hasn't worked and when he doesn't work he doesn't get paid. We have been trying to find work but during these recessionary times it is just impossible. My husband has proved his willingness to go wherever the work is, he travels all over the country, staying in bed and breakfast hotels or whatever accommodation he can get just so that he can earn something, of course a great deal of it has to go on his accommodation costs. Usually he comes home at weekends for some family time but the last contract was in Plymouth which meant he was unable to come home as it was just too far.
We don't get social security and because when he was made redundant he took contracting work rather than making a claim on our mortgage protection insurance, it appears that our insurance is now invalid and they won't pay out. All our savings are gone, our overdraft is maxed out and we have no source of income. At a time like this we have great anxieties about or future, we have only two years left on our mortgage and to lose our home at this time would be a nightmare, it is heartbreaking to be unable to meet our financial commitments and to provide for our children. We don't know what is going to happen but we are sure that our Heavenly Father, who loves us more than we can know even to the point of giving His own beloved Son for us, knows what we need and will provide for us. Last week our son came home from school with the soles of his shoes separating from the uppers and we just didn't know what to do or how we were going to buy new shoes for him. The next morning we got a call from someone who wanted to give us a gift to help out. When we saw him we thanked him and said how grateful we were to be able to buy some shoes for our son, the next thing we knew the gift had been increased to cover the purchase of shoes. We just give thanks to God our Father for His loving concern. In my last posting I shared two passages of Scripture which God was impressing on my heart, and this week I have had two people who don't know of the existence of this blog have texted me to share exactly those passages. I think God is trying to tell me something! I firmly believe that God provides for our needs but sometimes He takes us very close to the wire. For me that wire is a line of trust, I have to believe that He will continue to provide for us despite all that seems to point to the opposite. I often think, and sometimes say to my husband, "it will be interesting to see how God gets us out of this one" Sometimes the trusting is so hard to do and I confess to feeling very down at times as our situation seems so hopeless, but one thing I know with absolute certainty is that however this situation turns out, I would rather go through it with God than without Him.
Friday, 22 October 2010
Blessings to the soul
Just after I had posted that last thread I had a look at a couple of other blogs which I follow from time to time, one of which contained a posting which was a reminder that God not only cares for us and has a plan for our lives but that that plan is already in motion. That posting was such a blessing to my soul. I would love to be able to reproduce it in full but will need to ask permission to do so.
In the meantime these Scriptures have been a lifeline to me during this anxious time.
In the meantime these Scriptures have been a lifeline to me during this anxious time.
"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."
Jeremiah 29: 10-12
"Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life? "And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? So do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well".
Matthew 6:26-33
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