I'm giving wordpress a whirl. I may be back. I haven't decided which I prefer yet, but for now I shall be updating over at www.giveagirltherightshoes.wordpress.com
So come visit!
Saturday, 21 July 2012
Wednesday, 18 July 2012
Song of the day: No Doubt - Settle Down
NO DOUBT ARE BACK!
I haven't made up my mind on this, their comeback single, yet. Tragic Kingdom is my favourite album of all time and I'm not gonna lie I was hoping for more guitar back in their ska. But saying that, this is suprisingly catchy.
It's like I shouldn't like it, but I do.
Thursday, 12 July 2012
Me + dogs + countyside walks ...the photos!
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| "Ooh a stick!" ...easily pleased doggies. |
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| Muddy puddles! |
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| Muddy dog! |
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| Pylons - the breadcrumbs back to where we started! |
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| My favourite doggy (Ssssh, don't tell the other two!)
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| Me! (See... me! In the countryside!) |
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| The doggies conspire to get me lost ...again! |
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| Everyone always remember the day a dog ran through the school grounds ...! (This school narrowly avoided that day!) |
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| How do you get three labradors in an Astra? :-) |
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| How cute? |
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| Ah more puddles! |
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| The troublesome twosome! |
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| Mud bath! |
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| The doggies head home! |
Things I've learnt:
1. Labradors like mud and water, mud and water mixed together is a special bonus
2. It's not a walk until there's been some dog on dog humping
3. Standing next to an electricity pylon in a lightening storm is scary
4. Dogs will do anything if they think there is a treat or biscuit involved
5. Green frisbees get lost very easily in green trees
And last but not least...
6. Despite being more Eastenders than Emmerdale ...even I can survive looking after three dogs ...in the countryside!!
Sunday, 8 July 2012
Dressing up
This is the beautiful dress that I wore out on Friday night for a friend's birthday. Felt very glamourous in it ...which is unusual for me! 'Tis from Topshop and I have since been informed that the studded pattern is apparently bang on trend, although I'm happy to say no one else was wearing anything like it on Friday.
Absolutely love it.
Saturday, 7 July 2012
More days like this please
A really great day at work. A lovely long walk in the woods with the dogs ...that I actually managed to time between downpours! Some time spent spoiling the guinea pigs and then cleaning out their hutch. All the chores around the house done and out the way. A gorgeous long soak in the bath ...and a little mini nap.
Admittedly today has been nothing special, but somehow it's also been pretty perfect!
Now I have a whole evening to myself with a few magazines, the infamous Mr. Grey and a tub of Ben and Jerry's.
Bliss.
Admittedly today has been nothing special, but somehow it's also been pretty perfect!
Now I have a whole evening to myself with a few magazines, the infamous Mr. Grey and a tub of Ben and Jerry's.
Bliss.
Sunday, 1 July 2012
Three labs, two kids and a little lady
Three reasonably sized labradors and two kids. This is what I am up against for the next two weeks while I dog sit and I'm not sure I have really thought this through. I mean it doesn't take a mathematical genius to work out that's five. FIVE, versus just ONE! It only occured to me exactly how outnumbered I am when attempting for the first time the logisitcs of taking the dogs (and kids of course) up to the woods for a walk this morning.
I was actually, and naively, really looking forward to dog walking. And in my naive excitement had banished all questions and possible things that could go wrong from my mind. Right up until about five minutes before I was about to go that is! Stood in the kitchen I looked around at the three labs - the two chocolate labs and my favourite (sssh don't tell the other two!) the black lab, and the two kids (my boys aged 5 and 11) - and then I looked down at myself and my two, pretty delicate small hands, my mere 8 stone of a frame and my distinct lack of a deep booming voice ...all I was equipped with to control this excitable brood! Needless to say this was the moment I panicked. This panic even involved a phone call in an attempt to rope in some back up - unfortunately though, back up was still in bed ...what with it being a Sunday morning and all, so after some words of reassurance I was left to face this jumble of animals and kids head on and feign confidence to lead them out for a walk in the woods.
Just "leading" the brood out through the front door proved more difficult than anticipated. Doggy one (the black lab) was connected to his lead with ease, as was doggy two (the smaller chocolate lab). But somehow in between connecting doggy one and doggy two to their leads, doggy three (the larger chocolate lab) had grabbed the end of doggy one's lead in his mouth and was now trying to play tug of war ...against doggy one's wishes. This resulted in doggy one being pulled and dragged like a giant furry lump of unimpressed-ness around the kitchen, with doggy three barking and snarling louder and louder determined to encourage a full on tug of war competition and insistant that I was not going to gain control of doggy one's lead. What must have been a good 10 minutes later doggy three FINALLY dropped his end of the lead and for a brief moment the whole tribe was under control and we made it out of the house.
Cue the next game...
I had been given many tips on the 'getting the hounds into the car routine' before their owners left. All of which left me with visions of the dogs willingly just popping themselves up into the boot of the car one by one like something out of a disney film. And all this compliance relied on was taking the right dog in first allowing the others to just follow on. So doggy one was lead to the car and as expected he just popped himself up into the boot and began to settle ready for the journey. Doggy two - who was actually doggy three in the previous paragraph, followed quite willingly and into the boot he went. Actual doggy two, who was sharing a double lead with doggy three decided that she didn't want to get in the boot with the two boys ...and so began the antics of trying to get her in. When she finally jumped in the boot of her own accord, out jumped doggy three! And so ensued a game of you jump in and I'll jump out, lasting several frustrating but admittedly quite amusing minutes until finally as one jumped in I managed to grab the other lifting them into the boot whether they liked it or not and swiftly shutting all three doggies safely in.
So kids, dogs and me all made it into my poor old Vauxhall Astra ready to go. And as promised by their owners all dogs laid down nicely once the car was moving and we made it to the woods easily enough. Arriving at the woods and getting the kids and dogs out the car also turned out to be relatively simple...
But the peace and 'lets stroll relaxingly through the woods feeling' didn't last long. It takes no more than two minutes for the smallest doggy to slip herself out of her collar and run off like a naughty child freed for the first time and it takes no more than five minutes for the two biggest dogs to find the boggiest, muddiest, wettest, grossest puddle in the world to run through. There is mud and just yucky wet stinky dog everywhere. But no, just running through this patch of bog once wasn't enough ....obviously. The black lab and the bigger of the two chocolate labs felt it necessary to use the bog to challenge one another to a mud wrestle! Yes. An actual mud wrestle. There is mud and water flying everywhere as the two dogs snarl and growl and tumble and pull and chase each other until eventually the fear that their fellow walkers are too far ahead sets in and they seperate from each other almost in tandem to shake the mud and water from their coats, before running on to catch up with me, the little lab who has now been reunited with her collar and the two boys.
The rest of the walk is reasonably uneventful. Bar the odd run in with another fiesty dog or a walker that didn't really want two muddy labs rubbing against them ...oh and the strange man sat on a bench part way round who after the way he responded to a simple "morning" could easily have been presumed an escapee from the nearby pyschiatric prison ...it may be pretty much standard practise that as a dog walker you say morning or hello to all you pass by, but for further walks we may just nod and move away from him or any other weird and suspicous men that may be lurking.
Anyway, all was back on track and going ok.
Until we got lost.
"The dogs know where they're going and if all else fails the boys'll know" I was promised many times before the owners left ...and again this morning during the reassurances from my failed back up. However it turned out that neither dogs nor kids really did know where they were going. Especially not the kids. Although it had already been discussed that my five year olds sense of navigation was possibly not the most reliable. We started to realise we really were lost as we approached a stream that nobody had remembered seeing on any other attempts at this walk. And we started to realise we were approaching a stream when we heard the sound of three dogs splashing, jumping and wading through the water as much and as ferociously as they could before being inevitably caught and dragged out. Three big furry, muddy and now soaking wet stinky doggies eventually came out the stream and all six of us looked around, completely miffed as to where we were.
As it started to rain and the dark black clouds left the woods looking slightly creepy I found myself trying to calm the hysterical little girl inside me. The dogs were wet and stinky and muddy, the kids were starting to lose patience and look a little worried and I was responsible for making sure we all got home in one piece, all six of us! Counting to ten and taking a few deep breaths I managed to gain enough rationale to lead the brood back the way we had came in an attempt to to find the path that led back to the car. With a slightly scary, hissing, but pretty useful, row of electricity pylons to guide our way we only got lost once more before finally finding our way back to the car.
Amusingly, in hind sight, the smell and silence as we drove home said it all! But with one down and thirteen more trips up the woods to go, I reckon there is hope for us yet and we can get this down to a military precision routine in no time... !
I was actually, and naively, really looking forward to dog walking. And in my naive excitement had banished all questions and possible things that could go wrong from my mind. Right up until about five minutes before I was about to go that is! Stood in the kitchen I looked around at the three labs - the two chocolate labs and my favourite (sssh don't tell the other two!) the black lab, and the two kids (my boys aged 5 and 11) - and then I looked down at myself and my two, pretty delicate small hands, my mere 8 stone of a frame and my distinct lack of a deep booming voice ...all I was equipped with to control this excitable brood! Needless to say this was the moment I panicked. This panic even involved a phone call in an attempt to rope in some back up - unfortunately though, back up was still in bed ...what with it being a Sunday morning and all, so after some words of reassurance I was left to face this jumble of animals and kids head on and feign confidence to lead them out for a walk in the woods.
Just "leading" the brood out through the front door proved more difficult than anticipated. Doggy one (the black lab) was connected to his lead with ease, as was doggy two (the smaller chocolate lab). But somehow in between connecting doggy one and doggy two to their leads, doggy three (the larger chocolate lab) had grabbed the end of doggy one's lead in his mouth and was now trying to play tug of war ...against doggy one's wishes. This resulted in doggy one being pulled and dragged like a giant furry lump of unimpressed-ness around the kitchen, with doggy three barking and snarling louder and louder determined to encourage a full on tug of war competition and insistant that I was not going to gain control of doggy one's lead. What must have been a good 10 minutes later doggy three FINALLY dropped his end of the lead and for a brief moment the whole tribe was under control and we made it out of the house.
Cue the next game...
I had been given many tips on the 'getting the hounds into the car routine' before their owners left. All of which left me with visions of the dogs willingly just popping themselves up into the boot of the car one by one like something out of a disney film. And all this compliance relied on was taking the right dog in first allowing the others to just follow on. So doggy one was lead to the car and as expected he just popped himself up into the boot and began to settle ready for the journey. Doggy two - who was actually doggy three in the previous paragraph, followed quite willingly and into the boot he went. Actual doggy two, who was sharing a double lead with doggy three decided that she didn't want to get in the boot with the two boys ...and so began the antics of trying to get her in. When she finally jumped in the boot of her own accord, out jumped doggy three! And so ensued a game of you jump in and I'll jump out, lasting several frustrating but admittedly quite amusing minutes until finally as one jumped in I managed to grab the other lifting them into the boot whether they liked it or not and swiftly shutting all three doggies safely in.
So kids, dogs and me all made it into my poor old Vauxhall Astra ready to go. And as promised by their owners all dogs laid down nicely once the car was moving and we made it to the woods easily enough. Arriving at the woods and getting the kids and dogs out the car also turned out to be relatively simple...
But the peace and 'lets stroll relaxingly through the woods feeling' didn't last long. It takes no more than two minutes for the smallest doggy to slip herself out of her collar and run off like a naughty child freed for the first time and it takes no more than five minutes for the two biggest dogs to find the boggiest, muddiest, wettest, grossest puddle in the world to run through. There is mud and just yucky wet stinky dog everywhere. But no, just running through this patch of bog once wasn't enough ....obviously. The black lab and the bigger of the two chocolate labs felt it necessary to use the bog to challenge one another to a mud wrestle! Yes. An actual mud wrestle. There is mud and water flying everywhere as the two dogs snarl and growl and tumble and pull and chase each other until eventually the fear that their fellow walkers are too far ahead sets in and they seperate from each other almost in tandem to shake the mud and water from their coats, before running on to catch up with me, the little lab who has now been reunited with her collar and the two boys.
The rest of the walk is reasonably uneventful. Bar the odd run in with another fiesty dog or a walker that didn't really want two muddy labs rubbing against them ...oh and the strange man sat on a bench part way round who after the way he responded to a simple "morning" could easily have been presumed an escapee from the nearby pyschiatric prison ...it may be pretty much standard practise that as a dog walker you say morning or hello to all you pass by, but for further walks we may just nod and move away from him or any other weird and suspicous men that may be lurking.
Anyway, all was back on track and going ok.
Until we got lost.
"The dogs know where they're going and if all else fails the boys'll know" I was promised many times before the owners left ...and again this morning during the reassurances from my failed back up. However it turned out that neither dogs nor kids really did know where they were going. Especially not the kids. Although it had already been discussed that my five year olds sense of navigation was possibly not the most reliable. We started to realise we really were lost as we approached a stream that nobody had remembered seeing on any other attempts at this walk. And we started to realise we were approaching a stream when we heard the sound of three dogs splashing, jumping and wading through the water as much and as ferociously as they could before being inevitably caught and dragged out. Three big furry, muddy and now soaking wet stinky doggies eventually came out the stream and all six of us looked around, completely miffed as to where we were.
As it started to rain and the dark black clouds left the woods looking slightly creepy I found myself trying to calm the hysterical little girl inside me. The dogs were wet and stinky and muddy, the kids were starting to lose patience and look a little worried and I was responsible for making sure we all got home in one piece, all six of us! Counting to ten and taking a few deep breaths I managed to gain enough rationale to lead the brood back the way we had came in an attempt to to find the path that led back to the car. With a slightly scary, hissing, but pretty useful, row of electricity pylons to guide our way we only got lost once more before finally finding our way back to the car.
Amusingly, in hind sight, the smell and silence as we drove home said it all! But with one down and thirteen more trips up the woods to go, I reckon there is hope for us yet and we can get this down to a military precision routine in no time... !
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