Archive for the 'Macs' Category

Another lovely Summer’s Day

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pixieminx
on August 10, 2007
in Generally, Home-ed and Macs
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All up earlier than usual to go round and babysit J&K. Alex had to go off and leave me with the four kids most of the morning - but they were all great and played very nicely together 85% of the time!!!

The littlies (Hermionie (2) & K (3)) played the usual babies, picnics & dressing up whilst the biggies (Natalie (7) & J (6)) PS2′d and tried to infiltrate the babies game with the littlies. Natalie made up a fruit festival in J’s room - not quite sure what that entailed but they were all drawing fruit commanded by Natalie (exerting her leadership skills :-) ) who stuck them on the walls later for when S came home.

Kids had lunch in the garden and some fresh air play in the gorgeous sun then S came home - tried to show her how to use iPhoto but since I’ve known S - she’s never been one-with-the-computers bless her! - will have to coach her! Dropped off some of Natalie’s old clothes for K who was super impressed!

Got home just after 2pm and Natalie watched ROAR while boo (Hermionie) whinged for a bit (tired - but stubborn!!) I decided to take them to the library for Natalie to finish off the Big Wild Read - which I left her doing with the librarian while I watched over Hermionie & the entire box of Connors Toy Library Bits (it’s a library hun - we don’t come for the toys - what is it with other kids toys that keep mine so fascinated when they don’t really seem to ‘play’ with their own?) and rifled through all the lovely 5p each kids books for sale ( :-) ) - only came away with 11 this time, plus some Kipper & Wibbly pig (who must be referred to as Arnold - ‘cos Hermionie thinks it’s Arnold from Kipper!) books for Hermionie.

NanP  popped into the library to surprise us - I think Natalie finished the Big Wild Read thing OK - I forgot to check  :oops:  we’re supposed to go collect her medal in September I think??

Got home where Alex & GDadP were waiting for us. I had emptied the pool earlier and watered all green life possible with the water so it was time to fill it up again for the girls - lovely sunny afternoon for it!

Natalie, NanP & I tried to salvage what sunflower seeds we could from our strange 5-headed 2 foot high ‘Giant Sunflowers’.

Alex & I popped to Tesco due to the lack of foodstuffs for dinner around, NanP watched and played with the girls (while GDadP snoozed :-) )came home and had an impromptu little BBQ with Nan & GDad P. Girls had had lot’s of fun, swinging, in the pool, trampolining and building an impressive looking ‘farm’ in the sand pit with stones, shells & bits - all with NanP!!!

Lot’s of trampolining after Dinner and Alex joined them!!!!! - I think he’s only ever been on it once or twice! - I remember when both Alex & I were on it and we were in danger of needing it to be re-inforced!! - Alex jumped so hard it sent me flying!!!! So Girls & Alex had a good rough ‘n tumble session on the trampoline - until Alex got kicked in the head by Natalie (accidentally).

Tidied up the garden, got kids sorted - NanP read them a couple of books and put them to bed - both very tired I think, but after a good day. Arranged another 3 night sleepover for Natalie with them soon.

Lovely day :-)

What’s with the transformers - please explain…..

Published
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pixieminx
on August 9, 2007
in Generally and Macs
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More Smart on CBBC this morning - Natalie wants to try painting on toast with food colouring. I had to a spot of Technical Support with the Router - thought the WWW had been slow lately! The girls amused themselves - not too sure what they were doing though. :roll:

Natalie has now counted 13 chrysallises in the net!!!

Alex took the girls round S&G’s to gawk at some Transformers with G while I have been blogging retrospectively again (hence the details are a little foggy!), then we took the girls down the Inside-Out park. Popped into the Healthy Living Place for some very-nicely priced toothpaste & toothbrushes and found they were holding a cooking session - so Natalie wants to join in on the 24th - must fill the form out.

At the park, Natalie bumped into a girl she knew from school - they were in the same class - they played together for a couple of hours in the park with others - while I tried to keep Hermionie amused with the sand and on the swings - she joined in with her sister and other friends later on and was very pleased to be with the ‘big girls’. Came home with some fresh bramble for the sticky’s, I had to perform more technical support with the internet, Natalie & Hermionie watched ‘Hoodwinked’ and now Natalie is Watching the Shoebox diaries, Hermionie is being annoying and Alex is making dinner.

If anyone wants to donate a new 2.8Ghz 24″ iMac to me - feel free! :-)

Published
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pixieminx
on August 8, 2007
in Generally, Macs and Trips-out
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Went to Moors Valley with S, G, J & K - had a great day - picnic’d on the lawn by the lake then all off to the park, then it started raining! We sheltered under a tree for a while before deciding to set off through the forest trail despite the rain. We completed all the Forest Trail.

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Stopped off for Dinner at Harvester - Yum!

Got home and put 2 tired kids to bed and watched some Heroes.

I checked out new iMacs and iLife 08 - yes please! :lol:

Another Sunny Day

Published
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pixieminx
on August 5, 2007
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The sun’s here again!!! :razz:

Alex did a car boot sale (so don’t envy him having to get up early!!!)

Girls spent morning watching The Slammer and some other CBBC stuff (which is the current trend at the moment - usually they watch ROAR, SMart, Blue Peter and the Slammer if they’re on :roll: )

They spent the afternoon in the pool/sand garden with lots of thirst-quenching ice-poles.

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Natalie read lot’s of books last night and is more than ready to finish off her Big Wild Read at the library.

Alex & I nipped out leaving GDadF babysitting for an hour to pick up Hermionie’s new bed - a bargain! (from eBay!) and set it up in Natalie’s room - both kiddies in one room - sleepless nights ahead then! It’s just temporary until we figure something out - like whether we might be able to keep the house and whether it’s worth doing anything here.

I spent ages cleaning Natalie’s room before the additional bed move-in - Hermionie really did a number on that room, Polly Pocket mixed with Bratz mixed with Barbie mixed with Baby Bits mixed with clothes mixed with books - ugh! - all sorted now though :razz: one of those jobs that’s been bugging me for a couple of weeks now - everytime I’ve had to enter that pit - it’s been brief - if something needed putting in there - sod doing it carefully - just throw it in!!!!!!

Natalie also has a strange habit of stuffing all sorts of items down the sides of her mattress - books, dirty pyjamas (which she really doesn’t need ‘cos she always ends up taking them off and sleeping in just her pants! (OT Hermionie now says pantsees for pants - v. cute!)) - also toys, a sonic screwdriver, bouncy balls, hair clips and ties, and so on…..

Anyhoo, finished it all and Hermionie was very pleased with it - have had to put a big blue bean bag between the 2 bed, in-case Hermionie forgets where she is in the middle of the night and ends p on the floor - won’t last long though - it’s a pain in the bum trying to clamber on a bean-bag to get to the beds!! She went to sleep almost right away - only problem is I can’t kiss her goodnight - I’ll have to get a stool so I’m tall enough to reach over and kiss her.

Natalie & I have had the Hedrin treatment due to this:

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agggggggh!!!!! - thought home-education would mean a big goodbye to little bu**ers - but no - Natalie’s and my hair seem to be the perfect breeding ground. Doctor only gave us a 150ml bottle though - so I suspect I’ll be phoning later to get another bottle to finish the second application - need to order some soapnuts - apparently headlice don’t like it - we use tea-tree (with lavender) to spray our hair before detangling but I don’t think it has deterred them so far!

Alex & I watched more Heroes and now he’s tired bless ‘im and here I’m sat blogging and getting far too carried away with reading Apple-related rss feeds like appleinsider, macgadget, macnn etc, all those home-ed blogs and some flickr-ing.

Nite all.

Rabbits Neutered

Published
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pixieminx
on July 24, 2007
in Generally, Macs and Trips-out
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Got the male Rabbits neutered at Southampton RSPCA - while we waited for them we went to West Quay for a look around - found the new Apple Shop (((((((((me in heaven!!!!!)))))))))) lot’s of 24″ iMac goodness. Picked the Rabbits up all safe and sound and looking sorry for themselves :???: and dropped the girls round S&G’s while Alex & I went to pick up Natalie’s new bed (off eBay) and then we went back to West Quay, picked up a MacDonald’s for the kids on the way home. :roll:

Friday the 13th

Published
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pixieminx
on July 13, 2007
in Generally, Home-ed, Macs and Trips-out
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Started off the day with brekkie in Tescos, followed by shopping at Tesco and ASDA because we’re going through the ‘I’m bored with Tesco’ phase again. Got a new pair of shoes at ASDA

I’m not a traditional girlie where shoes are concerned - I’ve about 3 pairs that I’ll wear, one’s a muddy pair of mountain climbing boots, the other are several times repaired brown calf-high boots and now these - they’re soooo comfortable I”m never taking them off!

We all went to a local school fayre in the afternoon and picked up a couple of bargains:

Pink ‘n stripey hats & gloves for Hermionie -

gorgeous aren’t they?

And black kinky barbie boots and a tartan belt for Natalie.

And lastly lots of lovely books…..

&

…which will end up here…..

…our living room bookshelf - we also have one in the hall, dining room and both kid’s rooms - I need more book shelves- you can never have too many books!!!

It’s also about time to officially hand over my fav cardigan of Natalie’s to Hermionie. (Sorry rest of family, I know I’m supposed to pass it all to you and wait for Hermionie to get it but there are a few items I’m hanging onto for dear life - this being one of them!) It’s soooooo soft and cuddly. Natalie’s been wearing it for about 4 years now!!! We’ve finally decided that cuffs up to her elbows aren’t fashionable, so Hermionie can wear it with folded cuffs round the wrists.

Took the kids to the park (Inside Out Park was Closed again???) for a bit then headed home for dinner. Natalie & Hermionie read through the books I bought and played in the living room. NanL popped down to see and play with the kids and gain a bit of technical support for WinXP - Grrrr!!, GDadL popped in for a bit (on the way to the pub!!)

Alex’s MacBook is running a bit screwy so I’ll spend the best part of the evening sorting that out - will probably re-format it and make it all new - whilst he falls asleep on the sofa watching Click. :roll:

Shock Horror……

Published
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pixieminx
on July 12, 2007
in Generally, Home-ed and Macs
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…..Natalie actually fed the Rabbits this morning without being asked. :shock:

She then delved straight into a pile of books and worked on SME, Crosswords, Monkey Maths (our home-made maths book - where I write out stuff for her to fill in - stuff that she needs to ‘recap’) and read some of the library books - again. Hermionie was busy using all the stickers we have on one sheet of paper to make a very lovely picture which I have been ordered to put on the wall! (She can be a bossy little madam sometimes).

St*pid Virgin Media have screwed the bill up again, charged us £15 over the top in charges and cut the phone off! - It’s set-up on DD, it’s not our fault if they can’t manage to take the service charge plus the call charges - Alex phoned them (’cos you can still use their operator number to moan at them even when they cut you off teehee!) - managed to sort it out but they can’t turn the phone back on till tomorrow, GREAT. :evil:

….anyway, Alex and Hermionie popped round S&G’s to use their phone and pick up some bits, Natalie stayed with me and ate coconut cake!

Natalie carried on with books I left her and then we had an early dinner then we all went round S&G’s (I think we should be contributing to their mortgage by now!) to look after K while G had a funeral :cry: and S took J to Karate. Bless her, she stayed asleep most of the time - Hermionie was not very pleased to see her bestest friend in the whole wide world asleep in her presence! Natalie Gameboy’d for a bit then I took her to Brownies. K woke up and played colouring with Hermionie - alot of whinging again. :roll: S&J came back and all the kids played nicely for bit. Came home and tidied up a bit and kids went to bed, Alex in usual position at table and me here - on my G5,peeing around with the ‘Now reading’ plugin, tagging photos and listening to lots of my favourite music on iTunes. Night

A lovely afternoon.

Published
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pixieminx
on July 11, 2007
in Generally, Home-ed, Macs, Pregnancy and Trips-out
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Didn’t achieve much this morning or early afternoon really. Kids were playing in the living room, fed rabbits, looked at sticky’s, mooched generally. Alex & Natalie popped round S&G’s for some bits while Hermionie & I cleaned up a bit - she loves helping me out especially when she’s on her own with me - she takes great delight in helping me clean, dusting, plumping cushions, and attempting to sweep - it’s v. cute, not to say that Natalie doesn’t dislike taking charge of the hoover!!!!

Had another Estate Agent round today who said the same as the other one so negative equity it is then - guess we’ll be staying in this house for the next ten years!

Packed a lunch, filled the car with some much needed - we’ve-been-running-on-fumes-for-days petrol and headed for Southsea. We late-lunched on the green behind the Portsmouth Natural History Museum which was where we headed after eating.

It’s a nice little museum - free (which is a bonus!) but I don’t think it’s changed that much since I went when I was a girl? Nevermind - kids still enjoy running round - we’ve been 5 or 6 times now and they still learn something new, they’ve got some butterflies there as well. (Although they don’t always seem the healthiest/strongest butterflies I’ve ever seen??)

So we spent a good 1 1/2 hours walking round. By closing time - we still hadn’t made it to the microscopes, so Natalie was a little disappointed - will have to make a repeat visit soon.

It was the first time Alex had been - he was quite impressed considering it didn’t cost him any money and it kept the kids busy without arguments or whinging. :lol:

Sun was shining, a little windy but pretty much gorgeous on the seafront, headed down to the beach for some pebble-throwing and shell/stone hunting.

Popped past the Southsea Model Village which we’ve never been to - so we’ll add that to the list for another day also. Grabbed an ice-cream from the van and had a lark about practising cartwheels, swinging the kids round. (which Hermionie reaaaaallly doesn’t like - bless her!) The kids then proceeded to bashing Alex about (I remember this as being a favourite pastime with my Dad - play fighting and charging about like loons :lol: )

We then headed for the park to let of some more steam!

Had to return home to eat. All watched Anthea Turner:Perfect Housewife (why? oh why ? - I hear you cry?), I managed to resist the urge to clean the house some more for about 1/2 hour, but the Anthea-Effect got the better of me!!!!

Tucked the kids up on the sofa watching Charlotte’s Web, (I’m still upset by the Spider dying :sad: ) and I have been trying to publish my now-updated iCal calenders without a .Mac account? - Trying the setting up a webdav server on the G5 but it looks a little to scary for me right now, so I’ll settle for sharing via this.

Oh….and just this pic ‘cos I think I’ll miss this face as she grows up!

More piccies up on Flickr now as well - managed to transfer all our photos to iPhoto (can you tell I’m big with the Apple love?) and tag them and found I can drag them straight out of iPhoto to Flickr……little things :roll:

Blah, blah, blah….

Published
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pixieminx
on July 8, 2007
in Generally, Home-ed, Macs and Pregnancy
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Natalie was DSing in bed this am while H trashed her room playing dress-up.

Natalie had a guide bbq (free Yay!) this afternoon and had a good time making new friends with the older girls. I spent a very comfy hour with Hermionie on the sofa, playing on Natalie’s Leap-pad and watching CBeebies. She still has quite a rough cough, not taking anything for it now though. Picked Natalie up and went to Emsworth for some duck feeding and boat watching. Damn forgot crabbing materials! Had some nice ice-creams (baby no 4 likes the ice-cream - my excuse at least!)

Natalie and I watched RSPCA Rescue - she’s v. interested in working with animals - have to work on that.

General ramblings: Binka’s limping again - keep an eye on him. • Saw a link for tie dye on someone else’s blog - want to that now! • Looking forward to a possible holiday in September, a couple of days in the New Forest. • Been listening to ipod alot lately, great escape listening to music, but means I don’t sleep till about 3am! • Want to do alot more spontaneous stuff, paint, create - need to fulfill a creative desire, instill it in the littles ones who will invariably make a mess :-) Saw people painting down Emsworth - amazes me people can that - I have no faith in myself - boo hoo. Want to learn to play the guitar.

A new way to approach things…

Published
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pixieminx
on July 6, 2007
in Generally, Home-ed, Macs and Pregnancy
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Have had some lovely weather here today - managed to 3 loads of washing washed and dried on the line! - Yay! Rabbits also had a lovely day out in the garden.

I sat with Natalie whilst she completed 5 pages of SME and set-up some maths and handwriting for to carry on with later through the day, along with some french, human body, and please oh goodness please child finish JP7!!!! (just so it’s finished!) - can’t believe I haven’t tried this approach before - I’ll figure out what I want her to cover the next day - set it up, bookmark the relevant pages, etc and leave her to it (unless she asks for help obviously)- hopefully with her completing it by 5pm, this might take the pressure of the work/play divide that seems to happen - if she knows what she has to do - she can take some responsibility for it and arrange ‘play time’ around it - I hope!!!

Kids watch a few DVD’s- Toy Story, Barbie Fairytopia - Magic of the Rainbow and The Secret Garden. Alex took kids to Tesco for top-ups and crazy-pregnant lady fetish food whilst I tided the usual load of can’t-see-the-carpet-for-toys that Hermionie had left me with.

Hermionie has been wandering round most of the day chanting her version of the alphabet (v. cute!)

We all watched the last Doctor Who again on On Demand - made more sense watching it knowing what’s going to happen - Natalie still couldn’t quite get her head round the whole one word at one time all across the world and the satellites thingy that saved the Doctor and now I’m tired of trying to explain these sorts of things in simplistic form! (you know where you try to explain something to a child without using words that they don’t understand thus leading you to divert the explanation and explain the meaning of the word then backtrack to where you were originally, without repeating yourself and carrying on! - Ugh!) And is just me or where you put off by Catherine Tate in the Christmas Episode and now she’ll be back in Season 4 - Not Pleased. :evil:

Spent some time re-connecting with my G5, sorting through iTunes, iPhoto, enabling Front Row (tee hee!) and trying to control it all with my mobile! (wonder if it will ‘just work’ with an iphone?) obviously this was all too much for Alex ‘cos he doesn’t see a point in it all (Front Row that is….) ‘cos it doesn’t actually achieve anything…….until…he saw that you watch movie trailers on hand with a few clicks - fickle bu**er. :lol: