Giant insects in the forest!

On Boxing Day, CBC and I decided we had spent far too much time inside so we decided to go for a walk. We decided to aim for Lullingstone country park - (Lullingstone castle and Roman villa are nearby)

There are various walks you can make, which are fairly tame. The park seems well set up with some extra attactions to entice children to enjoy the walks.

The first of these was a series of giant carved insects to look for around the forest; not sure I found them all but I did see these ones.










CBC ran ahead and played on the sort of Jungle Gym which was a series of moving platforms and climbing frames though he didn't get a chance at the zipwire.

We stopped at a bird watching hide but didn't see anything. Not one single bird. At all. Not even a pigeon.

We joked that perhaps the birds were all behind us watching us and saying, "What are the dumb humans doing??"

I found the trees really fascinating- there were some really odd-looking trees, growths and fungi.


Continuing on, we reached the edge of the woods and came upon the edge of the Lullingstone golf course and a bridlepath.




As we continued around the edge of the golf-course we saw a fox running across the middle of a beautiful stretch of mowed golf-course grass but alas, I was not able to reach my camera in time.


As mentioned, there were some really interesting trees- I loved this hollow one. It was a bit like an elevator or the end of the Slippery-Slip.

Walking past the golf-course, we saw a sign post to go through the Lullingstone woodland circular walk so we headed into the woods.
I must confess that wooded scenes like this, carpeted with leaves always fill me with excitement- don't know why. Makes me think of Narnia.

As we neared the end of the first stretch, we saw this sign so CBC had me run ahead in a mock-being hit by golf balls- I had to run right across before he'd finished AND there was someone waiting to putt!


During the next stretch, we saw the first vibrant colour in this holly bush and I confess to singing about 7 Christmas carols/songs from this point onwards including the Sans Day Carol, The Holly and the Ivy and many others!





We even saw a Christmas tree!

CBC saw a lithe squirrel but I just saw more interesting trees.

Including some that even me the anti-climber (I am useless at climbing!) could reach.


Finally, nearing the end of our journey, we saw the lavender fields- even now, without there being fields of purple, we could smell a faint lavender smell and decided we must return in the summer for a purple adventure!

Walking down the slope towards the car,


We were all smiles until CBC realised he'd lost his car key somewhere along the way...



Hope all is well with you. Have you had any beautiful walks?

xxx

I doubt I can be bothered to do any sort of 2014 roundup that involve lots of copying and pasting of pictures or text -you read it first time- how DARE you not have it consigned to memory! ;-)  so if I don't get a chance, may I take this opportunity to wish you a warm, loving and enjoyable end of the year and a positive start to gasp- 2015!
xx

Christmas day again

Hello there!  I hope that you have had an amazing Christmas with many blessings!  I have had a lovely time so far over the Christmas holiday!

We went over to my Dad's house for Christmas. I went over on the 22nd and CBC returned for a wedding and returned on Christmas eve.
Lots of tasty food was had, lots of washing up was done and some nice presents shared.

1. Frozen Christmas cake- even though she's over 20, my sister loves it.
2.  Christmas breakfast.
3. Christmas decorations.
4. Gingerbread men cupcakes- I only helped with the top features so my gingerbread men had an icing jacuzzi!
5. Dad lighting the fire.
6. Rainbow cupcakes.
7, The obligatory Christmas fizz- groan.
8.  I devised a Boxing Day treasure hunt- made up some fun clues and hid them around the house.
9.  I love their Christmas tree.


10. Presents galore.
11. Mesmerising flames in the fire.
12.Christmas headdress
13. Rudolph potatoes.
14.  Chocolate pudding as a Christmas pud alternative for me and sis.
15. Nice table laying.
16. Christmas jumper CBC.
17. Dinner
18. Amazing blue skies.

And what blogger Christmas is complete without a What I wore?

Definitely had to wear my Crown and Glory Christmas crown.

Plus green cardie, Cream lace dress and a claret bow from a Christmas present.

CBC in his new Gilet (from me) and jumper (from my Dad)



A belated Merry Christmas from CBC and moi!!

xx

I've got the TARDIS blues

TARDIS  Tuesday has been going for four weeks now.  I panicked a little today, wondering how I can keep it original each week, but will just have to explore different permeatations of the same items or think harder.

Today, I decided to don a combination I've been dying to try together but just haven't got around to- that's my blue cloche and blue cape which CBC bought me for Christmases and birthdays respectively over the last 3 years.  It totally wasn't deliberate but they are a perfect match.



He's very good when it comes to buying things he thinks I'll like. He was right in both cases!

Since my hair has grown, I can't see how flapperish my hair might look with the hat but haircuts are a seldom experience with me.


"What's going on UNDER the cape?" I hear you say.  Ok, I can oblige.

Apple tree boutique horseprint Peter-pan collred dress under TARDIS blue Monsoon cardie.
Paired with black leggings and thrifted brown boots. Sometimes I wish I had a pair of black ankle boots in this style but haven't found any at a price or shape or height I like so I count myself lucky to have found these in a charity shop in my size.  I find so many shoes BORING, expensive or unsuitable that I can't bring myself to buy them

That's my Doctor WHo monster in the background poor little Aloe Vera who has got too big for the window sill- not sure what to do with him!x



Just wanted to wish you all a very Merry Christmas with many hugs xx

The Christmas logo quiz answers

If you want to take part in this quiz first, don't look at this post until you have done the quizzes.

Kezzie xx

Here are the answers to the logo quizzes.

No cheating...

Christmas quizzes and fun: The logo quiz

Hi there,
I always like to have some fun making quizzes for my family to do on Christmas day- it all sprang from a Christmas quiz idea with my inlaws a couple of years ago.  I've shared ones I've done before.
Now I thought you might like to share these with your family.

I've uploaded these as Jpeg piles but if you want the Publisher files to print in better detail just let me know.  I'll post the answers in a seperate post  just in case you want to join in the quiz yourself. No cheating. Let me know if you decide to use them.

Here's the label for previous quizzes I've shared here too. Enjoy.

Love Kezzie xx
* Disclaimer- I don't own any of these logos- I'm just offering these companies free publicity by using their logos in my quiz.*

Bloggers Secret Santa 2014

I signed up for and took part in Char's Bloggers' Secret Santa and  received a wonderful parcel on Saturday from Ingrid at See the colts who thankfully included her name and blog link.

She'd decorated the box beautifully with lots of lovely washi tapes so it was already exciting from the outside.  When I opened it up, I found some lovely looking parcels and a pretty card which had also been decorated. This kind of put me to shame as I am Mrs Absolute-Scruff-ball when it comes to wrapping up presents- most of mine look like they've been through a bush backwards.  Everything was wrapped beautifully with exquisite labels.



But what was inside?


1.  I first unwrapped this cute book about a cat which I look forward to reading as the blurb looks really exciting. I always love a parcel with a book!
2. The second one I unwrapped was a beautiful pair of handmade paper heart earrings which are really delicate and pretty, just the type of thing I like! I can't wait to wear them once the season of Christmas earrings is over!
3.  Also included were two rolls of pretty tape which I can imagine using to decorate cards with- sorry if anyone hoped to get presents wrapped with these- they are far too pretty to end up in the bin with wrapping paper!!
4. I was totally excited about the white bunny lamp- Ingrid must have read my post about Alice the white bunny recently! I have seen these lamps and wanted one but didn't think I could justify buying one- so brilliant that I got one as a pressie!
5.Ah ahahahaha!!!! Doctor Who stickers!!!!! Excellent!
6.  A wodge of money- alas, tissue money but very very cool!
7.  Finally, a fold-up burger- I have read the instructions and still not quite worked out what it is, but it looks really fun and a good project to work on!

Thank you SO much to Ingrid for my lovely presents. I love them!

I had a little more trouble with my mystery partner who had not included ANY sense of her likes or dislikes in Char's e-mail and when I went to her blog, found very little more about what she liked (hers is a professional blog of her profession!) - in a panic, I read her entire blog history in the vain hope of finding some ideas. I gained a few little ideas from some recipe posts and an reference to note books so went along the foodie route but I admit,it's been the hardest 'blogswap' I've been involved in! I really hope that a) she received it and b) liked the items!!

Did you take part in any swaps or posting fun at all? Let me know if you did- I love a snoop over these posts!
xx

A pause for Advent 2014: 4- Jesus selfies and Feel the Christmas beat

Two thoughts for you this Sunday on Advent. Today was the Nativity service at church. The subject of the speaker's short talk after it was Selfies with Jesus.  At each part of the talk, parents and congregation were called up to take selfies of themselves with the various characters in the nativity.

The first question was 'Why do we want to take selfies?'

Various people shared their answers- I shared mine: "Because they want to remember feeling happy at a particular moment, at a particular place or with particular people because they want to remember it."

Imagine it though- those shepherds who went to see Jesus were the lowest of the low- considered unclean because they had to deal with dead sheep; recluses and not in the mainstream because they were out in the fields and they were called to go and see Jesus.  If selfies had been invented then (or indeed, cameras, digital devices etc), just imagine how they'd have loved to have had their picture taken with Jesus. Of course they would have loved to! The prime opportunity. Imagine the Instagram caption:

Here's me with the Son of God!!!!!!!! Jell??

I didn't go and take a selfie because of showing the children's pictures here on the ol' web but here, in stating that I want to take a metaphorical selfie with Jesus. In posting, I am showing that I believe and trust in Jesus, I am glad to know him and want to be associated with him. I want to show my happiness and my happy times are associated with him. He may not be physically in any selfie shots but I want him to be with me this Christmas and I know he will be!  It may sound cheesy or cringy to you who read this (or don't), and sorry if you feel that way, that's not my intention, but there it is. I am humbly stating that this Christmas.




The second thing I wanted to share was my song for Christmas 2014. It isn't the best recording at all- it was from the rehearsal at school and it isn't the best recording quality (nor is my piano-playing anything but dodgy) but I want you to share the Christmas beat.  In its own humble way, the motivation behind writing it was this: the song expresses for me, my excitement and joy in the Advent lead-up to Christmas. It's like a beat, a cool funky beat that keeps on at you and gets stuck in your head. But it's a beat you want to share, a happy beat.   And for me, writing songs and sharing them is doing my part. It's something I can do each year, whether it is good, successful or not. It's my selfie!

Feel the Christmas beat

Feel the Christmas beat, it’s in your heart

Share your jubilation by doing your part.

Sing with all your might, with all you can.

Clap that groovy rhythm every boy, girl, woman, man.

What a Christmas blessing we can all bring

Doing our part with the songs that we sing.

Even one song can bring a great smile

To the loneliest heart, to the hardest trial.

CHORUS: feel the Christmas beat….

If you lack money, or a role to play

Christmas gifts can come from what you say.

Sharing love, care, offering things to do:

Since a baby from heaven, comes free to you.

CHORUS: feel the Christmas beat…

Lest you forget in all of the fuss

The true point of Christmas is unfailing love.

Then take a moment now, to recall

That this message of love is free to all_____

Feel 

The 

Christ- mas

Beat 

Feel the Christmas beat 

Feel the Christmas beat 

Feel the Christmas beat 

Feel the Christmas beat  OH

Feel the Christmas beat, it’s in your heart  

Share your jubilation by doing your part.

Sing with all your might, with all you can.

Clap that groovy rhythm every boy, girl, woman, man.

Feel the Christmas beat, it’s in your heart  

Share your jubilation by doing your part.

Sing with all your might, with all you can.

Clap that groovy rhythm 

Clap that groovy rhythm 

Clap that groovy rhythm 

Clap that groovy rhythm every boy, girl, woman, man.

 Wishing you all a Merry Christmas and thank you for sharing Advent with me this year.

xx

This is my 4th contribution to Ang's Pause in Advent. Click the link to find other posts to read.
You can read my previous posts and those from previous years by clicking the A pause for Advent label.

And that will be your crowning glory your whole life through

Special brownie points to anyone who tells me which film the blog title comes from (no cheating and looking on google!)



It was my work Christmas party last week and we went for a very nice Chinese meal at a gold club.  I was really lucky as my kind Deputy-Head teacher let me go round to hers in between and had a relax, a bath and a sleep! I wasn't feeling very well so that was SUCH a kind thing to do.   Her house was amazing! She's got SUCH a good idea for quirky and fun ways to decorate a house.

I wore an old staple little black skater dress from the Closet brand which I bought in a shop close to my old home- it/s got a velvet  bodice and a short circle skirt

All the full length shots were rubbish (And I had the nicest pair of grey chevron tights on as well!) but you can see it here /below where I wore it with a sweater last year.


I added a blue sparkly Oasis shrug (charity-shopped) but the berry on the cake was my new festive floral crown from Crown and Glory. I really like it- it's got berries, pine cones, roses, mushrooms  and foliage over it and I am definitely going to wear it on Christmas day too. I'm not sure that the golf club was quite ready for hippy chic head-dresses but after a few initial glances I think they got used to it! That's my lovely, lovely work colleague above!



I didn't really get any close ups of my headdress as I told you, the photo quality was pretty awful (why can no one work my camera except me and CBC?) but you can see it in the box it came in above!  I like how it takes festival chic and gives it a winter edge!

Looking up the title reference on Youtube (for a bout of nostalgia for one of my favourite films), I somehow saw that there was a full film on Youtube called Wildchild which I just ended up watching. It's really good/fun*!! I really enjoyed it, It's about a wild American girl who is sent to live in England at an austere boarding school where she tries to rebel to be sent home. Of course it fulfills all those stuffy English stereotypes that American directors love to exaggerate and had lots of interesting things including the girls bathing in 4 adjacent baths. REAAALLLLY? Like that will really happen in England. I liked the reference to the girls going charity-shopping in Cancer Research though. Wish I could go to that particular store- it appeared to have loads of vintage goodness!!!

My day went very well in the end.  The KS2 Christmas production at the church went reaaaaaaally well. Like really well!  I am amazed how well my children sang! Every child was there pretty much, there was no getting out of it this year which really made a difference and the children were ridiculously excited but to a good end!

Now just one day before the holidays begin!

Hurrah
xxx

*I know that the majority of the population will probably hate it, my husband included. Lucky he's out!

Christmas family traditions

A week ago or so, one of the Two Birds (I think) talked about Christmas traditions that the Two Birds like to do around Christmas with their families.
They asked if anyone else had any Christmas traditions with their family and that put me in mind of something I hadn't thought about for ages.

For me, when I was young, Christmas was a magical time with traditions and loving moments a-plenty. Thus, Christmas has no bad associations with it at all, as it should be and I often find it hard to fathom people who don't have that same experience.
I lived in the poky little 1.5 (second bedroom is tiny!) bedroom house that I only moved from a year ago, from the age of 6 and at Christmas, because it was so cosy, it felt teeming with decorations when my Mum put up the Christmas tree. We were never allowed to help with it, it was always a surprise for us and I loved how piled up the tree was with all the individual decorations- I call it a bit of a chaotic tree because there was no symmetry and colourscheme but it had artistic beauty in it.
That was one thing I miss. The other was something I really miss!

We have this family friend called N who we knew from my childhood church.  She sang in the choir with us, worked for the BBC, was wonderfully eccentric, had a myriad cats (she still does), did lots fo amateur dramatics and is just a wonderful person. She's remained unmarried and single her life and even featured on a programme called 'Spinsters' talking about it (Yours truly was there when it was filmed, sitting under the table with a bleeding leg) Every Christmas, she always used to come round to us for a Christmas meal before Christmas or we'd go to her. We'd have crackers, open our pressies to each other, We'd eat Christmas dinner. We'd have a good fun laugh!   She didn't have a TV then, so we'd always watch a Christmas film.  Because I don't like Christmas pudding, she'd always make me a special individual apple pie  for my desert.  She's a great cook  and she'd make my name out of many pastry letters and place these in spiral of my name going round and round the top of the apple pie.  It was a sight to behold! I wish I had a picture of one of them!

A few years later when I was around about 11, we began another tradition. I'd go round in the morning on  Christmas eve and help her make her cats Christmas dinner which involved turkey mince, bread crumbs, chopped spaghetti, gravy.  It was a special dish for her multitude of feline residents. I'd make bread crumbs for it using her traditional cast iron mincer which I'd then wash up! It was very curious and I always thought how good it smelt!  We'd then always have fish fingers, mash and beans after.  I remember chopping potatoes and boiling and mashing them.  It was always a very happy time.  I loved going to her house (I still do) because it was such a house of curiosities! She is so clever at crafts and I used to love looking round her house at the various things she'd made.

I hadn't thought about these memories for SUCH a long while and I feel all nostalgic! Thank you to the Two Birds for prompting the memories!

What happy traditions or family things did you do when you were young as kids? Or what do you do with your family?

xx

Reverse Advent

Frugal Queen has been sharing ideas of how to do Reverse Advent #Advent Challenge this year- giving things away every day instead of receiving something for each day of Advent. I really haven't managed to do this really dilligently, but have tried to do this on various days (not managed every day) and it's amazing how you can feel blessed because you tried to do something for someone.

1.  Someone had forgotten to do their cleaning duties in the staffroom so I emptied the teabag bowl, washed up mugs and cleaned the workshops.
2.  Took in a Cadbury's yule log and left it on the table for staff to eat.
3.  Taken in three boxes of Microwave popcorn so staff can make up some hot popcorn each day for
4.  Sold some new cat/polished stone ornaments from my Grandad's house (they were still in the box they were sent in at the Christmas fair, plus a few other bits I had, making £68 to give to the Salvation army for homeless people over Christmas. + Gift-aid, that made about a £84 donation!
5.  At the Christmas fair, gave 4 slightly broken (easily fixable) ornaments to a child who is very diligent and crafty so she could fix them- she had hovered round my stall all evening and really wanted to buy a few more ornaments than the two she'd bought. She was really chuffed ;-)
6.  Given a photo frame to a little toddler who was obsessed with this item but parents wouldn't buy it for him and he was crying.
7.  Gave a Jack Wills dress, Monsoon cardie and 2 other dresses to a teenager at church.
8. Gave a green lacy F21 top to a TA at work who is having a difficult time and finding it hard to make ends meet at the moment.
14.  Took in a pile of jars and tins of pasta sauce, vegetables and fish for the Food Bank to church.
15. Brought some gluten free Eat Natural bars for the Gluten-free member of our team that the bakery wouldn't cater for tomorrow's Christmas lunch.
16.  Bought another Yule log for Thursday.

It cost me very little, cleared a little bit of space but hopefully it made someone's day.

And do you know, it was me who ended up blessed, x

Why not try doing some random thing today yourself and let me know if you did it, as I'd love to know about it!

xx

#Adventchallenge 

The 6 degrees of Separation of TARDIS Tuesday and Inspiration Monday

I should begin this post with a disclaimer that I reaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaally would like this coat!  Carey Mulligan is the inspiration outfit for this week's Inspiration Monday with the Two birds and she's looking fine!

Alas, I don't own any coat remotely like this, or even a jumper like it, so I decided to play with the general colours of the coat and outfit- TARDIS blue! Excellent, that's two linkies in one! Again!

Aware though that my outfit does not resemble this...

Skirt and cardie- thrifted/charity shop, top- F21, Shoes-Reidke from Shoeshop
in Haltwhistle, necklace- gift

One more nod to TARDIS Tuesday and Doctor Who is my necklace.  This is a TARDIS key from the Paul McGann 'era' of Doctor Who.  When I was in my totally mad Doctor Who stage (yes, there was one worse than the present), I received a few cool Doctor Who presents including this TARDIS key which has lain in my shoe hanger (one of those plastic ones) in its presentation box since then, not actually ever worn, just kept! The TARDIS key has evolved over the years but a few doctors used this model- read about it here or see all the different TARDIS keys over the years here.





Hope you had a lovely day.  I had a very, very, very busy day today. Mondays always are but then I had to fit in a final Singing Assembly practice for our KS2 Carol service in between two lessons in KS1 so no break. It's been really hard this year because I am only in KS2 on one morning a week so I can only do my Singing assembly on a Wednesday yet I have to somehow produce an impressive Christmas production on 20minutes week (if I am lucky) for 6 weeks lasting an hour and a half. 12 songs, 12 readers. One me, one rehearsal a week.  I felt a bit disheartened since the KS1 and Foundation Stage productions were brilliant but they can spend all afternoon rehearsing for days in addition to my teaching the children the songs in assembly. KS2- just me.

We had a rehearsal for Orchestra at lunchtime and then I went straight to Year 6 for music- they learnt to play Silent Night and O little town of Bethlehem on the tuned percussion and very well they did too! Not bad for a last minute lesson!

After school the Orchestra and recorder clubs performed to their parents.  I just wish the none-too-few rude parents who talked ALL the way through would think and listen and actually encourage their children by applauding loudly, not the damp squib that they produced.  Sigh.  Still the children were really good!

Oh and the blog title?

Carey Mulligan is wearing this outfit for Inspiration Monday. She starred in Blink, one of the most famous New Doctor Who stories. TARDIS Tuesday Celebrates Doctor Who outfits- BING!

xxx

Linking to TARDIS Tuesday with Maricel at My Closet Catalogue




And of course, the fabulous Two Birds and Inspiration Monday

It's Christmas jumper time!

Yo there! (urgh, such an un-Kezzie thing to say! I mean, could you ever imagine me saying yo? Well, look, bizarrely it happened!)

Friday was absolutely hilarious as everyone rocked up to school in their Christmas jumpers.  It was a fun sight and even the person who never dresses up and joins in with anything costumey or anything social also wore a novelty jumper!  My favourite was the Caretaker who had this wonderful bright London scene which had lights as well.

You saw my previous post gave some ideas for putting together your own temporary Christmas jumper if you wanted to avoid the cost or any other reasons but wanted to join in.  I had, however, already purchased my jumper, so I wore that on the day itself though I have been wearing my two 'homemade' ones.

This jumper came from Next and I bought it after my sister, who works there showed me hers. It transpired she was planning to buy it for me for Christmas but thought I might want to wear it before Christmas.  I did indeed, but I said to her I would buy it myself- afterall, even with her 20% staff discount, I didn't want her, a student, to be spending that much money on me.   I loved it for its simplicity but absolute bling-factor at the same time!

It's a great one as it is made from  100% cotton of the softest kind, it is so gentle and it's not too thick either.  The size 6 was this size which surprised me, because you know, it doesn't look too tight.



Decided to pair it with my tartany/plaidy/checkedy mini-skirt as it complimented the colours of Mr Ginger and added my Cath Kidston glittery star-earrings and Topshop necklace with Crown-and-glory holly glitter clip, navy leggings from a local shop and Ralph Lauren blue boots. I felt comfortable and me all day.


This Sunday, I wanted to wear it again (after all, not an all-year round jumper is it?!) so I decided to try a different look with it and added this charity-shopped polka dot dress, same leggings, navy ankle socks and Faith bronze lace-ups together with an Aldo gold sparkly headband to tie in with Mr Ginger again.


Again, this felt a comfy look but not too casual as I always like to wear something relatively smart for church and also for a house party we went to.


Decided to try to do some 60's flicks on my eyes which you can't really see but never mind! This shot rather accentuates me ears but ah well!x


After some good sleep on Saturday night (despite feeling like I was sleeping next to Skeletor or Slimer due to a rattly nose- unusually CBC has a lasting cold), I had a lovely morning at church.  The Archdeacon for our area came and gave a really inspiring talk and that woman has a lot of heart.  Then enjoyed some tea after the service and a kind friend brought all the Sherlock DVDs for me to borrow (as I've only seen 3 episodes and want to catch up!).  I then returned home to CBC and did some general relaxing and milling about before heading over to our friend's for Sunday Lunch Club.  There are seven of us and before we each hosted a monthly lunch and we've started it again.  We enjoyed a delicious Roast Pork lunch and homemade lemon drizzle plus copious cups of tea and chat.  It'll be fun to do this again- it's our turn in February!  Thai Green curry it is then?!

I'm feeling a LOT less grumpy than I was yesterday and thank you for your kind comments understanding.  I wanted to share that post because I know lots of people say I'm really nice and sweet (which is kind, thank you) but I am human like everyone else and I fail.

xxx


Linking to Visible Mondays with beautiful Patti
Linking to Creative Mondays with the lovely Claire Justine.