One Photo and Twenty words

Such a small photo for something big. Introducing Mr & Mrs B by a proud Mum and Mother in Law

With many thanks to Abi over a Creating Paper Dreams.

Wendy xx

Academia

As I mused the other day, contemplating what I might post about I received messages from two of my three children. One telling me how her maths exam had gone, the other telling me about a ‘published’ paper of his. Ah, the word - Academia:

The word comes from the akademeia in ancient Greece, which derives from the Athenian hero, Akademos. Outside the city walls of Athens, the gymnasium was made famous by Plato as a center of learning. The sacred space, dedicated to the goddess of wisdom, Athena, had formerly been an olive grove, hence the expression "the groves of Academe."

In these gardens, the philosopher Plato conversed with followers. Plato developed his sessions into a method of teaching philosophy and in 387 BCE, established what is known today as the Old Academy. By extension Academia has come to mean the cultural accumulation of knowledge, its development and transmission across generations and its practitioners and transmitters.

In the 17th century, British and French scholars used the term to describe types of institutions of higher learning.

Not a word I would ever expect to be using when referring to my family. I didn’t even do any A-Levels let alone attend University, in fact it was never even suggested. I’m clinging to the belief that this was due to it still being the province of those that could afford to go rather than the fact that I wasn’t capable lol. But somehow my children are in this space.

My eldest, The Boy B, was adamant he would NOT be going to ANY University. Sadly I have to admit that I didn’t really present any resistance to his decision, so strong was his voice. Suddenly though a girl changed all that and I found myself rushing off up North, touring the halls with potential students all a year younger the The Boy B so late had he left his monumental decision.

But he went and I can still remember the day he moved into student halls and how I felt as I left him there. I can remember his little face as he sat on his bed in his little room as if it were yesterday rather than nearly 7 years ago. I can still remember the girls saying goodbye to their big brother, the oldest smiling though her eyes were full of tears and the youngest wailing and sobbing all of the journey home in the car. He never came back. Oh, he visited often (and still does, so all is well) but he made a life up there with his girlfriend (soon to be wife) and I think they’ll continue to live in that area, and I’m glad – it suits them. What’s more he seems to be continuing with the Academia as following his degree (4 years) he started a 3 year KTP with a PhD to boot and is now slowly switching to lecturing so that at the end of the 3 years he hopes to become a lecturer. Bit odd for someone so set against going to Uni don’t you think.

Then we have Grumpy, DD1 on the left, determined to do even better than her big brother. She’s in the middle of her AS exams and is really trying as hard as she can to get good grades. She plans her revision so that focus is placed on the areas that need more attention and so that she can re-cap in a timely manner just before each exam. She worries about which subject to drop as she still can’t make her mind up about what she wants to study at Uni let alone what she wants to be ultimately - But the The Boy B has NEVER known what he wants to be so I tell her not to stress about that lol

Lastly we have Tattyhead, DD2 on the right, who wailed so much when we left her big brother all alone in that nasty place. Tattyhead will always do things her own way, and that may not coincide with what I might want but boy does she has a cast iron will. She’s year 10 and starts a few of her GCSE exams next week. Once again the rules have been changed and there will be NO re-sits allowed for the exams she takes now. Not that I advocate being able to re-sit endless times BUT she isn’t ready yet and I just hope it isn’t her undoing. She is revising (some) but I do worry that being the third she feels she has a lot to live up to and rather than being outwardly determined to do as well or better than the other two she’s setting the scene for doing the opposite. I don’t know how to counteract this, all I know is that she’s easily as bright, if not brighter, than the other two and she’s my baby. She too wants to go to University but has no idea to do what yet.

So come the summer we’ll be doing the rounds of Uni’s (at the right time) for Grumpy and then once again two years later. Hopefully by the time Grumpy goes The Boy B will be secured as a lecturer and then when Tattyhead goes all three will be safely ensconced within the world (or is that word) of Academia – fancy that!

Phew, is that (part 1) job done do you think? T’hubby and I will then sell up and run off while there’s no one home lol, only joking ……….  But then I do quite fancy Crete !!

Thanks for dropping by and please feel free to leave me a comment, it is lovely to hear from you.

Wendy xx

Ten on the tenth

Today is my baby’s 15th birthday and boy does that make me feel old. Those years have absolutely flown by with all the inevitable ups and downs of having children (now 15, 16 & 24). Tattyhead can drive me to distraction at times but without a shadow of a doubt, I love her very much – Happy Birthday Baby Girl xxx

Because it’s her birthday and because it falls on the tenth, I thought I’d share ten layouts of  my youngest with you today. None are recent as my scrapping inspiration has long been absent – OMG, its over a year I think! They’re a mixed bag (digi and traditional) and a couple are amongst my very first layouts so the styles differ greatly – you have been warned.

And so, in no particular order, I give you….

Tattyhead

The photo used above was printed onto silk then mounted onto card.

Often in a world of her own

Always sporty

Always a poser

I’ve said it already

Will not wear a dress unless absolutely necessary

Sunburst effect on the photo and numerous beads sown on

Completely and utterly devastated for such a long time when her Granddad died

Lol, You may not be able to read the journaling above but I know that I got the date of her birthday wrong on this lo. Couldn’t face the hassle of correcting it though.

Bit of artistic licence on my part

Well that’s all for now folks.  Wish me luck, we have The Boy B home for his sisters birthday and 9 teenagers sleeping in a tent in the garden tonight, deep joy lol

You’ll find the links for more ten on the tenth over at Shimelle’s so please take a look. In the meantime, thanks for dropping by and please feel free to leave me a comment.

Wendy xx

Technology sucks = Major Aaaaarrrgghh

I’ll keep it brief:

New Phone - all singing, all dancing, lovely bit of technology. Need to set up to pick up email, calendar etc etc – aaaarrrrgggghhh.  Don’t get me wrong, it’s not the phone it’s the multitude of user names and different solutions out there that causes the problem. Have spent ALL day sorting things out and so now I’m going to crash and burn on this weeks photo assignment (that’s a sad face not an angry one, although it could well be angry)

Link Within – still not working properly (thank you to those that tried to help) Despite deleting and adding several times I could not get it to display. I discovered that its the very old posts prior to me using Windows Live Writer that aren’t displaying the photos so I duly copied all the older photos from the one blogger online album to the other but to no avail. I am going to go away and see if it changes over night, if not – I am stumped.

Mums birthday yesterday – no stress or technology on this one, or so I thought! Had a lovely day at Trentham Gardens and tried out the camera on my new phone lol

Hmm, its a 8MP camera – it should be better than this, we look like we’re in pain! Guess that’s another thing I need to get sorted – aaaarrrrggghhh, I AM in pain.

ETA (21:46)  Well I figured out how to get the higher resolution photos off the camera so I’ll just share this one from the gardens yesterday. I have played about with it though

Thanks for dropping by and please feel free to leave me a comment.

Wendy xx

Its the eyelashes that took the time

One of the teachers asked me how long it had taken Grumpy to get ready, much to dd’s dismay I said “2 hours for the eyelashes – 10  minutes for the rest”. Ok, it was a slight exaggeration BUT, I have threatened to emigrate if she wants to wear false eyelashes when she gets married – next time she’s on her own. I suppose nerves played their part but during the ‘application’ she was pure evil. The first eye had gone smoothly but the second was a nightmare. Gone was the calmness that had existed, gone was the spare 30 minutes I’d built in for a photo shoot (especially planned to tie-in with module 1 for CJ’s Advanced Artistry), all replaced with pure stress. Not helped by the limo turning up 15 minutes early it has to be said.

We did manage a few shots before she sped on her way and then more were taken at the main pick up point and again at the hotel after their tour of the town in the gorgeous cream baby Bentley. I won’t bore you forever with photos but for today here are my favourites.

If you’ve got this far down, thank you for visiting, thank you for indulging me and please feel free to leave a comment.

Wendy xx

One happy Grumpy

And one proud Mommy xxx

Belle of the ball

Tonight this little girl will be the ‘Belle of the Ball’.

The photo was taken when she was two and a half, she’s fifteen now and tonight it’s Grumpy’s prom.  My little girl is still only fifteen not sixteen like most of her friends, but tonight she’ll look all grown up and beautiful.

After weeks of sunshine it appears that heavy rain is forecast locally for this afternoon/evening so if anyone knows the opposite of a rain dance I need to know NOW please.

To my beautiful darling daughter, I hope you have the most wonderful time in the world tonight. Love you always xxx

Thanks for dropping by and please feel free to leave a comment (or do the anti-rain dance for me)

Wendy xxx

Oblivion

Today my Baby DD tackled her fears and joined the queue to ride Oblivion – without me! In fact I wasn’t even invited to join the trip!!  A group of them (all 14 year olds) arranged their own trip to Alton Towers. They arranged the minibus (a friend of one of the parents), arranged half price tickets, got themselves up and out at the crack of dawn (well normal time to us adults but mega early for teenagers on a Saturday) and they had themselves a whale of a time. Not without some tears by all accounts. You see Baby DD has flatly refused to even get any where near the queue for Oblivion in the past, she’s scared. That’s ok, she is often scared of things that the rest of us just get on with but she deals with each in her own way and her own time. I have learnt that there is no point whatsoever in trying to make her do it any other way. And so I let her trot off today to a large Theme Park and just kept my fingers crossed. She knew all her friends intended ‘encouraging’ her to try it and she really didn’t know how she was going to react.

In the end she joined the queue without any fuss – unbeknown to her pals, she’d sent me a text saying they were on their way to it. She chatted and smiled as they progressed through the queue, all was well. Eventually they reached the front of the queue and ………….     IT BROKE DOWN.

Well, you can imagine can’t you, for one whose tummy was already in knots that was the final straw and, well lets just say ‘there appeared a little wetness upon her cheeks’ Another text home to say it had broken down received a reply from me telling her that she really didn’t have to do it if she didn’t want to – and then silence, no more text messages. It seemed to me to be an awfully long time but it probably wasn’t and then I got the text ‘MOMMY I DID IT!’ and yes it was in capital letters to let me know that she was shouting it. WOOHOO went my proud reply. No big deal I know to lots of folk who (like me) love all the big rides, but for my scared Baby DD it was something significant.

Thanks for dropping by and please feel free to leave me a comment.

Wendy xx

Maisy for England

No little doggies were harmed in the making of this I can assure you lol. It’s all down to Picnic, which is a wonderful little site and what I tend to use now to resize my photos for the web. I’m giving myself a metaphorical kick up the backside today. I need to get with it, need to get back into the zone. Need to be organised, get everything done, keep in touch with friends and family AND scrap. I’ve printed out the photo from Alton Towers that I gave the Hipstamatic treatment to last week and I’m hoping to get a layout done later with it. – Yes a ‘whole’ layout in just one day, don’t anyone hold their breath will you.

The fitters have cried off for today, running a day behind on their last job it seems. So really I should grab the opportunity to get myself out – just waiting for the surveyor to come and go.

Thanks for dropping by.

  Wendy x

The boy done good

And so the boy Bukowski did good. This morning he had his interview for the KTP (Knowledge Transfer Partnership) he's been working on and was successful. He now has a 'job' for three years with a brilliant salary for his age, time for further non degree related development and his PhD at the end of it. I am proud of my little lad, Well Done Ant xxx

Meanwhile, work is starting on the bathroom. I think the day has gotten off to a slower start that envisaged due to Steve (Pete's brother) being a tad ill !! Ten minutes ago they set off to B&Q with a big shopping list that was the result of this morning's 'planning phase'! Five minutes ago they called to ask me to read the list (that was still on the kitchen table) out to them - Doesn't bode well does it?

A 1st Class Proud Mummy Moment

And another layout, this time using the July GoGoCreate kit and scrapping a photo of Anthony and I at his graduation back in July. I wanted red for the background so I used cardstock from my main stash rather than the kit. I am struggling at the moment though to 'know' what my style is - I seem to have lost it, if indeed I ever had it. Consequently, although I like this layout tonight, come tomorrow I may not.