plaster!

We have plaster! The plasterer came today, and we now have a plastered ceiling, and 3 plastered walls. He's coming back on Tuesday afternoon to do the last wall, which is slightly awkward in that it's got a curvy bit that was a chimney breast, and a window. Looking good!! Plater dust all over the place but it's a good thing. Been to B&Q this afternoon and bought tester pots of paint.... can't wait to try them out! Also looked at border type things, and wall stickers... and light shades... and bedside lights... Winnie the Pooh looking good at the moment!!!
We actually bought our Christmas tree today!! I have managed to talk Steve down to a 4 foot tree, instead of the 6 or 7 foot ones we normally have!! I would quite like a fake one, for the ease of it, but he NEEDS a real one!! It's only little, and is going to go on wooden box thing we have, should look quite cute! Will post pics when I find camera!!
16 days to Christmas... still got to shop!!!

The very busy household!

No posts for a while, as life seems to have got very very chaotic! The last 2 weeks we seem to have had something on every night during the week, and a couple of the weekend nights too.... all very tiring! We have progress on home improvements! As well as a new very big bookcase that Steve and I put up last week, we also have a plasterer coming at the weekend to plaster the baby's room. This in itself has caused more chaos, as Steve had to finish taking paper off the wall, his brother needs to come and over board the ceiling, and his cousin is coming to take radiators off walls so that holes can be filled behind them!! Along with all that we also have a new cooker coming on Thursday, to replace the ever breaking one we bought when we moved in. Technical hitch at the moment is that we have no-one to be at our house for delivery! Steve had booked day off, but realised he'd got his days mixed up, and so can't be off.... .which leaves us slightly stuck!!
Anyway, it's all systems go at home, and school is on the crazy side of mad too, as it's my turn to do a Christmas production, so our whole life at school seems to be spent rehearsing, or sorting out!!
25 week midwifes appointment tomorrow. Not really sure what happens there, but guess they'll tell me about antenatal classes and the like. Baby is kicking like a trooper now!! Morning, noon and night, although not enough to keep me awake. The kicking sometimes starts as soon as I wake up, so I do wonder if she's kicking while I'm asleep.... I am a heavy sleeper, so she'd really have to go some to wake me up!!
Will take pictures of new cooker, and plastering when completed!! Then it's on to choosing paint for the baby's room!! And puttting a false ceiling in our room!! That bit will NOT be fun!!

Power cuts are us!

Well, we had one almighty power cut here on Saturday evening. The power went off about 5, whilst I was at Tesco! Most bizarre, as they have their own emergency power, which kept coming on and off as the electricity flickered on and off for about 5 minutes! There was no power in the town centre at all, which made leaving Tesco difficult, as you just couldn't turn right because of the traffic. Detoured all the way round Bury to get to the Manna House, where we had a youth event due to start at 7.30. Cafe, full band, the works! Took them torches, but obviouslly no more setting up could be done in the darkness, incase it stayed dark! Contingency plans were in place for cancelling if the power didn't come on by a certain time, but it came on in time, so the set up went on! I went home, expecting the power to be on, and it wasn't! So Sheba and I sat in the gloom with some candles and torches. She kept trying to sniff them.... Steve phoned me about an hour later to say the power had gone off again and they were cancelling the event, and packing up what they could. The electricity helpline number was reporting faults in Bury, Radcliffe, Little Lever, Farnworth, Prestwich, Whitefield, Unsworth, Ramsbottom, Tottington and surrounding areas! Because of an underground cable fault they said! As someone said at church yesterday, you mean the cable under the sea that supplies everywhere!?! We got power at home about twenty to 8, although I left the candles burning for a while incase it went off! The Manna House got power just before the last person got picked up, which meant that there was still packing down to do before church yesterday morning!! All fun and games! And something to post about I guess! If I'd have been organised I could have taken dark and grainy photos of our house without electricity, and the Manna House, and posted them...... but obviously I didn't!

Scan picture

So, here are the scan pics. Have managed to scan and print copies to send to various family members, and small ones to go in my purse!

Baby news!

Hello all.
Just wanted to post quickly to update on baby. We had our second and probably final scan on Monday, and all was well! Baby is measuring properly for dates, and all the things they check are ok. However, baby wasn't behaving! Obviously very comfy as didn't want to turn round for the sonographer!! I eventually had to have a coffee and a walk and a trip to the loo before baby would even consider turning! The sonographer thinks that baby is a girl, although they say it's not 100% definate! So our bump is a pink one! Think we'll probably do neutral bedroom etc just incase when baby pops out our little girl is a boy!! The search for a nice name, with a good meaning is now on.... any suggestions to us please! Picture will be up soon, not got the energy to try to scan and sort out now. God bless. h.x

Lost my password!

Well, as you can tell, it's been weeks and weeks since I posted. I forgot the password to log in, and then had problems recovering it! But it's sorted now!
This week has been half term, which has been fantastic. Lovely to have some time off school to relax and get jobs and things done. Have to say, as always, seem to have achieved less than I aimed for, but never mind!
I never did post our 12 weeks scan picture, so have stuck it on this post. We actually have our 20 ish week scan on Monday. Really looking foward to that. Hoping we can find out if baby is a boy or a girl.
Meant to be back to school on Tuesday, but have to go to my grannie's funeral. She died earlier this week from cancer. It's really sad, but she's not in pain anymore, and we know she's with her saviour now, so we can't really feel too bad about it.
Anyway, washing and things to do, so will leave it here. God bless.

It's raining in August!!

Well,
We had the most fantastic holiday in Cyprus. The weather was gorgeous, where we stayed was fantastic, it was lovely!!! Steve got sunburnt, as he usually does!! He lives in the swimming pool whenever we go abroad, and the suncream just washes off!! I don't think I got much browner than I was from Britain, as it was too warm for me in the sun! I spent all my time sitting under a brolly in the shade!! LOVELY all the same!! Sheba has come back from her holiday too!! She had a ball at the dog sitters, playing with her 2 dogs!! Apparently she was so good when they let her off the lead, she always came back!! I think that's what having her with 2 well behaved dogs does, she follows them! She certainly isn't that well behaved for me!!
Recharge next weekend. We're hoping for sun, rather than the horrid rain we've got going on at the moment!! Camping is not a prospect I'm exactly relishing anyway, the thought of camping in the rain is really quite awful!!
Anyway, things to do and all that.
God bless. H.x

THE SUMMER HOLIDAYS ARE HERE!!!!

Just a short note to celebrate the fact that the summer holidays are officially here! In school this morning for a staff meeting thingy, but as of lunch time, the holidays rule! In 2 weeks we'll be in sunny Cyprus, although with the weather as it is at the moment it's not too bad here! Fantastic thunder at 5 am this morning! Have to say I only ventured out of bed to shut the window, didn't watch the light show like Mrs Green!!

Nearly the summer holidays!

Well, it's been quite a week. Steve's grandad who has been very ill with cancer died this week. Obviously Steve is very upset about it, as are whole family. The funeral is next Wednesday, and Steve might be saying something at it, although that's not being definately sorted till tomorrow night when they meet with the vicar.
Aside from that it's not been too bad a week... in that the summer holidays are creeping closer! It's been school trip this week (to Heaton Park, very nice) and Sports Day (not too hot and not too bad!!) A week and 3 days of school left!! Roll on the summer holidays. H.x

The drain is nearly done!!

We are nearly done!! The bit of the drain that they took out and then had to put back in is now back in!! And it works! It's all connected up and working beautifully. My kitchen no longer smells, and the yard looks slightly less like a bomb site!! Will have to post a picture later! Just the stone to go back down and some soil to disappear and we'll be done!!

and the saga goes on!

The never ending drain saga continues!!
Steve spent part of yesterday putting stone chippings into the hole where the inspection chamber is, to prevent it sinking and make access easy if we need to dig it back out for any reason in future. The water pipe was in the way of inspection chamber, but a crafty kick from his brother had it out of the way without the pipe snapping!! Good news! Soil needs to go back in now, and then the flags can go back and we'll be more or less straight........
Except that we've got a smelly kitchen!! There is some drain ish smell coming back up the sink waste pipe... so apparently they have to do some other thing... I'm not asking, but I'm sure it's not good!!

Not very sunny now..

As I write this, I'm looking outside to lots of wind and rain! Been thoroughly foul since the weekend, so the drain is as yet unfinished. We need dry weather so that joint bits on the inspection chamber can have special tape to seal them, and then it can all be filled in with stone chippings so it doesn't sink, then the soil and hopefully then the stone can go back in, and we'll be back in business. Have also bought samples of paint to go on walls in the yard, so need dry weather to try those. Hoping the weather will improve for the weekend.
Household glad that England are through, and avoiding Germany!

the drain's fixed!!

The drain is fixed! Yay!! We now have new bits of drain, an inspection chamber and drains that work! It's fixed, and all working nicely! I can now run all sorts of water based machines at the same time and they'll go down the drain!! aparrently part of it further down the yard is possibly fractured, water pipes catch slightly as they go down it, but for now it's fine. The inspection chamber means we can rod that bit again if we need to...... It's fixed!!!!

progress

It is now looking like the drain is nearly fixed. It's 4pm and they have been working on it since 8 this morning.... a long day!! We have had half of the yard dug up, (or so it seems,) rods and water down the pipes, but they seem to have solved the problem!! If ever you have a problem with your drains, even just outside your property boundaries, don't bother to phone United Utilities, they're not interested. Apparently it is our responsibility to maintain our drains up to where they join the main sewer, which is under the middle of the back street. Quite how you can maintain that bit without digging up the back street, which of course you can't do, is beyond me!! But they seem to think it's completely logical!! But anyway, new bits of drain are in place, along with concrete, lead and all sorts of other interesting bits!! Hoping we're getting there now as i would really like to be able to have a shower without the water regurgitating itself up the drain and down the yard!!!

They're working on the drain!

The work on the drain has now commenced. Steve and Jimmy and John have now
dug up half of the yard so that they can figure out what the problem is
with the drain. They have also in the process managed to trip the power,
which means that my cooker, which is slightly temperamental, now isn't
working!! It has a button that you have to press to make it work, and it
doesn't always work (the button that is!!!) Of course, today it isn't so
now my cooker and grill doesn't work. Which scuttles the plan of bacon
butties somewhat!! Hoping that this might be the last day of drain
problems, but I am not depending on it! Will keep you updated.

Quite smelly really

My yard is quite smelly today. As a consequence of the ongoing drain issues part of the drain is smashed open, so as you can imagine the smell is not particularly pleasant! The dog doesn't quite know what to do with herself, she probably wants to lick everything, so it's a matter of keeping her away from smelly bits!! Hoping it will all get sorted tomorrow, it's beyond tedious now!! Washing machine, sink in kitchen etc running straight into holes in yard.... fairly clean water at least. Praying for a quick resolution!! I think I'm on brew duty when I'm in tomorrow.

and so it goes on...

... quite a proportion of my yard is now dug up, some more of the pipe is smashed to get access, and still it's blocked or something. Steve is busy tomorrow, so now it's going to be saturday... they're going to have to take the flags up one at a time in the yard, smash the pipe to try and find the problem. Then it's going to need a new pipe..... not good.

So, the drain...

For over a week we've had problems with our drains backing up. Running water quickly, taking a shower or bath, using the washing machine, all made the drains back up. Which as you can imagine was not plesant! We've done using pressure washer, which made no difference! We've done rods, but that just didn't work, the angle was all wrong!! Then we did some aerosol thing that should have blasted it, and that didn't work. So last night Steve and his brother took up flags in our yard, smashed part of the drain, and used the rods. Which ran in fine... but made no difference to the fact it was all backing up!! So now the crack squad are in!! Steve, his brother and his stepdad are in next doors back yard, looking in the inspection chamber that does our house too!! Hoping this might show what the problem is, and get it sorted, as am totally bored of the whole saga!!
Will update when there's more news!!

first time at posting!

Hi. Welcome to the Wilky's blog. I have been inspired to create a blog after the ongoing saga of my broken drain dragged on over a week! Also Mrs Green suggested it, and as I do spend time online chatting, figured i could do this aswell! Having never done this before it might take a while to get into the swing, but it could be fun!
Here you will find lots of interesting things (I hope!) and news about Steve and I and our pooch Sheba!
Enjoy, and please post back. H.x