New Everything

New year came and went and I started it with a new look, really really short hair.  Much to my surprise everyone seems to like it, not that i was very bothered with anybody's comments.  

I find it so cool and practical, get up in the mornings and its a quick shower, even quicker hair drying and then put some dry wax and I'm set for the rest of the day, not a single hair out of place, I find its very very practical for a mum of three kids like me.

Not everyone likes short hair, and I can understand that, the thing is that I have never been very good with long hair, I have never been able to make myself or my daughter Erin for that matter a straight pony tail, or a french plait, or any fancy hair do's, so she is really missing out on the hair department as she is very much a girl, and love everything girlie, and she would love me to be able to do any of the following hair do's.......yeah right

With the start of the new year I also decided to get new tattoos, so off I went to elsantocrew.con tattoos in Martorell - Barcelona  and a lovely man from Uruguay called Gabriel Palermo got my ideas and made then into a great design (he has a lot of talent) for my liking and I got my arm tattoo extended and then added a mandala and my name in Thai.  I'd like to thank my friends Adrian and Suyenne Lima for getting me what I needed at such short notice thanks again guys your both brilliant :). On my other hand i got this done:-

hahahahaha mine obviously does not move, but I think its the most simple but most heartfelt thing i could ever have gotten done :) if you know what it means you know how much it means to me.

So goodbye for now and see you soon hopefully I will not have done anything drastic again.

The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched - they must be felt with the HEART. 

Day 1 year 2015

So the new year has started and with it all the new years resolutions, ideas, thoughts, memories of times past…

We are know ready for the three kings feast.  We celebrate this is Martorell, Barcelona, as Lluis my husband is from there.  So we celebrate Christmas with my side of the family and then we travel to Catalonia for the three kings feast which we celebrate with this side of the family.  Like this everyone is happy especially all the in laws.

This year we decided to drive from Gibraltar to Barcelona, its roughly about 1158 kilometres if you don’t get lost that is :)……which we did this year….but nothing bad ever comes of making mistakes, we pasted through Almeria, which took us through the desert of Tabernas were most of all 60’s and 70’s western movies were filmed.  It was a nice experience, I half expected to see Clint Eastwood with his cowboy hat smoking a big fat cigar ride by on a big horse.

Well we finally arrived after a 10hr drive, the kids behaved themselves admirably and were very excited to see their grandparents and as usual my mother in law had one of my kids favourite dish ready for supper, “sopa de mandonguillas” (add link to receipe) little meatball soup.  My niece and nephew have grown since august when we last saw them and they were over the moon with our arrival.

Kisses, hugs, and more kisses have been the order of the night, supper and now a good nights sleep, as it has been a long day.

Reflections 2014

2014 is nearly coming to an end, and as I look back and reflect on this wonderful year I realise the amount of things that I have done and what more I could have done.

There have been fun times, sad times, happy times, serious time, arduous times, I guess that there has been a bit of everything like in every ones life I suppose.

This year has been long, it has seemed longer than usual, we have done so many many things as a family and individually.  As a family we have grown with the addition of three lovely pets Kenya, Will and Flossy.

On the month of May we were very very busy, my twins Erin and Ewan did their first holy communion. It was such a proud moment for us, especially when they both walked down the aisle at St Theresa's Church together to receive the holy sacrament.  Also, I was over the moon when the teachers in year four from Notre Dame First School included Ewan (who goes to St Martins Special Needs School) in all the ceremony even with the offertory.  Erin was a princess till the end and Ewan behaved admirably.

Also in the month of May my oldest son Ryan did his confirmation and finished school to start Bayside on September.  He is becoming a very handsome, loving, caring young man.

In June I went on my girlie weekend with my good friend Julia Vincent, which i love dearly.  We went to Marrakech, we had lots of fun, we ate by a river, and climbed up a mountain to see some waterfalls, went to a typical Arabian night with horses, guns and fireworks.  We visited the tannery and last but not least we did lots of shopping at the zoco.  It was a trip to remember.

I got back home and 7 days later I was off again to London with my princess, for a girlie weekend, just her and me, to spend quality time together.  We did everything she wanted to do, the London eye, cruise trip across the Thames, Madam Tussuad's Museum, Mamma Mia Musical (she sang all the songs by heart) but all in all I think she loved best the M n M shop and the Disney stores. lolololol

Summer arrived and so did the summer holidays, seven weeks of kids at home, beach, pool, sunburn, and all that comes with it :).  We went on holiday in August and then we started getting ready for the new school terms.  Both Erin and Ryan were starting new schools and everyone was very excited and scared with the changes.  Thanking my lucky stars everything went according to plan, with no hiccups.  School started for my three kids with no major incidents :)

With the coming of Autumn it was time to start getting ready for the Convent Fair :).  Im the Vice Chair Person of Little Smiles Charity, and our aim is to collect funds to help out in St Martins School were my son Ewan attends and also some of my friends children too. So, with the help of my friends Julia, Rosa and Jane we started making jams.  We made over 150 jams of many different flavours, and it was a great success, we sold everything we made, knitted and had great help from two of Rosa's friends.

In october we had a bit of a bad patch as my granny of 102yrs of age passed away, but it wasn't really a sad time, she had lived a long and very fruitful life and without all her sacrifices we would not be here today.  So to her I say thank you 102 times from the bottom of my heart.  Victoria Colton was a great and wonderful woman, may GOD bless her always.

Christmas time came and along came the Christmas shopping for food, gifts, presents, decorations.  But somehow we managed to do everything and have had great Christmas.  I have spent it in the company of great friends and the best family anyone could ever wish for and for that I am truly thankful.  I could not have done any of this not one thing without the constant help and support from my husband Lluis, I love him dearly, and I think we are a match made in heaven. I hope that the new year which is only hours away, comes full of happy times.  I wish all my family and friends all the best wishes for 2015.

It is not how much we have, but how much we enjoy, that makes happiness 

Turkey 2014

Well it's that time of the year when we all party and go to family members houses for lunches or supper, and we have the usual turkey, potatoes, pork, gammon, bacon, sausages and all the trimmings.  So believe it or not I have never cooked a turkey before, I do lots of cooking but we usually only have turkey at Christmas time so not a dish I have ever done, and of course there are the tupper wares you bring back home for later.......:)

So this year we are having a friend over from Barcelona for a few days, and I thought that it would be a nice thing to have a Christmas lunch with all the trimmings.  So off I went to my local butcher and after much discussion decided upon a Turkey crown (which consists of only the breast of the bird with no bones) brilliant not too difficult I thought.

My mother gave me a tip:  cook prior to the day so that its cold enough for slicing and it won't break up into pieces.

I defrosted the bird as per the instruction, 1 full day out of the freezer at room temperature and all that, and its ready to go in the oven.  I remove the plastic around my perfectly looking turkey crown and what happens...........Its a BLASTED cook in the bag Jobie, no instructions about that on the bag, just the weight were it comes from and nothing else, so the whole things sort of comes apart in my hands, how awful it was coming undone, and I only have 2 hands to keep the whole thing together and get the foil paper out of the drawer to see if I can rescue the blasted thing.  After much shouting for someone to aid me, my son Ryan always so helpful (hahaha) comes to my rescue, he gets the foil and I manage to piece back together the turkey and get it looking more or less like a hunchback turkey.......(I was sweating at this point).

We popped it into the oven at 200 C for about an hour and thirty minutes and voila it was done.  Now we had to wait and see what had come out of it.  I was distraught I had invited my parents over for lunch and I did not know what it was going to look like or for that matter taste like, definitely not like the ones on the TV ads...lol...

To my amazement you can cook a "Cook in the Bag" meal outside of its bag and no big deal, the turkey was done all nice and juicy, golden brown with its crackling skin and juices for the gravy.  It looked as good as it tasted and I was chuffed with the results, and also I have now cooked a turkey so the crisis was averted.

We are Prettiest when we are HAPPY. Don't waste time being sad.   

Three kids, two dogs and a frog is my Blog, and whats this blog about, well I guess it's about everything that pops into my mind, all subjects no matter how trivial, comments, daily complaints, books, movies, quotes, recipes, crotchet patterns, knitting patterns, my kids, my dogs...wow the list is endless :)

The title of the blog well self explanatory I have three kids, two dogs and a tortoise (but frog sort of sounded better so I went for it...my little tortoise is called Flossy and is hibernating at this time of year, my dogs are a black female labrador called Kenya, a black male half labrador and half rat terrier and my kids are 2 boys and 1 girl and yes even though I have not mentioned him, I do also have a husband :)

Kenya :)

I love my life at this moment in time, I'm happy, I'm healthy and very grateful for what I have.  I try to do one good deed a day...and try to smile as much as I possibly can, although that with 3 kids its sometimes quite difficult, not impossible, but difficult.  

I come from a very large family, we are all a bit weird in our own special way, I think that thats what keeps us together, we all compliment each other one way or another :) I can truly say that i am blessed with the family I have in more ways than one

I also have very good friends that I share quite a bit in common with, mainly the love for our children and especially the love for our children with special needs.