Sunday Afternoon Fun

After taking Dan and Sonya to the train station, and having a spot of lunch, we popped over to Mark and Heidi's for a few hours. The whole of the Clarke family were there to meet the newest addition to the family, Elodie. Unfortunately I have got a bit of a cold, so had to stay a safe distance away from Elodie, but she really is gorgeous. The others all had lots of cuddles, so I'm sure she didn't feel left out because I couldn't cuddle her!! It was really nice to see everyone, but Sarah and I realised that although we'd made arrangements to see each other in August, one of us had got the wrong weekend (again!) so we've had to canel it for now which is a bit disappointing.

Anyway, we have just got home and I think I'm going to go and have a bath and go to bed fairly soon because I am feeling pretty rubbish at the moment.

Oh, forgot to say, we won the pub quiz on Thursday! I'm sure we wouldn't have won if it hadn't been for Andy and his immense music knowledge. We got £20 vouchers for food and drink in the Boundary House, but between 6 people that doesn't really go too far. Guess we'll have to try and win again next week and build up our money!

NEWS FLASH

More photos from Zakynthos have been added to my flickr site, so take a look!!

Punting with Dan and Sonya

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Originally uploaded by adam.mim.

Today has been very pleasant so far. After a very lazy morning and a cooked brunch, Adam, Dan (Ad's Brother) Sonya (Dan's girlfriend) and I all popped into Oxford for a little look round, then decided it would be quite nice to go punting. It was a really nice way to spend an hour or so, even though we didn't quite make it to the pub! I'm sure we will get there next time. It did start raining at one point, but didn't last too long, and certainly didn't mean we enjoyed it any less! I was the only one out of the group who had actually been punting before, but everyone had a go, and there weren't too many crashes! We did have a near miss with some fishing line, but thankfully the fisherment were fairly on the ball and managed to reel it in before we got tangled up!

We're off outt o dinner later which should be nice, probably stay in Oxford for a few drinks too. Then tomorrow will hopefully get time to pop over to Mark and Heidid's as all the Clarkes will be there to meet 2 month old Elodie. That probably means that we won't get many cuddles with her, but I'm sure Caleb and the other kids will entertain us!

As Promised...

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Originally uploaded by adam.mim.

So this is what we spent most of our holiday doing!! We're both looking a bit shiny on this photo, but never mind! I have only managed to upload 6 photos so far, but I'll add some more later. (click on the pic to see the others).

We haven't really done much else this week, have both been working late on various nights, which hasn't been great but at least the weather has been horrible, makes it a little more bearable! Off to a pub quiz tonight, then have got Adam's brother and his girlfriend staying for the weekend. I *think* they're arriving tomorrow, but not entirely sure. I might even manage to take and post some more photos over the weekend, you never know!

Flickr

This is a test post from , a fancy photo sharing thing.

I am Really Annoyed

Because I came home early, specifically to add some holiday photos onto here, but for some reason unknown to me, I can't access the flickr site, and also can't even upload photos straight to here. This is not just me being rubbish, I keep getting a stupid service provider message.

I'll keep trying!

Sorry, fed up, am going to bed. Might try again tomorrow!

I'm really sorry I haven't managed to get any holiday snaps up here yet, I just haven't found the time! The thing is, I can really only do it easily at my parents house (having broadband and a generally faster computer than us) and I haven't quite been organised enough to take the camera round and get there early enough in the evening to do it before falling asleep!!

We had a fabulous holiday, the highlights being:

a) the glorious weather
b) amazing food!
c) The trip to see the shipwreck, absolutely beautiful blue sea
d) Turtle spotting

We both came home with fairly good tans, wasn't so happy with the comment from Keir that I looked like I'd been tangoed though.

This weekend has been good. Had a lovely barbecue at Keir's house, didn't stay too late though because we had to get up fairly early to go to my cousin Rebecca's wedding in Sheffield on the Saturday. It's funny how much more attention you pay at weddings when you're planning your own! Becky looked gorgeous in a very plain ivory dress, and her husband Kazuhiro (Hiro for short!) who I had never met before seemed lovely. It was a really nice, relaxed, understated day. Nothing over the top. The food at the reception was delicious. Roast Beef, Lamb, Pork, Gammon, Turkey and Salmon. Adam had them all!! Unfortunately we had to leave fairly early to get back to drop Ben at Mark and Heidi's.

Today we have been into town, and to Tesco's and spent far too much money! I feel it can be vaguely justified though because it is all stuff specifically for our honeymoon, which we won't be able to get nearer the time!

Also had a text from Esther fromChina today which was a nice surprise, sounds like she's having a brilliant time!

I am quite excited because I am going on a visit to a farm tomorrow, to see how they take the blood samples which we test. Should be a fun morning off work anyway!!

Quick Hello

Well, we are back from our holiday (actually got back at 1am yesterday) so thought I'd say a quick hi on here. I can't be long though, because I'm at work, and theoretically should actually be working!!

We had a fantastic time in Zakynthos, will give a full update later, with the possibility of some photos!!

This weekend has been a fairly busy one, some nice stuff, and some not so nice stuff.

I'll start with the not so nice stuff. After I had left the barbecue at Andy's on friday night, Rich and his friends decided they wanted to go to Strattons. Now Strattons is awful. It is Abingdon's only nightclub, frequented by a funny mix of teenagers and 50 year olds. Lou was trying to tell them all not to bother, but after a few cans they were adament. On the way there, as they were walking through the park which is pretty much next to my house, some teenage lads decided to start some trouble, and threw a bottle at Rich's brothers head. Rich, for obvious reasons, wasn't too happy, and retaliated. He is now in hospital having his broken jaw fixed. Rich isn't a small bloke by any means, but being completely outnumbered by Chav's, just didn't really have a chance. So apparently they all spent the night at the police station giving statements etc. Louisa rang me in a bit of a panic on saturday to check I'd got home ok (Andy only lives round the corner, but I had walked through the very same park), because she'd heard someone else had had some trouble with the same group of teenagers that night. Fortunately it wasn't me!

Other than that piece of news my weekend was really good. Adama and I took Esther and Ben to Oxford on saturday morning to see Est in her bridesmaid dress, and get Mark's birthday presents. Esther looked gorgeous, and I have just heard today that Kate tried it on too and liked it, so thats sorted! I also got some lovely new shoes, (the black ones) I really must stop spending money! Adam and I then pottered around here for a bit, sorting out stuff for our holiday, then drove up to Birmingham for the night. We went to see Angela, one of my best friends from uni, and her boyfriend Nick. They took us to a barbecue at one of Ang's friends houses, which was really nice, and then off to a club called Snobs in Birmingham. Snobs is a cool little indie club, which for anyone who knows Oxford, is rather like the Zodiac. Its a bit of a dive, but plays good music, and there aren't so many idiots around as in other places! We had a really good night, and didn't get to bed till about 3.30am. I had to be at work at 1pm on sunday, and just about managed to get out of bed and drive back in time! Sunday afternoon, after spending a couple of hours at work, was spent watching the Wimbledon men's final, and snoozing, perfect!

So now I only have a 4 day week at work, before heading off to Zakynthos on friday. I cannot wait. Hoepfully it will be nice and relaxing, and I'll get a good tan, thats really all I ask from a holiday.

Sorry to anyone who may have been looking at this over the past couple of days hoping for an update, alhtough I doubt there's many of you! I have been starting work at 7am, and to be honest haven't really felt like looking at a computer screen when I get back, and haven't even had much time during the days to update. I actually prefer starting work early to finishing late. Somehow by the time it gets to 10am, I've forgotten that I was at work an hour and a half before everyone else, whereas if I was there til 6.30pm everyday, I dare say that would be less easily forgotten! I have managed to clock up a fair amount of overtime already this month, and its only the 1st! Roll on payday!

On Wednesday Louisa and I went to a class at the gym called Body Jam. We have been going to salsa aerobics for about 2 years, and suddenly our teacher resigned from the Abingdon gym and now only teaches in Oxford. I know its only a gym class, but we had got into quite a good routine of going on a monday and friday, and I really enjoyed it, and felt like I could at least eat what I liked, because I was still exercising. So for the past month or so I have been feeling more and more sluggish from not doing any exercise, and also getting progessively flabbier!! So anyway, Body Jam was a pretty good alternative to salsa. I managed to work up a sweat but still really enjoyed myself. Its kind of like street dancing I guess, I will soon be the coolest girl around! But now I'm going to have to change my whole routine, because body Jam is on a sunday and wednesday! I would really like to still go to salsa every now and again, but it means travelling 20 mins as opposed to 5 to the abingdon gym, and paying for the pleasure, when I get really cheap gym membership through work anyway. A bit pointless really.

Tonight I have been over to a friends for a typical British barbecue where everyone sits out in the rain and eats raw meat! It was really nice, just a few people from work, really relaxed. But after Big Brother and one too many red wines, I was feeling a bit too relaxed, and nearly falling asleep, (I am such a lightweight) so here I am, back home writing a load of waffle, waiting for Adam to get home from his work summer party. Talking of BB though, I am *so* glad Saskia was evicted. I absolutely hated her. She blatantly didn't really liek Maxwell all that much, and just wanted to get on the cameras as much as possible, conniving little ******!

Anyway, I'd better go and get ready for bed, I had a contact lens appointment today, and the chap told me to try to make sure I didn't keep them in for more than 12 hours. So after putting them in at 6.30am today, they've been in my eyes for nearly 18hours already. oops.