Bachelor Of Wizardry

I got my official graduation picture through the other day. Not a bad pic actually, much better than my 1994 one!

Xander looked at it and said "Mummy, you are a wizard!". I like that, Louise Gillard - Bachelor of Wizardry!

Birthdays, Stars & Sunshine

I'd like to thank whoever ordered me this absolutely beautiful weather for my birthday, best present ever! We're in the middle of a heatwave here which means I've got to spend my birthday weekend basking in the sun.

First of all thank you to everyone for the cards, presents, texts, emails and Facebook messages; I'm a very lucky girl indeed! On Friday I got up and opened my pressies then me, Rob and Xander headed to my favourite place Costa for breakfast. Cake for breakfast, well if you can't on your birthday then when can you?! Then the boys left me to shop for the morning which was lovely; I don't get to shop much unless it's for food or kid's stuff, so having some pennies to spend on me was pure heaven! I got some lovely shoes and a bag to match and a couple of other bits. Then, when Rob had taken Xan to school he picked me up and we went to Nando's for lunch. Thanks to the weather we got to sit outside which was lovely. Then it was off to the pictures (Hot Tub Time Machine - a definate no-brainer but lots of 80s rock on the soundtrack for me!) before coming home for surf n turf on the BBQ.

I had a lovely surprise on my birthday too, when my son came home from school with this:

He got Star Of The Week and was chuffed to bits with himself. Mummy was very very proud!

Yesterday the sun was even hotter so we packed up a pic-er-nic and headed out for some quality sunshine. We had lots of lovely food:

And basked in the sunshine in beautiful surroundings:

Rob and the kids had a bit of a kick-about while I chilled in the sun:

We then went for a walk round the farm to see all the animals and found ourselves an escapee goat:

It did get a bit too toasty though so we headed home and got the paddling pool out, where the kids invented their own waterslide and practised their daredevil stunts:

So, we've woken up to another schorcher. However, the weather's going to break tomorrow so today will be spent taking full advantage of the yellow stuff before it goes into hiding for another 12 months! So, BBQ's out, suntan lotion is at the ready and most importantly, Mummy's sunlounger is out and ready to be chilled on! Well, I am a lot older now you know, I need to take it easy!

The (Not Completely) Blackbird

I've been meaning to blog about this little guy for a while now.

For the past couple of months, we've had a fairly rare visitor to our garden - a black & white blackbird. At first we thought he was just a fledgling who still had his baby feathers, but as the weeks have gone on he's grown and kept his colouring.

We've been feeding him and his friends every day and they sometimes sit on the decking waiting for their bread (think the word's got round that the cats are far too fat and lazy to go hunting birdies these days!).

So here he is, though a little blurry (he's a numble little monkey!):

Swot - The Partaaaay!

Here's a few pics from the party that my parents threw for me on the evening of my graduation. A good time was had by all though there were a few sore heads the next day (especially mine!):

Swot! The Official Bit

Thought I'd blog this is 2 bits as it was a pretty big day!

On Saturday I finally had my graduation from uni. It was a very exciting and proud day and I'd really been looking forward to it. We headed up to Harrogate for the big ceremony. Once there I got all gowned up in my official robes:

I managed to get 4 tickets which allowed me to take this little lady:

And Rob, who like me looked scarily grown up:

I was also really proud that I got to take my parents:

I was very nervous, especially as I had to sit seperately from my guests for a long time before the ceremony. Luckily the girl sat next to me was lovely and we had a good chat about our degrees before the ceremony began. It was a really good ceremony, all quite relaxed and I got to graduate with Kay Mellor!

So, my big moment came and I walked across the stage to shake the Pro Chancellors hand (though I almost missed him as was too busy smiling at Kay Mellor) and that was it. I looked forward to seeing the pic of that bit but unfortunately I left Rob in charge of the camera. Hey, I suppose I should think myself lucky he actually got me on the pic:

And that was the official bit done. We headed home for the big party. Watch tomorrow's blog post for all the deatils!

Charlie

I do have a really long post about yesterday,with lots of amazing photos...but I just can't post it today...

I woke up this morning to find out I'd lost a friend. Charlie was one of my GUCH friends and though he's been in hospital a lot recently, you just think that's par for the course with this dicky ticker stuff, you never expect this.

I don't know the full details yet, all I know is that it's devastating news and that he will be missed so so much.

Love you Charlie, let's hope that up there they love your cheekiness as much as we all did down here.

Political Correctness

So, it's the big day, the day we get to decide the future of our country. I mean, exactly which party do we pick to take our country even further up the swanny?!

TBH, I've been quite interested in this election. I'm not a political person at all, but the debates on tv have been fabulous and I love how close it all is, about time we made those politicians sweat. However, as much as I've been interested, I think that spending the whole evening watching the BBC's swing-o-meter might just do me in, so I was delighted to see this advert:

Now that's my kind of politics!

Cool Pics!

I always forget about pictures that I take on my phone. They tend to be the most impromptu pictures as well as it's those occassions when you're out and about and spot something. But finally today I got to downloading them so here's my faves from the past few weeks.

Emily and her friend Shiwone at the park:

Xander on a walk to school:

Emily and the Viking boat her class made at school last week:

A cool pic of Em looking at a whole display of swords etc at the Royal Armouries yesterday. The display takes up all 4 floors but they have this great hexagonal mirror on the ground floor so you can see the whole thing in one go: