30th Birthday Photoshoot

While we're on the subject of photography and catching up with all things wonderful from 2012, I forgot that I hadn't show you any of the images from our Turning 30 Photoshoot.

A lot of my wonderful friends that I have now as a grown up (ahem!) were actually wonderful friends of mine when I was smaller and at school. So we all hit our big 30 milestone this last year. To celebrate the event, a few of us got together in August for a photoshoot with Mr Bogert. You know, before we start sprouting any more grey hair or wrinkles! ;)

So we hired our village hall, brought drinks along, ate pizza and mini cakes, and Potato Salad Heather brought a huge 30th Birthday cake for us all to share. It was lovely and relaxed, and we all popped on and of 'set' for our pictures in between eating and chatting.

One of our friends had his restored bike with him, so it was brought in for a few of the shots. You can also see my blog profile pic is a product of the photoshoot -----------------------------------------------------^

You can see a few more of the images over on Robert Newman Photography blog.

Me and Mrs Jones

I mentioned a while back that our very good friends were getting married. The wedding took place this last November. The Small People had been asked to be a little bridesmaid and a page boy, Mr Bogert had been asked to be Best Man, and I was asked to be a bridesmaid. The marriage took place at Stoneleigh Church and the wedding reception was held at Coventry Golf Club.

We had an absolutely lovely day! Everything looked wonderful, the children were actually quite well behaved (although we did bribe them with Haribo in church!) and Mr Bogert and I managed to pull off the impossible by being part of the bridal party, keeping a check on the Small People AND taking the wedding photographs for them. It was a bit of juggling act, but, we did it!

Anyway, the lovely Mr & Mrs Jones have honeymooned and have now received their wedding album. In fact Mrs Jones came over for a drink and a chat to look through the album one evening last week, so I thought I'd just do a little follow up blog post.

You can read more about it and see more of the images over on Robert Newman Photography blog.

Toddler Group Tuesday - Melted Snowmen

We actually had to cancel Toddler Group this week because of the snow. The ground was pretty icy especially on the small side roads through the village, and we didn't want to encourage any accidents. A few of our older volunteers felt a lot happier not having to drive to the hall, and in this sort of weather we are often very quiet anyway because people are not that happy to venture out in the yucky conditions, and with quite a few schools closed, some would have older children at home too.

But, I can show you what we got up to last week at the craft table (having been entirely rubbish and not done my job properly and shown you last week!). We made melted snowman pictures.

To make your own you will need:

- A sheet of coloured paper
- Some white paper
- Glue
- Scissors
- Cotton wool
- A pipe cleaner
- Black card
- Silver glitter
- Orange and red paper or card
- Snowflake confetti

First of all cut a random wiggly blob shape out of the white paper and glue onto you sheet of coloured paper. This is your snowman's melted body.
Glue a ball of cotton wool anywhere you like onto the white paper shape. This is your snowman's head.
Cut a black circle big enough to cover the top of your snowman's head, and a small rectangle of black card that can be rolled to form the top of the hat. Glue the rolled black card to the black circle and allow to dry (we had these ready prepared for our toddlers)
Glue the hat to the top of your snowman's head.

Wrap the pipe cleaner around the snowman's neck and twist at the front to form the scarf.
Cut some small circles from the black card and glue in place as eyes and buttons.
Cut an orange triangle and a red crescent shape from the paper/card and glue in place for a carrot nose and a mouth.
Add glue and glitter where you see fit, and decorate the rest of the coloured paper base sheet with confetti snowflakes.

All finished!

And here's the Smaller Person's finished snowman (stuck on the fridge!)

You can see, his snowman has melted so much, his face has slipped down onto his body!

You could also gather some small twigs from outside and glue to the melted body for arms. Your snowmen could take any form you like, so perhaps it is a snow-woman? You could make a family of melted snowmen.  You could even take ti further and create a little 3D scene next to an iced over pond made with tinfoil or metallic card cur to shape. Melted snowman can also turn up on the top of your cakes and biscuits: use icing as the melted body, a white marshmallow for the head, liquorice laces for the scarf and mouth, biscuits or wafers with sweets to form the hat, and other sweets or icing for the features and buttons. Yummy! Again, the larger scene or family of snowmen could be made on a larger cake.

Wonderful Snow!

I know not everyone will agree with me, but I absolutely love the snow! I love the potential for fun, the prettiness of a sparkling blanket of white, and the satisfying feeling of snuggling up in a warm house with a hot drink staring out at the soft white flurries outside.

It's often considered a bit of a joke how well us English cope with snow in contrast to other countries like Canada, but really, we're not set up for it. It's a once in a blue moon occurrence. Our sloping, winding country lanes and smaller side roads are not great for snow travel either. Often the snow is deep enough to cause problems, but not deep enough for things like snow socks. Or there's the transition from one extreme to the other: gritted with no snow but plenty of slush, compacted and iced over ice rink like surfaces, then the deep crunchy stuff.

On Friday we checked the school closures list and the Small Person's school was still open, so off she went on the bus. Then we had a phone call to let us know the school would be closing at 2.30pm because the weather was getting worse. At that point there would be no school bus because the other schools involved were not in agreement on a closure time. Excellent. Most of the children at the Small Person's school are within walking distance, or at the very least, live in the town where the school is. We are further out in our little village, definitely not walkable and I don't drive. Mr Bogert was miles away at work in Birmingham. The next development was that school was now closing at 12pm and could we all collect our children soon. Even better. I had no choice but call Mr Bogert and get him to head home early to collect her. Finally the other school all agreed to close and the bus was sent to collect them. Too late for Mr Bogert to stay at work. It actually ended up taking Mr Bogert 2.5hours to get home from Birmingham, so it's probably just as well. It took the school bus from 12.30 to about 3.45ish to get from Coventry, to the schools in Kenilworth and then back out to the villages. That part of Friday and snow was not fun.

BUT once we were all home safe and changed into lots warm layers and wellies and waterproofs, we had the best time ever! And that fun carried on right through the 3 days. It is a snow day today too, but Mr Bogert is hiding away upstairs working from home, the Small Person has a list of homework that has been emailed from school and I'm trying to catch up on housework and do some uni work, so were all indoors. But still, love that snow!

I thought I'd just share some of our snowy photographs while it's all still fresh and wintery outside.