Rocky the Ragdoll

We are now the owners of a male kitten who we brought home a week ago. He is 14 weeks old and here's how it happened. A has been wanting a kitten for a long time. I was reluctant because I have never had an indoor pet before that lived outside of a fishbowl. I've had rabbits, chickens and even a stray cat that used to come for scraps, but never an indoor animal. In addition, I had my previous pets when I was a child myself, I have never had my own 2 young children and a pet at the same time!

Naturally, when he had a discussion with the children about this kitten that was coming to live with us, there was no going back. He had done his research, spoken to a friend who is a cat owner, decided on the breed, and found a breeder. All while I was visiting my parents and siblings in Dubai. 

So far he has just been adorable. The day we brought him home he was terrified little bundle of fur and cried a lot for the next 2 days. Then he became very attached to A. On days 4 and 5 he became comfortable in his new home and was exploring every item in every room in the house but was still afraid of the children. And now he has stopped hiding, the children are very affectionate towards him and he returns the affection. 

12.12.12

Well today was a special day for a few reasons. First of all the date itself, 12.12.12 apparently a date like this will not happen again until the 30th century! I spent the morning buying gifts in Harrow, and K and I had lunch at Debenhams. He chose a Gruffalo jumper for himself and some cosy slipper socks and a new winter hat. Here he is in his Gruffalo jumper with his sister.

 And more importantly for me today was the day of R's school Christmas play! She was just brilliant and when I think back to how she was last year she has come on in leaps and bounds in her confidence. Her class didn't have lines but she did an adorable dance and played instruments. She looked like she really enjoyed herself and I was so proud of her.
She's all grown up! I keep catching myself say this and I'm saying it quite a lot!
Here's what we had for dinner!

Scottish mussels and homemade fries, spring rolls and vegetable samosas. For some reason unknown my children love mussels! After they eat all the mussels they scoop up the sauce with a half clam shell. I decided to make homemade chips for once, and they loved these too! So I have now decided that one of our holidays in 2013 will be to take the children on a trip to Belgium where they can have moules frites to their hearts content!

Back to blogging

Oh dear, I've not been keeping up with my blogging as I'd wanted to. If I'm really honest with myself, it all went wrong last summer and I'm now regretting not keeping up to date, because my family and I really did have a brilliant summer. Oh well, you know the saying if at first you don't succeed, try, try again.
There are things I have been doing though. I have been keeping a memory box and a memory book. Let me explain. The memory box is just an old shoebox which I get the children to decorate with stickers all over. It gets filled throughout the year with items that remind us of something we have done or somewhere we have been, like theatre tickets, seashells, paper place mats from a restaurant, postcard souvenirs, brochure or leaflet of a place we have visited and so on. The idea is that in years to come, we will look back at the contents of the box and enjoy talking about the memories.
It is a similar idea with the memory book. When I hear something funny, clever or just too cute, I write down the phrase or sentence in the book and the context of the conversation so that I never forget it. I also record their age at the time.  When the children are older, they will read it and laugh at themselves.
And of course, there is the obvious camera photos and camcorder but photos don't capture sound, conversation ,what was said etc. With the camcorder, it only captures what was happening at the time of recording but that might be something uneventful or mundane and often the best moments occur when the camera is off.
The camera has become something of a frenemy though. It's a friend because I always have it to hand, thanks to my iPhone, but an enemy because I never develop them! While I do regular back ups, I haven't been good at selecting which to keep and which to delete because I tend to take dozens of shots in order to get one good one.
Hence I am back to blogging. It is already half way through February in 2013 so I am already far behind but I hope to stay this time!