Close your eyes, big sister!

Grateful for 'depth of field' - it hides most of the bad bits!

A little close-up of areas to be re-painted

I have more or less finished another painting. More or less because I can't finish off the flowers. The original flowers died and I haven't replaced them yet. I assumed I would paint them before they died, but what with kids not sleeping in the evening and what not, I ended up painting them when they were busy composting themselves downstairs.

Nor did I even have them in this jug, so really the whole thing is a fabrication. I intend re-painting the flowers though, the jug I can live with. This was meant to be a complementary painting for the bowl and cup painting I did, but with time not on my side of late, and painting by light bulb and not natural light they've both turned out slightly different colour-wise. Ah well.

Everything that doesn't turn out as well as I like I tend to give to either my mum or my sister, so this may well be where they are headed. Close your eyes big sister, this might be your birthday present! I am trying to get enough paintings done to open a little Etsy shop. It'll be a mix of baby name pictures and well just regular paintings. I want to really do things that I want to do, as opposed to following a brief.

At the moment I am trying to come up with a name for the shop - that seems to be the hardest part. There is already a Fiona Gray who does lots of creative things, so I can't really use my own name, and anyway, I think I might like a different name for the shop. Once I have a short list I might have my Facebook friends have a vote. Better get thinking!

You just don't know it yet, but you need a banner

I have come home and discovered my Facebook inbox and my email inbox full of good news. Good news of commissions. Yippee! I recently did some illustration work for my friend Sarah who has opened up a DaWanda shop called Millicent's Closet selling vintage-style jewellery.

We agreed to do a skills exchange where I would do the illustration work for the site and her business cards and so on, and she would take some nice photos of my kids (and I have another request I haven't yet told her about!).

In the time that it took to do the work, it turned out that someone nipped in and opened an Etsy shop, a Facebook Fanpage, and a blog also using the name 'Millicent's Closet'. Ugh. So Sarah is trying to think of another name but has opened her DaWanda shop up in the meantime.

Meanwhile I posted the image above on my Facebook page (in actual, fact I find Facebook a brilliant way of being able to show someone work) and very nearly put a comment on along the lines of "I know now you've seen this, you'll all want one". Well, there you go, turns out to my surprise that there are quite a few people out there with banner needs. Yippee!

Now if you find yourself suddenly with strange urges to have your own illustrated banner, of course feel free to get in touch with me by email. (gray_fiona@hotmail.com). Or if you just want to go "Ooh!" and "Ah!", fill up the comments box below and make me feel marvellously talented!

Less haste, more speed

It's the one at the bottom of the pile. See? Right there...on the right.

I could tell you what fantastic progress we are making towards the move. I could tell you that we're bang on track for getting everything sold in time for the move to Berlin. I could tell you that I'm making real headway with all the form filling-out and the inventory.

But I am fed up of it all. The place is a mess. We have a sofa on the patio that never made it to the dump today, and the rest of the house is just strewn with a seemingly endless mix of items that defy simple inventory.

On the positive side, I finally saw proof of one of my mother's favourite sayings this evening. How does it go? "Less haste, more speed"? I think that's it. Stevie was rushing me to place adverts for the car on various websites just before he raced out to the pub, moaning all the while about how slow I was being. I wasn't. It's just that he was desperate to get down to watch the football though you would have thought he had something utterly vital to get to.

So, I was hurrying as best I could, and as soon as we finished we simultaneously realised that we forgot to put a price for the car in the adverts. I've been left to fix them but the database hasn't registered them yet so maybe it'll be tomorrow. Anyway, I have lost momentum now. I just want to swipe a pile of things off the remaining sofa in here and watch Ashes To Ashes again. I was too busy working on the inventory last night to really grasp what was going on.

Anyway, here's a photo of the canvas I have completed (and stuck in a pile) for my neice. Making a 'to do' list is top of my mental 'to do' list.

3 weeks and counting...

I'd like to be more prepared than this, but really, I'm not

We had our meeting at RR on Tuesday and finally got told that the secondment paperwork was mostly all sorted and that we are good to go. They wanted us there for the 1st June, but we have put it back a week, primarily because of my eye appointment. So we leave a few days later!

I should be scared and quite frankly worried by the fact that it seems that we have done nothing much to prepare for this move, but it seems that it'll all be taken care of. They asked whether we would like a trip to Berlin next week to go on the scouting tour and see where the shops, doctors, schools, parks etc are and to try and secure an apartment, but there seems no point when we will be moving there just the following week. An odd thing to say perhaps but we have the option of moving into a serviced apartment for 2 weeks and doing the tour and apartment search then.

So the reason for starting this blog has finally arrived and yet now it's here I'm not really allowed to talk about it. The deal is really quite good and I am really happy that a lot of the worry has been taken out of things for us. We'll get a lot of help once we get there, so it should be a pretty smooth transition. Mind you, I always say things like that and of course it's a mess.

So since Tuesday we have arranged medicals, sold the garden swings and toys, read a lot of documentation, each had a sleepless night, sat and watched a whole evening of tv when afterwards we both felt we should have been doing something, had letting agents round to visit, got the car cleaned and ready for sale, and been to Woburn Safari Park.

The trip to Woburn today was great. We took ages getting there because i missed a signpost and we ended up about 20 miles away, and once we got there we had to scoot round as fast as we could so that we could race back for the first letting agent. No hanging around and taking photos from the front seat for us! Especially not as I left the camera in the boot and then couldn't get out of the car to get it in case I got mauled.

But it was great, and we got tickets for £1 each as it was their 40th Anniversary, so I am pleased that we didn't spend £52. The kids weren't too pleased about the whole being in the car thing. they had already sat for 2 hours and it didn't seem like fun sitting in it even with giraffes walking past. So kind and creative parents that we are, once we scooted out of the safari park with no stopping, we headed back on to the M1 and took them to the services and let them have a little stroll round WH Smith. I even let them both touch a Turkish Delight, and then it was back in the car and just back in time.

Tonight I am planning on retiring to my bed to read a folder full of boring Word documents and attempting to put them in some order of critical priority. There are forms which should have been with the removal company 4 weeks ago. Ah well. All this though after I start going through things for anything that we can take to the dump. We chose our container size (1000 cubic ft) and I didn't think till later that that's just 10 ft x 10 ft x 10 ft. Stevie thought it was adequate, but I don't think he knows how much stuff I have stashed in every corner of the house.

Goodbye curtain finials that I never used, goodbye lots of towels and bedding that I would have got rid of eventually, goodbye lots of Stevie's stuff that he'll never notice...

The Kate picture

I spent a little less time on the internet last night, and I bit more time being creative. I did this for my friend's daughter for the joint party next weekend. It's meant to be one of these 'secret Santa' type things but I enjoyed doing it so much that I wanted to show it early. This is the kind of thing I plan on spending my time doing in Berlin. What do you think? I hope she likes it.

Berlin update featuring Brendan update!

Time for a Berlin move update I think. Stevie ran into the Chief Engineer on the stairs last week who told him he thought it was ridiculous that RR is a global company and yet it is nigh on impossible to get a secondment sorted out. So he said he would see to it. Stevie made a rare phone call to me from work quite excited at the prospect. I am worried that because it is now the Chief Engineer looking into sorting it out that no matter what he gets, Stevie will be obliged to accept it. Hello, to Rolls-Royce Germany's new Toilet Unblocker!

After my sales disaster (or so I thought) at the NCT sale last week, I got my cheque through on Saturday. I managed to sell £225 worth which was a complete surprise. The second I clocked the amount I was already starting a list in my head of lovely things I'd like to buy. I got as far as 'a big inspiring art/craft/photography book' when Stevie 'gloomed' the frivoulous joy out of my heart and said "That means you can use that money for food, etc, and I don't need to give you any." Bah humbug. On the plus side he is going to go to town on the camera fund, so i don't feel too bad.

Sunday started early as usual but this time I was up BEFORE Hamish to get ready for the car boot sale. My plan was to get in and out as quickly as possible and also find a good home for Brendan-Black-Bingo-Bob. I ended up being about the 10th last car in, which worked out well as I got an excellent spot - what I class as an excellent spot is as easy for me to get to the exit as possible. Anyway, the clothes sold well, as did the toys. Brendan got a lot of admiring glances, but I just wasn't going to let him go for a couple of quid. Plus the people all looked a bit scabby. *Update* I had put Brendan on Ebay and mentioned it on here, but my sister quickly realised her responsibilities and has given him a home.

Anyway, I made another £150 at the car boot sale, and then came home frozen to the core. We went to Olivia's party in the afternoon which was lovely. We were a bit worried that the kids wouldn't enjoy it as all the other party guests were 5 and maybe wouldn't want to play with 'the babies', but they had a cracking time. Hamish got an insight into his 20's and had hoards of girls running after him trying to cuddle and kiss him. He loved it! I really hope Orla is not going to turn into a pop band groupie when she grows up. She was lingering about the clown with the same air of devotion she normally reserves for the postman.

Tonight is my last pottery night and I should have an extra special bowl to show you tomorrow! I'm expecting it to be hideous as I was encouraged to use a lot of sparkly glazes, and I think there might be a fair bit of overkill on the sparkle front.

Tantrums, procrastination, and a big bag of pee. It's what dreams are made of.

Orla has started having the most hideous tantrums the like of which we have not previously experienced. We're talking about 5 stages beyond the fist-thumping on the supermarket floor advert. Generally they rush up like a whirlwind from something innocuous like suggesting it's time we got some clothes on. Stevie witnessed his first full-on tantrum this morning - cause: a top; length of screaming and ranting: 1 hour and a bit. He was on his way out to work but was determined to take over and wrestle her into the top. I thought some fingers would get broken in the struggle, but luckily for him he just got kicked a good few times. (I half thought it was the ideal time for me to land a few secret kicks). Anyway, he ended up carrying her up to her room and leaving her to shout it out and asking me on his way out the door if I thought she might be a bit mental. What would Supernanny do I wonder? If only I watched the programme I might have the answer.

My sister has told me that being 3 is worse thasn being 2 in terms of tantrums etc. I daren't ask about 4 or 5 bacause for all I know it might be worse. I wish I had known this before. I had high hopes for 2010 being a good year, and now I find out I have a 'terrible 2' blossoming this year and an even worse 'tantrum-ing 3'. Utter yuck! A good time to be moving abroad...ugh...

Stevie has been speaking to the people at RR Germany and has decided to hand in his notice at the end of this week and go sub-contract. So that's just over 4 weeks until we move. I need someone following me around shouting in my ear "It's only 4 weeks until you move!!! At the very least pick up those socks or find the missing banana!! Just do something!". I'm finding it hard to break out of my usual method of leaving everything until the last minute and then just flinging things into bin bags. Still, why fix something that ain't broke? I had a moment of proactivity this morning and threw out the very dead orchid that has sat on the console table for a year. So that done, we're ready to go!

My NCT sale was a bit of a disaster. Apparently there were very few people through the door, so having taken two carloads round to it, I had to bring one carload back. So now I am stuck with having to do a carboot sale this weekend. The last time (only time) I did a car boot sale I was quite pregnant with Orla and Stevie had been putting the pressure on me to clear my 'Fiona room' as this was to be Orla's room. So I forced myself to sell a lot of books and a single handbag. Anyway, the tme I chose to do the car boot sale coincided with having to carry out a 24 hour urine sample collection. So my car boot sale was quite brief as I sold everything for 50p just because I was desperate for the toilet as Orla was jumping up and down on my bladder.

I had to do a couple of those 24 hour urine things and it was nearly enough to put me off having Hamish. Of course Stevie and my mum were both like 'Oh it's no big deal. Just get on with it and stop making a big fuss over nothing'. But I had to go to a client meeting in Sheffield with a great big petrol-container like thing full of pee in a carrier bag, which was bad enough, but the final humiliating straw was that someone in my office was looking for something and pulled it out of it's bag, held it up, and said "What's this?" in front of everyone I worked with. I think this is when I really went right off open-plan offices.

An evening in with Michel Thomas

Just when you thought we had settled on going sub-con to Berlin, things suddenly pick up with RR. Stevie has been offered an interview in Berlin for a secondment. This would probably be the best option for us, but I am ever so tinyily irritated as I would just like to know what we are doing and how we are going there. I hate all the messing about.

I had a lovely weekend with 2 extraordinarily tired children who were determined to be utterly horrid. Hamish has developed a lovely scream which makes my ear drums vibrate, and he uses it every time things don't go his very own toddler way. And even when they do.

Anyway, I got into my NCT ticketing groove and I do believe it might be possible that I manage to get my entire house cleared of baby items by next weekend. I made over 100 tickets and got all my ironing done, and have nearly finished clearing Hamish's favourite drawer in the kitchen for emptying. How pleased am I?!

Last night Stevie got started on the Michel Thomas CD's (thanks Naids for those!). What a laugh. I sat at the table quietly giggling at Stevie moaning at how quickly the 2 students were picking it up compared to him. He is all confidence though - he says he will listen to it a couple of times and that'll be him (practically fluent). As he is struggling to say "Ich" I have my doubts.

Well, ok, I had my doubts before he even started. His pronounciation is appalling, but it should be hilarious in the shops! I am looking forward to some brilliant Stevie-isms. I had my doubts confirmed about his so-called excellent Spanish and Italian - I firmly believe that he may well be dreadful at those too. But at least he tries.

For those of you who haven't heard this story, we went to Barcelona for a weekend and needed to change some travellers cheques. 'What's the Spanish for "Can I change these travellers cheques?"' I ask him. Oh I'll do that, says the fluent Spanish speaker. So in we walk to the bank and up to the counter he goes. 'TRAVELLERS CHEQUES?' he shouts as though the guy is deaf. I quietly backed away muttering 'Even I could have managed that!'.

eBaying my life 7 items at a time

So following the Valentine 'lie' thing (not exactly an incident, though it's tempting to call it such) I was standing at the sink washing the non-dishwasherable dishes when Stevie lovingly suggested "Shall I help you get things on eBay?". - This is because with the decision to move to Berlin I need to get rid of the mountain of clutter that I have accumulated and which makes me feel like me. Admittedly, the Avent bottle bag and the 2 juicers don't really give me that warm sentimental fuzzy feeling inside, but you get my drift. Stevie after 8+ years together is still the minimalist I met, and I am still carting around a transit van of 'personal belongings' (and I'm not even allowing myself to think of the personal attachments I have to some of the larger pieces of furniture).

- So, where was I? Yes, 'Shall I help you get things on eBay?'. For once, I actually took a moment to think about this one, and my first response was "Mmmm, that would be great. You can write the descriptions!", to which he said "Oh well, I'm not very good at that kind of thing". "Ok, well why don't you take the photos?". "Well, you're better at that than me". You can see I was starting to run out of tasks for 'getting things on eBay'. I KNEW IT!

Why does he do this? I utterly despise when he speaks to me like I am someone he is 'project managing' at work. It's not like I am not familiar with the techniques required to get people to do things that they don't necessarily want to do with a little gentle persuasion - my day job is getting toddlers with wills of steel into trousers that they do not want to wear when we have 10 minutes to get to an appointment. So, yes, there was no intention on his part to help it was just his way of telling me to do it. Why can't he just ask me straight? Well, I asked him that and he said that he doesn't like to because I am always on his case. He wants to just come home and have an easy time of it, and he thought I would complain if he asked me straight. So I won't go into all the boring bits but it boiled down to that in actual fact he wants to do what he likes and not have me say anything about it, while he is free to say anything to me and I should not complain, question, or anything - just do what he wants.

Now it's not like he wants to go off to the pub the second he comes home or stay out all night with strange girls, nor do his requirements of me extend to being a mousey little housewife who has the place neat as a pin and his dinner on his table for him coming home. No, no, no, what he most desires to do is leave the toilet seat/lid up and the door unlocked so Hamish can go fishing with his bare hands and post my make-up to the sewer system; and leave toothpaste all over the sink upstairs. For clarification it is Hamish, not Stevie who wishes to drop my make-up down the toilet. As for what he wants me to do with out question or complaint, well, he would like me to put the washing out and not leave it to him all the time.

It sounds really petty, but aren't these the things that drive you mental? Anyway, that was a big digression. So I have started the mighty eBaying task. I am getting as much as possible on on a Wednesday and covering 2 weekends with a 10 day sale. Unfortunately though I am only able to get 7 things on a day so it will take me forever to get rid of everything I need to. I also had made enquiries with the NCT about doing a sale in March in Mickleover and I only managed to get on the reserve list! I have so much baby stuff to sell our house will look empty when its all gone. I am starting to realise just how lazy I am too. I thought I should add the baby monitor that we have not used for at least a year into the pile of things that must go, and it was still plugged in. Admittedly I have been tired over the past nearly 3 years, but too tired to even unplug something we haven't bothered with for a year??

n.b. Don't read this if you are particularly 'green', but I have just realised we also have a Humax box that doesn't work still plugged in and on in the living room. Right! I am off to sort it out, possibly get side-tracked by a child and end up doing something else entirely leaving the Humax box where it is guzzling electricity and only able to entretain us with its little blue LED display.

a box of baby books

I finally gathered together my baby books in order to sell them on one way or another. I had a look on ebay to see how much they might go for, and it looks as though you might not even get a pound for them; people just don't seem able to sell them. Anyway my sister had suggested I do a car boot sale, and to be honest when I did one just before I had Orla I did really well with my books. I sold them at 50p each, but quickly realised by the fact that my stall cleared in about 10 minutes that I was under-selling. Still, as Orla was sitting on my bladder at the time I was just happy to get out of there as quickly as possible.

This time round I think I might price more accurately. Who knows how much I have spent on baby and pregnancy and toddler books, but lets put it this way, I have 18 of them. A bit excessive, but how I enjoyed them! I am keeping back a couple of the toddler ones for the moment, but the rest have to go. I am slowly but surely clearing my over-flowing shelves and I like how they are starting to look.

I have also made enquiries into selling at the next NCT sale in Mickleover. I have tons and tons of toys and clothes and equipment to get rid of so hopefully I will make a nice sum of money from that too while giving something back to the NCT.

And finally, I have started watching some Phil and Ted's prams selling on ebay to see how much they go for. I am uber-excited about selling the pram! I am hoping to get around £200 for it even with its shopping basket damage. I am not looking forward though to sitting of an evening and sewing the hole up. Next week maybe...