My Week In Lists

Here's a little summary of my week, in my favourite medium, lists! I'm really feeling the love for autumn this week, wrapping up in cosy layers and snuggling up with hot water bottles. I am also seriously getting in the Christmas spirit - I know it's early, I just like to be prepared, ok?! Does that make me a little crazy, or is this totally normal?

6 Tasty dinners:

• Roasted butternut squash, rocket & pine nut salad with rice (a Nigella recipe)
• Linda McCartney Veggie pies with sauteed courgettes and roasted parsnips
• Veggie toad-in-the-hole with red cabbage and a brussel sprout & walnut salad
• Pizza, salad and cous cous (this is our go-to lazy dinner)
• Macaroni pasta and broccoli with a Mediterranean veg sauce, and garlic bread
• Homemade potato & leek soup

5 Things I'm loving at the moment:

• Crisp clean sheets
• Chain-drinking cups of tea
• Feeling christmassy
• One week left before half term
• Feeling crafty and planning projects (see below)

4 craft projects:

Made:

• Bunting using string and recycled wrapping paper from last Christmas

• Christmas tree decoration (still needs split pin through the middle to attach the ribbon)

To make

• Paper snowflake

(source)

• Gift tags

(source)

3 Pairs of coloured tights:

2 X factor scorecards:

Week 1

Week 2

Nu Vibe for the chop tonight? They were the worst, but I'd happily any one out of them, Sophie, Janet, Kitty, Sami or Johnny go (I'm still foolishly optimistic that Frankie might stop being rubbish one of these days). What do you think? Any suggestions for scoring categories for next week? I'd love to see yours if you're doing one too :)

1 'fancy' Nail colour: (fancy for me, ok?)

Barry M burgundy (what I'm holding) and Collection 2000 Pure Red on my ring fingers.

And a partridge in a....

I'm kidding, that's all(!) I've got for you today.
What have you got planned for your Sunday?

How we met - his story

Thank you all for your lovely response to my version of our "how we met" story. I thought it might be nice to share with you (and read myself!) Mr B's side of our story. The basic story is the same, but it's nice to know he felt the same as me, even from the off. Warning - it's pretty sickeningly cute.

So without further ado, I give to you, my gorgeous husband...

------

*insert hazy flashback noise and wiggly screen here*

It’s Christmas, 2007. Gordon Brown is the Prime Minister and I’m on a train to London to meet up with some friends I’d met previously at a gig. It was lucky that I was going at all - having had to get up at some frankly ludicrous hour in the morning to get to the station so I could be on my way, I almost opted not to go at all. I walked past our meeting point once, but not seeing anyone I knew, walked past again until there were. There was this one girl who caught my eye, she was very pretty and had a nice laugh, and I was determined to find a way to sit alongside her when we went to get pizza for a cheese overdose. I don’t think that happened, because I definitely ended up alongside a tall, bearded gentleman in a Santa hat, but the seeds were sown.

Not the man I sat next to in Pizza Hut.

We went to a pub, and for the first time I had an opportunity to really study this girl. She had lovely eyes, big and beautiful (she obviously still has big and beautiful eyes, they’ve not changed a bit, and they still captivate me now), and a stunning smile, but the main thing I noticed was how damned funny she was. We chatted as part of a group, mostly about the kind of music we liked, and I realised that we had very similar tastes. I was just starting to get really interested when she left to go and see Patrick Wolf sing some songs.

There he is, singing some songs, probably poppy ones.

Between leaving and meeting up again with Rosie, a few of us adventured to Gatwick to go on some fancy trains. And ate some cheese. I was due to leave to head back to Bath to sleep before going on home, but (oh, crumbs, here comes something I’ve not told anyone before, I don’t think) I decided to stay because I wanted to see Rosie again. No, seriously, that’s not some retrospective twenty-twenty vision thing going on, that is the actual reason I stayed. (I would like to point out, I was also really enjoying myself as well, and it was going to be a wrench to leave when there was fun was to be had, but Rosie was definitely the deciding factor in it all). I think the £50 I paid the next day to get my ticket home was a worthwhile expense.

So we all decamped back to our friend's house, where we played Monopoly. Rosie got aggressive whilst playing, and I became more and more smitten as the night wore on. I think the deciding factor in it all was when she stole my beer. It wasn’t so much the fact that she just stole it; it was that she did it right under my nose, as if she wanted my attention or something. The cogs in my head started turning, and I was slowly falling head over heels.

Our game wasn't as civilised as this.

Now, if I’d had my way, I’d have stayed up all night talking to her, quite happily. But that’s not the way the night panned out at all. Instead we all went to bed, where I lay awake thinking about her for a bit before drifting off.

The next morning, I woke up and hastily dressed to get some more time in with this fabulous girl who had so won my heart. And she won it more as the morning progressed, whether it was wrestling on the bed or hiding behind my chair whilst we watched Doctor Who. We bonded in a way I never thought I could with another person. But all too soon it was time to split (although I nearly ended up spending a night in another town watching a band with her. Oh how tempted I was to draw this meeting out longer).

At Paddington, I got a sandwich, which we ended up wrestling over using our teeth, grasping either end between them and growling at each other like to hungry wolves. Until the old people stared at us too much for Rosie to continue without bursting out laughing.

The sandwich to which we owe so much.

As I boarded the train, I made a silly typing-in-mid-air gesture whilst saying to add me on Facebook. I watched Rosie walk back down the platform, looking over my shoulder (I actually watched her for a long time, giggling to herself as she walked). And two weeks passed, before I had the internet again (my parents live in the dark age) and was able to comment on a Facebook picture of hers.

A train! And Rosie! How wonderful this picture is!

And what did I say? What were those fateful words that (I like to think) won this wonderful girl's heart?

‘Is it bad that from that picture I know it a British Rail Class 76 electric train, built possibly in '51 or '52 and because it's the only preserved one I know it's from the National Railway Museum in York? Nice shade of British Rail Green as well...

And back to reality. How are you?’

The response?

‘Yes.
You complete freak.’

And we’ve been in love ever since.

I love you, Rosie B

xxxx

---------

D'aww. What a cutie :)
What else is there to add except, I love you too Mr B, and I'm very glad I met you that day.

P.S. I promise that's the end of the sappiness. For now...

How we met - my story

A year ago today, Mr B and I (the newly Mrs B), were still on our honeymoon in Scotland, holed up in a tiny cottage in the frigging middle of no where (we got SO lost trying to find it, and then our food delivery got stuck in a ditch trying to reach us, sigh, but that's another story...). It was pretty perfect, after that initially rocky first night. It's nice to think about how we got from there, to where we are today, all from the day we first me when we barely even noticed each other straight off - that changed pretty quickly, obviously...

So here's how it all started. Growing up I struggled to make a lot of friends at school, since I had such different tastes and interests to most of the people my age - I was into music and books rather than boys and make-up (that came later). Around the time I was really starting to get into music, one band in particular, was also around the time I was using the internet a lot more, and so it seemed natural to use that as a way to find people my age, who liked the same kind of things. To cut a long story short, I met some of my best friends through an internet forum, and since we were all based near to London, we would meet up to go to concerts and to see each other (and er, get quite drunk...). When we left London for various different universities, it was a sort of unspoken agreement that we'd all meet up again every Christmas when we were back home.

I merrily turned up at our preferred boozer in the heart of the city, not knowing that one of my friends had invited some new friends along, as well as the old gang. I thought Mr B was nice, but quiet and a little geeky (I wasn't wrong), so didn't give him much thought when I started chatting to everyone else. I barely remember speaking to him at all that afternoon, although he might remember it differently (more on that to come). I left the group to attend a concert whilst they took a little train ride round London. But when I rejoined them everything was different. With fewer people and less commotion around, suddenly I really noticed this cute boy with the glasses and the silly Paddington-Bear coat. I wanted to sit next to him, I wanted to talk to him. I couldn't believe I'd not really noticed him 4 hours earlier, but now I couldn't take my eyes of him.

We went back to our friend's house where we both where staying (I had planned to, he had not, but I guess something made him not want to leave...) where I charmed him by stealing his beer and being rather overtly aggressive at Monopoly (something he credited with having won his heart in his wedding speech). And before we knew it it was time for bed. I was desperate to find a way to delay this or find some way around it, because I didn't want to waste another second not talking to this boy who'd captivated me so completely, but I couldn't.

The next morning I woke up frantic to see him and talk to him, to keep getting to know him, but then I saw him, and that feeling went away. Something had changed and suddenly it felt like I'd known him all my life, like he was my best friend (a feeling that has never left me). That morning we just felt so comfortable together, we joked around, talked about how much we loved doctor who, I pushed him (this boy I barely knew) off the bed we were both sat on. We did not want to leave, but again, we had to.

Getting ready to see him off at the train station, he, having just bought a sandwich for his trip, was holding it in his mouth whilst he put his wallet away, and I, clearly losing my mind temporarily, feeling sad but not really knowing why, grabbed the other end of the sandwich with my mouth! He looked surprised for about a second before pulling it and suddenly we, two near strangers, were fighting over this sandwich (Wensleydale & Carrot Chutney, a sandwich worth fighting over, I think you'll agree) like animals. I only let go off my end when I glimpsed an old lady giving us the funniest look over his shoulder and we both dissolved into giggles. And then it was time to for the Goodbye we did not want to say :(

Immediately after all this, Christmas with my family (a bit of an ordeal since there are so many of us) happened, so I didn't have much time to brood over that boy, but when I got back to Uni a week later, there was a message waiting from him which made my heart soar, and well, we haven't stopped talking and laughing since. FYI, it's pretty awesome marrying your best friend.

What I Wore- Snapshots

I have come to the conclusion that I am incapable of taking a non-lame photo of my outfit at present. I blame my bog-standard point-and-shoot camera, which is not performing like the SLR I wish it were... And not my lack of photography/modelling skills at all. Clearly I could've been a runway model/professional photographer, IF I HAD WANTED TO (er, yeah Rosie, you keep telling yourself that).

So, instead here are a few "snapshots" of outfits I've worn recently, including me pulling a rather silly face, as in my habit when I look in a mirror :)

 Dress: H&M

Belt: ASOS

Tights & Shoes: Primark

Tights: Primark

Boots: Shoezone

Dress: George

Necklace: Anniversary gift from my husband! The Stolen Thunder necklace I blogged about ages ago :)

I'm going to attempt to pull less silly poses in future, but I can't promise any increase in photo quality for a while yet, so I'm afraid you'll just have to bear with me on that front, sorry! Also, I can't promise I won't sometimes pull a silly face, because sometimes that's just what my face looks like...

30 day journal challenge - part 5

So I've now entered my 4th month of doing this er, "30-day" challenge... But I swear, I will finish it, even if it takes me until the end of the year (a conservative estimate...)


Day 21: What is the best piece of advice you've ever received? This one took me ages before I realised it was staring me right in the face...

Duh!

Day 22: A challenge.

Day 23: Summer sounds.

Day 24: I make ____ well.

Only 6 more to go! Do you think I'll ever finish? :)

What I wore- Lock & Key

Dress: H&M

Cardigan: vintage, eBay

Necklace: gift

So Autumn has officially finally started after that little fake-out last week, and as much as I love wrapping up in layers, tights and boots, it feels so much colder for last week's heat, so here's an outfit that makes me feel summery and warm again. I really love the detailing on the dress I got recently, the little heart locks and keys are really cute and something a little bit different.

How are you all coping with the colder temperatures? 

Do you love it or hate it? 

The real question though, is can you ever truly please Brits with the weather? :D

Busy Bee

I have been up to all sorts of exciting hi-jinks recently, including putting together some flat pack furniture, working a lot, playing with kittens, oh, and celebrating my one year anniversary with my darling husband, so whilst I have lots I want to blog about (and I really do mean to complete my -ahem- "30 day" journal at some point, maybe by the end of the year?), I'm afraid I just haven't had the time to edit any photos or sit down and write anything half decent out. Only 3 more weeks until half term though, thank goodness!

Will be posting something appropriately mushy to mark the anniversary sometime this week, hopefully, because I love nothing better than a big public display of affection, but until then, here's the card I made for Hubby. It took me two attempts, but it came out pretty perfectly 2nd time round, if I do say so myself :D