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June 20th: Father's Day :-) We went out for a meal at a carvery with The Doctor's parents, and here's the carvery counter. (It was one of 5 courses, with an 'all you can eat' arrangement! It was ideal for all of us - even the fussy The Children were able to find plenty that they liked...)

Breakfast that day had been some porridge, made my usual way with just oats and water - no sugar, no milk, nothing extra. I did use a bit more water than usual though, which made for a creamier porridge, which I rather liked!

Top Ten Tuesday

Just a quick snapshot of what I'm loving right now :-)

Reading Terry Pratchett's latest paperback...

Eating blueberry muffins...

Playing the new Harry Potter Lego game on the Wii...

Eating raspberry muffins...

Sunny days (just as long as I can find some shade to sit in)...

Eating black forest muffins (chocolate muffins with fresh cherries)...

Teeny tiny froglets, the size of the fingernail on my little finger...

Fresh fruit, so refreshing on hot days...

Unexpected photo opportunities...

And homemade, low-fat chicken tikka (recipe to follow, I promise!!)

So yeah, I'm mostly loving eating then!! What are you loving right now?

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On June 19th my cousin got married :-) Congratulations to A and S! It was lovely to catch up with lots of members of my family, including an uncle I hadn't seen properly for many years - and The Father, The Sister, The Brother and The Nephew were all there too! (And so was The Mother, she's just not on that list because I see her pretty regularly and the others not so much.)

At lunchtime I had some rice pudding left over from the previous day:

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England played Algeria on June 18th. I wore my England polo shirt in honour of the occasion.

We drew 0-0 in a rather uninspiring match.

*sigh*

That afternoon had been The Girl's class afternoon tea - once again, a 'healthy eating' tea - I had a lovely plate of fresh fruit with a blueberry mini muffin :-)

A Prayer

Dear Lord,

Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,

the courage to change the things I cannot accept,

and the wisdom to hide the bodies of those I had to kill today because they got on my nerves.

Help me to be careful of the toes I step on today,

as they may be connected to the feet I may have to kiss tomorrow.

Help me always to give 100% at work:

12% on Monday,

23% on Tuesday,

40% on Wednesday,

20% on Thursday

and 5% on Friday.

And help me to remember, when I'm having a bad day and it seems that people are trying to wind me up,

it takes 42 muscles to frown,

and it only takes 28 to smile.

(But it takes just 4 to extend my arm and smack someone in the mouth!)

Amen

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On June 17th The Doctor's Parents arrived for their visit. They travelled by train and there is no through train from them to us, so I drove to one of the intermediate stations to save them some travel time and the hassle of two further changes. SatNav helped me find the way there!

I'd made a vanilla sponge for us to have that evening; I had some cherries with my slice:

Scrap Your Day 6 of 12: The Day

Halfway through this project now! (If you don't take into account the fact that I haven't actually scrapped May yet, never mind June.... Ahem!)

Here's what 25th June involved:

Got everything ready for The Children to go to school. Forgot to put sun cream on The Children so took it with me and did it when we got out of the car.

Cleaned the kitchen worktops then had breakfast - mini shredded wheat and a mug of coffee.

Straightened my fringe (which had dried a bit wild) then went to do a bit of photocopying - more details later...

Went to my weekly women's Bible study group - had another coffee, then discovered that the person due to lead couldn't make it. Somehow ended up leading an impromptu study on Psalm 66.

A friend came over for lunch - I made some hummous and some fresh lemonade (recipe to follow).

Had the hummous with some homemade tortilla chips and a bit of salad, then some melon, pineapple, kiwi and grapes - mmm :-)

My friend had come over so we could talk about a new group we're thinking of setting up. The monthly craft group is stopping (*sob!*) but we still want to offer 'something' for the various groups of people who used to attend. We did get lots of ideas together (and had a lot of laughter!) so we rewarded ourselves with muffins - blueberry and raspberry - and coffee.

Time to collect The Children from school. It was 'Wrong Trousers' Day, so The Girl was wearing pyjamas and The Boy had his trousers on back to front.

Emptied and reloaded the dishwasher then (shock! horror!) did some washing up to clear the stuff that wouldn't fit in the dishwasher.

Kept  swigging my way through my bottle of water. Prepared chicken in a flour and water crust (Jamie Oliver recipe) and popped it into the oven.

While it cooked I got out that photocopying. It was for a display about the children's work in church, ready for a 'jobs fair' today (Saturday); I had some colouring, cutting out and sticking to do! I did manage to squeeze in a quick blog post though...

The chicken was delicious! Really moist and flavoursome :-) We had it with roast potatoes, broccoli and curly kale - and white wine!

Followed by a mini mint Feast ice cream. Again, yum!

Watched a bit of the World Cup match between Chile and Spain, and read my TES (Times Educational Supplement).

Caught up on some blogs in front of America's Next Top Model (yeah, OK, I'm not proud of it!)

Mixed up some chicken tikka to marinate overnight (recipe to follow) and did the last bit of preparation for the 'jobs fair' display.

Ate the last bit of melon and had a cup of decaffeinated tea.

Currently reading: the latest Terry Pratchett. I read the first few pages before finally going to sleep!