Author: Mum Scottish

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Mothers Day Giveaway from Interflora – Ends Sunday 27th March

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I arrived home to find a lovely surprise on my doorstep.  There were the flowers and box of chocolates that Interflora had sent me to review.    When they asked me to review one of their Mothers Day Gifts, I jumped at the chance.  We are all mothers, who have mothers, so it is a fantastic product to have.

I was given some links on their website to browse, and I had a good old root through all the products they have on offer for Mothers day.   There was a huge choice on offer, from hampers in the Mothers day gifts section, through to gorgeous Mothers day flowers, and the  absolutely fabulous Spring flowers.

As a mother myself, and with special needs children, a bunch of flowers appearing in our house is a rare occurence.   The only flowers that I usually see are the ones that I buy for other people.  I decided that, for me, a gift with some chocolates would be appreciated in our house, with the flowers for me, and the chocolates for my children.  It gave me the best of both worlds.  As tempting as the Spring Gift with a bottle of wine was, I think my children appreciated the chocolates a lot more.

I chose the Scented Spring Perfect Gift with Chocolates, which was priced at £31.95.

I picked up the vase, with their box of chocolates and eagerly took it into my kitchen.  I tried to take a nice shot of the flowers, but I’m not a professional photographer, so please forgive the shots if they look slightly amateurish.

Here are my flowers in all their glory on my mantlepiece, and they certainly brighten up my room.

The smells were absolutely fantastic as I walked along my corridor.   Even my husband who is usually florally challenged said that they had a lovely smell.   I was surprised to see the flowers were in the vase, with water already in it.  I am guessing it is to preserve the life of the flowers, and for me it worked.  I loved them just for the smell.    The vase is quite a sturdy, heavy glass, definately a substantial vase.

The chocolates, well, they were lovely, as my boys could tell you.  The box is rather nice, and with the little chiffon ribbon, looks very swish.  Inside the box, the Maison Fougere chocolates for Interflora looked lovely.  With 12 gorgeous chocolates, in a mix of dark and milk chocolate, there was something for all of us.   There was even a competition here for who would get the red heart….You can hardly make out the red heart in this picture, but it really was a vibrant, lovely shade of red.

Apologies for this photo, as the chocolates have now been eaten, and I have no chance to take a better one.

The best part of all this, is that Interflora are allowing me to give away the same gift set that I received as a gift for Mothers Day.     You, or your choice of recipient will receive the same bunch of flowers, with chocolates and the vase, and you can choose your own message to put on it.    You can see the gift set on the website here.

Scented Spring Perfect Gift with Chocolates

All you have to do to enter is:

1.  Make sure you either follow me on twitter, or google friend connect my blog if you haven’t already.  If you want to do both, thats fab by me.

2. Hop on over to Interflora using the links on this post, and tell me in a comment how many gift sets Interflora are selling in their mothers day categories.   These two things entitle you to one entry.

3.  For an additional entry, tweet the following:

Win a Mothers Day gift from Interflora with @scottish_mum Enter at  http://scottishmum.com/2011/03/mothers-day-giveaway-from-interflora-ends-sunday-27th-march/   Pls RT

The competition closes on Sunday 27th March 2011 to allow the winners entry to go through for Mothers Day, which is on Sunday 3rd April.  The winner will have to claim their prize before midnight on Monday 28th March.  If it is not claimed by then, it will be given to the runner up, via selection through random numbers, of the entrants. 

Good luck everyone.   It’s going to be a lovely arrival on someone’s doorstep.

 

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My Old Singer Sewing Machine

This is my old singer sewing machine.  It still works and has pride of place in our extension.   The wheel has to be tied up when its not in use so that they kids don’t catch their fingers in it, but it’s eye catching, and I love it.

I put up the picture as @mmeguillotine on twitter is interested in them, and I offered to let her see my one.  I have great memories of the machine when I was younger.   I remember at age 10 or 11, upstairs in my grandmothers house with it, and sewing away on patches of old material, just to use it.

I think it was bought for my great grandmother to mend the fishermens clothes with, and I am a bit sad that I don’t know it’s complete history.    I wish I had paid more attention as a child.   It doesn’t take away from the fact that I have always loved this machine, or the fact that it has always been in my life, in one way or another.

How many of us have vintage machines in our homes??  I’d love to know..

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Who’s Calling?

I felt a rant coming on tonight, and I just had to share it.    I am sure you all really  really want to know all about it.   It’s not often that I get as annoyed with others outside my family (other than education and people who make fun of my kids – but that’s another story)

So, what has got me into a frenzy of absolute rant hood.  Well, I think you might have guessed by the use of the picture of the telephone in this post.  

Yes, the telephone is my first love, and also my first hate.   From an early age, the telephone played an important part in my life.  I remember my grandmothers big, black old fashioned rental phone from BT.   And yes, before someone asks, almost everyone rented their equipment from BT in those days.  I even remember the telephone number we had for it, and that’s not bad, considering it was nearly 40 years ago.

From then, onto teenage pain years, and the main telephone in the hall, which was corded of course.  Everyone else who was anywhere else in the house could overhear your conversations.  Cue early romances and  calls with phone mouthpiece cupped in your hand, as you whispered as quietly as you could to talk.  That’s got nothing on the daily dash from upstairs to get to the one phone in the house downstairs when it rang.  Those were the days.  The days when the phone rang when it was from someone who wanted to speak to someone for any reason that didn’t involve selling you something.

Fast forward, through the mobile phone craze, and the budding cold sales caller.  I can’t remember exactly when I received my first one, but I think I was about 18, and it was from a kitchen company in the local area.    It was quite amusing at first, but quickly became the bane of my telephone life.  With only one phone in the house, and having reached serious dating age, it was a time where no call could go unanswered as there was no answer machine to record calls.    Being upstairs when the phone rang meant a breakneck speed jump down four stairs at a time, just to reach it before it rang off. 

“Good afternoon madame, we are in your area……..”

What bit about stop calling on the last 10 phone calls did they not understand.  It just got worse, and worse, and worse.  I managed to set telephone preference a couple of times, and that did work for a while, but you seen to need to repeat that often enough.  I gave up having name and address in the phone book to try and stop the flow of double glazing, kitchen, bathroom, conservatory, or driveway salespeople.

Oh but it doesn’t stop  there does it??  I’ve had some fun with some of the callers, and turned the tables on them.  There is nothing like asking them if they want to buy something to make them hang up.    Now I know they are only trying to make a living, so I try not to be rude to them, unless they are rude to me first. 

I do have to say though, that the most recent calls about the “government scheme to write off all your debts” annoys me more than all the rest have ever done.  THEY JUST NEVER GIVE UP.   

They call several times a day.  They usually call from International, and they always seem to know more about us than they should.    When I see international on the line, I now just wait for the answer machine to pick up.   It’s usually a morning and tea time call that arrives.  I’ve asked about, ohh, say 100 times for them to stop calling me, and they just keep on a calling.

If anyone has any tips on how to get them to stop calling, I am all ears…….

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A Camera Dilemma – Canon v Nikon – A Shot in the Dark

I have had a really hard choice this week.  I have spent more hours than I care to remember looking at Cameras.  I have dragged my kids from pillar to post to weigh them up and potter about with them, whenever I could.  

I had decided on this one – the Nikon D90, and went to order it. 

Unfortunately I did something wrong somehow, and it ends up that it is out of stock at the moment, and will be back in stock over the next few weeks.    I didn’t want to wait for a camera – as I have serious camera envy at the moment – of ANYONE who has a nice DSLR.


I went and retrawled the shops, and came across this – The Canon EOS 550D.  I loved the video capabilities of it, and was almost at the point of purchase, when………the salesman graciously decides to tell me that there is a new camera coming out this week.

The Canon EOS 600D with the swivel screen.

At this point, I am tempted to hang up my camera seeking self for a week or two and then come back to it.  I now have no idea what to choose.

It looks like poeple end up being loyal to the first brand of camera they buy, as the lenses are so expensive.   It’s a minefield.   Who knew that buying a camera would be so complex.   I am so confused by them all, that I think I am just going to pick the cheapest one out of all of them and live with it.

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Housework Hatred

  Image: koratmember / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Now I have to be honest with this post.  I started thinking about it today, as it is the never ending cycle of domestic purgatory that exists in my world.   Dirty dishes, laundry, hoovering, floor washing, bedding to be stripped and remade, dusting, animal walking, and lots, lots more.  

And none of that includes the never ending cycle of kids bedrooms, perma toys all over the place, homework, night routines, la la la la la

I really really detest housework (WITH A PASSION).   Did you get that, or do I have to repeat it. 

I REALLY REALLY DETEST HOUSEWORK (WITH A HUMUNGOUS GINORMOUS, PASSION)

With that in mind, I decided to try and work out which of those chores are my most dreaded.    What brought on this post of major grumpiness, I hear you wonder.  Well, if you really must know, the sun is shining.  It’s a nice afternoon, and with the sun streaming in through the windows, it should put me into a good mood – right. 

Did I tell you that my house has 27 windows, 28 if you include the garage.    I stopped smiling at the sun coming out a long time ago.  Why on earth we bought a house with so much wall space as windows is anyone’s guess.   Well, it did look pretty, on a dull winters day when we first bought it.    I had no idea, that I would be letting  myself in for window torture.

I don’t think this picture gives you the best indication of what happens when the sun shines on all these horrendous pieces of clear glass.  At best it looks manky, at worst, it looks positively slovenly.  Oh, yes, and we do have three rooms that have glass panels as well.  It just never ends. 

If anyone has a tried and tested method of keeping windows streak and grime free, I am all ears.  I’ve heard of stuff you can put on the windows, but I don’t know what it is, or how good it is. 

I’d love to know what everyone else’s pet hates housework wise are.  Leave a comment, or twitter on @scottish_mum

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Fill In The Blanks !!!!! Meme

I have been tagged by @jontybabe AND @helloitsgemma on twitter.    They are getting me back for tagging them last week (only kidding).

Fill in the blanks is as it sounds.  A list of words that I have to fill in the blanks of.

I am… 
Trying to be the best mum that I can be.  I know I am not perfect.  I know my kids actually wish me out of the way at times, and I know that sometimes I get things wrong.   It doesn’t stop me trying though, and maybe, one day, my kids will understand that there are rules for their own good.

The bravest thing I’ve ever done…
I’m not very brave.  I will challenge things that I don’t think are right, but I am not a gung ho type of person, not any more.  The kids took care of that.    In fact, bringing 3 children into my life was probably my bravest feat.

I feel prettiest…
Now this is predictable and corny for me.  Easy – I feel prettiest when  I am thin, and on the day I get my hair coloured.   At the moment, the first is out of the equation, but the second was done last week, so I’m still feeling slightly confident.

Something that keeps me awake at night…
Education struggles for one of my children and my childrens special needs sometimes does keep me awake for hours at a time.

My favourite meal is…
I don’t particularly have a favourite meal.  I have a love/hate relationship with food, but if pushed, it would swing from (proper) stovies with baked beans, milk and oatcakes, to chicken risotto.

The way to my heart is…
Through my children.  Treat them well, and my heart goes out to you.

I would like to be…
A fly on the wall in the education and council departments as they make swathing cuts to childrens services.

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Beautiful Blogs Collection

Beautiful Blogs – I have a page on my blog that is compiling a list of goreous blogs for me, and for others to share.  There is the option to share yours, just by filling in the form to add your link.  You can choose to add the code to a post on your blog, and then you will have the same list.

If you want to be added, but are struggling to get it to work, send me your email and blog address to scottishmum@gmail.com, or DM me it on twitter at @scottish_mum.

You have to follow me on google connect for me to keep the link to you in my collection.   Apart from that, I will google connect all those who sign up for the collection.  Take note, any blogs that sign up, and who are not relevant to my blog, or contain inappropriate material, I will be removing from the list.  If you are in doubt, send me an email to ask.

Go to my beautiful blog collection page which will remain permanently on the blog.  click here

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This is me.

Sticky Fingers has challenged us to add a picture that our children have drawn of us.   She is compiling them in a linky gallery.

In Tara’s words:
It’s so so easy.
Ask your child – their age doesn’t matter – to draw a picture of you.
Post it on your blog.
Pass it on to your friends/enemies if you want to.
(If you don’t have a fancy pants scanner, take a photo of it and post it that way!)

Then when you’ve done, go to Taras Post here and add yours to the Linky so we can all laugh. 

    THIS IS ME, by middlie

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5 Things That Make You Feel Good.

With all the juggling that we do on a daily basis, it seems to me to be a good thing to celebrate our womanhood, and what we like to do as women.   Not as employees, girlfriends, wives, mothers, daughters, or friends.   As I have been focussing on the negative aspects of my body and life recently, I wanted to move to the things about me that make me feel good.

I have seen lots of posts about what we struggle with, or things that we like to do, and I’d like to find out a bit more information about all of you. 

This is my way of doing it.     I am looking forward to visiting some of you on the blog hop.

What you cannot choose.  The Rules are Simple
We all know that blogging / facebook, & or twitter  is in our arena of what we like to do, so I am going to rule them out as one of the 5 that you can post about.  They really are not very girly.    Likewise, phones, computers, ipads are all out of the running.

 I am challenging myself to this, as I am really not a girly girly type of person, and I want to find that within myself.   It’s not all about power suits, filofaxes, ipads and designer phones.

If you want to pass this along, pick bloggers that you want to find out more about, and challenge them to write up their 5 secret passions that make them feel good.  The idea is to lift our spirits this week.  The fact that there is a linky added, just makes it all the more worthwhile in doing.

Here goes.

1 – I actually, really love my hair.  I pretend that I don’t, as its thick, tends to frizz with curl when it is humid, and can be difficult to tame.   What it can do, well, almost anything really if I really set my mind to it.  I can wave it, curl it, frizz it, or straighten it.  I choose to straighten mine nowadays as I like it that way, but in the 80’s, I used to have it like a poodle perm.  It takes colour beautifully (when I get time to go to the hairdressers), and I do tend to change my hair colour by the year.  Last year I was brunette, this year I am sort of blondish.

2 – I have no bunions, corns or callouses on my feet.  Yay me.  I hated my mother when I was growing up as she made me wear sensible shoes until I was old enough to buy shoes for myself.   She used to wear gym shoes as she couldn’t afford to buy both me and her shoes, but I didn’t know that as a child.  I so love her now for it, especially as I have internal foot problems with nerve damage, and I am grateful that the outside of my feet were never damaged by badly fitting shoes. 

3 – I love my pink epilator.  I used to spend a fortune on waxing, then I spied an epilator in Costco a couple of years ago.  It cost me £40, but has saved me hundreds of pounds on waxing.

4 – Shoes.  I have always had a shoes passion.  Unfortunately I can’t wear  most of the lovely things that are out there these days, so my passion has shifted to fitflops.   I can handle that.    It nearly broke my heart to sell the lovely Prada boots I had in my cupboard and the pair of Manolos that I had treasured, but when a couple of pairs of new fitflop boots arrived, I quickly got over my angst. 

5 –  I love make up and smellies.  You probably wouldn’t think so as I don’t go overboard with mine these days, but I do.  So many things are now free of the nasty stuff, that they are nice to try out.   I love scented oils, candles, perfumes, mascaras.   You can’t ever have too much make up choice, and a nice scented candle always makes me smile. 

I am tagging some people from twitter today, but anyone can join in, and add an old post that covers the same topic.  Lets find out a little more about each other.

 This will initially go to:

@crystaljigsaw @nettiewriter @kateab @superamazingmum @melaina25 @tara_cain @flutterbyrosa @softthistle @mummylion
@theboyandme @mrs_moog @jontybabe @jencull @mid30slife

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