would love to be mortgage free!

Mimi09

Hi Cazzie,
depending on space, you could play a game of 'Sharks'. Put a few sheets of newspaper down on the floor for islands. have the children swim around the islands (hop / jump etc) when you shout sharks they have to get onto an island for safety. Remove an island each time...those children who don't get onto an island are out.

Sunken treasure game? make treasure or pictures of fish etc (cardboard coins wrapped in foil) and hide around the house or garden. Tell the children there are x number of coins/fish, they have to find them as a team i.e. find a coin and bring it back to the treasure chest (pot/saucepan) until all are found. When all are found give them each a chocolate coin or lolly/chew as a reward.

coldcazzie

Hi Mimi :wave:

Love the Sharks idea! Will definitely use that! Can cut out island shapes from cereal boxes.

Treasure could be doable... I've a baggie of pirate treasure coins that I've been searching for a use for (they were originally going to be a stocking present but I couldn't find them around Christmas and ended up with plenty of stuff anyway, then I found them again about new year and have been wondering what I could do with them). So, I could definitely do a pot of treasure...

For Squish-pot's 5th we had a Fairytale Party, and I made little bags out of an old curtain tied with some gold ribbon - each child had their name on it in an olde worlde font, and then I put some pirate treasure, plastic rings, etc etc in and hid them around the garden - they each had to go find their bag at the end of the party. Perhaps I can do something similar with treasure chests... although it would have to be fairly easy to do with stuff I've got around the house... I shall have a ponder.

Thankyou for pitching ideas in - it really helps stimulate the old brain cells! :rotfl:

I've stopped moving now to do computery things and I'm really cold!

coldcazzie

GAH!! :mad: Gotta hoover the girls' room AGAIN!! Since hoovering this morning the bloody cat has been up on the shelf AGAIN and ragged down the tub into which I had put the food from the ripped bag I cleared up earlier, so now that's EVERYWHERE (it was only a small portion of the bag and mostly confined to the desk earlier) and has also tried it on with another bag of food! Food now confiscated, and cat banished to garden. Still need to rehoover though :mad: who thought pets were a good idea?! Whoever it was needs a good slap!

coldcazzie

Latest saga in the house of horrors: running the kitchen tap results in the water backing up the drainage pipe and coming out of the standpipe behind the wm. Is it normal for wm drainage to be the same pipe as the sink drainage? I'm fairly certain it's not. I wish I knew what the **** the previous owners were thinking when they had this kitchen installed. If they paid someone else to do it they were ripped off. If they did it themselves they should've paid someone to do it! I could actually cry at the idea of having to live with it for another year until we can afford to replace it... I know it's probably just a bit of a block, but that's not the seat of the problem. The crux of it is that the kitchen was badly designed and badly installed.

Tilly_MFW_in_6_YRS

I am sure it is driving you mad. I would imagine the fun with the extra vacuuming you have done hasn't helped. Get the kettle on, and forget the list of jobs. Hope you have a peaceful evening - I think I would want to rip the kitchen out so you are being really patient. Night Tilly x

coldcazzie

If it weren't for the fact that I can't afford to replace it yet I actually would rip it out. When it comes to that time it'll just be me and a crow bar and lots of wild shrieking/evil cackles. I don't hate this house, but I do seriously question what the hell the previous owners (I think at least the last 2 sets) were thinking when they did various things. If I listed everything I'd be here all day. Sometimes I regret buying this house - we were very naive and it's showed. But considering the crap hole we moved from (damp, mould, no heating, rats, etc) this is tonnes better, we just need to slowly go around and correct all the shoddy work. Then at least we know that it's good for the next owners.

Anyway, I love my hubby. He mopped up, took all the old pipework off, and then went to B&Q to find a bit (which it turned out later was too small lol) and rang a friend to get a piece of pipe, and has put the whole thing back together in such a way that 1, the wm is connected to the proper connector bit instead of draining into a standpipe; 2, the sink pipework is straight, and not on an angle; 3, the U bend is on the left of the sink instead of the right, meaning that there's actually room in the cupboard and the water doesn't have to go on a trip half way round the kitchen before eventually ending up outside. He also removed a large blockage from some pipe somewhere. All within 2 hours, with minimal fuss and only 1 hypo. And I hid in the living room thinking end-of-the-world type thoughts.

Thanks Tilly I'm already in a fragile state of mind this evening as a friend of mine got her results back from a needle biopsy this afternoon and it turns out she's got breast cancer. Feeling very shocked as she's no previous history, never smoked, breastfed 4 kids etc, but she's early on so fingers crossed things should turn out well. Just makes you think, y'know. She's only 37. Sigh. Think I need some hot chocolate and my bed. Thank god I've got nice clean sheets on. Love clean sheets for making you feel a bit better at the end of the day. Night xx

Hurdler

I can relate - the guy I bought my house from bodges SOOO much - we'd be playing bodge-poker for ages, you and I!!!

JonnieShah

Sounds awful Cazzie.
Suppose you could just this of it as a challenging adventure, to save your house from the Demon ex-landord conman randomness..... ooooh, biscuits *nom nom nom*

Sepa74

Hi Cazzie, yay for hubby, and boo for the breast cancer.

What a horrible day! I really hope your evening was nice and relaxed, and tomorrow brings some sunshine for you

coldcazzie

Woo! Free listing weekend again on eBay this weekend! :T only downside is I wasn't expecting it so soon so I'm not prepared! :eek: guess today is going to be spent photographing & weighing things!