Onion Goggles

My sister gave me these a few months ago. They're brilliant! At first I thought they just make me look silly, but they WORK! They have a spongy liner between the goggles and your skin so no onion eye stinging fumes can reach your eyes. I use them every time I need to slice onions now!

Christmas crafts

The kiddies in my craft classes have been making the most beautiful Christmas crafts. Take a look at what we've made so far.

Lots of glitter everywhere!!

We've also made handprint cards and footprint wrapping paper and reindeers and this week we're making stars to hang on the tree.

Wondering when my voice might return...

I started getting a bit of a sore throat last weekend. My colds always start with a sore throat so I know to then load up on the anti-flu meds and that usually prevents it from getting any worse. Well this time it's dragging on a bit longer than usual. My throat is still sore and I don't think it has ever been as sore as it's been this week. It's been really really painful. And to top it all I've had just about no voice all week!

I think the bit of a cold combined with my job which now requires me to be talking for most of 8 hours every day all of a sudden gave my vocal chords a bit of a shock! Compared to being at home on my own for most of the time this past year meaning very little talking at all.

It's just never taken this long to get my voice back again and now I'm getting a bit worried that it still won't be better by Monday... I've been trying to be really quiet today and not to talk at all unnecessarily. 

Let's hope I can keep up the silence the rest of the weekend!

Note to Family reading my blog

You can now scroll through the photos on my blog, seeing them larger, without leaving this page. Simply click on the first photo. The photo will open larger with a black background. Don't worry, you can easily get back to where you were on the blog!

Click on the picture. This will take you to the next picture. Continue clicking to scroll through and view all the pictures you'd like to see. When you want to go back to reading the blog post simply click on the black background anywhere outside the picture. This will close the picture and take you back to the page you were at.

See it as placing a photo album on top of the book you're reading and then just lifting the album off and your book is still there open at the same place you left it.

Hope this explanation helps! :-) Most of the photos on here were taken by Andre and are worth seeing larger than it is displayed in the blog post. Try it out on the previous post about the Bike Show.

- Anneliese xx

NEC Bike Show 2011

A year ago we went to the NEC (National Exhibition Centre) Bike Show, my first time then, and there was snow along the road as we drove the 2 hours north to Birmingham. This year the weather has been so much milder. Mild in summer and mild in winter (so far) which means all I've had to change in my wardrobe was my light summer jacket for my down winter jacket! Anyway, no snow yet this time during the bike show.

We thought it was bigger and even better than last year. I particularly loved the part where we went to see the freestyle motocross show inside the centre. Those guys were really good on their motorbikes, flying through the air and doing tricks. I could have watched the show again, it was showing three times during the day, but after almost 5 hours at the NEC we were rather tired and ready to head home.

Here are a few pictures of the guys on the bicycles but there were motorbikes too (which were more exciting). Unfortunately we couldn't get good pictures of them. Above you can see their bikes parked.

No shopping this year. Last year we got a new helmet and winter gloves for me. But it was great fun looking at all the different bikes. Of course there were also lots of girls promoting stuff in tight fitting outfits in case the guys got tired of looking at bikes!

Here's a few more of Andre's pictures.

Click on this picture to enlarge.
The guy is wearing a beanie. That's not his
hair. Just looked funny with the stomach too!

The same type of bike used in one of the Harry Potter films.

Pink girlie bikes. See the eyes on the helmet!

Andre enjoyed sitting on the BMW's

Mom & Jürgen will understand why this one made us smile :)

Guys talking bike talk

"I'm sexy and I know it."

PS the Movember mustache is no more. Phew!

I'm still here!

I apologise for not writing much during the past two weeks. Have been a little busy with new and exciting things! Tomorrow night I promise I'll write. Maybe even more than one post. I want to show you some of Andre's photos which he took at the Bike show in Birmingham two weekends ago. He's got his work Christmas do tomorrow night so I'll have time to just relax in front of the tv and spend some quality time with my laptop.

See you later! x

Roman Silchester

The town wall

A few weekends ago we went for a walk around some Roman ruins near where we live. I've seen the sign for it each time we drove past it and wanted to go see what it's all about. We had a lovely walk around. It was a very sunny day for a change. All that remains is basically just the town walls along which you can walk. We walked all around, but unfortunately missed the amphitheater which is also still there. We'll have to go again to find it.

Another section of the wall and one of the entrances to the town.

You can read some more about Roman Silchester by clicking on this link. Below I've copied some info from the site.

After the Roman conquest in AD 43 the settlement developed into the Roman town of Calleva Atrebatum. 
Silchester remains one of the best preserved Roman towns in Britain and one of the very few with continuous occupation since the Iron Age.
The Iron Age town of Calleva preceded the Roman town and was located on the same site, covering over 32 hectares.
Calleva seems to have been established between about 20 and 10 BC.

Walking on top of the wall.