What's Rockin' My World This Friday?

Good morning Rockettes and bloggers alike



I hope this finds you all thriving.

It's been a funny old week this week with a true mixture of the horrible and the fabulous - to both extremes. I think I'll start with the fabulous while I think of ways to be grateful about the other sides of life!

Those of you who know me well and for any length of time will know that as a family we haven't done proper outside-of-Scotland holidays for many, many years. In fact when I counted back, even i was shocked to realise that it was 16½ years since we'd been outside Scotland far less the UK! Much of this has been down to the fact that travelling with my little man has been very difficult and stressful for all concerned with the result that it's only been done in very small manageable distances and only with great amounts of planning and contingency planning. My OH and I have however always made sure that as many opportunities as possible have been made possible for our darling girl, although we've always known that the preferred the family holidays.

Anyway, to cut a long story short, via a little financial windfall and an extreme amount of soul searching, we took a trip to the travel agent on Wednesday of this week and booked return flights to the Big Apple for April 2011, along with hotel, airport transfers - the works. It's still not quite sinking in for me yet although I was high as a kite on Wednesday afternoon! My OH's parents are, sadly, both gone now and that left me to break the news to my parents. After the initial disbelief, my mum's telling comment was "About time too!". So there's a really big grateful!



Regular Rockettes and bloggers alike will know that I'm always grateful for every second Friday because it means that my gorgeous boy is home for a few days. Today is one of those days so YAY!!!!!!!!!!!!! to that and much gratefulness. He's coming out of a recent decline and the staff have yet again been marvellous in guiding him through his often troubled little life. Let's count our blessings bloggers!

Unexpected visitors - having lives a life which was so often filled with chaos and mayhem, unexpected guests were often the least of my worries and I still very much live by the ethos that if you want to visit me then you take me as you find me and if you don;t like it, well.............. Monday brought unexpected guests (well - 15 minutes notice) in the form of my lovely friend Mhairi and her mum. Two hours later they left following a wide ranging discussion which went from autism, to cupcakes, from loss adjusters to stampeding cattle - fabulous - only in my house!



Sparkles - now these little specimens, well known to all crafters, are magical things, multi-purpose and very effective. I'm so very grateful that they do actually do their stuff. In this post I'm sending out bucket loads of them to those who need or want them and some of my crafty pals/bloggers will know that the super-strength variety are heading straight to them to see them through these darker days. You know who you are ladies.

Right, must get on with some of the work I'm paid to do - lunchtime being over. I certainly won;t get a chance to complete this post tonight so am going to leave it as it stands and wish you all things you wish yourself in the coming week until we all meet again - same time - same place.

Gillxx

The Boy's on a full-scale charm offensive

Evening all

Before I forget, Happy National Scrap booking Day, especially to all my buddies on the Do crafts Scrap booking forum - have you left any BP kits for tomorrow? Am going to stand and do the dreaded i*****g while the parade of goodies is passing before my eyes!!

Well, today's post is largely abut the boy (just for a change). He went back to school on Monday as cool as a cucumber - no fussing, screaming or any of the other undesirable behaviours he's been known to exhibit when displeased. Reports all week have been of compliance with his programme, smiles, laughter and the giving out of many hugs. We've always known that Ross can be a real little charmer when the mood takes him but it's unlike him for the mood to last for more than a day! All week the girls working with him have been using words like "fab" "great" "cute" and best of all "no SIB (self injury behaviour) over and over again. It sounds like they're all having a ball and it would appear that Ross is working really hard to improve his speech and the length of the small phrases he can manage. He's really good at the short ones like "no school tomorrow" but then that's kids all over isn't it LOL!!! It's all just timely reminder that the majority of us take it so much for granted being able to communicate our hopes, fears, desires and general thoughts so easily in a verbal form - how easily we forget the people for whom that's just not possible, or near nigh impossible.

Anyway, we know that despite his difficulties Ross is a really smart little cookie and it seems that finally, 11½ years down the line, he's starting to make some visible inroads into some of the most trying aspects of the way autism affects him. He has a big multi-disciplinary review in just over a week so hopefully some of his achievements of late will be highlighted. Just hope I'm not putting the kiss of death on all this by posting about it - that really would be sod's law!

DD, Alexandra, went to the hairdressers this morning and I left her to it - at 13 she knows what she wants. She came out looking gorgeous with her hair merely trimmed to a shorter version of her bob. Our girl is growing up so beautifully - must take some photos before I forget.

I took delivery today of my new stamp from Foxcraft Cards - Graduation Poppy - and I'll reveal her to you tomorrow hopefully.

Lastly, a message to Maria. Maria, keep your chin up sweetie, you know that I know how hard it is at the moment and I just wish I could do something to help, so just know that I think of you every day (Stephen as well) and am sending you both cheering strengthening and brightening sparkles and hugs via t'internet. How I wish I was closer that I could do it in person.

Right folks, off to slob a bit in front of the TV and debate about whether to stay up for the launch of the Craft Day TSV on QVC. How much excitement can one woman cope with I ask you?!!!!

TTFN

Happy Birthday Jude!!!

In true awards fashion I'm going to work through time backwards since the last post.

Firstly, tomorrow if a dear friend's birthday, so Happy Birthday Jude for tomorrow, and I still find your confession about going to the dogs amusing. For those of you not familiar with Edinburgh, The Dogs is a restaurant and not a self-deprecating remark by Jude, funny and amusing as she is!! Have a lovely evening Jude and bring your precious boy in to see me again soon. Anyway, was driven to making a birthday card as it was too late to find a nice shop-bought (sweary words I know) one by the time I finished work tonight. Came up with this effort using my beloved K & Co's Blue Awning. Needless to say the selflessness of this sacrifice of one of my most beloved papers will be totally lost on the recipient LOL!!! Sue-Bubbles you know who you are and you will vouch for my sacrifice!



Also, Happy Birthday to step-daughter Suzie, for yesterday (told you I was working backwards!!!

Yesterday saw Ross heading back to school after a lovely peaceful weekend at home. Peaceful and Ross aren't two words I would usually use in the same sentence so it was indeed a weekend to be celebrated. Major achievement for all parties involved was Ross allowing me to give him a haircut (No. 4 clippers all over, with zero blade trim round the edges!). This had to be done as Ross was in danger of adopting his look-alike persona of Elvis!! Ross was one of those children who had to be given his first haircut immediately prior to his christening aged 11 weeks or the minister would have struggled to find his face. This is a pretty remarkable achievement as Ross is one of those individuals for whom a haircut is regarded as something, quite literally, as something akin to physical assault, except in autism it's probably actually more of a sensory assault which is a step too far. Anyway, I digress, as usual.

The weekend was spent in a haze of sleep, housework, time with Ross and watching TV. I've decided one of my new heroes is Marco Pierre White - you've just got to love the guy. He's nothing if not honest and I personally find him very endearing.

I also found time since last posting to visit Foxcraft Cards to order this cute little stamp as quite a few of our part-time staff at work graduate this summer and cards will be in order.

I logged onto Docrafts last night and the ladies of the scrapbooking forum are having a right royal debate about whether or not to buy the Brenda Pinnick Scrapper Keeper kit which they've all been waiting on coming over the from QVC USA. I personally am feeling more than a wee bit tempted and I know several ladies have confessed on UK Scrappers to already having made the purchase far ahead of the much awaited QVC Craft Day this Sunday.

Right, need to go and phone school to check on Ross. Two and a half years down the line and we still phone morning and night to check on our precious boy - it's just a slightly different way of life now. Thank goodness for free evening and weekend calls!

Right

Definitely for the off, so take care ladies, and sparkles to you all.

XXXXX

Just one of those days..........

We all have those days we'd really just rather forget don't we? Well for me, today has been one of them. Avoiding the risk of developing a hurricane style rant, suffice it to say that this is a day when I really and truly loathe and detest autism and they way it affects people. In my case I hate what it does to Ross. What should have been a simple trip into town to collect a drive-thru MacDonald's Happy Meal turned into full scale warfare which meant us only getting a third of the way and then having to turn back. Ross was in meltdown and OH who was in back of car with him wasn't far behind. A good few hours later Ross has settled by OH is still not worth the speaking to.

Anyway, on a brighter note, one of the regulars on the Docrafts forum, Clarky J, has some fab blog candy on offer including some gorgeous stamps. Pop over and have a look - it's gotta be worth it. The girl's sure done good going by the number of hits her blog's received!!!

Need to go and get ready for back to work tomorrow - think that may be a blessing in disguise LOL!!

TTFNxxx