In Loving Memory……

[Whispers] Hello, is anybody out there?

Silence.

[Shouts] Hey! Where is everyone?

Silence.

As I am sure you can imagine brimming with anticipation on returning to blogging I excitedly went on a whistle-stop tour of all my favourite blogs. Of which there were many.

Eager to catch up on all I’ve missed since Libby was born and attempted to suck out all my will to live by never, ever sleeping.

Sadly, I found lots of this,

Only to be expected I guess, and obviously I would’ve been invited if I hadn’t carelessly neglected my blog for quite so long.

But I also found lots of this,

Gasp!

I really mean it, GASP!!!!

Too many of the blogs I loved and followed are not even in existence anymore.

It’s like while I was absent completely unbeknown to me there was some kind of tragic blog holocaust.

Whole blogging civilisations wiped out with absolutely no explanation.

Sob!

I find myself feeling a bit like this guy,

See the sadness in his eyes?

That’s exactly what my eyes look like right now!

Those few who remain almost without exception seem to be super-bloggers now attracting millions of visitors and blogging on a scale I never even new was possible.

So here I am, a Wall-E emerging from a blog holocaust (though for certain I’ll be doing a lot less cleaning up than that guy!)

I guess it’s time to make some new friends.

Anyone?

Be My Valentine…

Yes, it’s true I am officially smitten.

Thank you Microsoft for simplifying one area of my life.

Now if you could only excel your good selves and invent a program that gets Libby sleeping 12 hours a night I’d be forever in your debt.

Watch Out People!

You know you're completely out of the blogging loop when you log in on blogger and it kindly informs you that you have 261 unmoderated comments. For a mere second I let it go to my head a tiny bit and felt tres popular indeed. Right until I scanned the comments prior to moderation and found each and every one to be completely identical, all offering me Viagra.

Viagra? Are you kidding me? I have 3 kids, the smallest of which it appears failed to read our family sleeping policy prior to arrival in chez Siswick and is killing me slowly, mostly a brain cell at a time. I think I'm likely down to approximately 12 remaining right now.

I need a pill to keep me awake in the morning and another to put me to sleep at night preferably for at least 8 gloriously solid hours. Viagra I can live without, it is surplus to requirements here.

But is this what the blogosphere has come to in my absence? Spam comments? Uncool.

It was a humbling moment when I came to the realisation that if I neglected one of my kids as badly as I have neglected my lovely blog these last 12 months or so social services would've intervened long, long ago. Surely my blog is as worthy of my love as my offspring?

So I have used up all my paltry excuses for not blogging:

I'm pregnant and tired-check.

I just had a baby and am even more tired-check.

I fell over because I was so tired and fractured my shoulder-check.

I can hardly string a sentence together due to combined tiredness from pregnancy, having a baby, fracturing my shoulder and having to contend with dear sweet beautiful Libby whose single goal in life is to ensure I never get a good nights sleep-check.

No more excuses people, I'm back on the blog.

And I mean it!

That is my only New Year Resolution.

Out For the Count

I think we all know how much I enjoy moderating my comments.

I'm so easily pleased, I know.

The last few weeks I have been utterly baffled.

Blogger has lost the ability to count correctly.

My two year old can count to 14 all by himself.

I am expecting Blogger to be slightly more intelligent than Eli.

Is that really too much to ask?

What am I rambling on about you wonder?

Without fail I always have one more comment than Blogger informs me I have.

At first I thought Blogger was just having a bad day.

I sympathised, we all have days like that after all.

Lately I am having a few (thanks kids!).

But weeks on the madness continues.

You know what the worst thing is?

Sometimes when it says I have no comments to be moderated if I click on moderate comments lo and behold there is a single lonely comment anxiously waiting acceptance.

What is the world coming to when even Blogger is keeping secrets and lying to you?

See this is exactly why I am concerned about my children's future.

A deceitful blogger account is surely just the beginning of the end.

Saving the World a Chocolate Bar at a Time

Lucky you! I am feeling inspired.

Partly by those (slightly greedy) souls who suggested a giveaway, and partly by the fact that for the last few weeks I haven't been keeping on top of my blogging etiquette.

My Google Reader overfloweth and I have a trillion emails to respond to.

Thinking I haven't stopped by in a while? You are not alone I assure you.

But I will catch up I always do, I am far too nosey/intrigued not to.

So therefore I introduce to you my lucky readers, my Cadbury inspired giveaway.

The incredibly lucky and honoured winner will receive one of each of the new ultra healthy Cadbury bars. Obviously I am looking far beyond the sugar and the fat here and focusing on the cold hard facts.

Cranberries? Hello antioxidants and super healthy urinary tract.

Apricots? Hello to a nicer source of Iron than Spinach.

I am all about improving your health (actual bars will appear larger in real life).

With the holiday season just around the corner I will even throw in a few of my other favourite bars, because lets face it the less chocolate there is in my close vicinity the less I am able to actually eat.

So all you have to do is leave me a comment before Tuesday 8am (English time of course) and you'll be included in the draw.

You don't have to have a blog or even a google account to leave a comment and if you don't usually comment feel free to do so (which includes most of my family and the British Isles). Plus if you're reading my blog surely I should be reading yours so feel free to unlurk and share your link you lurkers.

From someone who has recently eaten her body weight in these bars this is truly an opportunity not to be missed.

Happily Reunited

Our beloved laptop finally returned to our homestead on Thursday morning. The virus completely removed, well actually virtually everything removed but still we were happy to have her back nonetheless.

For 4 days we were completely Internet free. It was almost like losing an arm. But not nearly so dramatic.

I was forced to find new sources of entertainment, time wasting and procrastinating the ironing.

Fortunately for me our loss of laptop coincided beautifully with the Olympics.

I dedicated many an hour to cheering on team GB and was thrilled to witness our greatest number of medals ever (yes we are generally a nation of gross underachievers), and it's not even over yet!

Roll on London 2012 (but not too quickly because I am not so excited about getting 4 years older) when we get to watch it at a reasonable time of day for once.

Without access to Google Reader I had to resort to the lowly alternative of reading an actual real book. So I found myself delving under our bed where I hoard all new books that I buy. (Does anybody else collect unread books? Just me? Righto!) Anyhow I pulled out 19 Minutes by Jodi Picoult and read and read and read and I loved it. If you love Jodi like I do you will not be disappointed I promise.

With Rob computerless he was forced to end each working day early which obviously was a huge hardship for him. So we utilised some of our time by taking the boys for way overdue haircuts. We figured it a more sensible ratio to go two on two, reducing the risk of me getting tag teamed by the toddlers. Especially after the drama last time I took Eli.

So they used to look like this

Now Eli looks like this.

We managed to get through the ordeal with relatively few tears. Though being the drama lover that he is he did cry out 'Ow-Ow' or 'Ouch' with every single snip to his precious locks. He also threw in a few whimpers of 'Daddy no hurt me!' too.

Thomas now looks like this.
Excuse the complete trance-like almost gormless state of both boys. They were fully engrossed in a critical point in an episode of Go Diego Go when I pulled out the camera. All attempts to bribe them to look into the camera by offering chocolate sadly failed.

Yes, I am that kind of mother.

Unthinkable Happenings

Saturday night I couldn't sleep.

After tossing and turning for hours and being forced to listen to Rob's deeply sleeping sounds I had had quite enough.

I got up.

There was nothing on TV.

I headed to the computer.

The computer booted up and I snuggled into my blanket.

I looked at the desktop and noticed it was different than usual.

Then as it finished booting up the desktop informed me that the computer had been infested with a virus or spyware and I needed to install antivirus or anti spyware software quickety quick.

It was an emergency.

I am no computer whizz I assure you but I downloaded antivirus software and before it even had a chance to run the computer shut down completely.

Then magically it started to reboot and I thought all was going to turn out OK after all.

It didn't.

The desktop remained a different colour and although all the icons appeared nothing was clickable. Not a single file could be accessed on the computer. The computer I feared had been sadly murdered by this virus.

A tragedy.

I couldn't exactly wake Rob up with the less than cheerful news that his computer had come to a tragic end in the middle of night. So I waited until morning.

Currently our beloved laptop is en route to Scotland to Velux head office to see if the IT department can resuscitate it. Who knows when it will be coming back to us or if we'll be welcoming a brand new replacement in it's stead.

So in the mean time we are completely computer-less.

So if you're wondering why I'm rudely not commenting on your blog or replying to emails this is the reason.

I have discovered that I can blog from my mobile phone which is from whence I blog right now. But alas it is like sending the worlds longest and most annoying text message and it is no doubt rather pricey too.

But I just wanted to provide an explanation as to where I am.

It's My Blog and I Can Write What I Want to...

I think we all know that I love to blog. I make no secret of it.

I love that I can write about whatever I want, completely uncensored and best of all I like that nobody can interrupt me while I do so.

Brilliant, right?

I don't mind at all that endless strangers the world over (yes, I am kidding myself a tiny bit) can come by and read about whatever I am considerate enough to share that day.

I have been known to whine (just the once and that was practically forever ago) that the majority of readers fail to comment. Anyone that blogs themselves will know that comments are the icing on the blog cake so to speak, and we all know how much I like cake. (Unless it's ginger cake of course, ginger cake I can live without.) But I have made my peace with that. If you comment that is super dooper great, if you don't that's fine too, but just know I won't like you so much.

From my very first blogging day I have had comment moderation enabled. That way I get to see who has commented and what delightful things they had to say and I then get the option to either publish or reject. I always publish my comments except for a couple of mishaps along the way where I rejected completely and honestly by accident. One of these mishaps involved 2 comments from Rob and he has never commented since. Can anyone say hold a grudge? (Come on Rob take the higher road and forgive me.)

From day 1 I also disabled search engines from finding my blog. Well, until the curiosity got to me and I started to wonder what people would actually have to Google to turn up right here (that is a whole other blog post in itself believe me) and I freely admit I have had my share of unwanted attention.

So this post goes out to the other people who arrived here by way of Google and commented on my blog and I chose to reject what they had to say to me.

Why did I choose to delete it?

Because I can.

I have the power.

So to half the population of Wales (who clearly have nothing better to do than search the Internet for critical things people may have said about their language) who responded to my post about our recent stay in Wales and gave me several lengthy and insightful lectures on the origins of the Welsh language and how it is purer in form than English. Those Welsh folk are fiercely patriotic (and evidently not big fans of the English) I have found. I thank you all but I reject you.

To the person who googled snakes in bed (seriously?) and then left me a comment telling me what I had just shared was an urban legend and they hoped very much that I was simply attempting to be entertaining because apparently an Anaconda couldn't eat an adult human due to the shoulders being wider than it's jaws could physically stretch and was kind enough to attach a link or two so I could re-educate myself more thoroughly on a snakes actual dining etiquette. I remind you that I never once said the snake actually ate her or even attempted to. I am not personally acquainted with this snake but I am willing to concede it may have been a snake with a low IQ that was shamelessly unaware of it's inability to swallow adult human shoulders. I thank you also but I reject you.

And finally to who can only be described as Matthew McFadyen biggest fan who was ever so offended that I dared have the audacity to suggest Colin Firth was a far superior Mr Darcy (which he is) than Mr McFadyen would ever be. I thank you for your opinion (as utterly incorrect as it is) but I reject you.

I beg of you no more silly interruptions.

Because after all it's my blog and I can write what I want to.

Check Me Out!

This morning I was over at McMommy's checking out this weeks POW (fantabulous way to find great new blogs to read BTW) and I was reading a post at Got Kids, Need Valium (don't we all?) where I have visited before and immediately noticed her brand new and lovely blog design.

I scrolled down to see who was responsible for the makeover and saw that it was Ragan at Blogger Boutique . So I sent her an email this morning when she was no doubt fast asleep and even despite that 8 hour difference in time zones she just finished it. Isn't that incredible?

I LOVE IT!

Now that my blog-self is all spruced up and beautified I just need to find someone to do the same for me in real life.

Though I doubt it'd be as speedy, or cheap.

Unwanted Attention

On July 10th my blog received an unusually high amount of visits. Of course I quickly came to the realisation that word had finally got out that my blog is truly brilliant. (About time too!)

Then I came to my senses.

Then I thought it must simply be because my new pal Wendi who thinks I'm 'cool' (I'm really not I assure you!) had linked my blog from hers (Cheers Wendi!) and she is supremely popular in Blogland so obviously the masses (very slight exaggeration) would follow.

Turns out Wendi wasn't responsible.

Later I noticed one of my favourite people in the whole wide world, Heidi, had linked my blog from hers too. Heidi and I were missionary companions 10 years ago in Birmingham and I have the fondest memories of the 3ish months we spent together 24/7. Hailing from Las Vegas I was her very first companion and I really do have to applaud myself for the excellent job I made of Anglicising her. Her personality is the perfect combination of sarcasm and the ability to laugh at the misfortune of others to perfectly compliment my own. In response to my belated 4th of July post she did a British version so go check that out so you can see from an American perspective all that is good about England.

To my surprise it turned out Heidi wasn't responsible either.

I started to wonder if maybe my first instinct was actually correct and the world had simply just come to the conclusion that my blog is terrific.

Then I came to my senses again.

Finally I remembered something my friend Rachael had told me about and so I went to check out Google Analytics.

This is what I learned, if you put the words b00bs (notice I'm using zero's there not O's and will always do so from now on I assure you) in a post as I had on the July 9th you're gonna attract a lot of visits to your blog.

Google had a super busy day that day directing people looking for the following:

Abbie Hawkins b00bs,
b00bs,
Abbie Hawkins b00b,
Big b00b blogger,
34FF bra,
Abbie Hawkins,
Abbie Hawkins big b00bies,
Abbie Hawkins bra 34FF b00bs,
Big b00bed Abbie Hawkins,
Big b00bs,
B00b check,
Hawkins 34FF big b00bs,
and finally,
How big is 34FF bra,

Do you know what is really incredibly sad? Not one person googled to see how the bat was doing.

That poor unfortunate bat squished in the padding of a humongous bra cup for 5 hours and nobody in the world cared enough to google about its well being. What kind of world do we live in?

So it would seem that Abbie Hawkins (and yes she is blond) is an international superstar because I got hits from Saudi Arabia to Finland and Hong Kong to Germany.

I can only imagine the calibre of individual who would out of intrigue (and no doubt seeking photographic evidence) google her bra size.

I can only laugh when I consider how ultra disappointed they must have been when they arrived right here.

Where the only b00bs on show belong to preschool boys.

And if they were foolish enough to scroll down in their search they would have been faced with Poop art!

Mwahahahahaha! That'll teach them.

A Tragedy

You know how I pretended to be on blogging strike (when really Rob just took the laptop to Scotland on business) because I wasn't happy with my visit:comment ratio?

I don't know what it is exactly but receiving comments about the random contents of my brain that I somehow manage to form into text on my blog makes me feel verified as a human being, not to mention totally super giddy with excitement.

So Rob finally finished his notice period (no more sleeping in for him!) of his last job on Friday and had to return his car, computer, printer and all that great stuff we take for granted to head office.

Do you know what that means? No Internet at home.

Well actually only until Monday.

I actually felt like a junkie going cold turkey. Rob too (fortunately) has been feeling the wrench of being disconnected so I don't feel quite so tragic. (Though I do still feel slightly tragic which I think is justified.)

So we went to visit the in laws this afternoon and pick up my car. Now that Rob's old company car has been returned he is driving the new company car (which I blissfully enjoyed for two weeks) and I am now back to my oil leaking crappy excuse for a car, but a car is a car. It gets me where I need to be and fingers crossed that will long continue.

So while we were at the in laws the family PC was calling me from the computer room, 'Come check your blog, you know there will be comments....' I couldn't resist. (I am only human!) I went on in and logged in.

14 comments. (Yay!!)

Somehow a combination of my incapability in mouse operation (that's what 2 years of laptop only computer contact will do to you)) and sheer panic that Rob would catch me getting my blog fix and mock me endlessly (it had after all been only 36 hours) resulted in a disaster.

I deleted 5 of the lovely comments.

So if you were kind enough to comment on my Game, Set & Match post don't think that during comment moderation I deleted your comment because it was not appreciated.

It was simply deleted because I am a imbecile.

Thanks for your comments whoever you were/are.

If you're wondering how I am managing to post this post without Internet access I am actually high jacking a computer at this moment in time.

As for any other posts over the weekend they were posted utilising the handy scheduled post thingy that blogger kindly does for you.

I love blogger.

Blogaholic

I have come to the realisation that I have a problem.

Rob oh so innocently happened to enquire how on earth I manage to spend so much time on the Internet (he himself is a frequenter of an entire 5 sites in total, which are:
email,
Sports,
Sports (yes I know I included that twice, it is apparently a big deal),
Facebook and
Internet banking.

I know his enquiry was totally innocent because on Saturday he played Top Spin Tennis (I think he was trying to get into the mood for Wimbledon, after all Rob is as likely to win that particular Grand Slam than any Brit actually competing in it) for approximately 5 hours on his XBOX, so it's not like he's really in a position to judge me on how I invest/waste my time.

My reaction to his question?

Completely dramatic,

Incredibly defensive,

Overly sensitive,

and 100% Pure Ridiculous.

Seriously?!

The tell-tale unmistakable behaviour of a bona fide addict.

Obviously once I had come to terms with the fact that I have developed blog addiction. I heartily apologised (incidentally while he was still playing Tennis) and he graciously forgave me.

I now fully embrace my addiction (and add it happily to my list of deeply cherished things along with chocolate, Pepsi and Reality TV), after all it could be worse, it could be crack!

I'm Putting YOU on the Naughty Spot!

You may remember how I previously mentioned I am a huge advocate of Supernanny and her Naughty Spot technique. In recent months it is even working supremely (not to mention frequently) well with Eli. I find it really gets the point across with my kids, both simply and effectively. Plus Eli has outgrown the stage where he would loudly mock cry and attempt to sit on Thomas the whole time he was on the naughty spot. Which Thomas clearly didn't really appreciate at all (though I did find it quietly hilarious).

So this leads me to the point of my post today. The nice people at Sitemeter recently sent me an email saying my blog had attracted 1700 visitors in the few months that I have been blogging. Obviously for a second I felt so incredibly special. Then reality sadly kicked in. If my blog has had 1700 visits then why oh why has it only had 182 comments? (Yes, I did count all of them specifically to reinforce my point and it was worth every single mundane second!)

Now I am happy to consider the point that sometimes people check my blog only to find it hasn't been updated recently, hence no new posts to comment on. But seeming as I generally blog thrice weekly or so I'll divide the 1700 visits by the 7 days in a week and multiply by 3 (I know I am a maths genius!) to determine that 728 times whenever someone checked my blog they would have been greeted by a brand new somewhat spectacular post.

I am not considering that what you read on my blog didn't deserve comment, that is not even possible. Especially considering I generally neglect keeping my house clean to update my blog (which I hasten to add is a very small sacrifice).

Commenting by the way could not be easier:

• You don't need a Google/Blogger Account,
• You can simply choose the name option and input your actual name,
• Or else you can do what Rob does and leave anonymous comments and claim it wasn't you,
• You don't even have to be someone I know, frankly I am more than happy for anyone to read and comment about my endless ramblings on life. (BTW I know you're out there because those nice Sitemeter peeps let me know location and pages visited of every single person who visits my humble blog!)

So somehow I am missing 546 comments. Well that is naughty behaviour if ever I saw it!

Therefore.....

I am putting you on the naughty spot.

I am even dispensing with Supernanny's preferred manner of providing a warning to allow people a chance to change their behaviour. She says when behaviour is serious enough to warrant it skip the warning and get straight to the discipline. You have to be cruel to be kind after all you see.

(In a stern tone) You people haven't been commenting on my blog like you should and it is simply just not acceptable behaviour. Now you can sit there for x minutes (x being a minute for every year of your life, so for some of you that's a really LOOOOONG time).

So there you have it, while you're on the naughty spot thinking about what you have done (or failed to do in this instance) I am going on strike! No more blogging for me until previously mentioned behaviour is fully rectified!

I need apologies, hugs and kisses people! Then I'll happily forgive and blog on.

But until then 'Au Revoir' while I go cry into my pillow about not feeling the love.

Awesome

Today we had a fun family trip to Flamingo land in honour of it being Eli's 2nd Birthday Eve. (You can find all the pictures of our fun and frolics at the end of this Facebook photo album.) Obviously a fun time was had by all and the sun shone just enough to not need jackets! Perfect. Both boys were thrilled by the endless rides and rollercoasters and got soaked through before our day was over!

On the way home with both kids unconscious (which means they'll be up until midnight no doubt) in the back of the car we started talking about blogging.

Rob: "All you do is blog about the kids anyway....." (Because my life is SO crammed full with other things, right? Nope!)
Me: "Is there something special you'd like me to blog about you then?"
Rob: "Yeah, that I am awesome!"

I am in full agreement and I probably should have said it far sooner.....

Rob is awesome!