So Saturday started with trying to tidy the house. We’d put it off on Thursday and Friday due to being completely shattered and I was feeling abit of pressure as I am now back at work. Lunchtime came round and I’d asked what Vonnie wanted to eat at which point she asked if I fancied finding somewhere for lunch. Thinking she meant one of the local pubs I chanced my arm and seeing as we didnt manage to get a trip to get icecream last week I said we should go to Largs. About half way out of EK(1) Vonnie changed our destination to Ayr(2) as its easier to get to from EK and within about 40 minutes we were sitting in a wee cafe at the far end of Ayr beach having some grub. It wasn’t the nicest day outside though despite the bright weather as a fair wind was blowing everyone about the place so Vonnie suggested finding the Electric Braes.

Ayr Beach from the safety of the car

Having lunch

On the drive out of Ayr I passed comment that I’d always wanted to go back to Culzean Castle as when I last went with the school we never seen much other than the beach. Anyway we drove down to the stone sign for the Electric Braes and despite not actually noticing it my perception of what was a hill and what way it went flew right out the window for the next mile or so despite knowing we’d passed the place in question. Just shows you what the power of suggestion can do I suppose. So we drove passed there and then Vonnie started driving into Culzean Castle(3). Turns out it was going to cost us 16 quid to look around the gardens never mind the castle itself. Considering I thought we were just coming in there to turn around I wasnt quite as shocked as Vonnie at this. Then instead of heading back home Vonnie decided to head to Girvan(4).

I don’t know why but I’ve always got it in my head that I’ve been to Girvan before and yet everytime I drive through the place I remember that the place I’m thinking off is Largs. I’m sure I’ve been there as a kid but for the life of me I can’t remember when. It was at this point that Vonnie suggested driving to Stranraer. Now this isn’t really that long a drive from Girvan except we took a wrong turning and ended up on the road to Newton Stewart. It was a nice we drive down that way but I missed the coastal road to be honest. We stopped off at Galloway Forest Park(5)to stretch our legs and ended up wandering around one of their forest walks. One and a half miles and Nairn made it round almost all of it by himself.

Nairn wandering around the forest trail

Erica keeping an eye on Nairn

Finally made it to Stranraer(6) and I honestly wonder why we bothered. I don’t think I’ve ever been to a place so depressing in my life. Even Methil wasn’t as bad as this. Add to the mix that the road signs in the town are abysmal which meant we ended up taking about 10 wrong turnings as we tried to get out of town and you can understand why I’ve considering petitioning the Ordanance Survey folk to miss it out the next time they update the maps of that area.

On the way home Nairn got really grumpy and discovered his seatbelt wasn’t quite as tight as it should probably have been and tried to squeeze himself out of it. The next layby that came up Vonnie pulled over so that I could fix the seatbelt but it was off the main road and actually a picnic spot right on the beach just outside Lendalfoot(7).There were a couple of caravans and tents pitched up and it looked like quite a cool wee place to stay for the night. We ended up spending 15 minutes wandering up and down the beach while Nairn played with the sand.

Nairn playing while Vonnie goes shell hunting

The view from the beach looking north

The route

We almost done the same thing yesterday as well but the sky opened up just as we were about to get our gear together and leave. Just as well though as I’d done in my back building up the trampoline that morning and by mid-after it was seizing up. If we’d went driving anywhere outside of EK I think I’d have gave up the ghost.

Serves 6

400g pork sausages
1 tbsp olive oil
1 Onion, chopped
1 large carrot, grated
150ml red wine
300ml veg stock
3 tbsp tomato puree
50g butter
50g plain flour
600ml milk
Grated nutmeg
500g pasta, preferably some type of tube
200g fresh spinach
140g mature cheddar, grated

1. Preheat oven to 190C/Gas 4/fan 170C.
2. Remove the skin from the sausages and then cut them up into small bits. While doing this heat the oil in a pan and add the onion.Once its soft and lightly browned add the sausages. Fry until the sausages are lightly coloured. Add the carrot then mix in the wine, stock, tomato puree and season to taste. Bring to the boil and then simmer for 15 mins.
3. Bring a large pan of water to the boil and cook the pasta until tender ie 10 mins or so. Remove from the heat and stir in the spinach until wilted and then drain.
4. Mix the milk, flour and butter in a pan over a low heat, whisking until thick and smooth. Add some nutmeg and simmer for two minutes.
5. Tip half teh pasta into a shallow dish. Pour the sausage mix over this and then the remaining pasta over the top of that. Pour the white sauce over the top and then sprinkle the cheese over the sauce. Bake for 20 minutes until golden brown and sit for 5 minutes before serving.

We had the house in an alright state at the tail end of last week and with all the rushing about and the eventual canceling of trip to Anstruther its ended up being worse than it was to start with. The good thing is that the bedrooms are sorted out furniture-wise so its just a case of sorting out the clothes and making sure the toys are put away in the right places in the boys room. Talking about the boys room Nairn is loving the extra freedom he has now we’ve got a gate over their bedroom door. The only problem is leave him there for 10 minutes to his own devices and its like Godzilla just waded though Tokyo. Its a never ending mess. Even if we tidy it once Nairn’s in bed asleep by the time we wake up in the morning or we realise he is awake the bedroom’s in that same state again.

On Monday we headed down to the Clyde Valley for a drive with the hope of getting a few photo’s and some icecream at the end of the drive. We ended up in Valley International park which seemed to be half shut for some reason. It was really quiet despite being in the middle of the fair fortnight and the birds of prey area was shut. Vonnie found a lab breeder selling puppies and has upped her attempts to talk me round. We did manage to go on the narrow-guage train however.

Yesterday was a trip to Edinburgh Zoo. It didn’t start to well when we were delayed in getting out the front door and forgot a few things. With Erica’s constant crying, Nairn’s constant desire to explore and Findlay’s never ending energy and bouncyness wits ends were reached before we got passed the entrance. Eventually we all calmed down though so we managed to make it around the zoo before heading home completely knackered. I really want to go back once I get a decent long lens for the camera and hopefully once the babies are a bit older and are not quite a handful as they are at the moment. Managed to get a couple od decent pics though

Today we done some financial dealings with the bank and I went to work in my back garden with a mattock. I demolished about 6 trees but the last one before I get to the huge flower bushes is going to be the one that determines wether I’m a man or a boy. The roots on it are huge and theres thousands of them!

I’ll post more tomorrow about our recent travels but this is just a quick note to say that ive transfered the blog over to wordpress but until I get the template right I’ll still be running the b2evo site alongside it. Should hopefully have the change done before I go back to work though.

On another note I’ve updated my photoblog with a few more pics to get me back into the swing of things.

Yet again I’m getting hit with bandwidth hogging crawlers and idiots that think its really great for their scripts to sit and download 400mg from my server over the space of a few hours just for the fun of it.

Apparently b2evol has a major problem with this and as much as I hate the idea I may have to get a Wordpress install on the go as anyone I know thats had to move from b2evol has said that switching to Wordpress stopped the bandwidth hogs almost overnight.

So I’ve been off work now for a week and we’ve got a fair whack done on the house and we are due to go away to Anstruther for a few days. A late minute addition to the plan meant we were going to go up to see the Highland Games up at Lizzie’s over the weekend but thanks to lack of sleep with me we didn’t leave on friday afternoon like we had planned and the backup plan of leaving at 6am this morning fell by the wayside when Vonnie was up with Erica all night. So we called that off as you can guess.

Hopefully we’ll we well enough rested and the house will be tidy enough to head off to Anstruther this afternoon at some point but we’ll see how that works out

Right. I’ve decided its time to get the photoblog back on the go. Since Erica was born I’ve had neither the time nor the energy to keep it up but enough is enough.

Two things have got my enthusiasm and energy level back up for this. I’ve got a fortnights holiday starting next week and we’ll at least be spending a few days on the east coast an maybe fit in a trip elsewhere as well. A photography forum I am a member of has also started a mini competition running alongside a main competition. The main one gives me a chance of winning some weird monopod/pouchpod thingie for every post I make and the the mini one gets me put forward for display on the sites front page each week. Basically their assignments are going to slightly more strict for a change. You get two weeks to get a photo taken and uploaded on a specific theme and the best one wins. I doubt I’ll win but its the taking part that counts as they say. Also each photo I post makes my chance of winning the main prize a little better The other reason is that Alt Nation is changing the way its photography forum works and a small camera club seems to be starting with folk from AN running the show.

Last night was a tough one. We’d sat up and watched Die Hard 2 in bed and then managed to drop off by about midnight. Her royal highness woke up around 2am and after having a bottle of her mothers finest refused to settle back down. I eventually managed to get her to settle down by about half past 4 but only by bringing her into bed and cudling her into me. Its the only way I could lie her down without her waking up. I then couldnt sleep because she was so close to me. I remember seeing the clock tick over to 6am and my alarm going off and then I blinked and it was 6:45am. So much for getting up and out to work for 7am!

I’ve sat here almost in a daze all day barely beiong able to concentrate on work but this last hour has been hell. The temperature in the office is about 26oC and the breeze is almost as warm so theres no way to cool down. Yes I know thats not really that hot but when your this tired it feels like im constantly surled up inside a duvet and my head feels like its surrounded by fluffy pillows. My answer to all of this however is lots of water and going and washing my face with cold water every 20 mins. Seems to be working so far but oh how I long for my bed!

Theres a huge bit of land behind my work that used to be just a dumping ground and a field. The train tracks run right through the middle of it and over the last year or so they’ve been eating away at it. Lidl’s was built on one side of it and for a long time before that there was rumours of a large hotel chain thinking about building a new hotel as well. A fair wee while ago now Hamilton Accies we’re looking at the other sie of the tracks to build their new stadium but it turned out the ground was to boggy for them.

Now we’ve got a pub being built and what I’m told is a travel inn type hotel. I can understand the need for the hotel but I’me curious about the pub. The nearest one is only a 5 minute walk away.

The thing that gets me is that the area they are digging up was a nice bit of ground where folk went for walks with their dog and the land on the other side of the tracks juts against the nature area I usually go to take photos in. Anything they build on that side (and they are looking for investors) is going to have a serious impact on that area.

I think it’s a case of grumpy Bob not liking change to be honest.

Does anyone remember Fluff?

It was that sickly sweet marshmallow spread for putting on your pieces. Used to get it about 20 years ago and then it suddenly stopped appearing on the supermarket shelves. I’ve been told you can pick it up from any one of the many online US sweet shops but as much as I like it I don’t think I’d spend that sort of cash.

I have however found a substitute. Or rather I may have found a substitute. Lidl’s sell what can only be described as mutated tunnocks teacakes. They are twice as high, have a very thin chocolate flavour coating and a wafer base. The thing is they only cost a pound for 12 of the buggers and theres enough mallow in them to fill up three or four Fluff jars. Not entirely sure how to go about removing the chocolate thogh as its so bloody thin. Then again the mallow is that sweet you barely taste it.

Think I may have to give this one a try very soon to see if it will work.