September 29th 2015 - Wizard Wand

September 29th Wizard Wand

Lil man has 2 outfits for halloween this year - his monster for school and a lovely blue wizard outfit (that I made better by adding star ribbon to).  The only thing the outfit was missing was a wand.  I had saved this pin to my Harry Potter party board ready for next year as I planned to make them for the party.

Well this has been the trial run of it - lil man wanted a blue wand with silver bits on the handle!  I didn't have any chopsticks like the pin says BUT I did have a huge hedge in the garden that has been cut down!  This emans I have loads of branches so we went out and found 1 that he liked.  We cut all the sticky out bits off, pealed the bark off it and allowed to dry for a few days.

Yesterday I started to make patterns on the handle end with  UHU glue as I couldn't find my hot glue sticks (I think they will work better and dry quicker), I did 3 layers in total building up  on the layer below so it was raised.  Again the wand was left to dry over night.  And today (after a trip to town to get the right colour blue sparkly nail varnish for it) I started to cover the wand in nail varnish.  It had to have 2 coats as 1 went patchy and wasn't as dark as me or lil wanted.  Once the blue was dry I had to go on a hunt for a thin paint brush, this was a task in itself as the kitten had knocked the tub of brushes off the windowsill and then batted them around as toys - I found 1 near the dvd shelves and cut some of the bristles so it was smaller still.  I then used a silver sparkle nail varnish to go over the raised glue on the handle, this took 2 coats as well so it was really bright and shiny. 

Lil man is really pleased with his 1-of-a-kind wand that goes with his outfit.  I just hope it still fits him for Harry Potter next year.  This was really easy to do and I will be doing 1 for all the kids for next year and maybe the adults (may not use my hedge but bamboo skewers or similar) and if  I have enough time I will make and extra load and attach a small bag of sweets to for the trick or treaters.

September 28th 2015 - someone loves you

September 28th 2015 - Someone loves you

I found this image on pinterest linked to pain and thought it was great.

The pin link can be found here Pain and love.  I'm very lucky in that I have an understanding husband and he knows what major pain is like as he was involved in a serious RTA 5years ago, had he been in a car and not a lorry he wouldn't be here today.  When he had his accident I was the one in reasonable health (my knee was no where near as bad as it is now) and I was doing everything.  He is still not 100% fit but he is able to do more than I can at present.

Therefore today's pin is for my husband who knows of sorts what I am going through with the pain.  He is the one that is here day in, day out and sees how bad I am and how much I struggle and he helps as much as he can - even if its just leaving me in bed of a morning to sleep as i've been fidgeting all night or bringing me a plate of sandwiches so I don't have to get up for lunch.

Not all people with chronic pain are this lucky.

September 27th 2015 - blood splatters

September 27th 2015 - blood splatters


Today has been a very gory day.  As halloween is now very close to us it was time to add some more blood splatters to the costumes that needed them.  My garden looks like a murder scene - there is red spray paint on the grass from where I did my shoes last week, there are halloween outfits hanging on the line all dripping with fake blood and there is fake blood on the patio.  It's all good fun!

So the outfits needed more blood splatters were my nurses dress:

It looked very "shop bought" and not very scary/bloody etc and my tights were plain white, so I made a mix of pva glue and fake blood and stuck it in a spray bottle and set about attacking the dress!


















My eldest sons chef outfit:

that was all the outfit had - the plastic mouth and plastic blood coming down from it, the trousers were just summer checked ones so again had no blood and the hat was a £1 shop chef hat so had no blood.  I hung them out on the line and used the same mix as I used on my dress. 

I can safely say they look much better now.  And because of the pva glue in them some of the runny bits have stayed as thick lines.  Here are the new amended outfits:

nurse dress and tights

chefs top, trousers and hat

Hubby and the other 2 didnt need blood adding to their outfits.

September 26th 215 - Steps

September 26th 2015 - steps


Take One step at a time and you will be there at the top in no time. Your tools are Positive mind, Hard work and determination. It may not be easy but it will be worth it in the end.

This is not just true to people who suffer from chronic pain, illness and depression but could apply to anyone!  It is very true.  However I would probably add in "I am doing it (just)" at the first step because for those struggling just getting up in the morning.  Also a "i'm getting there".


i'm sure other people could and would add others as well.

September 25th 2015 - Pumpkin game

September 25th 2015 - Pumpkin game

For Halloween my friend has asked me to sort out the games for the party.  This got me thinking of what we could do that wont involve lots of things needing to be taken with us.  I was also thinking along the lines of normal party games that we could make "halloweeny".

I had the thought on musical chairs - we don't have much room or enough chairs for loads of kids BUT we do have cushions, and from here came the idea of making pumpkins from paper for it.  I found a pumpkin template, asked my friends to help with orange paper/card as I didn't have any (2 of my friends were able to help).  I printed the pumpkin image and cut it out, and used it to draw round on the orange paper.  These were then cut out and the extra lines added, the pumpkin stalks were made from brown paper and glued on.  From here they are going to be laminated so can be re-used.

 Although this may look big it was cur out of A4 paper, and its not as dark as it looks its a real bright orange.

The idea is that of musical chairs, each child will start with a pumpkin on the floor and they will dance round them etc, when the music stops they need to stand on a pumpkin.   After the first round 1 pumpkin is removed so there is an extra child to pumpkin.  therefore when the music stops 1 child will not have a pumpkin to stand on and will be  out.  Another pumpkin will be removed and play will continue.  The winner is the last child that stands on the single pumpkin out of the last 2.

September 24th 2015 - Halloween party bags

September 24th 2015 - Halloween party bags

Yes I know there is over a month until Halloween but you can never be too ready for it.  I had a bit of  a panic the other day as there was  a poosibilty that the party was ggoing to be at my house and not friends, I wasn't going to be able to do a theme as hadn't got the time, it wasnt going to be as good as last year and I didn't know how I was going to sort it all with my knee being bad.

Well my friend rang me, she has decided she will be ok to host it this year but can I help her with preperations, party bags for the kids and the games.  I agreed as these are not major, she has said that she will cover the costs that I incure for buying stuff.

Well I know that I had pinned this pin linked tohalloween party bags with the goodies being in a glove but I am unable to find it so had to re-pin it today.   I have had a very halloweeny day today, we started off by getting EVERYTHING out of the loft and making a new inventory list as we couldnt find the 1 we had.   Then I started on the party bags with what I had.

Take 1 first aid/medical glove:

 an assortment of halloween novelties - eye patch, spinner, rubber hand (also had spiders, finger puppets etc) and a mini puzzle:

Put all bits in gloves and set aside until you get the sweets next week to shove in the fingers - we are going for the gory body parts and eyeballs etc.  Then the gloves will be tied off at the top and ready to go in the box with party bits.

September 23rd 2015 - Memory foam mattress

September 23rd Memory foam mattress

Today I have been married to my hubby for 9years.  We celebrated the other week as we had appointments and were not available to go out today.

However, our new memory foam mattress arrived and we opened it out.  We wern't sure how it was going to be as was only £69.99 but had an RRP of £199 so we hoped it would be good.  Upon opening it and placing on bed it spread really quickly from being rolled and after 2hrs it was really nice and soft.

I laid on it for  a few minutes and my knee didn't hurt (YAY!) and it didn't feel like a spring was digging in it like the old mattress did.  I couldn't wait to go to bed.