hiya!!!!!

Hi,

so I am trying to be really healthy and it sucks! why does eating healthy foods feel so crap and eating chocolate, crisps, cakes and yummy stuff taste so good and make me fel so good???????!!!! I want some chocolate and ice cream so badly right now it sucks!!

anyway, enough of moaning, things here are good. I finally go tmy lead working and here are some long overdue photos of me, fi, beth and laura from when we met up a few weeks ago. Hopefully I will be seeing them next weekend was it? Can't wait!

I also booked to go to guernsey today with my work friend Tracey! we are very excited, she has never been before so will be fun showing off my little island. Unfortunately mum is in france so I won't get to see her but she and sam are planning to visit me and tim in march!! That would be fab!!!! (mum book it PLEASEEEEEE!!!)

Well no other news from me, just trying to diet and it is not going well because I am moody and just want some sugar... Gillian Mckeith lies when she says eating healthy foods gives you more energy, I say a good big jiucy doughnut gives me much more energy than bloody carrot sticks and lemon juice!!!! RAGHGHGHGHGHHHHHH!

bye gemma x

update on my life!

Hello,

I have some lovely photos of laura, fi, beth and I from when we met up last week but my computer/camera lead is not working again. I don't know why it does that sometimes but not all the time. I will keep trying to down load them!!

So since I last wrote I have settled back into school after a wonderfully relaxing holiday! It has already started with the stress and never ending to do lists but hey that's what I signed up for so I can't complain!

Wedding stuff id getting very exciting! We have set the date for the hotel called St Pierre Park on the 9yth August 2008 and it is really exciting. I have had sooo many ideas and trying to resist starting to plan it all now as I know it is a while away.

Tim is working very hard at the moment and busy starting to look for jobs. I think it will be quite a long process but he is wokring so hard and is so clever at chemistry he deserves to be given his dream job. we will just have to wait and see.

Gym wise not so good however I did go for a jog after school today. Needed to relieve some stress and have too much work to have time to go to the gym. I know that is an excuse but I have a pile of marking already from just a week, I have my assembly tomorrow, my staff meeting tomorrow after school and a course tomorrow afternoon!! argh!!! I will get through this week in one piece!

well I had better go start on the marking... one job over will make me feel better! Big hugs to you all, Gemma x

Hi all,

so here is a picture my auntie sent me today. It is me and tim on christmas day, quite a new experience for me putting on a picture of us that we didn't take by stretching our arms out and giving ourselves double chins!
So today is the first day since the end of the summer that I haven't had any chocolate! MIRACLE!!! I have found it hard and did have a teeny tiny baileys to compensate but I think is a good step. Tomorrow I am going to start my gym routine, I want to try and go 3 times a week. I need a lot of inspiration so any words of wisdom feel free to blog. I lost so much weight last summer and am now the exact weight I started at. I need to learn to change my lifestyle and diet and exercise routine for life, not just till the end of the summer hols. I am like my cat marmalade, puts on weight in winter looses it in summer. I read somewhere the best way to avoid this is to book a hot holiday in the winter... where in the world is really really hot in December/January time? maybe next year tim and i will treat ourselves to a holiday... actually scrap that, next year we are treating ourselves to a wedding!!! That may just do it money wise...!!

what fun!! ant and annabel both sent wicked wedding books for me to read and take ideas from! I am enjoying having a date set as it now takes the pressure off a bit and I can spend the next 6 months collecting ideas before making any rash decisions!

I also would like any ideas for what to do on a rainy evening (other than go to the gym as I have drank too much baileys to dot hat today) as I am currently doing a puzzle and tim says I am a geek!!! The cheek of it!! It's not true is it? A 24 year old doing a puzzle is cool I'd say...!

Well chat again soon, gemma x

pictures at last!

Tim's sheep in kent, they kept running away from us so this is as close as I could get! Tim at my house on christmas day infront of the gorgeous open fire... when we buy our mansion we would like an open fire in each of our lounges!!!
The four horses who looked cold but were surprisingly cosy under their rugs!
This is our wedding diary thing I made! we are adding in snippets from magazines, ideas, lists, engagement cards etc...
Me and Tim on christmas day infront of the fire, was so nice to relax and be cooked for and wine just seemed to flow!!!
Here is my favourite horse Lily, she was the one I rode in the summer and will have another go on in the spring! she looks quite sturdy don't you think?
Tim and Ben, both pulling silly faces! But both look gorgeous!!
My Auntie Liz and Uncle Michael with us on christmas day in Guernsey.

Hello,

so very exciting news - Tim and I have set a provisional date for our wedding!!! It is the 9th of August 2008! Mum is meeting with the hotel manager to ask my list of questions and sort out deposit, then once that is done I will confirm the date with you all!!!! So so so exciting!

New years eve was lovely, very relaxing! Yesterday and today tim and I have just chilled out which has been lovely then as of tomorrow I guess I should start to do some work! I am dreading school next week as the holidays have been so much fun and have gone far too quickly, although it will be nice to see my children and hear all about their christmasses - they will no doubt have lots of exciting stories to share!

well better go now, chat soon, Gemma x

Back home!

Helo there!
sorry it has taken me so long to write again, we were just so busy being excited about our engagement on the last week of term then set off to Guernsey for christmas and on to Tim's family home in Kent. We had a wonderful time, was madly busy so am pleased to be back in my little flat to relax for a week before going back to school. I can't believe how quickly it all goes, I could have done with another few days in Guernsey and in Kent!

Everyone was very excited about our engagement too and we were spoilt rotten everywhere we went. We have lots of cards from everyone so thank you so much! We are going to keep them up for January as they merged in with Christmas cards and we want to appreciate them on their own!

I am afraid my camera lead isn't working at the moment so will have to get it fixed before I put on any photos. I actually didn't take very many as I kept forgetting then the moment of photo action time was lost... (sorry ant! Mum took lots so get her to email you some). I will put on the ones I did take when my lead works again.

So at new year Tim and I have decided to have a quiet one just the two of us. We got some M&S vouchers for Christmas so will go and buy some yummy food again and maybe treat ourselves to some more bubbly (like we haven't had enough over the holiday!).

Then next week it is new year resolution time... I think mine will be:
1) To go to the gym again as I pay ridiculous amounts per month and don't use it enough.
2) Get more organised school wise - do planning in advance and keep up to date with everything I take on.
3) Say NO to taking on any more things at school!!!
and
4) Plan my wedding!!!!!!! WOHOOOOO!!! What fun!!!!!!!!! (I have loads of phone numbers to phone venues next week to find out available dates and costs!)

There you go!

Chat soon and have a wonderfully HAPPY NEW YEAR whatever you do!

Hugs, Gemma x

EXCITING ANNOUNCEMENT!!!

TIM AND I ARE ENGAGED!!!!!!!!

Tim asked me to marry him today and I said yes! It is the most exciting thing ever, we are so happy!!! The ring was in my christmas stocking!!!

we are now celebrating with loads of yummy food from M&S, the champagne is finshed so will have to just go and buy some more I think!!!!

Just wanted the world to know, best scoot to snuggle with my FIANCE!!!!!!

Stratford!

Tim looking a bit chilly!
The two swans in the front were really loved up! Flirting and having fun in the water! Very romantic!



Hi,

So after last night's work do, drinking a little too much wine and having fun, tim and I had a big lie-in and lazily got up late morning and went to stratford. We love it there, especially at christmas time. They had the farmers market on, so we had an amazing hog roast bap with stuffing and crackling for lunch! HEAVENLY!

We then did the last bits of our christmas shopping and wandered along the rive. It is so pretty this time of year and the birds are so beautiful.

After stratford we went to spend lots of money in M&S on food for our christmas day tomorrow! We have bought camembert (a really smelly one) to dunk ciabatta in with garlic and cranberry! Then beef wellington and all the works for main course and a huge tub of M&S profiteroles with cream for pudding!!! I can't wait, I am feeling hungry for it already just writing it down!

So we have tidied and cleaned our flat and tim is busy wrapping christmas pressies for his family! It feels like it is christmas eve!!! what fun!

chat soon, gemma x

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

staff christmas party!

Me, tim and katie! Sandra, Jan and Annette
I won't name everyone but these are more of my work friends!
Me and Jill
Tracey and Lou
Candy and her partner John
Me and Gill (who was on soft drinks all night as she has a little baby in her tummy!!!! Due in april I think)

Hi,

so I was in charge of organising the work christmas party and was fab! It was at the Newbold bar and brasserie in leam and was such good food and service. Everyone had a really good time. Here's some of the pictures!

christmas hugs, Gemma x

my 100th blog!!!

Hi,

so I have reached my 100th blog! what fun! It is quite hilarious that I started it as an online diet diary and I now weigh exactly the same as I did a year ago!!!! I have said to tim that the diet starts again in january! I always fell a bit more inspired then...

So right now I am loving being a teacher. My children earned all their marbles in their jar (one marble for good behaviour/good work/just generally being great!) so they have their reward of watching a DVD with popcorn! I am therefore being a cinema attendant right now - enjoying the movie and popcorn but also able to do some assessments, plan for next term and blog to you all!!!

I am a bit envious as my sister has now broken up for christmas. It makes so much sense this time of year to give children time with their families baking mince pies and having christmas fun before christmas day. I can't believe how late we break up...

We have my work christmas doo tonight which will be fun. Lie in tomorrow then tim and I are going to stratford for the day then shopping in M&S for lots of yummy food ready for our little christmas day on sunday. We are going to do stockings and eat lots of christmas food and play quiz games! Always fun!

I had better go do some more work now but take care and another big merry christmas!!!!! Only one week before the hols YEY!!!!

gemma x

Hi,

here is another photo that did't fit on my blog yesterday. It is of the christmas fair outside the natural history museum. It had a gorgeous merry go-round which I knew my mum would love!!
So today I made such a fuss about getting up because I had that horrible monday morning feeling but then it was actually a good day at work! Our christmas play is wonderful and ready to do dress rehearsal on wednesday. We are giving the children a day off from practising tomorrow as we don't want it to become stale.

Tomorrow I have my class to myself all day! I am so excited about this (seeing I haven't had them to myself for ages due to having a student and doing management stuff). I am going to do christmassy things all day - reading then writing story of Jesus, christmas poems, making an angel, doing a letter to santa, making a paper collage christmas pudding and making fun printed christmas cards!! I have charged my camera so if I remember I will take lots of photos!

well no more gossip from me, chat soon, Gemma x

london at christmas time!

oxford steet on saturday night, crazily busy! Me and tim, I can't actually count the number of these types of photos I have! Tim and I always pose like this!!!
Natural history museum

Hi,

so tim and I just had a lovely weekend in london. It was crazily busy! I knew it would be madly busy but at one point we were stuck full stop on oxford street and couldn't move in any direction, all the people were stacked together like matchmakers!!! madness! Tim looked after me especially on the tube (which I hate) so I felt safer with him there. we went shopping in hamleys and harrods (not to buy anything just soak up the atmosphere!). The children with the toys in hamleys were so cute, although tim with the big robots was even cuter!!!! You should have seen the sylvanian families too, they now have a goat family and a really cool mansion and nursary! amazing!!!

The hotel was fine, very central which was fab but a typical busy london hotel. The show was amazing! we both really enjoyed it a lot! The bloke from the band blue was in it and was very good! We also got to meet up with helen and dave for drinks and dinner.

Today we spent the day at the natural history museum, outside was an ice-rink (fully booked already luckily for tim!) and a christmas fair. It felt very chrismassy - LOVELY! Then went inside and looked at all the dinosaurs and mammals, earhtquakes and volcanoes and precious stones and fossils! was fascinating!

now we are back in our little flat with our gorgeous christmas tree eating christas pudding with brandy cream listening to my new mariah carey christmas album (£5 from harrods!) LOVE IT!!!!

big hugs to you all and a big MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

gemma x

you'd better watch out, you'd better not cry, you'd better not shout, I'm telling you why... SANTA CLAUSE IS COMING TO TOWN!!!

Hi all,

so tim and I are having a lovely week! Last week was so incredibly busy and manic. At one point I was ready to give up teaching, dig a hole and just sleep in it for a long time... but then I had such a good weekend and this week at school has been brilliant. The children are getting quite excited but I am too so that's ok!

I have had a few afternoons with my class (after having quite a bit of time out of the classroom due to management stuff and having a student teaching some of the timetable), which have goine fantastically! We made plaster of paris hedgehogs which was so much fun, I got covered in the stuff! The children painted them brown then sprinkled white glitter on them to look like snow and dipped their noses in red glitter. I am so impressed with them! We are also practising for our christmas play which is finally coming together, the songs are fab and the children have learnt their lines so will be great to watch next week!

I can't believe it is only two and a half weeks till hols. I am really looking forward to being curled up with tim on the sofa in guernsey in front of the crackling fire with marmalade curled up next to us and our wine glasses being magically filled up with wine every so often by my mum and being fed yummy food all holidays... bliss!

we also booked our train tickets to london last night. This weekend will be lovely, we are meeting dave and katie and helen in london during the day then going to the theatre and back to our central london hotel! wohoo!!!!

well I had better go now but chat soon, big hugs, gemma x

Christmas time, mistleto and wine!!!

Hi,

I have had fun today changing my blogspot and i did it almost all by myself (tim had to help me a little bit!).

So we had our christmas party yesterday which was fun. Thank you to anyone reading this who came, it was very sweet of you, I hope you had fun!! I drank one too many cocktails as my curtains were spinning by the time I got into bed, however they did go down very well as did tim's tricky quiz!

Today we have put up our christmas tree. It is a bit smaller than last year (which is why I put in the photos of tim and I standing next to it, I wanted you to get a picture of its size!) but equally as beautiful, do you like?

Well I am off to cook our roast chicken with stuffing and little pigs in blankets! chat soon, Gemma x



Our beautiful sprig of holly with berries and all from Tracey.
Here is our little nativity scene from ant, we have another one on our piano - just in case anyone who comes round doesn't realise the importance of why we celebrate christmas. It's not just for the presents you know?


chat soon xxxx

just to say I am making changes to my blog but am struggling a little bit. sorry if it looks awful for a while!

santra's grotto!!!

Here is my lovely new role play area!!! I put it up tonight, it looks ace!!!! I have got lots of boxes wrapped up with different things inside them so some are heavy and others are light for children to weigh like a post office. I have loads of cards for them to write then post. I have puppets, toys, balloons, decorations and loads more!!!! I had so much fun putting it up!

Do you like???? This is why I love being a teacher!!!

my gorgeous little boy, marmalade

hi,

we have had a very lazy weekend. Lots of christmas shopping my end, tim got stressed with it so is now doing it all online and is much happier! He is so funny and just can't cope with lots of people in the shops!!!

I have all my presents wrapped up and ready to go! And also spent today writing my christmas cards. I hope all you people recieving them like them, I made them all myself!!!!! You had better be impressed! I still have about 8 more to make as my christmas card list keeps getting longer the more I look in my address book.

I did however have a little cry today as I miss my mummy, my family and my cat... I don't know why, maybe it's all this festive music and smells (I bought some christmas pot pouri) bringing memories back to me and making me think of home. Tim gave me a big cuddle and reminded me that we will have 3 wonderful christmases - 1 on the 17th for just the two of us, one in guernsey and one in kent with tim's family. We are actually very lucky!!!

well no more news from me, just wanted to say hi, hope you like the photos of my little baby in guernsey, I do miss him so much!

big hugs, gemma x

I'm broody!

Hi,

I have had a good week at work so far. Tiring with all the anti-bullying stuff but also quite fun. Only two days to go till the weekend and also half way through this half term. Only four weeks lfet till christmas! YEY!

I am incredibly excited and over-organised. I have done most of my shopping and wrapped some pressies too! I have made my christmas cards this year and am going to write them and send them next week!

I am however feeling a little broody at the moment and am thinking far too much about wanting babies - tim has said he will get me a kitten to keep me amused for a while but we can't get a kitten till we buy a house... there is so much waiting to do at our age! I am so excited about our future, there are so many brilliant things ahead of us!

Anyway, this is the kitten I want! It is a bengal kitten and isn't it soooooooo cute???!!!

chat soon, hugs to you all, Gemma xxx

p.s. I went to the gym today and did 45 minutes. I need to go more often to be able to notice a different wiht my figure but work is so hectic finding time is tricky!

Time tunnel!

tim and I before we went out tim and I in our old union, hadn't changed much. Just wished all our old housemates were there too!!!!
time tunnel in the market place
from above looking down on the market place
little anna and craig

Hi,
sorry I haven't written in a while. I have been so busy with school work and school governor meetings! It was a good week but crazily busy, I have anothe rbusy one ahead but after that it should be a really nice build up to christmas.

I have got lots of chirstmas stuff done this weekend - finished off my shopping and wrapped up lots of pressies! I know it is still early but I really do enjoy this time of year, I know I will still be just as excited in a months time!! I love christmas so much!!!!

tim and I went out with little anna (tim's chemistry friend) and craig (her boyf who also did chemistry with tim but finished his phd last year) to the union. We felt like students again, was great! We met tim's hockey team too, they were rather drunk and wearing all sorts of coloured clothes/face paints/body paints (each coloured corresponded to the year they graduated from warwick. we all danced the night away!

Well I am off to sort myself out for tomorrow, it is anti-bullying week so have a lot of preparation to do. Chat soon, Gemma x

photos

me and katie ready for our night out to the art exhibition, which by the way felt very 'sex and the city-ish'!! katie and kath


i am afraid all my bea

nakedness!

hello,

I had a lovely week last week at school. The children were very wel behaved and I got loads done! It really was a good week, I hope this one is as good! I have a ocurse tomorrow for my management stuff which I am a little nervous about, hopefully it will be ok and not too daunting!!!

The girls - hannah, katie and kath - came to stay with me. They are my friends from Guernsey who went to secondary school with me! kath is based in high wycombe now, katie hs just moved from guernsey to oxford and hannah is up in preston. We are all over the place and hardly ever get to meet up properly so was really good. We stayed in friday and chatted all night long, then on saturday night we got all dressed up and went to an art exhibition (Neil Moore, a leamington artist) in leam with my friend katie from school, her husband and friend. was a great evening out starting in the sozzled sausage! the art exhibition was amazing but quite controversial! All the art work was oil paintings of nudes, some with babies. was very beautiful but because of the nature of some of them the exhibition was banned from the pump rooms as not to offend the "delicate sensibilities of the people of leamington". The fun bit was there was a naked man and a naked woman walking around drinking wine too, just mingling with the people and chatting but naked!!!!

afterwards we went out for dinner and the girls and tim were discussing the rather painful looking piercing on the man... you can use your imaginations as to where the piercing was... and I hadn't even noticed!!!!! I just hadn't spent time looking at... it...!!! I was apparently the only one so now feel like I want to go again just to get a good look!

Anyway, was good to see the girls and ctach up. We are off to union this weekend coming up, I will feel like a student again, maybe I will drink lambrusco and throw up outside costcutters like old times (sorry mum!!!) (I won't really!!!!!!)

Chat soon, gemma x

work work work!!

Hi,

I have had a relaxing weekend so far but am now realising how much work I have to do this week and am getting scared! It always seems to build up and then deadlines happen all at once, never mind! I am going to spend the rest of today getting myself sorted!

Yesterday I cooked the most wonderful dinner for tim and dave, dave was up from london for tim's brithday so we went out for a few drinks in leam. I cooked my first ever roast beef meal! was very good if I do say so myself but I did forget to cook the yorkshire puds...! oops!!! I decorated our flat with balloons and streamers too! what fun! I also made some chocolate brownies which again worked very well for my first go at them! if anyone wants the recipe just ask it is so easy and they really do taste amazing... so much for the diet huh?

anyway, I should go do some work now but wll take some photos this week to post, have been too busy last week to do that! well take care and email me soon, I love recieving emails!!!!

big hugs, Gemma x