Friday's Fill Ins

After a break from the fill ins during April it's time to get back to them. The fill ins are hosted by Ellen at 15andmeowing.com and Lorianne at Four-Legged Furballs who provide the prompts in bold and the rest is by me. Annie from McGuffy's Reader is having a well deserved break from the blogosphere and we're sending lots of good thoughts her way.

 1. I spend too many hours per day online. Between Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest, e-mails, and blogging, I need about four more hours a day.

2. When I go online, I use my phone, tablet, and laptop.

3. Mother’s Day in the UK is in March and in lots of other countries including Australia and the USA it is in May.

4. I wish we had our own home so that we could decorate to suit us, and we could catify the space for the furbies. Check out The Cat's House where some very lucky kitty cats live - I would love to do even a fraction of the things they have for their feline residents.

Lord Rocky Horror

Do you spend lots of time online or are you very strict with yourself? Make sure you hop over to Fur-legged Furballs or 15andmeowing.com to see what my fellow bloggers have come up with for their fill ins.

Pamela & Ken

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Top Ten Thursday - Mother's Day without children

It's time for top ten Thursday and as it's Mother's Day this weekend our theme is around this. Last year's post for Mother's Day I wrote about the important things to remember when you're a mother to furbies - Top Ten Thursday - Mother's Day 2017.

This year Tamara at Part-time Working Hockey Mom has asked us to list the top ten things a Mom and / or significant other wants on the other 364 days of the year that make their life easier, so I've decided to give a list of things not to say to someone who doesn't have children. These are all things that have been said to me and they're in no particular order but have varying degrees of hurt depending on my defences on the day. A lot of these are assumptions that people make, and others are just ridiculous.

1. Do you ever regret pursuing your career instead of having children? (I don't have a career, I'm a nurse and that's what I've always been).

2. It must be so nice not to have to arrange babysitters whenever the two of you want to go out for a meal.

3. As you don't have children you won't mind working Christmas this year so that the staff with children can be off on the day. (This is fine, but after several years it gets a bit annoying).

4. What made you decide not to have children?

5. Do you not like children? (This one makes me a bit worried that I'm giving of antichild vibes - I love children and adore my nieces, nephews, godchildren, and friends kidlets).

Me with my friend Karen's little girl Claire - 2004

Ken with Karen's son Shaun - 2004

6. Don't you worry about not having anyone to look after you in your old age? (Yes, but that's more about the government not providing enough funding to the health service for elderly care).

7. You don't know what tired is until you've had children. (Really, I didn't know there was a competition about this).

8. Do you have pets to compensate for not having children?

9. You wouldn't understand, you don't have children. (so insensitive).

10. I understand exactly how you feel, we'd always wanted more children but could only have two. (I have no words for this one, it's just wrong).

I guess what I'm saying is if you have friends that don't have children, don't ever assume you know why that's the case, and please don't ever make her feel like she is less of a person because of this. When you're together, it's okay to talk about your children but make sure there are other topics as well, something that you both understand.

We hope all the mums out there have a wonderful mothers day and get pampered more often throughout the year.

Until next time, be kind to others and be kind to yourself.

Pamela & Ken
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Reflections on the 2018 A to Z Challenge

April has come and gone and it's time to reflect on our experience of the A to Z challenge. This year I chose the theme of keeping romance alive for married couples along with dating ideas. I'm really glad that I chose this theme as in doing research and remembering past things we've done together it has given me the impetus for a load of new romantic ideas - watch out Ken, you're going to have your socks romanced off.

This year during the challenge I got a bit snowed under with life and didn't get to visit as many blogs as I would like so will be taking part in the road trip. I also have loads of comments to catch up on. Three of the interesting new blogs I discovered were:

Trudy at Reel Focus - great posts that featured quotes from films for us to guess (answers were given at the end of each post). I love film trivia and guessing films so really enjoyed Trudy's blog - it was a real mixture of well known films and the more obscure.

Laura at Buttontapper Press - like me Laura went for the dating theme, but hers was online dating. This was fascinating and I have never been so glad that I found my beloved the more conventional way.

Melissa at Sugar Crime Scene - in her challenge posts Melissa wrote about interesting things to do with the law. I have learnt a lot about criminal proceedings.

Lots of the bloggers that I follow already were crazy enough to take part as well, and here's some of them that I would recommend checking out...

Part-time Working Hockey Mom - Tamara took us on a trip around the world to places that she has visited, and has given me lots more destinations to add to my travel bucket list.

McGuffy's Reader - Annie shared some of her writings, which was really sharing part of her soul. Beautiful words that captured real emotion.

Curious as a Cathy - Cathy took on the challenge of sketching with her ipad with some amazing results. Her drawings were really lovely and I'm amazed at what technology can do.

15 and Meowing.com - Ellen was creative for her A to Z, crocheting cat toys for each letter of the alphabet. My personal favourites were the eyeball and the golden snitch.

Rainswept - another very creative person, Lissa shared short fiction pieces that she had written to fit each letter of the alphabet. Lissa is an incredible artist and also shared her beautiful art.

Sophie's Thoughts and Fumbles - more creativity in the form of ghost stories. Sophie's words were put together so well that even the shortest piece made me look nervously over my shoulder.

Positive Letters.....inspirational stories.... - Hilary shared posts about her experience as a British girl living in Canada. So many interesting customs, places and fascinating history.

The most popular of my posts was B is for Beaches, and my favourite post that I wrote was Z is for Zombie Apocalypse, as I never thought I'd be able to find a love song about zombies and yet I did.

I'm still recovering from the challenge, but slowly getting my writing mojo back. I hope you enjoyed my theme and I'll take the next 11 months to decide what I'm doing for next year.

Pamela & Ken
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Top Ten Thursday - Spring

It's May and the A to Z blogging challenge that took over April is done so it's back to normal blogging for all of us crazies that took part. It's time for top ten Thursday and today we're looking at all the things we love about spring. The top ten is hosted by Tamara at Part-time Working Hockey Mom - make sure you pop over and see what my fellow bloggers have come up with for their posts.

1. Crocuses - it really feels like spring is here when these colourful little flowers start appearing. I love how they look like a multicoloured carpet under the trees. The most expensive spice in the world, saffron, comes from a breed of crocus and in the language of flowers, the crocus represents youthful gladness. (Meaning of Flowers)

2. Daffodils - such a happy flower with so many variations. A bunch of daffodils in the home brightens up the gloomiest day with their yellow cheerfulness.

3. Lambs - one of the great joys of the journey to work and back during spring is watching the lambs and all their antics. They jump and climb and play and just look adorable.

4. Cherry Blossom - a short season of gorgeous flowers and when the flowers are done it looks like there is confetti all over the ground.

5. Calves - so cute and beautiful at the same time.

6. Gorse/Broom - spring is when the highlands turn yellow (or Xanthic as I posted about previously) with gorse and broom all over the place.

7. Wildflowers - I love seeing the different flowers that appear in the woods in spring, creating a haze of colour to walk through.

8. Highland Games - spring and the month of May sees the beginning of the Highland Games in Scotland. I love seeing all the traditional activities - dancing, bagpipes, strong men activities, and tug of war.

9. Warmer Weather - finally it's time to leave the coat and gloves at home and enjoy the fact that the sun has warmth in it again. Much better weather for getting out and exploring the fabulous old graveyards we often stumble across.

10. Sunshine - this one is purely for the cats. Princess Cookie Cat and Lord Rocky Horror are very happy that it's spring as they can find much warmer sunshine to lie in, and it's even better if that patch of sunshine is across the nice comfortable human bed.

What's your favourite thing about spring? Until next time, enjoy the warmer weather and the joy of natures rebirth all around us.

Pamela & Ken
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P.S: Final photo that I have to share is the three brats in one photo - amazing.

Z is for Zombie Apocalypse

Welcome to the A to Z blogging challenge where for the month of April we post everyday except Sundays, corresponding to each letter of the alphabet. I've chosen to blog about keeping the romance alive in a relationship along with ideas for married couple dates. Each post will also have a romantic song for you to listen to whilst you read.

We come to the end of the challenge so I've going to have a bit of fun and I'm ending it with a zombie apocalypse, the only way to end anything. I've even found a romantic zombie song for you to enjoy by Your Favourite Martian, the song is Zombie Love Song. It has some great lyrics:

Baby, sometimes I bite, and you can bet

That I've got an appetite for human flesh.

I'll always be near though. You'll have to accept that

When I nibble on your earlobe you might get infected.

Cause I fell in love with you and I'm

Undead but you make me feel alive.

And when I chase you through the graveyard

It feels like foreplay.

 

You may think that there is nothing romantic about zombies, but if you search for zombie romance books on Goodreads they come up with a list of 165 books!! It seems zombies attacking is a fertile ground for the romantic soul. My favourite title amongst them is; I Kissed a Zombie, and I Liked It, by Adam Selzer. 

When it comes to surviving the apocalypse then that also provides lots of books on Amazon for those that are particularly worried about this disaster happening. Amazingly there are also lots of websites with information about how to survive the apocalypse, and what you should have in your survival kit.

Hopefully your partner in life will be the person you want beside you when you're tackling the zombies, so why don't you have a date night around this theme. The wonderful Dating Divas have a great Walking Dead/Zombie themed date night with free printables which I'm sure some people will love.

My apocalypse partner would of course be my beloved and our survival kit, top of the list for me would be coffee. In fact without coffee I would probably be mistaken for one of the zombies. I'm not sure what else we'd need in our kit but I'm sure Ken will have some great ideas as he's managed to survive 18 years married to me. 😊

Today's quote:

Thanks for coming along with me on this romantic A to Z and after a couple of days break I'll be back to normal blogging.

Pamela & Ken

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Previous A to Z posts:

2017 = Zero

2016 = Zoetic

Y is for Yuanfen

Welcome to the A to Z blogging challenge where for the month of April we post everyday except Sundays, corresponding to each letter of the alphabet. I've chosen to blog about keeping the romance alive in a relationship along with ideas for married couple dates. Each post will also have a romantic song for you to listen to whilst you read.

Today's song is by another loved up couple, and that's Trisha Yearwood and Garth Brooks with Where Your Road Leads. Love these words:

If we can love forever

That won't be long enough for me

I want to hold you tender

Be your shelter

All you need

For the letter Y I've found a chinese word, Yuanfen, which is to do with Lady Destiny joining two people together, which I like to believe is what happened with my beloved and I.

As we near the end of the A to Z I'm letting loose all my romantic soppyness. As a small girl whenever I dreamed about my knight in shining armour he was always a Scotsman as obviously the fates were already influencing my future choices.

One of my favourite proverbs is this Chinese one about people being connected by a red thread. Mine and Ken's is a very flexible thread as it was stretched to its limits until the day we met.

Last year when we went to Skye for a holiday we had lunch at a lovely pie cafe that had a red thread project going on. They offered tags for us to write our names on and afterwards the owner would stitch over them with red thread and hang them from the bike wheels on the ceiling - it was really lovely.

As a romantic date idea, why don't you recreate your first date together, whether it be a meal out, a trip to the cinema, or even a drink in a bar. 

Y is also for Ya'aburnee:

That is such a romantic sentiment and I can totally understand that feeling.

Today's quote:

Pamela & Ken

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Previous A to Z posts:

2017 = Yes

2016 = Young at Heart

X is for Xylophone

Welcome to the A to Z blogging challenge where for the month of April we post everyday except Sundays, corresponding to each letter of the alphabet. I've chosen to blog about keeping the romance alive in a relationship along with ideas for married couple dates. Each post will also have a romantic song for you to listen to whilst you read.

Okay I've totally failed in my efforts to have a romantic song by an artist that starts with the letter x, so I've resorted to the song Xanadu by Olivia Newton John (Australian of course).

Now you may well be wondering what a xylophone has to do with romance and dating, and it did take me a while to remember this. I was very short of ideas and was even considering doing x factor, as my beloved definitely has it.

We love days out together exploring and having fun with our best friend, which is each other. Occasionally we come across kids play areas that have instruments, including xylophones, made out of everyday objects so of course we play around with them (we're just a couple of big kids).

It's really good to have those days when we don't take ourselves too seriously and just get in touch with our inner child. Sometime it can end slightly disastrously, like the time I was trying to complete a children's obstacle course and ended up falling spectacularly off one of the obstacles.

Xylophone at the Horniman Museum

Ken playing the pipe bongos

Why don't you pick a fun day out together as a special date day soon. I'm excited for an arts and crafts one that we have in about a month.

Ken showing his musical skills at the butterfly farm

Fun fairs are another great way to have fun together - play on the arcade machines, play air hockey, and definitely get some fairy floss (cotton candy or candy floss) to share and get all sticky with, which is perfect for sugary kisses afterwards.

Today's quote - I think this should be a motto for the world:

Pamela & Ken
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Previous A to Z posts:

2017 = Xanthic

2016 = Xmas