Friday 4 February 2011

Storm in a teacup?

I splashed out last weekend on a weather station for the garden - rainfall, wind speed, temperature, humidity, I can measure them all now. It all goes to my laptop in the office then up onto a website, you can access it here. Check out the "trends" link for graphs showing all sorts of clever stuff.
If global warming is true, you'll find out about it here first!

Thursday 3 February 2011

Splish splash and chopsticks

One of the benefits of our new jobs is a gym allowance, so we have both joined our local gym, which also gives us access to the leisure centre swimming pool (think the Brittas Empire, you're pretty close). While Olga had her gym induction on Sunday I took Lara to the teaching pool for an hour. It was just time for her to play in the water, she's not been in a pool since we were in Holland last June, so this was just an excuse for a splash around and remind her what fun it is.  We enquired about lessons for her, they're not at great times, but once we get settled into this "working from home" routine, we'll find time to take her. In the meantime we bought her some goggles and a float, as the other kids in the pool had these and Lara will need them soon enough. She loves her goggles!

We're getting her used to them by encouraging her to wear them in the bath, last night she had a shower, and loved lying on her back under the spray of water, with it splashing onto her face. We'll probably go again this Sunday - I need to take the plunge and start my training regime; sadly I'm really looking forward to getting a sweat on in the gym, I don't think I've been remotely fit since well before Lara was born, and it can only be a good thing. I'm even going to take a Pilates class! My core stability is about as stable as a Middle Eastern government at the moment, and it gives me all sorts of back problems, so I reckon Pilates is the answer. It was invented by a bloke, you know!!

Lara seems to be really enjoying her new nursery. When she came home on Monday I asked her if she wanted to go again on Tuesday, and she was really excited and shouted "yes please!", which I think is a good sign. Yesterday, to celebrate the Chinese New Year, the kids had stir-fry vegetables & noodles for their afternoon meal, and they all had a go at eating with chopsticks, I would have liked to have seen that. Apparently Lara particularly loved the noodles, so we'll give her a try at those at home one day. She already likes poppadoms, and has had fajitas before, so it all adds to her international experiences.  The nursery has some ideas that are new to Lara, like she wears her slippers there rather than shoes or trainers when she's inside, and on Tuesday night she asked "May I start now?" before tucking into her tea, and that must be something they do at nursery, as we've not taught her such good manners!


Work-wise the home office is nearing completion, a new sofabed arrived this week, as Luda will sleep in the office after she arrives on the 2nd April for her 6-month stay. All our new screens and keyboards and suchlike have arrived, so the place does look more like an office now, and Olga has been putting in the hours up here this week - so long as the internet connection stays up, this working from home thing looks like a winner!
I've got 2 more weeks of limbo between doing little bits for Flare and finishing things up for Geotrace before we'll find out what it's like when we're both working in here...