A trip down memory lane.

We had the opportunity to go back east this last weekend to where Lauren and I grew up. It was great being back, especially as we were able to go to one of my cousins wedding day. 


While we were round my parents my mum reminded me that they had a box of "stuff" for me that they had put together whilst clearing their loft space.
As I looked through the items in the box I couldn't possibly keep it to myself so I have decided to share its delights with you all.


I found a picture of the demise of my 1st car:

I went in to the back of someone on the way back to Colchester on the M25

This is a map that I drew whilst on work experience at school. C. H. Lindsey & son

I found my old school leavers book. I won't share what's in it but I am tempted to send on certain pages back to the individuals that wrote them hehe!

These next few photos were, funnily enough, found in a photo album left in the magic box of wonders. I apologise in advance to those that are in these photos as permission has not been sort... Hehe!

My mum and her mum. Two generations of incredible women in my life. Love them both!

Grandad Watling on his 80th birthday (I think). There was a caption on the back written by my mum saying "Grandad, wondering what he is doing there and whose cake it is".

This is my friend Sheldon. We went out one night and got hold of this trolley... You can guess what happened next.

These are all my college friends that took me out in Colchester right before I left on a 2 year mission for my church. May I add that yes, they are lights off of roadside assistance and no, we weren't drunk we were all completely sober!

From left to right: Darren, me, Gemma, Steve, Hannah and Tariq

Yes, this is the popular comedian Jasper Carrott. Darren and I went on a holiday to the Algarve in Portugal and on our way back we saw him in the airport at Faro. Nice bloke, especially as my camera wasn't working properly!

So there you have it peeps. There were a lot of other things in the magic box of wonders but they are either too personal to share or insignificant to the masses. I hope you have enjoyed looking back over the years with me.

Matt and Maria's OK! Wedding

Well peeps, other than my own wedding, I think Lauren and I experienced the best wedding we'll EVER be invited to.

This last weekend we were invited to join one of Lauren's friends and her fiancee in Greece to see them wed. What a wonderful adventure it has been.

We found that booking a flight to leave on the Thursday was a lot cheaper than leaving on the Friday. So... We decided to take a flight that got us in to Greece at 3:00am Friday morning. Was it a mistake?!? Ok, so we arrived a little tired (not to mention COMPLETELY out of our comfort zones) but we set off to find our hotel - The Plaza non-smoking Hotel in Voula.

Our destination

After getting on a bus at the airport we watched as bus stop after bus stop flashed past our window... It was only when these 2 Greek ladies got the bus to stop that we asked the driver if we were anywhere near Voula to which he replied "you have to get off, it's back there" pointing in the direction we had just travelled for.

Well to cut a long story short after asking restaurant owners, taxi drivers and passers by we eventually found 2 very helpful police officers that informed us that due to their GPS our hotel was a 6km walk!

Our route (which Google says is only 2.2km - 26min walk...

This was the view we had whilst walking. There were MASSIVE forrest fires up on the hills (in the middle of the picture)



We found our hotel and received a fantastic welcome with the staff pulling out the stops and even offering us a room early just so we could get some rest. So we had our base. Now the fun could start.

This is the restaurant in Glyfada that we ate at on Friday eve.

We met up with another one of Lauren's friends and had some delicious ice cream. YUM!

We LOVED the food, Gyros MMMMMMMMMMmmmmm!!

We were very surprised to find this store

This was our local beach/bar. If you weren't 20-30, bronzed and ripped you didn't really fit in.

All ready for the wedding (doesn't she look beautiful?!!)

The bride and groom

This was the reception venue, it was gorge. It was like a boat but in a rock!

The partying went on until gone 4:00am! The Greeks know how to party! I was very very tired.

It was an absolutely amazing weekend where we had great company, great weather and great, great times.

Our new kitchen floor

One of the MAJOR draw backs to buying our house "empty" is that, unlike other new builds, we were given a shed in our back garden instead of flooring... Great for storage, not so much for aesthetically pleasing decor.

The one room that Lauren has been on and on and on about is the kitchen/diner. This is mainly due to the concrete floor and the fact that once you have left our kitchen you can then see all the other rooms you have entered due to the footprints that have kindly mapped out your route!

So... We went out and brought some supplies and this is what happened:

Off we went to Homebase and got the tools for the job; Tiles, serrated trowel, level, tile spacers and adhesive/grout.

Off we go. My Grandpa always used to say to my Dad "Measure twice, cut once!" and am I glad I followed that. I found that I was £70 worth of tiles short! I genually don't know how I missed calculated that badly :-s

With the correct amount of tiles brought I was flying. Not bad eh?!

Hard at work. To be honest, I hated grouting! Plus My knees were absolutely killing me by the time I'd finished.

The before and after shot.

This all makes one very happy wifey!

All in all I enjoyed my first tiling experience and was happy with the way it turned out. My knees might want a little rest before I start any more rooms though.

It's going to be a patriots year!

Being a big New England Patriots fan I thought I'd put a little blog together especially being the start of the new 2011 season.

There have been many ups and downs concerning the Pats bid for Lombardi glory.

The much sort after Lombardi trophy

With wins in 2001 against the St. Louis RAMS:

2003 against the Carolina PANTHERS:

And 2004 against the Philadelphia EAGLES:

They are now out to gain their 4th! And hopefully this is their year!! 

Unfortunately, the PATS journey hasn't been without its upsetting moments... With 6 Superbowl appearances their record is only 50%.

They have had losses in 1985 to the Chicago BEARS, 1996 against the Green Bay PACKERS and 2007 against the New York GIANT which, in my opinion, they gave away after having a perfect season!

Still, it is another year and hopefully Bill Belichick can rally the troops and get things done!

BRING ON THE SPORTS!!

Yes people, the time has come! The start of the NFL season.

As we're a little more financially sound at the moment Lauren and I discussed the purchase of somekind of sports channel.
Problem is, there are SO many to choose from...



So I contacted SKY and had a chat with them. Turns out that I ended up moving our line rental from BT to SKY so it now costs us a MASSIVE 40p cheaper a month but we also get 3 months free line rental saving us £12.25 a month for 3 months.

On to the sports channels... I said that I was probably going to go with ESPN as it was only £9 extra a month and that would also mean I would be able to watch UFC events.

But... The lovely lady at SKY told me that I could get the SKY sports pack for 1/2 price for 3 months and ESPN free for 3 months if I take the SKY sports pack. I think you can guess how this all turned out.

I am now able to watch all the sports I want to watch, plus it's fun explaining all the rules to Lauren. RESULT!

Family weekend antics

I know it's been a while but here is the latest bloggings. We've had an absolutely fab weekend and I couldn't possibly think about keeping it to myself. 


My old man has reached the ripe old age of 60 so we thought it would be a great opportunity to go all out and do something a little special. So we threw a BIG party!


As it was Isaacs birthday the next week (Isaac is one of my little nephews) Charlie was invited to his party.

There was party food! YUM!

Bear cookie making

And bouncy castles!

Then when the kids went to bed it was time to start the REAL party. My youngest Bro Zach did a really good job of being MC (complete with 'Dad' jokes). I have put together a little movie of it all:

Dads Bday bash

Charlies recent happenings

It has been a while since I last updated you peeps on what was going on. As my life pretty much revolves around my lil boy here is what he has been up to recently:

unfortunately this has become a regular occurrence at dinner time, i think he just loves going in the bath!

We went to the river boat races and met some storm troopers

We met Chewie too... But, Charlie was petrified... Bless!

Charlie got his first ever hair cut

He was such a good little boy and didn't even flinch. We both thought he was going to be more interested in the scissors. Plus he still has both ears! Great success!!

Charlie LOVES being behind the wheel...

Thankfully he doesn't know how to turn the key yet!!

Being July, we got to spend 2 whole weeks with Nanny and Granddad Baxter! 

Charlie escaped whilst being changed one night and became "Bath boy!". Check out that costume!

I thought I'd share this as he just had me in stitches! 

FOO FIGHTERS!!!!

Yes peeps, the time has finally come. This last weekend Lauren and I thought we'd take a quick drive over to Milton Keynes to visit the Bowl to see..... The Foo Fighters!

From past experience I knew that the car park is a nightmare so I thought ahead and booked us a nice room in a hotel in Stevenage. The hotel was nice and the room served its purpose so it was defo a good idea.

On our way to Stevenage we noticed this:

There's actually a place called "Nasty" (it's top right)

Anyways, on our journey we thought we'd stop off for a bite to eat. So we ended up finding this leisure park which looked like an industrial estate at first but luckily we found a Chitquito restaurant, YUM!

But as we got out of the car we were greeted by this:

I did have a video of it moving and dancing but it wouldn't load :-(

After eating we thought it a good idea to get to our hotel and set up camp and then make our way to the venue.

As expected, traffic was a nightmare! But we followed the signs and successfully found the car park... Well... A car park. This car park ended up being a good 20min walk to the venue!

Still, we got there and found a nice little spot on the hill and got comfortable. The Foo had a band called Tame Impala supporting first followed by Death Cab for Cutie and then Biffy Clyro and to be honest I didn't care much for Tame Impala or Death Cab but Biffy were AMAZING!!

Here's a taste of what you missed out on:

Then came the Foo:

What a fab gig!! Here is the set list:

http://www.setlist.fm/setlist/foo-fighters/2011/milton-keynes-national-bowl-milton-keynes-england-23d36c8f.html

Oh and yes, that's Roger Taylor from Queen and Alice Cooper!!! How cool!

A mind blowing experience was had by all

Grohl was kind enough to finish up with one of mine and Laurens favourite songs:

Wheels by Dave Grohl - Foo Fighters at Milton Keynes

Sorry, once again it should be a video but it wouldn't load on here! Grr!

The one you've all been waiting for

Yes, that's right people I have finally sorted out the next blog. Well, I have cheated in a sense as it's a video compilation that I did on my iMac of Charlie in the park.


So here it is, enjoy:

New Charlie vid

If you're able to leave a comment please feel free to do so. I'd love to know what you think.


We visited Longleat the other day for Laurens birthday so expect another video compilation soon....

Monday night treat

We had a fab day a couple of Mondays ago. We were able to go and get our photos taken at AKM Photography which was a real laugh. The photographer was great and had us in all kinds of positions and had a bag of balls to play with Charlie, plus Charlie was as smiley as ever. I couldn't wait to see how they turned out. As it turns out, I'm a little behind in writing this blog so I have a few of the pics (see below).

We chose this as one of our free photos, love him!

We chose this one too but in colour

Our photographer has kindly put a few extras up on facebook

After our photo shoot we decided to stay in town and have a little mooch about especially as we were having such good weather. It was nice to be able to spend some time together. After we'd had enough of town we remembered that we needed to go food shopping. As is the case most Mondays we really didn't feel like cooking anything so we decided we wanted to eat out. So we had a little look at prospective restaurants which included Pizza Hut, Chiquitos and Las Iguanas. In the end we decided on Frankie and Bennys.

As it was a Monday night they had a special 25% off offer on so we took full advantage of that! It was quite funny yet a lil upsetting that as we were looking at the menus we noticed Charlie kept bursting in to proper tears! We couldn't quite figure it out until we noticed that he cried every time he looked up. 

As we looked up to see what it was that was upsetting him we noticed that he was sat right underneath a huge ceiling fan! He must have thought that it was going to get him! Bless! Needless to say, we moved him on to the other side of the table where he was a little happier but he never took his eyes off that fan! Lol!

Lauren had a Calzone (and a ceasar salad! Which was thought was free... But we were charged for it!)

I had the biggest and nicest burger I think I'd ever had! YUM!

Charlie took full advantage of the dough sticks

We had an awesome Monday and looking forward to many more like it.