If you wish to continue keeping up with our family news & photos, etc., and you don’t yet have a Facebook account, get on over there, register, and look me up.

Thanks for dropping by again, and I’ll see you on Facebook soon. BTW, my site will shut down on 28th May 2012.

Leo.

Pre drinks were had at San Carlo on Castle Street – impressive decor and clientelle list but the service wasn’t up to much…maybe I’m not famous enough yet. Barman didn’t know how to make a decent mojito and we found ourselves having to squeeze the juice from several limes to give the drinks a boost.

At the Bar & Grill, we had three courses + coffee, and the first two courses were simply the best two plates of food that I’ve tasted in 20 years of restaurant dining. High praise indeed and worth every penny. My starter was King Prawns Tempura with a Red Chilli & Lime jam…and every aspect of the dish was stunning. Yvonne had Pumpkin soup, which was very nice. For the mains, I had Tandoori Seabass with garlic & herb Bok Choi, which again was perfectly cooked, and Yvonne had a lovely dish of garlic & herbed tagliatelle with king prawns – looked gorgeous.

Post drinks were at the Hard Days Night hotel, which added to was some live music. You can’t beat live music.

Today (Sunday), another treat for my birthday…breakfast at a nearby gastro pub – without the kids! To be honest, I couldn’t eat a whole child anyway.

These are the weekends to savour

Two stripped layers of grass, one ton of topsoil, new turf, concrete, new soil and 80 plants later, the front garden is lookin’ f.a.b.

Another job down, 200 to go.

The party was in Southport at half-past midday in one of those soft-play adventure centres for kids, and while the little one partied, I took darling little Katrina out for a stroll in the park in the sunshine, and an ice-cream. Bliss. It wasn’t the ice-cream man’s day…I handed in a tenner, he didn’t have change, and gave me the ‘99 for free. That’ll learn ye. Post party, back at the house, out came the swing and the rocker for the kids, and as I built it the swing, the kids played on the slide. I love these sunny days.

After the kids were in bed, it was nice to just chill out in the conservatory with a glass of wine, listening to Band Of Horses’ Infinite Arms album, and watching the sun go down. Nice day.

Pre-show, we dropped into Portico Restaurant in the Albert Dock for a bite to eat, which boasted a 20% discount on production of Echo Arena tickets. We were a bit disappointed. The service was ridiculously slow, which was the result of young, inexperienced staff and not due to an unexpected influx of people as the restaurant was only half-full. The meal wasn’t hot, it wasn’t served as it had been advertised, and no explanation was provided. Having spent an hour-and-a-half there, we only just had time for a main, which was small. I don’t recommend.

Back to the show. I was disappointed with the length of it, considering that most people had waited 18 months to see the man (Yvonne and I picked up some last-minute tickets about 6 weeks ago). First half commenced around 8pm, and he exited the stage for a 20-minute interval by 8:45. Back on at 9:05, the jokes continued until just before 9:45, when he left the stage again for the obligatory encore before departing proper just before 10pm. Considering the lengthy wait and the not-so-cheap tickets at £40, I thought that a lengthier show should have been the order of the day.

Overjoyed at the deposit of chocolate and sweets at the breakfast table, by 10am, Sean and Katrina had already commenced their easter egg hunt through the wilds of the back garden, following the signs that led them to their prize. It’s always a joy to see the look on their faces when yet ANOTHER bounty comes into view. Smiles from ear to ear.

Post-hunt, it was off to Oeste Restaurant in Ormskirk for an afternoon carvery meal – including dessert – and then a quick roll back home with full stomachs. I love these lazy afternoons; clear, sunny skies, a warm breeze and a meal served up without having to lift a finger

I’m just about to bring the kids up to their beds, and then I might relax with a glass of wine and a movie. I wish every day could be like this. Tomorrow, Yvonne and I are off the see Peter Kaye at the echo arena in Liverpool, and with the good reports that friends are feeding through, I’m looking forward to it.

Roll on Monday.

The weather was sublime and the kids were as good as gold as we strolled along the banks of the Leeds-Liverpool canal, eating our home-made ice creams and soaking in some much-needed warmth on our faces. Such simple pleasures.

On foot, we stopped at the level-crossing at Rufford, and all of Sean’s wonderful young dreams came true when the station master asked him to press the button to lower the barriers of the crossing for an approaching train! He was delighted!

Later on, we stopped off at a nice little farm to see some pigs, goats, chickens, etc. and wandered around enjoying the day for what it was.

Back at the ranch in early evening, the paddling pool came out and the kids enjoyed a good hour splashing about in the shallow water. Wish it was me again! Kids fed and in bed, Yvonne and I enjoyed a nice glass or wine, relaxing in front of the TV. So, yeah…it’s been a lovely day Roll on tomorrow x

Dot. The world’s smallest stop-motion animation character shot on a Nokia N8Technorati Tags: videos, animation, fun, dot

So what’s happened in our lives since my last update? A lot actually. At the end of May, having sold our house, we moved out of Moss Lane, far, far way and onto Moss Lane. Around 100 yards down the road to be exact and into Yvonne’s Mum’s house. It was REALLY great to have that opportunity, and we’re blessed that Dorothy’s house was large to accommodate all of our stuff, and more. On 7th July, we celebrated Seán’s 4th birthday, and just over weeks later (23rd July), we picked up the keys to our lovely, new house in Aughton. Having spent a week ripping out the living room and the main bedroom, we moved in on 30th July – two house moves in under 3 months is not for the faint hearted. It’s great!

4 weeks later, Seán started in primary school and Katrina started in nursery, and both are doing great – very happy kids. Lucky old us. At the same time, I applied for a transfer to the local police station, had it accepted, so now I’m only 5 minutes drive from work. A week after that, Yvonne returned to work…so you can imagine the planning that goes into getting the house organised!

Graham (Yvonne’s cousin) is still en-route on his EPIC journey, that is The Odyssey Expedition. At the moment, he’s in China (Shanghai) and has planted his size 10’s in 171 of the 200 nations on Earth – and all by public transport! Check out his website using the link on the right.

Last weekend, Yvonne and I managed to get over to Dublin for my friend Colm’s 40th birthday celebration…billed as the 19th anniversary of his 21st birthday party, and what a cracking night it was – we got back to our hotel around 3am. 24 hours away from the kids, and around 5 hours sleep – that’s less than when we’re WITH the kids! GREAT fun, though. In Liverpool airport on the way out, I spotted Peter Kay, who happened to be on our flight to Dublin, and in Dublin airport, I had a quick chat with him and got him to sign Colm’s birthday card!

So, there ye have it. That’s a round-up of events as briefly as I can…and for me, that’s brief. I MUST make an effort to keep my site more updated. Oh, and I’ll post some more photos soon.

Ta ta fer now,

Leo. x

At one stage during the telephone call, I had to chuckle. We’re moving in with my Mum-in-law for a short period until such time that the legals on our new house have been done and dusted. Dorothy’s house is an old house, built around 1887, and over time, it’s suffered war damage, as well as damp, flooding and fire (an external garage), and understandably, this is seen as a greater insurance risk to house contents whilst we’re living there in transit. ‘Nick’ from the Indian call centre asked me if the house had suffered any “heew”, so I asked him to repeat this…still couldn’t understand what he was asking, and I asked him to repeat it twice more….but I still couldn’t understand what he was asking. And then he spelt it….

H for hotel
E for echo
A for alpha
WE for wictor
E for echo

I asked him if he was saying ‘hee-we’…and he responded by saying it again, and spelling it again, including the ‘we for wictor’. Then the penny dropped. He wanted to know if the house had suffered any movement or ‘heave’ (as in ‘we for wictor’). How Ywonne and I laughed.

This weekend, we’re off to view another 4 houses. Fingers crossed.

Two weeks ago, we returned from a holiday in Centerparcs (sniff…fresh air!) and were absolutely delighted to receive a letter confirming Seán’s acceptance into a primary school in Aughton, West Lancs, starting next September 2010. The following day, we had a vewing and just like any other, we presented the house as best we could, and hoped for further interest. It came 10 days ago with a request for a second viewing – the first second viewing we’d had – and we were both excited and nervous, but trying not to get too excited. It went well, and the following day, we had an offer, which we accepted! Whoop-dee-whoop! The pressure was on…we had to find a house for ourselves.

Last Sunday, we went to view a property that we’d previously viewed in January, and having considered all aspects of the buy, we made an offer and it was accepted – hooray!! It’s amazing what can happen in such a short space of time. Today, we dropped into our estate agent and made all of the final preparations  signatures, etc. and we expect that the whole thing will be through – done and dusted – by mid-May…actually, it may even be a little earlier, who knows.

It’s DAMN EXPENSIVE to move house…£7K in our case, but hey-ho, it’s what we want. I don’t think I realised just how expensive these things really are, and it’s funny when I think back about how we bought our current house – our first house; there were no estate agents involved and we kinda went into it with our eyes half shut. It was almost fun! So here we are with about 6-8 weeks left in our lovely little house, and this morning, I went outside to find that the word ‘SOLD’ had been added to the ‘For Sale’ sign by the pixies during the night – I love those pixies.

I hope that the new owners will be as happy in the house as we’ve been.

Wish us luck.

Leo. x

Last Saturday, Graham ‘The Odyssey’ Hughes surprised us all by magically teleporting himself from Rome, Italy to the bar at FACT, Liverpool! Great surprise! A ‘Skype-ing event had been planned and around 30 of his friends gathered for it, as a live link-up had been arranged. For those of you not in the know, Graham’s currently mid-Odyssey, attempting to visit every country on Earth – by surface – in the shortest time possible. He’d secretly returned to the U.K. so as to attain some visas for the middle-east. Shortly after the event began, we lost sound, followed shortly by faint cries of, “can you hear me…can you hear me?” until eventually, the webcam link went down. Suddenly, and as if by magic, Graham appeared in the bar, shouting, “Can you hear me now?!”. It was great.

On the Sunday, we headed to his folk’s place for a similar event, and a similar surprise for his family, which also worked a treat. On Monday evening, I met up with Graham & friends in a bar in town, and seeing as we had a busy day planned for Tuesday, I got the last train home. Tuesday arrived, and post breakfast, we worked on a little bit of the Odyssey website and some film conversion, before heading to Granada Studios in Manchester for some filming for the news’ Granada Reports. Later on, we headed over to the BBC studios as ‘Auntie’ was also interested in The Odyssey. We headed into the studios of North West Tonight for a live interview with the legend that is, Gordon ‘The Krypton Factor’ Burns. Post interview, we met up with a technician from NWT, who was keen to get involved with the project.

On the Wednesday, Graham headed to London for an interview with ITN for the national lunchtime news, and later that night, I put out a news story on his website indicating that he was home. Thursday arrived and was spent generally catching up on the events of the week, sending & receiving e-mails and news contacts via the website. On Friday night, a meeting was arranged for The Odyssey team, but it fell through, much to my annoyance. Tonight (Saturday 13th Feb), I’m staying in with the wonderful Yvonne, our little angel Katrina, and enjoying the calm that is Seán staying at his Nana’s for the night! Bliss…

Here’s the footage from the ITN news piece on Wednesday.

Bye for now x.

Christmas day was great. A wonderful meal coupled with some good wine and sparkly – thanks Yvonne xx. So, it’s been really, really nice to spend time off with the family, and I expect that on New Year’s Eve, we’ll crack open some more bubbly – hooray! Here are a few shots of our christmas so far:-