Packing for uni #1

Hi all,

So tomorrow lunchtime my mum and me will be driving up to Oxford with all my stuff so I can move into my new house. We arn't taking 2 cars because I have so much stuff (although I do have a lot) but because I need my car at uni so I can get back home etc. Trying to park is going to be an absolute nightmare as my new house is on a narrow but very busy street with parking on either side of the road, trying to find one space is going to be difficult enough let alone 2! Once I have them I will post some photos of the inside of the house but as of now I do not have any and have only been inside of it once before, but from what I can remember the house is pretty big :) It has 6 bedrooms (well hopefully they are supposed to be converting the attic into the 6th bedroom) and a large kitchen with dining table and sitting area. At the moment there is only one bedroom but I was told when they convert the attic another one may also be put in so we shall have to wait and see. I am moving in with 5 other girls from my uni, one who is going into her 3rd year and the other 4 are all in the same year as me (2nd). My bedroom has a double bed and a back door leading into the back patio area but that's about all I can remember so will have to write again once I am there to give more details. I don't think everyone is moving into the house tomorrow but I think there will be 4 or 5 of us so hopefully we will go out or something and have time to get to know each other as I don't know the girls particularly well yet. The photo above is one of my house mates Evie and the house (it's the house on the right that she is actually standing in front not the left one.)

Seeing as it is only about 24 hours until I will be packing the cars up ready to leave for Oxford, you would expect me to be all packed and ready to go? Wrong! I did yesterday evening start sorting out my kitchen equipment but got bored and so stopped. This means today I have a stupid amount of things to do, I need to wash all my clothes, organise what clothes I am taking and pack them in my suitcase, go to Tesco and do a food shop so I have food to eat when I get there, collect my contact lenses, go to Boots to get some makeup, go to the gym and probably some other things I can't think of right now. All this needs to be done before tonight as Nick is coming back (he went to uni on Monday for a bit of his freshers week) to spend my last night here with me which is so sweet of him and mummy is buying us Indian for dinner :)

I will post again later when I have progressed more with the packing etc, wish me luck

x x x

Back in the saddle

Today I got back on a horse for the first time in over a year. I hadn't stopped riding because I was scared or anything it was purely because I couldn't afford it as it is pretty expensive and haven't really had time with work, uni etc. But I did it, I had become quite nervous of riding as I hadn't been in so long so was shaking when I got there (after getting lost for a while and having to phone for directions). So I got to the stables (Rycroft in Eversley), they checked my hat to make sure it was correct which luckily it was, then took me to see my horse, Zac. He was gorgeous but very big, I would say 16hh which is alot larger than the 15hh and below pony type horses I used to ride but I could tell he was a lovely boy (photo of someone else not me riding him bellow, sorry it is so small but is the only photo I could find). Anyway we led him into the outdoor arena and up I got with one big jump I was finally back sitting on a horse. I wont go into loads of detail about it as it will be very boring but we started with the basics of walk, trot and canter and some circles and change of reins etc. Then the instructor started getting me a Zac working together more and getting my position (which after a year was terrible) back to standard and getting Zac into a neat outline. By the end of this the lesson was over, far too quickly for my liking but off I popped and untacked Zac and back home I came. I haven't been so happy in ages and haven't stopped smiling since I started the lesson, it all went perfectly and now am looking forward to joining the equine society at uni and hopefully continuing my lessons there.

x x x

DBARC

This post is coming a few days late I am aware I am getting lazy with my blogging again. So on Sunday me, my mum, my granny and Bruno all made the long journey to the other side of Reading for the annual DBARC fun day which as always had a fun dog show as the main attraction. The venue for the fun day was amazing, it was in the grounds of this huge house and there were just miles and miles of fields and a lovely river with people rowing and things. So we got to the show just after 10 where I was upset to see the classes had already started and I was too late to enter Bruno in best veteran (usually the class he does the best in) so instead I entered him for best collie or collie cross (turned out to be a fix as the judge was from the BOARDER collie society so only dogs which looked like boarder collies did well. George, her mum and her dog Finley also came along to the show but left after entering only one class as hey had other things to do. Then we went in for best DBARC dog (DBARC is the rescue centre that was holding the show and the place we got Bruno from 11 years ago) anyway we went in for this class thinking we had no chance, all of the dogs were very sweet and playful and there were over 30 in the class! Bruno being his usual laid back self just lay down and went to sleep and even when the judge came over he didn't really show any excitement (no hope for us placing now as all of the other dogs were saying hello and wagging their tails at the judge). Anyway it came to placing the dogs who had won and he went through 6th, 5th, 4th, 3rd, then came to second, started walking towards Bruno and handed him the rosset!!! I was so happy, fair enough it wasn't 1st like last week but 2nd in a class this big is still amazing. Bruno looked happy and mummy and granny were thrilled. We left the show not long after this as granny was tired and so was Bruno but before we left we picked up a drawing of Bruno we had paid a man to do at the show which I think is adorable and looks a lot like Bruno. Was a lovely day in total, mum brought a picnic which we ate in the sun by the car and even though I got a little sun burnt it was nice to be out in the sun and Bruno fell straight to sleep once home bless him.

Drawing of Bruno we had done and his second place rosset

Bruno all tired from coming second and ready to head home

Here is the link to the rescue centres website, if you are looking to get a new pet (they have cats and small animals as well as dogs) then I really would advice looking at rescue centres as there are so many lovely dogs in then needing new homes. http://www.dbarc.org.uk/

The dog show was of course the main topic of this post but just a quick note about yesterday. Yesterday me and Nick went for a late lunch/early dinner to The Leather Bottle in Hook which used to be a Bluebeckers restaurant. These used to be my favourite places to go and eat but I was really disappointed as they have changed the menu and it just isn't the same as the old one. Was a nice meal anyway but just wish they would change back to the old one.

x x x

Paralympic's

As promised I am going to write a post about my trip to the Paralympic's yesterday.

So I headed over to Nick's house at about 2 in the aftenoon as the original plan was to drive up to Heathrow to pick his mum up from work and then to go into London from there. In the end she came home first so I had a few hours at Nick's just watching TV and getting excited about the trip to London we would soon be embarking on. Once we finally left Nick's dad drove me, Nick and his mum to Wokingham station where luckily we were just about to miss the train to Waterloo meaning we chose to drive up instead, allowing me to sleep the whole journey. Once there we got the Jubilee Line to the Olympic Park where I got very excited and started acting like a little kid at Christmas. The park is huge! We walked around a bit and went through security etc before deciding to go get some dinner in McDonalds (as I had been told it is the biggest in Europe or something), it was indeed enormousness with about 30 counters etc, so we left Nick's dad to get the food and headed out to find a table.

After eating we headed into the stadium which was completely packed, almost every seat was taken and had quite a good view after being warned they wern't great seats, I couldn't complain about them. During the time we watched we saw, long jump, discus, shot put and lots of running. The atmosphere was absolutely amazing and had a lot of fun with all the different Mexican waves that went around the stadium. We stayed till about half 9 before deciding it was a good idea to make a move to avoid the 80,000 people all trying to leave the stadium at the same time. Got the tube back and then drove back to Nick's for the night.

I  hate tubes and seem to hate them a little bit more every time I go on one, they are hot, squashed and make me feel sick! Glad I don't have to go on them everyday. Anyway this is the end of my post I shall now show you some photos from my trip :)

Olympic Stadium 

Me and Nick having dinner before going into the stadium

Inside the stadium

One of the running races

Me and Nick standing on the bridge overlooking the stadium

x x x

The Legoland adventure is over

I have done it! I made it through the whole summer at Legoland, I laughed, I cried and had many many good days but just as many bad day's but however much the customers shouted at me, however many plates I dropped and broke, I made it till the end and am proud to say I have now had a full time job. So yesterday was my last day and was just an average day, was on kitchen end which was actually quite fun we just messed around at the end and things, but after wanting to leave so much I was actually a bit sad when the time came to take my inform off for the last time. But on with the new stage I suppose, it's a summer I will never forget and met some amazing people, but now it's time to relax for a few weeks before heading back to uni.

Am going to the Paralympics today with Nick and his parents! So excited, we're seeing the athletics this evening and I have a Union Jack to take and everything. Will blog tomorrow to let you know how it was.

x x x