Saturday night was dinner group in Dave and Busters, it was a small group, but lots of fun. It was some of the better service we’ve had in that Dave and Busters, and, I struck gold in the ‘reward zone’ finding a couple of things that will work great for Col’s upcoming birthday party.
Sunday morning we headed out to the Phoenicia Deli for a celebratory lunch. We have two friends, Emily and Luke (you may have heard me talk about them on occassion! LOL!) who are big runners, they both got selected to run the Houston Half Marathon!
This in itself is a huge achievement, I know a lot of people, who didn’t get a spot. They’ve been training for a while, they are complete machines! Especially Emily, she runs miles and miles every single morning, at the crack of dawn. I admire her, she gives me something to work towards, something to strive to. She’s highly successful in her exercising, and, not only did she run the half-marathon, she ran it in under two hours!!!
They both finished with great times and did themselves (and all of us) proud!
Team Van der Waals
I don’t think I’ve ever seen them not look stunning – I can’t imagine them being the sweaty mess that I am, post-exercise. Can you believe how fab they look after running over thirteen miles??
Anyhow, the Scooby gang got together at the deli, to celebrate. It was a great way to start a Sunday (yes, for us, we started our day with lunch, for Em and Luke, they’d already done a weeks worth of exercise in one go!!) It was a lovely time, the food was delicious (I had chicken curry) and the company was, as always, great!
After lunch, Col and I hit up R.E.I sports, Academy sports and Sun and Ski sports to have a mooch around for some ski stuff to tick off our shopping list for our upcoming ski-trip. I ended up coming away with some ski socks (which are class!), some thermals (top and bottoms), a thermal head band thingy, we both got under-gloves (they go under your big puffy ski gloves), Col got some thermal bottoms but not much else…
When we’d finished our spat of shopping, Col and I went to see The Iron Lady. A movie we’d both been looking forward to coming out, neither of us enjoyed it much, I feel like it was a waste of Meryl Streep’s talents. I was wholly unimpressed and disappointed by it, so I’m not going to write anything else on the subject!
Monday morning, I was a little nervous. Magz, the SSA QHSE (health and safety) person, had arranged for the Skid Simulator to be brought down from Oklahoma for us to play with.
SkidSim
Originally, I thought it was a simulator, until we found out that it was going to be a truck, that we’d drive around the car park. It was great!
Magz went first!
Rachet (the teacher), had control over the back wheels of the rear wheel drive truck, but it was fun. He told me I was a natural and that he’d never have guessed I’ve only ever driven ‘regular’ sized cars – it was nice to hear, though, like my friend Natalie said, I’m not sure if I’d have reacted the same way if I was really skidding on ice!
Natalie having a go :)
After our time-slot in the SkidSim, Natalie and I went to the Dollar Tree and Big Lots to pick up some stuff for Col’s birthday, before Emily and Magz met up with us in Whole Foods to pick up lunch (which was delicious by the way!)
We sat around Magz’s dinner table, eating lunch (lots and lots of lunch), chatting, drinking tea and eating carrot cake – it was a really civilised and fun afternoon of girl-time.
Little Eve, enjoying lunch with the ladies!
Back at home, I had a nap before my first choir practice of 2012 where we started on our new programme of music. It’s going to be a good year!
Tuesday (17th) morning, I introduced Natalie to Body Pump, the instructor was somewhat off the wall (and kept shouting things like ”put your fanny forward”). The cafe has re-opened, and, if possible, the smoothies are even nicer than before!
Tuesday night, we had a fundraising meeting in my friend Cam Sa’s house, for the choir. If you happen to know any big business men or women, who donate to charity – send them my direction!
Wednesday morning started with an old-skool lunch, my friend Theresa was in town for the week, so I grabbed the chance to see her for lunch, with both hands. It was great, Theresa, Julie and I, had lunch just like we did before T moved to Paris. We caught up, ate good food and just hung out, I miss her!
Wednesday night, was our first night of babysitting little Eve. For Christmas, Col and I, gave Magz and Sam 12 date nights, one per month for a year, I got the idea from here, on Pinterest. So, it was our first night babysitting for our favourite lil gal!
It went well, she was a sweetheart, uncle Col read her a bedtime story, while I fed her (after her bath) and she went down for the night around 8.15pm. Perfect! I also think mummy and daddy had a nice date night, which made for a double success 
Getting bigger and bigger!
She’s such a sweet lil gal!