January 12, 2012 by Amy Hansford
This is fascinating.
Apparently, young babies (0-3 months) share a language. Five words or noises specifically. I plead that you watch this video. It’s brilliant.
Click here for the video.
(I’m not clever enough to embed it.)
In short, nah = hungry, howh = sleepy, heh = discomfort, eair = lower gas, eh = burp.
Brilliant.
Thanks to Sarah Giles for pointing this out.
Category Comments | Tags: babies,language,talk | No Comments
January 11, 2012 by Amy Hansford
My memory is dreadful. I have no idea how long we’ve been doing this now other than it’s over a week. This I know because everyone had their weigh in on Monday and they were all very happy with how much weight they’d lost. Alex lost 5.5lb, which we were impressed by.
Last night we had spinach and mushroom cannelloni which allegedly takes an hour to prepare and cook. I started at 5.15pm and we at at 7.15pm. It tasted brilliant, but was a bit too much for me to be playing around with at the end of the day. I think I’ll need to prep it all in the middle of the day next time, give me a bit more time to breathe (and feed/bathe daughter, tidy for visiting photographers).
It was carnage in the kitchen by the time I’d got it all in the dishes. Slimmers World suggests that you pipe the spinach/mushroom mixture in or use a teaspoon. Sod that – get stuck in and use your fingers. It’s the only way to get it all done in less than two hours.
The finished product was lush. The highest aspiration I have is that my food be like a Marks and Spencer ready meal, and this wasn’t far off. We also have plenty left for another day – the recipe is for four, but we easily got six portions out of this and I still had some broken Cannelloni and mixture leftover.
Category Comments, Uncategorized | Tags: cooking,diet,dinner,food,Slimmers World | 1 Comment
January 6, 2012 by Amy Hansford
Having spoken to a few of the Griffin Players on how they’re coping with the Slimming World rules, they were split pretty much in half: those who realise it’s fairly similar to what they were eating before and are happy, and those who resent not being able to have a full fat coke. To all the latter; don’t forget you can go wild in the diet aisle!
Day two wasn’t quite as successful as day one, but it did represent a return to the workplace for Alex so there were always going to be issues.
Breakfast was porridge. Not my favourite, which is why it was a good job Alex was eating it and not me.
Lunch was planned to be beans on toast. However, for health and safety reasons, toasters have been banned from Alex’s workplace. Beans on bread doesn’t have quite the same feel to it, but hey ho. It’s an easy option so he’ll be having that for work lunches from now on. This leaves me with a fridge chock full of salad to be used up. Somehow I feel Alex is getting the better end of the diet at the moment.
I ran out of time to do dinne before leaving for rehearsals, so left Alex to fend for himself in the kitchen. We had everything in for the Chilli Beef Noodles but, as I understand it, he left it cooking a little too long. It probably tastes better when it’s not burned…
Category Comments, Reviews | Tags: diet,Griffin Players,Slimming World | 2 Comments
January 5, 2012 by Amy Hansford
Alex, like many of the Griffin Players, has started Slimming World. The theory behind this diet is that most meats trimmed of all visible fat, veg and fruit is ‘free’, while other things have ‘Syn’ points. For example, two tablespoons of light mayonnaise is 1 Syn, a Jaffa Cake is 3 Syns, etc. Alex has up to 15 Syns a day. I make up a menu at the start of each week (mainly so I can make sure we have enough shopping in), only now it’s run by Slimmers World.
You should know at this point that I dislike cooking. I don’t hate it, but there is a definite resentment at the amount of time it takes to grate an onion, chop veg, measure out spices etc. You should know also that whenever I’m preparing dinner I’m also feeding my nine month daughter whilst aiming to be out of the door as soon as Alex arrives home in order to make it rehearsals 20 minutes late. This means that these meals had better bloody be worth it, or I’m going back to sticking something in the oven for 40 minutes.
I thought it might be valid to have a real world look at someone on Slimmers World, so here it is.
Day one.
Breakfast was brilliant. Giant fry up. Lovely and took me through to well past lunchtime hunger wise.
For lunch we nipped over the marina to the Carvery. Nomilicious. Alex found he could eat pretty much everything on offer but needed to check Syns of a few things when we got back.
For dinner, I made meatballs and spaghetti. We used wholemeal spaghetti – I bought pretty much wholemeal everything in the last shop as it’s meant to be better for you, Syns or no Syns. You know what? Wholemeal spaghetti tastes fine, don’t fret it. It was a bit of a pain prepping and cooking everything simultaneously, but it came out pretty good. I whacked a salad on the side so my portions didn’t seem too small. I’m impressed at how good it tastes. I made enough to put two portions aside to ‘ding’ another day, so not a bad start.
Category Comments, Reviews | Tags: cooking,diary,diet,food,Griffin Players,menu,Slimming Word,Syns | 3 Comments
January 3, 2012 by Amy Hansford
You may notice that ye olde blog looks a little different. I thought it was time for a little update and change of colour, plus changing to a theme that gives me a little more breathing space on the blog side of the panel compared to the last one. You like?
According to Google Analytics, someone came to my website last month using possibly the most amusing phrase ever as a search term. “how to touch a girls butt without her finding out while she is awaket”. Brilliant. Certainly tickled me. The answer is here for you kiddo: don’t. You’ll get the most amazing slap if you do.
And finally, I did say that I would make a hat to go with the washing-up themed pantomime dame dress below. That I did. Using baubles hotglued to a base and kept on with elastic, it’s meant to look like washing up bubbles. Unfortunately, given the rigorous nature of the dance routine involved, the hat had to be retired to the dressing room. Mind you, it still looked bloody good up to that point!
Category Comments, Costumes | Tags: analytics,blog,comment,costume,funny,Griffin Players,Luton,panto,pantomime,photoblog | No Comments
June 30, 2010 by Amy Hansford
Monthly, I analyze my website statistics thanks to Google Analytics. The most entertaining stat by far is the collection of keywords typed into search engines that have led people here to awakey.com. Below I answer the top five queries, followed by my award for the Most Random Keyword.
awakey
Yep, you found me. It’s a good little handle. I’ve had it for about 15 years now, so I’ve become quite attached to it, and it me.
sequin top hat and tails gold
You’re looking for Columbia stuff, right? There’s three things you can do.
i) Get a bog standard one-size-fits-all jobbie from the interwebs.
ii) Get a ‘Columbia In A Bag‘ – we like to see people have made the effort buy investing in a costume, but we like you more if you add to the costume, i.e. sew some proper ribbons on the shorts, reinforce the top etc.
iii) Get As If By Magic to make you one.
Columbia Rocky Horror pyjamas
Do yourself a favour – don’t go mad on trying to get film accurate ones. If they’re blue and white stripe, or even blue and white in some sort of basic pattern, it’s absolutely fine! Besides, no-one will even notice once your nipple’s popped out.
Rocky Horror costume guide
You’re looking for one of two things.
Either Ruth’s Anal Retentive Costume List, or the Student’s Guide to Rocky Horror Costumes. The latter, I created back when I was at university. Shamefully, not updated much past the girls, but the basic ideas of how to whip together your own costumes are there.
Vyvyan Young Ones
It continually entertains me that this search term brings people to my site regularly. This site has summed up the components of the outfit marvellously, but don’t forget the stars!
And the award for Most Random Keyword for June is…
9 1/2 toes
Category Comments | Tags: comment,costume,facts,June,keywords,stats,Student's Guide to Rocky Horror Costumes | No Comments
June 5, 2010 by Amy Hansford
I am taking a Facebook holiday.
There’s been a lot of talk lately regarding the privacy of Facebook. I’ve been tempted to follow the suit of others by deleting my account, but I know I wouldn’t be able to go that far. I would miss the interaction, the photos and keeping up with the latest events. Equally, there are people who DM me through Facebook whose emails I do’?t have, so I would lose this communication line.
While my Facebook account will remain active, I won’t be around so much.
To a lesser extent, I’ll also be giving my Twitter feed a rest until everything’s out the way too.
I am busy costuming “Our House” for the Griffin Players. It’s taken up an immense amount of my time – if I’m not working, I’m searching shops or surfing Ebay or (yes, it’s true) actually sewing to make theatre magic happen. I’ve found my emails are building up and my other projects suffering as a result, with my attentions turning to Facebook for relaxation in between crafting sessions. As an aside, it really is a cracking show. The Griffins sound amazing and I’m genuinely impressed at the rehearsals I get to. Definitely worth seeing, especially so if you like cheery musicals (we need them right now, right?)
It’s on from 16th – 19th June at the Library Theatre in Luton. Friday/Saturday are nearly sold out, so phone the box office 07906 075455 for your tickets. And mine’s an orange and passionfruit J2O afterwards in the bar, thanks.
Also, I’ve just started my new job! Well, I’ve been doing it as a temp for a couple of months. Having completed the interview process, it’s now official and comes with some extra responsibilities, so I’m finding myself working longer hours than normal. While 9am-6pm isn’t a patch on the old teaching hours of 7.30am-6.30pm, it’s tricky when I’m trying to do everything else at the same time!
I feel for my poor websites – www.ehos.co.uk really needs to be updated with all the great stuff going on with their production of Little Shop Of Horrors; www.awakey.com – well, the first update that’s had in a while will be this one; As If By Magic could do with a scrub up and pictures of the divine things we’ve been making recently, plus I’d love to be more active on our Twitter account, www.twitter.com/aibmcostumes.
Don’t worry – I have my Facebook set up so I will still receive your emails and messages, just to my inbox instead. But I may not know if you’re inviting me to an event (hey, occasionally, it happens) so give me a shout.
* Extra props if you get the title reference
Category Comments | Tags: dramatics,life,me,Musical,privacy,work | No Comments
April 14, 2010 by Amy Hansford
The time has come (the Walrus said) to speak of spooky things. To give you a little history about me and my family, The Lodge has been the family house since about 1994. From then until about 2006, it contained my mum, me (popping home from uni for four years of it) and my dad. Since 2006, my sister has lived there with her three kids. Prior to this it was owned by an old lady about whom little is known, and before that it was part of the nun’s estate next door. Before that it was part of the land owned by the Earl of the town, and before that… goodness only knows. Either way, it’s an old house.
When we first moved in it really looked like a bomb had hit it. It was dilapidated – children were afraid to knock there on Halloween for fear of what was inside. We had a camper van at the time so some of the residents had assumed we were squatters to begin with. My dad redid the entire place, adding a big extension on to the kitchen (was was pantry sized) and an extra room. It was proper old – we were ripping off the wallpaper and found an additional door into the kitchen, previously hidden. Nothing exciting, no portal to another world, just a door between the hallway and the kitchen, but the plaster that was coming away contained horse hair and everything. So everyone understands it’s an old house with lots of history, right? Right.
Some more backstory now – since I remember, the house has been haunted. Yep, I’m cutting straight to the chase here – there are dozens of anecdotes I could share, and I probably will in time, but the important thing here is that when everyone’s gone out for the day, the house is not empty. When you think you’re alone, something happens to prove that you most definitely are not. Depending on who you are and what’s going on, the house will either be welcoming or looming.
What we do know is that we have evidence of this ghostery. The form of that evidence… well, you’ll have to stay tuned for that.
Category Comments | Tags: facts,family,ghost,haunted,house,ponderation | No Comments
March 18, 2010 by Amy Hansford
Regarding puns, none can beat the one I saw in today’s Metro. Sadly, the online story is missing this top journalistic treat.
The premise: surfer surfs with Alpaca.
The gold: “You bring a wetsuit, Alpaca surfboard”.
Absolute genius.
Category Comments | Tags: beauty,comedy,health,social | No Comments
February 3, 2010 by Amy Hansford
I hate it when I’m not in control of my body, hence why I just can’t stand being ill. This morning I woke around 2am with the shivers, not to be blessed with sleep again until around 5am. One wake up call and one unloading of my tummy later, I found the top of my body to be too heavy to be carried by the bottom half, leading to me crashing back in to bed. After a few hours kip, I woke up feeling a hell of a lot better for it but still wobbly. It seems I have been the latest victim of the Panto Bug. Yes, at least three of my colleagues have suffered the same in the past two weeks, only they had the sense not to do it during show week.
I will heading up to the theatre this evening and plan on taking to the stage as Urchin #3, but not without a precationary bucket on standby…
Category Comments | Tags: health | No Comments