Cream teas, crying and a crisis or seven...

Phew, what a weekend.

Started off brilliantly on Saturday when my auntie, mum and I went to Kilworth House for afternoon tea which Tom had paid for us to have as we've all had a bit of a dodgy week. (http://www.kilworthhouse.co.uk/) We arrived and ended up in the middle of a massive wedding party. I have never seen such a colourful and beautiful wedding as we were priviliged to witness. It was an asian bride who was marrying a bloke who I think had Polynesian background as the wedding was a mix of both traditions so had all the rich golds and reds of an Indian wedding and all the flower necklaces and beautiful floral displays of the Polynesian wedding. I apologise if I sound incredibly ignorant of both traditions but it was truly spectacular. The weather was glorious and the wedding party amongst the grounds looked so vibrant and absolutely stunning. They had their reception in the "Orangery" and we had our tea in the "Wordsworth" room which was unfortunately not within gawping distance of the wedding! I've included the link to the hotel as if you're looking for a venue for any function with an element of not just "wow" but "bl**dy hell!" then Kilworth may well be the right place. It's flippin gorgeous.

Anyway, mum, aunty J and I stuffed ourselves absolutely silly on tiny sandwiches, gorgeous creamy cakes and scones. It was all going swimmingly until we were assaulted by a giant flying army. No, unfortunately it was not a gang of RAF hunks, but instead, a jam obsessed swarm of wasps. Mum looked like some sort of demented belly dancer as she whirled napkins around - she tried to do it delicately but nearly had the cake stands over three times (if aunty J hadn't managed a catch that Freddy Flintoff would'ver been proud of then we may well have been wearing half a gallon of earl grey too). Mum's frantic flapping only served to get her stung and so the room of dainty ladies was party to a little Estonian swearing as I tried to wrench the sting out with a pair of twezers but couldn't find anything. We later found out that it's only bees that leave the sting in!
Having caused havoc in the Wordsworth room, we retired to the courtyard garden for a vino or seven. I hadn't had a drink all week due to my diet so Captain Chardonnay made a very welcome entrance back into my life. We had a good old chinwag and aunty J was telling me that my cousins hadn't seen ST out on the town for over a year and no one in the rugby community knew what on earth had happened to him. We had a good old slating of ST and my mum retained her gold medal in ST-slag*ing! We then went onto discussing the lovely Tom and both my aunty J and my mum kept saying that they'd leave my dad and my uncle and marry him tomorrow! My aunty J also kept saying that I shouldn't keep turning Tom down if he did keep on about moving in and getting engaged as there weren't too many men in the world as good as him. They both then went on to plan my wedding in Estonia to Tom. I gave up trying to divert the conversation in the end and let them plan the whole thing - I don't think I've ever seen them both so excited so I hadn't the heart to bring them back to reality and remind them that Tom hadn't even proposed!

On Sunday Tom and I decided to have a day out at Chatsworth House. It was meant to be a romantic stroll amongst beautiful gardens in the sunshine but it could not have been more of a disastrous day out.

It started badly in the middle of the night on Saturday night. I don't know if I've mentioned before that Tom has terrible trouble with his eyes. He has to put drops in every four hours and then at night has to put this gel in which, once he puts it in, his eyelids are glued together for at least 4 hours and he can't see at all. He'd been feeling really full of allergy which makes him snore really badly too so he had decided to sleep in the spare room. He'd stayed with me until I fell asleep and then crept out to the other room. We're currently redecorating the house and after Tom had done his eyes with his "blinding gel" he walked into the spare bedroom. However, as his gel makes his eyes completely blind, he had to feel his way around the room but of course all the furniture was in different places. He had managed to navigate his way around the furniture but had forgotten that he'd hung a full length mirror in a different place. This meant that he had successfully reached the bed, about 3 metres away from the nearest light switch but had blundered into a 5 foot mirror. This fell off the wall and smashed onto the wooden floor. Now I don't know if you have ever been awoken in the middle of the night by the sound of a metre and a half of smashing glass and your boyfriend nowhere to be seen but it does not make for a scene from sleeping beauty.

I started screaming for Tom as I didn't know he was in the other room but I couldn't hear his answer as I still had my earplugs in as I had thought he was sleeping with me. I was therefore convinced that there were intruders and that Tom had been hurt whilst spprehending them. I leapt into action in a combat outfit of a thong and a "too cool for school" t-shirt (0bviously designed to put the fear of god into any burglars. I mean, surely any man would be terrified of a 34 year old woman leaping through the darkness with her cellulite wobbling and a completely inappropriate kids' t-shirt)

Anyway, upon flinging myself round the door I was met by Tom shouting that there was glass on the floor but definitely no burglars. The poor lad was scared half witless as he couldn't see a thing and was surrounded by shards of mirror. Eventually after much clearing up, we both managed to get into bed but I couldn't sleep as I was really on edge after the mirror fiasco. For some reason, over the past few days I've been feeling really anxious at night and have no idea why. I can't seem to breathe properly and I keep getting the same feeling I used to get before my panic attacks last year. I haven't had a proper panic attack at all but keep getting the "butterflies in the chest" feeling that usually precedes one. Needless to say, a good night's sleep eluded me and so I only had about 2 hours.

I also ended up driving to Chatsworth as Tom has a flat tyre and is currently driving around on one of those spacesaver tyres. I absolutely hate driving, especially with Tom as he's a truly excellent driver and makes me feel like something out of Driving Miss Daisy. He never says anything but he gets "twitchy feet" and I can see him stamping on the brake or accelerator every so often. It didn't help that we were in the mother of all traffic jams and I was all tearful and hormonal as well as having had virtually no sleep. We took the wrong turning off this one roundabout three times and were stuck in all sorts of temporary traffic light tailbacks and jams. We couldn't decide whether to turn back or not and then my car decided not to play ball either. First we almost ran out of petrol and then once we were on the road again (but not before I'd had a massive sobbing emotional meltdown on the forecourt and cried all my mascara off) the flippin oil light came on. Apparently you can't just bung any old oil in my car either so we had to find a Halford's before 4pm on a Sunday to get specialist oil. This was not turning out to be the best day out. The worst part though was that when we did finally get to Chatsworth, Tom revealed that this was where they'd sprinkled his dad's ashes. The perfect end to a perfect journey. I drag the poor lad halfway through the Midlands' worst traffic jam, lose both the way and my own mind on a garage forecourt, only to bring him to the place where his dead dad is. I really am the worst girlfriend in the history of the world.

We ended up driving back in near silence, apart from the odd yell of "I think Halfords is over there! Oh no, that's a pet superstore" or "Can't I just put in some castrol GTX and hope for the best" and "I think that pasty is coming back on me". It was not our finest journey.

After a total of three and a half hours in a car, one petrol station meltdown, a gallon of oil at Derby Halford's and me still reeling from the "ashes" revelation, we finally got home. I fell asleep on the sofa and Tom finished painting his study. Luckily, later on, we made up, had a lovely cuddle on the sofa and do what all couples do on a Sunday night which is eat a whole honeydew melon then have a competition about who feels most sick.

This morning I was woken by a text from Tom telling me he was on the train to london and that he'd accidentally still got my cashcard in his wallet. This means that I've got no funds at all until tomorrow night - eek!

I also weighed myself today after the gym. I've lost exactly nothing. In fact, I've put 2pounds on. I'm now 9st 9 which I have no idea how I've managed to accumulate. I've virtually moved into the gym, have stuck religiously to 1500 calories a day and have been off the booze for ages except for Saturday and I haven't lost a gram. I am thoroughly depressed and believe that the forces of Science are ganging up on me and if I carry on in this vein then my bottom will require its own postcode it will become that large.
I am writing this in a haze of hunger and longing that even a sandwich made out of two sofa cushions and a remote control is looking tempting. I cannot believe that such dedication to gym-ness and such self control near the fridge has resulted in a weight gain! I have looked into the YAYW diet and may well have to pay up and look happy as I'm getting very disheartened at the moment. I even had to buy a pair of jeans the other day in the next size up as my size 8s are screaming at me and making me walk as if I have a horrible water infection. So, i had to bite the bullet and get back into double figures in the jeans department. Booooooooo!

Anyway, I'm very nervous this week as I've got my first hospital appointment this Thursday. I was going to say a pre-op appointment but that makes me sound like a transsexual. I've bought some new PJs for the 24th and have even been super organised and bought loads of Xmas pressies as they consultant said we'd probably have our first round of iVF before Christmas so don't want the added stress of sorting out all the presents when I should be concentrating on the treatment. God, I'm so flippin anal!

So, I'll sign off for now. I've got a tonne of cooking to do as I've got 8 for dinner tomorrow night. Why do I offer to do these things?

Lots of love in the meantime

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