The Weeks That Were - Sports, Reports & MOT's

Since my Clean 9 results, I've been pretty quiet over here - I've been enjoying my new found weight loss. Also, not much interesting has happened.
Although over the past few weeks, TONNES has happened. However, because so much has happened, I haven't had the time to update the blog.
We saw Princess take part in her very first sports day! I won't bore you with loads of pictures - mainly because the school doesn't allow any to be shared on social media - but I was so proud of how well she did.
We were a bit worried at first - Princess can be competitive. However she's not the most sportiest of children. Our fears were soon dashed though as we watched her eager to take part and actually begin to enjoy herself once she got in to the swing of things. There was a hiccup during the running race, reason being because she didn't win. At first she was at the back, but next thing you know, she's overtaking kids like she's Michael Schumacher and speeds her way in to 3rd place. She could well have come 2nd if she hadn't given up at the final hurdle after realising she wasn't going to come first. There were a few tears and was adamant that was IT, but she eventually got herself back in there and went on to win the tomato & spoon race.

As well as her very first sports day, we also received Princess's first school report. I was so pleased to read the comments the teachers had written about our girl. She's confident, sociable and eager to please. She's attentive, imaginative and helpful. All of this we already knew, but don't get to see as much of at home. They don't set targets in the first year at nursery as the teacher said all children start with a clean slate - neither of them better or worse at something than another child. When September starts the will all receive individual evaluations that they will base their reports on. Right now though, we are so proud of where she is. She has fitted in to school routine so well, and I know that given the chance, she would go at least 3 days a week rather than the afternoons she does now.

Unfortunately, all of this wonderful praise coming our way over our brilliant daughter, could not help the car pass it's MOT. When Ross called me and told me it had failed - I wasn't surprised. We had expected it to fail over the CV boot (I don't know what that is - I'm just pretending) However, it failed on more than that. The handbrake wasn't working properly and the brake pipes were severely corroded.

After a quick trip to Ross's friend at the garage at the top of our road - we were informed that the pipes weren't corroded, just had surface rust. At most, it should have been an advisory, nowhere near a fail. We panicked. We didn't have the money to replace them at £300 . So we did the next best thing... we cleaned them. That's right, yours truly got underneath a jacked up Vauxhall Vectra with a scrubbing brush, some sandpaper and some grease and cleaned away. Ross changed the brake pads to get the maximum hold from his handbrake and I scrubbed until the pipes sparkled.

It passed!

The most annoying thing about the situation is that if we'd have had the funds to replace the brake pipes - we would have. But it turns out that the fail was completely unnecessary and all they needed was a clean, not replacing. They didn't even get an advisory on the retest! That's how good of a cleaner I am! It feels like the garage failed it, hoping Ross would have paid them to fix the car when it didn't even need fixing. My tip would be that if you ever feel like your car was unfairly denied an MOT, then remember most garages will do a free brake/tyre/engine check. Get a second opinion!

So there are my weeks that were.

I feel like I'm falling behind again, but I'm trying. Things are tough, but they're looking up. We're getting on with life day by day and enjoying the good parts whilst we can.