Harry Potter Fever!!

I am a HUGE fan of the Harry Potter books and films! Bloomsbury launched the new signature editions on November 1st, they are stunning, I already have the books but I may just have to get my hands on a set of these. To celebrate, Bloomsbury have a brand spanking new Harry Potter website for you to explore:

http://www.bloomsbury.com/harrypotter

Plus they have a new facebook fan page which you can join:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Harry-Potter-UK-Book-page/166482176703640

So you can go along and have a little look at those and wait in excitement for the new film which is out this month!!!

Christmas Celebrations!

I had such a lovely evening last night, we had 4 of our friends (they are doing medicine with Mr S) over for a pre-christmas dinner! They are really lovely ladies who literally live over the wall in our back garden! Out of all the people who have become friends from Mr S' course they are the ones who have made me feel the most welcome and included! So we put the Christmas tunes on and lit the fire and had a little Christmas meal complete with crackers and it was really good, really put me in the mood for Christmas! They and Mr S are feeling a bit sad about Christmas this year as they won't get to celebrate much due to having a huge exam the week after so it was nice for everyone to relax a bit last night and take their minds off it!

I have been whizzing through re-reading Harry Potter- this is the one that I have enjoyed the most second time round. I think that I am probably reading it really quickly becuase as I mentioned earlier I have some new books that I want to read as well!

The Weekends go too quickly!!

I have had such a lovely weekend with Mr S and Alfie. On Saturday we went into town and had a lovely Italian breakfast at Carluccios, as long as you didn't look out of the window you could pretend to be on holiday! Then I dragged Mr S round the shops to spend some of my birthday vouchers! As the Winter has arrived Mr S said that he needed some vests to keep him warm so off we went to good old Marks and Spencers and it was shocking, £15 for vests! They say that they have a climate control function built in so they keep you cool but surely the whole point of a vest is to keep you warm, very strange! Anway he wore one yesterday and said they were very effective, good job for that price!




Yesterday we went back to Birmingham for Sunday lunch with Mr S' parents and we took Alfie with us and they absolutely loved him. We were a bit worried as they have only recently lost their family dog so we thought it might be a bit upsetting for them but they couldn't stop playing with him. Mr S' Dad is a very big man and doesn't usually like little dogs but he had Alfie on his lap to watch the TV, this made him look like a slightly camp Bond villain but Alfie wasn't complaining!

Talking of Bond, we went to see Quantum of Solace in the afternoon and I really enjoyed it; I don't think it was as good as Casino Royale but still excellent. Lots of action scenes and I really love how he has made it darker and more character based. I know that people say it should be more light hearted but I would rather watch this then a cheesy Roger Moore Bond any day!




Finished Harry Potter and The Order of the Phoenix on Friday night and I think that it was better the second time I read it. I think that Professor Umbridge is such a great creation of J.K. Rowling. She is such a good villian; her physical description alone is enough to make you dislike her but it is the vindictiveness that she shows that really made her into a villain for me. Rowling has created a character that I think really stirs the reader up as you become increasingly frustrated with this vile woman as she gains more and more power and influence.




Quite a busy week ahead, Alfie is going to have his final jab tonight so he will be able to go on walks later in the week so that should be very interesting; we need to find a collar small enough first of all!

Sleeping Under Water

Sleeping under water is exactly what it feels like when you have to resort to sleeping with ear plugs jammed in your ears as Mr S and I had to last night. Now don't get us wrong, we both LOVE Alfie, absolutely love him but he is still freaked out about sleeping on his own. When he wakes up in the night he makes sure that we and probably the whole street know about it! So Mr S suggested that we purchase some ear plugs as we are both feeling like we have jet lag but without the added benefit of having been somewhere nice! They did work really well, just took a bit of getting used to; it really is like being underwater, everything is a bit muffled and you can really hear your heartbeat. They didn't cut Alfie out completely but it wasn't as loud so we got several more hours sleep and will be jamming them in our ears again this evening!

I had 2 lovely books for my Birthday and a nice big WH Smith gift voucher so that I can buy some more! I am re-reading Harry Potter at the moment, I am on the 5th book and loving it. I have wanted to re-read them for a while as I had the tendency to rush through them when they first came out just to find out what happens. It's nice to read them again and take my time; I think that people have very mixed opinions about J.K. Rowling but I have to say that I think she is brilliant. You can see that she has been influenced by other classic children's books but which writer hasn't been influenced by what they have read? I think that as you read the books close together you can see how she develops as a writer and you get a sense of her individual style of writing as her confidence clearly grows. I would love to write children's books- it gives you such a wide audience and something that J.K. Rowling has proved is that good children's literature can always transcend to adult readers.