Yorkshire invasion

Much cleaning and preparation has been underway in the last week as Rich's Mum and Dad were due to be visiting Tea Towers for the bank holiday weekend. The flat looked spotless for when they arrived on Friday (and it took us about 5 minutes after they had left to get it messy again) evening.

On the Saturday we all trouped off to Hampton Court Palace for the day (Photos will follow when I find where Rich has hidden them all) and exhausted ourselves by having a good look at everything. We arrived in time to see the King and Queen make a grand entrance and be welcomed by Cardinal Wosley, and a very excited jester. The experimental historical chefs were also out, trying out Tudor cooking with the tools and methods that they thought the Tudors used. On our wandering around the palace we also saw the King and Queen about to have a dance in the gallery - they were trying to get everyone to join in, but didn't seem to be having any luck. We tried to dash out without them noticing us, but the Queen caught Rich's Dad's eye (who bowed slightly before making a run for it) and was disappointed when Rich himself ignored her highness.

After wandering around the palace, the ground and even the maze we all had a clack on so went and had a lovely cream tea (yum!) before heading back home just in time for the rain to start. Photos are now up in the picture gallery.

On Sunday we all decided to rest ourselves and we had a quiet day in. I made a very tasty Sunday dinner (with a little help from M&S) and after we had finished Cara and Nick visited so we all settled down to play a fantastic game of Risk (which Rich won).

On Monday morning we sent Rich's Mum and Dad back up to Yorkshire (we were both sad to see them leave - come back soon!) and I settled down to a little crochet (hence the tenticular photo on the left)

Hooray for Italian food!

This weekend has been a bit of a set back for the pre-wedding diet, I've eaten far too much tasty Italian food with not one, but two meals out.

Rich and I went out with Em and Aubs (my uni mates) to a Pizza Express in London and had a fantastic Friday evening enjoying pizza and pasta, as well as three bottles of wine! Aubs and Em are both very excited about our wedding, and Aubs has even offered some of his experience to help us organise it.

On Sunday Rich and I trotted off into Kew to visit my parents and take them out for a nice Sunday lunch that also turned out becoming Italian food, this time in an ASK restaurant. Lot's more (non-diet) food was consumed - and I had yet another tasty dessert. After a weekend of chatting about wedding plans Rich and I fully intend to put some more effort in getting things organised, so hopefully invites and details will be making their way out to people soon.

On a side note, the much loved 'Daftness of Rich' page is now back and better than ever! The photo on the right is the latest edition to my new 'Daftness photo page'.

A sumptuous feast

Rich did manage to get the new computer up and running finally - and it is a very lovely machine. Luckily Rich had some friends from work coming round in the evening so that he could show it off to them.

Steve and Matt had been persuaded to come round by the sumptuous feast that I had promised them, and a sumptuous feast it was. We had a Mexican banquet of chilli, tortilla wraps, those triangular crisps, and some delicious cheese baked potato skin things.

After all this food we then decided to try playing an exciting Space Munchkin game that Matt had given us for Christmas and we still hadn't quite figured out the rules to. Rich had spent a half hour getting himself acquainted with what the different cards meant and how you could use them. We all then started to play and after a couple of hours we had about figured it out and were ready for an ice cream break.

Steve won the game, but it was very close in the end with everyone almost finished at the same time. I love all the pictures on the cards, and hopefully I'll get to play again soon.

Geek-a-tron

Our bank holiday weekend started very early this morning with an exciting delivery for Rich - lot's of shiny electrical stuff for him to build his new computer with. I wasn't quite as excited a Rich so I decided to spend another half an hour in bed before dragging myself up to find the sitting room filled with boxes of computery stuff.

Luckily I had already planned to be out shopping today with my good friend Ruth - so I wandered off an hour later to hunt for a potential wedding dress. Ruth and I had a little luck and found a couple of possible options - but I still wasn't convinced and after having walked into every dress shop around we decided to call it a day (have some cake) and head back home.

Back home - the sitting room was still filled with boxes of computery stuff, and so was the spare room. The new machine seemed to be winning whatever the battle Rich and it was having. I decided to have a nap while it all got sorted out...