Confession Time

I'm doing the Friday Confessional again!

Click the pic to go visit Mamarazzi and play along!

I confess...

...that I'm not finding the planning of my "world tour 2012" very enjoyable.

Let me catch you up if you're new around here or visiting from Mamarazzi's. My family is going on a big, awesome, round-the-world holiday next year.

It is a very big deal and it is going to be awesome.

And it's not even just in the wishin' and hopin' stage; it's really happening! We have forked over our thousands of dollars for the flights. We are visiting our travel consultant tomorrow to spend some more money. Yay!

But I've got to admit that trolling through brochures and surfing the internet, comparing prices and making lists, is getting old real fast. And when Chris and I talk about it, some very real cracks are starting to appear in the "perfect holiday plans", given that he and I have very different personalities and, I think, ver different expectations for the trip.

I hope that the travel consultant is not called upon to do some impromptu marriage counseling tomorrow!

...that I have not done a thing so far to prepare for Christmas.

No. Just no. Not a hope in hell that I'll ever have something like this for Christmas.

Please don't tell me how many shopping days are left until Christmas. I don't want to know.

I have no idea what I'm buying for the kids, or what to tell other relatives to get for them.

I have no idea what I'm buying for the assorted relatives that I need to buy for.

Christmas cards? With a cute picture of the kids/family on them? Haven't done them since 2001. Seriously. I buy my Christmas cards in the supermarket and send them off in reply to cards that I receive. I know. I suck.

...that I signed up for NaNoWriMo.


What was I thinking???

For those of you not in the know, NaNoWriMo is National Novel Writing Month. Yes, novel writing. In a month.

For the month of November, I'm going to be madly scrambling to write in every spare moment to reach the magical goal of 50000 words (yes, you read that right!) and get this novel out of my head and onto the page. Pages.

Go here to find out more!

Well that's all for me. What do you have to confess?

Let's catch up!

How about I catch you up on what I've been up to, 'kay?

I have tickets to see The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn Part 1.

I told you I'm a sucker for the teen stuff! How about you? Are you on board for another episode of sparkly vampires and shirtless werewolves?

Alana and I have read the books and watched the movies. We've chosen our seats and printed out our advance purchase tickets. We're ready to go! Come on November 18!

The kids' passports arrived today.

And guess what? We've booked and paid for our round the world airplane tickets. No way! WAAAAY!

I made a photobook using snapfish.

I used to scrapbook, once upon a time. But then I stopped using film and started taking all my photos digitally. And got really lazy about printing them out. So all my family photos from the last few years are either sitting in a file folder on my computer or in a Facebook album or on this blog. For shame!

I'm getting together with some girls I went to school with in a couple of weeks time. We try to get together once or twice a year. Sometimes we make it a family affair and all bring our partners and kids, but this time we're just doing a girls-only lunch. 

One of the girls suggested that we should each bring along some photos of the kids, and that's what prompted me to get my act together and put together a little album.

I found snapfish easy to use and good value.

How about you? Do you scrapbook? Make digital albums?

I still don't have a permanent library job.

The whole looking-for-work thing is getting me down. I've done some casual work in a library and I loved it. I believe that I did a good job and that my employer would like to give me more work if it becomes available. I also know that if something permanent or some contract work comes up, I'll have to apply and interview along with everyone else. No guarantees.

Jobs that I'm seeing advertised are generally for librarians with a significant amount of experience.

I really don't mind starting at the bottom. I'm just more than ready to get up, get dressed, put my makeup on and go to work in the morning. I also have all kinds of ambitions for my career, and I can't really make a start on it until I have a job!

So there you go, you're all caught up! What have you been up to?  

Things to see and do in London - Part 1

I'm trying to make some progress on the trip planning front. 

First task: make a list of all the things that we want to see and do in London.

Accommodation in London is frightfully expensive and our current trip itinerary has us staying there for 5 nights before we travel on to Paris. I've been encouraged to decide if we really need to stay that long!

Here is Part 1 of my list of places to see and things to do in London. They are in no particular order; but I have provided a link to a website for each one so that anyone interested can follow the link to find out more.

• Tower of London  

• Shakespeare's Globe

• London Eye

• The British Museum

• Maritime Museum and Observatory Greenwich

• Westminster Abbey

• Buckingham Palace

• St Paul's Cathedral

There are still many more touristy places of interest so I'll be needing a Part 2 for my list. And I think it's pretty obvious that I'll be able to fill in five days of sightseeing in London no problem at all.

Have you been to any of these places? I'd love your feedback on whether or not they lived up to the hype. 

Do you have any suggestions for Part 2 of my list? (Bearing in mind that I already have plenty of ideas!)

I wonder how we'll turn a huge wish list into a manageable itinerary?

And if our whole holiday is this action-packed, I wonder how tired we'll be when we get back!