Great excitement in the house - Jack has started to get some offers from Universities.

This is only one stage on the road to "the next chapter" in his life - but it is the most exciting so far...

Frankly I don't know if the process is more taxing for me or him.

Stage 1 : University visits - found this a bit scary - could my boy really live in this concrete jungle.

Stage 2: Complete the UCAS form. Not as easy as it sounds - he had to write a personal statement to sell himself - too much and they would think him arrogant - too little and he risked getting passed over. One admissions tutor told him to try and sound like an enthusiastic puppy - not the greatest advice - spell checker kept rejecting his yapping....

Stage 3: Choose the univerisites and send off the form. This proved to be rather complicated - lots of advice to listen to - not all good. How many choices should he make? What happens if he gets no offers? (obviously as soon as we had passed this stage I have become something of an expert to advise any-one who I meet with a child vaguely of an age to be applying to Univeristy)

Stage 4: Sit back and wait and see what happens......

Stage 5: Try not to check progress too much on the UCAS online tracker. I must admit to a bit of peeking to see how things are getting on. Can imagine the man at UCAS monitoring the site saying - ehh up that mum's on here again.

And now he has had 3 offers - hurray.

Now he just has to get the results he needs!

To be continued...............

Beta isn't always Better

My curiousity got the better of me today and I decided to upgrade to Beta.

Have just spent longer than I dare think about fiddling about with the template thing to try and get it looking like I wanted it to. Can't seem to add in my "Blogs I like to read" bit.

Help is no help - answers lots of questions but not the one "How do you add in Blogs I like to Read".

Think I might have to phone a friend...

Feeling Festive

Not like me at all - usually takes weeks to get in the mood (and wow does he moan about it) but this year I am feeling festive and it's only December 6th!

Yesterday we had an office christmas lunch in Covent Garden - had to go on a browse round the shops afterwards (the things you do in the line of duty!). Everything was so christmassy (is that a word?) I felt like bursting into a quick round of Good King Wenceslas. Fortunately for the people I was with I managed to restrain myself.

Even the people on the train seemed perkier than normal - two actually spoke to me!!!!

We've had our first mince pies of the season - Tom had to eat two to be sure he doesn't like them. He is banned from them now until he reaches the age of majority (21 in our house) as he wastes them by scooping out the insides and eating the pastry.

Had 3 Christmas cards - very exciting (normally I am not exicited by a card but I am this year - what is happening to me??) This is a bit of a problem as I had decided not to send any this year and send an email with a charity pledge instead - but once you start to get some in it seems mean not to return the gesture. Will have to think about this one.

School christmas concert tomorrow - no nativity to cry over any more but I am sure I will shed a tear when Tom starts playing his trombone (it is an eye watering sound at the best of time - only joking Tom!)