Where has the time gone

I can’t believe how grown up Lily is now. Time seems to have flown by. She is a right little charater, and by that I mean she is a girl who knows what she wants and when she wants it. Though one advantage of her growing up is that she now drags me and Rosie by the hand to whatever she wants, instead of us having to guess the reason for her sudden angry outbursts!

She is dancing and singing alot, a mixture of in time humming and the occasional word. She has also started to walk backwards, usually with the intention of sitting on something(or at least thats what the little reversing shuffle looks like to me) .

I think my only regret so far has been the long hours that I am out the house, which makes going round the shops on a Saturday or cuddling her off to sleep on the sofa so special. However, the latter can be a little uncomfortable, as Lily is like a little radiator and with the weather at the moment she’s hotter than ever!

So I get some time with her everyday, I get to wake Lily up every morning to get her ready to go to her grandma’s.: It is during this time I get to see the cuddliyist side of her and also the stroppiest (if she has woken up on the wrong side of mine and Rosie’s bed).

I do love my little ginger ninja!

IMDB, here I come!

Its been over 6 months since I started my new job in London as a junior rigging TD, and I am at a point where I think, “you know what, I’m not to bad at this!”.

It is amazing how .much you can learn from some of the best vfx artists in the industry. I have crammed into my rather coffee tabled head (not saying its flat, just it’s not got that much space) more knowledge in 6months than three years at uni, (meaning something will have fallen off the back of the table, like how to tie shoelaces or walk in a straight line.)

Well, anyway, on to more exciting stuff! I have finally got a character that I have worked on in an official movie trailer (and the movie of course) It .might only be a few frames in the trailer, but when I saw them I just had to rush and show Rosie. She then played the trailer through and missed my bit all together, but this is just the start of hopefully a long career as a rigger, and I’m aiming to lose the junior bit as soon as possible!

(Just as a side note, the trailer is for the Seventh Son and my bit is at 48 seconds.)

Wheatabix canvas

On more than one ocasion now Ihave I made my hour and a bit journey to work with the signs of morning wheatabix finger painting.

This wonderful art form, rare as it may be, only takes place under certain circumstances:

Firstly you need to be running  late,: and I don’t mean by a few minutes, 30 is the minimum and the consequences need to involve more than being late to the pub.

Secondly,  clean clothes must be worn, washed the night before, with the specifically for replenishment of a dwindling clothes supply.

And under these conditions the artist can begin. With masterful cunning, a finger wheatabix covered, paints a modest patch , inconspicuous in a rush, but on first look down, the breakfast paint is proudly displayed on that freshly washed canvas.

And here is my little wheatabix artist.

Aerocool monster

Well, what is a geek without his ( or her) super powered machine.Unfortunately that’s me, though I do plan to put aside some cash after me and my better half(and I really do mean better) have finally tied the knot.

So far I have a seagate barracuda 3tb hdd, still in its protective wrapping, and the aerocool strike-x air.

I absolutely fell in love with this open air, half work bench half gamers case. I must have spent weeks reading every review going.

After a rather successful birthday haul, u managed to buy it. This case is huge, as the reviews pointed out. What I love is the XL-ATX motherboard bay and the hot-swap hdd bays, however it is stuck in its box until I can buy some more parts.

The motherboard, now I haven’t really paid much attention to this in the past, but now I am building my own machine it’s only right I find one that’s right for me. That has come in the name of the MSI Big Bang Xpower ii

What with the overall dark nature of the board and the idea of four graphics cards and up to 128gb of ram the board is screaming out to be part of my build.

And on the subject of graphics cards I have found just the card for me, the suped up HD Radeon 7970 by sapphire tech . Just think about the gaming experience with those under the hood.

Which leads nicely to the processor, I will be marrying the MSI awesomeness with Intel’s. i7 3930k

Overall this will make a tidy machine so I can play games with graphics settings turned up to jamanji realism (the concept not the film fx) and populate fields with billions of maya grass strands and enough trees to make the amazon look like a bonsai tree.

Well, once I have paid for my wedding. Which I’m rather glad to say will definitely be an amazing day. I’m very excited to see Rosie in her dress! And, as I now have my contract up till 1st November, all will be paid for.

Rabbits

For the past couple of days, as the weather has been good and I have been home from work on time, Lily and I have fed the family rabbits.

First we sit in front of the fridge, while I gather the lettuce, cabbage, carrots and radishes required by the law of if “Peter Rabbit likes it, so will our rabbits”. Lily at this point will either be eating said veggies or  spreading it about the floor.

Next we take 95% of what I got out and head to the back door, Lily toddling beside me holding my hand.

Out the back is the smallest patch of grass known to man, reclaimed from the soon to be in-laws garden refit. Plonked alongside that is the disproportionately large hutch, up on bricks and plant pots.

It’s at this point, or at least just after convincing the rabbits to stay put, we sit transfixed on the speedy emptying of the food bowl.

I really love spending this time with Lily as I don’t get to see her much during the week as I do long hours in London, so its nice to get some daddy daughter time.

Dinton Pastures

Even after a year and a half I still get moments when I think, ‘christ I’m actually a dad’. One of these moments came driving into Dinton Pastures. I have fond memories of weekends as a kid going there, feeding the ducks, and the angry, or just greedy, gease, playing in the park and just having a great time.

And this weekend I got to take Lily and my niece. It was a lovely day out, Rosie and I made pita bread sarnies and we took the cakes my niece and Rosie made earlier that day.

I was probably more excited than the kids, though my niece did make a new friend within about 5mins of being on the climbing frames.

Mustangs and Buicks and Caddies O my

Lets just say I love old American cars, and if it has a fast back, well, that’s even better. Though don’t ask me how one works, as I will just say, ‘you put the key in it, don’t you ?’.

And it’s because of this love of non-car-cars, as my beautiful fiance would say (she thinks they’re ugly and not like proper cars), that she sent me off to the London Motor Museum with my best man (as he also likes non-car-cars).

The cars were great. I was almost sitting in one of my all time favorites the ’67 Shelby gt-500.

There was also one of the coolest bel-airs I think I have ever seen, just a matter of taste on that one though.

But the morning wasn’t all about the Mustangs and Stingrays. They had one of the coolest sports cars, the Gumpert Apollo. Which I couldn’t believe weighs as much as a Mini.

And just for anyone who loves Mr.Bean

I must say, it was a great way to spend a Saturday afternoon!

Lily

I take loads of pictures of you on my phone (which will have to change for a camera). But it’s not since starting this blog that I have gone through them. Not to mention how many nice pictures are on Facebook that I haven’t looked at in ages. Well here are just a few.

1 of 200: My way to work

Unfortunately today is one of the 200 days of rain that the UK gets a year.

But it has definitely made using my new app fun.  My rather fantastic fiancée has shown me MagicHour, we had a laugh or two when she said that she would show me once we went to bed, and by “we” I do mean mainly me.

Now the dreary sky and soaked streets make for excellent testers so I can really get the most out of the app.

May bank holiday

My family

Lovely weekend with the family, my fiancee Rosie and my daughter Lily.

It’s been nice to spend some time with them as I work in London as Junior Rigging TD for feature films.
My little one has enjoyed the extra time with her walking pillow, lets just say the winter reserves are quite a comfort to her.

And I have actually spent some time with Rosie, doing nothing, which in my opinion is the best sort of time two full-time working parents can spend with each other