I’VE BEEN TAKING MY VITAMINS AND TRYING TO STAY STRONG.....
EVERYONE I KNOW HAS A COLD THEY WANT TO PASS ON....
THIS WEEK IT GOT ME BUT WHAT COULD I DO......
WE ALL KNOW LADIES DON’T GET “MAN FLU”!

Hello again and how do you all feel this week? I am asking because I think everybody I have seen or spoken to recently all seems to have been ill!

In this modern day and age of new medical breakthroughs and research, it’s such a shame that there still is nothing anyone can do to prevent or treat the common cold. Or “man flu” as it known by certain people!
We have sent men to the moon, made it possible to reach the other side of the world in 24 hours, and have the technology via the internet to communicate with anyone at any time in any country, but still can’t defend ourselves against sore throats, runny noses and stinging eyes!

Anyway, the week started well; I had a lovely evening out with my brother. We went for a meal and then to see Adrian Edmondson’s band “The Bad Shepherds” in Bristol. They play old 70’s and 80’s songs, mainly punk, in the style of folk music on guitars, ukuleles, whistles, and bag pipes! My brother is only 25 and probably doesn’t remember Adrian Edmondson from ‘The Young Ones’ days, but I do and never realised he was also so musically talented. There is a 14 year age gap between me and my brother, but when he takes me out I like to think of it as a nice payback for all the times I used to take him out to the zoo, and to the play park when I was a teenager and he was a toddler! He says it is to keep me young and stop me from turning to bingo in my later years!

However well the week started, I knew that the time was ticking until the germs got me. I was optimistically taking my extra vitamin tablets and trying not to breathe when speaking to anyone at work, customers and staff, but it’s very hard to keep this up without turning blue in the face and collapsing! Especially when you have a job that involves a lot of speaking and contact with lots of different customers.

And sure enough, Rob’s man flu and my cold struck! To be fair, Rob hasn’t actually taken any time off work, but the difference is that he has been going home to his flat and tucking himself up with a lemsip as soon as he finishes, whereas I have been just counting the hours until the boys bedtime, so that I can finally clock off and go to bed too!

I have been making the most of early nights though and have worked my way through my John Hughes film DVD collection, tucked up in bed. Well it’s the best cure I have for feeling a bit cold and miserable! ‘Pretty in Pink’ still has to be my ultimate favourite.

I decided we all needed cheering up, so last night me and the boys had a special ‘Chinese night’. If you read my food reviews you will know that I recently reviewed the “Kung Po chicken” from Iceland and I loved it. I decided to buy this and a selection of other dishes in the Chinese range for the boys. Obviously it all worked out much cheaper than a takeaway and gave the boys a chance to see which dishes were their favourites. I also thought it might be fun to introduce them to chopsticks and see how they got on. Looking back now it was an odd idea, especially as I myself have never mastered the art and always embarrass my friends in Chinese restaurants by asking for a knife and fork!

Well the food was a big hit, especially the sweet and sour chicken pieces which they could actually skewer with a chop stick. Not authentic I know, but it got the job done! The chicken fried rice was also eaten very fast, but by this point they had discovered chopsticks actually make really good drumsticks and lost all interest in actually using them to eat with. I tried to calm them down by telling them that even Phil Collins didn’t drum at the table whilst eating or his mum would tell him off, but it didn’t have much effect.

In fact after the meal they held onto the ‘drum sticks’ and got the guitars out as well and had a full band practice! This is something Sam is particularly passionate about at the moment, as he tells me he has formed his own band with some class mates. Apparently they have actually recorded themselves but when I asked if I would get to hear the recording I was told that I needed to join the fan club and pay £1.50 for the CD like all the other “fans”! The cheek of it!

Thanks for reading this week, and to all those of you that have either a cold, bird flu, swine flu, or man flu or similar; I hope you feel better soon!

Ellie
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Being recognised?!

THERE IS SOMETHING NEW IN MY ICELAND STORE....
A PICTURE OF ME STUCK ON THE DOOR.....
NEVER THOUGHT I WOULD SEE THE DAY.....
ROB SAYS IT’S TO SCARE BURGLERS AWAY!!!!!!

Hello again.

Sam asked me this week “how long will it be until we have lots of people all crowding round us and pushing to take photos of us when we go out shopping?” I just laughed and said “Well hopefully never Sam. I don’t think I would like that would you?” He told me that he thought it would be “cool” so I advised him that if he wants all that, he should stick with his own dream that he will one day be in a boy band and win X Factor!

However, having said that, there have been some changes to our regular shopping experience in Iceland. Now when I walk in I am greeted by the sight of my own face, larger than life smiling back at me from a poster on the door advertising the new autumn adverts!

My first impulse when i saw it was to acquire a black marker pen and draw on a moustache and glasses, don’t ask me why?! Luckily it’s an impulse I have managed to suppress. The other “Iceland mum’s “ starring in the autumn adverts with me also have their photos up in their local Iceland stores and several have had their photos taken next to the poster so that we can all see.

I wanted to do the same but was terribly wary of trying to get the shot and blocking the door and being told off by another shopper just trying to get their trolley home for being in the way! In the end we decided to go up on a Sunday when it was quiet and I asked the boys to stand and pose by the poster of their mum instead. As I have mentioned in previous blogs whenever a camera is pointed in Luke’s direction a number of interesting faces get pulled. At least this time, as I had asked him to point, he didn’t have free hands to pull his ears out as well as go cross-eyed! The result is definitely one for the family album!

I have also had several well-wishers popping into the opticians where I work asking “how does it feel to be famous?!” and many people coming to tell me that they like the adverts. This is really nice to hear, as none of us had any idea of how well the new adverts would be received by people, but were hoping they look as natural and fun as they really were to film.



Me with the Girls!

 Unfortunately for Sam though, and fortunately for me, I am not recognised everywhere I go now, and have so far not needed to hire bodyguards and wear dark sunglasses both indoors and out! It was quite funny when I went for a meal with my friends in Bristol a man tapped me on the shoulder and said something to me whilst we were eating. My friend Zaheera saw this and said to me “did he recognise you from TV? What did he say? Did he want your autograph?” I told her that no, in fact he was just pointing out to me he had accidently spilt some of his drink on the floor and not to slip when I stood up!

As if that wasn’t enough fame for one week we were also lucky enough to have our pictures in “The News of The world”. There is an X Factor special each Sunday in the paper from now up until Christmas and the “Iceland Mums “ will be featured in it. This week was the first one and Eve, Sue and Amira were all there with me. Several of us are making scrap books now of all the news coverage of this special time to look back on in years to come. I always buy extra copies of everything to send to my Grandpa who is in his 80’s now and very proud of me. I only wish my Granny was still here to see it all as well as she was a great inspiration to me, and a firm believer of “If you put your mind to it you can achieve anything”.

I enjoyed being a VIP for the day!

I also attended a big Iceland conference for the store managers this week. I actually found it very emotional as one part was all about the new adverts including the Christmas campaign, and about the whole “New Face of Iceland “competition. They showed some previously unseen first audition clips and some of my new friends talking about what filming the adverts meant to them. There was a huge cinema size screen on stage and I was very privileged to see the Christmas advert for the first time. This is the advert that took us 4 days to film. I have to say the end result was worth all the blood sweat and tears that went into making it! I now can’t wait for everyone to see it and really hope that all the other Iceland shoppers think that we did them proud!

I had another “un celeb” moment at the end of the conference when some of the Iceland store managers came over and said “Ellie can we have a picture please?” “Of course, I said” taking the camera from them ready to take their picture all together. They looked a little confused and said “No, we don’t want you to take the photo; we want you in the photo with us to take back to the store!” That did make me laugh, and I felt a bit daft but I really am not used to people I’ve never met wanting a photo of me!

I think I need Sam to teach me how to behave as he and Luke both seem so much more ready for super stardom than me!

Thanks for reading, and special thanks too for the nice feedback my blogs have received.

Ellie
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My Screen Debut!

THE TIME HAS COME TO JUMP AND SHOUT.....
THIS IS WHAT IT WAS ALL ABOUT.....
I’M IN AN ADVERT ON THE TELLY....
IT’S PIZZA NIGHT ROUND AT ELLIE’S!!

As I sit in my kitchen surrounded by a rice krispie breakfast explosion I wonder what the word “celebrity” really means. Whatever it is I feel sure that despite my first T.V appearance I am not one! Try as I might I just can’t imagine people like Beyonce or Davina McCall scraping cereal off the chairs and the floor every morning!

The next thought I have is that despite all that I am still very happy to be just me and wouldn’t want to swap places with anybody. Life is not all about celebrities, Iceland have given me and the other mum’s the chance to do something special, and show that normal ordinary people sometimes get to follow their dreams! I really hope that everyone watching our first adverts can identify with us as real people who deal with work, school runs, and getting cemented weetabix off breakfast bowls on a daily basis!

As most people know by now since I was very little I always wanted to be in an advert after seeing the “shake and vac” lady jumping around her sitting room with the hoover. I also used to amuse my friends on the school bus by memorising particular adverts and reinacting them on the way to school; the saddest part is that most of them I still remember: “drinka pinta milkaday”, “watch out! Watch out! There’s a Humphrey about” and “The twin Twix pack is the longer lasting snack” to name but a few! So you can imagine my excitement as the day of the first advert screening approached. I finally had my own advert!
 

Me and My Star Mum!

 All the family came round and we all sat patiently waiting for it to come on. Normally you might go to make a cup of tea when the adverts start, but this time we were watching avidly. Every time an advert started we sounded like people watching a firework display going “oooo, ahhh “and then “no not that one!” Sam and Luke enjoyed saying “oh look that’s you mum” to every single advert that came on including the annoying singing opera man, and the piece of cheese that goes for a swim, and an old lady in a stair lift!

Finally the moment came and I was there, on the screen, clutching my glass of watered down apple juice and having a pizza with Eve, Amira, Alissa, and Sue! Then I saw the words “pizza night at Ellie’s” come up on screen at the end and thought that is really me and I did it! 

Everyone was surprised to see me!


 It felt so surreal to see myself and my friends on T.V and we all laughed and clapped. I then had lots of nice messages sent through by text by people all saying they were proud of me. What was also really nice was the enthusiasm of the other “Iceland mums” who will be shown later in the big Christmas advert with all of us together. They all sent messages to us on facebook saying how well we had done.

There are four autumn adverts in total and I am in two of these but it is just as exciting seeing my friends in the other two. I still shout out to the boys “look there is Charlene, there is Alissa, and Eve, and Lizzie! I know them!” and they say “yes mum we know!”


They are all live on air now and I was even more excited to see the “dinner party at Eve’s” advert for two reasons. Firstly I get to hear my own voice in this one, and secondly Jason Donovan is our surprise waiter! The surprise you see on our faces when he comes in and says “hello ladies” is real because no one at Iceland had told us he would be there. We had practised that shot several times with another person being the waiter, then after a few takes we did the same thing again and there was Jason! We had time to have a chat with him after filming too and he seemed like a very down to earth nice person in real life. I never would have dreamed all those years ago watching neighbours and crying when “Scott” and “Charlene” got married that one day I would be meeting Jason and starring in a T.V advert with him! Life can be funny sometimes!

As if all that wasn’t enough excitement I also had a trip down to Bridgewater this week to attend one of Iceland’s employee meeting and to give a small talk on how it felt to have won the “new face of Iceland “competition. This is yet another time I have proved to myself that I really am capable of more than I thought. I didn’t know I could talk in front of a room full of people without going bright red and fainting or stuttering but I did!

That's me!

I even answered questions at the end. One of the questions they asked was “has your life changed a lot since winning this competition and now being on T.V?”

The answer to this question brings me back to the rice krispie explosion I described at the start, which is still waiting to be cleaned up as I write this. I have to say that rather than my life changing, it now feels more like I have a double life. My normal life continues exactly the same, the only difference is that I now get to go off and do extraordinary things as well. This whole experience and every new “mission” or “assignment” for Iceland is enhancing my life, but not changing it, and to be honest I wouldn’t want it any other way. When I left they said jokingly “do you have to rush back to do another store opening, or meet the queen or something” and I said “no, I just need to be back in time for the school run!”

Iceland picked me, and the other mum’s in the adverts because they recognised us as normal, average Iceland customers. We are all unique and different but all the heroes of our own families. I think rather than aspiring to be celebrities we should all take pride in who we are already and just let that shine through! I also think that applies to absolutely everyone whether or not you get to be on the T.V. We are all stars in our own families and in the end it’s always going to be their opinions that matter the most.

Thanks for reading

Ellie

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One Adventurer Returns and Another Leaves

SAM CAME HOME AND I BURST INTO TEARS,

I WAS THEN OFF AGAIN TO CONQUER MY FEARS.

I'M GETTING MUCH BETTER AT FLYING ON JETS,
MORE FILMING IN MANCHESTER, IT WAS THE BEST SHOOT YET!

Hello and apologies for missing a week’s blog. I have a good excuse I promise!

Luke and I got through a very quiet week without Sam and soon Friday came around and I sat eagerly waiting for his coach to return from camp. I promised myself I would not embarrass him by hugging him to death and crying as soon as he stepped of the coach. I had not anticipated the present he had bought me though!

As he walked off the coach I was sure he looked taller, and older and my stomach jumped to see him. He then finished me off completely by producing a present from his bag, a fridge magnet that said: ”If mothers were flowers you’d be the one I would pick” That was it then, it was lucky I had my sunglasses on as the tears were streaming! I hurried him home quickly so his friends didn’t see an over-emotional mother and then started on the enormous bag of wet muddy washing. It turned out once the clothes were clean that most of them didn’t actually belong to Sam! I thought I was going mad at first thinking, oh I don’t remember buying that top, I don’t remember buying those trousers, but then I realised that was because I didn’t!

He had a fantastic time and took part in every activity such as abseiling, raft building, zip wires, canoeing and lots more. I felt very proud of him and told myself if Sam can do all that aged 10, I should be able to sit on an aeroplane without having a panic attack every three seconds and convincing myself the propellers are about to fall off!



Me & Bev

 It was with my new found bravery that I set off to the airport again for my next adventure with the Iceland mums. We were filming the last series of adverts to sponsor the programme “I’m A Celebrity, Get Me Out Of Here”. As usual the childcare and work arrangements were complicated, but as we are all mums with busy lives this is always the way, and the same for everyone. It was a tight schedule. I flew up to Manchester on Sunday afternoon, then filmed Monday, flew back Tuesday, went to work Wednesday, flew back to Manchester straight after work, filmed Thursday, and caught the train back to arrive home Thursday evening, in time to go to work on Friday and Saturday!

Hence no blog, well you have to admit it’s a better excuse than “the dog ate my homework!”



Kim, Victoria, Bev, Eve, Me and Charlene

Every time we “Iceland mums” meet up it is more fun and more relaxed. We are no longer strangers that just find ourselves sharing the same extraordinary adventure. We are now friends who keep in touch almost every day in between filming. We have shared life experiences and found we have a lot in common. This means that every shoot we do is easier than the last. Imagine getting together with a group of friends and staying in a nice hotel together every few months. Even on set now it is easy to forget we are actually being filmed. When our instruction from the director is “just start chatting and laughing amongst yourselves”, if anything the problem is getting us to stop, not knowing how to start. It carries on back at the hotel as well! These last adverts were filmed on location rather than in a studio which meant we got to see some amazing houses.



Charlene, Amira, Sam, Me, Sue & Alissa

The second day’s filming was at another beautiful house and this time I had a screen daughter for the day. It was lovely, and I would have been happy to keep her but I think her real mum was quite keen to have her back after the filming! I really did feel so much more relaxed than filming the first advert when everything was new, and although exciting, it was quite intimidating too. It will be interesting to see if this shows as the adverts are aired one by one. It was an emotional goodbye to the mums this time as it was our last official assignment to film. I have no doubt that we will all keep in touch and we actually already have a date lined up to meet quite soon. Even so, I think I speak for everyone when I say we have all absolutely loved making these adverts and we are all hoping the Iceland shoppers like them, and want to see more of us next year!



 One thing this whole experience has taught me is that you never know what will happen next in life so anything is possible.

Our first adverts are now live on TV so it’s been a very exciting time. Please come back next week when I can tell you how we celebrated my screen debut! I wonder if the Shake and Vac lady was watching......

Ellie
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