One word? When seven would do…

A great bank holiday weekend all round really…
Yesterday was really nice, we finally dug out our old tower from the old computer and took it round for my brother, which resulted in an arrangement to meet my parents for a walk later in the day weather permitting, then we drove over to our friends farm. The kids loved it! It used to be a dairy farm with hundreds of cows, now they make their money from a horse school, a few cows for beef and using their acres of fields for all sorts of enterprising ideas such as caravan storage! They have ten free (and I mean free) range chickens and a very very proud cockerel and two ducks, ferrets and usual assortment of farm cats and dogs. Teeny could not believe her eyes! Chickens who came up and stole her peanut butter sandwich out of her hands, real life cows who even mooed for her and all the teenages up there grooming their ponies cooing over how cute she is! Monster went on an egg hunt with Bruce and collected 8 eggs which he got to bring home with us. An hour after we were supposed to be meeting my parents they rang to say weather was poor over their way and would we like to go over for (a very late) lunch instead, which we did. Another friend came over in the evening and Teeny only woke once last night then slept through (as did Monster) till nearly 7.30 this morning!

Today Ady went off to work in the morning – although one of the supposed big benefits of this job is no weekends and no bank holidays and he really didn’t want to go it was worth it as he feels he bonded with the rest of the team and does not feel such a ‘new boy’ anymore! After much consultation and discussion Monster assured me he was up for the walk to my parents house – about a mile and a half, about 30 minutes so off we set. Teeny spent the time cooing in her pushchair pointing at all the trees, cars and bicycles, Monster was a true superstar! He walked all the way with no complaints, was super sensible about walking on pavements, crossing roads and being all careful on the small areas of road with no path. We talked about loads of stuff on the way, electricity pylons, why you can’t see the wind but you can feel it, and more! We arrived and were greetly warmly, mum played really well with both kids while I spoke to Dad, then Ady arrived just in time for lunch, we then spent the afternoon taking a flat tyre off my parents car, taking it to kwikfit who said it had just gone down, putting said reinflated tyre back on again, lounging around their pond, then we came home and Monster got totally soaked playing with the hose, Bruce and Jean (farmers from yesterday) arrived on their motorbike midway home for a cup of tea and Dad came over to help us move our big chiller (its one of those coca cola big tall chillers that you see in newsagents full of canned drinks – here its full of beer, wine, and bottled water) back into the house from the garage as we have decided we can’t live without it afterall! Kids all now asleep, tomorrow we are going over to the Activeo meeting… oh and while you can comment due to me foolishly changing my template into the pretty one you have no doubt been admiring I have comments strangely located above rather than below the post, and the MP blog ring box is gone – will be back soon I promise!

Monster and Teeny  

ooh its been a good one!

Yesterday evening was all it promised to be – even though I knew how Friends would end (tried to be strong but had to read the ending after it aired in the US in one of my many weekly celeb gossip mags) it still made me cry. BB5 was interesting – my initial thought is that they’ve gone too all out to just shove the most controversial twelve people they could find in the hope of huge rows and sensationalist TV – I think looking back at previous winners the public tend to vote for the people they can relate to, or would like to think they are like – friendly, outgoing, good looking and basically well, normal! I reckon with that in mind the likely winner will be Shell – nice blonde southern lass, a bit posh, quite intelligent, no visible piercings or other wild body adornments. But then that’s just my very early impression, is likely to change at a moments whim and unless you are a BB fan this is mindless waffling to you anyway so I’ll shut up about it now!

So today dawned with the birds doing the dawn chorus at about 4am – Teeny has woken me around or just before it every morning this week – she has gone back to sleep but I’ve not managed to and have listened to it every day. Its so lovely to hear the birds singing – they really go for it! I don’t know why I didn’t hear it in Manchester – Ady says the sirens and car alarms drowned it out, or there just weren’t any birds but it really makes me all glowy about being ‘home’ in Sussex. The post then arrived containing our Activeo newsletter, in which we feature as new guest members introduced by Chris and Julie (Ady’s bro) – grr we were going to HE first! Its packed with events pretty much every day, loads of great stuff for all ages, and although its mostly over Chichester way (about 20 miles) thats fine! We’re going to Chris and Julie’s event on Tuesday which will be our first one and I’m really looking forward to getting stuck into it. Also arrived in my email inbox was the Sussex HE newsletter, again packed with local stuff going on so it looks like my diary is gonna be filling up pretty quickly which is nice.

Today we went to Arundel in the morning, very nice wander up the hill and back down again, lunch in a sandwich shop sitting outside (kids even ate something – okay so it was just a toasted teacake each but hey its a start!) then a quick play in a park – Monster very nervous, wouldn’t be daring and wanted to get off if another child started playing on something he was on, Teeny very daring, brazened out all the older kids with her determined little attitude and climbed up all the slides and down all the steps! We then walked along to where you used to be able to feed the trout (40p for a cupfull of very smelly fish food which they would have to feed them if they didn’t charge you to, but huge fun chucking loads in at once and creating a fish whirlpool!) but it was closed – waste of my breath either telling Monster to hurry up, slow down, get out of the long grass and walk on the path etc etc etc. Then onto the birthday party. It rained and was sunny all morning so we held our breath about the weather – in the event it was fine, a small shower at one point so we ducked under the gazebo thingy they had put up. Monster was great after a small warming up period – he got in there and played with everyone – he’s so funny when another child snatches something off him and he asks really loudly (generally infront of their parents) ‘why did that little girl snatch the toy off me mummy, thats not really nice’, I also overheard him really politely asking one little boy what his name was and announcing his own – he’s sure to grow up to be some some of etiquette expert! Teeny was not at her best, she was tired, has gotten used to Daddy being a weekend novelty again and wants all of his attention all of the time when he’s around and either wanted to be cuddled by him or have the various balls strewn around the garden to play with. We got home and she went straight to sleep, I nipped up to Sainsburys to do the weeks food shopping and came home in time to get Monster to sleep in time for the BB live challenge!

Not sure yet what tomorrow will bring, think weather will dictate what we plan…

Grr just wiped a wet finger across my mouse glider thingy on the laptop!

Well no pics cos I forgot to take the camera and actually no slagging off my mother either as we had a really nice day – hurrah! One of those ones which is nothing mentionable but nice in its uneventfulness. She arrived pretty much on time, offered money for the picnic lunch I bought in Asda (while she kindly sat in the car entertaining the littlies – and did I have a quick browse round the clothes section and pick up a rather nice black linen trousers and top for a mere tenner each while she did this? yes i do believe i did!), kids behaved for the whole journey, conversation was kept neutral, she bunged 20 quid towards entrance, which yep, Roslyn is mightly dear – we joined for the year, upgraded Monster to the gold membership so paid a total of £132 – eek, but they turned a blind eye to the fact that mum clearly was not Mr A Goddard and we all strolled in – we would have paid about £40 just for today so thats not sooo bad (well Ady didn’t go grey when I told him so it must be okay!). Monster did his usual act of racing round everything without giving the animals more than a cursory glance – Ady apparantly used to be the same on school trips – always rushing through each bit to see what was next, never actually seeing anything and going home feeling cheated! Mum amazingly pushed Teeny round pretty much all day and was really good with her, pointing out things and chatting away to her. I don’t know whether I am too challenging and always trying to see educational value in everything and push them too far but Mum always annoys me by being the polar opposite and having no expectations of them, doing everything for them and failing to ‘test’ them (wrong word but hopefully ykwim!)but then Ady’s a bit like that too – frequently I’ll ask Teeny which block is yellow and Ady will point to it instead of her!! We ate the picnic – Teeny ate everything she was offered, Monster ate the pastry off a pork pie and some grapes, he had a little play on the equipment although did not brave anything with people already on it, then we meandered about a bit before calling it a day at about 2pm. We got home in record time, made some chocolate milk ice lollies in the new ice lolly maker moulds I bought in Asda, ate the rest of the picnic, Dad came over too and Ady arrived home nice and early.
I’m about to have a quick bath then shove in the ready meal bought in honour of BB and Friends night!! Tomorrow we are going to a 2nd birthday party, praying for sunshine as its in the garden of a small house and they are planning a barbecue with 30 guests! Don’t think my kids have ever been so socialised!!

(assumes Brummie accent) Day one in the Goddard house and….

Sorry but I am just soooo excited about Big Brother starting tomorrow I can’t contain myself!!! and the last ever Friends ever too- ooh channel four with this evening of televisual treats you are really spoiling us….

Anyway, today was good and bad, lovely and icky! We started off well, a quick glance at the online bank balance triggered an emergency dash into town to transfer funds (i.e credit card cash advance!)which led to a spot of quick retailing! We then went back to library for the storytime session… which was actually quite fab! The woman doing it was really good with the kids – obviously all regulars, she coaxed the shy ones out of themselves and got them all joining in – about fifteen littlies and ten grown ups were there and although Teeny was more interested in emptying the shelves of books Monster enjoyed the stories, they both liked the songs (so odd to finally be singing Marrster instead of Massster when we joined in with Baa baa black sheep after all those northern toddler groups! although Monster did see fit to ask ‘why isn’t it baa baa white sheep!)then they did some colouring – Monster on the colouring sheet, Teeny on the carpet and a passing child’s shoes! and off we went with our new starter cards prouding displaying their first weeks attendance sticker promising to return next week. We then dashed home for a quick lunch before going along to (fanfare please) the Shoreham HE Get together club – our very first real live home education type thingy…
I was super nervous, do we get there early and befriend the first person who comes in, do we arrive late and sneak in at the back, how will I know who everyone is, should I have worn my Holy Clothing outfits to ‘fit in’ (!!!), would everyone be really ‘alternative’, should we even arrive in a car etc etc etc – oh the manic wonderings of a paranoid mind! Anyway we parked a little way away and walked down, sligtly early – I acosted a friendly looking woman and asked if it was the GTC – it was, she asked who I was, I told her I was Nicola – which confused her, I use the name Nic in all my emails and she was expecting a bloke!! Everyone was very friendly and seemed so nice, although I only really had a chance to speak to Jenny (at last!) as it was an author reading her own childrens stories session – stupidly I had not really realised that each week something was arranged – I kind of expected it to be a more mature version of a toddler group where kids roamed free in the middle while mums sat around drinking tea and chatting (I know, I know!)so my two who were pretty much the youngest there had absolutely no intention of having sat down at the library listening to a lady reading a story of doing it all over again! Teeny meandered the room, but quietly and without disturbing anyone until Monster started to resent the fact she was allowed to wander about and he wasn’t at which point he quite loudly said ‘I don’t want to listen to the lady reading the story’ so I decided to remove them both and stood outside talking to Jenny for a bit about HESFES, MP camp and my general refusal to stay anywhere without an en suite bathroom making me not such an ideal candidate for a camping excursion! We tried to go back in and managed for a bit but the author lady started to read another story and my two got all loud again so we left. I was actually really cross with Monster – his behaviour was not anything awful, I need to remind myself that he is only three and is not really used to mixing with others anyway but I do expect him, having been told three times, to do what I say without answering me back – yes probably totally unreasonable of me but its my expectation just the same! We will definately go back next week, and I will relax my expectations and ensure we do something a bit more complimentary in the morning!
Tomorrow we are going to Drusillas – a localish mini zoo. I made the fatal error of ringing my mum to invite her (Fridays are her day off) and can tell she doesn’t actually want to come but feels she should – I just know she will be late – I want to leave around nine, will be all critical about the weather and continue her amateur pyscho analysis of Monster tomorrow – once again I try to be nice and know straight away I’m going to fail!! Tune in tomorrow for possible pics of Drusillas, raving about how good it is and some theraputic whinging about my mum!!

Kipper cards all round!
The hangover has abated – although I did resort to alka seltzer when the headache was still lingering at 1pm! We had our dinosaur biscuits for breakfast, then drove into the local town and waited ages for a parking space. We went to the local library – they looked me up and amazingly I was still on the system so just had to pay £1 for a new card, then the kids both joined and got a ‘my first library card’ featuring Kipper the dog (that’s dog, not frog!) and a free book (which there was quite a bit of fanfare about but there were only two to choose from and both were too babyish even for Teeny – still I guess a free book is a free book and perhaps they can both learn to read from them!). This whole process (yes his first name is Davies not his second name – that’s with an e, yes its Scarlett with two Ts at the end) took a while by which time neither of them were in the mood to actually choose any books. Couldn’t find the dinosaur books (!) so i grabbed about ten and we left – have not actually looked at them yet but I’m sure one or the other of them will like them! The librarian also told us about Storytime which is every Thursday morning for half an hour – will pop along tomorrow and see what its all about. Then R and her son E came round this afternoon – we were running horribly late, I gave the kids their lunch (dinosaur turkey ham stuff which Monster begged me for in Sainsburys and surprise surprise did not actually want to eat!) and frantically pegged my washing out before shoving pork pie down me just in time to clear up a bit (R is quite a bit tidier than me!) before they arrived. E is a bit of a terror – although charming with it and the kids got up to all sorts of mischief this afternoon – I caught E standing on Monsters bathroom stool which he had taken upstairs throwing pennies out of Monster’s bedroom window, the kitchen floor was strewn with the contents of the tea towel drawer, for some reason all three children removed their left socks and Monster broke my new laundry basket leaning in to retrieve his sock after having chucked it in there (although he did come straight to me to confess and apologise which was nice!), E is a bit rougher than my two and they both got shoved by him at some point, which Teeny glared at him for and Monster came and whined at me about – I think having a new baby sister in a couple of months will come as a shock to him – and probably do him some good! But it was lovely to see them all playing together and they all got on well – E did not want to leave and Monster has talked about him all afternoon since. Then tea – which went well – I persuaded Monster to try some different food by still giving him his normal alphabites and chicken nuggets but cooking some sausage balls and some crispy pancakes – not healthy I know but he tried both and my plan is to start with other junky food, get him used to trying something new and then start to introduce the healthier stuff – Teeny just cleared everything on her plate as usual! R was still talking about how she fears E starting school – he should actuallly start this September as he is 4 in July although she is holding him back till after Christmas but she is worried about his concentration span, the kids he will be mixing with, ‘losing him’, and all the other stuff I simply don’t have to think about!
Tomorrow we are going to the story session at the library and then the Shoreham Beach HE club, which I am nervous about (although I already ‘know’ three lots of people who will be there via email, just don’t know what they look like! Will have to wait for them to shout at their kids and recognise the names or something!)but looking forward to. Got the 2004 EO contact list today and stupidly I had not changed our address in time so we are still listed in Cheshire not Sussex – grr! Nice to see Chris and Julie (Ady’s bro & wife) in there though! Julie is hosting an Activeo session next week at her house which I am going along to aswell so we are finally on the road to making some HE friends / contacts.
So hangover and pennies from heaven, well the upstairs window aside a good day had by all!

Three years olds are rubbish babysitters!
That was yesterday’s lesson – more for me than the children but everyone says you learn along with them! Bad mother alert for those of a delicate nature – we were in the garden yesterday afternoon playing with the slide and the sandpit (well actually thats what the littlies were doing, I was reading Heat magazine!) when I decided to run in the house and grab a bottle of water. Our house is detached and you can go all the way round it, but we have blocked off just beside the front door as its a steep step and not child friendly – so I said to Monster ‘Look after Teeny for a minute, I’m just running in the house, don’t let her go off this bit of grass’, he agreed and although I would not normally entrust his own safety to him let alone Teeny’s too I know that he will usually just block her way and stop her from going anywhere. So I ran round the house, in the kitchen, grabbed the water and back out again. As I came out of the house I saw a car had stopped in the middle of the road outside. And the reason it had stopped was 18 months old Teeny stood in the road infront of it!!!!! Monster (who is not allowed on the road without an adult and clearly did not want to get into trouble) was standing on the pavement trying to coax her back in. She was standing pointing at the stopped car saying ‘car, car’. I thanked the driver, grabbed the kids and went back in the house to try not to think about what might have happened! The car drove on, no doubt stopping to check our house number so they can report me to social services or childline or someone – I am just hoping that Monster did not have enough time to tell them about not being fed the day before cos I was on the computer all day!
Other than that we had a really nice day yesterday. The kids came with me to Sainsburys (normally against my religion taking the children into a supermarket but needs must!), both stayed contentedly in the trolley (although Teeny did have a dummy some of the time to control her!) eating the french bread I was buying for my lunch. Then in the evening we had friends round for dinner which was lovely. I am infact really quite hungover as I drank way too much wine and although I know we ate sausage and mash I can’t actuall recall what it tasted like!
Today we are making dinosaur biscuits in a minute, then we are going to join the library and later a friend and her son are coming round. Monster has already told me that him and E (her son) will be playing with his trainset (which means a big mess to clear up in Monsters bedroom afterwards!) and Teeny and I will be persuading R that it is good news she is having a baby girl (scan last week revealed it is not the second boy she was hoping for) – anyone got any tips on getting small girls to allow you to put their hair in bunches and plaits??? Teeny has a whole box full of little slides, bands and feathery things which she loves to play with but will not tolerate actually being used to make her hair pretty!

mummy didn’t feed me today cos she spent all day on her cooter so i’m really hungry and i need some apple
Yep, my little darling really did say that to Ady at bedtime tonight! Not true, although I did spent about an hour on the computer while Teeny was napping trying to get some work done – but he had breakfast, lunch and tea and plenty of attention – but he did get his apple!
A really, really bad night with Teeny last night – she has turned into the toddler tantrum queen seemingly overnight and strops about all manner of odd, previously no problem type things – the latest is being put in her car seat – she shakes her head, no, then goes rigid so you have to struggle to bend her in then just SHOUTS (no tears) until she wears herself out, then is fine again! Yesterday she did not like, going in the car seat (twice), leaving the beach, having her nappy changed or having her shoes put on – normally she is a total angel about shoes and nappies and even goes to get the nappy and the changing mat then lies down on it and fetches her shoes and everyone elses at the merest mention of going out! I knew she would have tantrums as she is very independant and has been since she was born more or less! Monster was very mild in his tantrums, he was articulate quite early and could always be jollied out of them and I always knew what was likely to trigger them and avoid it if possible. She is much more unpredictable but as everyone keeps telling me – like mother, like daughter! Anyway last night she went to sleep fine but woke at about 11 just as I was about to go to bed, and from 11 till about 3 I was up and down the stairs every fifteen minutes or so until I brought her into bed with us – at one point she just shouted for about ten minutes – again no tears, just rage! She has also taken to walloping Monster if he is not doing what she wants – which I won’t stand for and even if we were of the ‘well hit her back then’ school of parenting he wouldn’t anyway – he’s too mild mannered – she does do a very cute ‘sorry’ when told off of stroking and cuddling whoever she is apologising to! So today we have all been a bit tired and ‘not at our best’!
In the morning I tried to do some work, had another run in with Freeserve / Wanadoo / crap broadband suppliers, mediated in the whole instruments toy box war, then we had lunch and drove into town to collect some photos we’d dropped in yesterday and have a wander round. Teeny did not want her ice cream, Monster dropped his and people were giving me obvious evils for having a wee baby in a pushchair with an ice cream (it was a mini milk for crying out loud, thats practically got nutritional value!) but then she had just demolished a winnie the pooh jelly lolly so she was looking quite sticky and sugared up! We then dropped into see Grandad and Uncle, which was nice as the kids went straight off to mither my brother and left me free to chat to Dad, then Mum came home and Ady came over too after work, so nice to just do that impromptu type of thing after only seeing them once a month when they were staying at our house! All to sleep now and fingers crossed for a better night!

Ooh love these real weekends!
It’s taking quite some getting used to having Saturdays and Sundays really – ever since we met me and Ady have worked weekends – obviously I havn’t since having Monster but he still did, so to have him finishing work at 4pm on Friday and not returning till Monday morning is most strange – but nice!
Yesterday we went to Earnley Butterfly and Gardens, which was C & J’s (Adys brother and his wife) birthday treat to Ady. It was really nice actually, all four kids really got on and entertained each other and althouhg it was a bit erm rustic shall we say, the animals were good and the butterfly bit was nice too. We have arranged to see them next weekend and go to Pooh Corner if the weather is nice – its great that Ady and his brother are seeing so much of each other (they were seperated as kids and only really got back in touch a couple of years ago) and its so nice for the twins and my two to be growing up with their cousins. We also went round Chichester in the morning and despite me getting very stressed in McDonalds with the kids messing about instead of eating we had a nice day including getting the dinosaur book for Monster’s leappad in ELC at half price – hurrah!

Today Ady is out in the garden with Monster using his birthday pressie of a hedgetrimmer (I know, but thats what he wanted!) while Teeny is sleeping and I am, well actually I’m doing this but I am allegedly working! Later we are going into town for a wander along the seafront – ah bliss! Next week is shaping up nicely – I have had email replies from two local HEers, on Tuesday I am going to a fellow MP Bloggers, on Wednesday we have my friend R and her son E round in the afternoon – R is 20 weeks pregnant, was convinced she was carrying – and desperatly wanted another boy but found out at her scan this week she is having a girl so will be dressing Teeny all cute and flowery and making her do cute girly stuff to convince R its not so bad having a daughter! (I am not being flippant here – I really wanted another son too, and was quite upset when found out Teeny was a girl at the scan but overcame it by shopping for girls stuff, browsing girls toys and having a justifiable reason for shopping at Claires Accessories aged 30! – now of course I could not imagine not having a daughter and am really glad Monster did not have to deal with not being the only son!). On Thursday we are going to the local get together club for HEers, which only leaves tomorrow and Friday to be filling! On Tuesday night we have friends coming for dinner, we are going to a 2nd birthday party on Saturday – oh its so nice to be living near to friends again after 2.5 years of not really needing a calendar as we were not doing anything worth writing down anyway!

peace is restored – well sort of!
The evil bug has abated! Monster threw his juice back up this morning but then he had guzzled half a cup on an empty stomach! The Goddard day began at 4.45am today when we all awoke, Teeny first, then me, then Monster, and finally although not through choice – Ady. We all came downstairs and sort of faffed about till about nine when Ady went off to work. I rang my mum who kindly came over to watch the littlies while I nipped to Tescos – well that was the plan, what actually happened was Teeny fell asleep, Monster insisted on coming to Tescos with me. He was actually quite helpful and narrowly avoided being squished by others trolleys but did double the shopping bill by asking for cocopops, kinder eggs (for me and Teeny Mummy), a Travis toy (which we have been promising since Christmas!), a doll for Teeny, the cheapo Tesco version of Guess Who? (which I have been eyeing up for ages – huge educational value in that game – and sure enough he played about five games with my mum and really enjoyed it and got the hang of the question asking, elimination, eye colour, glasses wearing, beards, bald – loads of observation etc, biscuits and so on!
When we got home Teeny had awoken but (a first!) Granny had got her back to sleep again and they got on well for the rest of the day. Later my dad came over too, Ady was home early and mum and dad took a sofa to their house to store till we have the extension and room for it and so the playroom / office is looking a bit better and more spacious now.

evil bug strikes the Goddard home
Yesterday was an erm, interesting one – for some obscure reason we thought it would be a good idea to go to work with Ady again. We tried to be sensible, we took the people carrier instead of his company car to prevent Monster from travel sickness and allow the kids to eat all their usual in car snacks which they were not allowed in Daddy’s new car. We were going to Newbury, Reading and Slough. By Newbury I was feeling distinctly unwell, by Reading we had to stop for ten minutes for me to sit down on a compost pile in B&Q to catch my breath, inbetween Reading and Slough I was that person you feel sorry for by the roadside, and again at Boxhill – won’t go into my usual deep detail but it was not pleasant! We got home soooo late at about 7.30pm, I went to lay down for half an hour while Ady bathed the kids, then I got up to help him put them to bed, Teeny was asleep by nine, Monster not long after, but he was awake again at ten with us stripping down his bed, his PJs, his cuddly toys and so on – I then spent my night sitting holding a bowl for Monster while telling him it was okay and not to be scared, or running up and down the stairs to Teeny (she is currently sleeping downstairs, us and Monster are upstairs!) – my feet actually ache from going up and down stairs so many times, I lost count but it must have been about 20! Brought her into bed with us at about 3am by which time Monster had finally stopped being ill and fallen asleep. When me and Teeny woke at 6.30am Ady had already been gone an hour as he was doing three stores in Wales today. (hence him getting the nights sleep while I was up despite me being the ill one!). Cancelled the friend who was due to come round and spent the day with two poorly, clingy, cuddly children getting several phonecalls from Ady as he too went down with the bug – he arrived at Swansea and felt ill, by Bridgend he had been ill, by Cardiff he wanted to die and he finally arrived home through the thunderstorms and flooded roads at 8pm – just 14.5 hours after he left!
On the plus side we did quite a bit of educational stuff today – me and Teeny read her magazine with Dora stories and she can point to all the characters, trees, cars etc, we did some colouring, we read the dinosaur book, built a marble run taller than Monster, tidied the playroom, had a big discussion about why we are sick, what it means, why its scary and so on…so a very practical biology lesson there then!
Jenny – will email / ring you in the morning but yes I think we should put it off till next week! Hopefully tonight everyone will sleep, tomorrow we will all feel better and Saturday we are off to the local Butterfly Farm as Ady’s birthday treat from his brother, with Ady’s bro, his wife and the twins. Have also had some emails back from the EO people I contacted and am going to go along to a HE group locally next week, wish me luck!

the curse of summer

Teeny is poorly! She has had a really evil cough at nighttimes and when she runs around too much during the day for well, weeks really. I have suspected asthma for some time but every time we have enough of a bad night waking up coughing for me to think about taking her to the doctor she will suddenly be fine again for a few days… this weekend she has not been herself at all – quite miserable, a bit whingy and last night she would not go to sleep, despite being really tired she just tantrummed at me until she wore herself out, she then woke again a few hours later and was up for about two hours, coughing and crying, she finally went to sleep at about 12.30am and was awake again by 5.30am – BAAAAD night! So this morning I have taken her to the docs. She has a whole combination of stuff wrong at the moment – a big back tooth coming through, she is suffering badly with hayfever, the cough and she is also tired from not sleeping well. Doc listened to the asthma fears, listened to her chest and prescribed antibiotics if I wanted them – I took them and will see how she is later on before deciding whether to start her on them or not. I’m loathe to start her on an inhaler really – Monster had one prescribed when he was about her age and although I think I used it once or twice I don’t want to have one unless its really neccessary – will have to look into some alternative treatments for breathing / coughing problems. Monster is also suffering with hayfever and has what I would diagnose as a ‘sympathetic cough’ although doc kindly listened to his chest too! Teeny is now asleep – quite peacefully too and Monster is mithering me to do something with dinosaurs!
So to continue the rest of our weekend… On Sunday we went over to Ady’s brother’s house. C (his brother) married to J and they have twins called M (girl) and J (Boy) who are three months older than Teeny. Very spookily they are going to HE too, which is lovely as it means we have someone else we know doing it and the kids will all grow up doing it together. I say spookily as Ady and C did not grow up together, their parents split up and them and their sister were put in a succession of children’s homes, foster carers etc. They lost contact for a fair few years but when their sister died three years ago it brought them back together and we have grown if not close, then certainly friendly with them. It helps that I get on quite well with J, and we all clearly have similar ideas about bringing up children! We had a nice afternoon in their garden, the twins are a bit overawed with my two running around, but it makes a change from it being Monster cowering into my skirts so it was nice for us anyway! Honestly he has gone from being a shy, introverted, didn’t know how to interact with other kids to the life and soul of the party! In our first week at home we saw three other boys his age who he wouldn’t have remembered from before we left (he was only 15 months old when we moved) and all three of them are now his best friends – and it was lovely to hear that all three of them have gone on about playing with Monster again to their parents too – at the party on Saturday he had two girlfriends, was running about and clambering on the slides and climbing frames like he had always done that sort of thing – which was great as I spent most of the party talking about HE and was able to point out the small boy leading everyone else and say ‘well clearly we won’t have ANY issues with socialisation!’.

Yesterday we went on a hunt for sandpit sand, none in B&Q, none in Wicks and having really annoyed all the builders doing serious shopping in both stores trailing round with a pushchair and a small child getting in everyones way we recruited Grandad to come with us to Toys R Us where we got the sand, some new buckets and spades and a paddling pool. A happy hour was spent in the garden with Monster shouting at Teeny for knocking down his sandcastles, me shouting at Teeny for throwing sand and Teeny shouting at her dress which was too long and kept tripping her up! We came indoors for tea and thats when she started to go downhill – see earlier.

Today we have internet food shopping coming from Sainsburys which is a good excuse not to go out, Teeny will hopefully get a good sleep, I’m off to make a dinosaur scrap book with Monster, and I have emailed one of the local contacts to arrange to meet up, emailed to join the local(ish) HE organised group, will email another later and will also go through the EO contact list to see whether there are other local folk…the sun is shining but we are all indoors nursing our itchy eyes and snotty noses!

Still not a dinosaur day, but what a weekend!
I did type up quite a long and (I thought!) witty update post on Saturday morning including the sparkly powder incident but blogger erm lost it somewhere so I will recall what I can, add to it and the sparkly powder will have to wait for another day!

Thursday – the big birthday for Ady went pretty well – he got a fair few pressies, Mum, Dad and brother came over for a takeaway in the evening and although he said the next day it had not felt that ‘special for a 40th birthday’ (at which I had a secret tee hee knowing what was still to come) he enjoyed the day!

Friday was a learning curve for all of us – as I was doing the routefinder for Ady’s store visits first thing in the morning I suddenly had the brainwave of us all going with him, kids and I could wander round the shops while he did his store visits, meet back up for lunch and all get a go in the brand new spangly company car – so we unpacked all the car seats from my car, loaded the pushchair into the boot, Ady went through the food parcel I’d packed for the kids and vetoed half of it (No bananas in my company car, no chocolate, no crisps – he nearly fainted at the prospect of fruit winders!). We merrily set off, Monster started to get a bit tossy and turny in his seat, his colour went from his usual off white (he’s quite a pale child) to a greyish hue and he suddenly looked all panicky and asked to sit on my lap! Knowing what was coming next I declined just as he threw up pink gloop everywhere all (milk and ribena combined I assume as thats all he’d consumed so far!). Ady did his upmost to remain calm and passifying to his beloved son, whilst frantically cleaning the inside of his brand new company car! I did my best to be nurturing and earth mother like without actually getting any on me in the cuddling process. We cleaned everything up and continued on our way with me frantically trying to distract him using a wide array of singalongs, I spy, knock knock jokes and talking about dinosaurs! Teeny slept most of the way! While Ady did his store visit we wandered around the store (B&Q) stalking dinosaurs – likely followed by the store detective wandering why a grown woman was creeping round B&Q with a small boy and a baby in a pushchair shrieking ‘look a stegosaurus footprint, do you think he went this way?!’ instead of actually looking at or buying anything in the shop. The return journey was uneventful, thanks to a travel sickness pill and both kids falling asleep again – bad news for bedtime still having both kids snoozing in the car at 4pm so we did what any responsible caring parents would do and took them over the pub beer garden to wear off some energy – and of course in order for them to be allowed to play they needed to be accompanied by adults patronising said pub so we had a drink too!

Saturday dawned a beautiful day, which was a huge relief. Ady’s brother had arranged to come over with his wife and twins (same age as Teeny – also going to be HE’d)to see Ady for his birthday and we had talked oh so casually about maybe popping over the pub (where 40 of our friends and family would be gathered with a buffet, birthday cake, banners, balloons and a collectibe shout of ‘surprise’ waiting for us). Ady spent the morning wandering about in grubby jeans and no top, cutting the hedges in the garden, wandering why I kept nagging him to put something nice on to go to the pub, fussing about getting the kids changed to go over there and getting all stroppy when he suggested going to the park instead of the pub – Nic ‘No, we’re going to the pub!!!!!!’. It all went off spendidly, everyone came, a good time was had by all, the kids had a fab day, we’ve got arrangements with friends for the next million weekends and it was a great welcome home / birthday party.

More from then till now later…

mainly a good one – but GRRR broadband!
So today started well, having told Monster that no, it was not a dinosaur day and coped with resulting foot stamping and pouting we had to go to the post office so what better opportunity to visit yet another small town centre to see whether there are any new shops there (Littlehampton for those local readers ;-)) nothing new but did buy some nice tops for myself and some underwear for Teeny (realised that when she stops wearing vests cos its too warm and is wearing a dress she will have nappy access and will be constantly removing it and making puddles everywhere so bought her some cute knickers to hamper her progress!), got stopped by a breastfeeding gang out promoting it and handing out balloons and badges to help with their questionnaire – very liberating – and great to see! Came home for lunch, rang up about the ongoing endowment cheque saga and was given a definate timescale of two weeks (we’ll see!), then rang back freeserve (or wanadoo as they are now calling themselves – well i can tell them exactly what they wanadoo but i don’t think it would become me!) after waiting 8 hours for the call back i was promised as soon as an operator was free! Basically when we moved I rang to tell them, was charged £20 moving fee and told it would be up to 20 working days but would probably be 10 before the new number was enabled for broadband, so have been using dial up (at expense!) while still paying this months broadband charge and as the ten days were up i thought i’d see if they had enabled it or whether it will be longer, explained the whole thing to the bloke who could not find me on the system, gave him old phone number, new phone number, old address, new address, date of birth, mothers maiden name, cats eye colour, sons inside leg measurement, colour of my underwear and my second cousin twice removed’s favourite record by The Beatles! He put me on hold forever, stars were born and died, species became extinct, the children grew up, left home, married, had children and retired, he came back and told me to redial and press 3 and they would be able to help me. Slightly peeved I redialed, pressed 3 (thats press 1 to speak to someone who has only a basic grasp of english, let alone any knowledge of computers, press 2 to listen to the worst hold music in the world (which I am still humming in my head!) and press 3 for the scouse bitch (apologies to anyone from Merseyside, I generally have no issues with you and even quite liked Atomic Kitten!) from hell who I ended up talking to)who I once again explained the whole situation to, once again went through the whole old address, new address tango with and who then told me the moving thingy hadn’t been done and she needed to take the £20 charge from me again over the phone, but if it had already been done and I got charged twice just to ring them back and they would refund it. I do concede at this point to perhaps becoming a tad erm, terse and she ended up telling me she did not like the way i was talking to her, and that she was trying to help me but i kept shouting at her… she then put me on hold (presumable so she could tell the other people in the office what an evil cow she had on the phone) and came back to say that actually it had been done and they had charged me already. I asked how this had been magically done in the five minutes we had been talking and she said she had tried to explain but I just kept shouting, I calmly told her that the only reason I had been shouting was because she had asked for my credit card details and that all I actually wanted to know was whether or not I was ready to connect back up again. She refused to give me her name, refused to give me a name of a supervisor and simply gave me an email address (which bounced) to complain to, having finally told me that it was still in process and would be a few more days….
A few deep breathes later and a phonecall to the pub across the road where Ady’s surprise party is to finalise some last minute stuff (maybe I soaked up alcohol calming fumes through the phone?!) and I more or less recovered….
The went to Asda to get birthday cakes, candles, balloons and banners etc, purchased several bottles of wine and a face pack which I am about to apply and soak in a big bath while consuming said wine while lovely husband (40 tomorrow so a mid life crisis could be imminent – this time next week I will probably be cooking my own dinner while he is off cavorting with some teenage blonde!)cooks dinner….who knows tomorrow we might even get some educating done! guess i have taught them the art of complaining at the very least, oh and some retail experience too! Tomorrow may also see the blogging of the sparkly powder incident from Monday which I have not yet shared…

Slowly settling back in…
It is starting to feel like home again this week, we had a really good weekend with a trip to the dinosaur place (excellent place with huge planet earth dinosaurs to modern day man exhibition – we went round twice! with massive animatronic dinos and loads of educational information, outdoor gardens with Sussex landmarks in miniature, a massive outdoor with lifesize dinos walk, a small train, a big garden centre and more!), Monster was in his element – really impressed us with how many of them he could name, how much he knew about them all and so on – he has nagged me every day since to go back! Friends came over for getting drunk, eating curry and emotional speeches about how much we had all missed each other on Saturday night, they stayed and we were all up again with the kids by 7am Sunday morning – then another friend and his little boy (just a few months younger than Monster) came over on Sunday afternoon. It was great to see Monster playing so well with a new strange child, they eyed each other up for about five minutes, then disappeared to Monsters bedroom and proceeded to play together for about three hours really nicely – Teeny even joined in for a bit although she was quite busy charming the pants off the old friend who left muttering about ‘really wanting a daughter!’It took about an hour to clear up after the boys who had strewn pretty much every toy in the house (and believe me thats a lot!) around Monster’s bedroom buit worth it!
Yesterday I took the littlies into town where they behaved very well considering I was dragging them round pretty much every clothes shop in Worthing including changing rooms to try stuff on (quote of the day from Monster when I tried on some cropped trousers – ‘they look silly Mummy’, ‘why?’, ‘they look like clown trousers!’ hrumph – is he in league with Ady to prevent me from spending?!), bought them a cheap (as in £1) pressie each in The Works (man, I’ve missed that shop!) for being good, popped in to see mum at work where she enjoyed showing the much fabled grandchildren who used to live in Manchester to all her workmates, then back to Mum and Dads house to congratulate my brother who has finally got himself a job after two years of looking! and ask Dad to mind them while I ‘did’ Tescos. He did and I spent a happy hour trailing round, buying food for the week, all the kids summer shorts and T shirts, a coffee maker machine and River Cottage cookbook for Ady’s birthday pressie and generally relished being childfree! Last night our friend who is moving to Ireland came round….so nice to be dropped in on again after two and a half years of only the milkman ever ringing the doorbell!
Today we spent a nice morning with a short walk round the local shop to get magazines and lunch, then a lovely afternoon with a very good friend I met at baby clinic when I had Monster and she had her little boy. She is 20 weeks pregnant with number two, horrified at the prospect of E starting school in September (he is 4 in July) and has been toying with the idea of HE but didn’t want the committment. Feeling not unlike some religious cult recruitment freak I told her about how I intend to do it, quelled some of her own fears, answered lots of her questions, offered more info including book loans if she wants it, and no doubt left her deeply pondering. I also found myself saying that the greatest feeling I had once I had finally made the decision was relief that I won’t have to through any of what she is worrying about happening and almost a certainty that I am doing the right thing just by how calm I feel about it all now. Its amazing how many people when I tell them about it are either interested, have considered it or can certainly see the benefits despite it not being feasible for them personally….I really believe more and more people will be HEing over the next 20 years till it becomes commonplace rather than an exception.
Rest of the week is as yet unplanned – tomorrow I aim to ring some of the local HE contacts and see if we can arrange some meet ups. Monster really has the taste for playing with friends now and I want to keep on that roll! Planning for surprise party on Saturday also needs finalising tomorrow so it looks like a busy – and fun – rest of the week ahead!

Grrr! Nothing quite so simple as just moving back in and settling straight back into our old lives! Negatives out the way first then – the house feels so small – its like if you ever go back to your infant school years after you left and what felt like a massive great hall to you aged 6 is just a smallish room where they have assembly, the playground feels like a small back garden and you just feel like Gulliver wandering round Lilliput (was that the place’s name?! must read that to Monster, he would love it!), NOTHING has a home, the dyson is being moved between Teeny’s room and infront of the front door, if I leave a basket of washing infront of the washing machine you can’t get in the kitchen and just generally argh! Have been a pooh mummy all week too – after leaving the kids with my parents all day every day (well 9-5 which is way longer than I would normally leave them!) over the weekend and missing them like mad once Ady got back to work and I had them to myself I have just shouted at them all day yesterday and today! Have not caught up with anyone yet and feel a bit at a loose end really. Enough self pity – the plusses are inumerable – the probs with the house being sorted are temporary – i got our next door neighbours letter this morning (and opened it by mistake) – rubbish postie – I have had three items already for other houses in the road! asking if they have any objections to our planning permission to extend the kitchen and put a third bedroom ontop for Teeny – that will make all the difference – at the moment Teeny is sleeping downstairs in what will be my office one day, my computer and all the kids toys are crammed in what will be the playroon / HE room and furniture destined for the big future kitchen diner is strewn about the place taking up too much space! Ady’s job seems to be going well – loads of travelling, but a lovely brand new company car (complete with air con, cd player and various other spangly stuff, ooh and a petrol card!) he gets a mobile phone and much to his dismay a laptop! A real proper job! All is in place (except escaping to finalise the menu and pay for it all!) for the surprise 40th party for him next weekend, loads of people have RSVP’d to say they’ll be there so its shaping up for a bloody good day, I am going to start phoning old friends tomorrow to arrange stuff for next week so I am not trapped in the house with the kids all day long and I will also ring all the nice folk who HE and live round here and have promised me cups of tea! Keep forgetting that we’ve been home less than a week and although this was our home for years, it does not mean it will feel ‘like home’ straight away given how much our lives changed (including the arrival of Teeny!) in the 2.5 years we were away – I left here with one crawling baby and have come home with two walking, climbing children! Lynda has rung to say she misses the kids and thanking us for her cards and gifts – and she sent a real tear jerking email about how she felt bereft at us leaving and we have left behind a big part of us with her which she will treasure – aww!
So onwards and upwards and look to the future etc etc etc…next week will bring Ady’s 40th, happy reunions with old friends, some new meetings with brand new ones, the welcome home / Ady is old party and maybe even broadband! Not to mention the cheque for the whole deposit back on the manchester house (was bloody worth it after all – all that scrubbing of skirting boards and hoovering of light fittings!)…

WOO HOO! BACK ONLINE!

Well its been a whole week and a very long one at that! Wednesday was full of last minute stuff, Thursday Lynda had the children at her house while we hoovered and polished as Pickfords emptied each room into their VERY big van (I even cleaned skirting boards, never before in my whole life have I cleaned skirting boards!). Then there were tears all round as we said goodbye to our next door neighbours and then Lynda – very tough! We had a bad journey home really, as we were about to lock up the house for the last time, Ady had cleaned his way out of the kitchen floor, and just checked one of the kitchen cupboards to find all our fragile stuff had been missed by Pickfords! We had to load three whole cupboards full of crockery, glass dishes and so on into our car, around the two (not very happy!) cats in their carriers, the travel cot, overnight stuff for the four of us, shut the kids up on the journey bag of food and toys and stuff! We hit major traffic through Birmingham and again at Heathrow but arrived back at our own house at about 8.30pm – parents met us there, kids ran from room to room all awake and excited, cats were cautious but crept out of their carriers. We then could not find anywhere the litter trays we *know* we loaded into the car, or the cat food! So we took the kids back to my parents (grazing the people carrier on the lamp post by the drive that the old car always used to just about get past – eek!), Ady went to the supermarket to buy cat food, litter, litter trays etc then we finally got the kids to sleep at about 10pm, ate a very well cooked (as in burnt – not delicious!) lasagne and fell into bed exhausted. Friday me and Ady met Pickfords to unload the lorry in the torrential rain, they finished at about midday when we were left with a too small house with too many boxes! We had this foolish idea that we would be sleeping in the house that night, we ended up unpacking all day and going back to my parents for food and sleep Friday and Saturday nights. On Sunday night we collected the kids and brought them to their new home. Monster LOVES his new room – as he should, its really cool -pics soon I promise! Teeny is sleeping much better with no nighttime coughing (which leads me to wonder whether the damp in the old house was causing her problems?!). Today Ady started his new job and it went pretty well as first days go – he was given his company car – really nice – I had a go when he got home to dash up to Boots for emergency supplies – brand new, cd player, air con etc – better than mine!! He gets a phone tomorrow, got his petrol credit card today and what with the whole Monday to Friday 8-5, early finish on a Friday its like a real proper job!
Kids drove me insane today, a combination of the first time all day on my own with them for months, a smaller house, pouring rain all day long preventing Monster from ‘going to the seaside’, me trying to unpack the last few boxes, bad nights sleep for the last few days and general being one and three years old! Tomorrrow I plan to get out for a few hours with them, seaside if sunny, shopping if rainy!
The best news is that my Dad has offered to mind the kids 2-3 afternoons a week which will negate the need for finding a replacement ‘Lynda’ or childcare, cheaper, kids get to be looked after by someone who loves them and generally a better all round deal! Hurrah for my dad! and he is coming round to the whole HE idea too – slowly but surely!
Anyway, this is dial up instead of broadband so slower, costly and tying up the phoneline so a very tired Nic signing off for noq!