Off to bed v soon and have good intentions about making tomorrow a much better day!
Really enjoyed the chat last night and missed the various folks who were not around to take part /couldn’t get in / were invited but declined ๐
Anyone up for another one sometime soon? When is a good time for everyone? Who needs to get themselves sorted with the right technology in advance and so on…
God you’re brave – or mad! Spent all day long with your kids when you could just pack ’em off to school and let someone else deal with them for seven hours a day and enusre they learn, eat lunch, play nice with the other kids, run off all the excess energy in a controlled and confined way then collect them, stick them infront of CBBC for a couple of hours, shove some chicken nuggets at them and perhaps read them a bedtime story.
You know what, they might be onto something these school educators! ๐
Today has been a shouty, shrieky, tired, headachey, can’t see straight, don’t mess with me kinda day. Delivery arrived from Hawkins and the kids grabbiness at every item as soon as I pulled it out of the parcel annoyed me so much I told them it was all for me and put it away on high up shelves, a big package arrived from the QCA which looks very interesting and I would have sat and read were I not packing both children off to boarding school TIL THEY ARE AT LEAST 27 first thing tomorrow morning!. Davies did a really nice magic maize picture, then trod soggy stuff all through the house leaving purple stains on the hall carpet and Scarlett finally got dressed at about 3pm.
Have done various paperworky and phonecally things like sort out Tarly’s ยฃ250 handout voucher into an account, tried to get tickets to see Richard Herring (and failed!), sorted out booking lunch out for everyone on Sunday for Mothers Day (just need to get the card and gift for mine now) and all but cleared my email inbox. I have had an email from someone local wanting more info on HE and have managed to compose a chatty bouncy email back (god that was an effort!) which keeps bouncing – and with no other way of getting hold of them I am feeling bad that their first tentative enquiry into the world of HE may be met with silence ๐
Going to have a big bath, drink wine and go to bed early. Have already discussed with Davies how we can both make tomorrow a better day.
followed by very nice evening followed by crappy night.
In the morning we watched some of the Walking with beasts video from the library – a bit over Davies’ head but he did take some of it in. Then we put on a home video of me pregnant with Davies going to hist first Christmas (4 months old ish). Cannot believe how young I loooked then and how much I have aged in the 5 years since having kids – five years of crap nights sleep has really taken it’s toll ๐ It starts with me 8 months pregnant on my Dad’s birthday and we talk to me, Ady, Mum and Dad about how we are all feeling about the imminent arrrival of first child / grandchild, then there is me just before we left for hospital all giggly and excited, then Davies aged about 6 hours having the pediatrician check him over in hospital, then us bringing him home, then snapshots of him over the next couple of months. We have got hours and hours and hours of videos which we keep meaning to get sorted onto DVD and organise somehow, or at least make back up copies of. Already those early ones are so dated and precious when you watch them with the children. Wish there had been such things when I was a baby.
Went over to Chris and Julie’s in the afternoon – very nice actually. Ady and Chris have gotten over their initial awkwardness and happily spent a couple of hours in the kitchen chatting and bringing us regular cups of tea. Me and Julie sat in the lounge also chatting and the kids charged round like loons (which is fine when it’s not my house ๐ Oh I’m such a crap hostess!). It’s really nice to see the four of them being so happy together and all of us grown ups really hope it lasts and lasts. McDonalds on the way home for the kids and early to bed.
Ady made a lovely roast dinner, slept on the sofa for a while then went up to bed leaving me chatting to friends. Very nice that was too and had to really drag myself away just before 1am mindful of a 7am start to this morning and the possibility of Scarlett waking any time.
Sure enough I had just laid down in bed when she woke ๐ Through the blurry wine haze I went and changed her nappy and wet pjs, brought her into our bed where she squirmed and wriggled until 3am when she announced she had done a poo. Took her back downstairs to change her again and I think we fell asleep around 4am. Davies woke me at 8am and they went to play downstairs ’til 9am ish – feel very very woolly this morning ๐
Kids are running round one naked, one dressed as Peter Pan, can’t summon up the energy to do anything educational at all and don’t think they are interested anyway!
Snot experience at Science museum is all booked up ๐ but gonna go to the museum anyway that day and mix and mingle with other HEers.
Have just put Pete’s Dragon on for the kids at their request, Scarlett is sitting eating tinned peaches (her latest passion!) and I have dug out two potties and tried to tell her to use them. She shakes her head, laughs and runs off – already had one puddle on the floor today. But she is so ready and as she likes being naked anyway it seems like a good idea to have a go with it.
Right off to make some lunch for me and maybe boot up the laptop and do some of my online course while the kids are watching TV.
I think I have RITMOMT (right in the middle of menstrual tension) today I have been a complete and utter total bitch to anyone who dared look at me. Just as well I have not been required to drive (road rage would have been a cert), be compassionate or understanding (would have failed miserably and given advise along the lines of ‘pull yourself together we all have problems you self pitying fool’) or be a half way decent mother, wife or daughter (oh wait, I did have to attempt those things, and failed. miserably.)
Crap night with small people in our bed getting ranted at by me about middle of the night, should be asleep, why do you children never sleep, what do we have to do to get some sleep around here, this is not fair etc, Ady took Scarlett away in the end (to escape the shouting and to protect her from violence) leaving me and Davies who knows better and went to sleep snuggled up to me. He woke at about 7am and I had pretty much persuaded him to go back to sleep til the clock said 8 when Scarlett appeared in the room so that was me up for the day.
Ady was supposed to be getting a lay in but would have been disturbed by random shrieking at the children, and slamming about of doors and cupboards. I stomped off to get dressed when he appeared downstairs and then returned to *tell* everyone that we were going to the library as a family cos we never do anything just the four of us, and we were walking cos it’s good for us. Davies bless him had asked to play on the Cbeebies website so he was well out of it all, Scarlett redeemed herself somewhat by sitting with me reading books while Ady got ready to go out.
The walk to the library was fine – Davies walked with Ady and pointed out all the little landmarks along the route – he instigated a ‘game’ where you had to spot a wall or pavement with cracks caused by tree roots (he’s so clever at soaking up complete random bits of information and bringing them out at odd moments) and Scarlett walked with me, then the kids walked holding hands for a while which is very cute but had Ady acting like some sort of hyperactive sheepdog trying to herd them from all directions to avoid potential dangers – he was like a netball player – all hands up without touching them bobbing around infront and behind them!
Arrived at the library and found straight away the video I was looking for (walking with beasts – as recommended by someone on MP as a good one for the evolution thing) for ยฃ1.60 for the week (bargain!), tried to install the kid with Ady in the kids area while I looked for evolution books and found one eyewitness one I had been looking at on amazon which looks promising. I then picked up a few for sale ones on science-y stuff and a knitting book. I wanted to get The Alchemist but all copies were out on loan so will use the website later to reserve it. Did get another top 10 one The Time Travellers Wife which looks pretty interesting from the blurb on the back.
Then Ady took Davies upstairs as he was looking for a book on excel – Scarlett had a total fit about this – IN THE MIDDLE OF A LIBRARY – with lots of tutting old people sitting around in silence reading the papers (is this cos they can’t afford the papers on their pension, is it cos they have nowhere else to go, is it cos they like the feeling of superiority that you get from going somewhere where people are meant to be quiet but you know they won’t be so you can sit and peer over the top of the paper to give a withering look to both parent and child???) I took her outside and waited ’til she calmed down then ventured back in to find Ady.
The walk home was not quite so amiable – there was general fuss about who was holding who’s hand and Davies ended up with Ady again and they walked way on ahead – I encouraged Scarlett to run so we could catch them up and at one point she broke free – I said to hold hands again so she ran off, and inevitably fell over, in the middle of a dirty alley with broken glass and dog pooh and skanky old tins of Special Brew all around. How she managed to avoid jabbing herself with a used needle or a discarded condom I don’t know but she is mainly unharmed (small graze on each knee). She did of course make sufficient noise for Ady and Davies to turn back, Ady to give me a severe talking to about not holding her hand IN AN ALLEY and he gave me the very heavy bag of books he was carrying – to add to the very heavy bag of books I was carrying, scooped her up and marched on ahead – leaving me to persuade Davies to walk faster for the rest of the way home ๐
So that set me up nicely for an afternoon spent with my parents. Won’t even bother blogging my rant about him not pandering to Scarlett’s every whim at my parents house, or bribing her to behave with promises of chocolate, presents and so on instead of just insisting that she bloody behave because that is what is expected of her by ME but she eventually ended up coming and snuggling up on my lap and he jollied me out of it by making me laugh so I came round in the end!
Later I went up to Sainsburys with Mum and Davies (who was a perfect child all the way round) while Ady stayed with Dad and Scarlett. Back in time for me to deal with Davies’ complete hysterics that his gingerbread man had snapped in half (he had asked for it in Sainsburys then decided when we got back that he wasn’t going to eat him as he was his friend and he loved him :rollseyes:) I was making a cup of tea and he appeared crying like someone had done something dreadful to puppies and kittens infront of him. I managed to mop him up, talked to him about the fact it was *just* a gingerbread man, got him to agree to eat the bloody thing if I made him some more gingerbread men out of paper to play with and love and be his friend when my Mum appeared with a stickerbook for him ( I know she was trying to help but it really undermined both me talking him out of not making an irrational amount of fuss and the whole yelling at Ady for not bribing the kids too. Oh and she only brought one out for him too) So he sat with her to do that while Scarlett sat with me for stories, while Dad and Ady watched Utd v Portsmouth and had discussions on football ettiquete if you and your mate support opposing sides (Frazer is a die hard Utd fan and apparantly both sides really *needed* the win so neither could be gentlemanly or sporty about a lose or even a draw), Scarlett then wanted a sticker, Davies wouldn’t let her have one, Mum brought out another stickerbook for Scarlett which Davies decided was better than his and he wanted instead, Scarlett was not up for swapping, Mum got all pissed off that he discarded the one she had given him and said she was never getting him another sticker book (and I thought I had the monopoly on being a spoilt brat of a grown up today) and I ended up sat with them both on my lap facilitating them taking turns with Scarlett’s sticker book – oh yeah pretty much what I do every day of my life and could have been doing at home really without the backdrop of football, sulking grandmothers and stomach cramps and a headache and not enough sleep!!!!
Davies had another melt down about me telling him off and I am undecided as to whether he was just tired or is about to sprout pox as several people have said their kids got really grouchy just before breaking out… both are long since asleep, I have eaten several celebrations and am half way through a large glass of wine, the bath is run, Joyce is home, Sarah has invited me to her virtual party and I think I am over the worst! ๐
On the way to Tumble Tots Davies started asking questions which were clearly leading somewhere. It started with whether I went to Tumble Tots when I was a little girl and me saying no and I didn’t think there were things like TT when I was a little girl, perhaps he should ask Granny. Why? Because she looked after me when I was a little girl so she would have been the one to take me to TT if there had been TT. Thoughtful silence broken by:
D: Who looked after all the babies before there was grown ups?
N: There was always grown ups darling, otherwise there would have been no babies
D: No Mummy. You said that when dinosaurs were on this planet it was before people existed.
N: Yes, that’s right
D: So when the first people came they would have been babies, so who looked after them?
We then danced round the whole chicken and egg type thing with him insisting that it would have been babies before grown ups but quickly got to that being fairly irrelevant anyway because the main question was not whether the first people were in their infancy ot their pensionerhood but how the bloody hell they had gotten here at all. Ah! Bugger!
I briefly talked about how people who believe in God believe that He created the whole world and everything and He made the first two people – as grown ups – and everyone alive now is from their children and their children’s children etc. I then very warily touched on people being descended from apes but as I am totally wobbly on the whole evolution thing myself and luckily we pulled up at TT at that point the conversation was put on hold.
Help!!! Need to get my own knowledge on theories and beliefs up to speed on this one so I can provide some better answers next time he asks – which he will ๐
Is there an Usborne book of ‘how we all got here in the first place’? ๐
Went very well indeed. I’d already ironed out with Davies that he *was* going and there was no point in making a fuss about it. Scarlett had a fit in the car about not wanting her shoes on so she got one off and I dragged the other off yelling ‘stupid child!’ at her (just as a neighbour walked past, oh how I love to reinforce that caring earth mother impression in public!) then she refused to have them on again when we got there so I had to carry her (simply not worth the fuss). Davies was being a bit wobbly when one of the other little boys came over and asked if he wanted to play running with him (he is one of twins and is very bold and outgoing while his twin brother is quite the opposite – he also shares his name with my Dad which Davies finds amusing) so off he went. The other children all joined in with them and when it was time to go through to the main room Davies looked at me and I said ‘quick go on with the others’ and off he went – and he joined in with the singing and everything ๐ We peeped in at him a couple of times and I heard his voice all high and excited several times and he had a great session there.
Scarlett and I sat and did jigsaws together so she got a bit of one to one too which was nice. We have just been playing with Geomags (mainly brought out as an incentive to get them to help tidy up everything else, which worked:-) ) and their tea is nearly ready so this is probably me done for today blog wise. Not a lot of specific educational stuff but we certainly got music, exercise and socialising ticked off today.
Yes, name is rather twee isn’t it?!
Not bad at all, I have signed up for the next 10 weeks – not too expensive as they do a sibling is half price offer and the cost is reduced for block booking. Rather amateurish and a little ‘toddler group’ in its planning but the kids enjoyed it.
It was not that organised really, they did have a theme of ‘teddy bears’ which they had emailed me and I had forgotten, but as that involved collecting them all in, swapping them all over and then putting them all to one side which had more than one child in tears about some other kid holding their teddy – it was probably just as well!
So there was the teddy bear version of chucking your car keys in the middle at a 70s fondue party, then some singing and actions, then some random banging of instruments before they got a parachute out. I bought a parachute after seeing how much all the kids loved Karen’s at Melrose although it is still hidden away to bring out during a rainy day moment, so that went down well. Then they got out a bubble machine and all the kids ran about popping bubbles (infact Karen, are you sure you are not supplying ideas to Twinkle Tots – can I expect to see lapbooking there next week? ๐ ). During all this Scarlett fell over and went splat on her nose which meant she spent a while sat on my knee but they both claimed to enjoy it at the end and seemed to fit in quite well. Davies was by far the oldest and biggest child there – I think there were about 15 kids altogether – mine were the only siblings, mostly girls and mostly around the year old mark. Davies was very good and mindful of them all being smaller than him. Not sure how much he will really get out of it although I guess it is confidence building for him, but I really want Scarlett to be part of something so we’ll see how the 10 weeks pan out and make a decision from there.
I was chatting to the woman at the end about the set up – asking whether it was a franchise as she has an email address and quite well presented promotional materials and she used to work for another similar franchised music and movement company and got bored by being so restricted so broke out to do this on her own – which explains the lots of different elements not quite gelled together yet. I think it has potential and might even try and chat to her a bit more about it as the weeks go by – not something I’d ever consider doing paricularly but the mechanics of these type of business interest me and I have some half formed ideas floating around in my head about such things.
Kids are currently trashing the lounge whilst we hang around before going to Tumble tots – Davies’ TT T shirt was found crumpled up but clean in the bottom of his bag and Ady made me promise to iron it – he used to be the kid at school in too short trousers and too big shoes that all the other kids picked on so he is very conscious of the kids appearances not marking them out – I on the other hand don’t want to pass such shallow notions onto them (and also will do anything to wriggle out of ironing!) but Davies did make a hama bead car yesterday which I also promised to iron so I might just rouse myself to manage both ๐
Ah ABC – gotta love their odd backing lyrics, particularly on ‘Look of Love’. Don’t know what I mean? Did it out and have a listen, guarantee you will be laughing.
A pretty good day today really – lurked around the house first thing pondering blog security, reading other peoples’ blogs and watching the HESFes chat list with interest ๐
About 11am I decided that if I was going to see my Mum today as arranged then I needed to be the one ringing to make the final details so I did. I said that I was going to Sainsburys for a few bits and she offered (shock, knock me down with a feather, slap my cheek and call me Delilah!) ‘why don’t you drop the kids off here first and then you can have a look round Boots (my all time favourite store!) too?’ which is precisely what I did ๐
Had a lovely hour meandering round all the cosmetics stroking them and testing the colours on the back of my hand (cos of course that is where I would be wearing eye shadow and lipstick) and even had a brief wander down the baby stuff aisle realising for probably the first time that I no longer have a baby and never will do again… then to Sainsburys and I also took the opportunity to sneak home (we only live a mile apart and Sainsburys and Boots is sort of halfway inbetween us) and put the dinner on (beef curry made with stewing steak so the longer cooked the better) before returning back to two very happy to see me children ๐
Lunch, during which Davies behaved really badly, pulling all his best attention seeking, silly childishness tricks out of the bag ๐ Scarlett made it worse by being super cute (why do siblings do that?) then luckily my brother got up and that was Davies taken care of for the next couple of hours – they played with all our old lego and fisher price toys, and the Leap Pad we had taken over with us. Scarlett mostly sat on my lap being cute, Dad went off to carry on repainting their bathroom and Mum and I sat and talked about HE. She is finally starting to get it and her questions are far more intelligent and relevant than they previously were. I might even see if she wants to come to the Science Museum in March – she’d be an extra pair of hands on the cross London journey (if you decide not to come Jenny) and it might be nice for her to meet some other people doing it too – it certainly helped to convince Ady.
Home for the kids’ dinners and I had just got Scarlett to sleep when Ady got home. He has been working in Oxford today and is back there tomorrow so has had a two hour journey both ways (and is now flaked out on the sofa!). Davies watched Little Bear in lieu of a bedtime story but then asked for a lesson when I was tucking him in to bed. Sure it was just a timewasting tactic but he did really well – he is starting to recognise some of the more frequently used words straight away which is obviously part of the purpose of the book and although he insists he ‘can’t do it’ he clearly can – so progress continues to be made there ๐
We listened to one of the cds I got from Amazon which went down well in the car. Davies is getting really good at recognising what instruments are being played and what sort of emotions the music arouses in him. Scarlett just insists ‘I like it Mummy, I like it’ and does a sort of car seat restricted dancing ๐
Finally we taught Davies how to pat his head and rub his tummy the other night – totally hysterical to watch him trying the first few times but he has totally cracked it and now keeps calling me to see him doing it ๐
Tomorrow we have Twinkletots – a new place I have not been before – a group with musical instruments and singing and stuff for 2-5 yos and then Tumble Tots in the pm. Davies has already started with the ‘I don’t want to go’ about TT but I have told him we are going and that’s that!
edited to add – CUTENESS – today while he was doing his Leap Pad with the microphone he had to say his name, age, favourite colour etc and his best friend. He thought for all of about a second before yelling ‘BEN!’ into the microphone ๐ Sheffield looks ever more attractive!
Ooh it all feels a bit shifty doesn’t it?!
I want to give the password to a couple of regular readers but have no email address for them – if anyone has details for Kirsty, Leandra, Jules or Sally please can they either get them to email me, or let me have their email address so I can send them the username and password.
I know, my attention span is very limited ๐ Am also feeling bad that although I know what I want to do it is way beyond my ability to set up (and I have done a bit of very wobbly research on this, looking at WP help and forums and got scared and ran away from them again) which means I have to lean on the only person I know who can do it and she is otherwise very busy dealing with everyone else’s web safety paranoia, updating WPresses hither and thither and has a big day herself tomorrow (will be thinking of you Jax!). So for now I will carry on as normal – restricting what I write would mean I would rather not blog at all and find a different outlet – I don’t have the energy or time to do both – and wait until one of the more techie minded folk amoung you come up with the solution then copy you ๐
My final word on the subject is the one I touched upon yesterday about the kids feelings on the whole thing. Blogging as we all know is the new black, everyone’s doing it. It’s been featured in parenting mags, top 10 blog lists have been printed in broadsheets and some people even have T shirts referring to it ๐ I bet it is even an acceptable hobby and interest to list on your CV nowadays. I have always said I would never like to be a celebrity or have fame in any way as I would not like my private life picked to pieces by the media. I would hate for ex boyfriends from years back to sell torrid stories about ‘I knew here when…’ or photos of me as a drunken teenager being in the papers. I have no dreadful past secrets but everything I did in the past should stay where it firmly belongs – in the past. I always wonder why people who go on Big Brother are shocked when inevitably their whole previous life is splashed across the papers while they are safely in the house leaving their friends and family to either deal with it, or join in and sell their stories too.
I don’t know what the kids will want to do or be when they grow up. But I do know that in the same way teenagers hate their parents bringing out the baby photos of them naked on their changing mat when they bring their first suitor home the kids of today will probably be faced with the embarrassment of their friends tracking down their equivalent ‘baby blogs’ in 10 years time. Not at all sure my two with their unusal names and photographic evidence will want to be associated with details of the time their Mum was called a ‘Big fat lady’ in Sainsburys, how some LI set their parents up for the day or concerns over their Daddy’s testicular health. Yes I probably should have thought about that before blogging it, I am probably speculating on stuff which will never happen and yes I probably am cut out for a career as a tabloid hack with all these suspicious ideas of digging up dirt on people but if I can think like this then I bet others can too. The end!
Didn’t come back later last night as experimented in being sociable and wifely – that failed! He watched football and when I said ‘well laptop back out again tomorrow then’ he said I should have drawn his attention to it and he would have turned the TV off and talked to me. Not entirely sure I need to ask for an appointment to talk, and also don’t really feel we need to schedule ‘talking’ into our day – I quite like being in the lounge companionably on my laptop while he chooses what to watch on TV with occassionally chatter or comments. TBH I think he probably does too but feels honour bound to make some sort of point sometimes to show he is the bloke! ๐ Once he has cooked dinner, washed up and hoovered of course!
Watched that Driving Mum and Dad wild last night (normally watch Desperate Housewives at 10 but staying up late with S last week meant I already watched this week’s on E4) . What a sad programme that is. I’m not sure whether I felt sadder for the kids or the parents – with a couple of exceptions of people who couldn’t train a dog let alone raise a child! The single mother really hit a chord – she *was* me at the end of a very bad day – except she was like it all the time – just at breaking point and it makes me wonder yet again how single parents cope without anyone to take over at times or simply be there. Ady does a hell of a lot and more than his fair share during bad nights with the kids – if I was doing it all I don’t think I would have even considered the option of HE (I mean mentally not financially or otherwise) and I could see how spiralling into that sort of existance would be quite a small step.
Yesterday Jenny and I made the decision to cancel the hall for our group and just post a weekly meet up arrangement somewhere locally on our yahoo group. We have already tried going fortnightly but have simply had to ask people to commit to paying in advance to protect us from ending up paying for the whole hall ourselves. This is not a business, we are not aiming to make any money from it so we don’t feel we should be putting anything up either. It has taken up a lot of time, thought and love from both of us over the last several months and while we both still believe it could have worked for whatever undefined reason it has not. I hope that over the summer we can build it back up again to a larger group meeting regularly out and about and perhaps look at hall hire again in the Autumn. I feel sad and even sadder for Jen as she is also dealing with her children who really enjoyed it being upset. D & S liked it but won’t necessarily miss it and will probably be just as happy to got to soft play or wherever. They mainly played with their cousins there anyway and were not involved in the larger group yet. So some more ((((Jenny)))) if you’re reading and chin up – we’ll carry on and this will work somehow xxx
Supposed to be seeing Mum today although not sure what we are going to do – the kids really need to get out and about – would consider swimming as a good one if I didn’t know that my mother would feel totally obliged to make loud comments about my swimsuit clad appearance to everyone at the pool (yes she does it from her mother – luckily as I am larger Scarlett will be saved from that one – guess I might end up criticising her slimness – are you sure you are eating properly darling? or similar!) wonder if she could be persuaded to come to Brighton or somewhere like that with me for shop browsing…
Texas has been trackback spamming me very high volume which is also frustrating as I am getting loads of emails and they are all from him. Need to reassure Ady he is not Dwight using an assumed name ๐
I had a long conversation with ex boss lady last night, we were supposed to be going to stay with her this weekend but due to pox potential and dreadful weather conditions in her part of the country (she is even HEing her privately schooled DD today and tomorrow as they are snowed in – she thought it was hilarious!!). She is still wanting me to work for her on some level and at last we have come to the conclusion that we need to agree a certain amount of hours per week and that is what she will pay me for. One of those conversations you really need to sit down and thrash out so we have arranged to meet midway for a day in London sometime soon. Quite excited at the prospect of doing some paid work again actually – and hopefully the motivation of doing that will spur me on in a couple of other areas too.
I know, same song ๐ but as Davies is sat eating popcorn watching his Rudolph the red nosed reindeer adventure DVD while the snow softly falls outside it seemed appropriate. Poor child is completely bewildered as to how it can be nowhere near Christmas, quite near to Easter and snowing – he’s watching Rudolph to set his mind at ease!
A mixed day so far – I seem to have shouted at Davies lots while Julie and the twins were here – he does this complete personality change when they come over, he gets rowdy, defiant and is just so over the top with the younger ones – I’m sure there is a way of modfying my reactions to his behaviour to change it but can’t work it out yet.
I have suddenly found four of the five library books I was ‘utterly convinced’ I had returned – oops! They are all really skinny and were nestled in the bottom shelf of the bookcase amoung others – which means there is every chance the fifth is here somewhere – groan. ๐
Took the kids out to the park after they had eaten lunch and tipped puzzles everywhere where they all seemed to enjoy themselves despite the bitter conditions and their rapidly reddening noses. I got some pics which I will post later if they are any good (and I can get my security thing sorted).
Education wise we’ve done some mammoth brio track building, some puzzles and that’s about it. I have just served the kids their tea and given the mad musical beds routine ending in them being up from 5am I intend to have them in bed within the hour – Scarlett asleep and Davies tucked up with an easy lesson which have slipped a bit of late.
Back later…
Of my concerns comes in two incidents this morning.
Firstly I had an email from a journalist wanting to interview me about Home ‘Teaching’ – he found me through my listing on the EO website as a local contact for our town (on there for our WAG group). The email address listed is at the same domain as this blog – so not hard to find it for him if he wanted to get his info on my day to day life.
Secondly I clicked one of my own google ad links about blogging – and found an ariticle written about blogging and linking to several blogs. Now all of these were anonymous, pretty humourous and had no comment facility – so definitely no permission asked before linking to them and opening them up to anyone who happened to be reading. Which leads me to realise that what I write, what we all write – once written is just ‘out there’ for anyone to do what they want with.
Not sure it could be used as ‘evidence against me’, and I never blog about the beatings I give the children or how I keep them locked in the cellar ( ๐ ) but similarly aware that to the uninformed or downright ignorant reading on a day when I have done nothing except shout at the children and feel they have been ‘taught’ nothing I am as far away from a good advertisement for Home Education as you can be.
I do feel a bit like I am baling out – I know I have gotten enormous support from being part of and reading the blogring – I have had some lovely off list comments and emails which mean a lot to me but Merry’s comment about The Truman Show hit home a bit. A small spotlight it might be, but a spotlight just the same and I feel I owe it to the children – and Ady and myself to just be a bit more aware about to whom I am laying our life bare.
Well still no sign here apart from the three spots on Davies’ back which have come to nothing so I assume were not pox related. I know we are officially still ‘at risk’ for another ten days and I still wouldn’t go to someone’s house without prior warning or near pregnant ladies, small babies or otherwise poorly people but we have planned two activities on Friday which I have already paid for and the kids will be sad to miss – one is a music and movement class for 2-5 yos, the second is Tumble Tots for Davies in the afternoon. Both of them will be full of children who either attend nursery or preschool and will mix with other children daily. Not sure whether that makes me all the more irresponsible or whether that makes it ok as it is prime CP time of year anyway. We could be singlehandedly kicking off the Sussex 2005 epidemic or we could just be adding to the mix, or of course we could be hiding ourselves away for no reason at all and not get the bloody thing anyway.
Oh poo! Any opinions? Happy to hear what I don’t really want to as well…
Had to post one last time as I forgot to blog about the way I was woken up this morning –
Davies : (while bouncing on the bed) Mummy, Mummy wake up it’s snowed in the night
Me: urgh, yawn, eye drops urgh some more
Davies: come on Mummy, we need to go downstairs and put the Christmas tree back up!
He was persuaded to go downstairs alone and watch Tales from the Riverbank on video for half an hour while I went back to bed ๐
It has snowed on and off all day although it has not settled down here – I can see it settled on top of the downs though. Didn’t go out with my Mum in the end – she is far too nesh to be out and about in this weather and tbh even I was less than inclined to go out too so we have postponed for now.
Tomorrow Julie and the twins are coming over – Davies and I were talking about it while he was in bed tonight and he has promised (totally unprompted, bless him, he really shouldn’t have to be dealing with my issues at such a tender age!) to get the others not to make too much mess and to tell me and Julie if they are instead of joining in. Not at all sure he will manage to carry that off but it’s a nice sentiment!
Currently getting nagged lots about how much time I spend online in the evenings – so may try experimenting by not going online tomorrow and doing that talking thing other couple seem to do ๐ Will let you know whether this makes any difference or if he just likes to have something to nag about and taking the ‘you are always on that bloody laptop’ rant away from him will prompt him to look for additional things to winge about!
Have taken password protection off the last couple of posts as it was not working for at least two people (including me from my laptop!) I will speak with Jax about how to increase security to a level I am happy with without turning the blog into something people I want to read it feel is simply too much trouble to bother with.
Whilst I have not had the potential stalker scare I am listed on the EO website as a contact for the local area and have been debating getting a bit more involved locally with other HE bits and pieces. I use the same email address as my website / blog on various HE related things so it is a small step to find my blog – I am not sure I want any random person with an interest in HE reading all the various stuff I might fancy blogging about.
Bid on one of those alleged geomags suitcases on ebay last week – it was a dutch auction and they were ยฃ2.49. Stupid, stupid, stupidly didn’t check the p&p before bidding and of course I won. It was seven quid to get it here ๐
It arrived today and ok it is probably worth ยฃ2.49 – it is branded supermag, not geomag, is basically a very crappy quality plastic (as in all the hinged bits have already gone all white where it is clearly not up to being bent) case with sections – no carefully shaped bits to cradle your balls and rods – infact it is a cheaper version of the boxes I have been storing them in and got from Woollies to keep beads in ๐ That’ll teach me!
That’s the second parcel of the day – one from Amazon arrived this morning with some cds in it – they look fab all classical music for kids collections (majors for minors etc) . I am still waiting for a book order from amazon of the books Merry mentioned on her blog (and a couple more to qualify for super saver postage!) and a Hawkins order from their sale. I love getting parcels ๐ Oh and the Horrible Science microscope for the kids is due too.
Jenny rang me just as we were about to leave the house to say she is having a viewing later so understandably needed to get the house ready and keep it that way – adding my two into the mix of small people working against this would not have been a good idea!
It keeps snowing then being all sunny and melting it away again here – which although disappointing for the kids who have visions of making snowmen (poor naive fools – I think in my entire childhood it only snowed enough to make a snowman once down here – last year we had loads of snowy days in Manchester so their idea of snow is a bit skewed!) but better for Ady’s job which involves lots of driving about which I worry incessantly anyway so do not need the added mental anguish of adverse weather conditions creating further driving hazards.
Davies is very happily playing on the computer doing mazes and other learning disguised as fun type games, Scarlett is making a mess with one of those candy necklaces and in a bizzare turnabout the kids are both infront of the computer in the playroom while I am sat in the lounge with Teletubbies on ๐
Pox watch update – Davies has a couple of itchy spots on the back of his neck but they have been there for two days now and no more have appeared so this is either the mildest case in medical history or something totally unrelated to CP like an irritation to the label on his jumper!
Not at all sure where this morning has gone. I currently have one and a half children dressed and two rooms with floors covered in toys ๐
We have done some seed sowing – cress in decorated egg cups and Davies is currently doing some very creative work with his tap a shape which was one of those things I nearly didn’t buy but has had lots of use so I’m glad I did.
I have rung the library and reported the issue – they have checked the shelves but not found them. They have renewed them again and asked me to have another look round the house and then come in and see them if I still can’t find them. I *know* they are not here so later in the week I will pop down there and see what happens next. She was at great pains to reassure me not to worry and although it was not said I get the impression that if I cannot find them it will be written off, so I feel a bit more reassured about that now. ๐
Right, I am here under the pretext of making lunch so I have better go and do so. Round to Jenny’s later and out for a meal with my Mum tonight which I am still undecided about my feelings on… may not be back later.
And I really hope it does not uspet or offend anyone who has put a lot of hard work into making it the wonderful thing that it is.
I have been thinking about it for a while and reading Alison’s latest post decided me. I will still be blogging, I will still be reading but I never get round the ring any further than the ones I have put links to on my own, which is not any reflection on the ones missed out, simply a case of being a parent at least some of the time ๐ instead of spending my whole life reading about other people doing it!
I love blogging and although I considered seperating my blog from an HE one it is simply not realistic – both in terms of time and energy and also that we don’t seperate them in real life so it would be unrealistic to do so in cyberworld. I am also intending to either go password protected or create users on the blog so I have some idea of who is reading. I don’t necessarily write stuff I would not tell people anyway but I was a bit freaked out by putting nic, ady, davies, scarlett and our surname into google and coming out with three blog entries straight away. Anyone who knows us IRL could so easily do the same and I would hate to feel that people were reading without my knowledge. I don’t want to censor what I write – the main value for me in blogging is the doing it – I enjoy writing down stuff that has happened during the day, the victories, the crises and the general rants – and I like the fact that there is the regular readers support network to catch me when I stumble and fall – I guess I’d just like to be more aware about who’s arms I am falling into and whether they are friendly or not.
So that’s it. I have actually just put a link on MP list to a specific entry on my blog, I am aware that various people have links to it on theirs and I will keep the blogring box on my blog too (if I may!) so I am not totally going underground. But I did feel I needed to make a choice between being more cagey about what I blogged or being more cagey about who could read it and the option of writing less and thinking about it more lost ๐
Not sure where to put the spin on today really… thrice daily pox check reveals no spots on either offspring still though which has to be a positive.
After yet another night of musical beds I awoke with a pre eye opening stretch which kicked Bedtime Dora in the head and prompted her to say in her cheery voice ‘it’s time to wake up the day’. First thought ‘where the fuck am I?’ followed by ‘and who the hell is that?’ were both quickly answered by eye opening to reveal the vision of pink that is Tarly’s bedroom with Tinker Bell bedding. I could hear CBeebies in the distance so realised there was probably at least one child up. It was infact 7.45am, Ady had long since gone to work, Scarlett was still asleep in my bed and Davies (who clearly had quite philosophically accepted he had been orphaned in the night but was okay about it as Cbeebies was on) was sat alone in the lounge. He always comes into our bedroom first upon waking so must have seen Tarly in the bed alone, come downstairs to find a grown up and been distracted by Clifford the early years or something and decided he’d manage without us!
Managed to get us all to Sainsburys by 9.30am and aside from Scarlett chucking random groceries at Davies’ head they were fairly well behaved in there for once – surprisingly cheap week’s shop too ๐ Arrived back at our house seconds after my parents who hung around ‘entertaining’ the kids while I put the shopping away and then we all went to Paradise Park. In the car earlier I had groomed Davies by telling him that Grandad had not been to PP before and as he thinks Davies should go to school I wanted Davies to show him round and show him how much Davies knows about stuff and that he doesn’t need to go to school to learn. Davies took this very literally and dragged my Dad round the place by the hand like some sort of junior tour guide, showing off his great knowledge of the dinosaurs, including their names and whether they were carnivorous or vegetarian, he told Dad about volcanos and earthquakes, the ice age, the desserts and the rainforests, fossils and Egyptians. Not entirely sure Dad realised quite how much knowledge Davies was demonstrating but even if we didn’t get our point made I was still very proud of him ๐
For once Scarlett was quite happy to walk round holding hands with my Mum too – I think having her distracted from fawning all over Davies (Mum that is, not Scarlett) pushed her into realising there is another grandchild on offer and quite a cute one at that! They looked at all the crystals and stones together and enjoyed pushing all the buttons on the interactive bits. As usual I forgot to take the camera which was a shame as there would have been some nice shots from the day.
We had a walk round the cacti and rainforest garden areas and then a very brief walk round the outside area – including a life sized dinosaur section and various Sussex in miniature models. Then to the coffee shop for lunch. Mum disappeared and returned with the owner in tow (very tenuous link that his ex wife is the daughter of one of Dad’s cousins but Mum does like to track these people down with the express wish of showing how well connected she is to people in high places! Sounding like a real bitch about my Mum here – whoops!) who joined us – he spoke to Mum and Dad at one end of the table while I ‘managed’ the children at the other end. They both ate well actually, well enough for me to not worry about cooking a tea tonight ๐ and deserved their cakes for afters!
A quick wander round the shop which netted a stretchy toy each for the kids (a monkey for S and a frog for D) and two kids cds – one fairy story one and one classical music one, along with a severe frown and muttering about how crap with money I am from my Dad and it began to snow as we pulled out of the car park. We quickly drove out of it though and it took a further two hours to get over to our house.
We came home via the library where I had to return a video and borrow a few more books. I got a couple for me including the five people you meet in heaven which has me hooked already. I also got a print out of the books we are listed as having out on loan and as I feared there are five books on the kids tickets which I am totally convinced we have already returned. I have scoured the house and they are no where to be seen and the fact it is FIVE books not just one makes me all the more convinced I am right and they are not here cos I’ve already taken them back. I will ring them in the morning and see where we go from here – I am quite happy to go and look for them myself in the children’s section although I can’t quite see how it could have happened…
Also picked up a few more books from their for sale section including a couple on religion – one of which looks really good as it supports GCSE Religious studies and has lots of comparisons between the main religions, and two books on decades – one on the 1960s and one on the 1980s which might tie in nicely with our timeline stuff later on.
We got home and the kids played noisily and quite violently (in Davies’ case) with the toy animals and dinosaurs prompting the observation from Dad that all of Davies’ games have a destructive or violent undertone. They don’t really, and having watched other small boys particularly it seems to be a fairly ‘normal’ thing and given he was recreating some of the battles of meat eating dinosaurs from earlier today I am not concerned he is showing early traits of a serial killer or anything but I just wish Dad had picked up on the good stuff he was demonstrating earlier instead of the more negative stuff this afternoon. As a result I seemed to spent the rest of the day nagging at the kids for one thing or another – mainly Davies ๐
It started to snow in earnest at about 4pm and I called the kids to the window to watch it, then shoved a plate out in the garden each for them and brought it in for them to play with when it was full of snow. Highly educational with all the what is it, what does it feel like, what does it taste of, what’s happening to it and why stuff that went on, and also FUN cos it’s SNOW, but again a source of frowing at what sort of lunacy goes on in the house from my Dad ๐ Mum and Dad both turned into complete old people as it snowed sitting there worrying about getting home (a mile along the road!) and muttering about whether they had enough sugar and tinned goods (well okay maybe not but you get the idea!). What’s even more laughable is that Dad grew up in North Wales and used to tell me tales of walking to school along roads with snow drifts that could bury a double decker bus they were so deep, and you could DROWN IN THEM!!! so to see him sat there fretting about a mere dusting was quite amusing. They left before it settled!
Ady got home in time to witness a spot more irrational shouting at the kids from me before they were packed off to bed. They are both going though a complete turnabout to Melrose week and only want me all the time, which should probably be heartwarming, flattering and cute but is actually quite annoying! They both (shame filled confession coming up) still drink their warm bedtime milk from a bottle (yes, that’s the otherwise scarily mature 4.5 yo and the dry white wine through choice 2 yo) and will only sit on my lap to do so the whole getting them into pjs, milk drunk and into bed is much prolonged by debate on who goes first or if they have it at the same time who sits on the outside side of my lap… sigh.
Ady had come home via a friends with very sad news that they are about to split up – well actually even sadder that she doesn’t know this yet… sounds like a classic case of drifting into familiarity without any spark left but never easy for one person to come out and say it and then all the aftermath and logistics of splitting a life down the middle. I see alcohol fuelled long evenings listening ahead.
And that was us. Have been crap at getting any 100 EL done – D has been playing with his Leappad the last few nights in bed but I want to get back into that again tomorrow, need to sort out the library books and (oh joy for company!) going to Jenny’s in the afternoon to drink tea, ignore offspring and debate our HE group and other chats.
Yesterday – a pretty good day really with an unexpectedly nice couple of hours child-free courtesy of Specsavers one hour glasses service!
We went over to Dad’s via Sainsburys to buy stuff for lunch and had a very nice afternoon there with him and my brother (both kids’ favourite grown up without a doubt!). The blokes all watched football (Arsenal v Sheffield and the result was pleasing apparantly! More to do with Arsenal not winning than anything else I believe though), the kids played and I spent a happy half an hour getting out an old piano book and trying to see if I could remember anything from my childhood lessons. Pretty much the only thing I remembered was that if you don’t practise your scales very regularly your fingers become quite stiff! I then sat and read a magazine for a bit which was also quite nice ๐
I had an opticians appointment at 3pm for a contact lens checkup – I wear the all day, all night ones which you leave in continuously for one month before disposing of and putting a new pair in – which IMO is the closest thing to getting your sight back without the scary and rather pricey option of laser surgery. Those who spent time with me at Melrose may have noticed that I do have something of an eye drop habit though, as one of the side effects for me is that if I have hayfever or a cold then my eyes get gloopy and dry out. The only glasses I had were at least two prescriptions and four years out of date so I decided to get some updated ones for emergencies like lost lenses and possible soaking of lenses occassionally to remove said gunk build up.
Dad and Frazer were happy for the kids to stay with them while Ady dropped me in town and waited to save me having to try and park (can be a nightmare in Worthing and as I was only going to the opticians I didn’t want to have to park way out of town and walk in). Luckily we got a space straightaway so he came in with me. We had about ten minutes to spare before my appointment so we enjoyed the rare treat of walking hand in hand and not dealing with requests to go in toy shops, McDonalds or stop to look at the pigeons ๐ Waited in the opticians for over half an hour as it was heaving in there and like everywhere you book appointments for they seem to totally overbook, over-run and be behind. They also had very few chairs in their waiting area, most of which seemed to be taken up with one family who had brought at least three generations to witness Daddy getting glasses! There were several comedy moments such as lots of people brushing by each other and muttering ‘sorry’ which made me want to yell something like ‘did you not see me, do you need your eyes tested, are you BLIND?’ and then the actual optician I saw was clearly quite raving mad as he had this ridiculous overenthusiastic air about him and practically sing-songed his way through the examination, pronoucing everything ‘wonderful, suberb or splendid’. Ady was sat in the room with me but I knew if we looked at each other we’d get the giggles so I tried really hard to focus on not looking at him. Anyway, chose the specs I wanted (with for once some fairly constructive support and advise from Ady about what suited me and didn’t – guess glasses are less of a minefield than ‘does this skirt make my arse look big enough to have it’s own postcode’ – the worst a pair of specs could do would be to make me look old and serious!) and they said they’d be ready in an hour!!!! (I know this is probably completely normal for high street opticians but I genuinely expected them to be sent away for or something.) So we rang Dad who was still quite happy with the kids and went for a hot chocolate ๐
Last night Mum & Dad came over for dinner – nice enough really, Mum drank too much wine and got all silly, Dad sat there teasing her and I buggered off to bed at 11.30pm in the vain hope they would take the hint and leave – which they did half an hour later when it became apparant that Ady was not going to offer coffee and mints ๐ Mum is on two weeks holiday from work starting tomorrow and we have arranged to go to Paradise Park tomorrow and she is taking me out for a ‘girlie night’ (urgh!) meal on Tuesday night. Shame the sentence ‘how about you go off to work with Ady for the day and I’ll have the kids’ didn’t trip off her tongue really. I’ve asked enough times (he works so close to various big shopping malls that I would adore to spend a few childfree hours wandering round before he picked me up again) for her to know it is something I’d love to do – or even just offer to have them for the day so I can have a day at home to myself, but that would involve all sorts of plea bargaining, trade offs and be talked about for months afterwards so I can’t bring myself to do the begging it would involve to get such a favour. And yes I do know many other grandmothers who would dearly love to have their grandchildren all to themselves for a day, sadly my two children are not in possession of one of them ๐
Today – after another bad night (will they never end!) which saw Scarlett hurtling into our bedroom at 3am having been downstairs awake with Ady for an hour yelling and keeping me awake anyway practically shouting ‘I NEED Mummy, I WANT Mummy, I NEEEEEEED Mummy’ (sound familiar Alison?!) she proceeded to lay pretty much on top of me for the rest of the night until Davies woke me at 7am whereupon she snuggled back into my space in bed until 9am. Grrr!
Dad came over this morning and he and Ady went out to get some logs but the chainsaw was blunt so they were back within about 15 minutes, Dad stayed for lunch and decided he’d join us tomorrow at Paradise Park which will make it a better day for me ๐ (Better adult to child ratio and I KNOW he’ll buy lunch!) then we went over to Chris and Julie’s.
It’s been about 3 weeks since we saw them so the four kids were all thrilled to see each other and spent ages dancing round the lounge to a small keyboard which plays Jingle Bells – highly entertaining! Lots of tea was drunk, Julie is still trying to persuade Chris to either come to HESFES with her or let her go alone with the kids. They were really interested in hearing about Melrose and looked at all the photos – I really think Julie might be persuaded to come to Kessingland if not HESFES.
Home again via traditional Sunday dinner of McDonalds for the small people (our traditional roast beef is cooking ๐ ) which they are still demolishing prior to a bath (how come when they were teeny tiny and didn’t really need bathing that often I did it daily, now they probably warrant one at least every other day I would happily make it a once a week or even fortnightly task?!) and an early night.
Might be back later with some nonsense – if not I will be around tomorrow ๐
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