One word? When seven would do…

whatever that is 😉

Another crap night with smallest child – that whole caravan malarkey and being ill has really put her back in terms of sleeping well – Sarah, I wish I’d had your disciplines from day one!

Ali was due to arrive sometime between 11 and midday today so ever conscious of her being the first ever MPer to visit our humble abode I did a bit of superficial tidying, a lot of blogring surfing and even learnt how to use the vax machine after Tarly had a decorating incident with some nappy cream and the carpet! Did some more work on beating the washing mountain and continued mulling over some very half formed thoughts on my own personal aspirations and dreams on a couple of things…

Ali rang twice to say she was running late so we nipped round the local shop to buy more bread as the kids had been eating peanut butter on toast all morning. Scarlett is having issues with her shoes at the moment (need to get her feet measured again although I do know that the shoes she has are not crippling her by any means but just her current ‘thing’) and wanted to be carried. I bought one of these ages ago as something I simply must have and had never used so I dug it out, strapped her onto me after a fashion (need to dig out the instructions on how to actually use the thing properly!) and off we set for more nappy cream and bread.

We have quite a lot of toys (you’re not surprised at that are you 😉 ) so often before new friends come over I get Davies to get a small selection of things out to suggest as things to play with otherwise it can be a bit overwhelming and *everything* end up coming out of the toy room in a browsing manner as opposed to anything actually getting played with, which always stresses me out a bit. The kids chose to get out the play kitchen and pretend food and a lego -style Thomas the tank engine set which when strewn across the lounge floor pretty much hid the carpet so I deemed as sufficient.

Ali and Freya arrived and Davies as usual kept coming up with suggestions for games – some of which Freya was up for participating in – the most favoured one seemed to be running up and down the hall with a variety of pull along toys – seemed a bit of an odd choice but kept them all entertained.

Davies totally unprompted decided to write everyone’s names in his little ELC chequebook that came with the toy till and did an excellent job of ‘Scarlett’, ‘Ali’, ‘Freya’ and ‘Nicola’. His letters are really coming on and I think the only letter I actually wrote for him to copy was ‘r’ – the best moment was when I talked about how he needed a ‘big F’ for Freya cos it’s at the beginning of her name and he asked if that was like the E for elephant with a straight line at the top, middle and bottom – bless 🙂

All the kids largely ignored their lunch, Tarly was very tired (surprising that!) but Ali and I enjoyed a good old chat inbetween adminstering cuddles and encouragement when needed – a very nice day 🙂

After they left to get a train home – so makes me appreciate driving and having a car at my disposal – I decided to continue the good work Ady had done on the playroom by clearing out all the cupboards. A bit more work to do tomorrow on the craft drawers and colouring bits and pieces but it is looking good. Also Ady bought a bookcase in Ikea today for Tarly’s room – which will ease the already groaning book case in our hall, and will give her access to all her favourite books without me having to clear them out of her room each day. We have some plans for redecorating most of the rooms in the house at the moment and she is desperate for a wardrobe too but at least the bookcase is a start. I will make it up tomorrow and tackle all the bookcases in the house. It has also occured to me with her desperation to learn to read that she might just be pleased with some of the workbooks that I discarded for Davies at her age – they say they are for 3-5 year olds and as Ali commented today she has a very good pen grip and accurate pen stroke so some of the early writing practises should be within her ability. Other than dropping keys off to Jenny for WAG group we don’t have anything planned for tomorrow so further tidying looks in order.

From me, that is 😉

Finally got to sleep at about 4.30am just as dawn was breaking 🙁 which meant I didn’t get up again til nearly 11 am which means that I am not really tired now, but know I need to go to bed to get back into some sort of sleeping pattern which will enable me to function at a semi normal level for the rest of the week!

Roused myself just as Ady was taking a phonecall from my Mum inviting us over for lunch (forgiven after all!) so got dressed, hung some more washing out on the line, rowed with Tarly over shoes and bundled everyone into the car and over to my parents for the afternoon.

Had lunch, Ady helped Dad trim the many, many hedges surrounding their garden, kids and I played ‘name that tune’ on their piano (oh how I wish we had room to bring it over here, Mum doesn’t want it any more in their house and has offered it but we simply don’t have the space 🙁 ), lazed around a fair bit chatting to Dad about HESFES, the way the world has changed over the past century and whether it is good or bad etc, talked to mum about her job for a while and then came home. Two of the neighbours were out in their gardens chatting so we joined in with that for a while which was all very pleasant then Ady mowed the lawns, the kids played on their slide (one of those parental hide your eyes and hold your breath moments as the game involved walking up the slide then standing on the top of the steps and jumping off!!), brought in dry washing and put wet loads out (washing on my line day and night!), fought kids into bed, cooked lovely roast chicken dinner and am about to go to bed.

Ady and I had further fun with NICFes speculation and have decided it will have a nestle sponsored creche tent with free smarties for all, some of those sheep dip type areas that were all the rage during foot and mouth for super economy ticket holders to walk through before joining rich bastards and a possible venue would be just the other side of the A35 so we could look across at HESFES 😉 with the chant ‘we are considerably richer than yoi!’ as per the northern folk on Harry Enfields sketch. Ah happy dreams ….

Ali’s coming over tomorrow so should probably spend the morning cleaning and spraying air freshner as it has just occured to me she will be the first MPers to actually visit my house although I have been to various other people’s – urk!

And book your tickets here for the first annual NICFes 2006. Brought to you in association with Kandoo toilet wipes and Educationcity.com yes ladies and gentlemen this time it’s ‘All about the money!!’

None of that not for profit earthy malarkey here I’m afraid. No this is all about cash, cash, cash and if it serves to help out a few needy Home Edders in the process well then that mught just add to the warm glowy feeling wads of tenners in my pocket always brings me.

Accomodation on site will be of a luxurious nature – a row of camper vans will be available to hire subject to some negotiation with a used car specialist I know being persuaded into branching into camper vans over the next couple of months.

If you really must do the whole tent thing then might I suggest one of these?

For those unfortunate enough to be on site without your own en suite there will be packs handed out upon arrival to those holding ‘super budget ecomomy’ tickets comprising the following items:
p mate super value pack
vouchers for use in the marque housing this little baby
a pot of this
a pack of these

and a sticker to be worn at all times marking you out as possibly unclean and therefore to be avoided by those visitors holding platinum rich bastard tickets.

You will be barely able to move around the site for stalls set up selling various educational resources. Subject to booking and acceptance we anticipate representatives from:
Hama bead suppliers to the home ed society who may well be sharing a stand with rowenta irons;
Blog your NICFes experience hosting with wordpress hosted by our excellent site hosting company who will also be putting on tutorials in the main marquee;
Commemorative photos taken by our in house photographer (he llists his other hobbies as sleeping and cheese, both of which we may be able to persuade him to hold talks on) available to purchase in souvenier photo wallets with the official NICFes logo on the front, key rings, fridge magnets, T shirts, mugs, calendars or greetings cards;
and many, many more.

And don’t go thinking there will be nothing for those troublesome teens at NICFes either, cos there will. No drugs, loud music or underage sex mind you. But some good old fashioned needlecraft, some GCSE maths coaching and some serious life skills courses in the shape of ‘parenting – what it really means’ a series of talks from semi hysterical mothers who are at the end of their tethers and warn these future parents of the dangers of not doing everything they want to do for themselves long before they even think about having children of their own. There will of course be black clothing, make up, hair dye, nail varnish and other black accessories on sale pre the event, during the event and after the event.

What’s that I hear you ask? Food and Drink? Why certainly! At NICFes where it’s all about the money we have every possible food fad covered. We’ll be laying on refreshment stands to suit your needs whether you are following high carb, low carb or no carb; Atkins, Weightwatchers or South Beach, smoothies, juices and chocolate mousses, teas, coffees, hot chooolates, no caffine, extra caffine, regular caffine, alcohol free alcohol, vegetarian, vegan, sea food, dairy free, wheat free, taste free, nuts free, egg free, acetone free, fat free infact pretty much everything except, well, free.

You will be able to buy NICFes ringtones, logos and polyphonic interactive wristbands, hoodies, t shirts, baseball caps, pens, keyrings, rucksacks and book bags. Branded bicycle clips, postcards, coin purses and cross stitch kits.

And yes it is just gone 4am – I have not been to bed yet as Scarlett woke up at 11 just as I was about to go and I have been sitting here trying to persuade her back to sleep and fantasising about making my millions by commercialising the whole festival thing…. this might be deleted in the morning so read it and book now while I am still sleep deprived enough to leave it up here 🙂

From: “monsterteeny”
Date: Tue Sep 23, 2003 2:19 pm
Subject: hello…new girl arrival!Hello all,

That was pretty much where it all began – getting on for 2 years ago now I joined MP and posted my very first message. I also sent off for my Education Otherwise membership pack, bought a whole heap of books about HE off Amazon (most of which remain unread on the bookshelf), not long afterwards I made my first hamabead order and somehow I have almost lost sight of the reasons why we first considered HE, many of the reasons we thought we were thinking of it along the way and find myself here – a very short time away from September 2005 which is the monumentous occassion of Davies’ fifth birthday and when he would reach school age.

I have undoubtedly spent an absolute fortune on ‘educational resources’ some of which have already been or indeed may prove in the future to be justified or needed but the majority I suspect to become dust collectors; I have witnesses each extreme of the HE spectrum from the travellers at HESFES to the by the book Homeschool Moms who’s blogs and timetables I ocassionally peruse; I’ve made some very good friends, in real life, virtually, locally and nationally as a result – I’ve lost a few too – either through total disagreement with our choice or simply drifting apart having either nothing in common or simply too contrasting viewpoints to exist in harmony anymore. I have learnt more about myself in this period than I ever knew before, I have also learnt more about my children than I would have done if we’d continued on our planned pathway; I have also quite simply learnt more. About all sorts of things that my own education did not teach me – dinosaurs, space, evolution, Dr Seuss, camping (as a concept, not a personal pursuit!) and much more. You could say it’s been an education – and one I intend to continue pursuing! 🙂

So me aside we have considered various methods of HE and in the end I guess we have reached the one I can probably only call the Goddard version. It’s individually tailored to meet the needs of Davies as Scarlett with me as the facilitator. It takes into account all of our needs and interests, our failings (!) and our strengths. It is mercurial and never the same two days running, it has structure in the same way as a game of Jenga in that we keep building it up by taking bits out of the bottom and putting them on top, wobbling about, sometimes falling down but building it back up again and frankly I could not imagine it any other way. The very thought of sending one of us off dressed in a junior version of a suit and tie in a couple of months fills me with horror – my overwhelming feeling whenever I explore my emotions in relations to HE is relief. Relief I discovered it as a possibility, relief it is a choice for us (a choice in this country, a choice financially, a choice as supported and agreed with by all four of us), relief that the vast network of support, resources and guidance exist out there, relief that we now have a strong network of friends who are also doing it.

When we first started out I was probably more akin to the whole school at home idea than any other. I am now much closer to the idea of autonomy although I do have some basic aims regarding numeracy and literacy but I’ve blogged all this before so I won’t bother again 🙂 What I’m aiming to do is a bit of a round up about where the kids are at and where we have a vague notion of going next really, so here goes!

Scarlett – I am actually very ignorant of the whole school system regarding when they would /could start, where they would go and for how long and what exactly a key stage and a reception is – but blissfully so, so please don’t anyone feel obliged to enlighten me! But I think she would probably be due to start some sort of pre-school either by now or fairly soon, perhaps September – the term before she hits 3? Anyway as a child who is the complete product of HE she seems to be doing pretty bloody well really 🙂 Developmentally she hits all the right milestones on time and often ahead of schedule. Her speech is clear, advanced and she has a wide vocabulary; she can identify huge amounts of things and speak in complete sentences about them. She is beginning to put words into the right tense and stuff like colours, numbers (she can count pretty reliably to 20), shapes etc have proved no real challenge at all.
Her playing is very imaginative – she conducts very real conversations with her toys, uses two or more at a time to recreate situations and make them ‘talk’ to each other and is creative and innovative with her games. She’ s over her previous obsession with jigsaw puzzles and current favourite pasttimes are playing with her babies (two dolls, a baby bath, a potty, various feeding implements and so on), crayons (she loves drawing and colouring although I am still often called upon to draw something under her direction for her to colour in) and her biggest passion is books. She adores books and will go nowhere without them. She has a pile in the car, a pile in her room, regularly raids the bookcase in the hall (and seems to know exactly what she is looking for and where she will find it) and sneaks into Davies’ room to gather books from his bookcase too. This is one child I anticipate no trouble with learning to read – infact I should probably move onto the next level with starting to help her learn letters and sounds. She still loves Dora passionately, still hero worships her big brother and seems to become a stronger character and a more independant soul every week. Finally, although I know it’s probably not very PC and I aim to teach her not to trade on her looks alone I am getting such regular comments about how cute and pretty she is that I guess it’s not just motherly rose tintedness when I look at her and think she’s gorgeous 🙂

Davies – when did he get all big and grown up then eh? I’ve been really proud of Davies this last week. He has been really helpful at looking after Tarly when she was ill, been very mature and responsible about being ill himself, actually been quite a comfort to me while I missed Ady, gone off and done his own thing but been gratifyingly pleased to see me again when he returned, been very good at minding the smaller children and protecting them on a couple of occassions. All told he was a perfect Hannah in training 😉
I think Davies is a very good example of why we chose to HE – he is a product of mixing with adults who love him and listen to him and answer his questions and help with his love of learning; he has benefitted from mixing with a huge variety of children of all ages both male and female and is good at finding common ground with other children and playing with them appropriately. He has found his feet and independance in his own time, with love and support and all the while knowing he can run back any time he wants or needs to he is gradually getting stronger and able to wander that little bit further on his own every time. For Davies the choice to HE was all about his character, his confidence and his individual needs – none of which would have been considered in a school environment. In doing so we have allowed his ability and potential to be realised and academically I believe him to be at the very least on a par with his peers who are ‘in the system’ in numeracy and literacy and way way ahead in terms of general knowledge, (ironically) social skills, articulating himself and imaginative play.
He has had a sudden leap in letter recognition and early reading skills with no considered effort from me – we got part way through 100 EL and then failed to get any further (although I do thank it for giving us a bit of much needed focus and impetus to gte going with reading) and suddenly he wants to play ‘I spy’ on every car journey, read the roadsigns, letters on POS in supermarkets, the words in books, the commands on computer games and pretty much everything else. He is getting to grips with a bit of sight reading and recognising familiar words, experimenting ALL the time with rhyming words and generally getting there in a fairly autonomous way. Dr Seuss I thank you 🙂

Numbers seem to have suddenly clicked for him in much the same way too. He suddenly seems able to count far beyond where I thought he could although he stumbles with the order of tens when counting verbally but could probably write them all the way up to 100 (must do a 100 square with him and test that theory actually!), has grasped the concepts of addition and subtraction (again could probably do a bit more to aid this by getting out some maths type resources toys) and is generally more confident playing around with numbers.

In every other aspect of his educational development I am thrilled at how well HE is panning out. I am pleased with the various things with have signed up to do regularly (TT1, TT2 and of course WAG local group) and I think our current mix of a fairly structured week doing the same kind of stuff on the same day each week but with no real structure over and above that is working in a very positive way for Davies.

His creativity is always a source of wonder for me. He loves his art work and I really want to encourage that, similarly he loves performing in singing and dancing and making his toys put on little shows for us. As a child I always cherished creative artistic ambitions which I was very actively discouraged from as not being academic enough for me – ironic really that I ended up with no academic qualifications over and above bad A levels and a career which would have proved probably more profitable with creative bias studies and I remain a wishful creative person even now. Whilst it would be very easy to think that as Davies is clearly intelligent I should push him in the same way and focus on academic stuff; and equally easy to do the opposite and sign him up for stagecoach and various other arty things and ignore any brainy tendancies I am working very hard to keep all options open and nurture all his passions equally. I think his life has a current happy balance of everything a childhood should have and until it becomes clear he needs something more I intend to continue in much the same vein.

He has responded well in the past to projecty type things, particularly about sciencey stuff so I am planning to do a few more things in that area over the rest of the year encorporating some arty work, some general learning, perhaps some writing and looking at books on the subjects and maybe tieing in some trips to relevant places, but hopefully these will come about in a fairly organic way as opposed to a contrived one.

It’s gotten late now as I have been working on this on and off all night and I fear I will either begin to ramble and repeat myself or leave out important stuff I intended to include so I will end it here and maybe come back and make this a bit more considered at a later date 🙂

Just incase I appear in their shadowy bedrooms and find them wearing gas masks! That show is soo good, rivals even the X files at its best IMO and makes you so proud to be British!

Further malaise here today – I slept from around 11pm right through to gone 9.30am this morning and should be feeling much the better for it but don’t really. We were planning to see Chris and Julie today but as Scarlett has had a really bad tummy all day (the only child ever to insist on continuing her good work with potty training despite bad diarrhea – has saved a fortune in nappies mind you!) and would not let Ady out of her sight and I felt pretty rough too so not inclined to go over with Davies we cancelled and apart from me going to Sainsburys we stayed in all day.

HESFES unpacking is pretty much done – I did a fair bit yesterday when I got in, Ady did some more when he got home and aside from the washing mountain (the line is groaning with four loads done yesterday, rained on twice and still blowing about out there – I refuse to do more until that is dry) it feels like we have settled back home again. Huge bath and my own bed being two comforts I really missed (oh and Ady of course!).

Have been reading blogs and various lists for accounts of other peoples’ HESFES experiences and I have to say we seemed to have missed a fair bit of the action (thankfully!); had a much much better time than a lot of other people and also not has as good a time as others. We were totally unaffected by either the weather, the gradient of the field or the toilets thankfully – I think staying safe within that muddlepuddle cocoon we didn’t leave was probably for the best 😉

So back to real life – next week is actually fairly quiet (and sickness recovery permitting could get even quieter!) with a visit from Where the days go Ali planned for Monday (note to self, must email and get an acceptable lunchtime menu offering from her – or Ali if you’re reading can you send me one!), Mary Rose trip on Wednesday which I am leaving Tarly with my Dad for (looking forward to some time with just Davies, seeing Ros and Layla who I missed at HESFES and seeing Sarah again so soon) and that’s about it. I’ve been meaning to do a sort of HE round up type thing about the kids for ages though so will start one and see how we go with it.

Ady fell out with my Mum a bit while we were away – he had rung her when he was having his hysterical moment about not being able to reach me on Thursday morning and she had been very unsupportive and told him basically not to ring her worrying her as she was about to get in a taxi and go up to London to see Mary Poppins – Ady in a blind panic had probably been rather less than his ususal very polite, model son in law self and I think responded with something along the lines of ‘fuck Mary Poppins!’ – he did ring her back once I had rung him but I think it was only to say ‘she’s rung and she’s ok’ and we have not heard from her since!! I guess I will probably have to be the one to ring them tomorrow as usual – but can’t be arsed tonight which gives her the chance to make the first move…

Depending on the sort of nights sleep we all get and how we are all feeling tomorrow we may venture over to Chris and Julies / see my parents or we might just laze around the house enjoying being together again before Ady heads off for another long weeks work on Monday.

Below are some pics and the daily blog I wrote in word while we were away and have blogged upon our return. TBH it was more for my own blogging habit than any sort of record of HESFES and just my thoughts on each particular day.

We got home today at about midday after packing up and leaving earlier that we anticipated. Kids and I all had a bad night last night and concerned we might still be contagious I thought it better to just come home rather than go and say a goodbye to the rather depleted number of campers left on the field 😉

So, what did I think of HESFES?

Well it was exactly what I expected it to be. It totally lived up to all my expectations – good and bad about how it would be. All of my pre-HESFES worries were justified ; me and the kids missed Ady terribly when he left on Tuesday, I felt quite daunted by the large number of ‘alternative’ folk there; it was totally and utterly disorganised and unclean and the kids were very young for it. Davies did go off twice to the playground – both times with another adult but I was still a bit wobbly about it after about an hour and judging by the hugs from him when we were reunited he had felt much the same. Scarlett did wander off a lot, at least twice to the point of small scale but scary nonetheless search parties; my all time top concern of me or the kids getting ill when I have sole charge of them came true; I didn’t make it to any of the workshops or talks and neither did the children.

However – all of what I was looking forward to also came true – I got to spend time in real life with my online friends – particularly enjoyed spending time with Jax, Sarah, Joanna and The Portico and the evenings with Joyce and Barbara were lovely. I still failed to spend much time with Merry but she was very busy with her 4 🙂 The Saturday night when we had a caravan full was a real highlight for me. It was really nice to see Davies getting straight back into his friendship with Barbara’s B and to see him and Lije getting on too – I also witnessed him dealing with a bigger boy coming over and trying to take something off B which made me very proud.

I also came to the unexpected conclusion that I *could* do camping after all. Not at HESFES and probably not ’til the kids are a bit older but it is certainly something I think I will look into for a couple of years time if the current level of annual camps continues. Also not forgetting the retail opportunity such a past time would provide 😉

HESFES itself I didn’t really do. Being in the caravan park meant that we missed any evening socialising – whether inhouse Muddle Puddle stuff or the entertainment in the marquee and it would have been nice to partake of some of the workshops, but I’m assured by Merry that the talks remain the same each year so as and when I go again I’ll catch those.

I was staggered by how uncommercial the whole thing was – which might just be praise indeed for the organisers as I know that it not what it’s all about but on two levels I found it actually quite offensive that there was no effort at all made to make it as such. Firstly as a self confessed retail addict it was bloody hard work to spend any money there – the hoodies being a case in point. They were rumoured to be arriving on Tuesday and actually made it by Wednesday. They sold out very quickly. Now, the date for HESFES was annouced way back so why exactly they were not there on sale from the very first day – if not on sale on the web pre the event is beyond me. As is why not enough were purchased either – not only that but by buying in greater numbers they would probably have been able to lower the price too. Secondly I just can’t help but see potential opportunities for making more money and improving the service / experience for everyone. I’m not suggesting it gets re-branded as ‘HESFES brought to you in association with Sonlight and Baker Ross’ but I do think there were advertising opportunities given the captive audience of several hundred home educators who may well have been interested in certain related products or services. They would certainly have purchased camping gear / waterproof clothing / pretty much any HESFES branded merchandise and have been glad of the chance to do so. The cost of the programme could have been covered by selling ad space within it, further food and drink concessions within other areas of the sloping fields would have doubtless made both a profit and a happier HESFESer. I can’t comment on the toilets as a confirmed Princess I don’t even know where they were located 😉

I would imagine that plenty of people who went would shudder at what I thought but I certainly spoke to plenty more who would welcome what is perfectly acceptable at many other ‘festivals’ around the country.

Anyway – I think I had decided by about Monday that I won’t be doing HESFES next year – Davies will still be too young – IMO – to be free range, Scarlett will be even more scarily independant and making more considered breaks for freedom, it’s a bloody expensive week if you do the offsite caravan thing and I can’t justify that level of expense again until the kids are old enough for them to get the most out the whole experience and also old enough to allow me to do the adult-y bits of HESFES too.

I’m very very glad we went, it was great to see friends and one of those things I would have regretted not doing if I hadn’t. For the moment there are enough camps and other get togethers arranged for me to consider sufficient meet ups throughout the year to give HESFES a miss and come back to it at a later date.

Playing their grass monster game…

Which looked all cute and lovely until it started licking her
face and I was unable to get close enough to grab her and run due to my own fear of canine creatures!

You may note she is running slightly faster than you would expect on a ‘flat’ field!

Firm friends!

Even if you’d never met this man, I’m guessing you could guess who he was by his accessories!

Tarly knows a retail opportunity when she sees one and enjoys a good browse!

Ah yes, it all went horribly wrong ? Anticipating further sickness from Tarly I was not surprised when by about 4am I had both my children in my bed with me. At 7ish when E and B woke up in the bedroom next door it was only a matter of time before mine woke too and the four of them emptied the fruit bowl, drank milk and ate cereal while Barbara and I blearily tried to get ourselves up for the day and Barbara packed up her car to leave. Scarlett has made a miraculous recovery but Davies was green from getting up and sure enough within an hour of waking he was being sick again 🙁

At 10am I went into the bedroom to get my phone and see 10 missed calls and three texts from a very panicked Ady. I had said I would ring him when I got up this morning (when we had our late night goodnight I love you chat last night) then promptly got caught up in holding bowls for green faced children, changing horrid nappies and generally stumbling round inside the chaos that was our caravan with 7 people in it this morning and genuinely hadn’t even given ringing him a thought. He had been unable to reach me, convinced himself that we had either been poisoned by carbon monoxide leaking from the gas fire, whipped away in a freak static on the seaside storm event, killed in our beds by Barbara who had turned out to be a baddy in disguise (sorry Barbara!!) or run off with one of the travelling families to learn circus skills and live in a brightly painted caravan with frilly nets and a dog tied with rope to the front of it, giving away all my worldly goods and material trappings and wearing just a HESFES hoodie and a hand knitted beanie hat!!! He had rung my Mum, the local police at home to check the procedure for reporting me and the kids missing and was quietly having a nervous breakdown! I possibly didn’t help by laughing at him, telling him he was over-reacting and that I had to get back to holding a dettol scented bucket for Davies!

Barbara left and aside from a very brief outing to Safeway to get emergency supplies of milk and something for my own dinner tonight we have sat on the sofa, watching Dora dvds and colouring all day. The weather has been grey and miserable although I’m not sure whether that makes me happy to be tucked up inside a warm dry caravan or even more fed up to be stuck inside all sad and lonely. At a point this afternoon I seriously considered just packing up and going home and only the fact that I myself felt pretty crappy and probably not up to the drive stopped me from doing so. I am really hoping for a semi decent night’s sleep, no further puke and the chance to go over and have a nice last day with any remaining campers left on the field tomorrow. Failing that we might just pack up and go in the morning – we’ll see. But it would seem a shame to end it with this miserable day as our last one

A fairly good nights sleep although we still failed to get across to HESFES much before about 11am. As we passed the playground we met Barbara and various children including B. Davies almost went in to play but as Barbara was not going in straight away but over to the launderette he panicked at the prospect of no adult supervision and ran back to me instead. We then encountered Jax and Small and that was enough of a pull for him to go back in to play. Scarlett and I carried on up the hill and after trying very unsuccessfully to access the wireless internet I chatted to Joanna and Joyce and watched as Merry and Sarah packed their tents up for the great HESFES early getaway ? Eventually Scarlett and I wandered over to Chez Portico where her and Lulah enjoyed giggling in the van and playing with stamper pens together. Davies returned and I set off with Joyce to get some of the elusive HESFES hoodies.

We wanted to ‘experience’ the labyrinth building on the beach but as I had somehow developed the idea that the beach at the end of our caravan park (all of a two minute walk) was separate to the labyrinth venue beach I decided to drive to it. We arrived way too early at only half an hour later than the published time for labyrinthing in the programme (yes you read that right!) so we had an ice cream and the kids clambered about on the beach really looking the part in their ice cream stained hoodies!

Sarah, Merry and respective children appeared and I sat having my only real chat managed with Merry until someone appeared to inform us that the labyrinth was being built the other side of the beach. (This made perfect sense – the tide was in, there was no sand and barely 20 foot of pebbles on the stretch of beach we were sat on – a shame no one had thought to check that out in advance really!) We went into the café and had ice creams and hot chocolates to allow some progress to be made before we ventured over to check it out and my children behaved as the worlds worst advertisement for HE kids while Merry managed to be responsible for people getting up and leaving the café in disgust at her breastfeeding!!! We then went over to where the labyrinth really was being constructed which involved crossing a river and getting water over the top and inside of both children’s wellies before deciding that actually it was too cold and too cramped to hang around anyway. I then had the realisation that the caravans I could see right infront of us were infact the ones we were staying in and were a bloody site nearer to us than the car!!! So we trekked past our caravan, back across the bridge, beach and carpark to collect out car and drive it back to our caravan!! Ah well, it amused Chris anyway 😉

Barbara, B and R arrived with Joanna, Tamsin and Isabelle for pasta tea and a Dora fix. E had managed to lose herself somehow so was returned to us by Jax on her way over to Joyce’s van a bit later. Somehow we managed to get all five children asleep (although Tarly threw up ? ) at a fairly respectable hour allowing Barbara and I to drink wine, eat lasagne and have a really nice long chat exchanging life stories, HE histories and so on. Another very pleasant evening to follow the one with Joyce from yesterday.

After a vomit free night Ady went off to work never to return and I decided I simply *had* to go into Axminster to find some sort of retail opportunity (supportive as I have been of Portico and Clarke children’s scoobidoo creations and bead bracelets – my van is littered with them! – I felt the need to use plastic!). Sarah and kids came over for their turn in the shower (scald your skin off hot veering to freeze the exposed blood cold – I think it could actually result in requiring medical attention!). I managed to make some phone calls trying to sort out my broadband service provider swapover which was challenging to say the least but worthwhile. Then they left to return to HESFES and we whizzed off to sample the delights of Axminster.

Given that I know who reads my blog and assuming that if anyone else was of a mind to hack into it without a password because they were *that* desperate to see what I thought of Axminster they would be so ashamed of their hacking actions they would not sue me for slander, even if they worked for Axminster Tourist Board or lived there and were fifth generation Axminster inhabitants and had roads there named after their great grandfather and were actually very proud of the place and all it stood for (carpets mainly I believe!) I feel quite secure in telling you the truth. There is nothing in Axminster really worth driving there for from HESFES!!!! Go to Bridport instead 😉

We found a Tesco (not a real Tesco, didn’t sell clothes or toys!) and stocked up on milk and a few other really quite non essential but nice to have bits and then came back again. Packed a picnic and traipsed back over to HESFES. This was popular with Barbara’s B, who Davies immediately went off to play ‘grass monster’ games with – which largely involve picking up heaps of the dried grass from the grand grass cutting ceremony much mentioned on HESchat list and chucking it at each other. There was also some playing with a bit of discarded rope and one of Big’s wellies! Scarlett was very tired and very two and very trying.

I was waved at by someone I did not know by sight on the way in who turned out to be Heather from Pip and Titch fame and also got to grin a bit at Joanna who had arrived on Monday – intend to have a bit more of a chat to both of them perhaps tomorrow.

Scarlett – and her random wandering off interspersed with crying for her Daddy, to go home, to go to sleep, to have things she is perfectly capable of verbalising properly but felt the need to try to articulate to me by the power of the word ‘wahhhhhhhh’ -aside I had a really nice afternoon. Davies went down to the park with Merry, Barbara and assorted other children (including B, obviously!) and I mainly sat around with Jax, Joyce, and Sarah talking about money making schemes, watched Sarah teaching an unidentified teenager how to do scoobidoo. Around five I started to really miss Davies and deciding that ringing Barbara or Merry and asking to speak to him would be just too weird I gathered Scarlett and our tranglings together and began to start the walk down the hill only to be met by them all coming back up the other way.

Got back to the van and fed the kids, then managed to bath them by putting an upturned glass over the shower plughole thus removing at least the surface level of grime from their skins before dispatching them to bed. Tarly went straight to sleep but Davies hung it out a while longer, finally going after many returns to the lounge for ‘one last cuddle and kiss’. Joyce had arrived for wine and chats by then so after a very nice couple of hours of life stories swapping and general chatting about career type stuff and the nature of internet based relationships and how they transfer into real life ones Hannah in the next door but one caravan paged Joyce her ‘come home now it’s getting dark!’ message just as Ady rang me to say goodnight. I made a very indulgent (whipped cream, marshmallows and sprinkles) hot chocolate, set up various heaters around the place, shut strategic doors to prevent Scarlett from a middle of the night break out to the beach and retired for the night myself.

I heard some talk of people coming to HESFES and being alternative for the sake of being alternative over the last couple of days. Sure enough while I was doing something in another cupboard in the caravan I came to find Scarlett had taken her pjs off, turned them inside out and put them back on again – yep, it was rubbing off on us!

Argh!!!! For not the first time already in the last three days I find myself thanking an omnipotent force I don’t believe in that we are Not Staying In A Tent. A really crappy nights sleep last night, Ady and I were both in bed by 10.30pm as he was leaving at 6 this morning. Scarlett was awake and demanding all sorts of obscure things for about an hour round midnight and then we were all woken at 2am by Davies throwing up ? Ady dealt with all of it as I am quite wobbly about sick and then Davies got into bed with me while Ady got in his bed and managed to get Scarlett back to sleep (although there are three bedrooms the kids want to share so we’re using the third as storage). I woke at about 7.30am to find Ady long gone and Davies throwing up again (luckily he is excellent about using a bucket and only really requires me to hold his hand and pass him a tissue afterwards…

Spoke to Barbara and exchanged texts with Sarah and it would appear that we are the only inflicted parties so hopefully it is something he ate / reaction to running around in a field in the sun all day yesterday and only eating drumstick lollies and doughnuts all day / an allergic reaction to tent canvas / patchouli oil or the fumes from 500 camping stoves cooking beans and the rest of us will be ok. Scarlett thus far is fine, Davies did eat some rich tea biscuits and bring them back up but he is currently eating a packet of skips and is fine in himself so hopefully our exclusion will end tomorrow and we can get back to that muddy field again!

Barbara also seems to think the lure of a shower and a clean toilet are worth the risk (and although I do not speak from personal experience if legend is to be believed the loos over at HESFES probably contain greater medical risk than potential lurgy in our vomit van) so will hopefully be arriving for a shower and a chat soon. I have painted my nails, painted Scarlett’s nails, succumbed to setting up my mobile phone and laptop to access emails via the worlds slowest –and possibly most expensive – dial up
Connection to the internet, watched The Incredibles on my laptop with the kids and followed Scarlett aka The Destroyer round the caravan tidying up behind her as she goes. I am about to get Davies dressed and then bring on the good news that I have Green Eggs and Ham on dvd to watch.

UPDATE – Barbara and offspring came over for a very nice couple of hours. We drank lots of tea, the children and Barbara had hosing downs in the temperamental shower, E watched Dora and Cat in the Hat on the laptop, R looked cute and was baby worshipped by Tarly and Davies and B ran around outside with sticks ?

They went back to the field (!) while I got the kids ready for bed and stuck a curry on, then I hijacked Joyce and Hannah on their way back from the beach for a little bit more adult company before Ady arrived back from his very long day.

Oh the plus side of sitting in a caravan for most of the day alone with two small children in varying states of nakedness (them, not me!)? Scarlett appears to have cracked potty training – at HESFES – which must be some sort of odd achievement!