One word? When seven would do…

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 🙂

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 The only glasses I had were at least two prescriptions and four years out of date so I decided to get some updated ones for emergencies like lost lenses and possible soaking of lenses occassionally to remove said gunk build up.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 🙂 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 🙂

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 😉 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 🙁

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 🙂 (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 🙂 ) 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 😉