Monday Monday

Ever conscious of the clock ticking down to Caz and Bid leaving for NZ when Caz posted up about a meet up today at Littlehampton Peace to celebrate International Peace Day we decided to go along and snatch hours in their company while we still can. I’d cancelled our intended RI visit today anyway last week when I did a rationalisation on all the lectures I’d booked deciding whether they justified the £20 plus train fare for the 3 of us to get to London and todays was a casualty of that so we were free.

We arrived just after the arranged time of 10am thanks to not actually knowing exactly where the park was -Caz’s instructions had been ‘you know, its the park next to the beach in Littlehampton!’ which did narrow it down a little so we drove along the coast at Littlehampton until we saw a likely looking park and then spotted Saphire who has the same colour hair as me so is distinctive and headed off to park. There is a pay and display right next to the park for £3 for 4 hours, or a walk across the green for on street parking for free. So we went for free and ran across the green (well some of us did, I was more about walking sedately ;)). Katie and her brood were already there along with Caz and Bid, Archie and Elliot. My two and their two fell straight into being together and after a very brief go on the swings
headed for the beach with Bid. The rest of us drank tea from the nearby cafe and chatted, the littler children (two more families joined us) played in the park, Bid veered between the park and the beach and it was just a lovely, lovely morning. We talked Home Ed, parenting, life, the universe and everything and meanwhile Davies and Scarlett played in the sea with some of their very best friends in the world who will soon be playing in oceans on the other side of the world :(.

Eventually Caz and I drifted over to the beach too and Caz, Bid and I chatted further while the four kids continued to play on the sand, building sea defences with sand and seaweed and stones, beachcombing for treasures, splashing about in the waves and just loving life.

The whole conversation was punctuated with loads of ‘oh we’re going to miss you guys soooo much’ from all sides with Bid deciding that we’d just have to move to NZ too and a plan afoot to go straight to Ady’s work and kidnap him so he could sit on the beach with us and dream too. I’ve no idea how, where or when but I am utterly confident we will one day sit on a beach together again…

Caz and I both got sunburnt cleavage, the kids all ran around in sandy pants while their clothes dried out on the beach, Bid and the kids wrote ‘PEACE’ in pebbles on the sand before the tide came in and washed it away and it was just the most perfect way I can think of to be spending a Monday morning really. 🙂

Eventually we all decided we probably should go back to the real world and parted company. Davies, Scarlett and I headed into Littlehampton to get Scarlett some winter boots and to Tesco to get some shorts for gymnastics tonight. The kids and I had a really interesting conversation about the evils of Tesco, the *real* cost of the £1.75 t shirts I’d bought for Scarlett and who actually pays the price (all inspired by The Story of Stuff – if you’ve not seen it, please do watch it!) and why charity shop clothes shopping is a great thing on so many levels.

Back home I made an early tea for the kids and then it was off to gymnastics. Davies and Scarlett have both expressed an interest in gymnastics for the last few months although it has to be said it is solely due to a desire to learn how to do back flips. I did warn them this may not be a speedy goal and we discussed at length the pros and cons of gymnastics including cost, discipline, time investment, commitment to another evening per week, having to listen and pay attention and so on. It’s a half termly fee although there is also an £18 each club membership and insurance to pay out initially for the year which means the first half term is nearly £90.

We got there and they were whisked off upstairs leaving me to watch the activities downstairs. I guess there were 3 groups of children downstairs between about 6 coaches – one lot of smallish kids doing handstands off a springboard, another group of lads doing body conditioning type stuff and a group of mixed age but very high ability girls doing work on the bars. I personally hated it. I hated the way the coaches bullied and spoke to the kids telling them they were lazy / not trying hard enough / didn’t care or want it enough. It was done with bursts of humour and affection and consistent enough to make me realise it is a proven method rather than a bunch of people with really crap interpersonal skills but is so not a way I would respond well to. But then authority and discipline have never been things I have done well with so gymnastics would never have suited me and I know that about myself. I suspect it will not long term suit Davies and particularly Scarlett either but I can see them considering it a means to an end, sticking with it to learn the ‘tricks’ they want to master and then moving away from it. I certainly don’t see this as the beginning of a long term love of the sport. I have massive amounts of respect and admiration for those who do do well with such committment and tolerance for such disciplines really and I can see that it would pay off if that is what you want to do.

After 3/4 of an hour of brief glimpses of the kids from the mezzanine floor room they came downstairs and did work on the bars, the beams and some other bits. They both seemed to do well with stamina and strength type stuff (both won their hanging on the bars for the longest against clearly more experienced children) but were very inept with things like handstands and neither knew what a ‘tuck jump’ was. The coaches seemed patient and dealt with them well, the kids both paid attention and seemed to enjoy the challenge and both are adamant they want to sign up so I’ll sign them up for the first half term and see how they go with it – that unfortunately means they need to get the annual insurance and club membership at £18 each so it comes to nearly £90 for the first half term although it will be more like £50 normally per half term for the two of them. Gulp. On the plus side I won’t need to hang around and it is about a 3 minute drive so I’ll get 90 minutes to myself on a Monday evening.

Back home just after Ady and I had a headache. The kids were hungry after such an early tea so I read them a few chapters of which I found a bit too silly (especially when it talked about penguins and polar bears together – grr) but the kids seemed to like while they ate toast.

I had a bath and cooked dinner (first time in ages – for cooking not bathing) and we watched Come Dine with Me. Ady’s off to Birmingham for the day tomorrow so he’s got a very early start – the rest of us have a bottom heavy day with swimming and Davies’ first time at Sea Scout Cubs in the evening.