One word? When seven would do…

It’s a funny thing how friendships really do need something in common to remain healthy. I have got a school friend who I see very occassionally and our lives are so far apart now all we seem to do is reminice about school which can only fill a finite period of time before we go our seperate ways and back to exchanging Christmas cards with annual updates on where our lives are at the time.

Rachel has been here this morning and there have been a few instances of not really having much to talk about with each other. We met at baby clinic when Davies was about a week old and saw each other weekly ’til we moved away, stayed in fairly regular contact while we were away and seemed to pick back up where we left off when we came home last year – she was pregnant and I had already had number 2 baby so we had plenty to talk about there. She had also considered HE so that was a popular topic until she made the final decision not to and E started school.

Today is the first time we’ve met up since pre Melrose – we’ve not seen E for weeks and weeks and last week he started school full time. So now she is a woman with one child in school and a 4 month old baby. I am a woman with no kids in school and a noisy, messy, attitudey toddler. For some reason we struggled to find topics which were safe – I felt like my enquiring about E and how he was finding school sounded judgemental (which it so isn’t!) and she obviously felt she couldn’t slate school or mention her worries in too much depth incase I try and ‘convert’ her to HE, and it just feels like forever ago since I had a baby and was thinking about stuff like weaning, were they about to roll over and so on – an alien and long since left behind world. Just an odd morning really – hopefully next time we meet it will click back to normal.

Davies sat and watched class TV again this morning – he does really well with the Look and Read stuff and it is reinforcing the sounds stuff we have done with 100EL. He also watched something on one of the maths programmes about green bottles hanging on the wall type subtraction and recreated it with ‘five white glue spreaders having on the oil filled radiator’ – highly educational 🙂

They have played with sticklebricks, wooden blocks, duplo and other building – y stuff this morning. Davies built a Drusillas (zoo), a pirate ship, a Captain Hook, Peter Pan and Tinkerbell, a village and some other elaborate structures – all very recogniseable actually but they have been destroyed before I had a chance to take photos. He is now watching a dinosaur film on dvd – his choice – while sitting on the floor with Scarlett having a conversation about the colour of their skin. Not the greatest of films ever made but it does have some cool music and some good triumphs over evil type moral ending!

Scarlett has looked at pictures of herself as a baby, eaten the last of the Christmas chocolates (dark chocolate covered gingers!) and alternately annoyed and played with Davies in his games. And cooed and oohed and ahhed over baby A 🙂

Got a letter this morning from the church hall to say they would only charge me £28 instead of £45 for the forgotten cancellation 🙂 So glad I refrained from my anti religion rant 😉 Also arrived in the post this morning our Harry Hill tickets, which although is not until October reminds me that I do have times planned ahead with no kids 🙂 Now just need to get my Richard Herring tickets booked (the venue is not selling tickets yet although it is advertised) and I will feel as though we have a social life again!

Scarlett woke last night but Ady dealt with it and she did not leave her room. She had a bit of a tantrum about it but was not awake for too long so I am feeling more positive about life in general 🙂 Also the sun is shining 🙂 Ordered some books from Book People online too which always make me feel sunny!

And that’s about it from here. More later, probably.

This morning Ady was trying to get ready for work but Scarlett wanted to sit on his lap to drink her milk. Davies offered to give it to her and amazingly she agreed

And one of the four cousins having ten minutes playing in the bitter cold at the weekend – I had to put the kids hands in my armpits to get the blood running back into them again afterwards but they had a great time 🙂
note my hard Manchester born girlie with no hat on!

In the shape of spending money on face creams, PMT treatments and sleep inducing sprays and temple balms 🙂 A jumper for Davies (his choice of pressie 🙂 ) and a bathtime marble run for Tarly which I will bring out tomorrow.

In the shape of spending a couple of hours in the company of other normal, Home Educating mothers talking about the state of our mental health in direct corrolation to our sleep deprivation levels, the time of year and a challening few weeks post Melrose euphoria mixed with pox anticipation and quarantine, snow but not enough to play in and several other businessy things to give head space to.

In the shape of Ady arriving home early and a brief snatched chat deciding to give some sort of sleep thingy a go (neither child in our bed, once in bed they have to stay in their bedrooms even if we end up staying in them too). A slight tricky moment when we debated how it was going to work;
A: I have to drive each day, I NEED to sleep
N: I have to look after the kids each day – unless I get sleep I will be one of the stories in Take A Break about a seemingly happy everyday woman who one day lost it and my neighbours will all have to be interviewed about how I always seemed to cheerful when they saw me with the kids
A: OK – maybe I can go in to work late if I am up in the night and shift my day around a bit.

So that’s our plan – not sure who will be doing what yet and maybe the kids will sleep through anyway now we have a cunning plan but I do at least feel we have taken positive action.

Wednesday I am going to meet with Boss Lady – which will be a nice day out and will also lead to some paid employment, there is a job in the paper I am going to apply for too and I am feeling positive about getting back into some sort of career somehow this year.

Education? We watched the schools programmes and Davies did really well with the look and read type shows – maths went a bit over his head and I think we need to dig out the Exeter Maths books to start some sort of structure on that one. Feel quite relaxed about HE though – last of my worries 🙂

Just getting it all back in perspective, having a plan and the promise of a child free few hours has made the sun come out again 🙂

Of this endless self pity – I am boring myself and I am not by nature a wallower (although I do have the figure for it 🙂 )

Giving myself a shake of the shoulders and a slap round the face and a bucket of cold water over the head and an urge to count my blessings not my whatever the opposite of blessings are? Misfortunes? dunno, anyway… am risking turning into my mother (Dad’s stock impression of her ‘if we didn’t have bad luck we wouldn’t have any luck at all’) am risking making my eternally patient, kind and loving husband running off with someone else who is capable of cracking a smile (well probably not actually but I do have a flair for the over dramatising so I may as well use it), kids only education has been to learn not to bother asking me for anything and to frantically work out how to use the phone so they can dial Childline and get someone to rescue them, I am not a comfort eater by nature and can normally take or leave chocolate but have been troughing tonnes of the stuff and it simply has to stop!

So.

Another truly crap night last night – I am totally sleep deprived and although I don’t have any sort of master plan I do know that we can turn this around somehow – will chat to Ady later about what we are going to do to prevent the nightly rendition of musical beds, ranting mother, hysterical child screaming for a mummy who really just wants to be left alone and is rapidly finding the neediness of said child completely overwhelming – aside from anything else I can’t even see what there is attrative about me to be wanting to spend time with me at all – let alone 24 hours a day. I think we need to install a total bed ban on any children in our bed for now – not saying they can never come in it again but I think we need a ground rule that extreme for now so that in that middle of the night, only been asleep for about half an hour mental wooliness we don’t keep falling into the trap of letting them share our pillows in the silly misguided hope that we and they might get some sleep. I know what a different place the world is the right side of a decent nights sleep and that is the world I want to be seeing.

Back in the loop again today socially too which must surely help – seeing Jenny, Julie and various other HE folk at Jenny’s later (inlcuding cheap book buying opportunities 🙂 ) seeing Rachel tomorrow and have Twinkle Tots and Tumble Tots on Friday. Parents have in theory agreed to the day trip to London next week (not an overnight trip – just me saying I need a whole night where I indulge in sleeping not being Mummy!) and I have decided we are not seeing anyone on Saturday but I might sneak off either alone or with Davies (the worst victim of my mardiness this week, bless him) for a few hours somewhere . And then of course it is Mother’s Day on Sunday – lol what a week to be wishing I wasn’t one eh!

So that’s it. I think far from helping by getting it off my chest my blogging this week has made me feel slightly worse, so sorry to all those who have bothered to read it 🙁 I’m sure it has been dreary and depressing – rather like Eastenders but without the cliffhanger at the end 🙂

Will probably be back later – off to make lunch then off to Jenny’s via a medicinal trip to Boots ( feel the need to stroke cosmetics and either get a quick hit by buying something or a feeling of immense self satifaction for resisting the temptation – win/win situation!) 🙂

that endless daze, that total daze you gave me.
I’m thinking of the daze, I woun’t recall a single day believe me
daze I could be in all my life
daze where I don’t know day from night
I bless the sleep, I bless the sleep you give me…

dedicated to Davies and Scarlett 🙂

Yep, feel like I am wandering round in a perpertual daze really – only broken by occassional low points (several rants coming up) and the odd highlight (some examples if I can think of any!)

Feel really bad complaining really as Ady gave me a full nights sleep last night by attending to any wandering small people – I did wake feeling much better but within an hour of getting up I am feeling like someone has left the cellophane wrapping on me and I am just not working properly. Not helped by the fact I am wearing my glasses today – I have worn all day all night contact lenses for the last 2.5 years so had almost forgotten that I have crap eyesight as there is only the split second between whipping one out to be replaced with a new one once a month when I am not wearing them. Cannot believe how bad my eyesight is without them actually – or how trippy wearing glasses is. I’ve never really worn them before and it feels like being drunk – looking straight ahead is fine but the smallest sideways glance or look down at the keyboard without moving my head aswell makes me go all spinny.

Kids are acting like the ADHD boys in Desperate Housewifes due to neglectful parenting of only giving negative attention, the list of stuff I really should be doing is piling up and I have no motivation to do anything other than eat chocolate really.

Took the kids to Tescos this morning as needed a few bits, Scarlett fell asleep in the trolley which required a lot of odd trolley pushing on my part to keep her head supported by me somehow instead of letting it loll on the metal bar to be walloped every time the trolley went over a bump or collided with an old person’s trolley, spent much more than I should on tat and junk food. Home for lunch and we had a brief period of peace while we all played with geomags. Have snuck off to find something I can do with them which won’t require much brain power, mess or negotiation skills on my part.

Should be doing my online learning course – only one assessment and I have completed the first half – the second half looks much more interesting and is new stuff instead of rehashing bits and pieces I already half knew and covering the theory side of stuff. I also need to be reviewing a website for Boss Lady and thinking as to what I can offer her in terms of workload for a meeting we are supposed to be having in the next couple of weeks. Oh and I need to grovel to my parents to have the kids while I go to said meeting (which will be a trip up to London – so an all day longer babysitting grovel). Also have at least two other businessy things I should be doing – both of which answer all my dream job requitements but also require me to be getting off my arse and doing something about them, and the monthly juggling act of robbing Peter to pay Paul is sitting in my to do pile too.

Kids have won a reprieve from boarding school as even I can see that their behaviour is a reflection of mine, not the cause of it. What I really need is a day pass to freedom – just one day (well and one night too) to be Nic again instead of Mummy. Hopefully the trip to London, the need to wear something other than jeans and the idea that people looking at me wouldn’t necessarily know I had two small children hanging off me for most waking (and sleeping) moments might just be enough to pull me back into where I should be.

So, a rant or two –
I forgot to cancel the church hall we use for group the week we were at Melrose – totally my fault and if you’d asked me whether I had made that phonecall I would probably have assured you that I had – I just didn;t actually do it. Got home from Melrose to a very snotty answerphone message to say someone had waited an hour for me to turn up and they had had the heating on too 🙁 I rang straight away and apologied profusely, explaining it had been a total oversight on my part, nothing to do with the group and that if they fowarded the invoice to me personally I would cover the cost. The woman (who only takes care of the bookings of the church hall and does not actually own it and frankly could do with being a bit friendlier given the fact I am a CUSTOMER as in I am paying money in exchange for goods or services) did not really accept my apology well anyway and today the bill has arrived for the last three weeks and they have charged full price for the hall for that day including use of both halls and the kitchen when the weeks either side of it we only used one hall. So that leaves me £45 out of pocket 🙁 I have sent a cheque from the group for the two weeks we used the hall and a covering letter asking for a revised invoice for the group and one for me personally and very nicely saying that I felt it was slightly excessive to charge for two full hours and for all the halls but if they sent me a new bill I will pay it. Arse! Will not put an anti religious rant although I am sorely tempted to.

So to end on a happy note – while I was on my hands and knees picking up the crayons (for at least the 14th time in the last two days) Scarlett literally leapt on my back yelling ‘Fun. Horsey!’ which had all three of us helpless with laughter. I love them both lots, I would just like the chance to miss them once in a while…

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 🙂

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! 🙂

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 £250 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 🙁

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 🙁 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 🙂 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 🙁 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 🙁

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 🙁 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 £1.60 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 🙁

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! 🙂

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 🙂

Is there an Usborne book of ‘how we all got here in the first place’? 🙂

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 🙂 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? 😉 ). 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 🙂

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 🙂

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 🙂

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 🙂

Lunch, during which Davies behaved really badly, pulling all his best attention seeking, silly childishness tricks out of the bag 🙁 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 🙂

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 🙂

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 🙂

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 🙂 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 🙂 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 😉

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 🙂 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! 😉 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 🙂

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 🙂 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. 🙁

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 ( 🙂 ) 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 🙂

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 🙂 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.