First overnight in arctic conditions survived. It *is* cold, we tend to keep our house on the warm side of normal anyway so we’re feeling it all the more. I slept in a fleecy nightie and socks last night and as I usually sleep naked I expected to wake in the night too hot and take them off. I didn’t! I think that early morning heating cutting in at 6am ish must make all the difference.
Ady woke me before he left (again) to say the sky wasn’t working so sorting that out was my first task. It turned out to just need resetting so I did that, drank some tea, make the kids breakfast, let out the chickens and then did some baking. I made snickerdoodles and M&M cookies. Davies came along and helped at the end although I suspect it was a well time ‘help’ to be around for spoon licking duty ;).
We gathered ourselves together and headed off to Ali’s.
We had a very nice time there with plenty of chatting for me, enjoying the various games consules (PS, wii, xbox 360) for Davies, kitten worshipping for Scarlett. Not sure the kids did much in the way of socialising with each other but it was very nice just the same :).
We left there and headed for home. As I brightkited earlier I am not *always* right but I do have a fairly high success rate so when Tarly came to me nearly in tears because she’d left behind at Ali’s the toys I’d told her she probably shouldn’t take incase she forgot them, swiftly followed by Davies also nearly in tears that he couldn’t find the trousers to wear for Badgers that I’d asked him to check were where he thought they were yesterday (his usual pair are wet in the washing machine with no way of my drying them. I knew he had a spare pair otherwise we’d have gone to the laundrette or dried them infront of the fire or something yesterday, which was why I asked him to check). We found some trousers for Davies and although Scarlett insists she will desperately miss her cuddly toys she has plenty of others to comfort her til we next see Ali :).
I made their tea and Ady arrived home. He lit a fire to get the house warming up while we were out, the kids got changed and we went to Badgers. Davies had said earlier he didn’t want to go, which is most unlike him and I’d been fairly dismissive.
Ady and I had a walk around while the kids were in Badgers and then went to collect them. On the way home Davies was a bit tearful and explained that he’d not wanted to go because he is in a different group for this badge and he doesn’t really know the other children in that group. When pressed he said that actually two of the boys have been a bit mean to him. One of them he had previously said he liked but a lad who used to come and then stopped has come back again and seems to be both being a bit unkind to Davies and leading the other lad in it too.
It’s half term next week so I’ve said I’ll have a chat with the leader next time and just draw her attention to the fact Davies is feeling like this and that he should make a special effort to be friendly to them at the same time. I tend to veer possibly too far towards listening to his fears and worries and giving validation to his feelings but I do believe that regardless of intent on the part of the other boys if Davies is feeling like this then he is both entitled to his feelings and we need to find a way of remedying it. I suspect that his HE status, increasingly different outlook and approach to life to most kids is going to have him finding himself in situations like this and I don’t want to just withdraw from everything like we did with Beavers (although I still think in that particular set of circumstances we did the right thing). This is one of the aspects of HE I always knew would be an issue as the kids got older and whilst I celebrate being different to the crowd and going our own way I do vividly recall being a child desperate to fit in and be just like everyone else. Ironically I can see how this could be a crossroads that would have a child deciding to go to school. I doubt very much that is what will happen with us but it is something both children, with our help and support, are going to have to get used to dealing with.
At Ady’s suggestion – he often comes at this things from a different perspective to me – we all watched a bit of the Girls and Boys Alone programme and chatted a bit about that. Then we got back to ‘normal’ for us and started the next Humphrey book.
Dinner, some Relocation and some Grand Designs and now as the fire dies down and it gets pretty cold in here I’m off to bed!
okaaaay. maybe the next post will be cheery.
tho did wonder if Ady was reporting the sky was falling as in Chicken Licken . . .
Comment by Michelle — 14 February 2009 @ 10:00 pm