Catching up

Tamsin had a big day out with Grandpa today to go and see Thomas the Tank Engine at a local steam railway. The plan was that Bill and I would get to grips with the house mess .... Hmmmm

To start with, I got stuck in to the corner around my desk with was piled up with all sorts of crap. Bill took Isabelle and the dog out for a walk and Isabelle fell asleep. When he got back, a failure in communication between us ended up in an argument and a major meltdown on my part. Sobbed and sobbed about how I feel I am running flat out everyday to barely keep up, the house is falling into disarray around me, I have no organisation, I regularly fail to make decent meals (and I am a nutritionist!!) am late everywhere and lose and forget things all the time. I'm either spinning around in circles trying (and failing) to get stuff done or I'm collapsing in an exhausted heap. I'm irritable with the children and generally feel I am failing at everything.

Bill once again proved to have marvellously absorbent shoulders and a plan .... We may get somewhere. Watch this space. I continued sorting out *one small corner* of crap under my desk. How come Merry does so much when there's only a baby in the house?

In 'other news', it was great having a visit from my brother Martin who lives in the USA. We realised it was 4 years since we'd last met, 6 years since he was last here visiting me (for Benjamin's funeral...) and it must be donkeys years since we had the chance to chat as much as we did this week. It was good to have him here, but sad to see him go again.

Good day

Started well with a fairly free morning, which these days we don't have except at the weekends. Since I've been sending Tamsin to playschool on Monday mornings so I can have a 'free' morning (with Isabelle only) as well as Wed to Fri mornings so I can work, and we go out to a group on Tuesday mornings, we are very short of days to just get up and chill out, or achieve something at my best time of the day i.e. 8-11am. Anyway, after clearing up a bit and, of course, building track (but managing to keep the TV off) we walked into town for me to drop a few bits and pieces into the charity shop. Bargain of the week, month or year was then discovered with the purchase of a pair of Gucci 'jeans' (soft, stretchy) for £9.99!!!! Not that the label should necessarily be that impressive but they are very well fitting and well made. I buy the majority of my clothes from the charity shop these days, but they're better clothes than I ever had before! I also got Tamsin a lovely wooden jigsaw puzzle and a pop-up toy for Isabelle.

Then after lunch it was off to Gloucester to visit Clare and girls of Playing it by Ear fame. Despite arriving with Isabelle covered in sick due to the yogurt she had just before leaving home not agreeing with her (and me not bringing a change of clothes for her, oops!), Clare was very welcoming and it was really delightful to meet her and her 2 girls. I think we have plenty in common and a reciprocal visit should be made in due course. Isabelle seemed to be particularly impressed with Rosie, laughing and smiling at her quite a bit, and towards the end, after both of them taking quite a while to warm up, Tamsin and Rosie played together hidden behind the sofa. In fact, Tamsin announced on her way home that she really liked that little hidey-hole and wants one of her own in our living room!

Dinner seemed just too big a hurdle to face on getting home, so we had fish and chips.

Tomorrow I have a work meeting in the morning while Tamsin goes to playschool, then home to make some sense of the mess in order to welcome my eldest brother Martin who is staying for a couple of nights during a shortish visit from the USA. Looking forward to that!

What's been going on

Miscellaneous activities, in no particular order:

- Went to see "The Gruffalo" at the theatre in Cheltenham yesterday. Tamsin loved it. She wants to go to the theatre again!

- Done another Usborne book party this afternoon - very low-key and small orders but I'm still practising, so it all helps.

*Pauses, trying madly to think if anything else positive, educational or useful has been done recently - and concludes that no, it hasn't"

Have spent much time agonising over the overwhelming number of things to do and lack of time or energy to do them. Am very peed off with the state of the house, and various other things.

Ah well, think positively. My brother is visiting from the USA this week - staying here Tuesday till Thursday. We haven't seen him for, umm, can't remember how long but a few years I think, so I'm looking forward to that. And tomorrow I am going to blog-bump with the Playing it by Ear crew for the first time!

More about yesterday than today

Swimming was great yesterday. We were late (as always) and only had 20 minutes in the pool, but while Isabelle played with the acoustics (she was definitely fascinated by the different sound of her voice in that place) Tamsin played about with some floats and was eventually persuaded to lean forward onto one, lift her feet off the floor and kick a bit! On the way home I called in on a friend who has 2 boys aged 3 and 5 and Tamsin had a good time playing with them, while Louise and I chatted non-stop about all sorts of things, ranging from creation/evolution to HE/school. She offered us tea/supper there which I gladly accepted and we left for home at about 7pm. My hopes that the girls would fall asleep on the half-hour journey home and then be quickly and easily transferred to bed came to naught when Tamsin resolutely stayed wide-awake and Isabelle fell asleep but woke up when I was getting her car-seat out of the car. Damn.

Today has been relaxed playing, quick trip to Tesco, out for a communal/shared lunch at someone's house in celebration of a friend's new baby, home, swing, Learning Land CD-Rom, dinner, bath and bed by 7pm. Must find the Melrose booking form! NB: I've already sung Isabelle back to sleep twice this evening - which she accepted very quickly - but please, please, please let her quickly stop waking so often! I'm having lots of sad feelings about the leaving behind of babyhood stage as she approaches her 1st birthday and is almost standing/walking, and I just keep cuddling her (probably too much!) and cherishing her baby-ness, but the disturbed sleep is something I will be *so* glad to leave behind, whenever it eventually happens!

Making a little progress

Every time Isabelle woke last night, I attempted to sing her back to sleep instead of feeding. Several times she accepted it! I think I fed her 2 or 3 times, when the noise was escalating instead of calming down, but probably 4 or 5 times she heard me sing or hum and just rolled over and went back to sleep. I'm hoping she will quickly learn she'd rather sleep through than hear me sing!

This morning Tamsin's been at playschool and I have totally failed to make positive use of the time available. Took Isabelle and the dog for a walk to try and get her to sleep but she didn't drop off till I got to the office, where I had some stuff to give to Kate. Then got tied up in helping a guy from South Carolina try and connect to our internet service..... failed .... and then had to go and get Tamsin back from playschool. Bright spot of the morning - my first Usborne order arrived. Haven't had time to have a good look through yet though. Going swimming this afternoon.

Sleeeeeeeep

Is what I did all afternoon today - well, I've had precious little of it for several nights so I asked Bill (or was it 'insisted') to give me the afternoon off and I just slept - okay so it was still disturbed every hour or so due to Isabelle waking 3 times from her nap and then Tamsin coming in, but it still helped.

Tamsin loved her dancing again yesterday. It made me feel rather inadequate about HE, actually, seeing her have such fun with other kids and responding well to a teacher, but still I can see there is a big difference between doing that for an hour or so at a time and full-time 9am - 3pm every weekday. I so wish it was easier and more 'normal' to arrange flexi-schooling. Even if we did manage to arrange it, there is a danger the child would be seen as odd and not really being accepted due to not being there for the same hours the other kids were.

At last, some education! EDITED

Isabelle has definitely said 'mum' a couple of times today (yah boo to Bill!! who had Tamsin say 'dada' long before she ever said 'mama', so it's only fair....!). I'd like to kid myself that she was addressing me, but I don't think she was, instead just practising the sound.

Anyway, having awoken from a strange dream (in which I and the family were visiting the Beans and I cooked a very strange large hot curry for lunch which I certainly wouldn't have wanted to eat, and then we were all poring over the Chinese takeaway menu choosing what to have for dinner, but Isabelle woke me before I chose) I whizzed off to Tamsin's playgroup slightly early with a box full of Usborne books to try and flog some. Didn't manage to get there early enough to catch many of the mums, but handed out several leaflets nevertheless and also some to mums coming for the Baby & Toddler Group. In the end I decided to say I needed orders to be in by Friday, so here's hoping. I need to make a few phone calls and try and drum up a few parties here and there too.

I was on the parents' duty rota today, and it was absolutely manic. On Wednesdays and Fridays they take 2-year olds (2 years and 9 months upwards for the rest of the week) so there were 14 kids this morning, plus my own 2 being fairly demanding for my attention. I was completely knackered by 11am. Plugged on till 1pm, came home, and absolutely insisted to Tamsin that I would sit down uninterrupted for 10 minutes, and not get up for anything.

Having recovered slightly, this afternoon we have looked at "Things People Do", one of the Sonlight books. First time we've done any Sonlight for over a week (or anything overtly educational at all, as a matter of fact!). I think I'll have to accept that I'm definitely not going to follow the schedule, but instead just have the books there to look at as and when. Then we've made bread by hand, instead of in the machine. Next we took the dog for a little walk, during which we saw a car going through the carwash at the local garage, and watched the postman emptying the postbox. Then I've actually made a proper healthy dinner (roast chicken, roast new potatoes and broccoli followed by melon) and Isabelle, having missed her afternoon nap, has gone straight to bed.

I'm supposed to be going out these evening, for the first of a series of group meetings on "Freedom in Christ", but I'm so knackered I don't know if I can drag myself out. In fact, I realise that it's time I was going out of the door, but Bill still isn't home, so obviously I can't go atm anyway.....

Edited to add: I knew there was something else we did. We actually got round to attaching most of the postcards from the postcard exchange to the map of the UK. Too many of you live in the South - there isn't enough room.

And, I did go out to FIC - it was very good and well worth it.

She has consonants!!!

Isabelle woke this morning, rolled over, and said "g g g". And then "muh muh". Wow, at last she has consonants! Slowly but surely ....

Still no crawling, but she pulls herself up at every opportunity and is getting much steadier while standing.

Shall we dance?

Well, Tamsin will anyway. We had her first session at the "Fun Dance Club" this afternoon, and she loved it! Mostly 'kiddy' stuff, pretending to be bears or kangaroos or whatever, but some 'country dancing' complete with do-si-do, and a bit funky stuff too. Actually it's lucky that she got there, because true to form I lost the letter and booking form, and once the closing date past I regretfully decided we'd just have to wait till next term to try again, but the organiser phoned me yesterday to see if we did want a place because she was holding one for us!

The title is also appropriate because tonight has been 'Rural Cinema' night, when Kate and I show a film at the local school. Today's offering has been 'Spanglish', which was OK-ish but not worth going out for, and only 12 people turned up, but next month we are showing "Shall we Dance" with Richard Gere, so that'll be worth it!

Have recovered a little from Wednesday's stress, making a special effort to remain calm and low-key and not snap irritably at Tamsin so much. Thanks for all the encouraging comments everyone. There is still an overwhelming amount to do and too little time, but c'est la vie ....

Losing it...

I just feel like I have not got a grip on anything. I am juggling too many balls in the air and they're starting to come crashing down. The house is a tip; we're not doing proper HE because first of all I need to read the instructions on how to do the Miquon, Handwriting without Tears, Reading Reflex and I haven't got time or the mental energy; whenever Tamsin asks to do something I say "not right now, I've just got to ....." (insert next most urgent task that's been waiting for days and really *has* to be done now); Isabelle is waking several times a night and I cannot get my head round how to night-wean her without it being a terrible ordeal (she still won't take any kind of cup or bottle); I cannot seem to stick to any of the boundaries I set for myself or Tamsin like less TV or less computer because I give in as soon as I have a weak moment (very often); Tamsin has taken to shouting or snapping back at me and it's only because I do it to her so often; ..... I could go on about all the other things that are pressing in on me .... but I'm too tired. AAAAAARRRRRGGGGGGGHHHHHHH!

A perfect heart

.... is what Isabelle has got, thank God! Not that we had much doubt about it, but it was good to check. Finally today, after appointments, cancelled appointments, changed appointments, missed appointments which we didn't know about and rescheduled appointments, we got an ECG and echo on Isabelle's heart, just to make sure. We did the same with Tamsin too, when she was a baby. It's good to know there are no little surprises lurking there for the future.

Sonlight is going well. Tamsin pounced on Berenstain Bears book of Science and Nature, and we're well into the seasons at the moment. She's had a go at making animals with her pattern blocks, and proved today that she definitely can decode some three-letter cvc words. With no pictures or other clues, this afternoon she read 'cat', 'leg', 'mat' and 'bed' and, with a little help, 'milk' and 'book'. She was delighted with herself, but still says she doesn't want to learn to read ..... okaaaay!

Hooray!

Sonlight package arrived today!!! Very exciting - lovely books. I think we'll have fun with this.

Happy Anniversary

to me and Bill. 15 years ago we got married on an absolutely wonderful day in Stratford-on-Avon, followed by the most beautiful outdoor reception at the Mill at Harvington. Those with more time (I'm just about to put the kids to bed) and lyrical ability with words would insert a romantic description of the day, the dress and all those little stories that go to make up a happy wedding day, including the 'rollers stuck in the hair' bedtime fun that we had ..... but you'll either have to beg me to tell you all about it when I've got more time, or use your imaginations ....

Anyway, I may be a bit scarce this evening. Got celebratin' to do, y'know!!!

On other news, the second day of attempting to get Isabelle used to a little formula milk to aid in the night-weaning process has not gone well. Yesterday she just refused to taste it, today she tasted it and gagged. Hmm, will keep trying, but am not confident!

Yesterday

was not good. Well, the morning was OK as I had to go into work for an hour to meet some people, took the kids in with me and all was fine. It was market day as well, so on the way back we mooched, had ice-cream and paid in some cheques that had been waiting for ages to go in. (Most of it my birthday money - I love having a bit of money to spend and musing over what to buy for *myself*!)

Got home and had lunch, and then, as per usual, I was sooooo tired that I just couldn't motivate myself to anything. Didn't want to move, didn't want to interact with Tamsin's incessant chatter. So I resorted to Nick Jr for Tamsin and bed for me and Isabelle, in the hope that Isabelle would nap. She didn't. I dragged myself up again and failed to do anything productive or interesting with the girls. Decided a trip to Tesco would be the highlight of our day, so did a big shop and had to threaten never to bring Tamsin shopping again if she continued to behave the way she was. Isabelle fell apart with tiredness while I was cooking dinner (late, at around 6.30pm) so I put her to bed, Tamsin and I ate, Bill came in just as we were finishing off and I then went into 'brain switched off' mode and stared at the computer for an hour or two. Never got round to making the decision to take Tamsin to bed until I couldn't stay awake any longer myself, so around 9pm we went upstairs, never to be seen again.

Last night's waking tally is difficult to recall in the fuzziness of sleep. I remember trying hard to compute how many times it was and to force my tired brain into remembering the number, but obviously it didn't work. I know that after being put to bed at 6.30pm, she woke up at 8pm, 10pm and 11pm and then there were at least two or three more wakings during my sleep time. Plus two wakings by Tamsin. Humph, this is getting old very quickly.

Last night's waking tally:-

5 times by Isabelle
Twice by Tamsin

(Yawn) No wonder I'm fit for nothing this afternoon.

Stressful day

Had an argument with Bill as he left for work this morning (since resolved, I think); my Mum came for a couple of hours to drop off the dog (who she'd had for a few days while we were away) and took *huge* offence because Tamsin frowned at her (shock, horror!) and even worse, later on, said "Don't be silly!" to her. I thought my mother was about to spontaneously combust or something ..... She is just so quick to take offence and get angry but can't stand it if anyone dares to get cross with her... anyway, I'm not going to waste any more bandwidth on her.

Then I had to do a desperately urgent search for some papers needed for Playschool - thankfully found them! Then off to a Playschool committee meeting of which I am Chair, so I got landed with the job of phoning a parent to chase up some outstanding money. Was worried she might let rip at me, and as she wasn't answering her phone this afternoon it was hanging over me for ages. Fortunately when I did speak to her she was just apologetic.

So, today's had more than its fair share of minor stresses. But it's also had some positive touches. Managed to keep the TV off for most of the day, and had some good one-on-one time with Tamsin, doing jigsaw puzzles, train track, counting money, drawing (some lovely pics of the family, including dog!) and so on. Was very aware that I had been intending to start more serious HE stuff today, but I still haven't got half the Sonlight stuff and haven't prepared the other things, so decided to wait another week.

Now have just got to go and catch up on the 5 months of finances I haven't done .....

In my defence:

... we were away at Greenbelt for the Bank Holiday weekend (Friday till Tuesday), emptied the caravan on Wednesday, went north to Teesside on Thursday to visit Bill's Dad and got home late on Friday, had a full day out with friends to Moreton-in-Marsh Show on Saturday and been out at church all morning - so not much time to get things straight!

I feel it's time I blogged about Isabelle, now she is 10 months old. She's still not mobile - her attempts to crawl pretty much stopped when she learned to sit - but she does love standing up (supported). She pretty much forces us to help her stand whenever she can. She's not quite safe enough to leave hanging onto something, but she's nearly there. Last Saturday at Greenbelt she spontaneously started walking while being held up, so that was fun! She absolutely loves pressing buttons, being in the bath, and blowing little bubbles. She loves a little game we have where she will vocalise something and I will copy, then she changes the pitch or the sound a little and waits for me to follow suit, over and over again! She is quite keen on food, although doesn't take much at each sitting. I usually give her a portion of whatever we are eating, as long as it is suitable, otherwise just the veg, and she pretty much feeds herself as it is all finger food.

Temperamentally she is very laid back, easy going and happy. Her beaming smile is bestowed upon many people, although lately she has taken more to seriously studying faces before eventually relaxing into the big grin. She takes life at an easy pace, not rushing to reach her milestones (!) ... who knows, maybe she is as tired as I am seeing as she wakes several times a night - I am determined tonight to try and count exactly how many. I remarked to a friend this morning that I thought she was waking me about 6 times per night - "well, that's better than the 14 times Tamsin used to wake you," she said, "I used to wonder if there was any point in you actually going to bed!" I'd forgotten about that. I am thankful for small mercies! But still want to get Isabelle used to a bottle so that I can water it down at night to night-wean her.

Oh, and my plan was to start HE properly tomorrow, seeing as Tamsin would have been starting Reception. But having had such a manic week I don't feel ready in any way. I plan to use Sonlight Pre-K (and some of it hasn't arrived yet), Miquon maths, Handwriting without Tears, and Reading Reflex as the main backbone of our stuff with bits and pieces added day to day as interests arise. But I haven't got my head round it all yet, so maybe it'll have to be next week.

In solidarity with Jax

Perhaps there could be a blog award for 'messiest living room' or something ... Here's my entry:






And that's 'after' I have done some tidying up - I did the table and was working on the pile by the chair when I started to feel quite ill and had to stop. (Recuperating at the computer!). The rest of the house is just as bad.

Back from Greenbelt

It was great. I love it. There's just nowhere else in the world I feel more at home. The blend of people with a spiritual worldview, not dogmatic but willing to ask and explore all kinds of questions about their faith or lack of it; music of all types (Christian hip hop/rap/funk anybody?) mostly very loud; art of every description all round the site; great food stalls, clothes stalls and all sorts of other shopping opportunities; and great speakers discussing issues of poverty, justice, ecology, radical action and humour .... there's just nothing like it anywhere else!

It was lovely to see Jan and Jonathan and the girls and to meet baby J! Jan and I had one evening together when we wandered down to the village with her baby to calm him down and get him to sleep (yes, it worked) and I left my kids in the caravan with Bill, so that was nice and relaxing.

Tamsin had a good time, with lots of time on the bouncy castles, lots of ice-creams and even a session where she was happy to be left in one of the very carefully supervised kids' areas playing with train track (what else?!) while I went off elsewhere. Isabelle doesn't mind where she is, of course! Bill chilled, and we all had a good time together. Except that we confirmed that our caravan is not big enough for 4! On the way home, we stopped off at a caravan dealers and drooled over the cheapest 4- or 5- berth caravans they had, which at £5-6000 and 7-10 years old were still light years ahead of ours and amazingly well-equipped. Not that we can afford 5 grand, but it's given us something else to dream about, anyway!

The whole experience still hasn't taught Isabelle to sleep any better, though, although Jan did give me night-weaning tips which will take a bit of work to implement but I hope to aim towards. Anyway, I hear her murmuring again so I'd better go!

My favourite weekend of the year...

...is just approaching. (Hmm, at this point, 10.30pm, Isabelle woke for the 3rd time since 7.30pm bedtime and I gave up and went to bed.)

Resuming the following morning:
We're off to Greenbelt today! I love it! It is the place in the world where I feel most at home. The spirituality, the music, the people, the non-mainstream feel, the food, the kids' activities, the outdoors-ness - it's fantastic!

So, I should have been madly packing yesterday afternoon and evening, but got precious little done. We always intend to leave mid-morning to get there by lunchtime (it's only in Cheltenham so not far) but are always late, and almost certainly will be this time too. We're going to be 'Stepping off the Path' with J 'n' J too!

There is a small chance that I may be able to blog while there, if I can remember my Blogger password, but otherwise, I'll be back on Tuesday!

Feeling nicely fuzzy.....

after a *very* large glass of Baileys. Definitely not one of my better birthdays. Been in a foul mood all day. Sobbed in the shower after blogging this morning. Half-way through the morning I decided to sod work and indulge in my second-favourite form of therapy: retail. (Favourite therapy being sleep!) Took kids to Stratford and spent over £40 in Boots .... various bits and pieces but sorted out a few problems i.e. replaced my lost tweezers so can now get eyebrows into shape, and bought some waxing strips to use with the home-made sugaring solution I made months ago.

Then came home and a quick change of clothes to go to my friend Kate's eldest daughter's 6th birthday party. I got a small fairy cake with a candle in it while they sang Happy Birthday to me, as well as Daisy. Tamsin was not in party mood - she refused to take part in any games or indeed to play with any other children although she knows many of them very well - she just kept asking me to play with her. Probably she's feeling my 'go away' vibes and it's making her feel insecure.... One of the major things that's been making me feel so weepy is that I am so fed up with her wanting 'mummymilk' every couple of hours throughout the day and I want to wean her, but am worried about inflicting a major emotional wound. Maybe it's the only one of her persistent demands that I feel I can change. Maybe I should find something else to change so that I find her demands easier to cope with. I don't know. I just know I feel very conflicted about it all.

Anyway, I'm just waiting for Bill to get home with a huge Chinese takeaway ... thanks to everyone for the birthday wishes!

Happy Birthday to Me!

Or maybe not .... I am feeling distinctly ropey. Feel sick as a hangover of getting travel-sick on a train on Monday, feel weepy, cried myself to sleep last night, and am fed-up of highly demanding children. Bill is working, as am I later. Hohum. Must get a grip!

Hooray, and yikes!

Hooray, because after 2-3 years of wishing something like this would happen, at last I have found a gaggle of local girls who like coming round to play with Tamsin and the dog. There are three 11-year olds who live on our road who this week have been dropping in every day to walk the dog and then play with the girls, which has been nice. The 'yikes' bit is that a couple of times Tamsin has gone out with them for a walk, without me. They've stayed on the estate, and only been gone a max of half-an-hour, but it's still kind of scary. They're really nice, sensible girls, though. Comments please - would you let your 4-year old go out with 11-year olds unsupervised?

Isabelle wakes ..... must go!

Who would have thought ...!

... that chickens like chasing butterflies! It's the funniest thing to see. I hope none of you ever, ever buy anything from a battery-farmed chicken - it has got to be one of the cruellest things ever. To cage up such funny, characterful birds is criminal. Make a free-range only pledge now!

Not much going on...

I've been really tired today, after a particularly disturbed night with Isabelle. I really must get her used to being settled without a boob in her mouth. The strange thing is, she will fall asleep first thing at bedtime without it, but during the night she won't accept anything else. And, I'm starting to think about some work stuff I might do in the evenings, so I need to be able to go out for the evening knowing she isn't screaming for me.

So, there's not been much happening today except plenty of TV watching, some playing in the sandpit, a walk into town for a UK wall-map (for the postcard exchange) when I also bought myself 4 books (oops!) and, of course, the Brio train track.

The work thing is giving me something to think about. I have signed up with Usborne, and some of the paperwork came today, although not the books. It was just too good a deal to miss - for August only, £200 worth of kit for £38. I'm trying to decide how much of a thing to make of it, although the competitive side of my nature is coming out now I see the 'quick start' targets they encourage you to reach. The other possibility is a franchise for a seemingly really good, healthy and sensible weight loss company. And as nutrition is my 'thing', I'm tempted. But not sure I can take on that much of a commitment just now. Still mulling it over, anyway.

Festival of History

It was a very interesting day, with almost too much going on, as I hate feeling I'm missing stuff! I think it was useful for Tamsin, although I'm sure it's all quite confused in her mind. However she's been introduced to knights and jousting, archery, the concept of living without electricity, television or computers; houses made of wattle and wood like those that burned in the Great Fire of London (which story we've read several more times recently!) and much else. We also did meet Margaret and her triplet girls so it's nice to put another face to a name.

I don't think I've ever mentioned that I am a complete history ignoramus. I got chucked out of History 'O' Level after the mock exams when it was clear I was going to completely fail, and I've just never got the hang of kings and queens, what on earth were Tudors and Stuarts, and phrases such as 'Norman Conquest' and 'the Restoration' have just been empty words to me. Seeing as I'm going to have to educate Tamsin, though, I have been feeling that I really must fill in the huge gaps in my knowledge, and last week with Bill's help I found some simple children's history books in the Library and have been reading. It's really interesting to feel it all beginning to come together, and to get a general overview of the history of my own country which I've never had. I don't think I'll ever become a big history buff, but at least I should get the basics into place!

A little bit more

... reading. All enthusiastic about what happened the other day, I have been encouraging Tamsin to decode more three letter words (cvc) and she's doing pretty well. I've also done some 'whole word' stuff with her by printing out names to stick on things (wall, door, computer, television etc) and also by having big printed words of verbs (dance, walk, stand), showing them to her and telling her what they are, and then doing a flashcard type of thing of showing them to her silently and she has to do each thing that it says. She's done really well! I'm so excited - but note to self: must not go OTT and put her off!

We've been for a really wet walk this afternoon in Batsford Arboretum. They're doing a summer 'game' with money (total £250) in £5, £10 and £20 to find hidden in the trees - but we didn't find any :-(

Tamsin's playschool is having a fund-raising disco this evening, and as Chair of the committee I have to go.... don't feel like it but I must show my face.

She took me by surprise!

Yesterday morning, when we were all still lounging around on the bed, I showed Tamsin the "Reading Reflex" book (that I picked up for 99p in a charity shop) that I am planning on using to teach her to read, starting September. "I want to read it now," she said, grabbing it off me. "Okay," I said and opened the book to a page with some simple 3-letter words...(Jo has been baby-alarmed so Bill is continuing)....like CAT, MAT, SAT etc. She saw the T and shouted "T for Tamsin!" and then the other letters M, A and said "M...A...T...MAT!!" and her face lit up. We pointed to the C-for-Clever-Cat and she said "C..A..T...CAT!" and so on to SAT. We both applauded and said "You can read!" and we turned to the page which said "Cat sat on mat" and she read it herself with very little prompting. We have a genius for a daughter (or so I thought until she totally flunked on 'byzantine chrysanthemum')*

Jo is currently keeping low due to her nose dribbling copiously and her chin displaying a zit the size of Mount Etna, and the house is filled with the pungent aroma of Tea Tree oil and plaintive wails every time she passes a mirror. But I still love her**.

*I made that bit up
**I didn't make that bit up

The day started with Tamsin dressed as a fairy, and of course the Brio track had to be built as well. While I was doing a couple of things on the computer (a Tesco order - been meaning to do that for months; and an order of various creams and things from my favourite non-toxic supplier) she started drawing. She's been doing more drawings in the past week or two, and they're definitely starting to look like 'something' instead of a scribble. Today's effort is here:



Bottom right is 'Mummy' with a big smile ("because I love you", she said), in the middle is 'Isabelle', top left is 'Daddy' and bottom left is a penguin. Top right, by the picture of the 'very big smile' the words say "please can you do what you are told"!!LOL! I did the odd letter for her which she didn't feel confident of doing, and of course told her letter by letter what to write, but the majority of it is her writing. I think that's the most she's ever written at one time.

She also impressed me this afternoon, when I left her in the car for a minute while I popped to the Fair Shares office. When I got back, she pointed to the sign in the door of the next shop and said "that says 'Open'". I was amazed! Thinking about it, I suppose she knows signs in shop doors either say open or closed, but even so I thought that was pretty good going.

I get the feeling that Tamsin has been quietly growing in understanding about reading although nothing hugely concrete has come out of that yet (apart from the above comment!). She has been asking what words say when she sees them printed, for example on cereal packets or book titles, and looking closely at them. She's getting a feel for printed text, and also in the last few weeks has confidently figured out how to spell her name - she used to ask me which letter came next but now she can do it all on her own.

Now I'm finding it hard to concentrate on anything else because I'm watching "Transformed" about 3 horrible husbands while I blog ... it looks interesting!

Hmmm

I am worth $1,675,076 on HumanForSale.com

It's a good job I know I'm worth far more than that! My friends and family think I'm priceless!

Struggling through

I have re-discovered that it's possible to almost hate your baby when it's 3am, they've woken you about 5 times since your bedtime, won't go back to sleep again without feeding, and your boobs are *very* sore because the new teeth haven't quite been adapted for when latching on.

I am very tired and grumpy, lethargic and fed-up. Isabelle's sleeping has got worse and worse over the past few weeks. Bill and I were going to have a major 'talk' last night but we were both just too tired by 8pm - and that's what got us into this mess in the first place (sigh).

Just a quickie

Had a fab weekend with my friend Andrea *waves at Andrea in case she's decided to start reading blog again*. It was just what I needed. Feel refreshed and with a bit more clarity.

I also feel a bit inspired by her (relative) organisation and tidiness. Even with a non-stop 3-year-old and a part-time job, she keeps her house nice and tidy. I wanna do that! Must find 'a place for everything' - half the reason I don't tidy up is I don't know what to do with stuff. Must also spend less time on computer. So, the plan of action for the next few weeks is:

Declutter
Re-organise and redistribute stuff
Overhaul marriage
Re-energise spiritual life

Hmmm, not much then!

It was also lovely to visit the Beans today and view the lovely house and garden IRL. SB and Tamsin had fun together, even if they couldn't agree on the rules for 'tag', and BB and Isabelle did their baby-bonding thing. Had a clear run home in only 2 hours so near enough to do it again sometime!

Holiday

Well, not exactly, but I am in need of a little R&R so I'm going (with kids!) to stay with my friend in Cambridgeshire for a long weekend. I haven't seen her for such a long time so it's going to be great. Sad to be missing the Portico do but hope you all have a great time!

For Sarah

It's not lovely, it's just a 1949 ex-council semi:

But in the desirable North Cotswolds, it's the best we can do! Besides, it's got a big front garden:

and back garden:

and the back garden also contains chicken house (top right of back garden), Bill's big shed/workshop, garage, and caravan/trailer storage space. But as you can see, we really need a garden designer and a windfall to afford to implement it, followed by a gardener each week!

Hacking through the jungle

The jungle that is our front path, that is. It has been impenetrable for weeks, as neither Bill nor I are the gardening types, or even the 'keeping the neighbourhood tidy' types. So here is the 'before' pic:















And here is the 'after' pic:

The pics I mentioned

Not sure how this will work - first time using Blogger Images - but here goes:

Our first history lesson

Well, I made some notes of the stuff that has been going on the past couple of days, but I have lost them in the piles of tat around here. But we've been doing some good stuff!

Earlier this week, I bought two children's cassette tapes (for 29p each!) from a charity shop. The first one was songs and stories, including "London's Burning" which Tamsin had never heard before. "Why was London burning?" she asked, so I told her that a long long time ago there was a very big fire in London. She asked more and more questions about it, so when at home I Googled it and found some interesting information which we looked at together, including an animated map of how the fire spread. I then looked in one of my earlier charity shop purchases, this book, and found a story about the fire. It has very advanced language for a 4-year old, but she seemed to enjoy it and has requested it and listened to it again this morning. Since then, she has asked several times "Why was London burning?" so we have gone over the reasons time and time again - houses made of wood and thatch, built very close together, windy weather, started in a bakery, no fire brigade, etc, etc!

We have also read a couple of other stories from the history book - about the first Eddystone lighthouse and Stephenson's 'Rocket'. I don't expect that she'll retain a great deal of it, but it's a start on history anyway.

This morning, following a second reading of the 'Fire' story, I showed her a practical experiment with fire. I lit a candle, and explained how it needs air to burn, and then put a little glass ramekin over it and we watched the flame go out when it had burned up all the air (OK, so I know it's oxygen, but thought that 'air' was a simpler explanation at this stage!). We did that a couple of times, and then I explained that's how you put fires out - by excluding the air with water or foam or whatever.

She's also been asking questions about why plants die (plenty of evidence of that round our place!) So we've talked about the things they need - air, soil, water and light. Each time she sees a dead plant or flower now she asks why that one died. Actually, those questions started being triggered when we went to Benjamin's grave to check on the little trough of alpines that we planted up there, and they have died :-( I haven't been watering them, thinking that they were well established enough by now to be able to cope with a little dry spell, but apparently not! So we'll be off to the garden centre to replenish those shortly.

She's also been working on several of her Learning Land CDs and she's now pretty proficient at 'left' and 'right' (tells me which way to turn while we're driving), and I've heard her working on simple fractions, adding and subtracting and this morning has been introduced for the first time to odd and even numbers. Actually - just checked on Ebay and some of these are available but I have learned that there are more issues than I have (I have up to number 28) so that could have just cost me more money to try and complete the set. Tamsin does enjoy them and they are good.

Lulu the speckledy chicken has given us a surprise! She disappeared earlier in the week, and I thought I had lost her but later in the day she unaccountably reappeared. She did that a few more times during the week, and once I saw her coming out from behind some old fence panels that are propped up in their run, but I didn't have time to investigate. Then on Thursday morning I let them out in the morning and she was missing, and having been out all night I thought for sure she would be a goner. However, I thought it was time I investigated behind the fence panels, although I had tried peering behind them a few times when she was missing. On moving them one by one, I eventually found her - sitting on 17 eggs!!!!! I knew we had only 2 hens laying but had thought it was the black hen, Flora, who wasn't laying. Now it turns out they have all been laying, but one in secret! Lulu was most outraged at being chucked off her eggs but she fails to realise there is no fella around to give her any babies!!!

Apart from that, playschool has now finished for the summer so I will have childcare struggles for work, especially in the coming week when Kate is away. Never mind - we're flexible enough that we can just shut the office if it's impossible to go in.

I took some lovely photos of the girls earlier this week - will try and get them uploaded asap, but must go and get showered and dressed now!

At least I'm consistent!

Your English Skills:

Grammar: 80%

Punctuation: 80%

Spelling: 80%

Vocabulary: 80%

Does Your English Cut the Mustard?

Remarkably accurate!

You are dependable, popular, and observant. Deep and thoughtful, you are prone to moodiness. In fact, your emotions tend to influence everything you do. You are unique, creative, and expressive. You don't mind waving your freak flag every once and a while. And lucky for you, most people find your weird ways charming!

The World's Shortest Personality Test

Cleaning (Edited at 4.30pm)

Sunday was carpet-cleaning day. It's something I've been meaning to do since early Spring, and eventually had the motivation on a sunny day when we could put all the contents of the living room out onto the lawn. I took the kids over to Evesham in the morning to collect the machine while Bill started clearing both downstairs rooms. When I got back there was still a ton of clearing to do and then vacuuming and then carpet-cleaning. All on an extremely hot day. Phew, I'm glad that's over! I was half-expecting the carpets to change back to their original colour when relieved of all the dirt, but they can't have been as bad as I thought as although there was plenty of dirty water emptying out of the machine, the carpets look the same colour!

Bill and I looked longingly at the mostly empty and clean-looking living room, wishing it could stay that way, but I guess all the toys and junk has to come back in, at least until we get a makeover from Life Laundry.

Bill and I also discussed the children's future sleeping arrangements. Tamsin's room is the smallest bedroom, with the 2nd bedroom being our guest room (and junk-dumping room!) where my Mum often sleeps when she comes to stay. However in a year or so, we think we will have both girls sharing in that bigger room, and change the small room to the guest room. Tamsin has been wanting bunk-beds, as her friends have them, but we though getting each of them (at appropriate ages) a cabin bed each with play/storage space underneath might be better. So I started showing Tamsin the beds in the Argos catalogue, and she fell for one which can have a castle-type canopy and a slide coming off it. Trying again on the sleeping-in-her-own-bed task, I promised her she could have one of those beds if she stayed in her own bed all night till it was light in the morning for a month.

In the small, dark hours of the morning she crept into our bed again, and on going into her room this morning she was surprised when her old bed was still there. Hmmm, methinks she didn't quite get the message!

Today's tasks are:
Return carpet-cleaning machine to shop - done
Walk dog - not done
Go swimming - not done. Tamsin didn't mention it/forgot so I kept quiet
Drink lots of water (am feeling rather lethargic, due to dehydration I think) Done & feeling better
Tidy living room contents back to their proper places, decluttering and editing as much as possible. Not done

So what have I done? Brought in/folded one load of washing. Put wet washing on line (and no0w it's raining). Put another load on to wash. Cleaned out chicken house. Done track. Spent too much time on computer. Tamsin had her first ever Happy Meal at McDonalds - does that count as cultural education? i.e. education about our culture, not high culture of course!

Finding the time

to blog is very difficult. It wouldn't be if only I blogged before I read everybody else's, but reading is easier than thinking, composing and typing. Anyway, here I am at last.

On Monday we didn't do much in the morning, and went swimming in the afternoon. I couldn't find Tamsin's armbands so she went in without, which as I was carrying Isabelle made me a bit nervous but in fact it was all fine, and I think I will carry on without them so that she just learns to swim on her own. Isabelle loved it again. Afterwards we went to the big Tesco (our local one is small and doesn't stock any 'extras', just food) and I bought a range of small presents and one bigger one (a splash-around Dora the Explorer and Boots). This was to bribe/tempt/encourage Tamsin to stay in her own bed all night instead of getting into ours. It's not a big issue for me but sometimes Bill gets irritated by it. Anyway, she was all for it, but that night in the wee small hours when reminded that she wouldn't get presents if she came into our bed, she said she would prefer not to get presents then. Hmmm, time to think again on that one! So presents are still tucked away unused.

Tuesday was a good day when a lot seemed to happen. Before breakfast Tamsin found the big DK 'Animal' book and was looking through it and we discussed the various pages she turned to - spiders, crabs, frogs and toads, fish etc. It's normally one of my free days but I had to go into work for a meeting in the morning, and the girls came with me. Tamsin brought her own 'work' in the form of sticker books/dot-to-dots and also played on the CBeebies website and with the big Noah's Ark which is in the office. Meanwhile the meeting was with Fair Shares staff from the other sites and we were discussing/agreeing what we wanted in our new contract - seems the right way to do it! We threw out a couple of clauses from the current one which we didn't like, and added a few bits which we felt appropriate.

Home for lunch, and then Tamsin played with her train track with the new trains we also bought at Tesco on Monday. Meanwhile I surfed! Later we made a cake, and Tamsin helped me weigh the ingredients. I told her we had to weigh 100g and told her to look out for when it said 1 - 0 - 0 which she did beautifully. While I made the normal cake, Tamsin made her own 'cake' with flour, salt, water, milk and copious mixing (yuck). Meahwhile Isabelle was doing her own sensory exploration sitting in her high chair with various bits of food for her to play with - some fruit puree, half-grapes, dry flour and a tomato to squidge. It went everywhere (sticky grin)! So the next stop was the paddling pool for a good wash down. While filling the paddling pool Tamsin noticed the measuring jug and spontaneously spotted '500' and then saw 400, 300, 200 and 100. I also pointed out that 'half' was written 1/2 which we had never discussed before.

When we were just too hot outside we went in and I put on 'Peter and the Wolf' CD while Tamsin played with her tea-set and she also did some writing in a Letterland workbook, and actually formed the letters properly according to the dots and arrows, instead of doing it 'her way' as she usually prefers. She also spelled her own name using Scrabble letters with no help at all - she's got the hang of that now. And then while watching 'Dora' she did some 'magic painting'. Meanwhile Isabelle was getting teeth numbers 4 and 5!!

Okay, so that's the day I took notes because we seemed to be doing so well and I wanted to blog it!

On Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, other stuff happened ;-) No notes for those days! I worked those mornings while Tamsin was at playschool and Isabelle was lent out to a variety of people. On Thursday evening both Bill and I fell asleep at about 8pm while settling children to bed, and he didn't get up again till the morning and I only got up at midnight because I had to shut the chickens away!

On Friday I completed my Sonlight order to get the majority of the balance of the Pre-K curriculum, part of which I bought from Katy. I think we'll start in September, but not in a pressured way - if we miss bits and miss days then it doesn't matter. I would like to start Reading Reflex and Handwriting without Tears as well but she said recently she doesn't want to learn to read :-o ! Still, that's fine! I'm just eager to get on with it! I will have to hold myself back. But I think when she realises that her friends who are starting Reception in September are learning to read, she might change her mind.

Today, Isabelle has started eating! She's really not had much so far - she's been interested but not in purees, only finger food, and then mostly just tasting and spitting out. At lunchtime, however, I gave her a few pieces of the pasta and tomato sauce we were eating, and she just kept on and on eating, and then was mad keen on the slices of kiwi fruit we had afterwards. She probably ate almost as much as Tamsin. Amazing! She didn't do quite so well with the cucumber and hummus I gave her at teatime but I didn't think bacon, egg, chips and beans were really suitable for an 8-month old!

Yes, she is

Very well, that is. The spots are just fading, but she's been bright as a button all the way through, and was only hot for about 24 hours. Isabelle is fine too.

It's a shame I didn't get to blog last night, as we had such a good day I made notes on it. And now Isabelle has just woken up so gotta go.

Now Tamsin's got whatever-it-is, as well. She was hot all Thursday night and Friday, and today has come out in a spotty rash. It doesn't seem to be making her feel ill, though, and once again refuses to subside quietly onto the sofa and give me an easy day. It's only Bill who's been sent to bed by this particular bug. Hmm, could insert rude comment here about men and illness, but Bill reads this blog!

Today has been the usual mix of Brio, Nick Jr, painting, going to the library where Tamsin very proudly took her own books up to the desk and got them issued to her on her own card, lots of swinging (which Isabelle loves too), and a lovely interlude just lying on the grass in the garden, looking up at the sun coming through the trees and making a halo effect round Tamsin's fair hair, and thinking she looked just like an angel. I gave the dog a good brush as she is moulting, and believe me, a Sheltie moulting could stuff several pillows or even an entire duvet. When Isabelle had her afternoon nap, I did too (Bill being on the road to recovery), which was good!

Snotty, spotty and grotty

Isabelle, that is. She's got some sort of horrible lurgy. She had a high temp. on Tuesday night so we had very disturbed sleep; then she came out in a rash on Wednesday. And my ear was rather painful on Wednesday and I was developing a sore throat so I asked Bill to come home and take care of the kids while I went to bed; then late last night he started to feel fluey, came to bed shivering, and has come home from work early today and gone straight to bed. (Sigh) ... and I thought it was my turn to be ill and have a few days in bed.

Ah well, educationally speaking it's been a bit lean but we have discussed cows chewing the cud, Tamsin's had 'free play' with a bag of flour (i.e. it went all over the living room); also paint and glitter liberally spread around this afternoon; she's currently doing another Learning Land CD-Rom and been to playschool yesterday and today. In fact, last week at Kessingland she kept asking me how many days it was till she could go to playschool again, and was delighted when the figure kept going down... I'm certainly glad she enjoys it but have a lurking concern about how she'll feel this time next year when she will shortly not be going any more.

And the winner of the 'imaginative roleplay' prize goes to.....

Tamsin!!

She was sitting on the arm of a chair, poised over a big beanbag.

"Mum, pretend I was a poop."

She slid down the chair arm, dropped onto the beanbag, landed in a heap and lay there for a few seconds.

Dontcha just love 4-year olds?

Seemed like a good idea at the time

I know what I forgot to blog about, and if I don't, I expect Merry will tell everyone anyway! I suppose it's too funny a story (in retrospect) to keep to myself.

Well, I don't ever remember having earache before, but in the middle of the Kessingland week, my ear started to feel very odd and sore. Not really bad, but of course I wondered if it might get worse and I may end up in agony at some point. I couldn't decide whether to go straight to the doctor or not, but decided a 'wait and see' policy would have to do. So there I was, in the middle of a Suffolk field, in a caravan, with all my normal resources (local chemist, doctor, acupuncturist friend, homeopath) a long way away. And then I had a brilliant idea! I had a perfect, anti-bacterial liquid immediately to hand, or perhaps I should say, immediately at boob. It is recommended to apply breastmilk when a baby has a little eye infection (sticky eye), and it really does clear it up. So, breastmilk in the ear seemed like a perfect solution (pun intended!). So I expressed a little into a cup and put a few drops in my ear. I did that one evening, and the following morning, but by the next day things were worse. The ear was quite sore, I couldn't lie on that side, and it had got totally blocked up and I couldn't hear anything with that ear. So I phoned the local doctor's surgery and got an appointment to see the nurse.

I told her all about my symptoms, and then she peered into my ear with her clever ear-inspection thingy (otoscope?). "Oh, you've got a horrible fungal infection in there," she said. "It's all white and damp." Then I remembered. And told her about my attempts at self-medication. She did a perfectly professional job at keeping a straight face, although was clearly nonplussed by this apparently normal-looking stupid weirdo! "I've never heard of it (breastmilk) being anti-bacterial and working against sticky eye," she said. "I'll have to ask my microbiologist friend about that! But even so, the ear is enclosed and warm and probably not a good environment for putting anything into ......" I had to admit she had a point! And felt rather stupid .....

Several conventional antibiotic eardrops later and things are much improved. So remember, potential earth-mothers out there, breastmilk does not cure everything!

The week we had

Must blog about Kessingland, although with two twitchy girls currently being my only company, I am liable to be frequently interrupted.

Overall, I had a great week. Although originally I was somewhat hacked off with Bill for deciding not to stay, in the end it avoided that feeling of divided loyalties of wanting to spend time with online friends who I wanted to get to know better, and DH with whom I don't spend enough time either. So I was glad to be able to spend satisfactory (although would have liked more) amounts of time sitting, chatting and generally hanging out, after sending Tamsin off to play with sundry other children and putting Isabelle down on a mat with her fellow triplettes (made-up word for small female triplets?!) and a few toys.

The good stuff:
The weather for the first half of the week
Tamsin going off and playing with others (last year she wouldn't leave my side at all) and especially bonding with Naomi (of Stef and Dawniy); Barbara's E and B, and Freya whose family wasn't on the list of attendees so I'm still not sure who her Mum is but she liked us so much she came and spent a night in our caravan!
A lovely conversation with Ammi on Friday
Going to Sea-Life in Great Yarmouth
Joining the blogring bandwagon by getting a Lidl like-a-bike equivalent
Getting to know people a bit better, esp. Katherine and Helen/Chris
The MuddlePuddle triplets of Isabelle, BB and Josie
Basket-weaving
Just getting away from it all

The bad stuff:
Not getting any decent time on the beach because by the time we tried (Thurs/Fri) it was too cold and windy and rainy. In all Tamsin's 4 years we've never spent more than 10 minutes on a beach.
Not spending much time with Jax, Alison or Merry - we just never seemed to be in the same place at the same time
Feeling humbled that Kris towed her own caravan, whereas I got Bill to drive us there & back. OTOH, if I learn to do it myself, I'll be expected to just do it alone from then on .....

I'm sure there was more but can't remember right now. Will edit later if I remember more vital stuff!

Very strange - just noticed the 'IQ test' post has disappeared. Is the universe trying to tell me something...?

Home again

Got back about 6pm; got lots of lovely things to read in the post (one of my favourite things about being away is all the post-opening when I get back) - Home Education Magazine, Mothering magazine, "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain" book which I have bought 2nd hand, and, most interestingly of all, Benjamin's birth notes which I have just got from medical records in Birmingham. Am now thinking that I want to get his medical notes from his surgery etc, just for completeness.

Oh, and the other thing we came home to was Bill's appointment for a vasectomy - on our 15th wedding anniversary in September!!! Much thinking to do about that.

Nearly there...

Last blog before going off to Kessingland. I've been trying to pack since about 2pm and it's now after 11pm and there's still stuff to do - I'm leaving the rest till the morning now.

Tamsin fell asleep at 5pm, and I left her there hoping she was so exhausted (long story) that she'd stay there all night, but no, she woke up at 8pm and is still up with us! We're all off to bed shortly, though.

Looking forward to the week!

See lots of you soon!

Must get on with stuff....

No packing been done here yet ... must get on with it tomorrow afternoon, which is the only chance I'll get. DH isn't coming ..... or at least, he is going to drive the caravan to Kessingland and stay till Sunday and then come home again for a week getting stuff done at home. Chance would be a fine thing, is all I can say ....

I feel like I only got about 3 hours of sleep last night, what with one thing and another. Had to work this morning, with a fussy and irritable Isabelle stopping me get a thing done, and the same will happen tomorrow morning.

Hmm, this is just disjointed ramblings really. Too tired to blog straight .... must go to bed.

Oh, I know what I was going to say. Benjamin's anniversary passed unremarkably yesterday. I would normally have a candle burning all day, but was out too much to do that. And I even forgot to take the cute little stone trough and plants up to the grave last night - took them this morning instead. I still think of him pretty much every day, even after 6 years, so really an anniversary day isn't that much different to any other.

Sunday night fever

And Monday night fever. Tamsin's not well - she's got what Bill had all last week, with what I guess must be laryngitis (not much of a voice and very croaky) and a bad cough. And a bit of a high temperature, especially at night. Poor thing was quite delirious last night for a while. Of course, as soon as she gets up in the morning, she's fairly bright and lively, and won't do me the favour of languishing on the sofa all day, like other people's ill children do, to let me recover from the disturbed night. Anyway, she's learning about normal body temperature and the immune system fighting off infections as we go!

So, Monday was quite good. We started off the morning with 'track', of course - a pretty much daily occurrence for at least the past year. We also had another game of Pairs, and some skittles, and then Linda, my hairdresser, came to the house to give us a trim. It was her first time back since having her baby Louisa, who was born 3 weeks before Isabelle. We were supposed to be due about 2 months apart, but then I was 2 weeks early, and she was over 2 weeks late and ended up with an emergency caesarean. Anyway, Louisa and Isabelle sat and looked at each other and played with the toys and grabbed them from each other and cooed and were generally extremely cute! Tamsin, however, refused to let the scissors anywhere near her hair and generally threw a complete strop, but I guess I'll let her off on the grounds of being rather under par. But please excuse any resemblance to a scarecrow next week at Kessingland!

Then Isabelle needed a nap and the dog needed a walk, so I got Isabelle into the buggy and we all walked into town where I picked up a few things to eat, and met several people to stand and chat with :-)

Home again, and we sat in the shade of our lilac tree and had some lunch, and then Tamsin complained of being tired and cold (!), so she curled up on the bean-bag and watched some TV. At about 3pm I asked her if she would like to go and see Henry the Harris Hawk, with whom she appeared on the front page of our local newspaper a few weeks ago after he had visited playschool. She said yes, so we set off up to the Falconry centre. We arrived in time for a demonstration, so we saw a falcon being flown, and then we asked if we could see Henry, so the man got Henry out to fly. He did several low-flying manoeuvres very close to our heads, which freaked Tamsin out a bit and she started to say she wanted to go home, and she didn't want to hold him :-( Never mind - I'd forgotten my camera anyway! We looked around a little, but Tamsin was really a bit scared of the birds, even though they were in cages, so we left, not really having had £7.50's worth! We wandered up to the nearby Batsford Garden Centre, where I used to work before I had Tamsin, and said hi to some ex-colleagues. Isabelle coughed a lot and consequently did a major puke while I was sitting in the office talking to my ex-boss! We had a brief wander round the garden centre where I got a small stone trough and some low-growing plants to make a permanent pot for Benjamin's grave, to take up there on Wednesday. We've had some spring bulbs in the plot, and also occasionally go up and put fresh flowers, but most of the time it's just been bare grass by the headstone, and that doesn't feel right. I'll feel better knowing there's a permanent flowery indication that he is not forgotten.

After getting home and a quick salad tea, I bathed Isabelle but Tamsin refused. I at last got round to changing the sheets that had been on the bed all last week while Bill was ill. Tamsin and Isabelle fell asleep quickly, and I lay there for a while, relaxing and dozing. 45 minutes later, Tamsin woke up confused and feverish, and vomited on the clean bed :-( I was just about to get the Calpol and dose her up when she just conked out again and slept fitfully for the rest of the night in our bed.

Some like it hot.....

but I don't. Phew, days like this mean I just lie around feeling lethargic and sweaty. Attractive, huh?

The day started in a wobbly kind of way too, with Isabelle being awake from 6am and despite yawning and appearing to be quite tired still, wouldn't go back to sleep. So we got up and came downstairs, and I did a quick round of the blogring. Or at least, I got as far as Merry's blog, which reduced me to a sobbing heap and I had to go and get my beautiful, cuddly, perfect baby and just hug her, crying madly. She is just so perfect right now, so adorable and beautiful, and I wish I could keep her like this forever and ever. Of course, it's exciting and lovely to see the development too, and I love so many of the stages to come, but something about my current mood is just making me feel grief and loss at her moving on from what she is now. (Oh, DUH! I only just thought of this - could it be because the anniversary of Benjamin's death is coming up on Wednesday...? Strange how the grief can get you even when you haven't been thinking about it. You might not think so from reading this blog, especially as I have recently had another baby which brings things up again, but I really feel the loss of Benjamin is a fairly small corner of my life now, but I guess this is what it means when people say you never totally 'get over it' - it pops up at odd times even when you aren't anticipating it.)

After recovering, the day went fairly nicely. Tamsin has developed a very husky voice and a cough so I didn't think we ought to go to church this morning, even though she is well apart from that. So yesterday and today we have had much splashing in the 'paddling' pool, which is actually what I bought as a birth pool but never had time to get into for the birth. I put Isabelle on the lawn with a bowl of water and utensils to splash in it, but she either didn't 'get it' or wasn't interested, unlike when she is in the bath when she splashes madly with great delight. However she was happy to sit there for quite long periods of time.


What's this green stuff?


Love the pool!

Later Tamsin played on one of her Learning Land CD-Roms, which included identifying various insects among other things. We've played some games of 'pairs' with a set of cards she got for her birthday, and she's got a pretty good memory for the position of the cards. We went for a walk in the woods, and talked about the different leaf sizes of many of the plants, and I showed her how to identify a fern. Oh, and yesterday we did the 'OW' lesson in 'Sound of the Week' and she did a fabulous job of looking at the pictures I had printed off, and finding the appropriate word to go with it. She was probably mostly just choosing by the first letter, but slowly, we are making progress. I am thinking of making a semi-serious 'start' on reading, if she seems happy to, in September when she would 'normally' have been starting Reception class. No push and no rush, but as long as she is comfortable with it I think she is beginning to show some readiness for reading. She has all the letters extremely confidently under her belt, and, having learned them in the 'phonic' way (a, buh, cuh, etc) she is now thrilled that she has learned the 'ABC song' and sings it several times a day. Also, having agreed to purchase a good portion of the Sonlight Pre-K curriculum from Katy B, we will probably start that in September too.

While Isabelle had a nap this morning, I watched the 'Sign with your Baby' video that I had and used with Tamsin. Isabelle is about the right age to start signing to her, although it is likely to be 2-3 months at least before she starts signing back. We did some of this with Tamsin, although we found it difficult to remember to do the signs consistently so it was never a major thing. She did learn signs for milk, Poppy (the dog), aeroplane and flower and maybe a few others. I would love to be more consistent with Isabelle, though, because again watching that video I was welling up with tears because it is such an amazing thing to see such little children so clearly communicating.

I'm sure there's been other stuff today, but can't remember what. As far as other members of the family go, I think one of the hens might be going broody. She's sat in the nesting box just about all afternoon. It could be the heat, but she definitely needs keeping an eye on. It means she would sit there for about 3 weeks barely eating enough to keep going, and not laying, and blocking up the nesting box so the others would find it difficult to lay. To stop it you're supposed to put them in a wire cage for a few days, but (a) I haven't got one and (b) it seems a bit harsh. I'm going to do a bit of online research to see if there's anything else I can do.

New baby must-haves

I could have done with some of these a few months ago, *especially* number 4 and number 6. Number 3 would still come in useful!

Tamsin's party

Phew, it's taking a few days to recover! All went extremely well, except that I forgot to take any photos. I managed to take one of the cake after everyone had gone!


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It was a Dora the Explorer party. Bill had done an amazing job constructing an adventure at the bottom of the garden, and drawing a map, and a friend had helped me make a Backpack for each child. They were told that Swiper the fox had stolen some of the gifts they were supposed to take home, so they had to go and look for them. They had to go through the Grumpy Old Troll's Secret Garden, who wouldn't let them through until they made him happy by planting some nasturtium seeds in a trough. Then they had to go over Rainbow Mountain (our climbing frame), collecting a Dora bookmark to put into their backpack on the way, then down the slide, look for Swiper because he lived somewhere near the bottom of the peartree, shout "Swiper no swiping" so that they could reclaim their prizes (a Kinder Surprise egg), then find a lost baby animal and take it through the bendy tunnel to reunite it with its mother at the other end. We also had Dora the Explorer dot-to-dots when the children arrived, and I had prepared Pin the Backpack on Dora, and another running round game, neither of which we had time to do. We did some dancing, some Musical Statues, and some general running around and playing, followed by lots of food and the Dora cake.

Tamsin enjoyed her Dora the Explorer house she got as her main present :


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Unfortunately, Bill having been ill in bed all day on Thursday (his birthday), he made heroic efforts to be up and busy and helpful on Friday and Saturday, and then relapsed and has been in bed ever since. He really has been feeling rough. Nevertheless I can't help feeling somewhat envious of a few days in bed sleeping (yawn)!

Isabelle enjoys a book:


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Party preparations

Oh my goodness, I can so see why people pay lots of money to have their children's birthday parties elsewhere than at home. I wasn't thinking clearly when I invited 15 - luckily a couple can't come, but it's still a mammoth task! I have a mountain of tasks to get on with, but just had to have a quick blog while Bill took the kids out to the library.

Bill was in bed ill all day on his birthday - didn't even feel like opening any presents until 7pm. I have a very sore throat and he is still majorly coughing. But I had more success than I anticipated doing Tamsin's Dora cake last night - it only took me until 12.30am - I thought I might be up till 2! Photos later, or tomorrow!

Birth-day Part 2

So, 4 years ago, I woke at 1am with definite pains. I left Bill asleep in the chair next to my bed, while I went to find a midwife, who suggested I get in the bath. I had told them I wanted to use the birth pool but it was too early for that yet (so we thought). While I was in the bath, Bill woke up and panicked when he couldn't find me! Despite expecting to find the bath comforting, I wasn't getting any benefit from being in there, so had just decided to get out again when Bill found me. We fixed my TENS machine in place, and then as things hotted up, the midwives suggested I went upstairs to the delivery room. I remember walking up those stairs and having to stop in the middle while a contraction came. At my request, they started filling the birth pool, but it quickly became apparent that there wasn't going to be time to get into it. She was born at 2.55am.

This morning, she wasn't in such a hurry to see the world, and I was waiting and waiting for her to wake up, and in the end had to wake her up at 8am. She was going to playschool for the morning, so we had limited time. I had got all her presents out the night before, but I went downstairs and hid all but one as there just wouldn't be time for them. She was a bit bleary for a while, and didn't show much pleasure at her new Dora the Explorer outfit which I thought she might want to wear to playschool. We all got ready and then I took her to playschool along with her big Thomas the Tank Engine cake to share with her friends at snack time. I had to work from 11-1pm, so Bill (who had the day off) collected her from playschool. She'd had a lovely morning, and shortly after I got back we got the presents out and had a fun time as she opened them all. She got some clothes, a bit of cash, a sticker-making machine, a few small toys and the much-sought-and-eventually-found Dora the Explorer Talking House which she was absolutely thrilled with and played with for ages.

Unfortunately Bill was fighting a losing battle against some sort of cough/general viral infection (which I am showing signs of too) and went off to bed for a couple of hours, so the rest of us walked the dog and then played/read/babbled as appropriate!

Dinner, bath and bed were followed by preparations (mine) for Bill's birthday tomorrow and Tamsin's party on Saturday, for which I actually need about another week to prepare, I think!

Is anybody out there?

Where have all my commenters gone (except Merry)? I'm feeling a bit lonely here! Is anybody listening?

4 years ago....

we'd all just voted in the General Election, and then I'd gone to hospital to have Tamsin's birth induced. I was highly anxious and stressed, knowing far more than I ever wanted to about stillbirths and neonatal deaths after losing Benjamin. Tamsin had a very irregular heartbeat, which the consultant assured me was nothing to worry about, but hearing it on the monitor, I could so easily imagine it just stopping, and I knew I'd feel happier with her out than in. So the Prostin gel was applied in the morning, then we went for a wander round Cheltenham to wait for things to get going. I started to feel a very slight something in Marks & Spencer, and hoped my waters would break there so I would get free clothes for life, or something like that, but sadly it was not to be. We returned to the hospital for a second Prostin gel in the late afternoon, and although I kept on my feet in the hope it would get things going quicker, in the end we gave up at about 10pm and I went to bed. I woke up at 1am..... ah, but that's tomorrow's story.

Anyway, back to the present. We had a full day today, catching the train at 9.20am to go to London and the Science Museum. My Mum got on the train at Reading and came along with us, which made things a great deal easier. We saw lots of obvious home-edders milling around, and chatted to Carol from Andover who is on the MuddlePuddle list. Tamsin really enjoyed "The Garden" in the basement, but wasn't impressed with the other galleries we had a quick look in - "I'm getting quite bored, Mummy," she said. So, of course, we then went to the shop to indulge in some retail therapy, where I bought her some 'Magic Plastic' balloon-making stuff; some no-spill bubble mixture, and a little glow-in-the dark 'box of bones' which we put together on the train on the way home, during which I took the opportunity of teaching her about the skull, jaw, shoulder blades, names of leg and arm bones and the pelvis and ribs. Oh, and I treated myself to a necklace in Accessorize on Paddington Station!

Isabelle was just a dream baby today - she is amazing! The journey to London was perfectly timed for her nap, so she slept all the way there. She was quiet and relaxed all the time we were out and about, had another nap in the buggy during the afternoon, and was happy and cute on the train on the way home.

Tamsin was disappointed we didn't get time to go to the Natural History Museum and look at the dinosaurs which I had told her about, so I think she'll be demanding another visit to London before long. In the meantime, I still have some preparations to be done for her birthday tomorrow, so I'd better dash.

Not much of interest today except a trip to the dentist for me to sort out some discoloured old fillings on my front teeth so now I don't have to be embarrassed when I smile (vbg). I've been smiling at myself admiringly in the mirror since I got home. Bill took an hour off work to supervise the girls while I was drilled and filled. I'm having an old veneer re-done too, so soon I shall really have a totally new smile and then I'll have to start planning the botox and the tummy tuck to really qualify for the "Ten Years Younger" programme. OK, I'm kidding! I prefer to save the money and cultivate the attitude that my burgeoning wrinkles and grey hair give me 'character'!

Tamsin and Isabelle were really good with the very boring morning driving to Oxford, waiting in a car park and then driving back to Moreton. Stopped off on the way to sort out some wrapping paper, birthday cards etc and then home to sort stuff out. As well as Tamsin's birthday on Wednesday, we have Bill's on Thursday! And Tamsin's party on Saturday. So there's a lot to get ready!

I'm a bit worried about one of the chickens - the one which lays blue eggs hasn't laid for 3 days now .... the trouble is, I don't know which one of the 3 it is. I've put a call in to a friend who knows more about this stuff because I don't know if it's a big problem or not.

Sunday

Didn't go to church this morning, as it was the annual Outdoor Service. I have extremely clear memories of being at that service in 1999 with Benjamin, so happy and full of pride in him, and I don't think I can bear to go now. Or maybe I could bear it, but I want that memory to remain his, and not be overlaid with others.

Instead I tried to take it easy, having been woken for the second day in a row at 5.30am by Isabelle, who wasn't inclined to go back to sleep after that. Tamsin took the hint I had left out the night before, and started filling in a handwriting workbook, as she has shown much more interest in writing recently. She enjoyed it, but didn't take well to being corrected as to how to write some of the letters. "I'm doing it my way", she said. "I'm only trying to show you how to do it more easily", I said, and she responded, "but I like doing things the hard way." Hmmm, what can you do? Leave her to do it whichever way she likes, in the hope that the correct way of writing will gradually sink in if she watches others do it, or keep on trying to show her the right way? I certainly feel it bodes ill for anything that I might try and 'teach' her in future!

Bill did some fantastic stuff in the garden, preparing for Tamsin's Dora the Explorer birthday party next Saturday. There's going to be some sort of treasure hunt/exploring thing, so he's constructed a whole adventure playground sort of affair, out of old fence panels, LOL! In the meantime, after a lot of effort, I have managed to track down and obtain a Dora Talking House, whew! Tamsin doesn't even know such a thing exists, yet, but once I saw it I really knew that's what I wanted to get her, but whenever I located a supplier, they stopped being able to supply it by the time I wanted to order. Eventually found an Ebay shop that could send me one.

I also put another coat of paint on one of Tamsin's little toyboxes that we got months ago and have been meaning to paint (still one more coat to do on this one, and then need to do the second one); tidied up the living room a little; had a good long nap with Isabelle to try and catch up on some sleep; had a picnic on the lawn for lunch; set Tamsin to 'painting' with water on the patio, and then she 'washed' the windows (i.e. made them dirtier); cleaned out the chickens; and tried to get my head round the busy week ahead.

The first ....... of many?

Here's what Tamsin did on Friday:




I was a pony-mad girl; loved riding from age 3 or 4 till I was in my 20s, dreamed of owning a pony, but by a bit of bad planning managed to be born into an impoverished clergy family, and had to make do with helping out at the local stables and riding other people's horses and ponies occasionally. So I thought it would be nice to see whether Tamsin might like it too, even though she's born into a moderately impoverished family too!

By going through the Fair Shares scheme (which is where I work) I arranged a trial ride for Tamsin with Sarah, who also happens to be her playschool leader. Being prone to being a bit of a nervous child at times, I wasn't sure how Tamsin would get on, but she absolutely loved it. I foresee more riding in her future!

Singing in Spanish

How about that! Tamsin learned a whole song in Spanish from watching Dora the Explorer, and sang it to me at the dinner table this evening. I was impressed! We've also been educating her in small-scale commerce today, by taking some of our clutter to a car-boot sale. We made a grand total of about £15 profit, but that's better than spending twice that much on a Bank Holiday day out. So the weekend has consisted mostly of tidying up a bit and sorting out stuff to sell.

Actually, did you notice how casually I dropped in that 'dinner table' line? We haven't eaten at the dinner table for months, but I managed to clear all the junk off it on Saturday morning so I've felt we're more like a respectable family now! And Isabelle is joining us in her highchair, now that she can sit. She, of course, wears more of her food than she actually eats, and definitely can't be doing with any of that puree stuff. She wants real food, dammit, that she can hold and stuff in her mouth! And then spit out. Hmmm. She's also working hard on attaining the position for eventual crawling. She's figured out the arms and is now working on the legs - she's tried legs straight and up on her toes, bending legs but hips still on the floor, wriggling from side to side, and on the bed this morning she had her bum right in the air but I haven't seen her do that on the floor yet. I wonder how long it will take till she actually crawls? Tamsin didn't manage it till about a week before she walked, so this feels new.

I've been restricting TV a bit more this weekend, and Tamsin has played with Brio, Mega-bloks, finger puppets, building bricks, stickle bricks, a piece of string and other miscellaneous bits and pieces. I've read her some books, and it's interesting to see that she is paying more attention to looking carefully at words when she knows what they say, e.g. the title of a book. It's like she's starting to teach herself the 'whole word' approach to reading. Definitely something changing there.

Tomorrow morning is the group at church, and then I think I'll go down to Cirencester for the afternoon.

Did the entire blogring go to the library yesterday? It certainly seems like it from the ones I've read, and we did too. As well as books, I got an 8-CD set of Spanish lessons by Michel Thomas ... as Tamsin is very motivated to learn spanish at the moment (due to Dora!) and I thought we might have a go together, if it's any good.

The big news is Isabelle's - she has a second tooth, and is SITTING! She seems totally at ease with her new perspective and suddenly seems to me to be a lot more grown up.

Pretty much no obvious home-ed going on at the moment. Just being out of the house for much of the day and Nick Jr when we're home. Though, Tamsin did get out her Letterland letter cards this morning before breakfast and started searching through for the letters to spell her name, found them all on her own and only needed some subtle stretching out of the way I said 'Tamsin' to remember which order they all went in.

Some days are diamonds (some days are stone)

John Denver is a great resource for blog titles, I am finding ....!

Ah, where does the time go? I have had a completely manic few days, and the bulk of Tamsin's education seems to have been being shouted at to hurry up and get ready, sitting in the car listening to Mr Men songs and stories, and being shouted at because she's taken her shoes off in the car again and I have to put them back on her before we get out. Gorgeous mini Reebok trainers bought for a couple of pounds at an NCT second-hand sale are all very well, but they have laces, which she can't do yet!

I had a moral dilemma on Monday. Monday is our totally free day with no regular appointments or activities, so it's when I sometimes arrange to go out for the day to see a friend. I had an arrangement to see someone this week, and in fact had already had to postpone it from a few weeks ago. When I went back to work I found that, while I was on maternity leave, a meeting had been arranged with the Charity's trustees and fundraiser for this Monday. As usual I dithered and dallied, and only made a decision on Sunday that friendship took priority over going to work on a non-working day for me (my job-share partner, Kate, works that day). So in the end we had a lovely few hours out at a soft play place in Evesham, and again making a change from past behaviour, Tamsin was mostly able to go off and play with my friend's daughter, leaving us to have nice adult chat! I even amazed myself by getting a meal ready in the slow-cooker before I left, so that was great to come home to.

Tuesday saw us going off to a new group (mostly mums and kids) at church, where the little ones can go in the creche and we actually get some really good heart-to-heart sharing, praying and laughing together. This group used to run a few years ago, when I first attended this church, and it was this fantastic group of women who made me feel so welcome and supported me in tremendous ways with all we went through with Benjamin and then Tamsin. I was really sad when the group stopped a couple of years ago due to dwindling numbers, but we now have another baby-boom and lots of new members, plus a new woman in the church who is skilled in leading parenting and relationship-building courses etc so I took the initiative in asking her to start up this group again. They first met last week while I was at Hesfes.

Anyway, we had a great time, and I think it is going to be good for me spiritually and relationally, but I had chatted with a friend on the phone the night before who told me there was a new woman there who was home-educating her four children. I was thrilled! So at the end, I grabbed her for a chat, and told her I was home-educating mine, and wasn't it great, but she brought me down with a bump when she told me it was a strictly temporary situation for her, they had just come back to this country from Bahrain and knew they would be unsettled for a few months before they found a suitable house and job etc, so she was only doing this in the meantime. She thought it was terrible for them socially, she showed me the bundle of workbooks that her oldest son had brought with him (CGP) (and I think that's the only way she knows how to do home-ed) and she will be getting them into school at the earliest opportunity! By this time, the kids had seen us and were clamouring for attention, so we didn't get the chance for more conversation (i.e. I didn't get the chance to put her straight!!) but I felt a bit rebuffed and have suffered twinges of embarrassment since then. I don't cope very well with people thinking I'm an idiot to have chosen such a path deliberately - *must toughen up!* - and on top of that I had also just ranted about how useless the disposable nappies had been last week while camping and how Isabelle always got poo all up her back, and received a shower of comments from everybody else about how 'brave' I was (meaning a hippy weirdo of dubious hygiene and sanitation practices) but how they all wouldn't dream of it and loved their disposables. Well, try explaining to your great great great great grandchildren why they could still visit a landfill site and see the nappies used on their ancestors then. And try telling your little boy why his sperm count is low because you overheated his testicles in disposable nappies, and marinated them in various toxic chemicals. Humph.

Anyway, to quickly finish before I go off to work for a couple of hours, I am also busy trying to plan Tamsin's 'Dora the Explorer' party (what else? - although till a couple of months ago I still thought we would be having a Thomas the Tank Engine party!). To my surprise (*) I found on Ebay a 'Dora's talking house' which is virtually unobtainable in this country any more, despite me having found a couple of suppliers who stopped being able to get them by the time I wanted one. The auction ended at midnight last night, so I intended to be hovering over my keyboard to make a last-minute bid. However, sleep won over, and I missed, but on checking this morning I am very glad I did as the price went up to £87 and the RRP is only £49.99 (and, of course, only $49.99 in the USA, but none of them will ship over here).

* I was surprised because a couple of months ago I kept looking on Ebay and consistently I could find the furniture and figures for the house but never the actual house itself.

Anyway, must go. The house looks like a hurricane has hit it and I'm overwhelmed ...