Birthday boy

Happy Birthday Benjamin - 8 years ago today. Still missing you.

I am an Echinacea What Flower Are You?

Good morning everyone! I have been away from the computer for 36+ hours and am trying to get a quick fix in before launching into another busy day with the girls and work.

On Tuesday morning we had an early start, needing to get up, dressed, make a packed lunch and walk to the train station in time for the 9.03 train to Oxford. Made it in good time, met the other local HE family there (with 8y.o. twins and a 6y.o. - all girls .... my girls love being with them) and waited for our 3rd HE friend to join us with her Family Railcard which she said we could all get cheaper tickets with ... and waited... and waited.... and at 9.00 we decided we'd better give up and get our tickets without her. Then of course there was a delay with the man in front of us, and the train pulled into the station while I was in the middle of buying my tickets, so we all had to *run* up over the footbridge to the other platform .... the rest of them went up over the steps and were well ahead of me while I sprinted pushing Shannon in the buggy up the ramp ... felt rather sick at such exertion but had to keep going ... and managed to leap on while the conductor held the train up for me .. . I don't think I really recovered from that all day! I really must do a little exercise every now and then ....

The train was jam-packed so we all had to scatter and sit in separate seats, ruining my fantasy of us all sitting round a table and the kids entertaining each other while T and I chatted ... Instead I had Shannon on my knee needing something to do so I pulled out a sticker book which she is really into at the moment, but unfortunately having to look at that instead of out of the window made me feel a bit travel-sick which I am horribly prone to since having children, strangely.

So not the best start to the day, but once we got to Oxford, and walked from the train station to the Natural History Museum (more exercise!) we were very pleased to meet with the rest of the HE group and sit down for 45 minutes to listen to a talk and hands-on session about insects. It was really good although Jade was very grumpy and just sat in the buggy with my cardigan over her head - she wanted to just go and look round the museum instead but I needed a sit-down! We were introduced to a giant hissing cockroach (again - memories of Kessingland!) and a giant millipede which had some other name which I can't remember. When the session finished we went for a look round, and saw loads of stuffed specimens including a shetland pony, cheetah, fox, badger, beaver, dinosaur skeletons, fossils, fossilised dinosaur eggs and much, much more. We particularly noticed the Nile Crocodile as we have just started our Egypt section of Story of the World.

We went outside on the grass for lunch, and Jade was delighted to realise that the lumps of stone we had to step over were casts of real dinosaur footprints! After lunch we went back inside, through the Nat Hist Museum into the Pitt Rivers Museum, which I had no idea about and didn't know what was there, but it was absolutely fabulous. We didn't have much time to look round and the girls just wanted to rush around looking from one thing to another whereas I would have liked to have time to linger, but they have the most amazing clothing and artefacts from other cultures and times - we headed straight for the real genuine Egyptian Mummy which we spent a fair amount of time looking at, along with the canopic jars and other Egyptian stuff, but we also saw Inuit clothing, dug-out wooden canoes, charms and amulets to ward off the evil eye and various shamanic bits and bobs, a lovely Chinese children's outfit which would have been just perfect for Jade if only it wasn't in a glass case, and there was just so much other stuff there which I didn't get a chance to look at (kids were getting fed up) that I'll have to go back another time.

Headed back into town after that, and spent a happy 45 minutes in Borders browsing, mostly through the parenting books and children's books. Bought some sticker books for the girls plus a Rainbow Fairies stencil book thingy which I am putting away for Jade's birthday. Met up with T and her girls there so that was lovely, and then we all walked back to the train station and home again by about 3.30pm.

I was really tired, so was very glad that Bill was home (off sick with his bad cough) and I just lay on the sofa and dozed a bit for about an hour, I think. Got up to find that my back was rather hurting, which it has continued to do ever since, urgh! I was very glad for a quiet evening and an early night after that.

I had been looking forward to Wednesday as a lovely jolly day out with K, my job-share partner, going down to Glastonbury for the day for a South-West Regional Time Banks meeting, but she's gone and left, hasn't she, so I went on my own , but still had a great time anyway. It was fab being on my own in the car for 2 hours each way, and having my *own* music on all the time *really loud*! How wonderful to be driving without having to listen to "The Wheels on the Bus" and the like! It was a really good day, especially as J, who used to be the project manager when we first started the Time Bank in the North Cotswolds, is now doing the same in Glastonbury so it was lovely to see him again and the day was really useful in terms of sharing experiences and networking. Stayed on after the end to chat with J and see his g/f again (she worked with me for 6 months while K was on maternity leave about 3.5 years ago) and ended up having a lovely meal out in Glastonbury, and leaving at about 7.45pm.

I congratulated Bill on coping all day while I was out for such a long time, and then realised it was only what I do every day while he's at work!

Today the job advert comes out for K's replacement, so I will be at work from 12-3 and getting ready for the trickle or flood of applications, and my Mum is visiting for a couple of days so she'll be here shortly. And now I've blogged as much in one morning as I usually do in a week, I don't know how long it will be till the next one!

Oh, but must remember to blog about Jade's swimming later!

Quick catch-up

I suppose I ought to start with Thursday and Bill's unscheduled overnight stay in hospital! He felt unwell at work in the afternoon, had a suspicion and checked his pulse to find it seemed extremely odd. He came home, went to our little local hospital who did an ECG and faxed it to the GP, who said "put him on an ambulance and send him to Gloucester Hospital!". In the end, I was the ambulance - we dropped off the girls with a friend and then I drove him to Gloucester. As usual when going into a hospital we were left sitting for a while not knowing what was going on, and more ECGs were done, and blood taken and other stuff, and in the end they decided he had atrial fibrillation and a heart rate of 140 and needed drugs to sort him out. I ended up leaving at 9pm, and he stayed in overnight. Apparently everything went back to approximately normal at 2am! I went and picked him up at round lunchtime on Friday. All rather strange, and worrying, but they said it could have been caused by an infection ... he's got a nasty cough which has in fact kept him off work today.

So we had a very quiet weekend. I was supposed to be helping out at the Stratford NCT sale (and thereby getting privileged pre-sale purchasing opportunities!) but Bill wasn't up to having the kids on his own all day so I skipped that. I did however do my Rural Cinema duties and we showed Casino Royale, which was much better than I expected and I really enjoyed it.

As reported below, we've today finally got back into doing a bit of work after the Easter break. Tomorrow we're going on a home-ed group trip to the Oxford Natural History Museum. Jade is most thrilled about the fact that we're going on a train - she's just about beside herself with excitement and has been counting down the days for over a week!

Must go now - ER is about to start .... (drool, Dr. Kovac.....)

Today's activity

Started with gardening first thing, as somebody was coming to help me weed the jungle, er... flowerbeds. Helped him for 45 mins and then left him to do some more on his own.

Came in and did some quick maths with Jade - quick-fire adding and subtracting questions with numbers to 10.

Then moved on to Story of the World - ancient Egyptians. Revised some of the chapter we did previously (over 2 weeks ago!) and then read 'Croco-Nile', a lovely picture book/poem about some Ancient Egyptian children.

Then food and she requested to watch the DK Eyewitness Human Body video while she ate.

Now she's getting changed for her afternoon at school.

Later this afternoon I go to see the Dr to discuss Selective Mutism with him - I've never brought it to his attention before and want to know what the options are for help outside of school.

Mid-green

Your Life is 64% Green

You live a very green life, and you're aware of how your actions help the earth. Of course, it's hard to be totally green. But when you make a tradeoff, you know why you're making it.

How Green Is Your Life?

I have much else to blog, but little time or energy. Will try later, honestly!

Here comes the sun.....

I'm LOVIN' the sunshine! It's been a lovely Easter weekend from the spiritual and weather points of view! We didn't get as much done as I'd hoped (I'd had vague hopes of getting some decorating done) but just mostly hung around at home. I did get some potatoes planted but need to put a lot more in.

Anyway, thank you Alison for prompting me to blog! I just seem to be completely stuck over the school issue. If I felt I was doing HE well, and could see a way to getting a couple of half-days per week on my own at home, then I think I would just take her out of school. The trouble is, I don't feel I am doing the first and can't see a way to the second on top of the hours I already spend out at work. One thing I forgot to blog is that my job-share partner (of 5 years!) is moving on to a new job, so my energy and input there are having to go up massively as I basically take it all on myself for a few weeks (not extra time, just doing it all alone) and then still take the lion's share as a new person gradually becomes trained and integrated into how things happen at work. And the idea of someone else taking responsibility for the education side of things for a while is attractive! But I still feel it will be very hard on her to go 5 mornings, or full-time. It does seem tough that I as a confirmed introvert, who needs to recharge my energy by being alone, should have a daughter who is particularly needy of my presence and attention. If I had even a penny for every time Jade said "Look, Mummy" in a day, I'd be a very rich person in no time at all. She is constantly asking me to "look" at her, while she pulls a funny face, or jumps up and down, or draws a picture, or plays with her toys - she wants me to watch what she is doing nearly all the time and it drives me mental! I honestly barely ever get the chance to complete a single thought in my head. And while staying with my friend last weekend, I asked if her daughter was the same, and she said no. So it's not just an 'age' thing. Sometimes I can't stop looking at her because I love her so much and she is very precious to me, of course, but I really can't bear being called out of the kitchen every 10 seconds while I'm trying to prepare a meal, or some such. But then I think of what might happen, with all her anxieties and stress over social situations, if I were to just send her to school full-time and I simply don't think I can do it.

So, what I need is:

• Shannon to sleep through the night and stop waking me 5-6 times, leaving me exhausted in the daytime
• Enough money (for a childminder) or some other solution to enable me to have two half-days per week on my own in the house to feel like I'm keeping on top of all my own stuff and to just have some me-time.

Apart from all that stuff, we've just been operating on 'holiday' status - the girl next door is round here most of the time so much raucous playing goes on with lots of time spent out in the garden. Shannon tends to get a bit left out sometimes, but I guess that's inevitable. We did a bit of Story of the World yesterday so we are now just launching on 'Ancient Egypt' stuff so I think there will be a lot of that in the next couple of weeks or so.

Tomorrow is my Dad's last regular day for coming over every week to look after the girls. He is approaching 75 and has been coming here weekly for over 8 years to help me in one way or another, starting when I was pregnant with Benjamin. He has been absolutely fabulous in every way possible and deserves some rest! From next week I shall change my work hours so that I work while Jade is at school from 12-3, instead of during the morning. Tomorrow, I will be taking my Dad out to lunch as a small thank-you for all he has done and all the love and support he gives me.

Quick blog

I've had a lovely few days away - firstly staying overnight with the Beans on Sunday night (thanks to them for their willingness to take me in at short notice!) and then on to visit my lovely friend A near Cambridge. Both stays were delightful, and have refreshed me noticeably although I am still undecided in the middle of the educational 'wobble'. One thing I have realised is that my mental 'scatteredness' is not helped and may be exacerbated by the 1001 e-mails I am subscribed to about all sorts of subjects under the sun. Each time I receive one, I want to get more involved in whatever it is talking about (paid surveys, children's food campaign, HE campaigns, online sales, decluttering methods etc etc) and am just whizzing from one thing to another and there is no way I have time for it all. I think 'simplicity' needs to be my new mantra. Yes, all these things are interesting and valuable, but I just can't do it all. I have unsubscribed from a lot, and will be continuing to simplify more as I see better what I really want and what is just 'good but not essential'.

Major wobbles

*Big brain-drain alert!* This stuff is just going round and round in my head and getting nowhere, so I thought getting it out here might help me sort through it a bit. Also it's kind of my duty to blog it as it is all about flexi-schooling issues and the troubles associated with it!!

So, we had our usual termly review meeting at Jade's school on Wednesday afternoon to have a chat about how she's getting on and if anything needs changing or dealing with. For the benefit of newer readers (if any), Jade goes to school 3 afternoons per week. This was originally envisaged as necessary childcare to cover some of my working hours - I thought she might be able to go one full day and a couple of half days. I also thought it would be nice for her to make some friends that she could see regularly. We wrote to the school setting out what we were thinking about and they asked us in for a meeting to discuss it. They seemed keen, enthusiastic even, and very open to understanding what HE was all about and the benefits of Jade having a little time in a different environment to do PE and group work and stuff. In the end, it seemed to work out best that she go 3 afternoons to avoid getting embroiled in their literacy and numeracy hours and the other more formal stuff that goes on in the mornings. It avoided me having to liaise with them about what work they were doing the rest of the week so that I could replicate it at home, which would have been a bit pointless!

I went to the meeting on Wednesday expecting that all was fine and just to ask them to put a bit more simple intervention in place to help her overcome her anxiety about speaking to adults. She does not speak to the adults, although she did do so once or twice at the beginning. What we got (DH came too) was a full-length exposition of why this is not going to work for very much longer, and how I need to decide whether we are working towards her going in full-time or not.

In brief, part-time school in Year 1 has been fine. They are very informal in the afternoons and she has been able to dip in and out without any trouble. In Year 2, they will all be working towards getting ready for SATs at the end of the year (rolls eyes) and the other children will gradually be spending more time doing papers and getting used to what's required which obviously will be harder to dip into part-time. In Years 3-6 (Key Stage 2), the whole timetable changes, things are no longer so easily split into formal and informal work and there will be no chance of her being there part-time. Now excuse me for being a bit pissed off that this was not clearly explained when we went for our first meeting! Or at least, I don't have a memory of this being said or hinted at, but with the general state of my memory that doesn't mean that nothing was mentioned. Maybe it was, and I just ignored it as being too far in the future.

As it has turned out, only one of her times at school has coincided with my work (now that I have changed my hours on a Thursday), so there's only one half-day that she 'needs' to be at school for my sake. However I have racked my brains to try and find another way of getting some sort of childcare for while I work that time but nothing seems to be available without spending money, which simply isn't possible. I can't afford not to work, I can't afford to pay for any extra childcare. Once Isabelle starts getting nursery vouchers next January, that will ease the budget noticeably and something else may be possible, but not for now.

Anyway, in the hope of leaving her there for at least the coming term and getting some help for her with the selective mutism, I asked whether it wouldn't be possible to get some extra strategies/intervention put into place to give her gradual exposure to speaking situations which she finds difficult so that she can gradually build up her capacity to speak to adults. Then I got this explanation of why that is difficult while she is not at the school full-time because there aren't the staff available to leave the classroom and work with her outside. If she was there full-time, she would be assessed as having special educational needs and the school would get some extra funding to get her some extra help. And the SENCO also asked what would be the point of helping her in the current circumstances if she is not going to stay at the school, i.e. why help her to get used to speaking in a school situation if she is not going to stay there. I was hoping that any progress in speaking in school would be built upon so that we could generalise it to other situations, but I can sort of see his point.

I said I didn't think Jade would thrive full-time in school at the moment, and they asked why not. Well as mentioned in my previous post she has been particularly clingy at the moment and hates leaving me under any circumstances. But I could see them almost thinking that it would be 'good for her' to be made to be apart from me more often, then, to help her get over that feeling. And I'm not absolutely confident of my ground arguing about that one. As DH said, I guess it's similar to people arguing on the "cry-it-out method" of getting little ones to sleep. And I could never do that either. But I suppose it could reasonably be asked, who has the separation anxiety here - the child or the mother?

Anyway the situation has been left that we will think about whether we want to work towards transitioning her to full-time school over the next 12 - 18 months or not. If we do, then they will of course be delighted to work with her to make her more comfortable in speaking to adults. If not, well we might as well take her out straightaway.

The problem is, the idea of sending her to school is not completely unattractive! Especially on a day like today, when I had another appalling night's sleep thanks to Shannon's waking and feeding habits, and I'm absolutely exhausted. I have been grumpy, irritable, lethargic, not wanting to do anything with the girls and really just wishing they weren't there so that I could rest or get on with things quietly. And I have days like that more often than I like to admit. The archaeology thing is the only overtly educational stuff that we have done this week. I seriously wonder whether the work would be more interesting at school, because although I have bursts of enthusiasm and energy for stuff, more often than not I feel uninspired and too tired to do anything very interesting. I wonder whether our relationship wouldn't be better in some ways because if I had space at home to do my thing during the day, when she came home I could really focus on her and be happy to give that time to her completely, rather than wishing I was doing something else. I really, really crave time on my own at home, and am simply not getting any at all. And I've always thought that late primary age is probably a fairly reasonable time for kids to go to school if they're going to. I don't like early primary because I feel they simply start too young and secondary school is too horrendous to contemplate mostly, but late primary seems fairly innocuous. And I also have to take into account that we're not just talking about sending her to 'school' as a general principle, but to this particular school, which has about 4o pupils max., about 6 or 7 children in Jade's current year, a mixed class of Reception, Y1 and Y2 which I like because then they're not all simply the same age; and a staff of 2-3 people in that classroom of about 15-18 children.

Over the past couple of days my thoughts and feelings have veered wildly between, "let's just take her out right now and I can take her to work with me on Thursdays and we'll just manage without any school hassle at all," to "oh it would be really nice not to have to have all this education burden on myself and it would be fantastic to have some quiet me-time at home sometimes (assuming Shannon went to nursery or playschool as well) and let's just send her to school full-time".

And then I wonder what happens if the best interests of the child (to stay at home with her family where she feels safe, loved and confident) conflict with the best interests of the mother (to be able to have some space to get things done, sleep, just be alone as necessary). And then I think I shouldn't be thinking about such things on a day when i'm so tired. And then I think, but that is the reality of many of my days.

So there, let's see if getting that out of my head and onto the blog gives me any more clarity!

Archaeology

We've done some work today that has satisfied a bit of my personality that I didn't know I had! Having read the first bit of 'Story of the World' a couple of weeks ago, I've been planning on doing a bit of 'archaeology' with Jade - all I needed was the chance to surreptitiously bury some stuff in the as-yet-unplanted vegetable patch and then set her up for an archaeological dig. I managed to bury the stuff last week, but then it got freezing cold, so we didn't do anything about it until yesterday. When she got home after her afternoon at school, and with me feeling frustrated because we'd just frittered away the morning without doing anything 'proper', I tempted her out into the garden with the promise of lots of mud and mess. She went at it with great enthusiasm, which I had to temper slightly for fear of damaging the 'artefacts'! But she was thrilled whenever she came across anything. I am slightly disconcerted that there are 2 things I buried that we never discovered, so who knows how long they will remain there now! We took great care, once we found something, to brush the mud carefully away so as not to damage it, and to mark on a plan of the area where we had found something. Before long, L from next door came round and joined in too.
















Shannon was happy to help by washing the 'ancient objects' that we found:

















And, yesterday, that was that.

This morning we had planned to go to HE group, where science experiments were planned. But despite looking through a few books last night, I couldn't find anything I was interested enough in to take with us to demonstrate, and I wanted to finish off our 'dig' project as I feel I can't go on with SOTW until we've finished this bit (I know me .... if I move on, I will never go back and finish off what I've left undone). And Jade was begging to go swimming and as HE group lasts most of the day (10.30 - 3pm) there wouldn't have been time to go. So we decided to abandon the group, finish off stuff at home this morning and go swimming this afternoon.

So, once we were up and dressed (mostly - Shannon wanted to remain naked for a good portion of the morning) I set Jade to taking photos of all the objects she had dug up, which included a few bits and pieces of broken stuff that I hadn't put there! I then started to show her how to get the pictures from the camera onto the computer, but hit a strange technical hitch which slowed everything up a great deal and she got bored and wandered off to play. I eventually sorted that out, uploaded the pics, chose a few and printed them off. I then retrieved her from her playing, sat her down at the table and persuaded her to make the pics into a booklet with a front and back cover, which she illustrated with a lovely drawing of a skeleton and a garden fork, and then wrote 'ARCHAEOLOGY' for the title. What has surprised me is how satisfied I feel at having got her to produce a 'proper' written piece of work (rolling eyes emoticon!!). Help, somebody stop me, I'm coming over all teacher-y!

We've also put stickers on the world map that those lovely people at the Guardian newspaper have given away free (courtesy of my Dad). We have placed stickers showing the 7 wonders of the ancient world (noting how they are all in the same area) and the 7 wonders of the natural world. She's had lunch while listening to a couple of the Rainbow Fairies stories which we've borrowed from the library on CD (well, it saves me having to read them to her) and then she sat on the sofa reading several books to Shannon (toddler books) while I listed a couple of items on Ebay.

After that we went swimming. By accident I slightly under-inflated Jade's arm-bands and tried to persuade her to keep them like that. Despite the fact that she could swim in them, she insisted I blew them up more. Meanwhile Shannon only wanted to hop onto my back and be towed around hanging onto my shoulder straps!

Tonight I am particularly concerned about Jade's apparently growing distress at ever being separated from me. She was saying this evening how she hates Wednesdays when DH is at home and I go to work, and she asked if it could be the other way round tomorrow. She hates me leaving her in bed to fall asleep, and always begs and pleads with me to stay. She has also been more reluctant to go to school recently, despite apparently having a lovely time when she is there. She's been clinging to me and not wanting me to leave. She really does settle down and play happily with the other children, and appears to do just fine while she's there. She won't talk to the adults, though. And that is another aspect of what is bothering me. Selective mutism, which she does have although on the milder end of the spectrum as she will at least talk to other children, is an anxiety-related condition, and obviously so is separation anxiety. She's such a fabulous girl in so many ways, and yet she is so anxious in these various situations. Everything I've done with her since she was a baby was supposed to develop self-confidence in a child - co-sleeping, carrying, long-term breastfeeding. And I wonder whether in fact it's done the exact opposite. Or maybe she's just genetically like that and would have been no matter what we'd done with her. She does after all remind me of me :-) I get so cross with myself for being anxious in other people's presence, fearing I'm not interesting or fun enough for anybody to want to be with me, and no matter what pep-talks I give myself I don't seem to be able to rid myself of this particular trait. But knowing what agonies that having an anxious personality has put me through, I'm longing to find a way to help her become confident within herself and deal with her worries.

To completely change tack, and just so that this is recorded for our own purposes and not to brag at all (I don't even know what's supposed to be 'normal' at this age), Shannon is completely confident at counting from 1-12, recognises the shapes square, circle, triangle, rectangle, heart and star, and is 'getting there' with colours.

Bits and pieces

Well, another couple of weeks have flown by. There have been various interesting things going on, but I can't remember when or in what order so I'll just do bullet points.

• Shannon astonished me by taking over Reader Rabbit 1 that Jade had left, and not only did I see her competently using the mouse and clicking on stuff for the first time ever, I realised that she was actually properly playing the pairs game and matching up sets of 2 pictures! Astonishing!!!
• Jade and I have been playing lots of Farmyard Bingo which Shannon's enjoyed joining in with and doing quite well too.
• Jade went to school all day on Monday. They were having a 'medieval day', making food, dressing up in costumes, dancing etc. She enjoyed it, but said it was too long to be away from me. I agree! It felt very strange not having her here for that long, and I just can't imagine what it would do to family relationships if she was there full-time.
• She's going all day tomorrow, too - for a trip out to Warwick Castle. I'm rather surprised she's so enthusiastic about going, actually, for one who's fairly anxious being without me, but she seems keen so I am happily going along with it.
• DH took the girls out to see Kenilworth Castle last Wednesday when I was at work all day. They loved it.
• This morning, we've done the story of Isaac from the Bible. On the way I explained about primogeniture, inheritance, cultural differences and lots more.
• Then we did some Miquon maths. She's still at the simple adding up stage, and using her fingers for 1+2 and other such sums!
• Then we pulled out the Usborne Children's Encyclopedia, and she wanted to look at the page about having babies, so we read about fertilisation, where babies grow, how long for and how they are born. Then we went onto the web to follow up the Usborne Internet Links and searched for some others too. So we saw short videos of fertilisation, implantation, and foetal development. Then we found a nice video of some women giving birth, gently and naturally, which may well have robbed me of the opportunity of ever having grandchildren, as she really does not like the look of that AT ALL! She says she's quite scared ....
  
• Also on the subject of birth, we visited a friend's farm last Friday for a tour round the lambing sheds. We saw the orphans that were being fed from bottles, the ones that had been put with another ewe to try and get her to adopt them, and then were fortunate to find one ewe who had just delivered one lamb, and my friend got the big shoulder-length glove on and stuck her arm in to find that there was another one on the way. This one was breech, though, and she couldn't manage to get it into a good position for delivery, so her husband came along and he managed to get the lamb born. It was touch and go for a minute or so but fortunately the lamb managed to get going and eventually we saw it struggle to its feet and have its first feed.
• The same day, I went to a funeral for a local woman whom I knew reasonably well, so that was sad. Birth and death in one day. The girls went to play with another HE family in town.
• This afternoon we've been swimming. Neither of them are swimming independently yet but Jade is showing a little progress each time we go and as she does so much better without any pressure I'll just let her take it at her own speed.
• There are of course tons of other books and stuff we've looked at over the past couple of weeks, but nothing else is springing to my memory at the moment.
  

The black hole of time

.... slips away with another few days! Wednesday was my work-all-day day, plus Thursday morning. Got a bit despondent on Thursday afternoon after collecting Jade from school, as I asked her teacher whether she thought it would be manageable for Jade to go in all day on a Thursday, and she was quite negative about it. My Dad has been looking after Jade on a Thursday morning while I work for a long time now, and as he approaches 75 in May he wants to 'retire'! So I desperately need Thursday morning childcare but have no money to pay for any. So I thought maybe we could work out for her to be at school all day on a Thursday, but as I say her teacher is really not keen on the idea, and as she is the one who would have to implement it then if she's not on-side then it's not going to work well anyway. I don't want to be liaising every week with someone who thinks we're just wasting her time. So ... don't know what I'm going to do about that yet. She's not negative about Jade's abilities, but simply about us working together so that I can, for example, finish up any work on a Friday that they've started on Thursday etc. "What about if we're using equipment in the classroom that we need to continue with on the Friday?", she says.

Can't remember at all what happened on Friday.

Saturday was lovely - Bill got up with the girls (voluntarily!) and I had a lie-in! And then after a general morning's playing, I took Jade to dancing and went off to do a bit of supermarket shopping while she was there. After collecting her, we all went swimming. Yes, all of us! For 5.5 years I've been taking Jade swimming, and this is the first time ever (except maybe once on holiday) that Bill has come along too. Whatever it is that's come over him, I like it! And as we were driving home, he said how it was too nice to go straight home and let's go for a walk, so we did drop in and pick up the dog and then went up to one of the Cotswolds high spots and had a lovely half-hour walk. So that was a lovely family day. There was much lunar eclipse viewing in the evening but although Jade asked to be woken up to have a look, she was in too deep a sleep and wouldn't even stir.

Today I took the girls to church this morning, got home by 1pm just in time to receive our monthly Tesco delivery, and then Bill and I took it in turns to have an hour's nap. Shannon is being really terrible at night lately and seems to want to be permanently latched on. Needless to say I'm not letting her but it's disturbing us all.

Tomorrow morning I'm not going to answer the phone if it rings, in the hope of actually getting some work done here!

I simply do not have time ....

..... to educate my children. They're just going to have to do it themselves!

Honestly, I just lose the time to all sorts of stuff and we just don't seem to be getting on with much at all. Yesterday, I was just getting started on an Lent chart (along the lines of this and this) with the girls when the phone rang, and there I was for an hour on the phone to a friend who was feeling rather down. When we finished I just had time to make a quick lunch for Jade, get her changed and rush her off for her afternoon at school.

Today I slept late, as I had a stinking headache, and had just staggered downstairs at about 9.30am when the phone rang, and it was my Mum needing advice about broadband. 55 minutes later I eventually got free and got myself some breakfast, and a second breakfast for Jade and Shannon. What with sorting out food, washing, a couple more vital phone calls and fighting terminal exhaustion we only managed to do a small amount of reading on the human body which Jade requested. I tried to set her up with an old DK CD-Rom on The Amazing Human Body but I couldn't load it on either the desktop or the laptop so that wasted half-an-hour. I eventually found a couple of interactive websites for her, so we heard some narrated clips about the brain and skeleton, built our own skeleton and that was about it. Then it was lunchtime, after which we went out swimming.

Swimming was good, though. Jade is now fairly confident swimming with her arm-bands, so I'll have to start gradually reducing the amount of air in them. She also took them off and swam holding one float in front of her. She was resistant at first because she didn't like how far down she went in the water, but when I showed her that when I did it, the tip of my chin was in the water but no further, she agreed to have another go and did it! Shannon discovered that she can get her feet on the bottom of the pool, so voluntarily let go of me for the first time ever and took a few steps here and there! It won't be long before she realises she can pick her feet up and not sink, and she'll be off with her armbands on too. And Jade actually let me wash and rinse her hair in the shower, which was a major, major achievement!! We've never managed hairwashing without major hysterics before, so I usually don't bother. She gets it wet in the bath and that manages to keep it OK, but I was relieved to give it a good wash for a change.

Anyway, head is still pounding and pizza and chips are just about ready in the oven (yes, terrible food I know but all I could manage feeling the way I do) so must go.

So.....

So, none of you except Helen gives a monkeys that I've been at death's door then Honestly, what does a girl have to do round here to get a little attention, huh? Ah well, at least now I know who my friends are ;-)

For the benefit of the few who are interested, I'll just reassure you all that I am definitely on the mend. I did go to the Dr in the end but he diagnosed pharyngitis which is viral so no antibiotics required for which I was grateful. I did suggest ice-cream, though, so I wasted no time at all in going to the next-door supermarket for a big tub of Ben & Jerry's! And I'm NOT SHARING IT!

On top of all this, on Friday we had the trauma of taking the dog for surgery. She'd had a large lump appear in her groin, and they weren't sure what it was so it had to be removed. She's fine, though - it turned out to be a fatty lump which popped out with no trouble and apart from the 6 stitches to be taken out, she requires no further treatment. Can't say the same about our finances though which are going to need CPR any time now .......

Anyway, as I've mostly been in bed for the past 3 days I can't tell you much about what the girls have been up to, apart from running riot! DH is looking ragged, the house is..... erm.... a tip and Shannon has been distraught about being kept away from me while I've languished in bed so she's particularly clingy. Could somebody send in the cavalry, please?

Thump, pound, thump .... stab, stab, stab

So that would be the thumping and pounding in my head, and the stabbing in my throat .... I don't know if it's tonsillitis or some other sort of 'itis' but it's been accompanied by fever and all-over-body aches.

Fortunately it chose to strike on a Wednesday, when Bill's at home with the girls anyway, so I spent the day in bed - didn't have any choice actually as I couldn't manage vertical. Today there is juggling between grandpa, childminder and friends and Bill coming home early, so though I feel slightly better I should be able to stay in bed today mostly as well. I've broken out the laptop again and am blogging from bed!

Unfortunately it chose to strike when my colleague and I were supposed to be doing workshops about the work of our charity to an NHS Trust in Oxfordshire. I was supposed to be there today, while she had my kids, and she's there tomorrow while I'm supposed to have hers. So I've had to cancel today's, and K's arranged different childcare for tomorrow. Ah well, it's not the end of the world but it's stressful having to cancel something external rather than just a day in the office.

I don't think we've done much specifically educational since I last blogged. We certainly haven't done any more maths or Sonlight stuff. But there has been painting, drawing, sticking, cutting, dancing, reading and the like. We are racing through the series of Boxcar Children books that Katy lent me, which are going down very well with all of us. I have just bought the Story of the World Book 1 and Activity Book, which look fantastic so we'll be getting into that shortly. I looked through the first couple of chapters of the Activity book and reserved some of the 'additional reading' titles from the library so they should come through in a week or two. I don't suppose I'll be organised enough to always plan ahead like that but at least if I manage it sometimes it'll be good!

We did go to the Butterfly Farm in Stratford on Avon with the HE group on Tuesday. The girls and I went on our own about a year ago, and after managing well to start with Jade had not liked the butterflies flapping round her head and we'd cut the visit short. So I was not sure how it would go. She managed well, though, as did Shannon, although there was one particular butterfly that took a great liking to Shannon's hair as a safe place for her babies, and laid 4 eggs in her hair! We had a guide who took us round and did a bit of chat in each bit, and although I don't know what Jade learned, I learned that butterflies taste through their feet! I didn't know that! We saw the caterpillars and the pupae and the emerging from the pupa bit and of course tons of butterflies. It did get a bit much for us all towards the end, though, as although there's no rational reason for it I really didn't like the butterflies in my hair and Jade had had enough, so we came out early and missed the mini-beasts bit, which as far as I'm concerned is not a problem at all. I do not want to encourage my daughters to love spiders and cockroaches!

Last night at about 7pm Shannon surprised me by saying her sister's name properly for the first time! I don't think I'm giving too much away of the real name by saying that Shannon always called Jade "Dandrin", but suddenly last night, she just got it and said it properly! We were all very excited and she repeated it several times, but she's refused to do so this morning. Ah well, she is 2!

Ah, silence. The house is quiet. Nobody here but me. I'm going to sign off and just appreciate it.

It's been quite productive here lately. Yesterday (Monday) we started off with some Miquon Maths - using Cuisenaire rods to play around with all the number-bonds to 5. She can add higher numbers than that but I wanted her to get clear the point that you can write the sums any way round, and that they are all different but equivalent. Then we did her first 'official' recorder lesson - we have a book and we did Lesson 1 (the note B) and today we moved on to A. She did extremely well both days, especially the timing (crotchets and quavers) which she just 'got' instantly. She was mighty pleased with herself! I also read to her the first half of Capyboppy, a novel from Sonlight K which I realised the other day won't be scheduled for us as we are following (or not, as the case may be!) the 4-day programme rather than the 5-day. It really goes without saying that she looked at/read several books during the day too. I don't have to encourage her to do that.

Today we started with crafts. She had pulled out several cards from my '50 things to do on a rainy day' Usborne activity cards, and wanted to do them all, LOL! We partly managed 2 things - a joined-up row of paper hearts, decorated, followed by a princess hat - a tall cone decorated with pink and purple tissue paper and (later) to be decorated with glitter and sequins and tassels. We then did the 2nd recorder lesson (cue more excitement and pride!). I think after that (about noon) I actually persuaded her to get dressed, and then we had lunch. We were out this afternoon at the HE group - just a social/playing get-together with no particular activity or theme today. When we got home she sat down and read the ten Oxford Reading Tree books that we'd borrowed off someone there! So I guess that's literacy covered for today then!

It's funny - when I write stuff down like this it seems much less somehow. I probably forget some stuff, and of course with a 2yo around everything takes an awful lot longer than you expect, but anyway, they've felt like positive and productive days so that's what matters.

Meet George

Say Hi to the quietest member of the family, although I suspect he may not stay long.

Obviously much snowy play has taken place here yesterday and today, although Shannon definitely is not too impressed. She won't walk in the snow at all, insisting on being carried, nor does she want to pick any up.

As well as that, we've had quite a good day. At last (been meaning to get round to it all week) we picked up the Usborne Children's Encyclopedia, had a look at the Solar System pages and then went to the Internet-linked sites. Had a fab time with those, on a virtual tour through the solar system here and also the 'create your own planet' bit of the same website. We then got sidetracked onto all sorts of other websites. We went here but Jade hates timed games so we explored the rest of the site. She (with supervision/help) did a 'which state goes where' puzzle of the USA, virtually polished some gemstones and made them into jewellery, and created a safe path for a bug to get from a mushroom to a flower (!), when all the time I think we were really supposed to be here! Ah well, it won't be the first or last time that a little unplanned wandering pays more dividends than the original plan. All this time Shannon was sitting on my knee and watching transfixed. She mostly does that when Jade is on the computer.

When I needed to go off and get lunch or dinner or something, Jade went on to a Learning Land CD-Rom which again Shannon just watched her doing. Shannon has also played with Fun-Blox, playdough, floam-substitute and done lots of jumping (her current skill-to-be-worked-on-at-all-times), spinning round and round and of course having strops and wailing.

The other thing of utmost significance that I did today was to at last find a home for one of Shannon's big Christmas presents, which I realised I could slot onto a shelf if I turned the existing box on it short-end in instead of longways. It does mean both boxes stick out in front of the shelf somewhat, but they are under a little fold-out table bit which is always out and never down, so it doesn't show that much. Dunno why I never thought of it before! That meant I could at least clear a few more bits of toys and general clutter and clear a space that hadn't been empty since before Christmas. Just to prove it, I vacuumed up several pine needles which I hope will be the last!

I have also (strangely) swept the entire kitchen floor, bleached the sink, cleared and wiped off two work-tops and wiped down the door-seal of my fridge like FlyLady told me to! Phew! No wonder I need an early night.

BTW, just out of general curiosity - anyone else not yet completely unpacked from Melrose?

Melrose

Loved it. Had a really good time. Much easier than last year, as Jade was actually able to leave my side and go off and play quite a bit. And I could even leave both of them in the Playroom while I went and had a nap, one day. Wow! How I longed for that last year! But I'm not in the mood to blog lots about it as I'm too tired by this stage of the day, and I can't blog coherently while the kids are around. So that's yer lot for now.

Getting ready

Going to Melrose is great, but it does mean you have to catch up on a huge pile of washing and ironing beforehand in order to have any clothes to take with you! As I stand at the ironing board (a very unaccustomed place for me) with the children playing at my feet, I'm imagining all my fellow-hostellers doing the same thing. I normally do very little ironing, but having been trying to avoid using the tumble dryer recently to save money, stuff has been left hanging over radiators and getting very creased. We'll be setting off some time tomorrow as we're staying with T-bird on the way up. Jade is very excited!

It seems like the right moment to record just how lovely both girls are being at the moment. Jade seems to go through phases of difficult behaviour sometimes (or maybe it's me!) but she's just being totally fantastic currently. She is a delight to be with and watch. She's funny and bright, and I'm loving to notice how her mind and thinking are developing, and her interesting use of words as she learns to use descriptive language. And of course she's very affectionate, wanting lots of cuddles during the day, writing notes to DH and I saying "I love you" and telling us she loves us "a hundred and billion"! Her reading is absolutely astonishing (she made a good attempt at "anesthesiologist" yesterday), although she is a good deal more reluctant to do much with maths. For anybody going to Melrose who hasn't met her before, please be aware that she will not speak to adults and don't take it personally! She will probably take a while to warm up to the children too, but will be fine once she's had time to settle in.

Shannon is totally adorable, apart from about 6-8 times per night! She is so funny, with great facial expressions, and she seems quite aware of her comic ability too. Her speech has come on in huge leaps and bounds over the past couple of weeks, with new words and phrases arriving every day, and she is very polite, saying "pardon me" after every fart and "please" when she wants something. In fact, she often just says "please .......... please" and it's a bit of a struggle to work out what she's actually after. Some of her lovely words are: "Bampa" for Grandpa, "butoo-hly" for butterfly, with the 'f' as a little blowing sound a bit like an 'h', and "bed-dik" for breadstick. She can count pretty well, being mostly reliable at 1 - 10 (occasionally missing out 8), quite good at the 'teens', and on one notable occasion recently she counted from 24 to 30, all on her own! Even Jade still sometimes can't remember what comes after 29, so I was astonished at Shannon, at age 2y 2 mo!

Anyway, I guess that's enough procrastination from the ironing/packing task, so I'd better stop there! See some of you on Sunday!

Phew!

You know the Bible 100%!

Wow! You are awesome! You are a true Biblical scholar, not just a hearer but a personal reader! The books, the characters, the events, the verses - you know it all! You are fantastic!

Ultimate Bible Quiz
Create MySpace Quizzes

I'd have been a bit embarrassed if I didn't, LOL!

Bits 'n' pieces

It's been a bitty sort of a day. We had to go out fairly early this morning (9.45!) to meet somebody and pass on something she needed, so after that was done we went to the nearest small town where I don't usually shop but I had heard there was a nice shoe shop there. Both girls needed their feet measuring as they were both done last September and I thought they might have grown since then. Jade surprisingly hasn't (yet) so she's still OK but Shannon is 2 sizes bigger. Luckily she is already wearing a pair of Jade's old trainers which are the right size so that was OK! Popped into a nearby charity shop and got 3 things for 50p each - a battery-powered bubble blower at Jade's request, a new 'princess-y' filofax type thing which will be good for a birthday prezzie if/when Jade goes to any parties this year, and a Dora flip-top cup similar to Jade's existing one, which means Shannon can have one too so there won't be arguments over Dora cups! So I was pleased with that little haul.

We got home, had snacks/food, then got the girls doing some colouring/cutting-out/sticking type activities while I attempted to beat the kitchen mess into submission. Then I got Jade busy on the computer and Shannon likes to sit and watch, so that kept them happy while I made lunch. This afternoon we were going to do some baking, but I started to measure out flour into a bowl and found the scales were not registering anything at all, so they seem to be kaput. Even though Jade had been nagging me all morning about the baking, she was pretty unfussed that we couldn't do it and instead I dragged them upstairs to do some tidying and sorting. I got the Christmas decorations back into the loft (!) along with several other boxes and bits and pieces, so that cleared a bit of space in the spare room (which used to be Jade's room) and in a cupboard in the corner of the girls' room. The plan is to move some of the downstairs toys into that upstairs cupboard, and hopefully keep the downstairs a little bit clearer and tidier. That's the theory, anyway! I did get as far as sorting out the 'general' toybox downstairs and throwing away all those Kinder Egg toys, cracker toys and general tatt that ends up hanging around. I was feeling ruthless so I threw away all the art creations Jade has been doing recently, that have been prolific, but it's definitely more about process than product so they've gone in the bin.

So the decks feel slightly clearer and the girls have mostly played happily today with this and that, although Shannon did fall asleep on the sofa in front of the TV at 6pm so I had better make sure of a reasonably early night as she'll be up early! Not to mention the several wakings during the night.

Sofa blog!

This is something of a milestone - I'm blogging from the sofa using the laptop on a wireless connection! Hooray! I still have all my e-mail settings etc on the desktop comp so am not in the habit of using this machine much but it's rather fun.

Anyway, I've just depressed myself by reading some Patch of Puddles archive - going back 3 years to see what they were doing when Fran was 5. Ooo-er! I am SO behind!

Our Tuesday went reasonably well - not quite as much done as Monday, but we did some more Bible, some more Hero Tales and some more Boxcar children. Can't remember what else filled the day but never mind. Wednesday I was out at work all day and DH was home with the girls. He looked at the Sonlight Instructors Guide and couldn't make head or tail of it, so didn't do any. Today I've been at work this morning with Shannon at the childminder and Jade at my friend Kate's, as my Dad has hurt his back and couldn't manage childcare. Actually he's been coming over once a week for over 8 years, since I was pregnant with Benjamin, and now he's approaching 75 he wants to stop. Which leaves me with a dilemma about what to do with Jade on a Thursday morning. We can't currently afford for her to go to the childminder as well. So that's weighing on my mind.

I've had a nice selection of packages in the post today. I got a selection of organic skincare products as a free gift with my Christmas present subscription to Green Parent magazine; a Little Hearts Matter teddy bear as a gift from them to celebrate their 10th anniversary, and an Usborne Books order which I only placed 2 days ago so that's impressive.

Since Jade came home from this afternoon's school, we haven't done much at all as I am again chronically tired from more terrible nights' sleep thanks to Shannon. Am pondering the possibility of getting some help in the daytime for a couple of weeks so that I can nap, and maybe if I know that I'll be able to catch up in the day I'll be able to stick to my guns in the middle of the night and refuse to feed Shannon, no matter how long she stays awake complaining about it.

And now I must go and do something useful.

I want more like this!

What a good day we've had!

My plan was to start Sonlight K and stick to the Instructors Guide schedule as much as possible, to see if that works for us. Jade has been getting on fine in many ways, but I feel very disorganised and out-of-control and felt that many days slipped by with nothing much going on. Maybe that's just a perception thing, but I thought it would be good to try a different way and find out if it's better.

Things didn't start quite according to plan as Shannon and I slept till about 9am and Jade slept till 9.40am! Jade has been having great trouble falling asleep at bedtimes, despite a consistent bedtime routine, so she was awake very late and hence slept late. I was glad, though, as she needed to catch up, and so did I! She's doing it again tonight, though - she was settled down at 8pm after a nice bath and stories, and here we are at 9.25pm and she's still wide awake.

Once we were up, dressed and breakfasted, we started work. We started with a Bible reading (Beginner's Bible) and beginning to learn a memory verse. I wrote the verse down and Jade decorated it. She then asked to copy it out herself, and who am I to refuse, LOL! So we ruled some nice wide-apart lines on a sheet of paper and she got on with it. Excellent!

Then we moved on to 'Hero Tales' with the introduction to the story about Gladys Aylward. Jade and Shannon were playing with the Duplo while I read to them. We checked out the locations mentioned (London, China) on the globe. After that it was time to get Jade ready for her afternoon of school, so got her dressed and made her lunchbox up and took her off to school.

I came home with Shannon and we had lunch together while watching CBeebies. Shannon snuggled up next to me while I read a book. It was lovely and cosy. After that we went into the kitchen to prepare dinner, and she came too and stood on a stool and played in a sinkful of water, and then played with a bowlful of flour. That took an hour, and afterwards I wanted to get some Usborne phonecalls done. So we sat at the table, and she scribbled and drew while I phoned round all the local schools getting the names of their Literacy Co-ordinators. When I had finished phone calls, I went through the pen/pencil box with Shannon, getting her to scribble with each pen and shouting out the name of the colour after me. She loved it and we did this for absolutely ages. I also demonstrated the pencil sharpener to her, and took the opportunity to throw away several felt-tip pens which were pretty much dried up.

Then it was time to get the dinner in the oven and then go and collect Jade from school. We came straight back home, I refused a request for the TV to go on (proud emoticon!) and instead we all played a game of Farm Lotto. This was Shannon's first try and she did really well! She seemed to get the hang quite quickly of taking it in turns, and then with a bit of encouragement, spotting when she had picked up an animal that was on her card and putting the picture piece onto it. We must do that again soon! We were all set for a second game but something distracted me/them (can't remember) and then Jade requested more of the 'learning books'. So I read the first section from the "Language and Thinking for Young Children" which was the story of the crow and the pitcher. It's a pretty short story, and then I gave her the option of either drawing a picture of the story, or doing an experiment with a jar of water and some stones and watching the water level rise. She chose the latter, was very excited to see it really did happen, and did it twice! Then we sat down and started on the story "The Boxcar Children" and by popular demand I did three chapters instead of just one.

By then it was time for me to prepare the veg for dinner so I left them playing. I got dinner on the table by 5.10pm (early for me!), then a bit of TV for them and a bit of computer time for me and upstairs for bath at 6.15pm. Jade loves a really long bath, so she was in there till about 7pm and then more stories and cuddles till Shannon fell asleep at 7.45pm and I left Jade to settle down for sleep. 2 hours later, we're still waiting. In the end I have told her to switch her lamp on and just read. She's always taken up to an hour to fall asleep but not this bad till recently.

Now I have to go into major planning mode for my Usborne 2007 Catalogue Launch party - need to order some new titles and get invites and posters done. Oh, and watch ER!!!!!

Six weird things about me

THE RULES

Each player of this game starts with the ’six weird things about you’ blog post. People who get tagged need to write their own six weird things post and state the rules clearly. At the end of the post tag six more people and don’t forget to leave a comment on their blog to tell them they have been tagged and tell them to read your blog.

1. Well I don't think this is weird but the majority of the rest of the population does. I breastfed Jade till she was 4.5 years old. In fact she still begs to have a quick go sometimes. Sometimes I let her.

2. Even though it's about 25 years since I last played a piano, I still sometimes find myself fingering the notes of a tune as though I was playing.

3. I am a biker! My 30th birthday present to myself was a motorbike, and lessons. Although I love riding, I found it impractical as it's too cold in winter, too hot in summer and the clothing is too bulky to wear to do anything nice at the other end. I hope to be a motorbiking granny, though.

4. Although objectively I guess I am very intelligent (high IQ), I don't consider that my opinion is worth much. That's very weird.

5. I was absolutely fascinated by pregnancy and childbirth even when I was pretty sure I didn't want any children myself. I even took a module studying it at university. I contemplated becoming a midwife, till I realised I am not good in an emergency.

6. I am an introvert, and yet my favourite colour is red. Red is supposed to be loud, vibrant and outgoing. So not me, and yet I love it.

Difficult to know who to tag! I guess it will have to be:

Dagmar
Sally
Jax, has anybody tagged you yet?
Dawn
Claire, if she's not to busy with the new baby!
Katy or Bob

Phew!

Miscellany

Was back to work last week, and Jade went to school on Thursday afternoon only, but we're not back to any semi-formal HE stuff yet. My plan is to start trying our best to stick to the Sonlight schedule from Monday for a couple or three months and see if it works for us that way. Nevertheless, as usual education goes on anyway. In the past few days Jade has:

• made cards for her friends, involving sticking, decorating and writing in them - more writing than she usually does and she did it all herself! she usually starts and asks me to finish.
• Lots of reading, of course, both on her own and by me to her. I wouldn't say she's really reading books yet, but sometimes she will sit down with one and look all through it and is probably reading most of it, as long as there are only 1 or 2 sentences on a page. Technically she can read at a higher level than that but the size and amount of text makes a big difference. I'm trying to remember which books we've read but most of them I've forgotten - I know there has as usual been plenty of human body stuff, ancient greeks, unicorns (her current fave) and lots of Christmas stories.
• Being doing spontaneous sums with collections of items ("If I get 3 of these in one hand, and 3 in the other, I've got 6!)
• plus lots of role-playing (being a unicorn, being Mary while Shannon is baby Jesus, etc).

I've been busy trying to get our finances in order (again!) - almost there and almost got a debt reduction payment plan worked out.

I spent Thursday night and all day Friday at the Usborne Gala Dinner and Conference, which was great fun - we won Sparkliest Table award! Also very informative and inspiring - I have big plans for going further with Usborne but whether I have enough me-time to actually get any of it organised, I'll have to wait and see. Watch this space for more Usborne stuff though!

After keeping my eyes open for years at Christmas time for a nice but not-too-expensive Nativity Set, I finally found one by luck in town while shopping for party poppers for the Usborne Gala Dinner! It's this one. Love it! There was a larger version, which I would have preferred, but couldn't afford it! Couldn't really afford this one, actually, but when you've been looking for something for years and then see one, and in a sale as well, then you've just got to get it!

And finally, today, I've had a long phone conversation with a woman living in my own street about HE! And they're Christians too! She has a 2y 8mo boy and an 8mo girl, and is starting to look around and decide what to do. She's not necessarily convinced by HE yet, but is certainly interested in seriously considering it, and the whole family is coming round one Saturday in February to have a chat and look through our stuff!

Tagged by Ali

Name three things:

That you had hanging on your tree:
1. A shooting star ornament in memory of Benjamin
2. ALL our tinsel (a lot!) because Jade decorated the tree!
3. Chocolate santas (for a short while, anyway)


That you’ve eaten / drunk lots of:
1. Baileys
2. Liqueur chocolates
3. Turkey


That you didn’t do this year but hope to do next year
1. Host a party/generally entertain more
2. Go to a pantomime
3. Go ice-skating somewhere


Favourite presents
1. Digital camera (from DH)
2. Subscription to Green Parent magazine
3. Fluffy cushion for the sofa


That you’re glad you didn’t get for Christmas
1. Smellies/bath stuff (I don't bath, I shower)
2. Anything hand-knitted
3. Plain chocolates


People to tag
1. Sally L.
2. Claire
3. Leandra

2007

So here's the New Year. It's not an occasion I make a big thing of - don't usually bother staying up to see midnight pass, but I do like the feeling of a clean fresh year ahead of me, a mostly blank calendar and a new-ish start.
The past few days at home have been very relaxed - much playing, resting, eating chocolate and hanging out together. It's been nice

Then on Saturday we drove North to visit Bill's Dad and sister. We stayed overnight in a Travelodge on Saturday night - although I can hardly say we 'slept' there thanks to Jade, who woke up in the small hours with a headache, which then progressed to ear ache, and then just seemed to be general insomnia and we were all (except Shannon) awake for hours. So we slept in till about 10am on Sunday morning. Had another short visit to Bill's Dad over lunchtime and the early afternoon and then what seemed like a very loooooong drive home in torrential rain and high winds with both Bill and I needing time to sleep on the journey but the kids not seeming to need the same

Needless to say we didn't try staying up to see the New Year in as even if we'd wanted to we were just too tired, and today we have taken down all the decorations and attempted to get things back to some form of normality.

I am, along with the rest of the population, abysmal at keeping New Year's resolutions, but some how setting goals for the year doesn't seem to be quite the same, so after spending a little time musing and thinking this afternoon, here are my goals for the coming year:

Children:

• Night-wean Shannon
• Get Jade doing regular chores
• Get Jade to usually sleep in her own bed all night
• Much less television - maximum half-an-hour in the morning while I have breakfast and 1 hour in the evening.

Home-Ed:

• Try actually sticking to the Sonlight K curriculum for at least 3 months to see if it works for us like that
• Otherwise concentrate with Jade on maths and writing
• Do more practical stuff like making historical meals, dressing up etc.

Personal:

• Regular stretching exercise - I can feel myself stiffening up
• Regular prayer/quiet time
• More sex (once a year isn't enough, DH says.....)
• Less web-browsing
• more book reading

Home:

• Keep up-to-date with finances
• Reduce debt (currently £10,000 or £15,000 if you count the student loan which I am hoping never to have to pay back)
• Redecorate at least some of the areas in this house that have never been done since we moved here 10 years ago, i.e. dining room; hall/stairs/landing; kitchen.

Business:

• Get at least 2 more Usborne recruits by the end of April
• Do at least one event per week, preferably 2
• Organise paperwork
  

Honoured!

My Peculiar Aristocratic Title is: Entirely Miss Reverend Lady Joanna the Defenestrated of Hoptonshire by Leer Get your Peculiar Aristocratic Title

Christmas

Despite the trauma of the dishwasher breaking down a couple of days before Christmas, we had the nicest C. Day I can remember for quite a long time. Everybody was happy, the girls were delightful and the present opening was fun. The only slight problem was that Jade was unwell - she'd had a heavy cold and cough and a high temperature for a couple of days and was still not too good. So she stayed in pyjamas all day and we didn't go out to church in the morning. Lunch was delayed as the turkey was not properly defrosted in time, so we didn't sit down to eat till nearly 4pm, but that's fairly traditional anyway, and it certainly was lovely when we got to eat it. Quite the tastiest roast dinner I've ever cooked, I think!

We weren't woken too early. Jade did wake at about 1.30am as she often does, came into our bed and said, "I think Santa's been - I felt my stocking and it's really full!", but I suggested she should go back to sleep and open it in the morning and she did! In the morning she was astonished because she said she "didn't sleep a wink all night" but still hadn't heard Santa arrive! And the night had gone really fast! So we weren't woken properly till about 7.30am - I suspect it won't be so respectable a time next year! Shannon was still asleep, so Jade opened her stocking in our bed and was really thrilled with everything, especially the Pooping Reindeer!

After Shannon woke and opened her small stocking gifts, we went downstairs and the children launched into the presents! We used to insist on a proper breakfast before opening only one or two gifts, and then out to church, and opening the rest after lunch, but all restraint was out of the window this year and it was all Bill and I could do to keep track of what was being received from whom in order to facilitate the thank-you letters! We didn't get to open our own gifts until the kids were mostly all done!

Particularly appreciated by Jade was the Dora pull-along overnight case:















which, fairly uniquely this Christmas, I paid full price for.

and for Shannon, the Duplo, which entertained her mid-morning for a good hour or more:















which came as gifts from Grandpa and Nanny (2 boxes) and a large box second-hand via Bill's work.

Also from Bill's work was Jade's other favourite:
















and, not photographed but enthusiastically played with by both girls was the Freecycled Fisher-Price Little People Royal Gift Set (this plus some extra buildings/pieces).

As for me, well I was very pleased with my replacement digital camera from DH, plus some MeatLoaf CDs, and he in turn was very happy with his dongle (I always want to blush at that word!) which turns a PC into a TV. And I even managed to keep smiling in the kitchen:















On Boxing Day we had a lovely muddy walk in the woods, all together, and today we've had a visit from my Dad and his wife Pat, so all in all a lovely time is being had, despite having to wash up by hand, grrrr!

Switch to Plan 'B'

I was supposed to be away with the girls at my Mum's now, but the foggy weather dissuaded me. I'm not a wimp about driving in all sorts of weather - it usually doesn't bother me too much - but with the girls on board I really didn't want to be either in an accident (obviously!) or stuck in miles of tailbacks because of someone else's pile-up. If the weather clears by Sunday we may do a quick pressie-swap at a suitable mid-point (usually Millett's Farm Garden Centre near Abingdon).

Anyway this has meant that I have been able to make some inroads at least into some of the mess and clutter round here and have cleared some space so we can move a bit. If only I had a nice chunk of spare dosh I'd hire one of those organisers/de-clutterers to come round and sort us out. It would save me from so much stress and irritability, and I'd get more done with the girls, I'm sure.

The girls have spent most of the day playing, aided by the girl-next-door who was here for most of the afternoon. They also made looooong paper-chains! That enabled me to get on with the said tidying up stuff, as well as loading Money 2007 Home & Business edition onto the laptop to see if it's better than what I'm currently running, in order to keep track of Usborne finances as well as household stuff. We have done some reading together, though, firstly of some Bible stories (Jade's choice) and then one of her Learning Land magazines which covered adding up in 10s which was new to her so I went into a bit more explanation about that. Don't know how much she 'got' it but it's a start.

Hmmm

I don't know about going against the flow but I have obviously lost the flow. Must try and get back to blogging. I just don't feel I've got much to say. I've kind of given up on any even semi-formal educational stuff and we're just doing Christmas crafts, cards and that kind of thing, in the small amount of time there seems to be between dashing from one thing to another.

Jade was in the school nativity play on Tuesday evening - she was an angel! She decided not to sing most of the songs, even though I know she can as she has sung them endlessly at home. She mostly just smiled, waved at me and Shannon repeatedly, and watched what everyone else was doing. She looked very sweet though, and TBH I was just impressed that she agreed to stand up there in front of everybody. Progress, I think!

I feel moderately on top of Christmas, for a change. Our cards have nearly all gone in the post today (except not the HE list ones - need envelopes!) as has the package for the USA - so it's probably a couple of days past the last posting date but that's the nearest I've ever got in the past few years so I'm pretty proud of myself! I have nearly all presents purchased - just one or two difficult people I'm still wrestling over.

The house is still a complete wreck which is a shame because I was wanting to host a Boxing Day party but thinking about it I don't see how we can possibly fit more than about 4 people in, and I was more thinking about 6-8 adults plus all their kids ... just don't think it's going to work, not even using the traditional 'stash and dash' method of pre-party cleaning and tidying.

Oh, and just for Sally, if you read this - I can't seem to post a link on your blog comments, so comment here and I'll e-mail you with that yahoo group I mentioned.

Still alive!

Yes, I am still here. Just, er ... overwhelmed with everything that's not getting done, really. I've been really busy with Usborne too although I haven't done the accounts yet to see if I've made any money! There doesn't seem to be much in my account, but I did buy some stuff in to sell at Christmas Fairs and some of that is still left over. I'm pretty much all done now till Christmas, though, as last ordering date is 11th December and I haven't got a booking for the coming weekend. I do have some for Jan/Feb though!

Hmm, what else is there to report? Jade was supposed to go to see a pantomime with her school this morning, but she woke up and didn't want to go. I took her to the school, and she still didn't want to go, so I drove her to the theatre to have a look round (she said she was scared of going somewhere new) and I could tell by her face that she loved the place but she still wouldn't stay without me. And as there wasn't a spare ticket for me, that was that! We all came home. Since then the girls have done playdough, sequins (all over the floor!), colouring, helping bring in the Tesco delivery, helping me stick address labels on Christmas card envelopes (cards not done yet!) and currently a bit of CBeebies. We have HE group social this afternoon.

What else of note? She's learned to play 'Jingle Bells' one-fingered on the 'baby piano' thing, which she's thrilled about. She's practising the odd bit of writing at her own pace, loves Numberjacks but keeps forgetting to watch it at the weekends, is still reading of course, but generally speaking we've been too busy to do anything much structured.

Busy, busy, busy....

So much to do; so little time. I've done quite a few Usborne events recently with more to come, a work-organised Litter Pick round town this morning, this evening we are showing our monthly Rural Cinema film, there's been HE group, work and part-time school, not to mention the usual domestic chaos. Sometimes I wish I did nothing except stay at home with the girls. No other commitments, no rushing about here and there. But if I did I'd be bored with the same old thing all the time and no variations. It feels good to be an active member of the local community, putting on events and getting involved.

The main problem is, I'm tired. Tired, tired, tired. I can't believe I've had 5.5 years without adequate sleep. And I was always a 10-hours-a-night girl!! I know I'm not the only one; I know many others have the same problems. But we just can't seem to get Shannon to sleep through at night - and I run out of stamina before she does so I give in and feed her and of course she's getting mixed messages and why on earth should she give up trying when she is sometimes successful?

But the chaos piling up round here is scary; once again it's weeks and weeks since I looked at my finances, my Usborne paperwork is building up everywhere and I just can't get a grip on where stuff should be put so it is messy everywhere. If only I had some time to myself during a morning when I have a moderate amount of energy I might be able to make inroads into it. I've been thinking longingly of school ... and when Shannon gets to the age when she can be at playschool for a whole morning the temptation will be even greater. And because I'm tired and short of patience with the girls, I want to hide here at the computer and just let them entertain themselves, so I'm not doing the educational and fun stuff with them that I want to either.

Oh well, moan over. Normal service (whatever that is!) will be resumed in a little while.

Catch-up

Quick summary of last Friday's science:

Dirty coins in vinegar - slowly becoming shiny
Dirty coins in vinegar & salt - quickly becoming shiny
Coins taken out of the solution - become tarnished again
Egg left in vinegar for a day or two - shell completely dissolved

can't remember what else we did in the morning. In the afternoon, stress levels were rising as we'd had 2 bad nights with Shannon and I was exhausted and very grumpy. so we walked into town and got a few more bits for our Operation Christmas Child shoebox, which is now almost complete.

When we got back, Shannon b/fed and fell asleep on my knee at 4.30pm, which was not ideal! And I was too tired to do that evening's dinner, which was home-made pizza, so we had heated-up leftovers instead. Well, it's bound to happen sometimes!

By request!

The 4-week Menu Plan!!!

Week 1 -
Monday: Potato, Bacon & Onion Hotpot with 2 veg
Tuesday: Chicken casserole (slow-cooker) on rice
Wednesday: Spaghetti Bolognese (pre-cooked sauce in freezer)
Thursday: Fish Pie with broccoli
Friday: Home-made pizza
Saturday: Jacket potatoes & beans with secret veg
Sunday: Roast Chicken


Week Two

Monday: Chicken cassoulet with pasta (using leftover chicken) & make stock
Tuesday: Baked Butternut Squash
Wednesday: Salmon Burgers plus salad
Thursday: Meatloaf plus couscous & veg & tomato sauce
Friday: Sausage paella thingy
Saturday: Salmon Teriyaki with rice (AK)
Sunday: Stuffed peppers


Week Three

Monday: Prawn stir-fry & fried rice (AK)
Tuesday: Roast Vegetable & Brown Rice Gratin
Wednesday: Pasta with roast vegetable sauce
Thursday: Home-made pizza
Friday: Spaghetti bolognese
Saturday: Fish in Orange Sauce (AK) with chips & 2 veg
Sunday: Roast Chicken


Week Four

Monday: Chicken Cassoulet & make stock/soup
Tuesday: Fish Pie & make flan for tomorrow
Wednesday: Cheese & Sweetcorn Flan with garlic bread
Thursday: Spanish & Bacon omelette
Friday: Chicken burgers with veg & apple (AK)
Saturday: Pasta & pesto & corn-on-the-cob
Sunday: Chicken drumsticks with potato gratin & veg

AK means Annabel Karmel :-)

I intend to change this over time to include more vegetable-based meals and to add to my repertoire of vegetable accompaniments rather than just plain boiled carrots, broccoli or sweetcorn which are our most usual ones. I may even add a few desserts - I usually feel I can't cope with making one of those as well!

Mission accomplished!

For several days I've been working on a menu plan, and not just any old plan but a 4-week one! I've tried to keep it frugal, balance it nutritionally, include fish at least once and preferably twice a week as recommended, increase our fruit & veg intake and introduce one or two exciting new dishes to our ordinary repertoire. I've considered which days I'm normally at home to do lengthy preparation, and which days often require something pretty instant. And at last, it is done! It also includes a weekly shopping list which does need some amendment, as I actually do a major shop online at the beginning of the month and get everything non-perishable, and then I need a weekly list of the short shelf life stuff after that. But anyway, it's fab knowing what's for dinner, and not having to think about it! We'll just have to see how well I do at sticking to it because it is not uncommon for me to get something out of the freezer the night before, put it in the fridge overnight to defrost, and then end up not using it the following day for some reason, usually lack of time or inclination to properly cook, then forgetting about and having to throw it away!

We had a good HE day yesterday. It started well, with me still lying in bed musing on what we might do that day, and wondering whether to get Jade to practise a bit of letter writing/formation. She was downstairs with DH while he had his breakfast, and after a little while I heard her asking for help as to which way to write a 'd'. DH wrote down examples of both 'b' and 'd', and shortly afterwards she came to me with a piece of paper on which she had written "Mummy and Dady, I (heart) you". So, no need for any further writing practise then!!
We started by going to the 'HE bookshelf' and I asked Jade to choose what she wanted to do, and she pulled out some maths workbooks. She wanted to start with the really easy one so I went along with it for a while and then persuaded her on to the more appropriate level stuff. After she practised writing down the numbers, we moved on to 'odd and even'. I demonstrated with a box full of magnetic letters, asking her to share them out between us, and pointing out when there was an odd one left over and when there wasn't. We got a piece of paper with two columns headed 'odd' and 'even' and she started to write down under which heading each number went. She was enjoying it and asked to do more even when I was ready to stop.

That's a fairly quick explanation for something that seemed to go on forever and certainly raised the intensity for me, because she didn't grasp the idea instantly and I kept having to ask her to think again, while remaining very calm! So I gladly called a break after a little while and then received a string of lengthy phone calls so their free-range playing went on for an hour or more. Then we had a quick lunch and got Jade ready for her afternoon at school, where she had great fun in the 'dance' class doing firework movements, which she enthusiastically demonstrated to me when she got home. While she was out I prepared the evening meal .

Later on, she was combining the odd/even thing with the brief explanation (well, that's all it needs!) of syllables I did last week, and she was sounding out words, counting the number of syllables, and then proclaiming whether the number was odd or even! After dinner I didn't want to do the various active things she was suggesting, so I proposed we played Snakes & Ladders, which we did very enjoyably (except when Shannon kept running off with the dice!). Jade played with very good humour, celebrating when she won 2 games, of course but also taking it in very good part when she lost 2 games. And then I had to insist that we stopped as it was bedtime!

Today has been just plain busy. We were out promptly this morning to help my Usborne recruit with her first toddler group event, which went extremely well. Jade and Shannon both happily played with the multiplicity of toys! Then back home (Shannon fell asleep in the car) for lunch, a quick rest and then out to swimming with the HE group. Both girls are gradually becoming more adventurous in a very autonomous, gently testing their own anxieties and finding them to be groundless, kind of a way! Jade took off her armbands and splashed and jumped about a fair bit without them, which she's never done before, and Shannon positively forced me to tow her about on her front and back, only holding her hands, which she wouldn't do at all 2 weeks ago. Back home for a bit of CBeebies and then dinner, after which the large Tesco delivery arrived, and then more Snakes & Ladders.