I hadn't realised it was so long since I blogged properly.

The slump has mostly gone - don't know why it came; don't know why it went away, LOL! Of course that doesn't stop me being overtired and grumpy rather too frequently, but at least it's not an overall malaise. In fact I treated myself to a very rare afternoon off yesterday on mental health grounds. I was feeling overwhelmed by the constant interruptions and demands of 2 (or 3 when L the neighbour is visiting, which is most of the time) small girls, and in particular, Jade's clinginess when we go out. We went to a local fete on Saturday afternoon, and to church on Sunday morning, and in public places like that where she feels shy and anxious she is all over me all the time. Her hands are up my top, pulling on my skirt, stretching my sleeves, hanging on to me, wanting to be picked up and carried, leaning on me, and it drives me bonkers!! And all that on top of a couple of really bad nights of sleep due to Shannon's shenanigans! I just had to get away where I could finish a thought that I began, and was not being touched and clung to all the time. So I left the girls at home with DH and went to Stratford. I spent a bit of time shopping, where I could browse uninterrupted (bliss) and a bit of time sitting on the grass by the river, where there were hordes of people so I enjoyed a bit of people-watching, a bit of peace and quiet and a bit of reading my book that I'd taken. Utter bliss! Treated myself to some jewellery from Monsoon at 70% off so that was an utter bargain, and a jewellery box which was supposed to be my Mum's birthday present to me a year ago but I never found one I liked till now! Found a couple of bargains in a charity shop too - a Per Una t-shirt, an animal board game and a new bag for carting all my stuff round.

We seem to have given up on overt education for the summer. Not by design, but by omission. A couple of times Jade has asked to do some 'learning' stuff, but time just slides away and it doesn't happen. She's having a fab time mostly playing outside with L the neighbour, spending loads of time on the trampoline and enjoying the good weather, at last, so that's no bad thing. She's done a lovely picture this morning - a labelled collage. She's stuck various things down and then labelled them without asking spellings and they're pretty good! There's "cotten wooll", "string", "paper", "flap", "cicele" (circle) and then "drew by Tamsin"!!! She asked me if I thought it was excellent, but before answering I asked her if she thought it was excellent, and she said yes, and I said that's what really matters. I did say I thought it was excellent as well, though.

(edited to add the pic)


I've been doing a fair bit of reading to her, mainly lightweight stories like Secret Unicorn, Magic Kitten, Magic Pony, Rainbow Fairies which she can of course read on her own but she likes me to read to her and I quite like it too so we're both relatively happy with that! After everybody else recommending the Magic Tree House books I have just won 14 off Ebay from the USA, costing $14 or about £7 which is fab, but apparently the cheapest postage now is $28!!! I suppose £21 for 14 books is still not too bad but I didn't want to pay that much so fortunately my brother who lives in Kansas is due to come over in September so I'm getting them delivered to him for $3 and he can bring them over!!

And now we're off swimming, so that's all for now.

At last!

I've completed that DfES consultation on Home Education. Been putting that off for ages - glad I've got it done! I was number 470.

Potty success!

Shannon actually did a proper wee on the potty!!! Hooray!!!!!!!!!!

Fatigue, floods and being fed-up

I am still in the slump that started last weekend. Maybe even a bit depressed, though I don't know why. Can't be bothered with anything, feel tired and unmotivated and generally blah. So I'm doing nothing constructive with the girls but just letting them free-range with toys and the trampoline and too much but not completely unrestricted TV. Whether it's a cause or an effect, I don't know, but there is a huge amount of sibling jealousy going on especially from Jade's end. They're squabbling and fighting more often than not, and Jade frequently says things like, "I wish I could cut Shannon in half". Charming. I am so sick of dealing with their arguments.

So 30 hours or so of torrential rain starting in the small hours of Friday did nothing to improve my mood. We were obviously stuck in the house all day, though did venture for a 10 minute walk to the post box and back. We ended up with a small lake in the back garden, though nothing in the house. DH got home late, soaked up to his hips, and it was only then I discovered that the main street in our little town was flooded in 4-5 feet of water, and he'd had to abandon his car on the other side of town and wade home. I went out with the dog at about 11.30 pm and viewed the scene - very strange to see streets turned into rivers. Call me hard-hearted if you like, but I really cannot feel that it's such a huge tragedy to have your house flooded several inches. Sure, it's a pain, a nuisance and hard horrible work to clear it all up, but no, it's not a tragedy. Having buried one of my children I really can't understand calling the physical loss of material possessions a tragedy. So there. Having said that, DH has just discovered that the flashing round our chimney has leaked and soaked loads of stuff (maps, slides, electronic bits and bobs) in the cupboard in our bedroom and he's spending ages sorting it all out so he may not agree with me!

Isabelle did her first ever few drops of wee in the potty on Friday, after I caught her starting to go on the floor. I persuaded her to sit on the potty for aaaaaages, and she managed a few drops. There were great celebrations and then I was just IMing with DH telling him all about it when she let loose torrents all over the sofa, cushions and floor!!! Jade was totally dry day and night just after she was 2, so I'm feeling a bit frustrated that it's taking so much longer for Shannon.

Anyway you probably wish you'd not bothered to come by my blog today, so I'll stop before I depress you all any more.

Ahem (embarrassed but pleased)

Thanks Jax for the link.

I saw a fairy in the woods yesterday

Am feeling grumpy and lethargic and have been for over 24 hours now, so this will not be a scintillating blog post but thought I'd better catch up anyway.

I cannot blog about what we did on Tuesday, for complicated reasons which I can't go into now, but it was a lovely day, and one which I wish we could have much more often. I will mention, though, that Jade threw a complete strop at the thought of going off with my Dad for an hour while I visited a friend and her new baby. Her separation anxiety is getting worse. I am very sympathetic and encouraging when she's anxious about going somewhere new, but when she's afraid to go with my Dad with whom she's spent far too many hours to calculate over the whole 6 years of her life, well I'm afraid I just got cross with her. It did the trick in the end, although not until it had cut my time down with my friend to about 45 minutes, which is just not enough when she is just getting used to having a new baby after a stillbirth last year.

On Wednesday I went to work, and Jade also moaned and complained that she wanted to come with me instead of staying at home with DH. Apparently she missed me quite a lot that day. Dunno what's going on. Hurry up, NHS, and get that referral going! While I was out, Dh started putting up the new trampoline that arrived on Tuesday, and when I got home we finished it together. Much joy and excitement all round! Oh yes, and we had to go and collect the old estate car from the garage which set us back £370+

I can't remember what we did on Thursday morning, except eventually get everything ready for Shannon to go to the childminder and Jade to come with me to work. I took various 'educational' stuff but she left all the 'serious' stuff in favour of doing a jigsaw puzzle and drawing pictures. That was OK. Worked till 3.15, collected Shannon, visited a friend for half-an-hour, gave a lift to someone to take her cat to the vet, got home, kids played on trampoline etc.

On Friday, Jade begged to go for a walk in the woods dressed as a fairy! Even though it was a bit rainy, I happily obliged and, though I wouldn't have chosen that activity that morning myself, we had a really lovely time and I took several pics of my fairy and my ladybird (Shannon in waterproof ladybird coat) in the woods! We hid in dens, ate a little snack perched on tree stumps, and pretended to be explorers. Pics later, if I can be bothered. Did a couple of errands on the way home, then settled the girls down with some food and a Tom and Jerry DVD while I went upstairs for a nap. That seems to have been a mistake. Ever since then I've felt completely tired and lethargic and very grumpy. I must've put all my biorhythms out of sync or something!

Today I've lolled around in bed all morning and then taken the girls plus L from next door out to the Wildlife Trust nature reserve to collect wildflower seeds - an organised event. I'd never been there before, though, and didn't realise that it would involve a 20 minute hike across muddy and cow-patty fields before we got to the wildflower meadow, by which time Shannon was tired, clingy and waily and it was almost impossible to actually do anything useful. We stayed about 20 minutes and then I left the rest of the group and made a slow trip back, carrying Shannon all the way. Not our most successful field trip! One useful thing was to see a badger sett which the warden says we're allowed to go and watch any time to see if we can spot them one evening. Would love to see wild badgers out playing.

In brief...

Today we have:
* Done cuneiform writing on clay (well, I did cuneiform, Jade did normal writing and decorations, and Shannon just mashed it up!) Pics are available but, erm, prob. not till Weds or Thurs as I don't think I'll have time before then!
* Revised chapter 3 of Story of the World about the earliest writing, covering the relative merits of stone, clay and papyrus.
* Made paper, or to put it more accurately, recycled paper using a paper-making kit. 2 sheets came out very nicely.
* Jade has coloured in Egypt and Sumer on a photocopied map.
* Been out for a walk with the dog.
* Got the living room tidier by the end of the day than it was at the beginning.
* Put Milton-y water through the caravan water system.
* Got one load of washing done.
* The girls have played 'schools' with their dolls and soft toys.

That'll do.

Do ya think I'm sexy?

No, please don't answer that!!! But just a reference to Rod Stewart whom I saw in concert last night!! Great fun. A friend had a spare ticket due to her DH having had emergency knee surgery, so I went along to the Cardiff Millennium Stadium and we had a blast! Wouldn't have particularly called myself a fan, but it was a really good evening and it's got to be impressive when someone can sing 31 songs, nearly all of which were Top 10 or Top 20 hits!!

Tons else been going on here - some nice Story of the World reading and we're going to do some paper making and cuneiform writing on real clay in the next day or two when we get the chance. Also some nice number work (I borrowed tons of lovely resources last week from the Learning Resources section at Oxford Brookes Uni Library (teacher training section) thanks to Bill's staff ticket! And reading books about poo with Isabelle in a so far vain attempt to persuade her to use the potty (several wees on the floor, none in the potty) ....... but no time to blog. 10pm and girls are still up due to an afternoon nap - must put them to bed, and probably myself too!

Out of the swamp!

We wore our wellies ALL week! Yes, Muddle Puddle summer camp was extremely wet. Our awning was flooded for the first half of the week until we moved to a drier spot, therefore the four of us were extremely cramped in our little caravan much of the time. But it says a great deal for the quality of the company that we still had a lovely time, and are glad we didn't miss it.

22nd June

In one way it's a day just like any other. But even after 8 years I can't help giving it a significance - the anniversary of Benjamin's death. I haven't really paid much attention to it today - I didn't even light a candle as I have done in the past. Partly because Jade is always terrified that we're going to have a fire. But as the evening wears on, the memories always grow stronger of that day and night. Rather than dwell, though, on those memories, I just want to set out what he gave me, and what I learned through him being here:

1. He taught me that I am strong. I always had an image of myself as being emotionally weak and unstable, because of the phobia and associated depression I'd had since childhood. But living through the news of his heart defect while I was pregnant, the poor odds in his favour, his short life and his death, taught me that I am indeed a lot stronger than I ever thought I was. I did it - I lived through something I never thought I could cope with - and came out stronger the other side. Nothing else is quite as fearful to me now. I know if I could survive that, I can survive anything.

2. He taught me that children are very, very, very precious. To be honest, I was very ambivalent about motherhood. After I conceived, I was terrified. Wasn't sure I really wanted to do this. The utter, utter joy of having him with us just blew all that away. I am sure I am a better mother because of him.

3. I learned that God really is with me. Isaiah 61 says “He has sent me to bind up the broken-hearted ..... to comfort all who mourn, and provide for those who grieve in Zion - to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair.” We experienced this, for real. Of course, we grieved for Benjamin. But our overwhelming feeling in the months that followed was just pure joy that he had come to be ours, even for a short time. We felt we had been given a precious gift, far more wonderful than we deserved, and we were full of joy, as well as times of pain.

4. I learned to look more to heaven, and less to earth. I seem to have forgotten this lesson as time has gone on, but every now and then I become aware again just how much more important eternity is than this temporary home. I didn't write the poem below, and I don't know who did, but it speaks so strongly to me:

The day will come when I will stand
At the entrance to that perfect land
And there to greet me will be my son
Who will gently show me the wonders to come
In that place where sunshine never ends,
Where the shining waters flow
Through hills and valleys green
Bathed in a golden glow,
And in those heavenly hills I’ll find
The love and beauty which will always be mine,
And once again a mother I’ll be
To that son I loved so tenderly.

******************************

Some people come into our lives
And go very quickly,
Some people come into our lives
And move our souls to dance.
They awaken us to understand
With their passing whisper of their wisdom.
And make the sky more beautiful to gaze upon,
They stay in our lives for a time,
Leaving footprints in our hearts,
And we are never, ever the same

I didn't write that one either, but Benjamin taught my soul to dance, taught me to love, and taught me about joy. I wouldn't have missed it for the world!

I love Freecycle!

Two nights ago, our tumble dryer (received from Freecycle about 2 years ago) went BANG. Yesterday, I saw a tumble dryer offered on Freecycle, was the first to respond, and Bill picked it up on his way home from work this evening! Amazing! Especially since our monthly budget, previously a pretty tight squeeze anyway, has just become impossibly so since I think the Child Tax Credits have just reduced by £100 per month, due to reclaiming an overpayment last year. So we would have had to do without buying a new tumble dryer if it had come to that. Great stuff! Last weekend I also picked up a child's trailer bike, so that as and when my bike becomes roadworthy again, I can tow Jade along behind me and know that she is (relatively) safe.

Anyway, this morning began in the usual relaxed fashion, or in fact even more so as a miracle occurred last night! I decided on the spur of the moment to put Shannon to sleep in her own bed, instead of ours, having left her to Bill's tender ministrations during the night for the past 3 weeks or so to stop her feeding at night. She fell asleep at about 8.30pm, woke once at about 4am and came to find me, so I returned her straight to her own bed and got in with her. She thought she could have 'hungry', but I said it wasn't morning yet, and she wailed in protest. I braced myself for it to go on for quite a while, but in fact it was just one quick grumble, grumpily took herself off to lie on my feet, and fell straight back to sleep. Then we didn't hear her again till 7am. I THINK WE MAY HAVE DONE IT!!!!!!!!! The girl who has woken 4-6+ times per night for the last 2.5 years only woke up once!!!!!! I'll probably bring champagne to camp to celebrate!!!!

'Scuse me, getting carried away there, but the prospect of regular full nights sleep after 6 years without (Jade was just the same till she was about 3) is getting me a little giddy!

So, this morning began happily, and after a little tidying and vacuuming, I started Jade on "Beyond the Code", which I got a couple of months ago but hadn't used yet. She did about 8 pages quite happily. I did seize the opportunity to try and clarify the use of capital letters and lower case letters, as she tends to mix them up rather. I wrote out the whole alphabet each way and she copied underneath. I don't know if that will be the final look we need to have at that, but at least it moved her a bit further on. Then we did some more "Dr Dooriddles Associative Reasoning Activities" which I linked to a couple of months back and can't be bothered to go looking for the link right now, so sorry! While we were doing both these things, Shannon was playing with the Cuisenaire rods.

After those, we sat down on the floor to look through our pile of library books. Shannon had a lovely time looking through the ones I'd got out for her, and Jade chose to look through the Rainforest book she'd brought home. However she was hungry, and had earlier requested to make milkshakes (seen on CBeebies, I think), and fortunately we had some strawberries so at this point we stopped and went and made a fresh strawberry milkshake for her and a strawberry and banana smoothie for me. Gorgeous! Then we went back to the Rainforest book for a time.

A bit later we had lunch outside in the garden, which was lovely, and then, despite my good night's sleep, I set the girls up with a Tom & Jerry DVD while I went for a nap. My excuse is that I'd stayed up late doing the ironing! A very rare event indeed.

Got up, took them swimming, went to visit my Usborne recruit to lend some bookracks and receive some leaflets. We saw their sheep being sheared on their farm. Ended up staying there for the girls' tea (with her 2 boys) and meanwhile Jade in particular was thrilled to spend some time playing with their Hornby railway set in the loft!

Shannon fell asleep on the way home (at 6.20pm) so was transported straight to bed. Jade stayed up with me while I had my own dinner and then watched Trinny & Susannah and then went to bed. Had to have words with her about her attitude - when she gets angry about something she tries to hurt whoever she is angry with, and then will not accept any reprimand or comeback for it - she puts her fingers in her ears, or blows raspberries, or shouts. In the middle of that little talk, Shannon woke up but was fairly easily settled back to sleep, and then I spoke quietly and calmly to Jade about treating other people with respect and how her behaviour is not acceptable. Let's hope some of that sinks in!

It's getting harder and harder to persuade Jade to go to school in an afternoon. After last week's anxiety about the swimming, we've pretty much accepted that she won't go on Wednesdays any more, but she was really not too happy about going today either. I'm not entirely sure how to handle it. We counted up today how many more times she is due to go, and what with being on holiday next week, she only has to go 8 more times in total. It seems so little and it feels as though it would be nice to get her to the end of term, have a 'proper' end to it instead of suddenly abandoning ship, and just trying to teach her a littlesomething about following through on commitments, even when it's hard. But it's difficult to know exactly what level her unhappiness at being there is - we've had many many times where she's been reluctant to do something, managed to do it, and had a great time! Anyway, we shall continue to play that one each day as it comes, I guess. We have told the headteacher that she won't be going back in September, and they accept that. The whole thing hasn't really worked out in quite the way we hoped it would, which is a shame, but we wouldn't have known if we hadn't tried it.

Anyway, much 'stuff' has been going on at home. This morning, for instance, I asked Jade what she wanted to learn about, and she shouted "trains"! Long time readers and MuddlePuddlers may recall that when we attended our very first HE camp in June 2004, when she was just 3, all we heard all week was her distress at being parted from 'track', the wooden Brio stuff we'd left at home. After that she played with it daily for a year and a half. Lately, though, the Thomas interested has waned noticeably, so I was quite surprised that she still regards that as the number one thing she wanted to learn about today! I asked her what exactly did she want to learn about trains that she didn't know already, and she wasn't sure (we have read endless train books together LOL!) so I decided to make it an art project instead. She chose to do it on card, so she cut a huge piece of cardboard and chose a picture from a book to copy. She went on to do a pretty good attempt at a pencil drawing. She'd almost finished when I got out the Geomags to distract Shannon away from ruining the picture, and of course Jade then just wanted to play with those too! Still, fiddling with Geomags is always educational, isn't it? Even when the game consists of dropping the metal balls down the front of your fleecy all-in-one pyjamas (Shannon) and then rattling your foot to hear them clattering about! I did find a couple in her nappy later, yeuch!

In the middle of this, someone came to the door to collect the cinema equipment, and conversationally asked the children (!) why they were still in their pyjamas!! I firmly told him that we were doing some learning, and it was just as possible to learn in your pyjamas as anything else!

Then I got Jade set up on a 'Nutrition Mission' CD game which was free from the British Heart Foundation. It was a bit difficult for her, being aimed at the 7-11 age group, but I think something went in about the importance of a balanced diet! We'll have another go sometime, I'm sure.

Then it was time to get her ready for school. After dropping her off, Shannon and I did various shopping things and were out all the time till it was time to pick Jade up from school. Now they're chilling in front of the TV while I catch up on the computer.

I know there's been tons of other stuff going on that I've meant to blog, but it escapes me at the moment. More later (maybe!).

HOW MANY .....???!!!

I got home from work today, and in the course of catching up with each other's days, Jade told me she had read not one, not two, not three but FOUR Rainbow Magic fairy books today, all on her own!!! And she is currently reading the fifth, up in bed!

Astonishing!

This is partly as a result being at home all day. She got so upset at the thought of going to school this afternoon for a swimming lesson (she hates them making her put her head underwater - not that they do 'make' her but they do suggest it and she feels the pressure to do so) that in the end, Bill phoned the school and she didn't go.

Now she is 6!

The party is over, the stressful bit is done, and now all I have to do is reflect on a lovely weekend when my eldest daughter turned 6! She had been beside herself with excitement for ages, counting down the days and just longing for the big day to come. So we anticipated an early start on Friday morning! It wasn't too bad, though - she woke at 6.30am and her first words to me were "I'm six now!!" in a sort of wondering tone. I asked her if she felt different being 6, and she said yes .

Anyway, to cut a long story short (I'm not Nic, after all ) she had a lovely time opening prezzies on our bed. She had from us a pair of rollerblades plus protective gear, and a double dance-mat (to save arguments with her little sister) and a 'Barbie and the Magic of Pegasus' DVD (which I had found for £2.50 at the charity shop!) and a set of Pet-Keeper Fairies books, the latter of which was her favourite present, I think, as she yelled with excitement, pulled out the first book, lay down, and was quiet for the next half-an-hour reading! The funny thing was, I had wrapped a couple of presents for Shannon because she's very much in 'imitating' mode at the moment and wants to do whatever she sees anybody else doing. However she was still asleep and slept through the whole thing!!

After breakfast and sessions of playing with roller blades and dance mat, we eventually all got ready and went to Stratford-on-Avon, which has a lovely park with a huge sandpit to play in. It was a really lovely couple of hours, during which DH and I were mostly able to sit and just watch the two of them running around having a great time. I commented to Bill how I had been waiting for so long to get to that stage of motherhood - when I could take a book to the park and just let them get on with it - and I think we're just about there!!






Then we came home late afternoon, Bill set up the projector and screen, and we had a big-screen viewing of the Barbie DVD, which had her transfixed. Meanwhile I cooked the dinner that the birthday girl had requested - roast chicken, roast potatoes, Yorkshire pudding, sweetcorn and gravy, followed by a custard slice!!!

Saturday was stressful! The party was to be a 'Nina & the Neurons' theme - loosely translated as 'science'. I'd done less planning than I'd intended, due to busy-ness and tiredness, but DH had put several things together too, so I think it all came right in the end! So we had rockets taking off (and ending up in the neighbours' garden!), food colouring in milk being swirled around when a drop of washing-up liquid is added, identifying smells, trying to get an egg into a narrow-necked bottle (that one failed!), and other stuff, but finally and most spectacularly, the wonderful much-renowned 'Mentos and Diet Coke' eruptions!

The party guests gather at a safe distance:




Finally, after much playing, experimenting and having fun, they descended on the food:



and at the very end, she blew the six candles out on her Unicorn cake!



The party guests sang Happy Birthday once for Jade and then for Bill, whose birthday it really was that day! He generously postponed his presents and pampering for today, Sunday, instead!

Somebody SHOOT me if I ever talk about organising a children's birthday party at home again ......!!!! (1 hour till they arrive - 3 or 4 till they leave ........)

We have decided!

Remember all my angst about whether Jade should "work towards" going into school full-time (as requested by the school she attends 3 afternoons per week) or finish going altogether?

We have finally decided that she will not go back next September . She is happy!

I still don't know what I'm going to do with her on Thursdays when I go to work, but we'll just have to figure something out!

Busy

Preparations are underway for weekend birthday festivities - on Friday Jade will be 6 and on Saturday DH will be, um, rather older! Jade wants a 'Nina and the Neurons' party, a Unicorn cake, and Numberjacks decorations!!! What DH wants is not publishable on a public blog!

Apart from that, I have my new colleague starting at work this week so much talking and teaching has been going on. She seems great, though, so it will all settle down quite quickly.

The Wychwood Festival was good last weekend - enjoyed it though less people passing by to chat to than we'd hoped.

As for education, well, once again I just have to trust in that autonomous process because not much formal has been going on at all!

Busy weekend

We're at the Wychwood Festival this weekend. I am partly working - we have a Time Banks stand (free - in return for distributing loads of publicity about the Festival: Time Banking in action!) so I was there yesterday (with the girls), helping to set up our stand. Today we're going as a family mostly for a fun day out, while some other folks staff the stand. Tomorrow I'm on duty all day!

It's going to be tiring, especially on top of being got up at 5-6am each morning by Shannon who no longer breastfeeds in bed! So I have to get up and go downstairs on the sofa with her in the early morning. However, that doesn't mean she's sleeping through until that time, oh no! DH is doing sterling, wonderful, patient work with her during the night while I'm in the other room (don't trust myself to be able to stick it out and say no to her yet). She's not wailing (much), just awake and restless. And yes, it still wakes me up even when I'm not in the same room. And it's been at this stage in the past that we've given up and regressed. WHEN will she just learn to stay asleep at night???!!!

Have just been falling off my chair laughing.....

at this thread on the Mumsnet forums:

So - what's your favourite and least favourite children's TV programme?

I LOVE Higgledy House, and Justin in anything because he's just so cheerful and smiley, but I don't fancy him tho'....! Sportacus, however -


Numberjacks and Nina and the Neurons I approve of because they are nicely educational! Not mad about the voices/actors on Numberjacks, though - think they could have got that better. And Charlie and Lola are just adorable!

Can't stand The Shiny Show, Tweenies, In the Night Garden, Smarteenies, Me Too, ................

Trying again ...

with the night-weaning thing! I've long regarded 2.5 as the target age for stopping Shannon feeding at night, as that's when we eventually managed to be successful with Jade, but have been feeling unable to face it for quite a while. There are several aspects of my life, though, that are simply not going to get any better until I am getting a decent night's sleep, so it must be done. One night down - who knows how many more to go?

Educational stuff over the past few days has included:-

- DH demonstrating levers and proving to Jade that she can lift him up with one hand as long as she's got a long enough lever to do it with!
- on request, sitting and reading the section on 'Matter' in the Berenstain Bears book of Science and Nature, covering solid, liquid and gas.
- a couple of Miquon maths sessions, with Jade again struggling with simple adding of number bonds up to 5
- making a pop-up card of an Egyptian Mummy, with hieroglyphs.
- various impromptu writing of stuff, usually with pretty good spelling.
- her first proper telling-the-time lesson, which I must follow up a bit more.
- painting/drawing
- singing/dancing
- lots of reading, as usual.

Must go - won't be getting much sleep tonight, I don't suppose!

Unusual...

for me to blog on a Wednesday, as it's my full work day, but I didn't manage it yesterday so need to catch up!

Yesterday, we went on an HE group trip to Compton Verney - art is so not my thing, in fact I am positively a Philistine about it, but we had quite a good time anyway. They do some lovely children's activity packs which are packed up into a quilted mat to sit on while you do the puzzles and activities, so the girls had a lovely time running round all the pictures and artefacts in the Folk Art gallery and even I appreciated some of it. We had a picnic lunch in the beautiful grounds by the lake, and then most of the rest of the group went off for a long walk. I didn't fancy tackling that with Shannon, who is very 2 and therefore insists on being carried a lot but weighs as much as my 5-year old! Instead we went for a walk round the 'wrong' side of the lake where the fishing sites are, and had a lovely time picking up sticks and pine cones and throwing them into the lake and watching them go 'splosh'. Shannon thought this was a particularly funny activity and it was lovely to watch her really enjoying it! Then we went back into the gallery to see some of the stuff we'd missed, and I was very glad we did as I discovered a children's room full of lovely books, puzzles and colouring stuff. Shannon sat at a little table doing some colouring while I read books with Jade who acted out the story with the puppets provided! The afternoon was only slightly marred at the end by one of those horrendous nappy stories that I guess all parents have at one time or another, due to the after-effects of the tummy bug Shannon had on Monday. Thankfully I had foreseen such a possibility and brought with me an entire change of clothes, so after washing down the buggy (!) and stripping her naked and cleaning her with half a packet of wipes, hygiene was restored!

Shannon fell asleep in the car on the way home, which boded ill for the evening! After getting home Jade wanted to have a go at the Reader Rabbit Maths CD-Rom that DH had brought home from work even though it is for Year 2 maths. She did quite well on some bits and had her first introduction to fractions beyond the simple talking about halves and fractions that we have done before. She seemed to get the hang of it quite well, including thirds and fifths and eighths, so I'm pleased about that. Not so pleased about her inability to answer "5 + 1" or any other "? + 1" questions .... she got very grumpy about having to do any more adding or subtracting and asked me to do those sections - must tread carefully so she doesn't get a complex about 'not being able to do maths'. We've put very little emphasis on it on the whole but I have been trying to do some simple adding and subtracting with her lately - at times she seems to 'get it' and at other times all previous knowledge completely leaves her brain! I'm not particularly worried about it as she's obviously bright enough and will get there in the end but it's just really interesting to see how different brains have their varying aptitudes - she's taken off with reading and doesn't look as though she's going to have any difficulty with spelling either (just like me) but maths is going to be an altogether slower skill to gain.

In the end, both girls stayed up till 10pm and still Shannon took ages to get to sleep as she didn't seem tired ... for the second night in a row I fell asleep with her, having lain there for so long, and spent all night sleeping in her bed in my clothes

Today, as mentioned, I've been at work all day. Jade has been to school and done swimming this afternoon but is still asking, "when I'm 6 can I stop going to school?". I asked her what she doesn't like about it, and she said, "P.E.". That seems to be the only problem! If I could see a way to get some childcare for my work hours on a Thursday I probably would just take her out, because the other 2 afternoons either me or DH are at home anyway and it's something of a pain to have to stop what we're doing to get her ready to go out. I still hanker after the dream of 2 or 3 half-days per week to myself to get stuff done, but realistically she's not going to be happy going to school more than she does, so the only other option in a year's time at the latest is to take her out.

I and my boss have interviewed 3 candidates for the other half of my job-share post, all of whom could do the job admirably so how we're going to choose I don't know. Maybe one of tomorrow's 3 will stand out as being even better.

And now, "The Apprentice"!

Er....

Can only think of boring titles like 'catching up' so can't be bothered to sit here for ages racking my brain ....

Shannon has a bit of a tummy bug - spectacular vomiting all over her bed last night, seemed pretty much OK today except didn't want to eat any solid food, and then threw up again in the doorway of Budgens just as we were about to go in .....(don't have an 'embarrassed' emoticon so this will have to do) - I'm just glad it wasn't 10 seconds later and inside, really! I'm gasping for a decent cup of tea, though, as I've run out of soya milk and that's what I was going to get .... plus some chocolate biscuits which are my staple diet.

So I am in my dreaded emetophobic state of wondering if I'm going to get it .....

Not much formal work has gone on here in the past week - I just can't seem to get organised to do much. This morning I did insist that we did at least one 'learning' thing so I got out the Usborne Children's Encyclopedia and asked Jade what she wanted to read about - she chose rainbows so we did a bit about weather, light, prisms, colours. Jade and Shannon both did some painting. Spent a fair bit of the morning trying to sort out clothes - last night I got the age 3-4 stuff out of the loft as I'm fed up of all Shannon's tops being too small for her .... but Jade got excessively emotional about almost every piece of clothing that came out that she recognised and wanted to wear them all again ... Still it's nice to have some stuff that fits Shannon a bit better now but I haven't quite come to terms with her needing stuff that's bigger than her age... Jade was always textbook age/clothes size matching.

Had a mega-clearout of junk toys and stuff at the weekend - got rid of 2 boxes of stuff to the charity shop and made a bit of space for Jade's approaching birthday.

I really can't think of anything else we've been up to. Must go and bath the girls.

Tired and Emotional ....

No, not the euphemism for pissed as a rat, but just genuinely tired and emotional ... We (the girls and I - DH stayed home to look after the dog) have been away at our annual church weekend away, had an absolutely fab but exhausting time and today has seen the fallout..... In fact I'm too tired to blog about it much, but suffice to say a complete tantrum from Jade at lunchtime resulted in her not going to school this afternoon because I thought she was just too tired to be able to cope (so why is she still awake at 10pm despite having been put to bed at 8?). We also had a failed attempt to teach her about tens and units this morning using the base ten blocks ... neither of us was in the best frame of mind for it so I abandoned that as a bad job and hope that another day it might click for her. I pretty much left them to it for the rest of the day. Jade didn't get changed out of her pyjamas until about 4pm when L from next door came round. Shannon has been mostly naked or just nappied today. Typically in her one half-hour nappy-free period she weed on our bed for the THIRD time in the past 5 days!!! GRRRRRRR!! There's been more TV and video watching than usual today plus lots of playing but also lots of pushing, shoving, hitting, arguing and crying ... (sigh...)

HE day in pictures

First pic is 8.45am when we arrived downstairs - dontcha just love not having to get up and rush in the mornings! Jade's got new wellies. She put them on as soon as she got up this morning!


We had breakfast while watching CBeebies. After eating, Jade played with Duplo while still watching TV. At 9.30am I went upstairs for a shower. At 10am I was dressed, but still chivvying Jade to do so. Shannon was still downstairs watching TV.

10.15 - at last she's getting dressed:


The post arrives, including this lovely item:



including a timely article about the perils of attempting mummification of a chicken - which as we are doing Ancient Egypt at the moment it had crossed my mind to try! I shake off the temptation to just sit down and read my magazine, despite the fact that the girls are happily occupied playing catch:


Then Jade requested that I sew up the hole in the toe of her tights, and when I sat down to do it straightaway (otherwise I knew it would never get done), she asked to be taught how to do it. I demonstrated, and she had a couple of goes, but then said it was quite hard, and gave up. She wandered off. I finished sewing up the hole.

Today's plan was to dress Jade up as an Egyptian Princess. The first part of the project was making an Egyptian 'necklace'. She drew round a big saucepan lid and then a small bowl and cut them out to make a wide cardboard collar.

11am - Then I had to tidy all the junk off the table so that we could do some painting - while I was busy tidying, the girls disappeared and started playing at being babies:



Eventually I dragged them back to the table and I told Jade what she needed to do, and I left 2 books in front of her to copy from. Shannon wanted glitter, to which I reluctantly agreed! I forgot to take a pic of them doing their 'art'.

Then followed a half-hour which is best skimmed over, when I got very bad-tempered with Jade for not painting her necklace 'properly' *rolls eyes at self*. Had to take some time out and get a grip!

11.45am - 12: Make-up and dressing-up as an Egyptian princess. Note how Jade gives her little sister a moustache!


































































12.30-1 Lunch

1-1.40pm: I read from and Jade enacted "How to be an Ancient Egyptian Princess", including sleeping and feasting. Meanwhile Shannon played on the computer.


































1.45pm - Jade decided to do some drawing, while Shannon played with her Fisher Price castle:


























































2.10 - 2.40pm: I suggest Jade might try some reasoning riddles out of a new book, Dr DooRiddles Associative Reasoning Activities which I picked up on Monday when I went to an Ichthus Resources display near Bicester. She loved them! I had thought we'd do a couple, and she ended up doing 33! And getting the vast majority of them correct.



At 2.40pm she started doing a jigsaw puzzle.


At 2.45 I went into the kitchen to start dinner - decided to do a quiche so started getting the stuff out to make pastry. Jade came and wanted to join in, and then Shannon did too. They both helped (!) me weigh out flour and butter and Jade started chopping and then mixing the butter in. After a while Jade disappeared (to do a bit more jigsaw puzzle, I think) and Shannon stayed in the kitchen playing with water in the sink.

At 3.15 my hairdresser arrived (a little earlier than expected) to cut all our hair.

At 3.45pm, L, the girl from next door, arrived and the girls all start playing with the leftover pastry. They are making 'cakes'.


4.10pm-4.30pm - I get to *sit down* with a cup of tea and my Home Ed magazine!!!!! Bliss!!! All the girls are playing upstairs.

4.30-5pm - The girls are still playing upstairs. I get the quiche in the oven, and then I tidy up a bit downstairs.


Yes, this is *after* the tidying up!!!!

5.20pm - I remind the girls that Numberjacks is on, and they race downstairs to watch that, followed by Nina & the Neurons. L. is called for by her brother to go home for dinner.

5.45pm - we eat our dinner. I am completely shattered.

6.15 - 6.45pm - Jade eventually finishes her jigsaw puzzle.

7pm - I get them in the bath and then into bed. We only have 3 chapters to go to the end of our bedtime reading book so I read it all - it takes till 8.30pm.

Jade comes down 3 more times before she eventually falls asleep at around 10pm.

And what was very interesting was to note how often Shannon had 'hungry' (breastmilk) from me through the day - I hadn't realised just how frequent it is. She had it upon waking (around 8am), 9.20am, 10.30am, 11.40am, 12.45pm straight after lunch, 1.50pm, 2.35pm, 4.15pm, 5.30pm, 6.15pm, 6.45pm and then bedtime at 7.30pm. When she asked, I frequently offered other food or drink instead but she totally refused it in favour of mummymilk. It's now 11.15pm and she's already woken twice and been fed back to sleep. No wonder I am so tired and I eat so much!

Word of the Day

Not that I've ever had a 'word-of-the-day' before, but anyway, today's is 'pejorative'. I heard it on Radio 4 this morning, as I have done before, and somehow managed to remember to look it up. It means "depreciatory, disparaging". So I shall attempt to use that sometime in the next day or so!

It's been a fairly laid-back day today. We got up not too early, the girls watched a little CBeebies while I had breakfast, and then I was attempting to browse through recipe books to make a new spring/summer monthly menu plan. As always when I sit down with a book, Shannon came over and tried to take over, turning the pages and looking through the book. It's great that she loves books, but I wish she didn't mostly love the one I'm trying to look at! Then Jade joined in too, and in the end, the two of them arguing over turning a page made it tear, and I threw a bit of a wobbly, snatched all the books away from them and stomped upstairs alone to go and get dressed in peace. Amazingly neither of them followed me!

Once I'd recovered a little equilibrium, I came back down, just in time for my friendly Fair Shares gardener to come along for a little more jungle-taming. I mostly left him to it this time, while I got a nappy wash on the go, and other sundry chores. The girls were playing nicely with some toys by then and did a little drawing and painting.

I eventually persuaded Jade to sit with me while I read her a little more Story of the World, still on Ancient Egypt. We also had a look through a couple of other books on the same subject that we have out of the library. She then sat down at the table with a book open at the page on hieroglyphics. I got her to write her name in hieroglyphics and then to translate the word that was shown in the book. She did both beautifully! I'll try and post a pic later.

Then it was time to make her lunch and get her ready for her afternoon at school. She was quite happy about going this time, and let me leave without any fuss or clinging at all. I went in to work to do a few bits and pieces, taking Shannon with me, and then we came back home. We played some lovely games together, having a lot of fun!

Went to fetch Jade from school, took all the plastic bottles to the recycling bank on the way home, and since getting home L from next door has come round as usual and they've all had a lovely time splashing in the paddling pool and similar rowdy games! As I type they are putting make-up on each other!

Later this week we hope to do more Egyptian stuff, like dressing Jade up as an Egyptian princess and maybe a craft or two.

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'.