I probably have a large amount to blog about, having left it so long, but of course can't remember much of it. Let's work backwards from today and see how much comes back to me.

Thursday mornings are a working time for me, and Jade comes with me while Shannon goes to playschool. This morning, however, after dropping Shannon off, Jade and I went off to look at Stow Horse Fair - of course Jade insists on going to anything with the word 'horse' in the title! It's a controversial event locally, with most of the shops and businesses in Stow being closed for at least the day due to the amount of crime and trouble that comes along with it, but it was certainly a culturally educational event for Jade to witness. She was quite shaken to see how some of the horses and ponies were treated, and we were glad to see the RSPCA there keeping an eye on things. We were only there for 45 minutes or so and then she was glad to leave and go to the office with me. She helped me by doing some paper shredding and vacuuming, while I phoned and e-mailed people.

At lunchtime she had her RDA riding lesson. They're not rushing through the learning-to-ride process as befits most of their clients, but in fact Jade's anxious tendencies means this suits her very well too. She has however very much got the hang of rising to the trot now, and she has a naturally good position in the saddle so she is coming along very nicely. She's not in a rush - she says when she is 10 she will ride up the long driveway and back on her own without anyone leading her! (I suspect it will be a lot sooner than that!)

We got home to find a parcel containing her long riding boots I'd got from Ebay - shame they hadn't got here before we went out! My Dad arrived, and really enjoyed it when Jade showed him her Letts 'Grumpy Grammar' workbook, and she then enthusiastically launched into the next section on Nouns and did very well, needing no particular help from Grandpa other than his attention. Meanwhile Shannon and I worked on her Wizard Whimstaff Maths for age 3-4 which she has just about finished. Mostly just because she wants to do something like Jade rather than me thinking it's anything close to necessary at this stage! After Grandpa left we all went round to the library, with Jade choosing loads of books she's had before. She doesn't mind, and seeing as she pretty much only wants to read about ponies or unicorns or Horrid Henry, she has a limited choice! Occasionally she will venture off into Magic Kitten or Animal Ark territory. I picked up my ordered copy of 'Affluenza' by Oliver James which has mixed reviews but is a fascinating topic.

Now we're in the middle of the dinner-pyjamas-stories-bed routine. Tomorrow we have no plans so we shall see what the day brings.

Last night Jade made her Brownie promise, along with 6 other girls as this is a new Brownie pack with only 9 girls altogether. I stood with her while all the girls spoke their Promise out loud - she moved her lips but made no sound! But she was so proud of herself afterwards and has said a few times since "Wasn't I brilliant last night?" and I am so pleased that she is feeling so good about herself for a change! The girls also all took their Hostess badge at the same time, by having made the invitations for the promise ceremony, making a table decoration each (Jade's is lovely and entirely to her own design) and then handing round tea and cakes to everyone afterwards. She did really well with that too :-) She is so loving Brownies, and is making steps each time to becoming more independent from me, although she's not ready yet for me to just leave her there. I spoke to another mum last night and am going to invite her daughter, one of the friendliest, chattiest Brownies, to come here probably some time next week during half-term, as the better she gets to know each girl, the more relaxed she will be at the meetings themselves.

I've just done a major Amazon order incorporating several HE resources I've been promising myself for months if not years. At last we will get Draw Write Now, First Language Lessons for the Well-trained mind, a LeapFrog Explorer Globe and several maths stories. Now all I need is some time and just a modicum of discipline and organisation to use them.

Still alive!

I seem to have completely lost the blogging plot lately, but we are still here! I've been training for the 5k run which is this coming Sunday. Running is not going quite as well as I'd hoped - I'm supposed to be able to run for 25 minutes at a time at this stage, but I've only managed to do that once. Ever since, I've usually felt like there is lead in my legs and I just haven't had the energy to do much! Never mind. It doesn't matter if I have to walk some of the time, it's just that for personal satisfaction I would have liked to be able to run all the way.

Home ed is being a lot more autonomous than I would like - meaning I can't get my act together to organise and plan much and 'life' just keeps getting in the way. There is various challenging child behaviour around which takes up time and energy too.

However, Shannon has started to do a little pre-school maths workbook which she says she loves, and Jade is coming along with some mathematical insights in the couple of times a week we manage to sit down and do it (though it was supposed to be 5 minutes every day).

Of course Jade is doing lots of reading, they are both doing lots of playing, and there are those interesting conversations that pop up (yesterday's question - when was the first money in this country? - haven't followed that one up yet).

Mostly I've been indulging in a Mumsnet addiction which is where my evening computer time goes. But will try to do better!

Running for your money

Okay, I know I have been neglecting this blog, but I have returned for a very important request.

On October 12th, I will be running (or walking!) 5K in memory of my son Benjamin. The race is being organised by and the money will go to Little Hearts Matter, the only charity in this country that supports all families with a child with a single ventricle heart condition (half a heart).

On the right sidebar, you will see my JustGiving donation widget. I know times are hard for some, but for those of you that can, please will you consider sponsoring me for doing the run.

The training is going .... er.... slowly. I had to have 5 weeks off due to a bad cough, and currently am up to running 5 minutes at a time! So I've a way to go, but I WILL finish the race, whether I run, walk or crawl!

Lousy weekend

Some time on Friday, Shannon was playing with my purse and took out all the plastic cards of various sorts. I reclaimed many of them at the time, but must have got distracted. On Saturday morning, we got all packed up to go off to the Beans, went into town to get some lunch, cash and petrol before setting off, and found that my bank debit card is missing. Therefore couldn't get cash, couldn't get petrol, couldn't go. I was mightily p....ed off and in too bad a mood to face the mammoth job of investigating every nook and cranny of the house to find where on earth she might have put it. I'm also feeling completely exhausted, despite having had the most relaxing week of the past 7 years. I think it must be hormonal.

To top it all, the internet has been down since Friday. Bill has investigated everything he can think of including phoning our phone provider and our ISP, and there doesn't seem to be any answer to it. Last night he managed to set up a dial-up connection so have managed to download e-mails at least, but I'm feeling very web-deprived!

When I'm not feeling so grumpy I'll try and remember to update about our review appt with Jade's psych and about even a tiny bit of education that's been happening!

Time Out

I am sitting on my bed in my hotel room, all alone except for my laptop and a wi-fi connection. It is bliss! I am not going to link to which hotel until after I've left, as for some reason I am unusually concerned that some nutter will find out where I am on my own and come and harass me!!!

Anyway, here I am, absolutely revelling in the space and peace and quiet, thanks to the wonderful birthday present from my kind and generous hubby. I got here about 6pm last night. It was something of a culture shock after spending the weekend at a loud and muddy Greenbelt Festival! Greenbelt had its usual effect on me. It is the one place in the world (albeit that only exists temporarily) that I feel most at home and where I most love to be. There is so much life there. So much joy and celebration and learning and thinking and wondering and calls to action and praying and art and music and play and worship and quiet and noise and people and colour ..... Greenbelt is the me that I'd like to be. I do not have any artistic expression, but I know I want to. I am beginning to learn that it touches me and is important. Greenbelt shows me how to put faith into action and how to believe that one person can be a little part of changing the world. Having said all that, I personally find Greenbelt with children very frustrating. There is all this 'stuff' going on, and yet they're bored by the stuff I want to go to, and I'm bored by the stuff they want to do. It takes so long to get them ready and so long to get them to go anywhere that I miss loads of good stuff. I feel like a starving woman who can see a banquet spread out in front of me and yet I just can't reach most of it. So next year, I'm definitely going on my own (or with any friends who might come too). Bill is happy to stay home with the kids - GB doesn't have the same meaning for him and he doesn't go to much anyway. The girls can come again when they're old enough to enjoy their things without me.

So, on Tuesday morning we packed up the caravan, went home via my Dad's to collect the dog, unpacked the caravan and car, re-packed in a very different way for a smart hotel, leaving the muddy jeans and fleeces behind and putting in the floaty dress and high heels type of clothing, went shopping for easy food for the family to have while I'm away, kissed the family goodbye and went. It was surprisingly easy considering that Jade had wailed long and hard on Sunday when I'd told her that I was going to be away a couple of days. I guess she'd got it all out of her system then, though, as she didn't really bat an eyelid when it actually came to me going. Shannon was easy with it too, though how she's reacted at her traditional 4am awakening to find I'm not there will be interesting to hear! And this is the FIRST TIME I've ever been away from either of my children overnight, let alone for two nights, so it's new territory for us all!

So I got here, unpacked, settled in, got the laptop connection sorted out (high priority, that!) and then went for a quick swim and soak in the jacuzzi. Ahhhh, I could feel the tension just oozing away from me. Heavenly. Went back to my room, ordered my meal on room service and sat and watched "Maestro" on BBC2 which I have really been enjoying for the past couple of weeks. I hung a card on the outside of my door requesting breakfast in my room between 9-9.30am. Went to sleep. SLEPT!!!! I did wake a couple of times but didn't have to go and see to any small people so just turned over and shut my eyes again. Woke up properly around 8.45am. 8.45am!!!! Heaven again! Shannon normally wakes a few times from 4am onwards, and then is up for good at 7-7.30am. Stayed in bed resting in the peace and quiet, waiting for breakfast to arrive. Nothing happened. At 9.40am I checked to see if it had been quietly left outside my room. It hadn't. The card was still hanging on the handle. Argh! Quickly got up and dressed and went down to the restaurant and got there just in time before they stopped serving at 10am!

Since breakfast, I've been reading, thinking, praying, musing, writing. Much of it (the 'God' stuff) isn't for this blog, but I did get on to thinking about how to incorporate some more space into our days at home so that I don't get so overwhelmed and irritable and burnt out. I am just the type of person who needs quiet and 'head-space' to make it through the days, and without it, I am irritated by the girls' constant demands and need for attention, and I often try to push them away so I can get some 'me' time instead of being able to concentrate happily on giving them what they need. We need some more BALANCE so that we can all get our needs met instead of none of us.

So, what I WANT to do is to make two quiet spaces for myself in each day. Firstly, if (and it's a big IF!) I could get up at 6.30am for an hour's quiet time before the girls get up, I could think/write/pray and/or get a few chores out of the way. Then I'd have a much clearer head by the time they get up and could concentrate on them for the morning. Secondly, I'd like to make 1-2pm each day a quiet hour when we each go to our own room. The girls could play quietly or listen to story CDs or read, and I could either nap or read. This will need them to be trained! I'm hoping aim to get this into place by January 2009. In order to get there, I need to:

a) get Shannon sleeping through the night without me getting into her bed.
b) go to bed by 10pm and lights off by 10.30pm
c) set an alarm to get up at 6.30. I can promise myself that I can go back to bed in 10 minutes if I really want to, but I know that most of the time once I've been up for 10 minutes I will stay up.
d) start teaching the girls how to stay in their rooms quietly (particularly Shannon). I will need to start with 10 minutes, and be around to encourage and help her to stay/play happily and gradually increase the time.

I'm always much better at planning than getting things done! But if I can get this sorted out, I feel it would make for a much happier household and more enjoyable time together including better HE provision.

And now it's 2pm. I might just allow myself a little nap, before going for my full body massage at 3pm! Ahhhhh, bliss and more bliss.

A blogpost!

I really have lost the plot here with the blog. A couple of reasons spring to mind - with the lighter evenings the kids have been going to bed later, so by the time I get downstairs after putting them to bed it's 9.30 and I'm knackered and haven't the energy to blog. Also we've been doing almost nothing overtly educational. I didn't plan to stop 'proper' HE over the summer holidays but that's the way it's ended up. No bad thing, I think, because I was in a bit of a crisis with Jade particularly. Anything that looks suspiciously like 'learning' she runs a mile from, and yet I am not comfortable with pure unschooling. The summer break has almost been a covert trial of autonomous learning, to see how it goes, and I'm still not entirely comfortable with it as a complete ongoing approach. I think I would be happy with 90% autonomous learning but just a little insistence on certain basics. I have hesitated over buying any more Sonlight, and won't attempt to stick with the Instructor's Guide again, but might do a kind of Sonlight Unschooling approach with the insistence on a page of maths per day as well, or something like that.

So what have we been doing? Mostly the girls have been playing, of course. Jade is still mainly either playing with horses or pretending to be a horse or a unicorn. She got me to make her a unicorn's horn the other day, and she gallops round the trampoline like a flying unicorn. She enjoyed watching the Olympic show-jumping and has then set up some jumps in the garden which she charges madly round. We haven't watched loads of the Olympics but what we have had on she has enjoyed and been interested in. She has had a sudden rush of interest in practising on her Heelys which she got for her birthday, and in the space of 2-3 days made massive progress. I took the opportunity to point out that she could do that with anything she was interested in - some things may be hard when you very first try them but if you're interested enough in doing it, you can practise and practise and very soon you can do it easily! Hope that lesson sticks! She's had a major reading splurge, too. She got 12 books out of the library last Thursday and they've all been read, along with her re-reading some of the ones on her own bookshelf too. She's enjoyed reading an old book which my Mum received for her 10th birthday present and has passed on to us - called "Hildebrand" by John Thorburn. I remember enjoying it as a child too. It's about a horse, of course! I've also been reading The Barefoot Book of Heroic Children to her at bedtime which she's liked.

Shannon mostly wants to play shops, with amusingly unrealistic pricing - £50 for an apple and 10p for a big book! She loves dancing, particulary to some extracts of ballet music and apart from that usually wants to do whatever her big sister is doing. She has a few books memorised, and it's lovely to see her going through a book and hearing her get it almost exactly right, and improvising when she can't remember! She is funny, totally charming and absolutely full of life. When I'm telling her off she looks sad, says earnestly "I'm so sorry" and then gazes at me smiling and won't stop until I've softened and smiled back at her. She is always saying "Mum, I love you" and giving lovely kisses and cuddles. It's a good job she is so charming, because her aggravating side is certainly present too, mostly incessantly repeating "but I want to" in a whiney voice if I tell her she can't do something.

I've been feeling rough the past couple of days when the cough I've had for about 3 weeks suddenly decided to add aches, pains, high temperature and a sharp pain in my side to its repertoire. NHS Direct didn't think I needed a doctor, though, and it seems to be a bit better today than yesterday, so I'm hoping to be fit and well ready for Greenbelt on Friday! My favourite weekend of the whole year - I can't wait! But the fun doesn't stop there. My most excellent and devoted hubby has taken note of all my moans and groans, and for my birthday present (it's on Sunday) has booked me into a hotel for 2 nights ALL ON MY OWN!!! Oh the bliss - I'll be able to sleep, read, think, swim, have a massage, and do anything I want. It's going to be fab and I'm thrilled and I want to publicly say that I think he's fantastic for organising it!!!! It's for next week - Tuesday and Wednesday nights, and the only thing I'm not looking forward to is telling the girls because they won't want me to go at all.

"The Unicorn who went to Fairyland"

by Jade (blogged with permission!)

There was once a unicorn who wanted to go to fairyland. She flew far and wide, but she never could find it. The next day a fairy saw the unicorn crying. and she gently tapped her on the sholder. Now, the unicorn was called jessica. and jessica looked up. She was amazed! What are you crying for, Jessica? asked the Fairy. i want to go to Fairyland! jessica sniffed. Well you can! The Fairy said. I will magic you there! and she did. and jessica lived there from then on.

Theme park, festival of history, circus

We are back from our few days away with a few other blogringers. Many thanks to the Petits Haricots for lending us a tent in which to camp at Wicksteed, and then attend the Festival of History.

It all went quite well. We arrived on Thursday evening around 6pm, got the tent put up pretty easily and settled in. It was lovely to see many of the MuddlePuddle regulars again. Our day at the Wicksteed Theme Park on Friday was fun. Jade and Shannon went on their first mini-rollercoaster. Jade looked terrified for two out of the three small circuits and was just beginning to relax into it and half-smile when it was all over. She came off and cried because she'd been so scared. I think if it had gone one more round she'd really have realised that she was beginning to have fun. Shannon of course just loved the whole thing and grinned from start to finish. Before long we moved over to the fairground area and I think altogether the girls must have had about 6 goes each on the very large carousel with the beautiful horses. We had a trip on the miniature train and then on to the monorail and the Nautic Jets which were fabulous fun.

The Festival of History was a good day out too. Jade and Shannon enjoyed dressing up as medieval serving wenches, I liked the WW1 trench experience, and we all enjoyed the wandering troubadours and danced in the rain a little. Jade did NOT like the loud bangs so wouldn't go near the trench where they had machine guns rattling off, and she and I were both sad to miss the Victorian gymkhana which we didn't realise was on at the time we stopped for lunch until it was too late. We did a lot of wandering round the living history encampments, caught the Roman Imperial Army display, and stopped to look at anything that we saw involving horses. We learned how to make fake wounds for war reenactments (paste thick PVA glue onto crumpled tinfoil until it dries, peel it off and then decorate with facepaints). Both girls loved the Victorian seaside experience, but hated the WW2 D-Day Dropzone experience (apart from the paratroopers which were amazing) because of all the bangs and explosions. In fact Jade became nearly hysterical at all the noise and we had to evacuate the area pretty fast. She's always been very sensitive to loud noises and unfortunately we hadn't appreciated just how loud this would be until it was too late. She declared it the worst day of her life, so I was glad we'd only bought tickets for one day! I think it's the sort of thing we might go to every couple of years, rather than every year, but I'm glad we went.

We packed up on Sunday morning along with everyone else, and then spent about 3 more hours at Wicksteed just doing the free stuff - playground, sweet shopping (girls only have sweets on Sundays) (note that 'sweets' does not include chocolate as that is an essential food group needed each day), and picnicking. Then home for unpacking and sorting.

Bill has the rest of the week off to use up annual leave, so Monday was a nice relaxed day, topped off by a visit to Giffords Circus just up the road. It was the first time we'd been, but it was absolutely wonderful. Much smaller than any other circus I've been to, but with even more energy and imagination. The thing that was most astonishing to me was the utterly amazing standard of horsemanship. Two parts in particular demonstrated such incredibly perfect control and training that I was actually almost in tears at the beauty of it. To train a horse to kneel, bow, and even sit like a dog and then lie down is something quite astonishing. Definitely a show worth returning to each year when it comes around.

I am at work tomorrow and Thursday morning as usual, so it's quite like an ordinary week for me, but it's nice to have DH around a bit more and everything feeling that bit more relaxed and summery.

Phew!

I phoned the school this morning. They don't have a place available in Jade's year. What a relief! She didn't seem too bothered when I told her.

One thing that was very strange is that the school secretary said that Jade (who age-wise would go into Year 3 in September) would not be able to because 'she has not completed the Key Stage 1 curriculum' and therefore would have to stay down in Year 2. I am very slow in responding appropriately to comments, and of course should have said "How do you know?", but in fact she is correct especially as far as maths is concerned. I thought it was very odd, though - presumably they wouldn't say the same thing if she wanted to join at age 8 or 9 or 10 - that she'd have to go into Year 2 to do KS1 before she could do KS2 stuff!!! I think she might have been talking off the top of her head because they do have another ex-home-edder of Jade's age who is staying down in Year 2 but that's because she can't read yet. Hardly the same kettle of fish, really! Anyway it's all academic (har, har) because she's not going and I'm very glad! I still reserve the right to moan and complain heartily at the fighting, arguing and general demandingness of 2 girls at home though!

I did give Jade a sheet of simple adding-up and subtraction sums this morning - she completed them adequately (though still using fingers and sometimes borrowing mine!) and then ripped up the sheet when she'd finished to show what she thought of it. While she was doing those I was playing with some magnetic Letterland letters with Shannon, spelling her name and talking about the other letters. Then she wandered off to play a Dora computer game, and Jade made yet another horse out of the back of the sofa, a hobby-horse and some cushions, so while she was there I offered to read to her. She said yes as long as it was interesting, so I rejected Story of the World as not being quite scintillating enough and chose "Twenty and Ten", a Sonlight read-aloud story which since we are no longer following the schedule might otherwise have got missed. She was pretty gripped by that and of course it is very educational, covering Nazism, the occupation of France, the persecution of the Jews and orphan Jewish children having to go into hiding, none of which we have covered before so that was good. I got through about half the book before stopping for lunch.

After lunch I finished my half-hearted menu-planning and shopping list, took the dog for a lovely walk in the woods and then went to Tesco for a major food shop. We got home around 4pm so had just under an hour before taking Shannon to a friend's so that I could take Jade to her final Rainbows. It was billed as a 'party' but, as Jade said to me when she was in bed this evening, it wasn't really a party. They had milkshakes instead of squash to drink and as an activity they put icing and sprinkles on some little cakes, but that was about it. Still, a month on from her Rainbows Promise Party she has now left and has the badges to prove it.

The week

Last weekend the girls and I went down to Hampshire to visit my Mum. Pleasant enough - we haven't stayed there for absolutely ages so it was a change. Nothing of note happened except that suddenly on the Sunday Shannon made one of those leaps and started saying 'yellow' instead of 'lellow' - I was a bit sad really!

We came home on Monday afternoon with just enough time to get the stuff out of the car and have a snack before taking Shannon to her babysitter and Jade to a farm visit with Rainbows. That was really lovely, particularly because they had a mare and foal which Jade was very excited about.

I had planned to actually get some proper education done with Jade on Tuesday morning while Shannon was at playschool, but my Dad rang and said he had found something wonderful for Jade in a charity shop and please could they bring it over. So instead we did a quick tidy-up and then my Dad and Pat arrived with a fabulous horse barn/stables/horses/jumps kit - all really good quality (Schleich) and bought for about £7!! So then of course there was no chance of her doing anything else other than play with it all for the rest of the day.

Late afternoon on Tuesday, while I was on the phone, Jade came rushing up to me and insisted on speaking to me. "I want to go to school!" she said. Huh? She didn't know what had brought this feeling on. She said she hadn't been talking to L from next door or anyone else about it. She just suddenly wanted to go!! She did use the phrase "I want to be normal and go to school and come back and play with L." Like a starving person unable to think about anything except food, I was very happy at the thought of being able to have time to myself!! I didn't really believe she would persist in wanting to go though. It was too sudden, out of character and not well thought through. After discussing it in the evening, she said she would play pretend schools on Wednesday and see how it went! In fact, she put her old school uniform on (much too small now, of course!) and went to bed in it.

On Wednesday I was at work. Bill reported managing a bit of maths with Jade discussing fractions.

On Thursday morning DH had a half-day off work because I had to be at Stow-on-the-Wold Farmer's Market for 8.30am to set up a Fair Shares stall (recruiting more members). He was supposed to get Shannon to playschool, but was unable to make her get dressed so she didn't go. He rang the wrong person to tell her not to collect Shannon from playschool, so consequently the childminder did have a wasted journey, and I had to take Shannon with us when I took Jade to riding. Ahem. I am making no comment.

In the afternoon, she asked me to play schools with her. As her teacher, I instructed her to write a poem, but instead she chose to write a story. It was so lovely I just have to blog it, but I can't find it at the moment so that will follow sometime.

Later on, during a conversation with L from next door, she suddenly realised that if she went back to her old school, she would be in Year 3 in September and therefore would go upstairs to a different classroom (Years R, 1 and 2 are in one room; Years 3-6 are in another). Cue absolutely floods of tears and much wailing about how she wants to go to her old classroom with her old friends. She was completely distraught for ages and ages. I assumed this would mean the end of her wanting to go to school Put her to bed early.

On Friday we went to visit another HE family to help the older 2 (ages 14 and 16) with a science experiment. They were testing for Vit C levels in fruit. Having done this some extraordinarily long time ago during my degree (okay it was only 10-12 years ago but it seems like forever) they asked me in for some expert assistance. It was a good job I did go because they would never have managed on their own. There were some very difficult (for youngsters) preliminary steps to go through to make up the standard solutions required, and they had no idea how to go about accurately using a pipette. I don't know exactly who the kit was aimed at, but I thought it was not well designed or adequately explained for people without significant science background.

We had lunch there and then rushed back for our hair cuts at home at 3.30pm. To my surprise, another discussion with Jade had her saying she still wants to go to school, even if she does have to go to another classroom. I have said that I will phone the school on Monday morning and see if they have a place and if we can go for a visit. I suggested she should go for a half-day on her own to see how she got on, but she said she wants me to stay! (Doesn't bode well, does it, bearing in mind she does know them all already.) And given more time to reflect on what this might mean, and with her seeming to be serious about it (though I still very much have my doubts once she is there) I really don't want her to go to school. Yes, I am very much in need of some time to myself at home, but that doesn't mean I want her out of the house 5 days a week for 6 hours at a time. I do wish there was more flexibility in the system, so that she could go to a 'learning resource centre' with trained 'facilitators' for a couple of days a week and spend the rest of the time at home. That's what I really want!

On Saturday morning I finally managed to clear enough time and space round myself to finalise our Tax Credit Annual Return, hurrah!!!! This morning we've been to church and the girls have played all afternoon, and tomorrow is Jade's final Rainbows which will be a party. She's going to Brownies in September and L from next door is going too. I am hoping that before too long she'll feel brave enough to just stay with L and not have me stay with her for the entire session too!

Noticeably different

Shannon was off to playschool this morning, so Jade and I had a nice morning together. I almost went straight to Tesco's from playschool, nearly forgetting to come straight back home to meet a plumber, but thankfully at the last minute I remembered and got back to find him on the doorstep. Our boiler has been out of action for at least a month, and we've been making do with showering at friends' houses and once-a-week swimming to keep us clean. It's amazing how difficult it is to get a plumber to come and mend or even look at a boiler. Anyway one came a week or so ago but hasn't bothered to send a quote. This one today seemed to think (no surprise really) that an 11 year old boiler shouldn't be repaired but just replaced. And gave us a heart-stopping quote of £3900 plus VAT. We don't have that kind of money, and we don't have that kind of credit available either as we are desperately trying to pay down our existing loans. Hmmm.

After he'd gone Jade and I went straight off to Tesco's which was drastically easier with only one child instead of two. I have to laugh about that standard home educator's thing about a trip to the supermarket being educational though. I tried to point out to Jade the prices per 100g of things and how that helped you compare prices, and all she said was "I'm not interested in money". I told her she should be because the less she spent (in her adult future) on food the more she'd have available to spend on her horse, but she still wasn't bothered. It was definitely a 'maths avoidance' moment.

Got home around 11am and decided to make the most of the beautiful sunshine. We put rugs on the lawn and the big parasol up and lay on the grass reading our respective magazines (hers: Sparkle. Mine: Good Homes.) After a while we were getting hungry so got sandwiches and then I finished reading The Butterfly Lion to her while she ate and then spent a while pretending to be a horse. Then we had to rush and get Shannon.

The atmosphere was considerably different once there were two of them here again. I'm sure it would be lovely with either one of them at home on their own, but two of them together makes for three times the work and aggravations. I must learn to cope better with two requests being made of me at once, as that tends to make me very irritable. Anyway we had an hour or so at home of me reading some Dora books to Shannon and I did spend 10 minutes with them on the trampoline and then I got our swimming stuff together and we went off to the pool. Had a lovely swim in which Jade swam a whole width for the first time and was thrilled with herself :-) Then home for a healthy home-made dinner and a prolonged bedtime which is still ongoing as it's 10pm and Jade is still wide awake reading. I have been going up to her at 15 minute intervals to reassure her because she is constantly coming downstairs these days saying she is scared, whether it's of monsters or fire or anything else. I asked her tonight why she is more worried recently and she said it's because they watched Monsters Inc a few weeks ago! So I told her (again) how that was a made-up story that someone has just imagined and written, and suggested that she imagine herself to be WonderGirl with magical gifts and a quick brain and strong body with which she can beat the monsters, and imagine how she is going to win.

From Elvis to Shakespeare

Quite a good day in a frustrating sort of way.

It started, as most mornings do, with both girls climbing into bed with me, after they'd already been downstairs and had breakfast and started watching a film and I was hoping for 15 mins peace and quiet to start my day, but no they came upstairs and disturbed me anyway. And Jade started talking about how she thought L from next door had told her a lie, and we discussed whether or not it was a lie, and I told her about how my best friend when I was 7 always told loads of lies. In fact, she had once told me that she had Elvis Presley in her room, and when I couldn't see him she told me he was lying on the floor on the far side of her bed. Hmmm. She's turned out to be a really nice, mature, sensible woman, (we're still occasionally in touch) but in those days she was a terror. Anyway Jade and I went on to talk about Elvis, and I told her who he was, and as my laptop was on the floor by the bed I opened it up and got some Elvis on Youtube. We enjoyed that so much we watched several more Elvis clips and with accompanying conversation she now has a thorough appreciation of the birth of rock 'n' roll. Scary to think that it's 'history'!!

Then once we got passed the 'getting dressed' battle, and I'd had breakfast, and set my Fair Shares gardener to work on the evil field bindweed and creeping buttercup, I sat Jade down to write her Thank You notes for her birthday presents. It's not too late to write thank you notes 4 weeks later is it? She started off happily enough, but after making several mistakes on the first card and scribbling them out and beginning to get frustrated and angry with herself, the tension rose rather. I had to do much deep-breathing and praying hard for patience to see it through, but eventually she has written 6 out of the 8 required so it's not bad going. Shannon joined us at the table and I found her some old party invitation cards that are unlikely to be needed so she enjoyed 'writing' on those and putting them in envelopes. While they were doing those I was mindful of trying to find a way for me to enjoy all this, so I decided to try a little drawing and did a fairly passable imitation of a horse which was interesting.

The next bit is when it all went rather pear-shaped, though it all becomes such a blur in my mind that I cannot write about it. This feeling comes regularly these days, when I'm trying to hang the washing out and Shannon wants to play a game and Jade is on the computer and something goes wrong and I go to put it right and then Shannon wants a drink and then the phone rings and then I try and sit down to menu plan for the week and then Jade wants me to watch her on the trampoline and then Shannon wants 'hungry' and I say no and she says "but I want to" like that's all the reason she should need and I say no again and she cries and whines and then I shout "No, you're not having any hungry, just go away!" and then everybody's hungry and wants a sandwich but then while I'm making them Jade hits Shannon and then I yell at Jade and make her sit on the stairs and go back and try and continue with the sandwiches and then I find Shannon is playing with one of Jade's toys and Jade has seen her and is yelling for me while trying to wrestle the toy off her sister and so I sort that out and then put the telly on to try and get some peace and quiet while I finish making lunch and then doing the menu plan and then doing the shopping list and by this time I am on the verge of tears and I've run out of energy and I feel like I just can't do this anymore......

So I leave them in front of the telly and go to bed for an hour. I want this to be 'quiet hour' from 1-2pm each day, with the girls quietly reading or listening to audio CDs, but I know this will need some training which will involve many interruptions to my quiet time until they get the message. And on days like this I'm just so desperate for my quiet hour the TV is the best way to get it to happen.

And then I got up and suggested we go for a walk, but by this time Shannon was n*ked and didn't want to get dressed again and it took ages to persuade her. But in the end we made it up to the woods and had a nice half-hour walk in the cool greenery, which was much appreciated. We got home and I was thinking, "I never got time to do the maths and bible stuff I wanted to do today" but by this time I had to prepare the dinner. Then I had to persuade Shannon into her clothes again because it was time for Jade to go to Rainbows. Shannon had to come too as her usual babysitter for that hour is away at HesFes. So we all went off to Rainbows where two police officers came for a chat with the girls about the emergency services and phoning 999 and the necessity of knowing your own full name and address, which Jade already does, not that she would ever tell it to anybody or phone 999 so it all seemed a bit academic really.

Then home to dinner and bed and to my surprise, while I was reading stories to Shannon, Jade found my Usborne Stories from Shakespeare and read the whole of Midsummer Night's Dream! We finished off with a further chapter from Michael Morpurgo's The Butterfly Lion as recommended by Chloe from the Manor Born. And so ends another day.

I had a 'sanity Saturday' yesterday - took off on my own in the afternoon and spent a blissful 4 hours without anyone yelling "Look, Mum!" or "Mum, she hit me!" or "Mum, I'm hungry" every 2 minutes. I desperately needed it and felt much better by the time I got home. I must plan them more regularly rather than waiting till I get to breaking point.

So off I went to shop in Cheltenham. The main aim was to get some proper running shoes. So I can run faster to get away from the kids. No, not really! I am planning on taking part in the Little Hearts Matter sponsored run in October, which can be 5K, 10K or 15K. I'm aiming for the 5K! So in due course I shall be badgering you lot to sponsor me for loadsa money, but first I've got to get training. Which I did today - took the dog out and managed seven sets of run 1 min, walk 2 mins. Well the schedule did suggest run 1 min, walk 1 min but there was no way I was up to that! It's not going to be so easy to get out during the week unless it's after 9pm but we'll just have to see how it goes.

In the process of buying the shoes, I had a video analysis of my running gait. I never knew that I was a severe pronator! As I walk or run, my arches kind of collapse, my ankles drop in and down and generally it's all a bit of a mess. So I had to buy highly expensive, highly supportive shoes and this probably explains why I've got constant foot and leg ache and why I get so tired by the end of the day. But custom-made orthotics for ordinary shoes cost £200+ so that won't be happening in a hurry.

While shopping I also visited many of Cheltenham's charity shops and was very pleased to find a brand new, unused "Around the World" Dorling Kindersley game for 50p, a book about Robots as Jade was very interested in them when we visited the Cheltenham Science Festival a couple of weeks ago (don't think I ever blogged that) and a little book about hair braiding. A Dora activity pack for Shannon, new underwear for all the females of the family and 4 new pillows (bargain £7.50 reduced from £25) completed my shopping spree.

Today we've been to the local riding stables Open Day. The girls have been very excited about this for days as pony rides were on offer and Shannon had her very first go. She was bumped about all over the place but said she liked it and had another go. Jade had 3 rides, one on the pony she usually rides there each week and one each on the other two, including a 16-17hh horse which I thought was very brave for her!

Jade riding Sonic


Shannon riding Sonic


Jade on Bracken


Shannon on Miniman, the pony Jade rides each week, and he is 30!

Brief notes

- Jade wrote her first story :-) About a girl and a horse ;-) I would blog it but I know she won't give permission. Perhaps if I rant more often about how little she is doing, she will surprise me again?

- Not long after I tried to impress you Twitter followers with my devoted-mummy-act about how I had gone in to work for a couple of hours to really study some books about how best to help Jade, I lost my temper with her in a very spectacular way and completely undid any fantasies I may have had about being a good mummy.

- The last 2 nights when I have come in at about 10.30pm-ish, I have found Jade tucked up on the sofa with Bill having a maths lesson using the abacus! Tonight she actually came down and told him she wanted to do the same as last night!

- We went to Stratford today. Jade had a £5 WH Smith token to spend, and she chose a pink A4 notepad, Helena the Horse-Riding Fairy, and Chrissie the Wish Fairy (3 stories in one book). She read HtH-RF on the way home in the car, and Chrissie by the time she went to bed :-o

- I bought some hand-weights. To start my exercise regime!

- I have got through Benjamin's anniversary today pretty smoothly. Too many other things on my mind I guess. And after all, it's just another day.

Please click for me!

Please would everyone coming by this blog please do me a favour?

I have nominated Little Hearts Matter to become the next charity supported by the MoneySavingExpert.com website. LHM is the charity that supported us all through the time that my first child, Benjamin was diagnosed with Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome, the pregnancy, the birth and afterwards, and I now help them with bereavement support. If LHM did become the MSE charity for a year, it might receive in the region of £20,000 which would be amazing.

The way you can help is by going to this place on the MSE forums, sign up as a forum member, scroll down on page 2 of the thread to about the 7th post down where I have nominated LHM (yes, I am MrsMessy!) and click on the 'Thanks' button at the bottom of the message.

Thank you!

HE rant

I feel a bit useless at saying that 3 years into HE and I still haven't settled on what I feel to be a successful and happy approach to HE for our family.

I like what I read about unschooling, but I am not totally convinced either in theory or in practice for us. Maybe I would feel better about it in practice if it was like I read somewhere recently with a quote roughly along the lines of "I started to realise how ridiculous it was to call my son away from designing his own model aeroplane to sit down and do some maths." If I saw plenty of designing, creating or discovering going on here, I might well just go along with it. Instead, what happens when left to their own devices is that Jade either pretends to be a horse or pretends to be riding/grooming/feeding one and Shannon begs to watch DVDs from dawn till dusk. I'm also not convinced about it in theory, because, rightly or wrongly and as someone who had a relatively academic education, I really want my daughters to be able to use grammar and the English language properly, with correct punctuation and spelling, and I want them to learn how to discuss and express their ideas and arguments fully and cogently, and I want them to be able to recognise good science from bad, I'd like them to have the basics of one or two foreign languages and the basics of maths, and how do I know whether, left to themselves, they would take these up to the level that I think they 'should'? It's disheartening when I read other blogs and find that other children her age are doing amazing art work, happily attending language groups, making their own patterns to sew their own clothes and being fascinated by electronics kits. With Jade, the only thing she is fascinated by is horses/ponies, and although I know there are plenty of educational opportunities in there, she WON'T do any of them. She will not make up pony stories, she will not write a pony project, she doesn't want to do anything that would feel to me as though she is doing something productive. She just wants to play at riding ponies and read pony stories and that is it.

With Jade in particular, giving her structured work is a dangerous venture, which has to be approached with the lightest of touches, otherwise sparking off major confrontations and leading to grumpiness and misery for us all. She is significantly resistant to being 'taught' anything, even stuff that she has actually asked to learn. I think perhaps she is incredibly insecure about feeling that she might get things wrong, so only wants to do things which she already feels she can do, and is scared of trying anything new. Her difficult behaviour seems to be part of the selective mutism syndrome, having compared notes with other parents, but she is particularly challenging to parent and I feel quite at sea with her at the moment.

It would be great if I was imaginative and energetic enough to come up with interesting activities and hands-on investigations that were fun and educational, but I feel stretched in too many directions and simply refereeing all the sibling rivalry, hitting and arguing and tantrums wears me out and I have very little left to give. It used to be that a quiet evening and a (relatively) good night's sleep (i.e. one where I only get woken about 2-3 brief times by Shannon) would refresh me and set me up again for the morning, but these days I am sick to death of the arguing and bickering before I've even got out of bed.

Part of me would quite like to throw in the towel and just send Jade to school, and then I'd get that blessed much-longed-for me-time that is so missing at the moment, but I know perfectly well that she wouldn't cope, it would do her much more harm than good and we'd end up in a worse position than we are now. Plus I'd miss what I feel that HE could and should be. I still believe in HE; I just don't feel as though I'm making a very good job of it with this particular child.

Festival of History

I have come across two problems pertaining to us coming along to the FoH weekend. Firstly, it is the Saturday night that we show our Rural Cinema film locally and I am in charge of that and I don't know if my colleague will feel able to have a go herself (she cancelled the one in May when I was on holiday). Secondly I note that Wicksteed Park only allows caravans on Friday and Saturday nights so we would need a tent to stay for the whole thing.

If I can find a way round problem number one, could anyone lend us a tent big enough for a family of 4 to overcome problem number two?

Good unschooling article

I've just discovered this really well-written blog post by an ex-teacher about why she no longer believes in schools and was not going to send her daughter any more, written just after she resigned her teaching job. A good read.

Birthday!

Jade is 7 today! I am completely and utterly exhausted from preparations and the party today, so this will be very brief.

T-bird Anni and Aprilia arrived on Saturday afternoon, and both Jade and Shannon were very happy to see them and to play with Aprilia immediately - no warming up time needed! Jade has even been speaking fairly openly in front of Anni (though not directly to her), so that's been lovely.

I put Anni to work making the birthday cake while I prepared the evening meal. Isn't it great having friends like that?

Anni and I were up till after midnight last night making said cake look like a horse's head. I did most of it but she did a great job steadying my nerves and making useful suggestions. Not long after we went to bed (it seemed) Shannon was awake and I had to go to her and of course spent the rest of the night in her bed, and she woke a few more times. Then Jade woke up at about 6.30am and was too excited to go back to sleep again.

She had a lovely time opening her presents on our bed with everyone watching, and was delighted with everything, which is always a relief! (Heely's, Barbie Jumping Horse (Tawny), I Love Ponies playset, squishy dolphin, fantasy castle playset, some beautiful elves/fairies on horses, etc).

She was not so delighted to go off to church but it was the 10th anniversary service of our combined group of churches which work together, so a local school had been hired and it was absolutely jam-packed with people standing round the back and sides as all seats were full. Aprilia and Jade went into the kids' group and Aprilia threw herself into all the activities with gusto and Jade refused to do anything, and in the end we left Aprilia in there enjoying herself and we went out so I could at least listen partly to the main speaker. Found Anni chatting at the main door with the mum of the only other home-educating family in our 4-church group, who introduced us to a dad who was considering HEing. Anni did a great PR job on HE! I met up with several friends whom I have not seen properly for ages so was disappointed to be having to rush off and get the party ready instead of staying for the barbecue and the afternoon's fun which was scheduled.

Anyway, we rushed home and made final preparations and then had 5 more small and excited small girls show up to have great fun at the party. We did a 'find the ponies' game where Jade's massive collection of little horse/pony figures were hidden in the garden for them to find. We did that twice! We had pass the parcel, show-jumping round a great course of jumps built by Bill, a bit of dancing, and a lot of playing and having fun. It was lovely! Beautiful, glorious sunshine too. Fab but exhausting, and as usual I question my sanity in continuing to do home parties, but as that is the way I always had my birthdays it is the only way that seems 'right' to me!

Aprilia and Anni are setting off in the morning to visit the MonsterTeenys, leaving us to get on with celebrating Bill's birthday .... now all we have to do is wait for him to decide where he wants to go for the day!

Random ramblings

Excuse me if this is disjointed, but I have several things on my mind and am tired.

Firstly, Jade has been vile today. We go through these phases every now and then, when her nastiness to Shannon (hitting, pinching, name-calling, snatching toys away etc) gets worse and our parental tempers get shorter too and every day is a trial for a while. So much so, at the moment, that she only has to do 9 more nasty things to anybody and her birthday party on Sunday will be cancelled. (T-bird: if that comes to pass, our Plan B would be just to go out somewhere with you and Aprilia, so do still come!). We haven't figured out what causes these phases - it might be that we are doing or not doing something to which she is reacting, but if so we are not seeing it yet. But it is so aggravating when you have tried every which way you can to improve a child's behaviour and it just doesn't seem to make one jot of difference.

Sunday was a strange day. We sold our cot on Ebay (for a surprisingly large amount of money!) and it was collected on Sunday morning, so we re-arranged our bedroom to return it to its pre-cot configuration. Which ended up having unanticipated reverberations for both Bill and I because the last time it was like that, Benjamin was at home with us. We moved the furniture around to get a Moses basket in when he'd been home with us for a few days. And considering I hadn't gone to church on Sunday morning, because it was the annual open-air service which I haven't attended for the past 8 years because I have such clear memories of attending it 9 years ago with one small baby, I guess I was already set up for feeling a bit weird. Sometimes I wonder if these uncomfortable episodes will ever stop - will there ever be a time when there isn't something that can send me all off-balance?

It feels like not much planned educational stuff has gone on lately. We did a bit of Miquon maths this morning which provoked some tension in Jade and had me working hard to control my reactions as she fiddled about, wrote stupid things in the book, didn't concentrate on my explanations and so on. That's about it as far as formal stuff has gone on. She has however spent a vast amount of the past few days avidly reading some books about ponies and pony care, so should we ever win on the Premium Bonds and be able to buy her one, she'll at least know roughly what to do!

Shannon is really enjoying having recently learned to identify all the letters of the alphabet as Letterland characters, and frequently stops and reads through the list of letters in any word / logo / advert she comes across. It's fun!

And, having just realised how horribly late it is, that's the lot for now.