Singing in Spanish

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Some days are diamonds (some days are stone)

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Hey, it's good to be back home again

We all had a lovely church weekend away at the Pioneer Centre, Cleobury Mortimer. Although with small children we didn't get to spend much time in the main sessions, but we had a good time anyway. Amazingly (huh? - this is GOD we are talking about!) the one hour of the one session that I did manage to get to was aimed perfectly at me, reaching me exactly where I am and really helping me move on a few steps. Isabelle's godparents Lana and David were total stars, with Lana getting her to sleep a couple of times and both of them having Isabelle on their lap for a while at several meals so we could actually eat using both hands.

So that's why we didn't get to Hesfes till Monday. For those friends of mine who read this blog and don't know what Hesfes is, it's the Home Educators Seaside Festival - a week-long camp for, erm, home-educators, obviously. It was our first visit, and with a certain notoriety about it, I wasn't quite sure what to expect. And especially as I was going to be spending 5 days in a small caravan with Tamsin and Isabelle but without Bill, I was a bit nervous at how it might go!

We took our usual leisurely time to get organised and on the move on Monday, so didn't arrive in Charmouth until about 6 or 7pm. Sarah had been extremely helpful by saving my electric hook-up pitch by parking her car there - small as the space was, it was better than nothing, which is what I suspect might have happened had she not been so helpful. So we were met by Alison and Sarah, and waved briefly to Jax, Merry, Barbara and maybe others before getting stuck in to getting the caravan set up. Bill left for the 3-hour drive home at about 9pm, and I got the kids to bed and ventured out of the van only to say Hi to my friend Jo who lives in my small town and was there with her 10-year old son. She had a programme which I was able to look through and get some idea of what was going on on-site through the week. I made a mental note to head for the Yoga for Under-5's on Wednesday morning, but nothing much on Tuesday appealed to me. After that I quickly headed for bed, sharing a rather small double bed with 2 children plus hordes of rowdy kids going up and down the road meant a rather disturbed night.
First impressions: a somewhat scruffy campsite absolutely teeming with hordes of strange-looking, unruly kids doing very dangerous things down a steep hill with skateboards, bikes etc.

On Tuesday morning after getting up and ready we wandered out for a look round the site to see what was what. We headed down the hill to the play park and found Alison, Merry and Jax there with their various kids, and I was pleased to note that on the whole Tamsin felt confident enough to go off and play on the equipment on her own instead of wanting me to follow her round and hold her hand all the time. So I was able to sit and have a bit of chatting time with the adults, which was nice. Later on we went up the hill from our caravan to find out where the marquees were that held the workshops and events, and had a general wander round. In the afternoon I needed a couple of things from the site shop, so wandered down only to find it shut, so we carried on out of the site to check out the beach. Had a lovely 45 minutes or so down there but were unprepared with no suncream or anything so we all got a little bit too much of the sun on our faces and didn't notice due to the stiff breeze. Went back up to the campsite and joined the gang of Puddlers sitting chatting. It was nice to meet Joyce and Barbara again, having only passed a few words with both of them at Kessingland last year, and later on I also met Nic, Heather and Alexia. As the afternoon/evening wore on, Tamsin had a lovely time running about and playing with Jax's Small and Barbara's B. In fact, one of the best parts of the week for me was seeing the difference in Tamsin from last year to this. Many might remember that at Kessingland she would barely venture more than a foot or two from me or Bill, and hardly played with any other children at all due to shyness and lack of confidence to go anywhere without us. This year she has run around, played with and talked to children she doesn't know, and generally been a much more confident child.

On Wednesday morning at 9am I remembered about the kids' yoga, so managed to get up to the main marquee in time to participate. It was really yoga for the adults with the hope that the kids would want to join in, which they mostly did, although Tamsin's idea of joining in was mostly running round and round the large marquee pretending to be an aeroplane, which was OK! While there I discovered that the week's programme of events was posted up in the marquee, so that was handy, as otherwise I wouldn't have remembered what else was going on all week. On returning to the campsite area I discovered that several Puddlers were planning on packing up and leaving due to adverse weather reports for the rest of the week, but as I had no car there was no way I could join this general exodus even if I had wanted to. However enough people I knew were sticking around to make it OK. I did phone Bill and arrange for him to pick me up on Friday instead of Saturday, though.

In the afternoon we spent a little more time at the play park before heading down to the beach ready for the labyrinth-building, which according to rumour was supposed to happen from 2-4pm. We arrived at about 2.15 pm to an extremely windy and cold beach, and no sight of any structured activity at all. We hung around for a little while, Tamsin enjoying digging and filling her buckets with sand, but in the end I was too cold and decided to head back to the caravan. Walking back I met everyone walking to the beach, and discovered apparently the labyrinth-building was supposed to start at 3pm, but by then I was too cold and tired to join in, so we carried on back to the campsite.

On both Tuesday and Wednesday Tamsin and I had the following conversation:
T - "I want to go home"
Me - "Why do you want to go home?"
T - "I want to watch Dora"
(very similar to Kessingland last year when every single day of the camp she wanted to go home so she could do 'track', i.e. play with her Brio train set.)

Anyway it was something of a blessing when in conversation with Nic she said she had a Dora the Explorer DVD back at her static caravan, and invited us to go over and view any time. Tamsin was over the moon when I told her, and from then on nagged me senseless until I phoned Nic and arranged to go over. I discovered that Barbara was packing up and planning to spend the night at Nic's, so when I was ready to go I offered to take someone or something with me, and ended up taking B. It was lovely to spend more time with Nic, and later on Barbara, despite her stress levels being a bit high due to some of her kids! I went back to my caravan when Isabelle started getting rather whingey due to being tired. Tamsin was thrilled with her Dora 'fix', though, and it stopped her wanting to go home for the rest of the week!

Thursday was the day when the rain arrived on and off for most of the day. Tamsin and I had a really nice 'girly' start to the morning, snug in our cosy caravan with its lovely fan heater, painting each other's toe-nails and plaiting hair. When we eventually emerged we went up the hill to the main marquee to see what was going on, and came across a belly-dancing session in progress. Tamsin couldn't resist the array of shiny, jingly and sparkly garments and insisted on dressing up a little and joining in, although again she didn't want to attempt any of the 'proper' movements but just ran up and down twirling around instead. After a while I was tired of that so we wandered off for a coffee and cake, and chatted a little with a man who I later discovered was Mike Fortune-Wood. He and Roland Meighan were about to begin setting up for their book-launch (name-dropping, moi?), which although I would have been quite interested to stay for, I knew Tamsin wouldn't have the necessary patience. On attempting to leave she fell flat on her face in lots of sticky mud, which she was quite upset about, so we went back to the caravan for cleaning up and lunch. I was so tired and attempted to have a bit of a nap while Isabelle slept and Tamsin played one of her computer games, but she kept disturbing me and I didn't get much rest. For the rest of the afternoon I felt completely lethargic, so although we went down to the play park again I didn't have the energy for it so just came back to the campsite for a sit and a chat with Sarah, Jax and Joyce, followed by an early bedtime. Actually around dinner-time I started to feel quite sick, and didn't know whether to put it down to the eggs I'd had for lunch brought from home and laid by my own chickens, or to low blood-sugar having not eaten anything else since then. I mentally started planning who I could call to look after my children while I lay in my sick-bed, but thankfully it didn't come to that and I felt better later on, although the nausea came and went for the rest of the evening and the night, and in fact on Friday too.

Friday was going home day, and knowing that Bill was on the way to rescue me from the mud and the children meant I just had to do the packing and clearing up and then wait for him to arrive around 2pm. Tamsin played wall-to-wall computer games but we were all getting a bit tetchy and bored, and the frustration levels rose when Bill phoned firstly to say he was late leaving due to a problem at home, and then later being stuck in traffic rather a lot on the journey down, so he eventually arrived around 4pm. It was lovely to see him and to be taken away from all the mud and noise!

Overall impressions of a Hesfes virgin: not as positive as I would have hoped, sadly. The major memory I am left with is of the really selfish and disrespectful behaviour of the older kids, who were definitely not a good advert for home-education. They didn't care what property they might damage by their behaviour, whether that was Bill's car or Joyce's tent, or how many small children they upset in the playground by hogging the equipment, or how many people they were in danger of hurting by frankly dangerous bike and skate-board riding down the hill. Also, along the lines of Nic's 'retail opportunity' musings, I really did expect to find a range of home-education resources that I could browse through. After all, these aren't things we can find in the shops generally and it would be nice to see some of the curricula, books, computer programs and other resources to have a look at. My good memories are of sitting chatting with on-line friends and hopefully turning them more into real-life friends, and Tamsin playing happily with children she hadn't met before or couldn't remember. Most of the activities or workshops were not suitable for Tamsin, and there was less on offer than I expected although a quick look through some other blogs indicates there were things there that I didn't know about. That in itself is indicative of a certain lack of planning or information-giving. All in all I can't see myself wanting to go next year, or maybe for a few years until Tamsin is likely to get more out of the activities on offer and Isabelle is less likely to be in 'running away toddler'-mode.

Well, that blogging has taken me about 2.5 hours and I still have over 800 e-mails and everybody else's blogs to read, so I'm going to be busy for a while!

I'm clean!!!!!

Ahhh, bliss is a long hot shower after a cold and very muddy field in Dorset. I'm not a major clean freak by any stretch of the imagination, but it feels so good to be home in a clean bed and with hot running water! I still have to navigate the washing mountain, though, and the caravan is still filthy, so major blogging will have to wait a while longer.

Sick, a surprise, and more sick

I've got a sad, poorly baby :-( We made an emergency dash to the doctors this morning, after a really bad night full of crying and Calpol and a morning when she ended up just screaming for ages, but it's just a cold with blocked-up and painful ears. I'm probably not alone in this, but when my babies are ill I'm always afraid they're going to die... so it's rather stressful! Still, at least I didn't get as far as calling an ambulance for what turned out to be a cold, as I did with Tamsin! It all nearly messed up the day's plans to meet my Mum near Abingdon to hand over the dog to look after while we're away at the church weekend and then Hesfes. But we made it in the end.

On the way back, we called in on Bill at work (Oxford Brookes University), leading to moments of delight and then pure farce. The delight was when I looked round the library on the campus, which is the teacher-training department. WOW! Thousands of videos of educational programmes, CD-Roms, cassettes, and fiction and non-fiction children's books - all of which Bill can borrow on his staff ticket. Perfect for the home-educator! I felt like a kid in a sweet-shop! Couldn't stay long, due to a crying Isabelle (again) and a hyperactively running about Tamsin, but did borrow a phonics video and a Learning French CD-ROM, and I will definitely plan to go back and spend more time there soon!

Then I was bursting for the loo, and Isabelle was crying, so I took her and Tamsin off so I could feed Isabelle on the toilet. She had a really nice long feed, so there I was on the toilet, clothing round my ankles, when suddenly she throws up all her milk, right inside my knickers and trousers. Great. Just then the automatic light times out and goes off. So now I'm in the dark, with vomit all down my legs, underwear and trousers, and can't see properly to wipe up, and Isabelle is screaming and snotty again. But it's a quiet day at the college, there are hardly any students about, and nobody has been into the loo while I've been there. So I risk it, and open the cubicle door and shuffle out, knickers and trousers still round my ankles. Now I need to put Isabelle down somewhere so I can wipe up the sick. There isn't enough room to lie her down near the washbasins, so I decide to sit her bottom down in one of the cute little sinks, which hasn't been used for a while so it is nice and dry. As I lower her bottom gently into the sink, the water comes on and drenches her in cold water. They didn't tell me the taps were automatically activated by an infra-red sensor (even in the dark).

We staggered soggily and hysterically back to Bill's office, I threw the baby at him and collapsed.

My three girls

I've been having fun getting used to three feathered friends - I've never done this before but have fancied having chickens in the garden for a long time. I decided to finally get them for my 40th birthday, which was last year but what with having to sort out a run for them, and then being pregnant/tired/having a new baby, we thought it best to wait till the Spring.

These 3 are Cotswold Legbars and lay lovely pale blue eggs - you may be able to buy them at your supermarket in a blue box under the Clarence Court label. We haven't thought of names for them yet - ideas in the comments box, please!


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When Isabelle grabbed a piece of pizza crust and started happily chomping, we thought it was probably time to start weaning!


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So here she is, having her first taste of mango and banana puree. She's sitting on Daddy's knee, and Tamsin is doing the feeding!

This was a week or two ago, and since then she really hasn't been too keen on trying much. Quite often, she refuses to eat anything at all. It's not a problem - I know mummymilk is quite adequate for the job for a long time yet.


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Major disaster!

We've run out of tea-bags, and shops are shut ........ (gasp, wheeze....)

I hope to blog properly later, with pics of the chickens.

Chickens, and returning to work

We have new family members - three Cotswold Legbar chickens, as yet nameless. We got them on Monday morning, but it has been planned for a while - almost a year, in fact. I decided they would be my 40th birthday present last year, but in the event, the amount of time it took to plan how and where to keep them and then my advanced state of pregnancy and tiredness meant we delayed it till the Spring. Bill has spent a fair bit of time constructing a fence to section off a large corner of the garden, and they will have a pretty nice space to live in. I'm anxious about losing them to foxes, but will just have to hope there aren't any daytime roaming ones, which is when they'll be vulnerable.

Tomorrow morning I return to work after maternity leave. I wish I didn't have to - I haven't got time! And it will completely remove any little bit of me-time I've had when I've been at home while Tamsin was at playschool (Isabelle doesn't count as interrupting my me-time much, yet!). But financially we simply can't manage without my income. It's pretty straightforward child-care wise. Tamsin will be at playschool, and I can take Isabelle into the office with me as much as necessary. My Dad will still come over on a Thursday to collect Isabelle from me at about 11am, to have her for a couple of hours, and Kate, with whom I job-share, will do something similar on Fridays. I had Kate's youngest this morning from 9-12.30pm in return. It will work fine, and it's as good a job as I'm likely to get to combine with having a family, with its flexibility, but a private income would be preferable, LOL! I don't know how or if it will work in just over a year's time, when Tamsin will no longer go to playschool, but I'll have to move towards working something out as time goes on. Maybe I'll have to spend money on a childminder.

So the next few weeks will be about getting into a new routine and seeing how it all holds together.

Happy Birthday Benjamin

I wonder what birthdays are like in heaven? Perhaps they don't have them. Perhaps heaven is just one long party anyway! Perhaps he's all grown up already, or perhaps he's ageless now. If he'd still been here he would have been 6 years old today. What a strange thought - that I would have had a 6-year old son. I can't make any sense of that. All I know is a tiny baby. We still miss him, but it doesn't hurt most of the time. But I guess I can be excused a bit of a slump today, when I've abandoned the 'no TV till 5pm' rule and left Tamsin in front of the box while I lie about taking things easy.

Soon we'll go out to take flowers to his grave, and this afternoon we'll make some cakes. I have a candle burning all day.

Love you, Ben.

Wednesday and Thursday

Wednesday had Tamsin at playschool in the morning while I tried to reduce the washing mountain at home. In the afternoon we went to meet with other home-edders at someone's house locally - we went to the February meeting but missed last month. It was OK and quite successful in that Tamsin relatively happily just disappeared off outside without me, to run around with the other kids, which is a first! Makes me hopeful that she might do the same at Kessingland and join in with everyone else more. I asked if anyone was going to Hesfes, and several of them looked at me blankly! I had to explain.... But also quite a few of them have some kids in school and some at home, so they can't go. No-one from that group is going. I did note the classic thing that people say about home-educated kids, but which I hadn't really experienced for myself till yesterday, but I was surprised how easily these youngsters chatted to me and were very comfortable mixing with all ages. Really nice.

Today, Thursday involved me going to Cheltenham for the first 'Gloucestershire Real Nappy Network' meeting - funding has just been received to launch a campaign to promote cloth nappies in the County (focusing on Cheltenham and Gloucester to start with) and I was invited to be on the Steering Group. Tamsin was at playschool and I took Isabelle with me. I took the opportunity of my Dad collecting Tamsin, and myself being in Cheltenham to do a little shopping. Got a few bits and pieces from Booksale and Lush, but was fairly restrained. Got home by 3.30pm as Isabelle got very whingey twice. Once was when she was hungry but I couldn't figure out what was wrong the second time, and I just got fed up and decided to call it a day.

I keep forgetting to say, but I must record what a fabulous job Bill has done with laying a new wooden kitchen floor. It's a vast, vast improvement, and I'm really pleased with it!!

This morning, while Tamsin was at playschool, obviously my first priority was to catch up on the blogring! But I didn't get too bogged down, and also pureed a load of carrots and apples and froze them in icecube trays, prepared week 3 of Sound of the Week, got some ingredients into the breadmaker and set it going, and played with Isabelle a bit.

After collecting Tamsin and coming home via the supermarket for a few essentials, everything went a bit pear-shaped :-( Isabelle had fallen asleep in the car but woke up when we got home, even though she was still tired. After a short time at home, she started to get very whingey, and needed to go back to sleep. The following hour got very stressful, because her normal methods of going to sleep for a nap either by feeding or being rocked in her car seat just didn't work. I was asking Tamsin to keep quiet so that Isabelle could fall asleep, but no matter what I did, she just wouldn't sleep but was just whingeing, fussing and crying. It was taking so long, and I felt I was being so unfair to Tamsin by asking her to keep quiet, that I just left Isabelle to it, hoping she would just fall asleep, while I gave Tamsin some much-needed attention and did the Sound of the Week words and pictures with her. Isabelle's crying just escalated, though, so I tried again and fed her and rocked her again, and eventually she fell asleep. I took her carseat upstairs so that we wouldn't disturb her again, but it was only about 30-40 minutes before she woke up again, still tired. I rocked her carseat and she was just dropping off again, when Tamsin came upstairs. I just managed to shush her in time, and although it disturbed Isabelle a little, she seemed to go to sleep. 2 minutes later she was *screaming*, and the only thing I can think of is she must have been having a bad dream, because there was certainly nothing else to make her scream like that. I knew she was still tired, though, and she almost dropped off again, except that Tamsin kept disturbing us. Poor girl, I'd been asking her to keep quiet just too much, and she couldn't keep doing it, and in the end I just brought Isabelle downstairs again to wake her up fully, even though she was still overtired.

I just don't know how it's 'supposed' to be done. How do you get a baby to nap regularly and properly with an older child or children in the house? We have too many of these times when I'm just always shushing Tamsin and then she interrupts at the crucial moment and Isabelle just won't sleep. Good daytime sleep helps achieve good night-time sleep, and also an over-tired baby won't do so well in many ways, so it's important. I will not just leave her to 'cry it out' - that is not something I could do for many reasons, but how can I take the time to teach her to fall asleep well at naptime and/or bedtime when I've got Tamsin to look after too? It just seems to be an impossible juggling act. At bedtime Tamsin said "I don't love you, because you shout at me..." I don't take the 'not loving' bit to heart, but it does show that it all gets too stressful in this house too often!

After all that fiasco, the rest of the afternoon went better. Tamsin did some more StudyDog (still only at the very beginning though), and, trying to think of something else to do with her when she got bored of that, I signed up for the EducationCity trial, on which she did just a few minutes. I managed to prepare a proper healthy meal again (did some menu planning a few days ago), and then the blessed 5pm came when I put the TV on for an hour of Dora, plus dinner, followed by a bath and bed.

Monday

Was a pretty good day on the whole, although quite hard getting through with no TV until 5pm, and I did also leave the PC off till then and I *really* missed it. I think it was much better without, though, because what tends to happen is I get on the PC and get kind of mesmerised by it and then don't think clearly about what else needs to be done. I stayed more mentally alert yesterday, on the whole! But as I slept through the evening again last night, and Tamsin is at playschool this morning, I thought I would catch up a bit.

So, yesterday included Brio, reading (including this one about evolution as recommended by Nic, which has given me some food for thought and the need to do some more reading and deciding of my own), playdough, and lots of "copy me" games, where Tamsin wants me to copy whatever she is doing (very boring....). We walked the dog, and pretended to be Dora the Explorer and Thomas the Tank Engine. After lunch we went swimming, which both girls really enjoyed, and then home to a meal which I had already (efficiently) mostly prepared earlier, plus the long-awaited hour with Dora on Nick Jr, then TV was switched off again before bed. At the last minute, Tamsin decided she wanted to do some StudyDog, which I didn't think she liked much, but I obliged and she went right back to the beginning to do the letters of the alphabet, which is rather easy for her but I guess a bit of revision and morale-boosting isn't a bad idea.

This morning (Tuesday) she's read all the words on our "sound of the week" poster (still only on week 2, even though we started back in January, LOL! - that's how much of a procrastinator and disorganised I am) and requested to do some more, so I will prepare week 3 sounds and words this morning while she's out and put them together this afternoon.

Isabelle has woken - must go now!

Edit: Forgot to say that a major part of the morning was vacuuming with my new G-Tech cleaner - the big advantage of which is that it is light enough and quiet enough for Tamsin, and in fact she grabbed it off me and insisted on doing the whole house - result! I think I might make this 'her job' to give her some responsibility round the house and some fun as well.

Thomas, a tooth, and Turnoff TV week

Saturday saw Tamsin, Isabelle and me having a Day Out With Thomas while DH stayed at home fitting the new wooden floor in our kitchen, yay! Tamsin was thrilled, as last year, to see Thomas, Henry, Diesel, Toby and so on in 'real life'!! So we had a good but exhausting day out, and came home to find good progress being made with the new floor.

Today has been full of surprises. The first was at church this morning when Isabelle chomped on my finger, as she likes to do, but this time there was a little sharp tooth poking through at the bottom!! Tamsin didn't get her first tooth till 8 months, so this is 'early' for us.

I had already decided that I would start giving Isabelle some real food this week, as I am due to go back to work next week, and although I can have her with me in the office a fair bit and make sure she is well fed before someone takes her away for an hour or two, knowing that she can have some other food if we get the timing all wrong eases my mind a little. And we're only a week earlier than the 'officially allowed' weaning age anyway. My decision was confirmed with the arrival of the tooth, and the fact that she grabbed a piece of Bill's pizza at lunchtime and sucked and chomped on it with great delight. I had hoped to wait till she was grabbing food off us before starting weaning, so I'm glad that happened first! So we then introduced her to a little pureed mango and banana (courtesy of Baby Organix) and she was a bit bemused but interested! I have a little frisson of 'earth-mother' guilt that her first food was not 'home-made and pureed', but I think I can get over it ;-)

My other decision for the week is that the TV will be off all day until 5pm this week, it being TV Turnoff Week. I can't quite bring myself to lose it completely all week, and chose 5pm because then Tamsin can just watch an hour of Dora, her current absolute favourite, while I produce some dinner, and I can watch something in the evening if I want without breaking my own rule! I have yet to decide whether the PC will join the daytime ban - I certainly think it might help our days run smoother if it did, but do I have the willpower?? It would be an interesting experiment for a week.

I also want to just muse a little on something that's bothering me. I have been thinking this week that I can barely remember Isabelle as a newborn. I know that when she was born, I kept on feeling that I wasn't getting enough time just to be with her. I resented the time that Tamsin and other household demands took me away from her, and TBH that feeling that I haven't quite had enough time with her has persisted. I carry her as much as possible, and use a sling when my shoulders/back can cope, but still can't get over this feeling. I think it must be all the other demands, particularly of Tamsin, but I am feeling sad because I feel I am missing out, in some way, of really 'knowing' her and being 'with' her, and this is my last chance as I do feel in many ways that I don't want any more children.

Not much about HE

Not much blatant HE going on here but plenty of playing including Tamsin learning to play 'Snap' with her Thomas the Tank Engine playing cards, which she has enjoyed and requested to do several times over the past few days. Other things have been occupying my mind recently:

1. I've just become Chairperson of the Playgroup that Tamsin attends, and my first important job was to make sure the forms to claim the Nursery Grant were sent in on time..... and I missed it :-( Not the final claim date, thankfully, but the interim date which would have meant the playschool received 50% of its grant this week instead of in June. I had to confess at the first meeting I led last night. Great big OOPS! The rest of the committee and the staff were very kind about it, and turned down my offer to lend them the £2000 or so for the two months that they will now have to wait for the money. The final claim has been posted today, in good time!

2. At last, nearly six years after the event, we have decided what to do with Benjamin's heart and lungs that were retained at Birmingham Children's Hospital. Being the procrastinators that we are, we had wrestled with the issue now and then but not come to a final conclusion. In the end, we have decided to allow them to be used for research purposes if approved by the Hospital Ethics Committee. This way, it may be that they lead to the cause of Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome being discovered some time, and that would be good :-)

3. At the first opportunity we've had to talk together without kids present, I talked to my friend Kate about the 'Center Parcs incident' which I was hurt about a couple of weeks ago. I was surprised to find myself go all weepy about it, but the air is cleared and there is no problem :-)

4. I've been monitoring myself more closely, and I do have serious concerns about my energy levels and my ability to HE. I generally feel tired, irritable and unable to think clearly or constructively from about noon onwards for the rest of the afternoon. Even when I do occasionally manage a nap, I don't recover from it and am still very sluggish all afternoon. And in about 2 weeks time I will be returning to work for 3 mornings per week. We seem to have very little quality time together when I feel alert enough to suggest ideas and participate in activities with Tamsin. Sometimes I gather ideas and plan things for the coming day or two, but a vast amount of the time they just get put aside because I'm tired and not in the mood, and TV is easier. I will keep thinking about this and monitoring how things are going, but I don't feel good about my ability to do a good job with HE at the moment. It may be that I just need a good detox diet and some regular exercise, but I'm generally too knackered to plan and carry through those plans either!

Anyway, I now have about 1.5 hours before Tamsin comes home, and I've got to go and do a big food shop as the cupboards are almost bare.

What is it with these women???!

I'm sorry, I can't keep this in any longer. I have watched a couple of TV programmes like this in the past couple of days, and right now I am watching "Who Rules the Roost", and the world seems to be full of people who have sparkling kitchens and dust-less living rooms, and *completely ignored* children!!! And this woman is *disinfecting the garden*!!! OMG, what is the point of that? Disinfecting the slide, swing and playhouse door handle? Please, get a life, and some decent information about micro-organisms and the human immune system!!!

I cannot believe how much energy people spend on scrubbing, dusting, tidying and cleaning. Yes, it would be lovely to live in a pristine house, but not at the expense of leaving my children uncuddled, unplayed with and scared to move in case they make a mess. And when I do have time to spare, I would rather sit and read, or blog, or chat to friends on the phone, than clean!

I'm not saying my way is the perfect way - there must be a middle ground somewhere. I probably don't spend enough time cleaning and tidying, but for heaven's sake, some people are *too clean and tidy*!!

Wake up!

(Sigh) ... yes, slept through the evening again last night. This is getting boring. Missed ER, although at least I can catch up on Sunday or Monday on other channels....

Yesterday was good - Tamsin went to playschool in the morning and I arranged for my Dad to pick her up and look after her for the afternoon; meanwhile I drove Bill to work in Oxford so that he could pick up his (old) new car - an Astra - and he showed off his newest offspring to his work colleagues. Then I went into Oxford city centre to SHOP! Found the Laura Ashley sale and bought some stuff for Tamsin - how come I just find it impossible to shop and buy stuff for myself these days, but can spend any amount of money on the kids? Also interesting how I never even look at full-price stuff (except shoes and underwear) but only buy from sales or 2nd hand stuff! I also had a fab hour or so browsing round Borders - my idea of bliss!

Today seems to have been manic with not much achieved. I feel like I've been rushing from one thing to another, constantly being interrupted by the demands of 2 children, and never actually getting anything finished. I keep trying to tidy up, and never manage it. Anyway, what we *have* done is:
- some more scissors/cutting practice (cut pics out but never got round to sticking them)
- dancing to music (PE, rhythm/music skills)
- reading a few nursery rhymes/poems
- lots of pretending/role play
- lots of 'Dora' episodes watched, and then the TV switched off afterwards
- went to the library: Tamsin rode her bike there
- a little bit of play with the cheap Geomag-equivalents (which Bill bought recently without knowing anything about the blogring bandwagon!)
- I've washed, dried and folded 3 loads of washing - 4th load needs drying.
- received an unusual number of phone calls - that's probably where much of the time went.

Isabelle has been charming people everywhere she goes with spontaneous smiles without waiting to be smiled at first! I wonder if she's going to turn out to be more outgoing and confident with people than Tamsin is at the moment.

I was thinking today how, if Tamsin was going to Reception in September as she 'should', I would be really worried about it. She still needs a *lot* of Mummy time, has snuggled on my knee while doing the scissors/cutting and reading, wants to be carried a lot, was worriedly asking this morning whether we were going to stay together all day today or not, and I really feel that it would be very detrimental to her to be forced away from me for 5 days a week. What a relief not to be facing that.

Hooray!

Friend's baby arrived safe and well late yesterday afternoon. Girl, 8lb 3.5oz. No other details except that I guess this means the induction took 24+ hours, so I hope it wasn't too awful, but I will find out in due course. She's the friend who had one stillborn twin in her first pregnancy, so I'm extra-specially glad that all has gone well.

I haven't heard about the other friend's baby - must make a few calls and find out what's happened/is happening!

5pm: edit - A baby boy, also born yesterday at home in the early hours!! Two babies on one day - wowee!!