Who’s Normal Anyway?

This is a quick blog from my mum’s. We drove up yesterday for a long weekend (me and the boys) because we were going to travel up tomorrow anyway to collect some plants and our fish tank from the in laws and we thought if we came up early we could meet up with some friends too. But everyone is ill! We were going to go to our old music group today but it was cancelled due to a tummy bug. We were going to visit Tech but they also have the lurgy. So instead we hung out at my mum’s this morning and then she took us out to a mill shop and I chose some fabric for trying to make my own baby carrier. I decided I need to make modifications from the one I’ve hired, so will try and sew my own. I’ll blog later about how it turns out, but basically I think I’d prefer a kind of MT/wrap cross, with the body of the MT but wrap like straps. This one I’ve hired digs into my neck. Tomorrow we might meet up with Tech and co if they’re feeling better, otherwise I’ll take M out somewhere to try and distract him from not seeing friends. A is driving up and should be around from mid afternoon. Ho hum.

We’ve had an up and down few days. On Monday we went to an excellent film workshop for home ed kids in Norwich. It was all about animation and how animated films are developed and storyboarded, focussing on The Cat Returns and Howls Moving Castle, so M has 2 more things to put on his Amazon rentals list.

Yesterday we went to Collectors World, a really unusual museum with a bit of everything, a pretty bizarre place. Unfortunately M wasn’t that interested in looking at anything and far more into getting to know some of the other kids which was understandable, but I felt he was being frowned on for mucking about so much. We left earlyish in the end (also my shoulder was killing me from slinging L for 2 hours with no sit down to ease or shift the weight - L was fine asleep but carrying him and a bag of stuff was no fun).

At home L has been cruising and finding paper to rip while M and I have been playing the new Altador plot on Neopets. When we’re not arguing over something or other…

This afternoon we got out for a while to a soft play and met up with Merry and her girls. M had a wonderful time racing around and I barely saw him except to buy him a drink and persuade him it was time to come home. L explored the baby and toddler area and made a few escape bids but mainly enjoyed himself while Merry and I chatted. Shall have to do something again soon.

I enjoyed doing this and it took me about 15 mins -I didn’t spend too long analysing each question.

# Your imagination, self-reliance, openness to new things, and appreciation for utility combine to make you an INVENTOR.

# The full spectrum of possibilities in the world intrigues you—you’re not limited by pre-conceived notions of how things should be.

# Problem-solving is a specialty of yours, owing to your persistence, curiosity, and understanding of how things work.

# It is more interesting for you to pursue excitement than it is to get caught up in a routine.

# Although understanding details is not difficult for you, you specialize in seeing the bigger picture and don’t get caught up in specifics.

# You tend to more proactive than reactive—you don’t just wait for things to come to you.

# You trust others, care about them, and are slow to judge them, making you CONSIDERATE.

# You value your close relationships very much, and are more likely to spend time in small, tightly-knit groups of friends than in large crowds.

# You enjoy exploring the world through observation, quietly watching others.

# Relating to others so well, and understanding their emotions, leads you to trust people in general, even though you’re somewhat shy and reserved at times.

# Your belief that people are generally well-intentioned contributes to your sympathy regarding their problems.

# Although you may not vocalize it often, you have an awareness of how society affects individuals, and you understand complex causes of people’s behavior.

# You like to look at all sides of a situation before making a judgment, particularly when that situation involves important things in other people’s lives.

# Your close friends know you as a good listener.

We got out of the house to a home ed meet up yesterday which helped us all feel a bit more human. A police dog handler came out to give a talk about his work and how police dogs are trained. It was interesting and all the children stayed sat on chairs listening for an hour - slightly bizarre for a home ed meeting LOL. There is one person who organises lots of the events and they all seem fairly structured but they look like they attract a really wide age range of children. It’s unusual to go to a home ed group where lots of teenagers turn up to something (in my experience so far anyway).

M asked lots of questions (I wish it was possible to have him on one of those 5 second delays so I could bleep or edit out the really silly things he sometimes comes out with) and got to try on a bullet proof vest and helmet. Afterwards he brought his dog out and demonstrated finding lost keys and a pound coin on the field outside the hall, but it was freezing and foggy so a bit too chilly for me. M got the chance to have a bit of a race around with another little lad and started making friends.

Today we were up early and to the shops to get a bookcase and a few other bits and pieces (nothing that exciting from a retail therapy point of view though I’m afraid Nic!). We got home about 11am and it was sunny and fairly warm so we all went out into the garden. A and M dug over the border by the house and took out all those random plants we had, then they tidied up the patio area that was completely overgrown. L and I planted seeds (thanks Kris, must pay you!). Well, I planted and then tried to stop L digging them back out again. He sat on the grass looking fairly non-plussed and dug his fingers and a pen into the pots of soil.

We had a late lunch of home made leek and potato soup and croutons. During the afternoon A put the bookcase together and I began moving books around. L is determined none of them are going to stay on the shelves! Afterwards I put L in the wrap and we all walked to the play park and L had a nap while M played. I feel much better for getting outside today.

I was so pissed off this morning you just wouldn’t believe. I was “shouty mummy” before 10am and felt like I just wanted the world to go away and leave me alone to cry. It’s feeling a very hard week. But I feel awful for yelling, there’s no good to be done in scaring your kids half to death, is there? I nearly had a long very ranty blog session but you were all spared because M was hogging the computer. I did phone A at work twice and told him I was fed up of living and I couldn’t do it all anymore and put the phone down on him, but he doesn’t react with any speed so it annoyed me all the more. He did come home for an early lunch and a talk though. This afternoon we did retail therapy but only at Morrisons, so that’s meals for a week or so already organised.

I’m noticing a bit of a retail therapy theme with myself at the moment. Almost bought a Mei Tai carrier and then got all sensible and decided to hire one for a fortnight first to make sure I could get on with it OK.

On a more positive note, yesterday I did a bit of house tidying and vaccing (think our vac’s on its way out, so more retail therapy oportunity there!) and we went out for a bit in the morning. I found some blue curtains that sort of go with our bedroom for £4 in a charity shop, so that was good. M found an old Star Wars annual and a Star Wars board game in the same shop so he was happy. In the afternoon a lady from up the road called in for a coffee with her little boy. She has 4 other children who are coming out of school at Easter including twins of M’s age, so hopefully we can meet up a bit to do things together.

We went to a new home ed meeting in a hut in some woods today. M met several boys a little older than him and played outside for a while. The waving around big sticks game was inevitably going to end in tears though wasn’t it, and this time they were M’s.

Afterwards we went back to join the other families in the hut (bit of a split with the families who felt excluded when the meeting was first booked for EO members only) and get to know them a bit. Gradually M got involved in chatting with some other children and I tried to speak with everyone. We went for another walk after a bit of lunch and M got chatting with some of the girls too and telling them all about Neopets!

The weather was freezing but L coped very well bundled up in the wrap and managed a nap as we walked. Overall it was a positive day, I think starting meetings often have their teething problems. I hope people can get past their differences and co-operate in making the meeting a good one in future. I’ll look forward to meeting everyone again and M said he wants to go back.

We had fun at Cambridge Science Festival today. It was only just over an hour’s drive away (well, as far as Cambridge P&R) but the traffic was light because we set off early. It was wierd being back in Cambridge, it being so long since I lived there before. Everywhere looked vaguely familiar and quite different at the same time. We went for coffee and Danish in Costa when we got into the city and nearly bankrupted ourselves LOL. Then we found our way to the lecture theatre where Carol Vorderman was due to speak but we were a bit early so M and A got started on “Wet Wet Gurgle” and made an underwater device with a plastic bottle and an elastic band. A was so keen he seemed like he kept forgetting he was supposed to be helping M.

We bumped into Carol V in the toilets before her lecture started and A was a bit jealous I think as he’s quite a fan of hers and of Countdown! Her talk was interesting and all about numbers and we all learnt something new. I shall have to think more about why casting out 9s works - something I hadn’t come across before.

Afterwards we ploughed through the crowds to find some lunch and then tried the pedal power exhibits. From there we went to a great section on earthquakes, eruptions and erosion. The demonstrators were all students and excellent at explaining the science at a level M could interact with. They run Time Truck and I think they’d be wonderful to run a home ed session if they’d come out to do one - they do school sessions.

M fancied going to the Crash Bang Squelch session but we queued for a while and then found out they’d issued tickets earlier in the day and we were unlikely to get to the front of the queue because they were only taking in people when people with tickets failed to show up for their slot. We went to do SeeK Science instead and it was jam packed - definitely needed your pointy elbows in there!! M had a go at designing a parachute for an egg and did very well. His egg landed safely with no cracks, which is more than can be said for the others we saw - big eggy mess on the floor!

We set off for home after that as we were all getting tired. Must go back again next year! I shall have to take M back to see some more of Cambridge when it’s a week day but hopefully before it gets too full of tourists and show him round some more of my old haunts.

We’ve got our new wireless up, encrypted and running this evening - a major achievement for us non techies that wouldn’t have got half so far without the helpful assistance of John W. Thank you!!

The earlier part of the day didn’t go too badly although it there was a low point late afternoon where I got rather shouty. A was away last night so I ended up sharing a bed with M as well as L and fighting them off on both sides for a bit of bed space. At least M brought his duvet with him. He woke up at 6am so that was all of us awake - far, far too early.

I think I was doing really well on being reasonable and patient this morning. We played some Age of Empires and M did his maths and some more about the Saxons. I read some King Arthur stories to him too. We stopped mid morning to watch Something Special and learn some garden signs. Then from 12 to 1pm M watched Class TV about the Saxons, Vikings and Normans. In the afternoon he played some more on the computer and in his bedroom and read a book. Towards teatime he wanted to install a Lego designer off the Lego website and kept wanting me to look at it while I tried to cook tea so I ended up getting annoyed.

I’ve been trying to make more home ed contacts today. I found someone who lives quite close to us through the HEAS contact list. She is taking her children out of school from Easter, so we’ve arranged to meet for coffee next week.

We’re supposed to be going to meet up with some other home edders who are wondering about starting up a new group next week, but today it became apparent that the lady who has booked the hall was only intending to invite EO members (we are EO members, but its the principle - why??) so that is feeling a bit awkward. Perhaps it’s just coming across badly via email.

On Sunday we didn’t do much except go to church and then to B&Q in the afternoon to get some shelving. What interesting lives we lead!

Yesterday was fairly horrendous in terms of everyone’s mood and stress levels. Not a good day at all. So I didn’t feel like blogging. The HV came round and that did go OK and M didn’t interrupt too much either which was about as positive as yesterday got.

Today we’ve been out to our first local HE event, which was about church architecture. I’d have gone whatever it was about just to get out of the house. We were stuck in a horrendous traffic jam on the way for 40 mins so were half an hour late, but at least L slept all the way in the car. The church is 600 or 700 years old (should have been listening better!) and looked after by a Trust and one of their staff had developed some activity sheets for schools that we were trialling for her. They were OK, fairly interesting, though a bit much writing for M. He made a good effort and seemed to be enjoying it anyway. At the end everyone got chance to do some stone rubbing. It was freezing in the church though.

I was hoping we’d get to know some other HE families through going to this event, but not many people were there. The organiser introduced herself but we didn’t meet her children, another family were friendly and we chatted a bit, though they had a teenager so not really anyone for M to start playing with and no one else spoke to us. Ah well, it’s a start. The next HE thing is next week and sounds like more of a social meeting rather that being “educational” so we might meet more folk there.

Things here seem to be organised quite differently than in Yorkshire. One person organises loads of activities (which is great!) and sends out an email monthly with details to book through her. Most of them are the wrong side of the county for us and over an hour’s drive away, perhaps 1.5 hours. This wouldn’t be so bad, I am prepared to drive that far occasionally - but they all start around 10am! What are they thinking?!! HE families around here must all get up really early because everyone seems fairly spread out so most people must have a distance to drive. I suppose there’s the argument that if it’s a long way you go and spend the day and make the most of it, but then most activities finish by 12.30 or 1pm. It seems like it will really break into our day. I like to get up at a gentle pace and do anything we want to do at home, then go out for the afternoon. I’m going to have to be super organised for some of the events that sound particularly good and we’ll try and get to, because to get into the centre of Norwich for 10am we’ll need to leave here about 8.30am, maybe slightly earlier, I’ll have to see what rush hour traffic is like.

After the church thing finished M persuaded me to go to McD’s for lunch and then I made him go round Tescos. Now A has taken him out to try a rollerskating session and I’m supposed to be making tea, so I’d better go heat up my meatballs and sauce and put some pasta on in a minute.

This making friends and settling in malarkey looks like it might be going to be more effort than I’d anticipated!

We got up early and went into Norwich to explore the shops today. We didn’t try and drive into the city centre - we opted to try the park and ride instead and it was fine. We’d found a website with maps of all the city centre shops which was just as well, as my sense of direction kept failing me. Norwich seems like a good place to go shopping - loads of shops including unusual ones as well as the typical chains. We came across 2 pretzel shops - is that a Norwich thing I wonder? I don’t remember ever seeing one before. I was very tempted with the pizza style pretzels for lunch but there was nowhere to sit down to eat so I didn’t.

The weather was really strange while we were shopping. We went into one shopping centre in bright sunshine and 20 mins later it was a whirl of snow as we came back out again. A got some laughs from passersby because he was carrying L on his front facing out with his coat fastened up to L’s neck and then above his head to keep A’s neck warm. I suppose it did look like he had a head growing out of his chest. L was nice and warm and could see everything though.

A was looking for some new shoes and while he tried some on I spotted some gorgeous boots. I had to try them on and then bought them. I love the colour!

This afternoon we’ve rearranged the dining room and moved our old kitchen cupboards next to the window and put the bookcase in the other corner. It’s made a little bit more space to get the table out. Then we cooked chicken, chips, roast veg and stuffing for tea. Yum!

Our broadband modem arrived in the post today too, so we might try installing that in a bit, if we can sort out a phone line extension.