Who’s Normal Anyway?

Yesterday we got up early and M played Runescape for a while then did some maths while L and I hung out washing and watered the plants in the garden. We had a fairly shouty morning, although I can’t think what about now. I think mainly we were all tired from late nights and early mornings.

Late morning we went out to the supermarket and had some lunch there and then got the shopping. I remembered to buy some more ice cream, which we usually don’t get because the shopping sits in the boot of the car while we go to music in the afternoon after the supermarket (both in same direction so we do them the same day), as music wasn’t on this week.

When we got home and got the shopping put away things got shouty again because M can’t find anything to do if it doesn’t involve staring at a screen and then he went to call for the boy next door and he wasn’t allowed to play, so M was in an even worse mood. He said he had a funny tummy and was too tired to go to rollerskating. We had to pop out for half an hour and sort out keys for the other Beaver Leaders to get into the building but the kids stayed in the car while I did that. I didn’t go to Beavers because I was supposed to be taking M to rollerskating with A being away and there was no way I was taking both children to Beavers with me! We came home and had pizza and it was early nights all round.

Today we had a better start to the morning (well, once M got over a maths paddy but we’ll gloss over that bit) and played lots of card games. M was asking me about poker and betting but I know very little about either, so we played a simple 3 sets of 3 game and then played Go Fish ina not very successful modified version but M still enjoyed it. Today we were doing about animal classifications and so I printed out these cards and we played the game with those.

Spelling was straightforward (The Writing Road to Reading scheme for sounding out words is still working really well for M and he says he likes doing spelling, he’s learning a lot through his Runescape typing too lol) and then we did an experiment with a candle, blowing it out and then lighting it again from the wax vapour (last week’s Krampf experiment).

L and I went for a walk to post a letter while M played a computer game. He likes posting letters. L is coming on with his signing but isn’t making many inroads into talking as yet. He signs for alot of things like drink and potty but recently is signing much more about what’s going on around him. His newest signs are aircraft (needs a bit of interpretation, though usually one is overhead so we know that is what he’s trying to sign!), milk, teddy, baby (any small child, especially if crying), crying and train. He makes himself understood pretty well with signs and looking and pointing at what he wants, but it would be nice if he would talk a bit more. I expect he’ll get there eventually, he’s so interested in everything maybe its just not a top priority at the moment lol.

When we got back M was bored so I sent him to look for inspiration in his bedroom and have a tidy up. After a little while I went to help with the tidying and suggested starting the Puddle Monster kit he got for Christmas (we were waiting for warmer brighter weather). We made some space on the top of a unit and got as far as putting compost around the pond part (this kit has a section to grow grass round the pond) and then stopped to make fajitas for tea. Fajitas are always popular here and even L ate loads and was covered in sauce. He had a quick bath and I put his pyjamas on and then we all drove to M’s ju jitsu class at the leisure centre about 40 mins away. We listened to our latest Audible download that I quickly put onto CD after tea - Narnia’s The Silver Chair dramatisation on the way there and back and L fell asleep. I dropped M off at the door and then had an hour to read a magazine before I needed to wake L to go in and find M.

When we got home M went straight to bed and I took L to settle down for the night and watched The Apprentice while he nodded off. Then A phoned just as Sir Alan was deciding whether to fire Adam or Paul, so I was trying to talk to A, listen to the TV and explain what the task was all at the same time.

Now I’m going to get another drink and check my beetles won’t eat each other overnight, the progress of my wine making and that my sheep have enough onions in Egypt, and then I’m off to bed

We’ve had a good day of few arguments and getting stuff done we wanted to today M did all his maths with no problems and didn’t get frustrated with himself. He also typed up an amazing page of things he’d found out about some sea creatures and added pictures. He wrote it very chattily, calmly asked for help with some spellings (though he did think the computer should’ve recognised that moonjellies was a word LOL) and sat and tapped away happily for quite a while. He was upset when L found his printout and drew all over it before I noticed , but thank goodness for saving and for printers! Meanwhile L pottered about.

We rearranged the TV and stereo area in the living room to put the DVD/video stand behind the TV unit right in the corner where L can’t reach it, because I found he’d cracked one of his DVDs. Though what to do with the drawerful of videos he can still get at? So I had a good vac out behind there and tidied up.

L joined M in doing some art with some oil pastels. M practised drawing a boat and then did a boat on the sea at night, with waves and reflections. L sat up to the table in his highchair and had some paper like M’s and was enthusiastic about using the oil pastels too, so that kept him engaged for ages My little righthander LOL - going to be the odd one out!

We made some chocolate biscuits together and then later I made tortillas for our chicken fajitas for tea. In and among we had a short walk out to the park too.

This evening A and M have been out to ju jitsu and I took L to church for the Ash Wednesday service. He was very well behaved in church but still rather a distraction I think, rustling his plastic bags of cereal and raisins and pushing his car around. Then he spent a while emptying out wet wipes, washing his head and then the carpet. He was taking it all in during communion and the bit with the ashes though. I thought I’d have him playing quietly on the floor of a pew where no one would see him but it turned out we were all sitting right up round the altar as there were only a few of us, so everyone got to watch his antics. I stopped for a quick coffee afterwards (L had a nap so I knew he wouldn’t be early to bed) but when he decided spitting on the tables (where do they get these ideas?) was fun I decided it was bedtime

Well I’ve been busy. Thought I’d post quickly because we’re going to Center Parcs tomorrow until Friday, so I won’t be blogging this coming week either LOL.

I’ve been spending lots of my online time exploring Ancient Egypt in my new game and M has been playing lots of Runescape. L loves Jump Ahead Toddler and we recently found Jump Ahead Baby in a box and he likes that too - family of computer addicts!

L is also very into his singing and signing nursery rhymes DVD and asks for it on every day. He signs alot now. He does eat and says “eee”, signs cows and says “moo”, signs dogs, pigs and frogs as well as his previous favourite duck. He can sign for a biscuit and for more, consistently signs toilet when he needs a poo, does all gone and is learning to sign along with Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. He loves us singing that and also Heads, Shoulders, Knees and Toes. But it does get a bit wearing after the umpteenth time. I’m glad he’s signing well because his words are almost nonexistent, though he is saying his version of words (usually the vowel sound) with some of his signs.

The Beaver leader has resigned and I’ve agreed to become warranted and run the Beaver colony when she leaves in a couple of weeks time. I’ve been finding out more about the Beaver programme and how it’s supposed to run and thinking up meeting ideas alot in the last week or so. A is the GSL and advertised for more help and a couple with a toddler have agreed to both become leaders, one as assistant Beaver leader and the other with the Scouts. Today at Church I chatted to a Beaver parent who has agreed to help out too, and an ex Rainbow Guider who might also be interested in helping occasionally, so that is really positive.

On Thursdays we usually got to baby signing and it starts at 10am. It’s a bit of a challenge to get there for 10am, especially when L likes to sleep til going on for 9 and it’s about 40 mins away. We were running slightly late this morning but it was probably going to be doable, until we got onto the A47 and were going along quite happily and then suddenly at a roundabout we found the whole road was closed - massive chunk of the A47 with a diversion sending us back the way we’d come and then off on a long diversion. When it got to 5 to 10 and we were only part way down the diversion I realised there was no way we were even going to get there for the end of the singing, so we gave up trying to go there and turned off in the opposite direction to go to a different supermarket for the weekly shop we also do on Thursdays. Then we hit 2 lots of road works (not literally LOL). From leaving home we took a good hour and a half to get to the supermarket, even though it’s less than half an hour away from our house. So we went for coffee and chocolate cake before we started the shopping!

When we got home I woke L up because he’s been having long naps late in the afternoon and then not wanting to go to bed til 9 or 10pm. We unpacked the shopping and M and then L played on the computer. M and I did some painting towards some Christmas presents he’s doing and L emptied out the painting supplies drawer but thankfully not any of the actual paint containers. I also put a curry on for tea and started maknig naan breads.

This evening L has learnt a new sign. He had some flapjack before bed and did a little jiggle dance and insistent “uh!” to get me to follow him into the kitchen where he pointed to the flapjack tin. It’s handy that we keep things he likes in a lot of different places in the kitchen or it would be even more confusing than it is, trying to work out what he’s after. So I asked him if he wanted some more flapjack and signed more and eat to him. He looked at me, looked at his hands and clapped. So I signed more again and said, “Look, you do it this way” and he changed his hands around and signed it back to me. We have been signing more (intermittently I must admit) for ages without any obvious recognition or attempt to copy it before, so it’s really cool when he gets a new sign. He’s picking them up faster lately. He’s signing food as well for the first time this week, and last week he learned apple (along with saying “ap” which helps somewhat, as his sign for apple is similar to his sign for hot and also cat). Although I think his “apple” means anything he fancies to eat rather than just an apple alot of the time.

I think we’re going to just carry on with signing at home now. We can’t get to the class next week because we’re going away for a few days, and I think next week is the last one before Christmas. The class is turning to a prebook only class and we’ve done 2 terms now and I don’t think I can sit through the same thing again for another term. So it was sad we didn’t get there today for the last time.

Apart from going out to baby signing today, we’ve had a quiet week in so far and for once I’ve been glad not to be driving around all over the place. It’s been pleasant just to be at home for a change. M has had evening activities Mon, Tues and Wed so not too stir crazy with no other kids to run round with, and we’ve had time to get on with his activities in the mornings and then play computer games or watch a DVD or whatever in the afternoons.

This week we’ve carried on with the Normans, we’re up to Henry II at the moment and dipping in and out of the crusades. I’m quite taken with these little figures (found while I was looking for pictures of crusader knights to colour in) but can’t really fathom the directions for the war games themselves. Anyway, I’ve printed some out for M to make and play with tomorrow.

M’s also been working on his Home Help cub badge, so he’s cleaned the living room and dusted and polished, he’s got extra motivation for keeping his bedroom nice this week and he cooked tuna pasta bake for tea last night. Shame there’s not more to the badge LOL!

L has been creating havoc in the art drawer this week. We have a unit we put together with MDF that holds drawers that contain alot of our craft things - paper, craft bits like glitter, paints and a drawer full of pencils, crayons and felt tips etc. He likes to pull out the felt tips and take all the tops off and draw (hopefully on paper if I notice, otherwise whatever is to hand) but this week is especially fascinated with a box of charcoal sticks. I know I could move them out of his reach, but then it would only be something else he’d be in to and I’m hoping the novelty will wear off given time.

L has also taken a fancy to the laptop and will fiddle with the keyboard and mouse on the computer in the dining room for ages if he can get on it.

Tuesday

We had a quiet day and M was pretty tired and lethargic after his late evening at Cubs. In the evening he had an early tea and then A took him out to rollerskating when he got inn from work. M had a bit of a disaster when he realised he’d lost 2 of the bolts holding the wheels of his skate on. He had to switch to borrowed skates for the rest of the session and A is looking into how to mend them if possible.

Wednesday

A was on a course all day, learning how to facilitate a new team building type course at work and do debriefing sessions. We also had an early start because we went into King’s Lynn to see Chicken Little as part of schools film week. I was really worried how we’d get on with L and if he’d sit through the film OK. When we got to the arts centre the main section of the theatre was packed with school kids, but there were 2 smaller aisles of seats at the back of the hall, behind where the stairs come up into the auditorium and the manager sat us in the front row of those so we had a great view, no one else in our row and I could get out easily with L if need be. He smiled around at people, watched the start of the film and then snuggled in to me for a feed and fell asleep through the whole film - bonus!

Afterwards we did a bit of shopping and went to BhS cafe for lunch. I ordered a tuna melt panini for us to share and had to wait 10 mins for them to warm it. When it came, M picked out a bit of what looked like grey plastic so I took the panini apart to see what it was - turned out to be red onion. The whole thing was full of large pieces of red onion and if there was even a teaspoonful of tuna in the whole panini I’d be very surprised. There was no sign of any cheese either. So M got a lesson in complaining and getting a refund and we got no lunch until we got home.

In the afternoon we got the painting things out and M and L sat at the table painting and drawing for a while. L is getting into doing hand prints. He didn’t distribute the paint into too many unwanted places.

A went out on Monday evening for a few drinks with the people from work, one of whom is the current GSL but he is moving away soon. A is assistant GSL with responsibility for training but had said he didn’t want to take on the actual GSL role because he’s happy just helping people get through their training and not having to sort out meetings etc. Anyway, he came back seriously thinking about doing GSL afterall and has taken it on now, so he’s going to have section leaders meetings to organise and go to district meetings and what not. Next year is the Scouts’ centenary year so there are lots of extra events happening. I suppose it’s as well he is doing GSL so the Group has some direction rather than all muddling along hoping for the best. But I’m not sure where he’s going to find any spare evenings!

Today

I slept really badly last night because L got snuffly as the night went on and woke up hourly from 2am. We went out to baby signing as usual anyway because we had other things to do in that direction and L was fine, possibly a bit more happy to sit with me and sing and do actions than he usually is. His latest sign is mouse, which is supposed to be index finger pointing to the side of the nose and rotating back and forth a bit - his sign starts out like that and then moves to finger rotating in nostril. Nice, especially with snot.

We did the supermarket shopping and had lunch in their cafe after signing and we also bought fireworks and sparklers for our Bonfire Night party. Then we rushed to M’s music class, arriving just as it was due to start. Luckily the teacher wasn’t running strictly to time and we had a good few minutes to say hello and what not before we got started. L fell asleep in the car on the way there and slept through the class on my knee, giving me an excellent excuse for not joining in. Afterwards L woke up and toddled outside for a bit while the older children played out in the play area, then I got a cup of tea and sat with the other mums chatting for a bit. I don’t know anyone there very well yet, they don’t live that close so don’t all go to the same home ed things.

We drove home and I made some pizza dough while M played on the computer. He was upset he couldn’t play with the lad next door because he’d gone to the tip with his dad and by the time they got back he was having tea and then it was his bedtime. We had pizza, watched TV and I bathed the boys. M stayed in the bath and was singing a beautiful made up song to God and got quite emotional and we had a long chat before he could settle down for a story and to go to sleep. He is very sensitive and easily gets upset and emotional about things, which is tough to help him with some times. Then while he dropped off I took L to our bed and tried to settle him down to sleep but it took ages because he was struggling to feed with a streaming nose. He’s been asleep a while now so I’d better head off soon and get some sleep before he wakes up again. A is away over night on an office related do, though he phoned to say he’s stopped drinking and was heading off to bed.

Thursday

Didn’t start off too well. A came in from his do about midnight and went to bed, but was up in the night throwing up. He was sober when he came in so it wasn’t the alcohol. He got up late and went off to work looking rather the worse for wear and apparently no one else there had been ill, so presumably not food poisoning either. We were all pretty tired because L is sleeping only fitfully because he has 4 molars coming through just now, and is doing that feeding-but-not-really-drinking endlessly during the night it feels like.

We went out to baby signing which was OK. We’ve got the basic signs they use in the class more or less sussed now as we’re on to the second term, and L just wanders around alot during the class and looks out of the window and finds things to fiddle with. M is very good at following and redirecting him or doing the action songs with him.

After that we went to the supermarket and had an early lunch and got the shopping. M did his maths in the car without me nagging him which was really nice for a change. When we got back home L napped, I unpacked the shopping and M typed up the answers from interviewing our neighbour, with a little bit of spelling help. Then he mainly played I think until it was time to have tea and get ready for Beavers. In the afternoon I finally got the pumpkin pie finished and we had some after tea, but it was really sickly. Maybe it’s an acquired taste.

Friday

I had another rough night with a restless teething L and then was woken up early to find M throwing up and feeling very sorry for himself. We had a PJ day and M stayed in bed playing Lego and listening to story CDs for quite a while, till it seemed like he might have stopped being sick. He came downstairs for a while and played on the computer a bit and watched some Class TV and had a small piece of bread and some water. By early afternoon he was looking completely worn out and was glad to go back to bed, then he threw up again (probably the bread). So he listened to more CDs and had a nap, watched videos while we had tea and then threw up again. I found some Nux Vom to give him around bedtime and he went to sleep OK.

L and I had a quiet day too. He was tired out and I felt queasy so we didn’t do an awful lot. At one point I got him into his waterproof all in one suit and wellies to go out in the garden with me while I picked the peppers, and the moment we stepped outside it began raining. I thought it was just a bit of rain and carried on, then it got slightly heavier and L looked a bit forlorn in the middle of the garden, so I picked him up and brought him over by the plastic greenhouse to shelter by the hedge. Then it absolutely bucketed it down and we were getting soaked through so we abandoned the peppers and ran for indoors!

Today

Another disturbed night. I got a few hours sleep up til about 3am and then L tossed and turned and nibbled on me and wouldn’t settle. About 4ish M woke and was upset he couldn’t get back to sleep, so I took L and the teething powders into his room and sat up with them both til they both nodded off, then eventually we got back to bed and I fell asleep about 4.30am. So I wasn’t impressed to be woken again by M at 5.30am and woke A up (eventually) to go and deal with him. Then at 7am M went to the loo and popped his head round the door saying he wanted to go downstairs. I said it wasn’t a good idea because he must be still tired and not feeling too good after yesterday and he said he felt absolutely fine today thank you very much. So he sat in our bed watching cartoons for a bit and then went downstairs and polished off a chocolate croissant for breakfast (kill or cure!).

Today we had lots of bits to do out and about. First we went to Argos to pick up a Dyson in their half price sale and I popped to Boots for more teething powders. Then we drove in to Norwich centre to the Scout trading depot for some badges and a cub uniform for M. After that we drove to the garden centre/craft complex to get some craft bits I wanted and for some lunch. M seemed fine, just a bit tired and he sat in the car listening to Wings while we went round the craft shop.

This afternoon I’ve made a quiche for a pot luck lunch at Church tomorrow and we’ve done some tidying up, then after tea we all watched Robin Hood, then M and I have watched Strictly Come Dancing while L went to sleep. L has glowing cheeks with his teeth and has been dosed up with kiddy ibuprofen in the hopes he’ll sleep OK for a while. I’m off to bed soon too to try and catch up a bit.

I think just about everything I’ve tried to do in the kitchen today has gone wrong! The first major thing was at lunchtime when i realised I hadn’t put the stew on in the slow cooker for tea. I got meat out of the freezer yesterday and even prepped some of the veg, but then completely blanked it this morning. So I set it off on the high setting just after midday, but it was nowhere near cooked by tea time. I eventually transferred it to a big pan and simmered it to death. So we had beans on toast for tea (to put us on) and then A went out for a work’s night down the pub so he’ll probably have chicken and chips in a basket or something and I had stew as a meal while M had some supper before going to bed.

I’d decided to try making a pumpkin pie with the pumpkin we got in the veggie box last week, and roasted pumpkin pulp has been sitting in the fridge for a couple of days now waiting for me to get organised. Theis afternoon I thought I ought to get it sorted so we had a walk out to the shop to get cream and eggs and evaporated milk for making the filling. The shop didn’t have eggs so we drove to the place we usually get eggs from, someone sells them from their front garden with an honesty box. They had none either, so we stopped off at another corner shop on the way home and bought half a dozen.

I started making pastry and decided to just follow the recipe on the card I’d printed out, but didn’t read it closely. So by the time the mixer was almost full of flour and I’d already added sugar and salt I realised the recipe was having me make 4 times as much as I needed with the rest to go in the freezer. I decided to plough on anyway but got something wrong in my conversions for the margarine, because it was far too thick and greasy. I binned all of that and started again with my trusty Bero recipe book. L was sat with me on the side in the kitchen but was determined to dabble in the washing up bowl, so I moved him to the other side and then carried on mixing not looking too closely at what he was fiddling with. Then there was a crash and 6 smashed eggs on the floor. Serves me right. Eggs are really hard to clear up too - resorted to scooping them into the dustpan in the end. So I finished the pie crust and baked it blind but couldn’t do the filling.

L is at the stage of loving emptying cupboards and we’ve sorted the bottom kitchen cupboards so they don’t have anything dangerous in. He particularly likes the baking cupboard with the plastic bowls and sieve and weighing scales in it. He’s distributed some of the weights around the house somewhere (unless he ate them, we can’t find them at the moment) so I sorted out just the 2oz, 4oz and 8oz weights into a plastic tub for him to play with (bigger but not too heavy) and put the rest up into a drawer. Unfortunately he came toddling in to the living room with the 8oz weight this afternoon and dropped it into my (cold) cup of coffee that I didn’t get round to drinking and had left on a low table. So that made a nice mess. But I don’t learn because this evening he brought the same weight through again and then dropped it on my foot - ow! So maybe I’ll put them all away after all. He does enjoy carrying them around in the plastic jug though and transferring them back and forth into some plastic cups - very Montessori. Don’t think I can face rice everywhere though.

What else have we done today? M’s done some more 6 times table practice, some spelling, discussed stories within stories (FIAR Finest Horse in Town) and done some art work on foreground, middle and distance, tried adding and subtracting with decimals and found it’s quite easy really, completed 2 new chapters of his Lego Star Wars 2 game and interviewed our next door neighbour about his job for a Beaver badge. I’ve done loads of laundry, some cleaning and made lots of mess in the kitchen!

I haven’t felt like blogging for a little while - partly because we haven’t really done much I feel like commenting on and partly because once I stop it’s hard to get going again. Let’s think what I might be interested to read back about, hmm…

Last week we got L his first pair of shoes. He turned out to only have size 2.5 feet, so they didn’t have much in to fit him (being an end of line/factory outlet type of StartRite shop too). I think the shop assistant thought we were dead pushy parents because he does look small for his age and as soon as the shoes were on he refused to walk and reverted to crawling, despite having been tottering about quite determinedly for several weeks. We wanted to get him shoes to keep his feet dry when we’re out places. He figured them out in a couple of days though and is quite keen on them now, bringing them to us to put on or trying to put them on himself. We could only get the “pre-walker” type in his size, but they do the job.

A week ago today we got a new tumble dryer. We have a washer/condenser dryer but the dryer part is rubbish and takes hours to not dry things properly. So a proper one that works is a big improvement and saves having damp washing hung everywhere. The things I get excited about these days, eh?

This weekend we went to a mediaeval day at Pensthorpe nature park. There were loads of re-enactors there doing different things than we’d seen before. M got interested in the old games and sat down to play a dice game (OK cos it wasn’t a Sunday LOL) and the man showed him how to play drop down dead. You shake 5 dice, take out any 2s and 5s and tally up the other dice to get a score. Then you shake the dice that are left in and do the same again, repeating til you run out of dice. On M’s first throw he shook 3 5s and 2 2s ROFLOL. The man was so flabbergasted at him doing that that he gave M a pewter token prize.

A got a new mobile phone during last week, because the previous one died of shock receiving a text message. He unpacked it all and swears he put the charger somewhere safe, but he hunted high and low later and couldn’t find it. So on Sunday we went to try and buy a cheap charger but ended up just getting one online. I can’t think where the other one can have gone unless L found it and binned it. He has a thing for posting things into the kitchen bin at the moment. I’ve rigged it so anything dropped in the front misses the bag now though.

Yesterday we went to a retail outlet place at Spalding to have a look around generally and also try and find M some decent trousers. We have a bit of a do related to A’s work to go to next month and M only has too short joggers and scruffy jeans. Nowhere is selling proper trousers at the moment, unless you want school trousers. So no success there, but we did find a big horseshoe magnet that we’ve been keeping an eye out for. They have a crazy golf course in the gardens behind the shops so we had a game between showers and L toddled about finding all the muddy puddles to sit in and dibbling his fingers in the water in the holes.

Oh, and we’ve been listening to Truckers for our audio book this month - got to recommend it. It’s very funny and clever how he comes up with these quirky takes on the world.

M had a 2 hour rollerblading activity this morning to go to as part of the local school holiday playscheme. There hasn’t been a local playscheme before so everything was a little bit up in the air and I waited with him until the coach finally turned up and they’d got boots on and started, then L and I walked home via the shop to get some things for lunch (and some chocolate but perhaps we’ll gloss over that). I then had a good hour before I needed to go back and collect him and it reminded me of when M was in nursery for a year and I used to get allsorts done in the 2.5 hours, it was my time to get some stuff finished or just read uninterrupted. Today I sorted out some website stuff for the ABM that is well behind and got L off to sleep for his nap. A phoned to say he’d come home for lunch and collect M too, so I didn’t need to get L back up to go out of the house.

The afternoon didn’t go quite so smoothly. First of all M was disappointed because he’d signed up for a rugby session for this afternoon (though he would’ve been too tired in hindsight) that was cancelled. Instead I said we’d go to the library and the supermarket, so I asked M to find his Reading Mission card to fill in with the books he’s finished. We hunted for it downstairs for a while and then went into his bedroom to look for it. M stopped looking to read Asterix and L grabbed a page and started crumpling/tearing it and M went mad with him. So I told him off and then he was in tears saying he wasn’t really trying to kill L. Anyway, we recovered it eventually and M showed L his Action Man things while I sorted Lego back into its storage boxes. In the end we came back downstairs and I finally spotted his card on the computer desk.

We drove to the library and L fell asleep in the car. I realised when we got to the car park that I’d forgotten my purse, but figured the staff would probably issue M new books on the basis of ones he returned. So I got slinged up and L out of the car, which woke him, and we walked to the library only to find it was half day closing. So back we went to the car and drove home again.

I did some vacuuming and tidied L’s toys, swapping the boxes over so he has different toys out. M mooned about and finally sat down to watch a Kim Possible DVD from Amazon rentals (when we got rid of lots of Sky channels including the kids ones we subbed him to the cheapest Amazon rental deal instead). L practised his toddling and burst into floods of tears when I wouldn’t let him play with my knitting needles (with knitting on) or touch the rings on the cooker or dibble his fingers in my coffee. It’s a hard and frustrating life being a new toddler LOL. He demonstrated his washer opening and emptying abilities (didn’t realise he could work the catch now) .

When A came home we had tuna pasta bake and A took himself off to bed because he’s full of cold and aching with man flu. Can’t remember what the rest of us did but then it was bathtime and bedtime. L was very tired and rubbing his eyes but not ready to settle down. We had uproar when he snuggled against M’s legs and then bit him in the bottom! M tried to shake him off but he clung on (like a lion according to M). I put him on the floor and cuddled M and when I picked L back up he tried to do it again! He finally settled down to feed to sleep though. I read M more of The Thieves of Ostia but haven’t caught up to where M has read for himself, so he kept telling me what was going to happen next. And now both boys are asleep and I’m having some peace and blogging.