Who’s Normal Anyway?

I’m not making enough time to blog at the moment and it’ll get worse before it gets better, what with Melrose next week and moving house the week after, so here are a few notable points for the past week.

A has now officially left the mountain rescue team. Earlier this week he was up in Scotland with them for a training week, but came back early to go on holiday. He was pretty fed up it didn’t snow til after he’d come home - they had to do ice climbing indoors. But he did get to go on 2 call outs, so a bit of excitement. The team leaving ceremony has been banned on the grounds it looks like bullying to members of the public, so A was a little sad (and possibly relieved given the weather) not to be “swum”, but he did get lots of whiskeys bought on his last evening out.

Yesterday A persuaded me he really needed to go and buy some of his own climbing gear now he’s not on the team. He got a new harness, stickies (climbing boots), bug and something else I can’t remember the name of LOL and hammered the credit card. But it was a bargain because he got it using team discount before we move

M has had lots of lasts, and more today. It was his final Beavers on Tuesday, last West Park on Wednesday and last Musical Theatre class yesterday. We’re hoping to keep in touch with people from WP though and at MT it was sweet because we were given leaving cards and one family even got us leaving pressies. So we’ve finally swapped names (!) and addresses and may write sometimes. I’ve enjoyed chatting to the mums and grans in the changing room while M’s had his lesson and they’ve seen L grow from bump through tiny baby to crawling around under everyone’s legs.

Today is M’s last dance class and then we’re seeing the doublets and family for soft play and pizza and goodbyes - though they’d better come visit, so not too final.

L has marked the week by finishing one cold and then starting another. He’s honing his pulling up skills ’specially for our week away and was popping up and down to M’s chair over and over yesterday evening, practising. He’s so pleased with himself when he does it. He also does a sweet raspberry noise (well, sweet except when he climbed on top of me in the middle of the night, socked me in the nose, grinned and blew raspberries : ). He’s teething and is waking sometimes hourly. His 2 bottom teeth popped through on Thursday afternoon. There’s no dosing him with anything though, he just won’t open his mouth and squirms away.

My highlight of the week was going shopping yesterday to spend Chirstmas M&S vouchers in Per Una and finding I could buy a size 16 skirt! Haven’t done that in a long while.

We’re all full of cold except for M who I think got it out of the way before the rest of us got going. I’ve been going to bed with L when I put M to bed and just watching a bit of TV and dozing, so haven’t had blogging time in the evenings. L has been snuffling and sleeping on one arm or the other all night for the last few nights. He seems particularly snotty and miserable today, though has perked up a bit this evening and is now trying to help me type and head butting the computer (?!).

Mum came out of hospital on Tuesday and is staying at my sister’s so they can look after each other. They haven’t killed each other yet!

We’ve had a quietish week. We were out Wednesday to C and D’s birthday bowling party. M had a wonderful time and was impressed he did well at bowling for a change. Almost wish he hadn’t because I hate how he gets so competitive about things. He was getting a bit possessive about friendships when we went to play in the park afterwards. I wish he’d just be friendly with everyone.

Today we went to the last music group before we move, so that was a bit sad. We had a Chinese theme with Chinese music and crafts and some Chinese food - yum! L was OK for the first half of the session but then started getting tired and whingey but didn’t want to feed to sleep cos his nose was streaming abd he just cried more and more and I couldn’t do anything with him. So we left earlier than intended and came straight home, so M also missed his musical theatre class. M enjoyed being the front of the dragon at the group and also played and showed his friends his Star Wars annual. C and D had made him some fabulous spying top trumps cards, they must have taken forever to make. Thank you very much, he loves them!

A was supposed to be rescuing mountains this weekend but is so full of cold he cancelled, which is unusual for him. He spent most of today in bed I think.

Feeling virtuous cos we’re just about packed for tomorrow when we’re going to stay in Okehampton YH with some other HE friends. We’ve even got the car packed - just the toiletries, bed guard and fridge empty out stuff to fit in somewhere in the morning. The plan is to set off as soon as we’re up and had breakfast, even if it means putting L in in his PJs for the first part of the journey. No idea how long it’ll take us to get all the way from Yorskhire to Devon, but it’s going to be a while with a 4.5 month old baby!

So, a quick catch up before we go. On Friday we had a mad day where A was rushing around sorting out work related stuff and form filling and all sorts of admin stuff all morning, including going into town for the bank. M, L and I stayed home and did bits and bobs, can’t really remember what now.

In the afternoon M had musical theatre and for a change they were learning Christmas songs. “Miss Jo” surprised me by inviting me in to watch them singing and swaying to Away in a Manger and Rudolf the Red Nosed Reindeer. Next week is parents week (about time, first one they’ve had since he started in January!) but we’re on holiday so was going to completely miss seeing him. They did a lovely performance. The teachers reckon M has really come on recently from being a bit “lost” initially to being keen to join in the drama and dancing now and has also improved in not giving his opinion on everything they’re asked to do! LOL. I can just imagine. When we set off out, A went to MR for his weekend away.

On Saturday I was sorting out holiday stuff and did some baking, while M played on the PC and then on A’s laptop til I told him to find something non-screen-related to do. In the early afternoon he had his dancing class.

Today we did more packing up and I tried (and failed) to catch up on some emails in and among. We went to Church and I tried to get a copy of the service sheet for M & L’s thanksgiving service next Sunday (bit late for M, but better late than never and we were a bit between vicars after he was born so didn’t sort anything). N was vague as usual and since we are away all week was supposedly going to drop round with it this afternoon, but as per he failed to show up. I just hope he gets it sorted OK in the week. Might phone his secretary while we’re away. I told J the organist which hymns we picked for when in the service and she said she’d get onto him too.

This afternoon I chatted with my sis and with T about passwording blogs and I’ve come to the conclusion it’s a difficult bit of netiquette I haven’t sussed yet! I decided this time I wouldn’t email passwords out cos I don’t want people to feel obligated to read it. But then A & T both said they wouldn’t ask in principle - can’t bl***y win! If you send them you feel like you’re forcing yourself on folk, if you don’t send them they get all reticent and huffy LOL!! But basically, happy for anyone I know IRL to read it all, don’t want anyone to feel they have to, but don’t want to put all the details up for strangers to read.

This evening I’ve watched Bleak House while cooking tea and got lost with what was going on, but I also videoed it (if I can ever find time to watch it). A got back about 7.30pm and after M went to bed we’ve been packing up, A’s cleaned the fish tank etc. Ought to go talk to him about his weekend really instead of sitting here blogging!

Quick catch up:

Wednesday

West Park - possibly the less said about that the better. The children were all getting on fine. The adults were having a few challenges on the communications front, shall we say. What is wrong with everyone having an equal say in running a group is beyond me. Anyway, M had fun. He helped build a theme park out of Lego, played in the playhouse, tried snooker and generally kept himself busy. L smiled at everyone and enjoyed being chatted to and held by some other people.

Wednesday evening we let M stay up later than usual and we all watched Freaky Friday on DVD and ate lots of popcorn.

Thursday

After doing his maths and sounding activities I took M into town to buy a Spy Bug from Tescos with his pocket money. He’d spotted it the week before but needed to save his money for another week to afford it. Unfortunately he’d interpreted that as “We’ll go and buy it on Monday” and then when we didn’t go Monday or Tuesday he got upset. So I promised we’d go Thursday if he got on with things in the morning. He got up early and had his maths finished by 7.20am! He also did his phonograms and spelling in double quick time, so that was a bonus. He is so chuffed with his new gadget and keeps trying to hide it around the house to listen in on conversations, but so far he’s not been very subtle and he hasn’t caught us out!

Friday

What did we do on Friday? Erm… M had his Musical Theatre class in the afternoon, and we finished listening to “Great Expectations” during the journey home. I downloaded the small file size of it from Audible (when Kirsty mentioned the free books), which was all I could manage on dial up, but it’s fine to listen to on a car journey. We do so much time in the car getting to things I like to have stories to listen to. This was a little bit too involved for M, so I kept pausing for a round up of events so far, but I think he got the jist and he asked to listen to more.

I applied online to upgrade to broadband after Joyce suggested trying and seeing what they say. I was getting hopeful - our postcode said we could probably get broadband, our phone number said probably not, but when I applied it said we could have the 500K speed though they might need to send an engineer out. Unfortunately a couple of days later I got a letter saying they’d decided our line wasn’t up to it after all. It’s so frustrating! I’d love to be able to download books, send digital photos for printing out easily etc etc but it’s not going to happen for now.

Saturday

We tried driving into town to go to the bank and change pin numbers on new cards, but there were no parking spaces to be had anywhere so we gave up and went supermarket shopping instead. We popped home for a quick lunch and then took M to his dancing class. He seems to be getting the hang of his 2 dances now. Don’t think we did anything memorable on Saturday afternoon.

Sunday

We got up early and went swimming for half an hour before church. It was L’s first time and we weren’t sure how he’d do, but he looked like he was enjoying himself in the pool. A and I took it in turns to hold him and swish him through the water. He liked to go on his tummy and splash his legs, but pulled some peculiar faces when his mouth and nose went in the water. He looked as though he was trying to taste the water with his tongue, then screwed his nose up at it.

Church was church, with a fairly unintelligible sermon about rendering unto Caesar what is Caesars. Why he can’t just say what he means instead of pontificating I don’t know, I just let it wash over my head most of the time. Coffee afterwards was better and I started getting to know the new assistant’s wife. There’s another lady there with a baby of 6 months, so we got chatting about the health visitor and the mums and babies group and stuff. She is the only other mum there who is breastfeeding past a few weeks, cosleeping and so on, and the HV keeps having a go at her for cosleeping and not doing CIO, so we encourage each other. I promised to lend her the Continuum Concept when she has time to read it.

The HV is really irritating me at the moment so I’m giving her a wide berth - whenever I see her (e.g. at baby weighing) she is always telling some poor mum she *should* do this or that, she never says anyone is doing a great job of mothering their baby. It’s all negative - breastfed babies don’t sleep well, the only way to get any sleep is to leave them to cry, grrr…. like there’s only one way of doing things. Do they not learn any counselling skills on these HV courses? What about asking how the mum feels about things before ordering her about?

Sunday afternoon M and A went for a bike ride and then tidied up the garden, and I caught up with a few emails. In the evening we watched another DVD - Maid in Manhattan. It was OK for a romantic comedy - watchable and not taxing. M was falling asleep though so he missed the last 10 minutes.

Today

A did maths with M first thing and then when I got up we did his phonograms and spelling. Then we went out for the day up to Teesside Park, where we watched Wallace and Gromit and the Were-Rabbit. Think it’s one of those films where you’ll see alot more the second time you watch it. We all enjoyed it, L was fascinated by the moving pictures, though the sound was a bit too loud. He screeched a bit (happy screech, but loud) and I tried to BF him off to sleep but he as having none of it - he wanted to be facing the screen. He eventually nodded off sitting up on my knee and slept through the second half of the film, so we could watch without worrying he was disturbing anyone else, though there were only about a dozen of us in.

A was away with MRT this weekend and the weather was lousy, so we had a very quiet couple of days around the house. On Saturday we did go out, but only to take M to his dancing class. He’s missed 2 out of the 4 classes so far this term (Legoland trip and full of cold last week) so he’s struggling to learn the new dance in his new class. The class is much bigger and going at a faster pace, and the dance they’re doing seems so much more complicated than previously. I even took paper and pencil to make notes so he could try practicing at home and I couldn’t keep up with all the moves. The dance is to Crazy Chick by Charlotte Church, so quite fast paced. Ah well, they’re learning a different one after half term - hopefully be easier! Their tap routine is to All That Jazz from Chicago and thankfully that is alot simpler. Think we’ll be able to practice that one here til he feels more confident, anyway.

Yesterday we did church in the morning and then when L had a nap, M and I baked banana bread together and I made lentil soup. I think the colder weather must be getting to me, because then I made toad in the hole for the first time ever for tea. M thought it was OK but wouldn’t eat the Yorkshire pudding because I forgot to make gravy. “Never mind mum, at least you tried and that’s the main thing” he said.

This morning M did his maths and sounding after some sulks over his times tables again. He wandered off but then sat under the dining table reading the Usborne Book of World History so I didn’t like to disturb him and put him off. Not sure what he was reading, except he asked me what politics means. He’s also been reading his new Horrible Science magazines that came on Saturday. He especially likes the gizmo that came on one of the covers.

L is desperately trying to pull himself up to a sitting position now, and generally toppling over onto his nose. He’s discovered his feet but isn’t putting them in his mouth yet, but he was watching them intently and wiggling them for ages over the weekend. And his new favourite household item is the TV remote control, which he is completely fascinated by.

Right, A is putting M to bed and L is asleep for the time being, so I really ought to get on with the list of things I’ve to do tonight. We’ve got “stuff” going on in the home ed group that I need to think about. Amazing how people can all be grouching about things for months and seem to be generally in agreement about changes, but when you begin to try and sort out changes suddenly everyone either goes silent (leaving it looking like you’re trying to stir) or all argumentative about it. Do other groups have anything written down about how they run and make decisions or just wing it? Do other groups have bank accounts or just not hold funds? Why do these things end up so complicated??