Month: October 2007

I wish I could remember what the children have been saying recently as some of it has made us smile. J’s vocab is mostly learned from reading these days, so he sometimes pronounces words strangely. My favourite is kuhpoons for coupons. A business trip to Germany has been hanging over my head for the last week or so but with no firm news, and I’m assuming that I’m not going tomorrow as I haven’t been told. L thinks I go to Germany to get her fridge magnets (the talking to customers must be something I squeeze in between choosing her magnets).

Yesterday some very kind friends turned up with a pick up truck borrowed from a builder friend of theirs. It was loaded with a sofa, a coffee table to go next to it, a mattress, some floor cushions and other goodies that they were giving us and delivering to us for free. We have therefore been able to convert our front room from err… storage room into grown-ups sanctuary, and so won’t force guests to sit on hard wooden chairs when they come to stay (sorry Barbara and Chris).

After several weeks of eBay frustration (just because computers are the medium doesn’t make sniping less like pushing other people out of the way to get what you want), Katy has managed to buy a Tripp Trapp chair for A, which we can convert temporarily into a high chair for her using the bits from the chair from J’s chair (which have been used for K’s and L’s chairs too).

A nice local independent toy shop had a half term special on Wedgits (of which Ideal Blox were knock offs). Katy bought some baby ones for A and the boys learned how to wedge green ones inside bigger ones.

I had a stomach bug for a couple of days, and J made me a nice Get Well card. K made me a nice pattern, and L started a card for me but was so overcome by the artistic process that she fell asleep at the table (mid-morning) before putting pen to paper – see Flickr.

The boys had another taster session of gymnastics, and so in theory are heading slowly closer towards having a proper place. They also start swimming lessons with the local home ed. group on Tuesday – another lengthy waiting list. K’s reluctance led him to learn the meaning of non-negotiable.

Katy found a hidden box of filing (taken out of the filing cabinet by removals people) so we were able to get a new car tax disc just in time, and start changing the address on drivers licenses and V5 (phew)

Tomorrow L starts at the pre-school bit of a nursery just down the road that a friend’s boy goes to as much as the government vouchers stretch to. (This will become permanent if she likes it – she’s not making promising noises now, but I’m not betting she’ll not change her mind.)

This afternoon there was a French market in town, where Katy and J practised French, we tried lots of yummy food and spent lots of money. J’s handwriting is getting neater, A is trying out sitting up and K’s reading is coming on – tonight I was reading Each Peach Pear Plum to him and L (L’s choice) and he could imagine the P of Plum moving to the other end, or having a P at both ends, and he kept spotting words he could read. L’s flights of fancy / logical explanations of the world (depending on your point of view) continue to be as imaginative as ever.

Last night I was listening to the radio and heard a tune that sounded strangely familiar. Eventually I realised it was a reggae version of the Coronation Street theme tune. Had it been the normal version, the knee-jerk dislike trained in me by my father would have been triggered, but this was disguised enough to be just a quirky reggae song. That made me wonder what similar reactions we have imprinted in our children. George W. Bush, the imperialist isolationist? Clare Verity – the brutal charlatan? Penry, the mild-mannered janitor?

Oh, and Spooks has devolved to Star Trek levels of believability in terms of science. Ignoring all the amazing inventions that defy current laws of physics (transporter, inertial damper etc.), Star Trek often has the shield or whatever that provides complete protection against ultimate disaster until it is 100% broken, at which point the ultimate disaster falls immediately and completely. Well, Spooks has this nasty fatal bio-weapon whose antidote restores you from death’s door to complete health before the split lip you sustained getting the antidote off the baddies has cleared up. *sigh*.

No – the title isn’t an Austin Powers reference.

Katy took the children to watch Happy Feet today via the local Home Ed. group and National Schools Film Week. Not the most successful outcome: A had a nasty nappy which Katy had to change in the dark in the cinema(!), J had his fingers over his ears because it was too loud, K found it too scary in places and L found it too scary most, if not all, of the time. The happy family film suggested by the trailers was deceptive – aimed at upper primary / lower secondary to get the themes and humour.

In fact, when I was putting K to bed he told me that there had been the scary parts and he almost started crying again. He said he ought to warn people about his age that it was scary.

Over tea J and K and I had a chat about fishing, and disappearing fish, over-fishing and so on. I said that it was harder to keep fishing boats in the correct places and out of places they shouldn’t be because it’s sea rather than land. On land you can set up barriers etc. K said they could have lasers floating at sea that crush boats, and then a remote control for “the goodies” to turn them off so they could go in. (There’s a house round the corner from us that has a gate with a remote control and the boys have seen it in use.) It would all be powered by wind and waves, but not solar because the lasers would have to run in the night as well as the day and so there wouldn’t be enough sun. Sorted.

It’s been ages and I have an active A on my lap (combination typing / cuddle) but time to catch up what I can remember.

First I think was Ernest and Buttercup’s joint birthday party. Lots of pizza, lots of children having fun, impressive sleeping arrangements and a very nice time. The main event was the taking over of the local leisure pool, with water flume and occasional wave machine. K had a go down the flume with me, L went twice (despite my dunking her in the exit pool fairly comprehensively) and apparently has been asking to go swimming every day since (I don’t think she realises that swimming won’t always mean all that. After the swimming was a party at the leisure centre and the glow sticks in the party bags triggered lots of fun in the dark field behind the leisure centre.

Someone in the local home ed. group had organised a trip to a local orchard, and the very nice man who runs it took everyone on a trip around in trailers behind his tractor. Explanation of cuttings and grafting, the need for a pond and some DIY apple picking. He makes and sells juices, so there was a tour around the juicing and bottling equipment.

Katy’s cousin’s children had their baptism – J2 is 6 and E is younger than our A. The vicar knew J2 and was obviously glad to have children in church. She involved J2 much more than just getting him wet, and E burbled at the right places, and didn’t cry at the right places too. On the way back home, A got very unhappy and her crying seemed to include “oh mum-mum” – maybe her first words, but I haven’t heard them since. She has been experimenting with vegetable eating – occasional enthusiasm but it’s early days yet.

A friend of a friend is a local park ranger and so J, K and L enjoyed doing some pond dipping. J and K have been to Badgers which is still going well, and for which a uniform will arrive for them soon – something else to lose / stress about / get late over / find again?

I expect many other things have happened, but that’s all I can remember!

UPDATED: I forgot to mention that Katy has done her first Latin with J, K and L. Actually it was (by design) a mini-gathering of some local Home Ed. families, with cooking, a bit of crafts and science and running around the garden like loons.

No big reason for the title – it’s what I’m listening to at the minute. A Mi Manera = (I think) the Spanish for My Way – it’s the Gypsy Kings’ version of the Frank Sinatra et al. classic, and what my MP3 program threw out in its randomness. Mmmm… cheesy. Err, so what’s been happening? I can’t remember further back than the weekend.

Saturday was full but good. We were up and out early so that the boys could get to mini-football. It’s the session that J used to go to before we moved, and it was his first time back and K’s first time ever. They both enjoyed it, although K will go into the later session for the younger ones next week. While they were charging about we were upstairs in the cafe watching them and chatting to a mum who was trying to coax her daughter into finishing her maths. (That was very familiar.) With ballet classes, football and I think swimming all happening at once the cafe is full of middle class parents shepherding their children through their extra-curricular activities.

After football we went to get J a recorder for his recorder lessons (under strict instructions to get exactly the right model) and passed some students in bright yellow T-shirts who were fielding the freshers and parents arriving bewildered at the college next to the music shop with their cars jammed full of stuff. Something I remember, and I suppose one day will be on the other side of. I hadn’t thought about it too much, but I expect that at least one of our four will want to go to university or college – I admit that I had been assuming they all would, but I shouldn’t.

Recorder bought we headed over to a community centre on the other side of town for a sling meet. This was largely me doing childcare with 3 / 4 children while Katy talked / did slings with other mums.

Then off to the countryside for the Pumpkin Fair (the annual village fair of somewhere nearby) as last year’s had been good. Like last year there were mutant vegetables, which were judged in about 20 categories, with 3rd to 1st place in each category and some with a cup or trophy for first place. (You got the impression that it mattered a great deal to some people.) We picked up loads of pumpkins and squashes cheaply from a stall groaning with them, watched majorettes, laughed at a clown taking ages to do a handstand on a chair, clapped a juggler while he did very clever things with diablos, and listened to the Boys Brigade band. There were tricks from a BMX stunt expert (impressive at the time, but the photos all look like he’s having nasty accidents and about to come off), and exhibition aerobics from the local primary school. Like last year there was a fire engine and crew and tractors, traction engines and some old cars and motorbikes.

The children had a go at circus skills – low wire, plate spinning and the little pedal wheel things with more fun than success. The boys gave in to the lure of tat – hook a bag. Their prize was a big 4×4 car which was so cheap and nasty that it fell apart before we had even left the car park! This was turned into a learning opportunity about why we appear mean sometimes 🙂 when we want to spend money on things that will give more than 3 minutes’ enjoyment and not on tat.

We drove home on a back road and I was hit by how extremely agricultural it was. Very flat, with fields as far as the eye could see. Only the occasional village, no manufacturing or other industry. God’s ironing board.

On Sunday I was flying solo (as Katy does most work days 🙂 ) as Katy was in Nottingham helping someone to sell slings at a baby show. So after getting up early we had a gentle morning until walking to church (about a mile, as we measured it later on the map). The reading included the body of Christ, and the preacher had us singing happy birthday to someone without using our lips (humming!) and some children had to race to the back without using their legs. After the service was a bring and share lunch that we were invited to stay for even though we hadn’t brought any food, it was all lovely and there was lots left over.

After church we walked home, and it was one of those moments when everything fits into place perfectly, and all the frustrations and annoyance of life are kept at bay and the passing of time doesn’t seem to apply. We were just walking in the sunshine – L was running on ahead with her hair streaming behind her and a smile on her face – by trees which were starting to change colour.

On the way we met a man putting his metal Canadian canoe into the river, so the boys helped him to push it down the slipway. We conked out when we got home – I think I dozed off!

J had been inspired by an arts and crafts book to make pop-up cards for Katy, so we spent the rest of the afternoon doing this. J did his own thing based on a chain of people, which fell foul of escaping glue a bit. L wanted a butterfly, so I drew it and she coloured it in (with some help from K and me when she got tired). K wanted to do a dog, so I suggested he copy one from Hairy MacClary as it has lots of pictures of dogs. He did a really good picture of Bottomley Potts (covered in spots – a dalmatian), and then a tree and some grass for the background. I helped with the pop-up bits and most of the gluing, and Katy was chuffed with the results when she got in after tea (shattered, with A who had been a star at the show but grumpy on the way back).

This week K has had croup, but is slowly getting better (no waking up coughing last night). J did his Maths and English before breakfast yesterday! L has been pushing boundaries / obnoxious a bit. At K’s request I sat with them when I got in on Monday so that they could stand watching the slitheen on the Sarah Jane Adventures. My first time – she has a sonic lipstick! 🙂 Last night we combined supermarket shopping with pizza – while Katy did some shopping, the big 3 and I watched our tea being made, which was impressively quick. Tonight is Badgers and K might need some persuasion to go despite really enjoying it, as he’s worrying about the test coming up next week on the animals that they all researched last week.