Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday

Tuesday was swimming, which led to a couple of minor strops, one from K, who didn’t want to go (unusual, as he is usually ready and in the car with time to spare 😆 ) and one from L, who did 🙄 J was ready when he needed to be, with no fuss 😯 😀
L, A and I didn’t swim this time, partly because A and I are still a bit under the weather and partly because it just takes much longer and costs much more when we do – worth it on a good day, but a pain on a not so good one. In fact, having told the boys that swimming is non-negotiable etc etc and much as I enjoy it when we do all swim, I am starting to wonder if it mightn’t be the thing which goes to slim down our week a little 😕 It is a long way to go for 30 minutes and although the classes are cheap it uses up a lot of time relatively unproductively on what would otherwise be a free day. If I could be sure that we would be very good about replacing the classes with something else the decision would be easy, as our gym membership includes unlimited and free use of the pool for us and the children (but only two children per adult) so in theory we should be able to just go along every weekend or regular evenings and do it ourselves… The flaws in this plan are that neither Bob nor I are very confident swimmers, it is hard to teach a child who is clinging to you for dear life, especially when another child is also clinging to you, we’re not sure what we should be teaching anyway and the pool nearest us is too deep for L to touch the bottom – K can and is happy to scoot around with a float, J can, but prefers to stand wailing and shivering in the middle of the pool 🙁 – so we end up either with one parent holding both girls while the other attempts to coax J to do something vaguely useful and K fends for himself or two parents each holding one girl and encouraging the boys (which works for K but is a complete waste of time and breath for J). I have a pool sling, but when we went swimming at the local pool last weekend the lifeguard took one look and told me I could not use it in the pool, which meant I had to wait for Bob and the boys to finish changing before the girls and I could even get into the pool, as there was no way I could hold A safely and get L down the steps 🙁 Being a coward I just submitted and then kicked myself for not having made a fuss and at least asked why (is there really a rule somewhere which says pool slings may not be used? It is what they were designed for, after all!) but it would have been much easier to have had hands free in the pool rather than just in the shower afterwards. Anyway, I digress! The only way I can see swimming with us working as lessons for the boys would be for one parent to take one child to the pool while the other parent did childcare and that involves a fair bit of time organisation. Otherwise we’re looking at local lessons – and the cost of those means that driving to CHEF ones and paying for parking, petrol and lessons for two is still cheaper than one set of lessons here! Maybe I should just let J win this one and accept that some people don’t swim?
Tuesday evening brought its own little disaster, as Bob attempted to make hot drinks in the evening and the kettle gave a dramatic little pop and expired!

Wednesday should have been easy, since Bob had the day off to take delivery of the freezer (and clear a space for it to go) but with no kettle and therefore only a mediocre microwaved cup of tea the day got off to a bad start. Bob had vouchers from work which we hoped we could use to buy a new kettle, but a quick google soon turned into a prolonged hunt for anywhere nearby that we could get a relatively eco-friendly kettle, with little to show at the end of it other than a pair of grumpy parents and a big rush to get the children out to drama 🙁 We decided to buy an Eco Kettle by mail order and hope that it arrives quickly, making do with the microwave in the meantime.
Drama was good, apparently, and while the boys were busy L did girlie things (Felicity Wishes 🙂 ) with her friend E, courtesy of Gina, A crawled around on the floor and helped herself to food from my bag (baby led weaning?) and I got to drink a fairly decent cup of tea, again courtesy of Gina 🙂
We came home for lunch then pottered in the afternoon until it was time for Gymnastics. The freezer had been promised for early afternoon, but by 3:30 had still not arrived. L stayed with Bob while A and I took the boys to gymnastics, then we went to Tesco’s to get a cheap and nasty kettle because I had suddenly remembered that toddlers was to be here this week as church in use 😯 By the time we had made our way back through the housing estate maze to Badgers it was getting late and the boys had decided they didn’t really want to go, which suited me tbh, as it meant we didn’t have to go out again to collect them (bad Mummy!) so we just came home and they had another tea (as well as the one out after gymnastics!), J played his new computer game (The Incredibles, bought with his own pocket money) and we all trooped out to admire the enormous new freezer.

Since we had no idea how many people might come, or at what time, today we decided to just go ahead and get on with things, starting with Maths etc as usual (J still not fussing!) and then moving on to making bread. While we had yeast etc out we decided to copy an experiment I spotted on the Beans Flickr recently and put some into a large bottle with a balloon on top to trap the bubbles. Finding we had a couple of spare large bottles (left over from Cartesian divers) we decided to do one with yeast, sugar and warm water, one with just yeast and warm water and one with just sugar and warm water, so we could see what happened. We fielded a few guesses as to what caused the bubbles, coming up with a short-list of hydrogen, helium (but they thought either of these should make the balloon fill up and the bottle lift up!), oxygen (which they thought unlikely as they knew yeast would need it to live so would not be producing it as well surely) and carbon dioxide. We decided to test the gas once enough had been collected to see if we could work out what it is. As we were finishing off the bottle filling and balloon placing there was a knock at the door so our first visitors, new to HE and possibly a little nervous about meeting new people, were greeted with a confused jumble of hellos and science explanations 😆 By the time that was pretty much sorted out and new children were being shown toys and introduced to Fussball Chris had arrived with SB and an unexpected but very welcome BB. Cups of tea and chat followed, while children played and then J and BB came through to escape the noise of an impromptu musical rehearsal which presaged a concert 😀 In fact J and BB spent much of the morning together, indoors, outdoors and on the computer (“Mummy, please may I show BB my new game? She really wants to see it!” I was sceptical, but BB was nodding like mad so I agreed and she did then spend a fair while sitting with him and proffering advice on what move might be best *grin*) – it was rather sweet to watch.
New family had to leave at 12, but Beans stayed on for a bit, enjoyed fresh bread rolls (but not enough of them; we had to supplement with cream crackers) and pootled a bit more. K and SB played Greedy Gorilla, while J, L and BB carried on Incredibl-ing.
The pumpkin pie I had intended to make earlier in the week finally happened, with just about enough custard left to make another using an emergency pie case from the cupboard 🙂 Cheese straws also happened, as did a small batch of chocolate cupcakes; these can now go in the freezer, which we managed to clean as per manual, and then turn on. K was worried about how we would reach to clean the bottom and suggested that he could get in, with shoes off obviously, and do it from inside. L also volunteered to go in, as long as we were careful not to shut the door. Cue explanation (completely unasked for) from both L and K as to why shutting the door would be a bad thing: there would not be enough air for very long and no more air could get in because the door has a special seal to stop cold air getting out or warm air getting in but that means no air can get in. Yay!