Pros and cons

Sunday provided a pair of constrasting moments to illustrate being a dad to small children, and its effects on parental mental health.

Sunday afternoon: Katy was out with J, and I thought that after I’d caught up with some boring chores that K, L and I all deserved a drink and a Little Something and then a cuddle up on the sofa to watch The Jungle Book. Eventually L dropped off to sleep (hurrah!) cuddled in one of my arms, and in the other K chatted to me about what was going on in the story, laughed, got sad when Baloo was heroic and didn’t mind when I sang along with the songs. Of course this was all good natural history and hence very Home Educational. This was very nice.

Not so nice was L really not wanting to go to sleep on Sunday evening. After more chores I thought that a bit of You’ve Got Mail would be brainless relaxation and also thought that L would eventually cuddle me or Katy and go to sleep. This did eventually happen, but two excerpts from her To Do list for the evening are reproduced below:

…

117 Empty cars from the bucket over the sofa (again).
118 Offer some to Daddy (again).
119 Accept them back from Daddy (again).
120 Play with them for a bit on the sofa (again). Maybe climb up onto the sofa/Daddy as part of this.
121 With Daddy’s help, put them back into the bucket (again).
122 Take the cars over to Mummy and offer one to her (again). If any cars drop out on the way, bend down to pick them up, which may cause more to drop out. Pick them all up and continue to Mummy.
123 After Mummy’s toy car needs are met, walk back to Daddy (again). Previous comment about dropping applies here too.
124 Empty cars from the bucket over the sofa (again).
125 Offer some to Daddy (again).
…
…
756 Go to sleep.

A Weekend of Parties

Kiddy parties. 😛

J’s friend B and his sister F both have birthdays at about the same time so it was F’s party on Saturday and B’s on Sunday. F’s was a family affair, so we all toddled along there and spent the afternoon playing (littles), chatting (bigs) and eating nice food (all) – including delicious chocolate crispie cakes with a distinct caramel flavour (reminiscent of Mars bars or Creme Eggs 😕 ) due to being made with lots of golden syrup – must get a recipe! F being 4 and girly, the cake was a triumph of pink, sparkly icing 😉

In the evening we did the second great Coke Fountain experiment, with some success 🙂

Today was B’s party, which unfortunately clashed in timing with church. J was very excited, though, as B had told him about a wonderful science man who would be coming to entertain the children, so we arranged to drop him off early, en route to church, so that he wouldn’t have to miss anything.

Sadly, after this masterstroke of organisation, the science man had cancelled, so the children were left to entertain themselves 🙁 which they did with great aplomb and a bit of good luck on the weather front 🙂

Sunday school was small (just two children, aged 4 and 9, so interesting from a differentiation pov!) and brief as we went back in for communion. K was listening very hard to the words which accompanied the bread and wine and repeating them after the minister. He opted to take wine (the children normally have only bread and a blessing – their choice) and seemed to get a lot out of the experience generally.

After church Bob dropped me off at B’s so I could bring J back at the end of the party and brought K and L back home for lunch and a quiet afternoon. This meant I got to chat and eat nice food again 😉
In fact, I did so much chatting and eating (and washing-up, of course) that J and I ended up outstaying all the other guests, by which time B’s mum and I were into deep philosophical and personal discussion and soul-baring (there’s nothing like washing-up to get you into counselling mode!) so we persuaded the children that they would like to watch a video and sat down with a pot of tea and a slice of birthday cake (chocolate biscuit refrigerator cake – mostly sugar, held together with fat!) to set the world to rights. Oh, and also arranged to go to the film festival at the Arts Theatre on Tuesday to see the John Shuttleworth film “It’s Nice Up North”. I’m really excited, not least because I can’t remember the last time I went to the cinema!

Got back home to find L fast asleep in Bob’s arms 🙂 which of course means she is now still up and playing with toys even though Bob and I are flagging fast and would love to be either in bed or at least doing worthwhile jobs 😆 The boys, on the other hand, were in bed and asleep (after a few chapters of MNLS) by half past six and seven o’clock!

More Diet Coke and Mentos

Having produced a fountain which was more aesthetic than spectacular last time, we decided to try making a hole in the lid and then putting the lid back on before dropping the sweets in, on the basis that greater pressure should give greater height. Obviously, this presented a couple of interesting challenges: how to make a hole in the lid (J thought of a nail and hammer; I suggested a piece of wood underneath to hammer into, we ended up with 2 holes as it was such fun making them and one looked too small) and how to get the sweets in with the lid on, without them being in contact with the Coke before the lid was on and without getting covered in Coke spray as we wrestled with the lid 😆 We solved that one by also making holes (slits in the end, as they split) in the sweets and then threading them onto cotton, which J then poked through the hole in the lid, leaving the sweets inside the bottle, suspended beneath the lid and above the liquid. He held the string until Bob had the camera ready and then let go…
Whoosh! We had a double-headed fountain at least 2 metres high! (photo)

We have one bottle and a few mentos left. J really wants to try suspending the bottle from the climbing frame and swinging it as we let go of the string so that we get a moving fountain…
Watch this space!

Wine, women and song

Well, two out of three anyway 😆

After a brief pitstop at home we headed back into town, picking Bob up on the way, and just made it to King’s in time for Choral Evensong. We sat behind the screen, so had a moderately good view of the choristers as they sang but were pretty much out of sight ourselves 😉 L made just enough noise for Bob to feel they’d be better off elsewhere so he took her and K outside to admire the gardens etc while J and I sat and listened to the singing and put our new-found stained glass appreciation skills into practice 🙂
Then we met up with our Canadian friends again and went to the Rainbow Cafe for a delicious meal. It was the first time we had met Z’s dad, R, and the first time N had met Bob, but we all got on really well. In fact, as a person who normally finds it takes about a year to summon up the courage to talk to somebody, leave alone become friends *sigh*, I can hardly believe how quickly we all felt at ease and how well everyone got on. We have exchanged contact details of every possible sort – now we just need to save up enough to get over to Canada for a visit…
It was a happy and sad evening for the children. They loved spending time together and very much enjoyed their meal, especially the dessert (vanilla chocolate chip cheesecake, plus the odd taste of parents’ rainbow brownies, and carrot cake), but were also very aware that this was the last they would see of each other for a long time. Even as we were saying goodbye the boys were plotting ways to get a few more minutes: “Mummy, I think the daddies would like to chat more, so how about if they walk together and everyone else goes in our car?” and so on 😆

Ship of the fens

Spent last night trying to work out whether and how to fit in some time with Z and family before they leave tomorrow and decided to ask them to dinner tonight. They were planning to go to Stansted Mountfitchet today, which we knew we would not have time to do, but when we phoned this morning to ask about dinner N had been overtaken by an attack of laziness 😆 – know that one well! – and decided to wait and see if we had any better ideas, so we suggested an afternoon in Ely instead.
K had a dressing up day at preschool (take a bottle for the tombola next week and in return you can wear fancy dress!) so went in as Batman – his current (and long-term) favourite character, even though he knows nothing at all about him except what he looks like 😆
Meanwhile J and I chanted some times tables. I told him he could earn an ice cream for each table he did, starting with one for Z, then K, then L and finally himself. Then he did a set of random questions to earn icecreams for the mummies 😉 He did well, although faded fast at the end – I think treating mums was less exciting than working towards his own treat 😆
Then he did some BBC literacy games on the PC while I hung out washing and sorted the car to take 7 again; L “helped” us each in turn.
We picked up N, Z and L (and enjoyed a great Canadian delicacy for lunch: peanut butter and banana sandwiches) and made our way out to Ely to visit the cathedral, known as the Ship of the Fens. The boys loved the big cannon in front of the cathedral and it was amazing to think that it had been brought all the way from Russia (captured during the Crimean) nearly 150 years ago! I had forgotten how beautiful the cathedral is; it was really special to have the chance to share it with a new friend and with the children. The highlight of the visit was seeing a hoist in action, lifting boxes from the ground floor to the first floor of the cathedral. This kept them all happy for ages while N and I admired the architecture and the lovely windows.
We decided to visit the stained glass museum rather than doing the cathedral tour, as we were a little short of time and the children were keen to see the glass and the pictures, so we climbed up a steep spiral staircase, holding onto a rather rickety handrail and then spent a happy half hour wandering round looking at beautiful pictures lit from behind to give a soft glow 😀 Many depicted stories and J and K got quite good at spotting them and working out what was going on. There were also little scenes showing how the windows were made and a glass kiln which proved to be just the right height for L to bump her head… Oh, and the museum afforded us a great view, over a sort of balcony, of the aforementioned hoist 😉
As well as the museum itself there was a stained glass shop, where we spent about as much time again. The children each chose a marble: K and Z a globe, L a fish in a ball and J wavered for so long between a red and black die (yes, a stained glass die!) and a football that in the end (after due warning) I chose for him and bought the die. This was, of course, the wrong choice 🙄 N bought a piece of stained glass to take back for her mother – to Canada via Italy. I hope it survives!

After the cathedral we met up with a friend who showed us a lovely little playground where the children were able to let off steam before the drive back – and incidentally N was able to take some great photos so the boys will be able to remember one another.
A busy day – and a busy evening, which I think will have to go in as a separate entry. I need some sleep!

Diet Coke and Mentos

Found some fruit mentos in a little newsagent’s last night 🙂 so this evening we tried the experiment with one bottle and 2 sweets. It worked fairly well (Bob says photos to come, hopefully) but I think the 1l bottle shape may be less good than the 2l they used, and I suspect we may need to use more sweets – or maybe they need to be mint ones for some reason 😕
Anyway, we still have 2 bottles left, so can try more sweets tomorrow and see how it goes 🙂
The neighbours were amused anyway 😆

Edited to add link to photo

Tots, tantrums and tears

Hard work at P&T today 🙁
On paper it should have been easy, as there was not only a church member down to help but also a new volunteer sent my way by a friend who works in careers and rehab type stuff. In fact, I had plans to pull everything out of the cupboard, sort it all out and put it back in properly. Talk about the best laid plans…

Things started well, with J and the new volunteer playing a word pool game (throw the die to see how many lily pads the frog can jump on to collect letters, then use the letters to spell words) which J loved. In fact, it kept him happy for nearly an hour, with various others joining in from time to time then dropping out when they got bored. K was happy just pottering with his friends, so all looked well….. except for L who was permanently teetering on tantrum-edge 🙁 She cried when a baby touched a toy she had earmarked as hers, when another child looked at the bike she had abandoned at the other end of the hall in a way that suggested he might be thinking about wanting to ride it 🙄 , when I told her it wasn’t time for biscuits yet, when her doll fell out of the sling (kids’ coorie) she was carrying it in… It didn’t help that it was an unusually busy session.

In the end I decided enough was enough and used the fact that I had helpers this week to give a bit of leeway; I took L out for a walk. A bit of fresh air and time out, cuddled up to mummy in a wrap, seemed to help calm her down and when we got back she was able to just get on calmly with the other children.

After P&T we went to Z’s for lunch and play, which was great – until N (his mum) tried to get a photo of all the children together and J got seriously stroppy. As I was starting to get frustrated with him I had a sudden flash that this was more stress than strop. In the past we have had special treat last days spoiled by awful behaviour because he cannot cope with the sadness to come 🙁 Instead of trying to coax or push him into cooperating I gave him a big cuddle and asked “Are you really sad that we have to say goodbye to Z?” and he burst into tears 😥
Eventually we worked out that part of the problem was that he thought we had no contact details for Z so would never see them again (I asked him how he had coped with saying goodbye to friends at MP camp and he said it was okay because they had all given him their phone numbers – first I knew of it 😆 ) so we showed him the card N had given us with lots of contact info and promised to save up and try to get to Canada sometime to visit…

Then spent the rest of the afternoon playing outside, finding pottery pieces (note to self: ask Polly), exploring a secret path where we found rope which the boys then used to mountaineer up the slide in the playground… oh, and introducing N to the slippery slope of babywearing :mrgreen:

Boxes and books

Dropped K off at preschool this morning and then went across town to a reading morning at S’s house. We arrived about 20 minutes early, so did some tables while we waited; the promise of Diet Coke and Mentos got J motivated to finish so we’d have time later to do experiments.
At the reading morning, S, J and a few others sat themselves in large cardboard boxes in the library and listened to S’s mum reading The Wind in the Willows, while younger siblings played in the playroom (oh, to have room for a playroom and/or a library!), then there was time for a brief play before dashing back to pick up K and take them all to Bouncearound – huge toddler group in centre, which has become part of our lives over the last 6 years 🙂
Had to leave BAR early (not popular as the boys’ favourite bit is tidying up!) to get back to car and collect Diet Coke, then popped to Sainsbury’s, where we failed to find Mentos but settled for Softmints to see if they work too. Then got caught in huge downpour so unable to go into garden to do experiment anyway 🙁
Ho hum.
Off to MSLC AGM shortly, so Coke fountains will have to wait until tomorrow…