Home Educating the Puddle Girls…

TT came today so theoretically my house should be really tidy. I worked all day but it doesn’t seem to look much better. Oh well, tomorrow is another day.

Fran made some really cute necklaces today, designed to be twiddle necklaces for feeding babies. Tried to flog them for her for £1inc p&p on the bfing list but no takers sadly; she’s a bit gutted. I might fake it for her tbh, because i love mine and so does Josie. She also did her normals, got hacked off with Animal Crossing cos the shop was closed again, tidied her room and they all played a lot.

I feel unreasonably exhausted and grouchy, so i’m off to bed. All i’ve done is shout, only just clawing it back with jigsaws and stories at bedtime. Ho hum. And my temporary filling dropped out.

I was hoping to reschedule last weeks clashing group for this friday but unfortunately there is a funeral being held at the hall.

I’m therefore suggesting a bit of a play/nature trail type thing (low key bug hunt etc etc) at Central Park for this Friday (3rd June) instead with Activity World as normal on the following weekend.

I’ll aim to be at the Park, near the Main Swings, at 1pm this Friday and will meet anyone who comes. If its raining, consider it cancelled I don’t do rain.

I must admit, the appeal of a family that is growing up is great. I love being able to get out and do things that interest us all without having to worry about the claptrap of a very small fmaily. Josie doesn’t seem to make much impact really, in another year though, i guess she’ll be a tired-at-times-toddler and it will feel harder again.

Another thing i am very proud of is the level of understanding that Fran, and increasingly Maddy, have of History. Today we visited Hatfield House and i really enjoyed taking interested and interesting children around its grounds. It fits in well with lots of what Fran knows; Henry VIII visited, it was a nursery to all his children, home and virtually prison to Elizabeth I, the home of Elizabeth and James I’s (or VI for Joyce and Hannah) advisor Robert Cecil, son of William Cecil who lived at Burghley House which is a regular haunt of ours. So it all fits together very nicely. As well as being the place Elizabeth heard the news she was to be Queen (a la the beginning of the film “Elizabeth) it has a fabulous Tudor Hall in the Palace part, where Henry often visited and where Elizabeth chose William to be her First Advisor and beautiful gardens which were originally designed by (and to some extent being restored to the style of) the Tradescant’s who were the subject of a couple of books i read a year or so ago. Which just goes to show you how important a concept “Living Books” is to me because i would never have believed this period of history could enthrall me after the horror of A Level, much less a book about the fortunes of a gardener. The Tradescants were tricked out of their collection of curiosities by the founder of the Ashmolean; i must find time to visit that sometime.

Stone Picture of Elizabeth asnd her Advisors.

The “New” Hatfield House, built by Robert Cecil after James I commandeered his house Theobalds.

A Queen and some Princesses.

Hatfield Palace; mostly pulled down to build the “House” this bit survives.

Another view.
After that we went to spend the afternoon with J and her boys which was very enjoyable. Girls mucked in well and aside from a few tussles, all the kids had a great time.

I’ve been for my walk and now i MUST answer all the emails that are piling up!!!!

Housing

Links

Craft ideas

Virtual Jamestown

Pocohontas Links

And actually me too!

We got to the allotment by 11. Although the girls struggled to help, they had brought pens, paper, books etc and entertained themselves well. They really enjoyed the planting bits, especially Maddy who is really good at spacing out onions nad potatoes just right. She also enjoyed some dot-to-dot stuff.

Amelie and Max did a bit of Butterfly work at her request (and the below justifies having had Draw Write Now on hand for him!) She has also spent the day filling squares with Hama, she seems to love that! (good, good…)

They seemed to have a nice time doing it and i’m pledging to do more about butterflies at Ammi’s level this week.

Having got back i took her out to get rabbit food and other bits (including another butterfly she fell in love with, a net ornament thingy) so she and i got time together - she is lovely.

When i got back Fran made this train cake - she had seen it on Big Cook, Little Cook today and was desperate to do it, so Max took her to get the ingredients and she did it all on her own. Was very proud of her and she was delighted.

She also did her box of normals today and spent ages producing Hama Coaster patterns for me and reading the Oxford Reading Tree readers. Ammi spent ages with these too, Maddy read Mr Men books. Ammi is convinced she can read, Maddy is picking lots of words out of our Pocohontas book unprompted “Captain John Smith” specifically.

Feel like we gave them a good day today, lots of 1-2-1 time, lots of stuff they asked for, lots of fresh air. And i got my walk (7.5 miles this week) and Max got his bike ride.

Good Stuff.

Friends.

Pheasants from around the Worlds Display. Most wouldn’t pose but they were lovely.

There is no getting away from it, under those wings, butterflies are just BIG BUGS!

Rather fab Terrapin thing, although according to the rather scary National Geographic article i read the other night, a very invasive and malevolent species.

Daddy and Josie. Max is outraged i’ve put a photo up of him with an apparent 8 chins!

Weeeeeee!

Monkey Maddy!

Pretty Bug.

I do like these - its like they were an entry in the “How to make a sheep look more stupid” competition.

Apologies for the dodgy photo, i only had my phone with me.

Decided today i had to brave the allotment and see what the damage was from not getting there before HESFES. I had horrible vsions of the other 4/5s of our patch being havens of productivity and mine being a weed heap.

It WAS a weed heap, but the others were too, so i don’t feel too embarrassed. Seems like everyone is finding it hard to find the time. The black plastic had mainly held, one side totally and one side until perhaps a week or so ago. So i had one nice side of rotivated, weedfree soil, still a bit of dead grass in it but usable and one side with some thistles and anaemic looking bramble shoots. However the uncovered bits were pretty hideous; the left had gone really grassy and the right, though not discernably different before, was not grassy but was covered in small thistles. It all looked a bit overwhelming.

So we covered the grassy bit with our plastic so hopefully it will all die back and set about the thistles. Took a while but we got them all up. Weeded round the onions which are growing nicely (left green bit behind the newly placed black sheeting) and then forked furrows right across the back which was agreeably easy thanks to the sheeting having kept the rotivated soil loose. Thank GOODNESS i did that!

I had Fran and Maddy with me; it had been a mixed success really because they whinged a bit and kept asking for jobs then only did them for a couple of minutes but once the furrows were done they came into their own and planted about 40 potatoes out and covered them back up to their shoots. Plenty of useful discussion was going on about sunlight, water, snails etc. maddy did ask a great question but i just can’t recall it now. Damn.

While they were doing that i carved out two more furrows in the harder earth and when that was done they planted out shallots (bit late but hopefully they will do okay) and leeks that Max got from a friend at work.

So really i feel extremely virtuous now - unfortunately i’ve still only used half our patch so far so more work coming - thank goodness i didn’t try to take on a whole one this year! Was also very nice to meet our “allotment neighbours” J and I while we were there and discover yet another “spooky mutual friend from aeons ago” thing. Its been a week for it.

I don’t know what i was doing while i was growing up, i only heard the “Stone Roses” album for the first time last year - it was on in the car today and it appears my girls know the lyrics better than i do.

Actually i DO know what i was doing, producing plays and listening to tthe Phantom of the Opera. Watched the film of that last night, very disappointing. Started well, fizzled out and then disappeared into a faint “ploopy” sort of plop in a well. Ah well.

I don’t seem to have blogged for days. Erm.

Thursday - passed in a haze of de-nitting, normals, Animal Crossing, Fran’s last Rainbows session, Maddy doing an emotional loop the loop.

Friday - KirstyandJames came to see us, so did Auntie Kate, more denitting, the Gameboy to gamecube cable provided more Animal Crossing delight, Ammi and Josie had their jabs and i had to wrap Maddy in the curtain to stop her crying while they had it done. maddy doesn’t appear to have glue ear, which means the congestion must be adenoidal; Max and i reckon she is virtually lip-reading at the moment. Hasty referral has been made to the ENT dept; in the meantime she is fast dissolving into a disconnected heap of jelly. Current hysteria is over a new kettle and a new chest of drawers. We had TWO HOURS of tears over the new kettle.

Today has been lovely though. Started the day with cuddles and lots of playing together. De-nitted Fran who seems to have a clutch of eggs without any mammas AT ALL, most disturbing. Good job we haven’t read The Veleteen Rabbit or she’d be panicking about her bear. I am *so* doing hair bobbles and hats at camps from now on. Even found 4 in my hair but only babies and no eggs i can find. I was still pulling ones the size of red spiders out of Ammi last night, which involved an eventual trip out for a more viscious form of chemical. AND we all stink of tea-tree and have the silkiest hair EVER from conditioner!

Oh yes, today. Pootled off to the Butterfly Park which we last visited with Kirsty last year. Completely lovely fday there; very educational - girls like the Llamas very much (not, admittedly, your most obvious candidate for a Butterfly Park) and the Nature Trail and the owls, snakes, lizards… Amelie managed not to ingest any bugs this time but was a trifle jumpy. Did well though considering our last trip nearly put he into a padded cell. Fran surpassed herself by locking a toilet door and the catch promptly fell of the lock… in a manner fairly unlike her, she utterly panicked and couldn’t slide back the very stiff lock and it wasn’t one you could slide from outside either. Park people were mildly helpless and then a rather cool (and much lighter and more agile than me!) mum came in and threw herself over the cubicle top to rescue her! Poor old Fran came out and collapsed into a jibbering heap.

Anyway, spent the afternoon there then went to Hunstanton, walked along the unbelievably windy beach laughing at the people who were completely unable to bring down their surf kite things and then finished the day with a very civilised manner at a Brewsters. Tis quite nice to have kids who can behave reasonably while eating out now. Manners seem to have come on a lot too. Did attempt to provoke Max into a conversation about the lovely family on the next table with 4 girls and a small boy, but he wasn’t biting

We’ve even managed some more Pocohontas story tonight. Need to spend some time talknig with Fran about her interests; she’s expressed some needs over things she wants to do - cooking, “experiments” and more history (more?????) so i need to address those in a way that is meaningful for her. Maddy has also asked to learn about “my body” (hilarious discussion about Daddy’s willy last night, lol…)

Will maybe have another day out tomorrow and hopefully one visiting an MPer on Monday too.

In other news… had a bead order a couple ofg nights ago from someone who’s address was similar to Max’s childhood home; snet a polite email saying i envied the address and it turns out that she is an HEer who remembers him (very well!) from Junior School - so planning to meet up in the summer. In a nice way, it was quite spooky really, to read snippets of such good memories about the boy he was. Even more impressively, he actually remembers her too!

I’ve decided to take my exercise levels in hand and have been walking this week. I’ve got a nice circuit i can do in our area that is exactly 2.5 miles - i’ve done it twice since wednesday and am planning to try and do it 4 times a week - on the other nights, Max is going for a cycle. Hopefully 10 miles a week of brisk walking will sort me out a bit. Its quite nice to put Josie in her pushchair and just have a peaceful bit of time out.

“If the next candidate could just come in.. thank you.. take a seat… right, i understand you are here to complete you assessment for your Stage One Motherhood Sash, in readiness for moving on to your Stage Two Sash… excellent, excellent… shouldn’t be a problem, just need to go over the paperwork here.

Right Mrs Raymond, if we could just check off the Badges you’ve achievemd over the past few years, that’ll give us an idea whether you’ve passed the test.

Right. So… okay….

Bad Birth Assault Course - check… I see you have THAT badge tightly sewn on there Mrs Raymond.. well done.

PND Survival - check…

Unexpected Birth Defect Badge - check.. well done, i see you got honours there… excellent, excellent…

Quantity Birthing without due Forethought - no difficulties there anyway…

Education Decision Making Badge - check… oooh, i see you went for a merit there.. marvellous, nothing like effort…

Behavioural Crisis Awareness Badge - lovely, lovely, i do like a mum who goes in for the killer “diagnose my child then please leave us alone approach”… good-oh…

OOOh - i see you played an extra card here.. Distinction for Hospitalised with a Normal Childhood Illness. Excellent. With extra Credits for the Asthma/Eczema combo.

Nice to see you went in for HomeMakers too - so unusual these days to see someone make 4 ATTEMPTS at that one. New house every time.. Goodness…. you ARE brave…

Right.. anything else, oh yes, bonus badge there for discovering Bondaweb, so much less hassle than sewing all these badges on… and of course, you can have the Hat Trick Badge for “Sterling Effort in Topping your own Birth Story each time…” - then of course there is the “Overcoming Bullying without following your mothers example and threatening to garrot the bully” badge (Well done dear, its so hard not to be like mum sometimes…) so that just leaves…

No… heavens no… I’m terribly sorry, you CAN’T have your Motherhood Stage 1 Sash. Oh how embarrassing, i’m afraid there’s been a clerical error… well, you see, you do have to pass the.. erm.. well… *whispers* its the Exterminate the Creepy Crawly Badge…. oh this is dreadful; somehow someone has let you get Practice Module F all the way to age 7 without sending you NITS to deal with. Ahem… dreadful, dreadful…its the staff cuts you know.

Right, what we’ll do is send you a quick dose now, then if you can irradicate that in a week.. you can have your sash. After all, we can’t have Young Practice Module F starting Brownies without you having achieved all your badges…

Now, with the nits, part of passing the badges is you should be as discreet as possible and not tell people.. yes, yes… WHAT??? What do you mean you’ve blogged it???? Oh HONESTLY!!!!!!

Amelie has a bug phobia. She also HATES having her hair washed. REALLY hates it, it normally takes two of us.

Therefore…
“ARGH Amelie, you have bugs in your hair… we have to wash them out NOW!!!!!”

…was probably not subtle.

Itch itch. Dunno if she caught the dreaded nits at HESFES, they all looked pretty newborn to me and i swear i didn’t notice them a couple of days ago.

Anyway, educational oportunity in the form of the lifecycle of a nit.

Discovery… broadcasting of knowledge.. nuclear warfare to obliterate…

Double sorrys to Sarah.

NOTICE!!!!!

Seems to be clashing with another local event so i am gonig to move it to next week.

NO MP group this week, it will be held on 3rd June instead.

Bad pun. Dentist had to take the nerve out of my tooth. Told you it was sore. Magically fixed now, no pain at all. Because of course, there is nothing to hurt! Still, could have been worse, she offered to take the whole tooth out.

I really don’t like dentistry. I REALLY don’t like dentists who say “Could you relax a bit, you’re making me REALLY nervous…”

Anyway. Today has consisted of more Animal Crossing, Fran paying off her first mortgage by steely determination and a grey market trade in dinosaur bones. She also did her normals, read about Oil Wells, negotiated her 8 x tables, started some bracelets, agreed to help me design some Hama Coasters, decorated a ribbon with sparklies and, oh, other things i am sure.

Maddy read to me (very well actually) played a fair bit of StudyDog, also learned to use the Hot Glue Gun and decorated a book of fabric samplers, Ammi did jigsaws, Happy Street etc.

We all went into town and bought new plates for the girls, Fran spent her birthday money on a GameBoy Advance and hugely impressed me by getting a second hand blue one rather than the full price pink one she had coveted. Good girl.

Must go watch football.

Binca Kits

I was supposed to have a dentist appointment this morning; its been booked for a month and had happily co-incided with the raging, codeine evading agony which is my jaw. I’d been hanging on till this morning, hoping for dental salvation.

They called. Apparently the new dentist isn’t starting, so i couldn’t have an appointment. I whimpered about excruciating agony and she said “Well i can’t do anything; could you call back in a few weeks?”

Hm.

On the up side, my bank have started listening to my rampant raving about them calling and then asking ME to identify myself with sensitive data. If you refuse, you now get told to ring 1471 which plays a recorded message telling you that your bank called. Which is an improvement. Can’t have just been me ranting then.

Along with Joyce, we’ve had a almost comical turn of events and thoguht processes which is this. Inadvertantly we’ve f**ked up. We’ve always told Fran that her gap is special and we love it and suddenly she is deeply concerned that when its repair is completed, she will miss it because its special. And then she asked who decided when it got done and if she could decide? Hm. Toughie that, particularly as i had already reassured her the other week when she noticed her nostrils were not symmetrical that Mr H would do whatever SHE asked about it. And even more, i remember finally being offered the option of investigating reconstructive surgery on my toes, only to realise that my toes were ME and i wanted them to stay. But a hole in your mouth, that directly affects a good bit of life… well… I’m busy creating this child to be a free thinking, independant young woman; who am i to say “but you have to have this done.” After all, i like it not one bit when people tell me that *I* have to have surgery for my own good. And actually, what Fran faces next is not THAT much more than cosmetic. Suddenly i’m not at all sure where the lines are drawn or what to say.

And then of course there is all the post-HESFES teen angst - clearly i’m very naive (and clearly they were having much more fun than i was!!!) but was i alone in not noticing the sex, drugs and rock-and-roll??? I thought going to HESFES with a bunch of 0-7’s was tough - i’m going to need valium to take a bunch of teenage girls! (I suppose i could DEAL the Valium.. or find a teen to supply it maybe!?!?!)

Anyway. Fran is totally absorbed in Animal Crossing - I’m quite hooked myself. her reading (and her word estimation) has gone in leaps and bounds. She has cottoned on to the economic side of it really quickly and is definitely getting a LOT out of it. *Impressed* The last couple of days she has come down in the morning and launched straight into her “normals” - she is really enjoying Toady Times Tables and seems to be getting the hang of how they “work” now - in fact, today i was very impressed by her using maths in Animal Crossing - “hmmmm… 3×4 is 12 plus 2 is 14 - look mummy! I have 14 bits of paper!” - i know its not much, but it does give me a thrill to see them make the connections from paper to real life all on their own.

We’ve also been using some of the Jolly Phonics factual books (i do laugh that this series is given the cosy name of “non-fiction”, factual presumably being too scary!) - the last couple of days she has read about shells and lizards and now wants to do “projects” on both - argh! And then this evening - “mummy, now i’m 7, i think i’d like to learn to cook and also do experiments” so we have agreed tomorrow to sit down and work out exactly what she’d like to learn and how. I’m currently on a quest for interesting patterned stitches to do on Binca with her.

Ammi is back to her normal self (lol) but had a nice day with J today, Maddy is still deaf as a post, must call doctor about that… Josie seems to have grown even MORE!!!

MUST get to the allotment tomorrow.

While debating with Max just now, who was gonig to go to the Post Office with all my parcels, i mentioned that if i went, he had to feed Josie her solids. Which he hates doing. And it occurred to us that this time 7 years ago, we were trying to work out how on earth to get liquids into a baby, never mind solids.

My mind has been occupied today, not with lingering regrets about the way that day went, but with the tragedy linked to from Sarah’s blog, the death of Toni’s daughter, a man i know only in passing from comment boxes but who i nonetheless feel quite bereft for. And reading the comments from grieving schoolfriends is very raw, even now, for me. Those feelings can be awoken like they only happened yesterday.

So today i choose to celebrate the fact that i have a beautiful, brave and wonderful daughter, who has reached the age of 7, passed all those operations that seemed such mountains once and now heads towards the final stage of a process that seemed insurmountable, 7 years ago today.

For just a very few days, i kept a record of my thoughts in a notebook that Max went and bought for me and i think now i’d like to put them somewhere where they can’t be lost. They are far from earth shatteringly interesting, but they have a feeling of something about them which i am glad to remember.

A Diary for Frances.

You have been as good as gold, not even bruised. Every time you look at me, your eyes are asking “What’s going on?” I love you so much.

I didn’t write anymore, i think i must have got too busy. Collect your tissues on the way out

Frances’s cleft lip story.

Frances’s Birth Story.