Amelie lost her first tooth last night; rather impressively she has recently been sporting a shark like double row of teeth, having fully grown adult teeth behind still fully there baby teeth. But eventually one has been squeezed out and last night she got to put her first tooth under her pillow As a credit “crunching” (boom boom!) double whammy, Fran also lost a tooth, so the poor tooth fairy was £2 down last night

*rolls entire head in preparation for this story!*

We’ve had 2 cousins here for a few days (with parents) and before they left today Maddy took them out into the garden to play with the rabbits. The rest of us were inside; Lou and i had been chatting covering, among other things, the extent to which our 2 boy rabbits would cheerfully rip each others heads off. Fiver (easiest to have out as small and obliging about coming back… as a rule) was milling about in the garden with Maddy, Izzy and Millie and all seemed well until there were sudden screams that he had got behind the big rabbits hutch, found a hole and was now on the wrong side of our fence. We back on to the showground so, fortunately, the road is very quiet but unfortunately, the huge expanse of grass on the other side of the big metal fence on the other side of the road probably looks quite appealing to a rabbit.

All the grown ups dashed downstairs and out into the garden, Fran was screaming inconsolably that “my Fiver” had gone, Izzy was shrieking, Maddy was shrieking and Amelie was in hysterics. I, somewhat to my surprise, managed to get over our 6ft fence in one swift movement (no really, i did!) in the hope of grabbing him quickly but was barefoot, which was bloody cold. Max followed me while Joe and Lou tried to console the children and stop Izzy following us (not successfully, she got stuck on the top of the fence and then wouldn’t move). Not sure what else J and L were doing but Izzy was convinced she had seen Fiver head off down the road. Lots of rabbits out there, many tend to have the dreaded Mxy, so my heart was sinking. Maddy was screaming and utterly ignoring my requests to get my shoes for me. Max and i did a fairly despairing hunt on the wrong side of the fence (which is flat on that side, so i had no hope of getting over it to my various hysterical children) and i was still vaguely hoping i’d get my shoes to save me walking all the way back round barefoot. (I did eventually, Maddy launched them into orbit and nearly brained me!)

After a minute or 2 Fiver was then spotted in the garden, which he had presumably never left at all Joe must have managed to scoop him up and just as everyone was calming down, he unwittingly chucked him into the wrong run, not realising WHY we have 2 runs (see head ripping bit above) and then got stuck balanced half on the run and half on the fence trying to rescue Izzy. MORE hysterical screaming from the kids as Smartie and Fiver immediately start to try and rip each others heads off, with Joe looking bemused and confused, Lou yelling at him to get in and stop them and me and Max still on the wrong side of the fence.

Fortunately no harm done in the end (no mean feat as they sounded to be really going for it and Fiver has been fairly hurt by Smartie before), though all the kids needed counselling and both the girl rabbits looked like they were going to march their respective husbands inside for a good telling off!!

*Chuckle*

Despite my moaning, the run up to Christmas was nothing like as bad as last year, but it did seem to go on a long time; i spent the last 2 days manning the phone and email from home and organising last minute fixes for problems/lost items/wrongly sent/wrongly ordered bits and bobs. Considering we were still sending out hundreds a day right up to the weekend before, the actual number of fixes was small, it just felt a bit hectic. I had to go in on the Tuesday, having not really organised enough cover for those last 24 hours, but it was okay.

Tuesday night we collected Max from work and took all the kids to see Madagascar 2 at a nicer than average theatre near Huntingdon. Took the opportunity to mention to Max that while browsing the NCT Peterborough leaflet in the doctors that morning (not something i’ve been able to do for a long time) i noticed that not one of the local birth announcements mentioned Peterborough Mat Unit; apparently ladies who know in Pboro, all go to Hinchingbrooke. Says rather a lot i think. He looked politely non-committal about it Film was good enough, kids had fun and we all felt like the holiday had started.

Christmas Eve needed some shopping doing so we all popped back into town; Fran and Maddy had eye tests, the result being that Maddy who wants them doesn’t really need them but has been issued with some nearly plain glass ones to see if they help her cut out the “life noise” that distracts her. She is thrilled.

Fran, who resolutely DOES NOT want them is really quite short sighted (i was a bit shocked) and has to go back before she starts school; she just scraped through and the optician doesn’t want her eyes to give up just yet but she will almost certainly need them in the Autumn. She was cross. We did however try some pairs on her and found several purple pairs that looked lovely, so perhaps by the time it comes, she’ll have got over it. Feel a bit sorry for her though, given she will undoubtedly need braces in the next year too. Oh well.

Spent that afternoon and evening doing wrapping with the girls for either each of us or for sisters. They were so happy to have gifts for each other. F and M also did stockings for their favourite toys, which was rather sweet. I was touched the next day that they handed gifts to sisters before asking for ones for themselves and opened toy stockings before they opened their own. I do rather love the growing sense of Christmas being about giving that they are coming to. Max and i managed to have a row about whether i had overdone the buying, prompting me to suggest HE does it next year but in the end we decided that actually it was all quite even and not too over the top. I didn’t think we went mad (althoguh plenty of them were fairly pricy i suppose) but at least, except for Playmobil, we avoided endless BITS. I decided this year i didn’t mind spending but i wasn’t spending on crud, cheap tat or things i would end up shouting at people to tidy up.

6 peoples presents.

Rubens Barn doll for each child, as requested.

I swear Fran’s biggest smile of the day was for a Latin book.

Amelie is thrilled with a camera.

Maddy has a sponsor a monkey kit, Fran has a Build a School sponsorship pack and Amelie and Josie got to name a star.

Josie was taken in by the 3rd hand DS Lite and has played Mum I Did It! constantly.

Amelie got the joke when we gave her a DHL van – “I can do parcels now!!!!!”

Fran moved into AC:CF Puddley.

Josie, lover of “bits”, got a PlayMobil house that closes and carries plus a “car like ours!”

Maddy set about creating an Egyptian world complete with blue silk Nile, paper boats and temple made of white paper and boxes.

Josie.

Max did a fab job of dinner, as usual and we had a lovely Christmas Day, very peaceful and very us. I do love our Christmases; it suits us to just be together after the busy period, suits the kids to just be and we’ve amassed some lovely traditions. I love that the kids bring their stockings into our room and that we have a “one night only” twinkly tree in our room. I love that there is always one present downstairs from FC with a letter, i love that no one goes into the living room unless we are all ready. I was thinking yesterday that so many of our Christmas traditions have come from my online/become life friends. I would never have done St Nicholas without HE-Land and yet this year it felt right to abandon the Church visit in favour of talking about the truths of generosity and selfless giving and thoughtfulness as love. A couple of years ago we collected Christmas Day outfits from somewhere and this year we did Nic’s Christmas Eve pyjamas.

Boxing Day we planned to spend alone too but a sudden change of plan meant we spent it with my mum, dad, brother, sister, BIL and nieces. It was LOVELY, particularly as Josie and Rowan are now BIG MATES.

Rowan.

Ella.

Nana.

Auntie Greer.

Uncle Rich (he, me and Josie bemoaned the “huge Taylor head that doesn’t fit cracker hats” syndrome).

Grampty (he is less blurry in real life).

Professor Granny and her minions.

Josie again.

I had a lovely few days with some great presents; good ds games, the posh version of Beedle the Bard, BIIIIIG box of Lush, pyjamas and books. Loved my brother giving us a LoveFilm membership too plus a fab plant from my parents (i was asked to think of something i wanted but wouldn’t get round to buying) and lots of lovely smellies.

Tomorrow we have guests arriving and i’ll have to pop into work as after Monday the unit space is shut for repairs until Friday; we’ve had quite a few orders; bizarre really.

Happy Christmas everyone, hope it was a good one.

I never got round to decent photos of this before so here are some views of the girls’ rooms now that they are all finished. As they got a good clean and tidy this weekend (the rooms, not the kids, though it wouldn’t hurt to wash them either!), it seemed an appropriate moment to take some

Fran and Maddy have one room with the same furniture but in different colours and so the 2 ends are distinctly separate and “theirs”. The bed would be better if it could be central but it can’t… so the top and bottom have bed clothes to match their end of the room.

This is Fran’s end.

And this is Maddy’s end.

Amelie and Josie have this rather delicious room, with a favourite animal to personalise each side.

I do love the way it all worked; it’s enough to make me not want to move until they grow out of them!

A couple of years ago i got some new glasses, but didn’t really find they helped all that much after the initial “oooh, that’s a bit better” and after a while i gave up wearing them. (Josie also tore the arm off them and i sat on a pair, neither of which helped.) Today i had my eyes tested again and before she started, i asked her to please listen while i explained that i was finding certain elements of my eyesight a bit disquieting and that although i knew my prescription was still slight, the fact that i’d recently had a car accident made me want to get someone to listen. She did, which was very good of her, and i explained that one eye felt constantly physically tired and like it was working too hard and that i felt very unbalanced a lot of the time because my eyes seem to focus at a slightly different rate. I’ve always had slightly different eye prescription ( i assume most people do) and a slight astigmatism in one eye.

She did various extra tests that i haven’t had done before and spent a bit of time working out what eye does what and it turns out that my left eye (the one that always feels tired and like it does all the work) is 80% dominant and my right eye is doing almost nothing at all, virtually a passenger on my face. My brain is only using my left eye. Now as i’m left anded, she says, this isn’t too bad because my body is set up to be coordinated on that side; if i had been right handed someone would probably have noticed earlier as my eyes would have struggled.

UNFORTUNATELY, it is my left eye that is 3/4 of a point out with the astigmatism, while my right eye is almost perfect. I snuffled and said all the people i know/live with/was brought up by with 6 or 7 point prescriptions laugh at this pissy little amount of wrong-eyed-ness to which she said “yes, well, they’d soon notice if someone altered their prescription by 3/4 of a point!” And so now i have specs that i’m supposed to wear all the time, not just for driving, as my poor old left eye is all worn out. FORTUNATELY, i found some rather lovely ones that make me feel positively sassy, they were made in an hour and when i put them on i actually gasped because the writing on the wall in front of me instantly went from fuzzy grey to sharp black! Even more fortunately, the prescription itself is slight enough that i wasn’t actually driving without when i should have had them but i can tell that everything is a damn sight (boom boom) better now.

Even better, this nice optician is going to see Maddy this week and prescribe her plain glass glasses. She been wearing a black plastic pair constantly for months now and they seem to really help her sense of well being; i don’t know if it is the weight on her face or the sense of the world being framed and under control, but the affect has been noticeable and for the sake of a pair of specs, i’m prepared to try it as she’s been finding the world tough lately. If i can just rid them of nits, my work is done. I say THEM as Fran now has them too; she didn’t, on Wednesday, when i combed her thoroughly and then went to work requesting she and Maddy please both tie up their hair and avoided wrestling – but they both chose to ignore me and now she has them too. Mumma does know best, you see. (As an aside, i made our Polish Cleaner laugh this week by saying that St Nicholas came 3 days late this year sue to untidy bedrooms! She was horrified!)

On Friday i went out to work and left them with the usual EC, music, tidy your room, brush your hair, pack for the weekend list – when i got home they hadn’t done any of that but Fran had learned to do piecharts in Excel – she had one of how she had spent her day, which unfortunately for the girl who “hadn’t had time” to complete my list, showed 32% watching TV!!!! Still, the piechart was educational

Sob story of the week is that i took them to see Father Christmas, conveniently located in a Tesco near us.. Josie wouldn’t speak to him as she “hadn’t realised he was actually REAL!!!!” However, i did nearly cry when he asked the older ones what they wanted and they all said “nothing really, we just want mummy to be at home….” On Monday this week they staged a mutiny and refused to eat dinner until i came home to eat it with them It has been hard. Still, while we were walking round town today we were thinking that if we were a shop and 600 individual sales rang through the tills each day when there were only ever 3 people serving in the shop at a time, you’d think you were pretty busy, which puts into perspective just how many people we have sent items to this Christmas – only 2 making me cry isn’t so bad.

The kids are away and we’ve finished work (nearly, 2 people made me cry yesterday) and all that remains in the last stuff on Monday which MF is in for; we’ve had the house cleaned, we’ve actually bought the kids (and ourselves) some presents and we’re almost ready for the end. I’m over the moon because in a flash of brilliance, i have thought of (and got) the most perfect present for Amelie Amazingly 150 people have placed orders since i finished last night I’m still not sure how to respond to the email i had today from someone who placed an order on the 18th, chose Special Delivery postage, had the item by 9am the next day and then emailed me to complain that she was disgusted to have to pay p&p and i should be ashamed of myself for making a profit out of selling toys that are for children. That would be me the charity then?