Money, money, money

With daddy being home, there was quite a lot going on today.

I took Bean, 9, into town to buy some presentation bags for his crayons he has made. He packaged them up when he got home We also needed to collect the books that he ordered from the library and he had £20 to spend in the supermarket (as promised a few weeks ago.) We also went shopping for items for our Samaritans Purse boxes. Bean only spent half of the money and bought: monster munch crisps; skips; four chocolate doughnuts; a cake each from the bakery counter; a bag of chocolate coins; He purposefuly bought multipacks and made sure that there was enough for all the smalls to have too.

Pumpkin, 7, had been planning all week to go on a bike ride with daddy. Plum wanted to go to. When it came to it he said he was not feeling well and wanted to stay home. He hadn't moved from the sofa all morning Two very unusual things for him. So, he didn't go on a bike ride and suggested that tomorrow would be a good idea. Pumpkin spent most of the day watching Pokemon until after the medicine kicked in and then he perked up a little and played with Bean.

Plum, 4, went out on the tag along with daddy for the first time and absolutely loved it. They went to the play park together.

Bean, Plum, and Pippin put together their Christmas boxes.
We ended the day with sparklers and stories and Pumpkin falling asleep on the sofa.

Neither of the girls have slept well. They are full of cold and coughing and not breathing well.

Changing rhythms

In terms of learning our weekends are no different to any other day, in terms of the rhythm of our days the weekend does not change things but having daddy home opens up possibilities that i can't orchestrate on my own. Today it was mummy going to the optician for an eye test and new glasses (as my current ones are broken) Daddy was left home with the smalls getting the dressed and a picnic ready to go to Box Hill and meet friends.  We spent five hours in the cold mist/warm sun/ autumnal shade on the nature trail. We didn't make it all the way around and, although the smalls and their friends had a great time playing forts on/in various wooden structures on the way around, Bean was upset that we didn't make it as far as the rope swings, so we have agreed to return soon. home to a roast dinner and a film. tonight was Disney's Robin Hood.

Sunday is church day in our house. This week i packed pens and colouring/activity books in everyone's bags. It worked out well except Plum didn't have her own pens. It definitely shows on a Sunday morning that we rarely have to be up and ready to do things in a morning. Pumpkin was very tired. We came home earlier than normal because he was ready to leave. Pumpkin picked up a large leaf from church and we looked up what it was when we got home, an american red oak.
In the afternoon i took Bean shoe shopping. He is currently wearing two mismatched crocks of different sizes. He has his feet measured (size 1 1/2) and we found a pair of trainers that he likes. Plum came with us and we played on the cedar tree before buying kinder eggs and coming home. Plum is keen to play lots of sweety games this week, carve pumpkins and a melon.
Daddy went out with Pumpkin on a bike ride and then took Pumpkin, Bean and Plum to the green with their bikes. Plum rode her bike, with stabilisers, for the first time.

Plum has slept three nights in her own room on her own. she creeps back to our bed in the early morning. Last night she fell asleep cuddling mummy and daddy as we put lydia to bed in our bed.

I want to ride my bicycle

Pumpkin has been thoroughly enjoying riding his bike and missed it yesterday so requested a ride today. We planned on going to the park. It has a nice big hill to ride down and has helped Bean enormously in learning to ride. We also planned some strawberry picking. This years lack of effort in the garden means that the planting, growing, harvesting cycle has not occurred at all (although the fruit trees are beginning to produce) so I thought a trip to a strawberry field might rectify some of the lack. And lastly we arranged to meet friends again at Warnham Nature Reserve to spot some of those illusive frogs. 


Fa#3 was still with us and we packed a picnic and headed off to the park, only to be reminded when we were packing the bikes that Pumkin has a flat back tyre. I found two bicycle pumps and we set up on the pavement outside our house and attempted to pump it up however we couldn't get either option to work and the tyre remaind flat flat flat. I tentively suggested he took his scooter which initially went down really well, until we arrived at the park and he decided he really could ride his bike with a flat tyre. There were a few tears and a little ride in the buggy before we got to the top of the hill and he decided that riding his scooter would be okay. Bean was initially worried about going down the hill on his pedal bike but I ran along side him and he did amazingly well, making it all the way to the bottom without falling off or panicking. This, of course, is something I couldn't have done if fa#3 hadn't been there too. We went and fed the ducks. I hadn't packed much bread for them as they are often over fed and not hungry, today they seemed eager to eat all we had. We then turned back towards the car bt Pumpkin wanted to go to the maze. The boys ran around the maze, I fed Plum and the rain began. Just some drizzle to begin with but it slowly and steadily became more than drizzle. We headed back to the play area, toiletted, changed nappy and lost Pumpkin. We found him back at the pool watching the swimmers and I explained that we were worried about him and he had gone too far away. He was most unconcerned himself. 


We had a quick pit stop at the post office to collect a parcel and the rain came down some more. We made the decision not to go strawberry picking and went and lunched in the car at the nature reserve. 


Considering all the rain that we have had so far this year this is the first time that we have picnicked in the car. Very British. My consoling thought was 'at least we're out and about!' I had also packed our waterproofs, not just rain coats but all in one waterproofs. We put them on, transferred a sleeping Plum into the buggy, who suprisingly remained asleep and went for the second time this week for a walk with our friends to try and find some baby frogs. It was perfect weather for frog spotting. We walked the same route as before and a couple of froglets were spotted by our friends' mummy but no one else got to see them. We did see the biggest slug that I have ever seen though, it gave me the shivers! And I feel a mini project on amphibians coming on. Bean thought it was 'amazing' that some animals could live on the ground and in the water. Creation is amazing. As always the leaflet including the map of the grounds was popular and Bean managed to locate us and our route on the map. Pumpkin's evaluation of the trip was 'we haven't seen any frogs mummy, that's disappointing.' this is the third or fourth time he's used the word disappointing this week and I'm hoping that it's just a new word that he's excersising and not representative of his overal evaluation on life!!!  


Daddy's coming home a little later from work tonight than normal and it will be the first time that I'm going to be faced with bedtime on my own. All three smalls head to bed within an hour of each other and this results in washing, stories, changing, feeding and nursing and bathing all happening at the same time. With daddy here we have got a rhythm in place which works well for us at the moment. Thinking it might be an out of step rhythm tonight and hoping that we all cope with it.

Update: Daddy came home at his regular time so all is well. We had a post dinner flurry of activity from Bean including: catching ants in his pooter, writing and reading two stories, dressing up as a motorbike man and riding around the garden and making the flower petal wheel that we picked up yesterday.

What a beautiful day

Monday 25th June

A double park day ment that we got to meet up with five home ed families today. One reason why I love Mondays. The boys requested bikes at Horsham Park today so we arranged them into the boot of the car and had our first ride around for months. Bean has not lost the knack at all and even managed to push himself off a couple of times. He did have one large fall but after walking a while got back on and rode away. Pumpkin persevered and slowly walked along from the car to the play area and to the duck pond and back. This is progress from previous trips and I remember going through a similar process with Bean. 

Before we had even left the house this morning the boys had played an epic game of lego.

And Plum and I had a play with the camera phone.

During one of the many discussion I had today with other home ed mum's we talked about a babies need to cry when they are tired. Their inability to recognise 'I'm tired' and just go to sleep. As if to prove me insane Plum quietly dropped of in her chair this afternoon and I didn't even notice, not a tear or a cry to be heard!

A rather serial moment occured early evening when Bean asked to play schools. He had two bags packed with things he would need: an indoor ball, an outdoor ball, notepad and pen, various tickets for outings, wallet and money. I found myself being asked to take the role of teacher! de-ja vu. He led me through what happened at school and he did some writting, where he asked to copy the names of people in our family and he got ready to go on a school trip which involved sorting and counting the money he had.  

Bean took it upon himself to 'practice my swirls.' I remember doing endless pages of dotted patterns at school as a child and it goes to show that these ideas have their origins somewhere in a child's natural pattern of learning, they just got a bit lost on their way around the school system.


After Plum and Bean went to bed, Pumpkin woke up! We have made chocolate cake and porridge for his dinner and he has built towers and played games on my phone. It's almost like having a different child around when 1:1.