The summer holidays: Day 1.

These holidays are going to be veeeerrrrryyyy long. Today like a Good Mum, I took the boys out and got them a new paddling pool as the one they had was so small they could only fit one foot each in it. Then we spent ages filling it up with a watering can as the dog we had for 24 hours ate the hose. Ten minutes in, the youngest hit the eldest over the head with a bucket and that was the end of that. So by 11.30 on  Day 1 they were stuck in front of the tv! I am a terible mother. But at least it's quiet! What are we going to do tomorrow? I'll have no voice left by the weekend from all the shouting.

Facebook: only for the good times?

We had a bereavement in the family last week. It was a big shock and still hasn't sunk in. The oddest thing is that there is a Facebook account for the person, and it's still active, and it is compelling to keep looking at it. People have started putting up tributes and photos, which is nice, but a bit weird to me. And on my own account, I don't really want to mention it as firstly I don't want to look like I am fishing for sympathy, and I have a mixed collection of friends on there and I don't necessarily want them all to know. I didn't post anything for a while, but now I'm back to my usual pithy remarks and putting photos up of the Olympic Torch going past the bottom of the road. But then I think, to people that do know, I must look bad making jokes and going on as normal. But what else can you do? Even if I put something on there about what happened, eventually everyone would go back to the usual dross that we all like to stick online.

Social media vastly complicates the bad times. But it can also help, as lots of friends I didn't know have sent lovely messages. But some people also like to speculate about stuff, and really have no thought for the people that could be upset about it. And do you know how hard it is to close down an account without the password? Bloody hard that's what. And you can't even really close it down, they "memorialise" it so people can still see it.

I'm going back to pen and paper like a Luddite. Probably. 

If all else fails...

...tell your neighbours to F*** off when they yet again light a bbq while looking at your almost dry washing. Then don't put it out again at the weekend just in case as you don't know what the next step is! Probably guns...

Benjamin Banjamin or Benjanim?

If you want proofreading work, don't email the publishers basically telling them they are shit! You won't get a response...

But really, do I want to work for a company that ignores 5 different spellings of Benjamin?!

The Great Hamster Escape

We now have a hamster, named Hotdog by the boy, which is quite annoying to say, and she is a girl. But hey, at least he didn't go for the other option, Milkshake. Hotdog settled in well, every morning she was waiting by her food bowl for her breakfast. But one morning she wasn't. My first thought was that she was dead, and I was trying to think how to hide it from the boys. But then on further investigation we found one of her tunnels that goes round the outside of the cage had fallen off. Queue panic, there was a hamster on the loose!

Now if you could see my front room, you would appreciate the scale of the problem. Toys, books, boxes of lego. Shit. Everywhere. A perfect hiding place for a canny hamster with a wish for freedom. We had everything up off the floor, while cooing "Hotdog, where are you?" and Littl'un waving a peanut around in the hope she'd pop up and go "oh here I am!". No joy. My dad was due in the evening for the weekend and all I could think was that if we didn't find her then at some point over the weekend Dad was going to be surprised by a hamster popping up out of the sofa and biting him. Probably in the butt.

But the boy had to go to school so I had to abandon Operation Hamster and make breakfast. I went to get the cereal out from under the stairs, and saw something move out of the corner of my eye. The bloody hamster was sitting in a box of coke cans looking at me innocently, her expression was definitely "what?!". And I didn't realise she was so fat as she was pretty easy to spot! She went on quite a journey by the looks of things.

Now she's back in captivity she spends a lot of time looking forlornly at us through the bars, she had a taste of freedom and I think she liked it! I am watching for attempts on the tubes again, she is so fat now she could probably break through them if she had the inclination...

New neighbours: an update

So this week son #1 came running in saying "Emily has just weed behind a bush and she does it all the time, and I am going to marry her". Whoop whoop, just the sort of classy girl I had in mind for a daughter-in-law.

The big fences have gone in, but they are not high enough for my neighbour who is really annoyed by the new neighbours, and he is planning to add trellises on top for maximum height! But to his vast annoyance Emily now hangs out of an upstairs window shouting at my boys, or she has figured out if she bounces really high in her trampoline she can still see them. The fences do help a bit but now we get shouting of "what are you doing? I can't see you?" which is still annoying!

Now the sun is out we are being treated to really loud Lithuanian europop, which while not being as annoying as hippety-hop or gangsta rap, is still annoying. Our neighbours were all really considerate of each other, while I would have loved to have a stereo in the garden blasting out music I never did as I know the neighbours like their peace (apart from the boys which I can't do much about!). But this lot don't give a hoot for anyone else. Living so close to other people is difficult, in London you can never get away from them, and if you get one lot of neighbours that are like that it really ruins your quality of life. I'm just thankful they aren't right next door. Our road had a load of elderly people living on it when we moved here and now they are either moving to retirement homes or off the mortal coil altogether, and I think we were a bit spoilt. I think we might move to a retirement complex next, who can turn down organised bingo and coffee mornings?!

New neighbours: the "highlights"

1. 1 week after moving in, 7 year old girl flashes her boobs at my 5 year old.

2. The weather is nice, all the washing is on the line, practically dry. They light up an extremely smoky bbq apparently directly aimed at our washing. Husband goes mental at them. They just look at him (probably didn't understand a lot of it, from Lithuania, but they definitely got the jist).

3. Week later, washing on line again. Bloke looks directly at it, then at me, then lights very smoky bbq. I say "are you having a bbq?" He grunts. I say for the second time "would you PLEASE tell me next time so my washing doesn't get ruined?". Another grunt which I take for "not on your nelly, I don't give two hoots for your washing".

4. Caught girl encouraging my 2 year old to let himself out of the garden and go to her house, only as he couldn't actually open the gate and was trying to climb over it. I said he was far too young and could she please not encourage him to leave the garden, to which I got loads of arguments. 

5. Now it's nice, the kids are out in the garden lots. Catch the girl telling my 2 year old he is a liar and encouraging him to repeat it. I ask her not to use words like that. Now I have to monitor the kids in the garden constantly, she is always saying things to them that aren't quite appropriate. She is older so my boys are in thrall to whatever she says. 5 year old now has constant attitude too.

6. Ask 5 year old if the girl has shown him her boobs recently. He pauses. "No," he says, much to my (short-lived) relief, "she showed me her bum".

The long and short of all this is that I can't leave the boys in their own garden unsupervised, and she keeps asking the boys over to her house, and I look like the bad guy when I keep saying no. Luckily the neighbour in the middle of all this REALLY hates them and is having 6 ft fences put up on their side this week so at least they won't be able to see her anymore!

You are allowed one phone call...

The school rang me up today to tell that me that Littl'un had bumped heads with someone else at lunchtime, though he was fine, no need for me to go in etc etc. I was sorely tempted to say "well, the last 5 times he bumped his head or came out with a random bruise on his cheek, nobody felt the need to ring me or even tell me about it". I wonder if they have some system, after you've had 5 accidents in 1 term you are allowed a phone call. A bit like criminals and lawyers...

Can you be too obsessive?!

So finally I managed to get a publishing house to let me do some proofreading for them. Not paid yet, it's a test to see if I'm any good. So I spent hours trawling through the proofs, it was supposed to be a straight reprint of the hardback so they weren't expecting many errors. I found quite a few, that had also made it through to the hardback. I am so obsessive it scares me sometimes. So they'll either hire me on the spot or say I'm too picky and would cost too much with all the errors I pick up! I just hope the person who proofread the hardback isn't the one who sent me the test or they'll really hate me! I am so made for this job. Fingers crossed!

Perfect boy

Litt'un #2 had his 2 year old check up today. It went very smoothly, apparently his height and weight are "perfect", his development is fine, no problems. This worries me more than the time they said he was deaf. They must be missing something...

Don't wanna go to school today...

It's all going down at school this week. Since a new head started back in September, the unrest has been growing steadily. A total new system of learning was implemented overnight, everything was changed, teachers started leaving, parents started complaining. Then the head was removed overnight, and escorted off the premises. Nobody knows why or what happened. It is so frustrating! We had to put up with all the upheaval and upset kids and teachers being off sick as they didn't want to come into work. Trying to guess what happened is hilarious though, we've gone from pagan rituals in the staffroom to sleeping with someone inappropriate. It's probably a lot less interesting. If we ever find out!

I like to move it move it

I think both my kids have OCD. The amount of times we have watched Madagascar since Christmas is ridiculous. And they show no signs of moving on to anything else. I know it word for word. And at zumba she has a new routine to "I like to move it move it" which is just taking the piss.

Pity party for one

So recently me and Mr Babs brought up the subject of having another kid. Yes we are crazy to even consider it. 2 is ok, 3 is a lot of arguments waiting to happen. And while the thought of having another little baby is tempting (until they start talking they are generally lovely) I realised that I was actually quite looking forward to getting back to work. Being a stay-at-home mum is fine, it is lovely to spend time with your kids growing up. But I've done it for 5 years now and it's getting a bit stale. I don't talk to anyone apart from other mums who only talk about their kids. Or shout at my own kids. That is it. I don't even talk to Mr Babs anymore as I have little to talk about. And we are super broke.

But then wondering what work I could go back to is also hard work. Ideally I need a part-time, term-time only job, but library jobs are SO not like that! And I miss libraries. What DO people do with their kids in the summer holidays!? I have no idea. My mum stayed at home until we were in secondary school so I have nothing to compare with. Working in a school would be the ideal option but I don't want to be a teacher or a dinner lady. I could do shifts in a supermarket but then I feel like I've wasted all my education and library qualifications.

So what does an out of work librarian with 2 kids do?!?! Having another kid seems the easiest option at this point!

School

Our school is in trouble. On special measures for probably 2 years now, but now we have a new head and everything is looking up finally. But this improvement brings lots of paperwork, questionnaires, letters galore, ofsted reports etc. Yesterday Littl'un brought home a questionnaire about what we think of the school. The questions go something like this:

"My child is taught well at this school"
"My child's lessons are not disrupted by bad behaviour"
"My child is making good progress at this school".

Now how am I supposed to answer those without having a spy camera in Littl'un's bag?! It's hard enough to get out of Littl'un what he did in a day (mainly "nothing") without asking if he feels he is being taught well! He is 4. The most I know is that in his reading book at home I have to write detailed comments about how he is doing when we read every night. The teacher puts a sticker in his book when they read at school. No comments about progress or anything.

But I have to return the form to his teacher so I can't put anything too damning in case they take it out on him! And I doubt if I wrote a 1000 word essay on what I thought needed improving they would do anything about it.

Click and collect

Littl'un turns 5 next weekend (how did THAT happen?!?!) and I ordered his present from a well known supermarket. I decided to do that new click and collect service they offer, to make sure I didn't waste a trip to the shop only to find it wasn't in stock. The premise of this is that you pay online, and they contact you when it's ready to collect. I've done it a few times with other shops and it's been really easy. This time I realised I hadn't been contacted in well over a week, so I rang them up to check. "Oh yeah," the lady told me cheerily, "when it arrives in store they usually don't bother to scan the packages so the emails don't get sent". And this is normal?! Oh and it gets better. I asked how long they keep them in store before returning them, as if you don't know it's there you aren't going to go and collect it are you? Other stores have a 7 day policy before they refund you and return the goods. Not this one. "Oh, one time someone's stuff was in the store for over a month before we realised!" giggled the lady on the phone. And this is funny?!?! Honestly.

Happy New Year!

Ah New Year's Eve. What am I doing I hear you cry? Well shortly I will be getting the kids to bed, then ordering a takeaway and opening a bottle of fizz in honour of the occasion! And I am really looking forward to it. Hell, I might even go to bed before midnight :)

Happy New Year to you all! I hope you are having a much more rock and roll New Year's Eve than me. One year I might even make it out of the house to an establishment that plays music and dance the night away! You never know what's around the corner!

Happy Birthday!

Littl'un #2 turns 2 today, I have no idea where the time has gone. He celebrated with a packet of Magic Stars! We had the family over at the weekend for his birthday so today seems a bit flat - but I'm sure he doesn't know! He got so many presents I have no room for them, and we still have Christmas to get through. I might have to rewrap them again :)

And talking of the weekend, tell me this. If you were invited over for a child's birthday, and to stay the night, would you come and not even bring a card?! One of my relatives did, didn't even say Happy Birthday. Hell, they could have drawn a card if they didn't want to buy one. It's made me really angry but obviously I can't say anything as in our family we are all so polite to each other it hurts, then the minute we say goodbye we start ripping into each other! I might write a sitcom about it, you couldn't make half of what we have to go through up!

Jingle Bells

I just went to see Littl'un at his christmas singalong at school. He was so good bless him! He's spent the whole of the last week insisting he didn't know any of the songs, yet he was right up there at the front singing his heart out! Most of the other kids were looking at their feet shuffling and half-heartedly singing, not my one! He'll be on the X Factor this time next year! I don't know where he gets it from, I refuse to sing in front of his dad due to some random paranoia that he'd leave me if I was a terrible singer, so the stage presence must be from his dad!

Chocolate santa

In a fit of helpfulness I wrapped 40 selection boxes for the school PTA last weekend. I am very sad and love wrapping and I enjoyed it! It's for the Santa's grotto at the school fair. Littl'un wants to go to the fair and I said "yeah but we don't need to go and see Santa do we?" as they want £1.50 per kid! "Oh yes we do," said Littl'un, "I want my chocolate". The boy ain't silly!

Sparkly!

A new phenomenon has appeared in Celebrity World. Crystal white sparkling straight as you like teeth. It is quite disconcerting. It totally takes your attention away from whatever they are trying to sell you as all you can do is gaze at the lovely sparkly things. Cee Lo Green was the latest I noticed, he started singing and that was it. Never heard a note. But his teeth are lovely. I think it's going over the top now, it totally takes any personality away, what's wrong with slightly off white a bit wonky teeth I ask you? And they are SOOO perfect,  it's like the very expensive celebrity dentist actually got a spirit level in there while he was at it. As soon as any wannabe makes it (ie they have enough dosh to sort them out or the management insist on it) it's out with the normal teeth and in with the SPARKLY teeth. How long till they start sticking things on them again? Diamantes or teeth tattoos? You watch, they'll be advertising their latest single/book/film on their gnashers before long so all they actually have to do is open their mouths...