‘…a pixie, the faeries, a grumpy troll and the witch’

Hmmmm, didn’t get much sleep last night, the constant jabbing of Hermionie’s foot in my ribs/arm/side/head just didn’t make for night of blissful sleep, the thing I’m more pee’d off about about is that it didn’t occur to me to move/wake Alex and ask hime to put her back in her bed/put her back in my bed myself Hey, ho.

So, woke up at lunch time after Alex left me to sleep (he had to get up to pre-empt Hermionie from smearing a poo-bomb night nappy all over the bathroom ). Kids had been mooching as usual and listening to music. Natalie had drawn a couple of pictures and DS’d, Hermionie had been making sure that the living room floor wasn’t visible for toys!. Natalie did 4 pages of MME, 1 of EME and I left her to do some SME while I went to the doctor to sort my earache out, drop papers off to the solicitor and pick up some Tesco bits. Came home to find Natalie playing with her moon-sand and Hermionie still finding patches on the living-room floor that needed covering with toys!

We all tidied up together and set-off for S&G’s, via the golden arches (’cos we don’t say Maccie D’s out loud!) - is it too much to ask to get the order right??? I ask for one of their promotion burgers - one of the ones with the bacon - hmmmmmm, baaacon - but no cheese and extra onions (I order like this ‘cos I always get a fresh burger - tee hee - also like to order the kids burgers without the green things, ‘cos they’ll make me eat them and I don’t like them - again fresh burgers!) what do i get - promotion burger, no cheese, take the p**s with the onions and NO BACON!! urrggh It’s always the small things that bring me down.

Anyway got to S&G’s (K&J at S Mum’s) and gave G his birthday present, which he was more than pleased with. Ha Ha! now we’re all old. We don’t have many friends - OK, we have 2, S&G, S I have know since school and G, well G is S’s other half so……….

So, out of the four of us, G was the last to turn 30! Ha Ha Natalie managed to con G into a quick game of Wii Sports and both kids managed to con S&G into many drinks and sugery treats! Took the kids new sleeping bags to test out on the sofas of S’s conservatory watching Ice Age 2 and Heffalumps (again!), DS’ing and not falling asleep :roll:,wel Hermionie did, but not till just past 10, Natalie ‘couldn’t sleep’ apparantly.

So Alex, me, S&G watched a Bottom Marathon - well, Nos 1, 2 and half of 5 ‘cos we’re all getting old and we were knackered!

…. I was lying on a very uncomfortable hospital bed, waiting for yet another lot of pessary’s to take effect while nurses and midwifes used me as a pin cushion all in preparation of the arrival of my first born, Natalie, my big girl. She arrived at 11:45pm - so only just on the 28th, it was a Bank Holiday Monday the day after and because she was unexpectedly small, Alex had to rush around trying to find nappies to fit a premmie baby!

So here she is now 7 years later, looking gorgeous. She is very loving and giving, is a great (help to me with her…) big-sister to Hermionie, loves to know ‘everything’ and be involved with ‘everything’, is very clever for her age (I think anyway, but hey, this 7 year experiment is my only source of information so I think I’m biased!) is a Doctor Who nut, is looking like she might want to be a Vet, is Home-educated and I’m just very proud of her.

Hermionie has also been building up to this day, she is soooooo excited about her sisters birthday (well, ok, maybe she’s excited about the BBQ!), she has been saying ‘apay you you’, which translated from troll-ese is ‘Happy Birthday to you’, she get’s really excited when she gets a chance to ‘Happy Birthday’ and she really loves her sister - well, most of the time!

We decided to have a BBQ for her birthday months ago, when we thought that by 28th May - surely it would resemble spring-come-summer - HA! - were we wrong - at least we have the shelter of the patched-up gazebo.

I had to dip out fairly early on to check on my Mum, who - after talking to my desperate-to-phone-me-for-help brother - wasn’t right! I checked on her, woke my Dad and phoned the surgery to get her checked on, after a while she was looking better so I left my Dad to get her to the surgery. Later my brother phoned to say she seemed OK now but was on her way to the surgery.

Got back to find everyone had arrived and S was handling everything indoors (thankx!) with Alex tending to the BBQ, while FiL wibbled on some more!

So, we had most of our close family and our friends round to celebrate Natalie’s day, lots of food, lots of DSing, PS2ing on Buzz Junior Robo Jam, a present disguised in a box full of paper confetti that will surely reach the far flung four corners of my house come the end of the week, kids playing, kids laughing, kids crying, kids screaming, party poppers, pin-the-eye-stalk-on-the-dalek, home-made messy fairy cakes (our speciality ), a home-made-triple-layer-marshmallowy-choctastic-birthday-cake (not my speciality but I was proud of it!), a small black poodle with more food dropped on the floor than he knew what to do with and chunky ginger furr-ball of the feline variety that may have gotten a smidgen to close to the BBQ.

Natalie got lots of nice pressies (which from a 7 years olds POV is what Birthdays are about I guess!), although I had picked almost all her pressies from others, so no surprises on my part. We did a pressie hunt for her pressies from us - it went down very well, underestimated her with the clues though - they were far too easy - nice to do something different though. Her biggie was the DS which we managed to get on ebay with a few games and accessories in there as well - she didn’t know she getting it, she wanted one of her own but we told her a porky pie about not being able to afford it - well - we can’t really afford it but she wants to sell her old Gameboys and games - I reckon we should get almost all the DS cost back if we sell them at a boot. She also got a card from her Rainbow Friends and our next door neighbours (who put a £1 coin for every year in the card as well , Natalie wanted to say thankyou straight away so we dropped some cake off for them to enjoy.

I hope she had a nice day this year, when I put her to put, she said she had had a nice day, but she does have a habit of saying the things she thinks I need to hear so I don’t feel bad, then I feel bad ‘cos I don’t know if she’s had a good day or is just saying for me - and round the circle we go.

Anyway - Happy 7th Birthday my darling - enjoy being 7.

 Popped to Tesco for brekkie and to get the food in for Monday. Needed more laminator pouches to print some montessori goodies.

Went to Staunton today (we surely must have used our annual allowance of visits by now - even though we all have season passes ) Because of the looming half-term, there were a few activities arranged but TBO I begrudge paying £2 for face-painting which I can do at home and the crafts cost more to do there than if I had bought the craft pack at Tesco -nevermind.

We had a lovely time today - as we always do there. Natalie got to feed one of the orphaned lambs (she is still busting to hold one!) and Natalie & Hermionie got to stroke a very young orphaned kid (a goat who apparantly thought he was a sheep?). Natalie got talking to the staff & volunteers there (like she always does!) about the lambs and make a joke about her Daddy wanting to ‘eat Barry’ (Barry is our favourite animal at Staunton - the cockerel!) - the man there (who I though was a vet but isn’t?) said that ‘Barry’s not too bright - the grass that Barry’s on has more brains than Barry’ Poor Barry - we love him anyway - we found out he’s a Brahma Chicken. We saw all the usual culprits there - Antonio the Alpaca Cria, Tony the Goat, 3 peacocks all showing off at the same time, an escapee turkey (Charles) and we even managed to shock-horror miss out the park today without too much whinging! Had a box I stuffed full of any food I could find packed lunch and got to look around the vegetables plots there - really wish we could get that allotment! (or least get my b**t in gear and dedicate a space in the garden but then that would mean moving the trermampoline which would mean moving the kids swings and tree-house which are bolted to the floor blah blah blah blah - arrggh!)

Dropped in at Wyevale to have a look around and bagged a couple of bargains - a better-growing-than-ours Strawberry Plant, a half-knackered but half-priced Lavender (I want lots of lavender in my garden!!!!), the man at Wyevale said I should prune it back and it’d be OK), an Oregano plant and a Sage plant. We then popped next door to see the fishes, lots of Nemos and Dory’s, box, puffer and cow fish and a few Siamese Fighting Fish that years ago when we had our tanks, Alex and I managed to breed (the fish - not us ) - we had our little baby fighter! (his Daddy wasn’t too bright - he kept dropping the eggs and losing them so Little Baby Fighter was siblingless!) It was fascinating watching the ‘act’ - eeeerrrr! - fishie-porn

….and Doctor Who - 5/5, can’t wait till next weeks!

…and on a historical note, our Chichester shop closed 1 year ago today!!!

I think Hermionie’s getting a cold - which will see us right for a few sleep-interrupted nights :sad:. She seems to get it worse than the rest of us, but it’s amazing how she battles on - until she’s supposed to be asleep - lots of drinks, Calpol and clear-breathing essential oils for her I think - oh yes, and a toilet roll strapped to her nose! All this and she didn’t have her nap today, which doesn’t seem to do her much good - just makes for a cranky 2 1/2 year old round about the time she should be eating her dinner. She is doing very well with the toilet training though - she can be trusted to hold it for a bit when we’reout now so that I have time to find a vaguely sanitary toilet and not have to nip her down the nearest ally!

Natalie finished SME(2) which was far too easy, more MME and I read more Ruby Red to her. Kids playing with sand and building barbie-sand-lands?, Alex has been on the phone to G.

I tidied the kids rooms and tackled the ‘I’ve been piling their clothes up here now for a week, in the hope that somebody else is going to deal with it but NO

Natalie and I looked through some of our library books on planets, stars and time. She’s doing better telling the time since we found her Bratz watch that NanL got her last year for her birthday. Pretty much got the hours, half-hours and quarter past/to sorted.

Today was Natalie’s last Rainbow session (she’s 7 in the half-term so she can ‘fly-up’ to Brownies after. She has changed so much since I first started leaving her there for 1 hour a week (although TBH she was still at school when she started so the seperation anxiety thing was a bit more of a problem!). At first, she would cry and hang onto my leg for dear life and make me feel terrible for wanting her to enjoy 1 hour away from me - it worked at school, which is why she was absent for alot of year 1 and then add in the other problems she had and tada - found about Home-Education - It didn’t work at Rainbows and thank goodness because she’s loved it!) Rainbows hasn’t ever always challenged her so I hope Brownies gives her more to sink her teeth into. Her friends from school A&N will be there plus other friends she made at Rainbows and have since flown-up to Brownies themselves - so she should have a great time there. I have already got her uniform for Brownies (thank you lady from ebay!) and you will see a slightly-worn but well-loved Rainbow uniform on ebay courtesy of us soon.

So yes, her last Rainbows, also coincided with one of the leader’s last days (lots of flowers and tears there!), another Rainbow (N) flying-up to Brownies and the end-of-the-first-half-of-term party so it was a really good session. Natalie made choccie-crispie cakes with Alex to take in and we arrived to pick her up early to watch the ‘flying up’ ceremony. Whilst watching and seeing all the Rainbows together (about 13 of them now - there used to be only 4!) I realised how much Natalie has grown and how fragile she was at age 5. Another plus for HE I think!

In the short time we had between dropping Natalie off and picking her up, me, Alex and Hermionie nipped to Argos to pick up a cheap new BBQ for Monday and 2 sleeping bags for the kids to be bundled off into in an attempt for me & Alex to enjoy some adult-time round S&G’s. (I really wanted to be able to sew some for the kids but I think I’m dreamin’) Hermionie really does enjoy just Mummy & Daddy time - she is lovely when she’s on her own with us!

Alex & I watched http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0355295/ - not good - & holby.

Oops - forgot my brother’s birthday - Happy 28th!

Am feeling better now - yes, I’m sure you’re glad (need a sarky smilie again!)Went down to Civic Offices to sort of C.Tax benefit claim form, Alex & Hermionie sorted that whilst Natalie & I went to the library and got a childminders ticket that allows us to have 20 junior books as well as the kids usual allowances - no more worrying about overdue kids books on my ticket again - needless to say we filled the new ticket on the first go. Picked lunch up at Co-op and picnicked in Victoria Park - had remembered food for the Rabbits and Guinea Pigs pinny-gigs, so kids were happy feeding them. Had just enough time to trundle back though Cascades to Claire’s Accessories where Natalie had her ears pierced - she looks so grown up now! - We had discussed getting her ears pierced with her and said maybe she can when she’s 8, so it came as a surprise to her when we asked her if she wanted it done today - not too much time for her to get too anxious about the pain factor either!She was nervous waiting in the chair for Mummy to sign the forms and for the lady (who was a walking advert for every type of piercing you could have!) to draw the dots in the right place, and I thought that the lady would do it by herself, one ear at a time and run the risk of Natalie having only one ear pierced, but she called someone over and they pierced them tandem stylee! Natalie’s eyed well up a bit but she sucked the tears back and smiled as soon as she saw her reflection in the mirror! An early birthday present for her.Scooted back to Cosham (yay! - getting bored with that now) for Alex to see the Solicitor - we can get legal aid - phew! Me and the kids got Tesco out the way, we changed Need for Speed Carbon for the DS that we got off ebay and a few £££’s for Animal Crossing WW  - Natalie is getting a DS for her birthday - Shhhhhh, don’t tell her ). When we got home NanP popped in for a visit, she’s been on holiday to Lyme Regis for a week - we didn’t realise she’d been away .Kids played out in the garden sprinkler for a bit - sprinkler aimed at pool to catch water to water plants later - The cheap garden sprinkler - cost £2.49 from Tesco has done a much better job at ’sprinkling’ the kids than any of the naff pricey kid’s sprinkler’s we’ve had!We’ve decided we should really have passports in case we want to escape have a holiday, so I whipped out Alex’ camera, Photoshopped them and came up with some that make us look like criminals as all passport photos do are passable! Managed to print them more than satisfactorily on my good ‘ol Epson 680 that had rest in the loft for about 5 years! The Epson 2100 that we bought for ‘other business plans’ that we had is a pain-in-the-butt - everytime I go to use it, it needs head cleaning/prints lines through everything or is just plain rubbish - oh and then there’s the Epson CX500 one of the multifunction ones - but now only the scanner works ‘cos of some duff cartridges I got that naffed up the printing part! (look for all these coming to ebay or a car-boot sale near you soon )Put littlies to bed and watched Eternal Sunshine of the spotless mind from the DVD rental trial we’re using this fortnight! I quite liked it - not our usual taste - I don’t think Alex really liked it - he knows that the times I get to choose a DVD to watch means that he’s not going to like it!! - tough - he made me sit through Catwoman amongst others!