3 things February - 9th February

1. Due to holidays, an inservice days and ANOTHER timetable change, I'm off college for a whole week! Wahey!

2. Had Philosophy today and really beginning to enjoy it - I even went and got a book out the library to read while we're off! That's dedication for you.

3. Elise kissing everyones heads, then making everyone kiss hers - was very sweet and adorable.

3 things February - 3rd February, a trying day

Today has not been the greatest. It started off around 3am this morning when I woke up on the sofa and realised I'd fallen asleep there last night. Off to bed I went where my 6am alarm gleefully woke me up to do some studying before organising the kids and myself for school and all that. 'Not a chance' I thought. So I got up for my normal time and looked out the window to see... snow! Great.
At college we had our final NAB of block one, for Sociology. Not fun. I've never been so under-prepared for an assessment and if I'm truthful I'll be extremely lucky to pass. Right before sitting the NAB I checked my mobile to discover a text from my brother saying Elise had been sent home from nursery with a dodgy tummy! Luckily my sister-in-law got her so I didn't have to walk out on my assessment. And now because it's likely a tummy bug, she can't go to nursery tomorrow!
Anyway, I reckon days like this are what 3 things February are made for - to force you to think about the good things and not focus on the negatives. So here goes:

1. We started Literature class this morning, which I enjoyed

2. Snuggled up in the living room with the children while gales and torrential rain rage outside

3. I don't have any assessments to study for now for the forseeable future!

3 things February - counting my blessings

My rather lovely friend Emma over at Made by Paddy blogged today about the 3 things February idea thought up by Sarah Rooftops. The idea behind it is every evening throughout February you blog or tweet (hashtag for this is #3thingsfebruary) 3 things that have made you smile that day, no matter how big or small. What a lovely idea, I thought, I'd be well up for joining in with that! So I am - and so should you. Spread the smiles.
So my first entry is at the end of a particularly trying day. I've developed a kidney infection throughout the day and feeling rather poorly and sorry for myself, but instead of feeling miserable I'm going to look at the positives (3, in particular):

1. Went to soft play this morning (pre- kidney agony) with the wee yin, Elise and my best friend Lyndsay, where I described the mental posh singing lady on One Born Every Minute last night who was singing to her husband. Cue tears of laughter and terrible off-key impressions in the middle of the soft play cafe.
2. My husband is amazing, instead of going to play geek-fest Magic tonight with his pals, he's staying home to look after me.
3. I have chocolate brownie ice-cream and mini eggs. All medicinal.

Manic Monday

Andrew's not well today, he has a sore throat and a barking cough. So he's home from school today, which is fine as it's catch-up week at college and we don't need to be in today. Because there's no college, I didn't see any reason to take Elise into nursery so she's home too. And poor wee Lewis had to go to school so I though it would be nice to let him come home for lunch and cover his uniform in tomato soup for the afternoon.







I've been listing things on Ebay this morning and discovered as my account is fairly new, there's a 10 listings per month limit til I get my Paypal verified. Frustrating!
Anyway, I *should* be studying for two NABs we have on Wednesday.

Checking in!

It's all a bit mental round here at the moment. I still haven't got quite into the swing of things with the morning routine and Block 1 of college is ending so we're snowed under with assignments and assessments. I'm also dealing with a little madam who refuses to go for naps now and needs potty trained (we're trying our best on the days we have at home together). Hoping to get that one done over the Easter hols as the original plan to do it over Christmas was scuppered by a nasty tummy bug she had. 

Our new timetable has been put up on the colleges website, so I now know what I should be doing in a couple of weeks - new classes include Philosophy Literature and Numeracy. The first two I'm looking forward to, the third - not so much. Maths is *not* my strong point. We should also get our interim grading soon, eek!

Anyway, there is much housework beckoning me.

                                                                              image copyright: Daeveb

Birthday times!

My little tiny new baby girl somehow appears to have manage to turn 2 yesterday. This is confusing me as I almost certain I just came home with her just a couple of weeks ago. I must be mistaken. Anyway, it was a lovely day and the birthday girl was spoiled rotten! She now has enough clothes to clothe several little girls but I'm not complaining as choosing her outfits and dressing her is one of my unashamed joys in life.

Sadly as our laptop is gasping and wheezing its way into early retirement (the bin!) I am unable to get the photos from Facebook onto here, except, oddly, this one of the birthday girl oohing over her new Peppa Pig DVD (she's just a little bit obsessed)

and this AMAZING one of the cake my DAD baked (I was just too busy and my Mum was unwell) and my amazing wee sister Sarah decorated. She's ever so talented in this area and I think she should become some sort of cake guru lady and live in a house made of cake.

Unfortunately the only way you can see the birthday girl in full swing (lol! you'll get it when you look at the picture) is to click on this link here (I hope it works). I know clicking on things is tiresome but go with it! It's a lovely picture.

Then for comparison purposes click here and see her exactly a year before at her 1st birthday party as a birthday fairy, with a lot less hair but much more cheeks!

Anyway, if you've indulged all that (and put up with the terrible quality photos from my mobile) then I thank you kindly. 

Happy Birthday my bestest, beautifullest girl xxx

The Inevitable...

Well it's happened. I'd hoped I would have a couple of months before it came to this but no. In my third week of college, I'm having to take the day off because I have an ill child. I knew, as a mum of three, that there would undoubtedly come a time where someone was ill and I'd have to stay home, I just didn't think it would happen so  quickly! And now I'm crapping myself about how much I'll be missing today - I have texted a classmate to let me know what homework we have and I know I'll be able to get notes from someone, but it's not the same as actually being there. 

Elise's 'not well' face. 

Anyway, she seems to be on the mend today so fingers crossed we're back to normal tomorrow and I'm only missing one day - I know it could be worse - she's been not well since Monday but Stewart was off work on Monday so that was fine, and I'm off on a Tuesday anyway. If it had started today I'd have had to take the rest of the week off. Send us some luck please!

A whole new world

Well the boys went off to school this morning and Elise had her first nursery visit - which, in all honesty, could have gone a little bit better. To start off with, the woman I had been dealing with was off on annual leave. No-one else knew we were supposed to be there today and after some gentle enquiries we managed to get a tour... of the wrong room!
We got a very in-depth tour and explanation of the room for the 3-5 year old's, despite me saying she was only 19 months. As I was getting shown the miniature toilet block I was frantically trying to calculate the logistics of toilet training a 1 year old in 2 weeks. I finally managed to convey to our tour guide that I thought we were being shown the wrong room - we got a look around the younger kids room and are now booked in for a proper visit to prepare Elise for starting at the end of the month - so we go back tomorrow morning and I will try not to cry as she shoves me out the door and turns her back on me.

Sunshine on a rainy day...

Yesterday I was perusing a few blogs and came across the perfect rainy day crafting project to do with the boys - so I had a wee practice (nothing worse than them slaving over something only for it to not work out, nothing to do with my childish sense of impatience at all) and posted a little teaser picture on Twitter to see if any of my followers could guess what it was. I thought it looked like questionable scrambled eggs, however I did receive one correct guess (and a few wrong ones) - it's a PVA glue/tissue paper window sticker, as inspired by this blog post over at Cooking, Cakes and Children by Amy Lane. If you check out Amy's post, it tells you exactly how to make one if you or your kids fancy having a go at it.


This morning my practice sticker was all finished, and it was fitting that it was pouring with rain given that I had made a sun.




Here are the boys busily working away on their own stickers. We all decided to make rainbows.




And here they are waiting to dry. There is a lot of PVA glue on these bad boys so I'm expecting them to be ready to stick up around about November.



The boys thoroughly enjoyed making their own window stickers and it was very easy for them to get on with and do themselves. It's a nice, simple little activity for a day stuck inside and takes up enough time to keep them occupied for a while but not so long that they get fed up. Definitely one we'll be filing away to do again.


In other 'sunshine on a rainy day' news, Elise's nursery called today to make a date for her first nursery visit (16th August) and to confirm what date I wanted her to officially start on (30th August). So in less than 4 weeks my baby is going for her first nursery visit then at the end of August she will be officially attending nursery! I explained all this to her earlier, and her response was to laugh in my face and say 'Muummaayyy' in a slightly condescending fashion. I have a feeling we're going to have to take Important Big Girl Nursery Business a bit more seriously than that! Like the 86 forms I have to fill in before she starts.

Have you had any rays of sunshine on this rather grey and dreary day?

Baby got Back

We're home! Had a truly lovely two weeks in the sunshine of Normandy but I'm glad to be home.

We stayed in La Vallee, Houlgate through Keycamp and I think we would definitely do this kind of holiday again - the kids loved it and the park itself was lovely.


I flew out with Elise and my sister Sarah - long story short - the rest of the family drove/ferried over and once they arrived my brother was meant to come get us from the airport. It was all timed to perfection. So of course something went wrong - my brother was late to the campsite so we had to entertain an 18 month old who had had NO SLEEP from around 6-9pm in the stifling heat and metropolis that is Beauvais Tille airport (shop count = 1). I also informed my sister 'Oh it's okay I've got enough money to get us some dinner while we wait' before realising it was all Sterling. We had muffins and went for a wander (or 6) around the airport.

That evening, we got lost and eventually arrived in the campsite at 5.30am. I should point out we should have been there for around 9pm the night before if everything had gone to plan.

So that was exciting. Apart from that neverending nightmare of a start, the holiday was a great success I think.



We went to the beach!



We wore our special holiday purchases that Mummy had been getting stressed about arriving in time (and looked adorable)



We met some interesting creatures.



There were waterfights...



And games of cricket on the beach.



And sometimes it just all got a bit too much...


Are you going anywhere nice this year?

*The observant amongst you may have noticed theres a heck of a lot of extra children in these pics - they are my nephews as this years holiday was a big family affair with my brother, his wife and their kids, both my sisters and our parents.

We are victorious!

I just got some truly excellent news - we have a nursery place for Elise! I am so happy - and it proves a little determination pays off as I have no doubt my phone calls pestering them probably helped (we're all best mates now). So I have one less thing to panic and stress about!

Join me while I do a little jig of victory why don't you?

An Introduction to... Elise

I thought it would be nice to take some time to introduce you to the important people in my life, starting with the children. First off, allow me to introduce you to the little diva of the house - Elise!

Elise is the baby at only 17 months old. She was induced 11 days early due to oligohydramnios on the 3rd of January 2009, a beautiful little girl to complete our family. There have been no lasting effects of this condition (it can sometimes indicate kidney problems in the baby), and has never been explained (my waters hadn't broken). It was a very quick labour (44 mins in established labour) but this was preceded by 2 days of NOTHING happening. By the time she was born at about 7.45pm I was desperate to get home and managed to get them to let me leave the next day - I went to the local supermarket to pick up some pink things (we hadn't found out the gender) and the checkout girl asked how old she was - I'm not sure she believed me when I told her 22 hours!


She is the most sunny natured little thing for the majority of the time, however she has also mastered the art of tantrumming perfectly and a lot younger than my boys ever did. Stay on her good side though and she'll keep you laughing.


She started suffering from eczema in the winter there which at times was quite bad, thankfully the better the weather has got the more her skin has cleared up - and we hope that she will grow out of it altogether as she gets older. It doesn't hinder her cool quotient in any way though


Anyway, that's a brief introduction to my gorgeous girl! Stay tuned to meet the rest of the madhouse over the next few days.