1.  Tessellation

2.  Acute Angle

3.  Fearful Symmetry

Son 1 aged 5 came in the Big Bed in the night.  Fast asleep, his little body seeks mine. Arms, legs, hands, touch,  touch, touch, snug,  snug, snug, following me around the bed.  I don’t think there’s a childcare book I haven’t read, so yes, I know I should be giving him the great gift of learning to sleep independently… but surely anyone seeing the unconscious behaviour of a small child in bed would conclude they are biologically programmed to sleep with their parents.   We of course are not biologically programmed to work ourselves into oblivion, which is why it all gets tricky. 

And which is why I get every bug going.  I still can’t speak, so I couldn’t go into The Office.  The weather was heavenly, so I decided to help my recovery by taking Son 2 aged 2y 1m to The Zoo.  He loved it. Monkeys, lemurs, ducks, deers, warthogs… “Next one! Next one!”  Lions, lynx, zebra, penguins, snakes, reptiles, frogs.  He walked and walked.  “I wan’ see lion.  I wan’ see lil farm. I wan’ see clip clop (= horses = zebras.)” After two hours I had to give up and we drove back. Son 2 fell asleep almost instantly.  I thought  a sherbert lemon from a bag my colleagues left would help my throat. The bag and the sweet wrapper crackled. ”I wan’ tweetie!” came a cry from the backseat.  At home I needed a rest. Son 2 wouldn’t lie down with me, so I went into the boys’ room, got into Son 1’s bed, and let Son 2 play with his cot and soft toys on the floor beside me.   I closed my eyes.  Something heavy smashed into my forehead so hard it nearly popped my eyeball out from the inside.  It was the lamp from on top of the headboard. Son 2, playing with the on/off switch, had pulled the flex and brought the heavy metal base down on my temple from two foot up.  The imprint is a trench in the bruise on my forehead. Being positive, at least we now know it’s dangerous. It would have cracked a little boy skull like an eggshell. “Mummy. Bump. Light. Head. Ouch.” said Son 2.

The Man collected Son 1 from School and the boys had the Sunday roast leftovers for tea. Just when I thought they’d finished and could be shooed up to bed, Son 1 reminded me that I’d said they could have jelly tot lollies for pudding. ”Ok, you can eat them outside as a special treat and we’ll read some books while we’re out there.” The evening was glorious. We sat beneath the fading sunflowers, and read Son 1’s school book. The boys gobbled the last pea pods off the plants we’d grown.  Son 1 was happy to have his bath and go to bed with Son 2. He dashed upstairs, sprinted into the bedroom and caught the side of his head full pelt against the doorpost, so fast and so hard he ricocheted off like a billiard ball.  He screamed, and cried loudly and horribly. I scooped him up, gave him a large slug of ibuprofen and made him an ice compress in a tea towel.  His left temple is grazed and bruised.  My right temple is dented and bruised.  On the same day, within three hours of each other, absolutely unrelated accidents.  How does that happen?

1.  Party 1 

2.  Party 2

3.  Party 3

A two party day. On the calendar, it looks so achievable. The Nursery Party was at 1030, in the village hall favoured by Nursery Mums.  The Town party was at 2pm, in the church hall favoured by some Town Mums.  Party 1 had a cross children’s entertainer. A member of the Magic Circle, professional, funny, but bossy and hostile, obsessed with his line. “Don’t come in front of it. Don’t put your hands on it. Don’t move the line.” As far as I could tell he needed the children behind the line because, occasionally, he pulled his hat down over his eyes and moved around blind.  Er.. strike the hat pulling kiddo - this is a 4th birthday party and they’ve just feasted on sugar. He told Son 1 off for playing with the whoopee cushion Son 2 aged 21 m won in pass the parcel during his magic show. Imagine how well that went down with the mother who thinks her child should colour over the lines to show he’s not constrained by groupthink.  

Party 2’s entertainer was camper, warmer, with a better hair cut and had the saving grace that he clearly liked children. Before the show Son 1 fell over so badly he ripped half a toenail off on his right foot and grazed his knees and shins.  Before I got there, the Entertainer, heaving in equipment and out of costume, had stopped and bent down to see if he was ok.  Did I mention we were early for the party? Charged around like loons, two children off their trolleys from Party 1, The Man giving a commentary unstilted by drawing breath on the perils of over-scheduling, and me still struggling because Someone Lost All The Sellotape on the day we had two parties. Pushing Son 1, oldest child on Mumsnet still in a Pram, up the road, miserable because I’m Always Late For Everything, we arrived at 1420 to find the start time was 1500. Hooray. At the end, I had everyone turning the hall upside down looking for Son 2’s shoes.  I’d taken them off and put them on a radiator. Gone. Nowhere. One of the children must have tidied them up in an unrealising grown up’s bag. Yes I know they didn’t fit, but they were the only ones we had.  Back home we found the shoes.  I’d taken them off at the first party. He’d gone to The Town one in bare feet. 

After the children were in bed, The Man and I sat out back at the patio table, talking, drinking wine and dunking bread in microwaved camembert.  A neighbour has a pack of three pre-teen girls who were outside till late, clearly having some sort of sleepover.  “How many children do you think they’ve got staying?” I asked. “Just one I think,” said The Man. “It just sounds like a lot more.”  Next Door But One, who went on a Business Trip with The MAn, was putting down slug pellets and bantering back and forth with The Man.  Michael Jackson songs wafted over from somewhere else.  The light held forever.  We might do that again.