1.  Daring To Kiss

2.  Spring Animals

3.  Dinner With A Friend

I spent the night with Son 1 aged 4y 4m.  He’s still hot and bothered. I got up just before 5am, and decided I Do Not Drink Coffee till 6am.  I cracked at 0520.  Did some admin/paperwork.  The Man got up.  Off on a Business Trip.  Very pleased to see me Downstairs.  He’d thought, as I wasn’t with Son 1, that I must be behind closed doors with Son 2 aged 17m.  The Man dares not go into The Lightest Sleeper In The World’s bedroom, and thought it would be bad luck to leave without kissing goodbye.  After all these years I think that counts as a Good Thing.

A text from a Wednesday Mum.  Little Three Year Old Friend fell off the new bunk bed ladder last night and has broken his arm. Overnight in The Hospital, in theatre this morning.  I rang.  Tib and fib.  Carried off in an ambulance.  Five weeks in plaster ahead.   We went off to the Bird Park.  It was indescribably busy.  Every table packed, buggies everywhere, people standing round the edges.  The Other Wednesday Mum went for coffees while Son 2 and I played in the toddler area.  A table became free right next to it.  I stepped over and plonk.  Camp struck, Good Thing bagged.  Son 1 played, but as his calpol wore off his mood crashed.  We went outside. Down to the Farm.  The goats weren’t hungry - half term, they ‘d eaten hundreds of bags of pellets.  they just wanted grass.  There was a great fat black pig with ten gorgeous tiny piglets.  As a vegetarian, I can enjoy the cuteness of piglets guilt-free.  The quails had chicks.  The Big Fat Hens had laid eggs in the hen houses.  We went up to the Penguin Pond.  Son 1 climbed up on the wall and sat, in a “W,” which meant he takes up three times as much room as a child sitting cross-legged.   About sixty children were crammed round the wall.  Buckets of fish arrived with two keepers.  “We need about 12 volunteers!”  Every had shot up.  Son 1 has learned from previous disappointments, and is now much better at getting picked.  He was the best penguin-feeder by far.  Coat off, shoes off, dive into bucket.  Fling Those Fish.

Only. We’d forgotten Nanna was coming at 4pm.  I tried ringing, and off we sped.   Her car was parked near the house, no sign of her.  My mobile went.  She was waiting with our neighbours.  We drove down to The Square and went into Pizza Express for tea.  The boys were worn out and loudly fractious.  And then in came Son 1’s nearly six-year-old friend with his Mother, just back from the panto.  They sat on the other side of the restaurant, and Son 1 spent the entire meal with them.  I sent over a glass of Pinot Grigio as a babysitting fee.   So. Rude to Nanna, but he wate nearly every scrap of pizza, and Nanna and I got our food. Son 2 went for a walk round the restaurant with Nanna, fell over, hit his nose and split his lip open again.

After a long, late, exhausting bedtime, I rang 3 year old’s father at home, and then his mum in the hospital. They were both within 1m of him when it happened.  Second rung from the bottom of the ladder, foot slipped in, child fell and they heard the “snap.”  He has two greensticks and one proper fracture.  He was X-Ray Of The Day.  He’s on calpol.  He seems fine.   In the next bed is a little girl still recovering from the car crash in which her brother died.  It’s really only a scratch on Son 2’s lip.

1.  Night And Day

2.  Every Time We Say Goodbye

3.  Too Darn Hot

Oh Man.  Son 1 aged 4y 4m had another rubbish night, burning up, sweating, red in the face, crying.  His ears are fine but he says his throat is sore.  Son 2 aged 16m has the same, raging temperature - measured only with hand-on-forehead… absolute “no” from him to thermometer-in-the-ear - and not knowing what to do with himself.  Overnight, both dosed with Ibuprofen, calpol and liquids.  Son 1 was off Nursery, which isn’t a logistical problem because we have Wonder Nanny.  But I had a jam-packed day at the Office and there was nothing I could do about it.  Two poorly little boys who just wanted their Mummy and off I went, knowing I would think of nothing else all day.

At 1230 a colleague came by.  “Your Mum rang. She wanted to know how the boys are.”  Hell fire. I hadn’t had a minute.  I rang Wonder Nanny.  Son 1 answered.  “How are you?” “Not all right.”  “How is Son 2?” “He’s asleep.”  Wonder Nanny had dosed them, kept them quiet and they seemed ok.  “I was just about to text you,” she said.  “I know you’d be worried.”  I didn’t have time to ring Nanna…

By the time I got back, Son 1 was in his pyjamas with his temperature raging again, and Son 2 was in his cot asleep.  I was bereft.  All I wanted to do was wake Son 2 so I could be with him.  I went upstairs to get changed, and he woke up.  I got him to sleep and went in to Son 1.  “My poorliness is back again.” Son 2 woke again.  He howled.  Son 1 came in with us.  i went down, The Man took over.  Nanna rang.  I still hadn’t called her back. The Man came down after an hour, and Son 2 started again.  He woke Son 1.  They both bayed, louder and louder, in a comical, horrible duet.  The Man went to be with Son 2 while I finished work (and quickly wrote this) and then I’ll sort out Son 1.  We’ll swap boys at bedtime.

1.  Kitchen

2.  Lounge

3.  Bedroom

Son 1 aged 4y 4m burned up through the night and today.  Hot and listless this morning, able only to lie in the Big Bed and watch Scooby and the Pirates. Couldn’t eat anything for breakfast. Except half a can of SpongeBob pasta.  We couldn’t got out to see the Wednesday Friends.  This is the Worst Fever Since Records Began.  Which was yesterday, when I started using my new Electro Ear Thermometer.  I’ve previously just looked at a child flopped on a chair, a shiny red hot face, dull eyes, clamped my hand to his forehead and brung on the Calpol.  Using the Electro Ear Thermometer was more complicated than the instructions suggest. “Get that thing away from my ear!”  “No!”  “Get it away from me!”   Son 1 whipped his head back and forward,  stuck his chin into his chest and folded his arms over his ears.  A deal was done involving two cut-price Playmobil pirates I found in Tesco.  Son 1 was happy, I got my temperature readings.  40 at one point.  I doubled it and added 30, which is what I do for the weather forecast.   Son 1 may have been better off with a cool hand on his forehead.

Son 2 aged 16m hasn’t been feeling too bright either.  He’s had two sleeps.  He’s clung.  But he’s shinnied up on the Toddler Table despite my efforts to keep him on the ground, he’s played pirates, he’s had a good sort of his cars.  Son 1 watched Sinbad during this morning’s sleep.  ”I know you think the Realm Of Chaos is no place for a woman,” says a breathy Catherine Zeta Jones character to Sinbad.  I’m with Sinbad.   

I left Son 1 downstairs watching Bee Movie and playing with his pirates, and lay down with Son 2 after lunch to get him to sleep again.  I fell asleep.  When I went downstairs again 45 minutes later, Son 1 and I were supposed to be making biscuits.  He couldn’t stop shivering.  I cuddled him, dosed him , but we couldn’t get him warm.  Into bed he went.  I read to him, then he wanted to sleep. I made him go to the loo first; he woke Son 2 up.  Son 2 and I went downstairs to get him a hot chocolate, and by the time we got back he was asleep.  I took Son 2 outside in the garden and we played with his pushalong car.  Nanna came round.  Son 1’s 40-something temperature was brought down with ibuprofen and an ice lolly.  He ate well at tea and rallied after. Son 2 however just faded as we watched him.

1.  Hothead

2.  The Mouse

3.  The Squid

The middle of the night.  Many times.  Son 1 aged 4 cried in arpeggios, getting louder and higher with each one.  I stood in the bedroom door hissing at him: “Go to sleep.  Mummy isn’t coming in with you.  You’re being selfish and naughty.”  I went into him.   He was burning up. I gave him a yard of ibuprofen.  Back in with Son 2 aged 13m, whom I’ve not been able to get into the cot at all since his two-hour evening fight against sleep.  Son 2 whinged me awake at 0630.  Son 1 cried, said his ear hurt, didn’t want to go to Nursery, wouldn’t eat breakfast.  “You’ve only got to do today and tomorrow.  And you’ve got swimming today and tomorrow.  And then you’re coming back after lunch tomorrow for  X’s party. And then you’ve got two weeks off and Mummy’s off next week.”  Off we went to Nursery.

They rang at 10.  Son 1 was pale, crying, saying his ear hurt, really not himself.  Can I come and get him.  I rang the doctor.  No-one could see him.  Bring him to a nurse at 1440, and she can see if he needs a doctor. He was asleep on some cushions in the little library corner when I got there.   I took him back to The Office, as I had a meeting I couldn’t avoid.  There was a birthday, and he helped himself to a huge doughnut.  The Office receptionist looked after him. When I came back he was sitting on her knee playing games on the CBeebies website. Which he’d told her about.  He printed off some colouring pictures at my desk.  I didn’t even know he could use a mouse  -  I’ve deliberately kept him away from computers

The Nurse said she wasn’t qualified to look in his ear.  She did anyway, and said it was a bit pink.  She put him on the Duty Doctor’s list for him to call us.  At home Son 2 had a Mr Bump plaster on his thumb.  Older Mother Thing: I don’t think I can see well enough to cut Son 2’s fingernails.  Plus I hate it. It’s like trying to trim the tentacle ends on a very small, very strong, very wriggly squid.  I asked Wonder Nanny to do it.  A little snip on the end of his thumb.  Unfair to blog it.  An east-facing house can get very dark on gloomy days.  And in a lap, on a nappy mat, or on a bed,  Son 2 whirls round like a drill bit.  We got a few spaghetti hoops inside Son 1, whilst all the time Son 2 tried to grab his food.  I did the baths.  The Duty Doctor didn’t ring.  The Man came home.  He is not useless, Carasmum, he is just easily tired.

1.  Treasure

2.  Biff and Beaujangles

3.  Countdown

A friend came with her son, aged 2.75.  She’d made Son 1 aged 4 a treasure chest for his birthday, and was setting up a treasure hunt in the back garden so he could find it.  She came round as I was putting Son 2 aged 13m down for his sleep… and while Son 1 had fallen asleep while watching telly upstairs.  He was hot and bothered when he woke, but recovered after Calpol and a drink.  Son 2 woke, and all three boys went outside. Son 1 found the clues, found the treasure chest and has gone to sleep with it under his bed.

The elder two boys started ricocheting off the walls after too much treasure chest chocolate and marshmallows.  We all walked into The Town, said our goodbyes to our friends and went to the dinghy park to watch the crane lifting boats out of the water.  The Man knows how to show a girl a good time.  We had coffee looking over the marina - hence Biff and Beaujangles.  Back home I played peekaboo with Son 2 round the high chair while Son 1 - who really isn’t feeling well- laid on the floor upstairs and watched telly.  Son 2 clearly asked for “na na” when he saw one.  He stuffed his face at teatime; Son 1 ate almost nothing.

We put the boys to bed.  In a manner of speaking, Son 2 is still going down on the double bed and crying every time he wakes up without a grown up beside him.  I am cutting back on the bedtime feed, with a view to stopping entirely in a week or so’s time.  I feel very strange about it.  Pleased I’ve managed to feed him this long.  Sad that we’re leaving that special him-and-me thing behind.  Proud I did it - it’s been crap.  But the fact is I won’t feed another child.  And I would of course love to.  Anyway.  We are indulging Son 2’s need for an adult while I move him off the breast.  Then we’ll leave it a week or so and get him back in his cot.  Somehow.  And of course that will be as easy as it sounds.  

I got out for a run tonight, and it made me feel much better.  The moon was nearly full, so I ran up to the top of The Headland. Not all the way round, in recognition of the fact I haven’t been out for more than a week.  But it was a lovely evening, crisp and cold, with The Town full of life as I ran through.  There are street lights only half way up the Headland, so about 400 yards was in pitch black.  It was harder running in the darkness - even with moonlight - than it used to be because there are some very bright lights from the docks which are too far away to light the path, but so bright they stop your eyes adjusting.  I really must defeat my Inner Robbie and Just Go, four times a week.  I have such a good time when I’m running, I sort out all kinds of stuff in my head and, in principle, it will get the weight off too.  Although on the way back I called in to The Spar and bought chocolate and crips.     

1.  Mummy time

2.  “Shop for food together”

3.  Escape

The Man’s gone away on a Business Trip.  We waved him off and had breakfast.  Son 2 aged 1 his usual banana, weetabix and yoghurt.  Son 1 aged 4 hummus, red pepper and breadsticks.  Which is what he had for tea last night.  Son 2 insisted on breadsticks and dipped them into his mush.  He’s still off form.  Hacking cough, streams of snot, a fever.  “We’ve got chickenpox,” the Old Nursery said, matter-of-factly yesterday.  I’ve peered at his skin all day.   He slept for two hours this morning.   Son 1 had a fire in the Scooby House, attended by the big wooden fire engine, the little wooden fire engine, the little wooden police car, Son 2’s ambulance and the tiny wooden ambulance and Harold from the Thomas set. Play abandoned in favour of pestering Mummy to watch telly with him.  So we did.  Shark’s Tale.  Which I’m sure is a DVD I bought well before we had children, but never had time to watch.  Maybe I was busier in the old days than I think.

Out we trudged in the rain to the library to change the books.  We went to Tesco because we needed fromage frais and yoghurt.  We ended up with: crumpets “these are my very very favourite,” laughing cow soft cheese portions “I like these,” trifles “can I have a treat because I didn’t have a DVD?” a box of Fab lollies (half price) and a four-pack of plain yoghurt with jam at the bottom.  I’m sure I wasn’t choosing food in shops when I was 4.  Mind you, I’d left home before I’d heard of half the stuff which is the boys’ favourite.  Hummous? Pesto? Breadsticks?  Maple Syrup?  I think I used to eat breadcrumbed things full of cheese sauce and a heck of a lot of Angel Delight. And I’m pretty sure there was always a cake on the table while we ate our (savoury) tea, which we then had afterwards.  I can’t have a cake in the house if I want Son 1 to eat his main course.    

Son 1 started tucking into his shopping as soon as we got back, so we did tea early.  Son 2 did well.  Couldn’t manage crumpets, but enjoyed a Plum 10m+ pot of spinachy pasta.  Ate about half and mortared the cracks in his high chair with the rest.  And then fed me Cheerios, cackling joyfully. I left them in the bedrooms while I came downstairs for the laptop to play Son 1’s Horrid Henry Cd.  When I went back, Son 1 was demurely lifting the flaps in his dinosaur book.  Son 2 was nowhere to be seen.  There was a crash from upstairs.  He’d legged it up a floor as soon as my back turned and was trying to get into the soft bricks.    

1.  The Bug

2.  The Tug

3.  The Bid

Rubbish night with both Son 1 aged 3 y 11m and Son 2 aged 11m.  Son 1 had a fever and we had to Ibuprofen him at some godless time in the night.  Son 2 had a cough and was uncomfortable.  I went in with him, then heard a very  upset Son 1 so put The Man in with Son 2, and took Son 1 upstairs.  He really wasn’t well.  A cough like a seal with croup, skin burning all over and weirdie wideawake dreams.  “Mummy, take my nappy off.”  He hasn’t worn a nappy in nearly a year.  

So. Day 2 at the New Nursery and I had to ring to say we were keeping him home. The Man looked after him - I had to go in to The Office. I rang The Man’s mobile at lunchtime. He’d taken Son 1 to work and he’d just lay on some cushions on the floor watching telly.  Pang. “I just want to be with you, Mummy.”  Pang. I had something complicated and important at The Office, scheduled for late afternoon.  Of course, it ended up happening even later.  It went well, which is actually A Good Thing, but I was very late picking up Son 2 and getting home.   Pang. Pang. Pang.  However.  A Counter-Pang.  Son 2’s Nursery Nurse said he’d had a good day.  “We were all just saying how much he’s grown in how he is here, and how much better he is now than he was at the start.”  Hooray hooray hooray.  

Guess what else.  I have bid for something on eBay.  Yes I know everyone else on the planet has been members since 2002 and you’ve all got 12000 stars, spotless feedback and £100,000 turnovers.  But I haven’t.   My New Year Resolution was to start selling off the clutter silting up the house by the end of January.  And I didn’t. I pulled out some bits and bobs and prammed them down to Oxfam instead.   But I’ve set up a PayPal account… not entirely sure how that’s going to work but they’re wading in and out of my bank account so something’s going on.  And I finally decided that I could commit to a 99p bid.  I am sure Wonder Nanny can sort me out if it doesn’t work.  I am so My Mother.