1. Before Time

2.  Lunch Time

3.  Home Time

Not yet light. I am awakened by fierce eyebrowing.  Son 1 aged 4y 9m hanging round my neck, compulsively stroking my eyebrow and fingering my closed eyelids and eyelashes. Vaguely conscious, I rolled over to check he wasn’t on the edge of the bed.  I was on the edge of the bed. He couldn’t get in. He was standing ,slumped over me, cuddling, with determined little fingers going for my eyebrows. I heaved him up and over and he was instantly asleep. I’m not even sure he was entirely awake.  Next thing I knew, there was a loud stage whisper in my ear. ”Mummeeee.   Mummmmeee.  It’s five, four, seven.”  Son 1 cannot tell the time, but he can read a digital clock.  “Go back to sleep.  We don’t get up until it’s at least six something.”  And I wasn’t going to be the one to tell him how soon that was going to be.

One of the men at The Office left today.  He’s going to work Far Far Away.  He’s very young and very special, and we are incredibly sorry to see him go.  There was a pub visit at lunchtime, which is sadly surprising for  us. ”Are we going to a proper pub?” said a male colleague. “We always end up at girl pubs.”  Indeed we were.  Seven men, two women.  Many pints of bitter.  They were all fast, funny and weirdly disparate.  Vegetarianism: “I will eat fish but I have to know it’s sustainable and caught using cruelty free methods which don’t wreck the marine environment,” said a Dark Green Colleague. “I’m vegetarian so I can have a tumble drier,” I said, using one of my latest (not necessarily true) lines. “You’ve got children so you’ve already wrecked your carbon footprint,” said the Dark Green Colleague.  “I’ve recycled someone else’s, so I win,” said The Colleague Who Adopted.

Back home, Granny and Grandad - who arrived yesterday - were in the lounge with Wonder Nanny, Son 1 and Son 2 aged 22m.  Granny and Granddad are staying at The Hotel With THe River View.  They’d been down to The Museum, where the boys coloured copiously.  They had apparently been perfectly behaved all day. Granny and Granddad cannot believe how well they’ve come on. I started putting them to bed, and The Man arrived back from his Business Trip.  Son 1 shrieked at the sound of his key in the door.  Son 2 stood on the landing and jumped up and down for joy.

1.  Girl 1

2.  Girl 2

3.  Dancing With The Tide

4.  Girls 3

I am still riddled with cold and over-tired.  Today I should have stayed in and let Wonder Nanny look after Son 1 aged 4y 6m and Son 2 aged 18m.  But the forecast was good.  If it rains, I can stay in. And if it doesn’t, I have to go out. The boys fell asleep on the way to the Shingly Beach. Wonder Nanny and I drove around Remote Touristy Village, looking for an Out-of-Season takeaway cappacino.  We found one. We parked. The boys woke up.  We bought our coffees, and walked with the boys to a playground we’d spotted on our drive-through. Son 2 loved the seesaw. Son 1 loved the roundabout.  He played with A Girl.  Quick, where did I put those flags and fireworks. 

Lunch was a dream.  The pub had a little play area with toys for children.  Son 2 built a mad thing with plastic bricks.  Son 1 alternated listening to Wonder Nanny reading a story with wailing that Son 2 was playing with his toys.  Another family with four primary school-aged children on the next table proved more entertaining than telly. Especially when the elder daughter said “Bugger!”  Father didn’t hear.  Mother was mortified. She recited the names of teachers who would be disappointed with Elder Daughter.      

And then down to a Cove by a Farm.  Son 1 was in raptures. He ran on to the rocks, he ran into the sea. Son 2, on his reins, wanted to follow him. Wonder Nanny tried to gently coax him away. Nope. He was Going In.  Son 1 played Saltwater Strip.  First he took off his wellies and socks, then his trousers.  Then his parkha. Then his sweat shirt.   Son 2 sat and plopped sand and stones in the lapping water. Son 1 hared around madly, darting, splashing, chortling and whooping. The sun came out.  There was just him, small, naked, his reflection dancing on the golden sand, his silhouette sharp against long, low waves as they rolled in and out.  It was very Cave Boy. I felt children had been playing in the same way, on the same rocks, for hundreds of years.  After a good half and hour, Son 2 started to sob with cold and Wonder Nanny scooped him up.  Son 1 fell in the sea up to his ears, but still got up and cavorted around. He finally came to a trembling, frozen halt, and I put him in my jacket and carried him back to the car. Dressed in: a fleece, his sun suit trousers, his wellies and his pirate towelling robe, we went back to look at a field full of mighty great Freisians with massive udders.  “This is so peaceful,” he said. “This is the life.”

After we got back, he demanded a bath. The Man came in and said another family had invited us for an early drink. I said I’d stay in with Son 2. Son 1 almost climbed out of the bath to make sure The Man didn’t leave him.  His first time down the pub with his father.  When he came back I asked “Did you sit quietly with the grown ups, talking, or did you race round with the girls?”  He laughed. “I raced round.”

1.  Messages From The Deep

2.  Sunday At The Pub

3.  One Star Dining

Son 2 aged 17m and I were sitting on some steps round a sports race track.  I dropped him, and I snatched at his clothes but no matter how much I tried I couldn’t get a good grip.  I called to The Man who was with Son 1 aged 4y 5m but no matter how loud I yelled he didn’t hear me.  The last bit of Son 2’s clothing fell away from my fingertips and he tumbled to the bottom of the steps, out of sight, and then emerged screaming, no longer wearing his trousers or nappy, his face red, his eyes closed in slits.  I woke up, realising that the reason my scalp, hairline and skin behind my ears has been itching for the last week isn’t head lice.  It’s a reaction to the new conditioner I’ve been ladling on to comb through with the Nitty Gritty.  It was 7am, and The Man was downstairs in the lounge with the boys watching Dora The Explorer.  I think I need more sleep.

Friends rang before 9am offering to take Son 1 out for a walk for an hour.  I said no, I can’t do without him when I’m not at work.  By 1015 we were coated, booted and ready for a walk through town.  Grey clouds descended and a cold wind whipped up.  The Friends’ van was parked outside the family pub and they were outside, having already done a bracing Sunday morning stroll.  We all trooped inside the pub for coffee, tea, and a play for Son 1 with their 3 year old.  By 11 Son 2 was unravelling, so off we went.  We picked up some bits we needed; Son 2 fell asleep in the Big Pram.  I said I wanted to make the most of his snooze so we went for coffee.  Son 1 had a new Ben 10 sticker book.  When he recited the names of twenty different aliens I wondered whether I should abandon my vague anti-mode and teach him to read.

This afternoon the boys played in the lounge.  Son 2 had the Wooden Railway out.  Son 1 alternated between playing with his castle, doing a puzzle and plonking himself in the middle of Son 2’s game and starting a completely different one.  Son 1 wanted to watch Harry Potter.  I said he couldn’t have it on with Son 2 around.  We settled for The Wiggles, again.  The Man rightly decided we were all too knackered for a Sunday roast, so they had sausages, leftover potatoes and peas and I had omelette.  Son 1 managed to sit at the table throughout.  He has another 8 weeks to learn to do it in front of Granny and Granddad on holiday.  Ever hopeful, we have started a new sticker chart.   8 stars gets him a Gormiti egg.

1.  Family Lunch

2.  The Band

3.   The Pub

Granny and Granddad are arriving tomorrow, so we all went into The Town to get some things we needed.  Wrapping paper, cards, and something for a meal.  We bought Dover Sole from the fishmongers.  Granny can cook.  I had lunch for Son 2 aged 13m, so we stopped off in a cafe to give it to him.  Got Son 1 aged 4y 1m some chips… ordered ourselves a snack… and had a really nice impromptu family lunch.  Son 2 wouldn’t eat his jarred mush as soon as he clapped eyes on the chips.  He’s using a spoon now.  Not always the right way up, not always the right end in the food, and mostly using long swinging arcs that splat the food on the table, on his clothes or on his forehead.  But he’s using a spoon now.

At home Son 1 played his drum kit, Son 2 played keyboards, The Man played Argos toy electric guitar and I was the singer.  Son 2 lurched for the microphone on the toy keyboard  “Ahhhhhh” he sang, “Ahhhhhhhhhhhh.”  Son 1 banged his drumsticks together “One Two Three, hit it.”  We devised a running order for Granny and Granddad’s visit.  “When Rock Was Young,” “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star,” “Give a Dog a Bone.” 

I went out with the Wednesday mums.  A very nice evening, all three of us on red wine. A mistake, but I’m still doing daft things because at last I’m not breastfeeding or pregnant.  We had a boat crew arrive - the skipper sat down with us, his crew were between our table and the bar.  One Mother chatted to him, I chatted to the stewardess.  Leaving for the Caribbean on Monday.  They wandered off.  We carried on drinking and talking and talking and drinking.  Then a man came over and said could he buy us ladies a drink.  Oh go on then, a small red wine, we said.  Large glasses arrived.  But not the chap who bought them.  We had to leave them because we couldn’t drink them fast enough before the pub shut.  Just one of those weird evenings - the three of us were absolutely self-contained and weren’t interacting with the rest of the pub in any way.  We still got it girls.