1.  Stamina

2.  Focus

3.  Energy

Son 2 aged 22m howled at 4 something am.  Which of course he hasn’t done since well well before we put him in with Son 1 aged 4y 9m.  “Mum-meeee.  Mum-mee.”  We left him.  I think he woke again.  And we…er… left him.  I think I even heard a “Sssshhh,” from Son 1.  Who pad-padded up at 0730.  There wasn’t a peep from Son 2. I never enjoy it when he sleeps late.  I dread there being a reason for it other than a lie-in. Especially after leaving him twice in the night.

Son 1 wanted to paint, so I set him up on a newspaper on the kitchen table. “And me, And me,” demanded  Son 2. They were gorgeous, sitting there side by side, Son 1 painting picture after picture, Son 2 using only the painting water to washout his pieces of paper. He tipped the water over.  He pulled the newspaper over his head. ”Boo,” he said. Granny and Granddad came round, Son 1 squash-balled off the walls, and despite the forecast of severe showers, we went out. Halfway through the Town we passed The Church.  There were service flags, uniforms, civic chains.  A band. We waited. We were rained on. We watched The Parade, Son 2 with his heavenly expression of total interest and concentration.   We followed.  “I want to hear the music,” said Son 1.

Back home we roasted a chicken, and I tried to make a tiny amount of vegetables go round four adults and two small boys. I cannot count the number of times I have had a mountain of veg box bags to go through. Today I had about four carrots, some broad beans, 125g of out-of-date asparagus and half a head of rather old greens. We got away with it. I am Nigel Slater. After the meal Son 1 decided that the ribbon from the one helium filled balloon leftover from Nanna’s birthday was the finishing tape for sports day. To start with, he and Son 2 had running races. Then, as the excitement cranked up way beyond acceptable levels for 6pm, I told him to have a slithering-like-a-snake race.  We did a sideways race, a backwards race, a crawling race, a hopping race and snapping race.  Son 2 joined in for the egg-and-spoon race, run with wooden balls from a skittle set and old silver spoons. Again, that brilliant expression of concentration, and then unbridled joy when he got his egg across the line. Son 1 used the string shopping bag as the sack in a sack race. He was of course the only competitor in most of these races, which meant that he won them all.  He loved it.

1.  Fast Forward

2.  Scene Selection

3.   Pause

The Man is back, The Plumber has been, the hot water is back on, and I have had a shower.   Son 1 aged 4y 8m slept in, Son 2 aged 21m woke up and came down into the kitchen with The Man and me.  He ate blueberries and banana.  He sat at the little ELC plastic table colouring one of Son 1’s drawings.  He’s left-handed two out of three times.  The Man is left-handed, so is Granny and the Elegant Aunt.  I wonder when it settles.  Son 2 has learnt to run. The child who never stays on the floor if he can climb, cannot pass an open door without darting through it and can tank off for hundreds of yards without a backward glance can now do it all a lot faster.  Hooray.  “Daddy, you should see Son 2 run,” I said. “He’s very good at it.” Son 2 stood, a big smile on his face, and ran up and down the kitchen, overjoyed.  And then started doing little jumping attempts - stopping, swinging his arms up, springing - without yet leaving the ground. It wouldn’t surprise me if he is trying to take off. 

I took Son 1 to Nursery. Sports Day, postponed from last week in the rain. Last week I could have managed, this week I had to drive over to The City.  Son 1 fell over badly yesterday. He was given a jelly teddy sweet and came home with black and red knees.  Son 1 has a weirdie hip thing which means he can’t run fast because his legs flay out sideways.   fr http://mumsnet.com/blogs/serenedays/2008/12/01/faster-legs/  His Wednesday Friends are always tearing off without him.  “I am going to run very fast,” he proclaimed as we got out of the car. “Well if you don’t run fast today, don’t forget that you fell over so you have sore knees,” I said, over-protective Mother trying to shield her child from the harsh truth of losing. In he went, off I drove.

When I got back they were watching their new Wiggles DVD (we are going to see them tomorrow.) Son 1 had run in three races. The potato race - pick a potato in your bucket, take it back, run up for the next one… the egg and spoon one “I think someone put oil on my egg because it wouldn’t stay on the spoon.” And a straight running race. Which he won. “X was winning but I runned past him.” Ah. OK. I will be less fast. To write him off.  On the camera were some pictures of Son 2 in the under-threes race. Smiling. Sun-hatted.  Clearly loving it.  With Wonder Nanny.  Pang.  Maybe, just maybe, not every other woman helping a small child in that race was the mother…

1. It’s Raining, It’s Pouring

2. And Bumped His Head

3.  Up In The Morning

Up at a dawn to do some Office work because we wanted to take the children out tonight.  Then Son 1 aged 4y 8m woke up, full of excitement because it’s school sports day.  Less so when he realised he couldn’t wear his shiny new PE kit to school and had to wait.  When I dropped him off it was raining. “Ring at 11 to see if it’s still on,” they said.  I remembered at 1230.  Off. They’re trying again next week.

The Man came into The Big Town for some Business stuff and we had lunch. Very nice to see him.  He collected Son 1, which meant I was let off the usual Friday tear-across-Town to get him in time.  Back home The Town is having a Singing Festival. We thought it would nice to take the boys, listen to some Singing, wine for us, ice cream for them, put them to be late and get a lie in tomorrow morning. Easy.  So we listened to some Singers. Chatted to lots of people we know.  Had a glass of wine. They had orange juice and put money in the charity buckets. Ran around with the other children.  Son 2 aged 21 months climbed up on a plastic chair and held on to the back, just like he does with the ones at home. The heavy ones.  He pushed this one right over and fell, 3+ feet, flat on his face.  And screamed. 

His forehead was bashed in. I gave him Ibuprofen, he calmed down and we packed up and headed home. We put them to bed; we ate a takeaway; we went to bed.  I’ll go in with Son 2, I thought, so I can check he’s ok during the night.  I got in the double bed with him. I looked at his head.  Red and grey and big and bumpy.  I rang the Minor Injuries Unit. No answer. I rang the doctor’s out-of-hours service. Take him to A and E, they said. And so there we were, midnight on Friday/Saturday, me, Son 2, several groups of loud drunks, two very fat women and an old woman with long, dyed-black hair and tons of make up. Waiting Time Four Hours flashed by on a ticker screen.  Swearing. Police. Hospital security. Son 2 wanted to get down on to the floor, but I was sitting by the infection-control MRSA/c.diff noticeboard and didn’t want him to catch anything.  He grizzled. I let him, figuring nothing motivates officialdom like a screeching infant.  The receptionist apologised. She’d reminded the nurse we were here, but there was a difficult patient… After 45 minutes the nurse saw us, and we were put into a children’s waiting room. Son 2 came alive at the trucks, cars, fire engines and diggers. ”Someone’s got a nasty bump,” said an ambulance man, dropping off a baby with croup. A very young, very pretty, smiling doctor appeared. She shone lights in Son 2’s eyes, looked in his ears, watched him play and examined his bump. He was fine, she said, but he clearly had a bad fall and I was right to bring him in. She gave me a list of things to look for, and said keep him quiet and give him Calpol and Neurofen, because he would have a headache. We got home at 0230.