The Glory days.

I kind of hate to post after yesterdays because I loved that one! These boys, although if I am honest drive me to distraction more often that I care to admit, just give me such reason for being.
I simply cannot imagine where my life would be if I hadn't met H and had these little gits.
I know I would be feeling very old by now, having the boys stops me having time to feel my age. I know I would not be ready for ...what? What would I be doing or have without these little boys? I have friends my age who don't have little people and most of them work, they have careers that they worked at whilst raising the children they have that are the same age as my older kids. They still work and they have time and money to build, to 'do', they enjoy peaceful times, plan for retirement. They wait for grandchildren and love visits from their children who flew the nest a while ago. Some have children who still live at home but are independent enough to need little care.
I am in the minority in having little children, still needing school runs, tooth fairies, Santa.
I am one of the lucky ones. Not a day passes by without my realising that these children are like bonus blessings, unexpected yet so longed for.
I do get comments on the fact that Seth and Isaac are 11 months apart, Elijah was a shock to all but H and I, we endured such harsh judgement for having him.
My answer to all and any criticism is this.
I always knew that I would have lots of children, I really did, for as long as I can remember I thought I would have 5 children. When the first one left I was heartbroken because his leaving changed everything. Funnily enough though, we had decided that we would have no more children, he had a vasectomy booked....still I felt that I would have more children so why his leaving left me so bereft is a mystery.
I was a single mother for 10 years and throughout that time, I prayed with such sincerity that somehow I would marry again and have the children I felt were waiting to be with me, that were mine.
So H~ and I met after those 10 years, I was 38, he was 40....time was short, I knew that I was going to have more children, I had prayed so hard for that, how then, did I have the right to now say "Oh thankyou Lord, here is the husband I prayed for and oh look, I am pregnant right away.....very good, now I will tell YOU when I want the others" In my mind it didn't work that way, this was no longer up to me, I asked, He gave. Enough.
When I conceived Isaac, 8 weeks after Seth was born, I was terrified, of course. But I wasn't for a moment regretful. When I lost the baby after Isaac and then conceived Eli immediately after that loss, I was so sure that this was right and I also felt, without any doubt, that this baby was the last one for me. Completely sure. When he was born that feeling was confirmed, he was my last baby.
The past 8 years, H and I have felt that we have had our heads down and shoulders to the wheel just getting by. It has been a tough, tough time. Babies and teenagers in the same house are akin to oil and water in the same bottle. You can shake it all you like but you are never going to make it mix! Oh my goodness, you have babies stripping your every ounce of physical strength and big kids sapping every single emotion you never even knew you had.
Babies getting you up 5am, big kids keeping you awake til 3am.
Babies needing you to 'do' big kids needing you to 'be' and 'hear' and 'know'
Now ( shhhhhh whisper this bit) the big kids are almost independent, pretty much alright and if not, well they are hardly here, what the eyes don't see etc etc.
The babies? Not babies, they are little people with personalities and the ability to reason, most days we can get them to understand what is expected and what do you know? They pretty much do what is expected.
We don't have the bags to pack every time we want to leave the house, if they are hungry or thirsty, they understand waiting. No nappies, oh JOY no nappies, or pull ups or bottles or potties.
They can get up on their own ( HUGE!!) in the past 2 months, if we are asleep when they wake, they come down and snuggle on the sofa, watch TV, get themselves cereal and they wait...they actually leave us sleeping CAN YOU IMAGINE THE JOY?!?
This means that right now, for me, these are the glory days, Too young to be out and making me pace the floor with fear and all those 'what if's' Old enough to be able to trust them for short periods of time.
I love these days. OK..the mess is never fun, I am resigned to it, unbelievably for someone previously so obsessed with perfection, I give in, it's a mess, nothing matches, yes this is our home, step over it, kick it out of the way, sit down if you can find a spot and whoops, sorry it's sticky.
It is for a short time, I look at Isaac in particular lately and can see a young man right there, so close by.
Just this week I have heard Elijah mutter these words " Ewwww, that's for GIRLS!" and turn away from it. " Acherlly, I like Ben Ten now, not High school musical" "Green" when asked his favourite colour and whilst a little secret part of me is breathing a massive sigh of relief, it all screams of him growing up. My last baby, growing up and I wonder if, even when I am near to 60, when these boys are ready to grunt as they pass us in the hallway, as they go out while we get ready for cocoa and bed, I wonder if I will be ready even then.
I doubt it. What I want to know is, that when I blink and we are there, when these boys are taller than me, stronger than H, when they look at us with that somewhat 'humouring' glance that teenagers give their slightly dim parents, I want to know that I grasped every moment of the glory days. So if that means dancing and singing to the carpenters while the laundry sits to the left...I'm up for it.
If it means running on the moors when the carpet is crunchy, too bad, not sad.
If it means buying go go crazy bones when we need fabric softener...oh well, crunchy towels are fine.
I also love those videos because, well, I used to sing, all the time, anywhere and everywhere. I did weddings and shows, recorded a song I wrote with a friend. I did pantomimes and choirs. I sang while I worked, drive, to my babies, always.
Then, I couldn't sing anymore. 2 years ago I woke up and I couldn't sing, overnight, I couldn't hear the notes and I couldn't get the sound out of my soul.
I was told that it was psychological, for so long I held so much inside me, stopped myself from crying and talking and screaming, that somehow singing got trapped inside too.
Right now, I am able so sing when I drive, as loudly as I want, I can sing what I like and how I like. I can sing in the kitchen and while I cook and clean.
I cannot sing at church, no matter how hard I try the sound will not come out, I can sometimes, quietly sing the alto to very familiar hymns, the rest, I have to mouth the words because the song is still trapped inside.
When I heard that video yesterday and I was actually singing, in tune and loudly enough to be heard, my heart sang and I have lost count of the times I have watched that since H downloaded it. I can still sing, albeit only in my kitchen and my car but it's still in there and it still sounds alright. A year ago I couldn't sing at all, not a note.
That tiny clip is like treasure to me and the comments about it are like extra treasure.
Singing has always been so important to me, when I was unable to pray I could sing and know the Lord knew what I was saying. Losing the ability to sing has been more painful than I can say and I have barely mentioned it because I haven't wanted to bring attention to it in case it made it real.
I have hope that some day I will be able to sing at church too, for now I suspect it is just still too emotional and I can't do emotions very well and still function. It's a long business this getting better lark.
I thrill at every small step toward 'normality' though. These boys are a huge part of being well, how can I be anything but OK when I see thigh slapping jigs from a little boy who used to stand and stare at the wall?
How can I do anything but laugh at that camp littlest one as he wiggles his hips and clicks his fingers in time to a tune?
How can life be anything but grand when that skinny little curly topped 7 year old cracks such jokes with such impeccable timing?
Yes, these are the glory days alright, I just hope I can keep stepping over the mess and grasping every glorious moment.

I don't think you are!

Isaac, you know the autistic one, the introverted and silent boy of mine. He has a new trick, he sings...he has been singing for a while and lately he wants the world to hear, he has adopted a fake opera voice and he uses it. Even in church, on sunday one of the hymns had Allelujah several times, he was in high heaven, without the switch that most of us have, he sang his heart out..Allelujah-ing even when everyone else had stopped.
I caught him today ( it took a while and several attempts) on video. This might show why I often have a headache. This level of noise is not unusual, neither is the chaos and fighting for top spot.




Oh my how LOUD are they?



Heh...might have been suckered in to the 'if you can't beat 'em join 'em' train of thought here....


Just have to love that thigh slapping too.

And this shows how much smaller Eli is compared to the other two, he doesn't get left out though, not Eli the dancing boy!!



Mum had an operation this afternoon and we kept busy so we didn't think too hard about what was happening, thankfully she is doing really well, we can go and visit tomorrow, when I shall write more about her.

21 today, 21 today, he's got the key to the door, never been 21 before.

Jordan Thomas Edward. 21 today.
From day one he has been my easiest child, he came into the world following 6 painless contractions, some pushes done in cold blood and amidst much laughing. I looked at him, this big boy with a mass of perfectly tidy hair and I had no idea what to think. He wasn't what I was imagining at all, there had been no pain at all delivering him, I felt as though someone had given me a cute new puppy when I had been hoping for a kitten.
I was distanced from him, able to do what he needed but still looking at him as someone else held him and wondering what the hell I was supposed to do with him. I did not want to breast feed, at all and refused to even try, with Dan I felt like c ow with one or the other udder out 24 hours a day and I just hated to even start that shinanigans again, the trouble is, he would not take a bottle, at all, he gagged and wretched and spat and he turned his head.
Everyone told me to breastfeed him, for 3 days, over and over, how he would starve and all he wanted was his mothers milk.
"He doesn't KNOW!" I would say, I hadn't even tried to feed him, how did he know that's what he wanted?
On day four, they beat me down, I gave in, so begrudgingly...and told them to pass him to me, I would give it a go but I didn't want to and they needn't think I was going to enjoy it, at all.
He latched on, he suckled for 5 minutes each side and he slept for 5 hours straight, every time. For 9 months. Delightful boy.
He loved me, if he could see me he was happy, if he couldn't, he screamed and that was the only time he screamed, ever. SO I just took him with me, everywhere, to the toilet, the kitchen, 3 steps to the right, he came too, it was a habit that suited us both, I never gave it a thought unless someone witnessed what we did and asked how I didn't go insane...then I would try and walk out of the door to show them what would REALLY drive me insane and they would get it.
He was a deliciously chubby baby, he loved to play with his hair and as I fed him he would rub his hair or reach for mine. He rubbed most of his hair off by the time he was 6 months old so he took to grabbing mine very gently and just rubbing it between his fingers.
I don't know if or when he would have grown out of screaming if he couldn't see me because he wasn't even 2 when his dad left and then when he was just 2 he was snatched and hurt so badly, well no-one ever questioned why he would scream if he couldn't see me then.
There is something about Jordan that has always had a most special part of my heart. So afraid was I that he would always be damaged and sad, so desperate for him to feel safe and be brave, I felt as though I had to shut off all emotions, strong feelings and tenderness, in order to get through it, make him well, help him grow up to be happy and unafraid without going insane.
He never ( that I can recall) made me lose my temper in the spectacular way that the others can do. Not until he was in his late teens anyway. Even then, if I am ever to lose my temper with him, he somehow knows how to diffuse it immediately and then he makes me laugh.
He always makes me laugh, he is quick and irreverant and says the kind of things that appeal to my humour, the sort of things that make you gasp because did he REALLY say that? And then laugh, because he did and it was so well timed and so wrong. On saturday at the park it was sweltering, truly almost unbearably hot and we were enjoying it but also not. Mel said " Oh I am SO hot!" and without a seconds thought he said " Oh don't flatter yourself!"
Now if anyone else said that it would most likely sound insulting but when he says it ..it's hysterical.
He gets away with talking that way to almost everyone, he also knows how to take it when it gets handed back, which helps.
I am enjoying watching him from a distance as he grows, he is doing a great job. He has found a new job and managed beautifully in the weeks he hasn't had work. He is doing what he should be doing and more. I see that the years I raised him alone have paid off, whatever I did, I did right, he makes me proud.
Now he is grown, he is still my easiest child. Lanky great git.

Things I want to do.

Occasionally I get the jitters and feel I want to burst forth into life and do stuff.
Today I feel like that...tiny weeny little sparklings of enthusiasm to be something more than I am, to embark on new things.
So here is a list, maybe this time next year I will dig it out and see if I did any of them. Be warned some of these things will be dull, some ridiculous, some surprising and some, forgotten because by the time I get around to actually writing the list they will have dribbled through the holes in my mind and be lost, possibly forever.

a) Learn to quilt and then quilt, like a mad lady, all kinds of quilts but especially splendid memory ones. I long for evenings filled with me making beautiful quilts and squinting at swatches and squares of material and visualising their magnificence

b) Play the piano, this has been a lifelong desire, I actually feel so sure that I can already play ( and I can sit and plonk in a pleasing way) What stops me getting on with it? A fear that actually I can't play and then I will be sad that I was wrong. Also I can't read music, at all..so there's something I would need to learn first and I am lazy.

c) I just deleted this one because I want it very much and as I was typing it seemed ridiculous and I can't have that, so what I intend to do is actually work on it, begin to make it happen and when it doesn't seem ridiculous I will tell you, I promise. It is a life changing and exciting plan and one that has been hatching for a long while. Intrigued? Very good.

d) Change Sophie's life.
I began today and although it is sure to be a long road, I know we can do it. I am seeing tiny steps she is taking on her own and so we decided that we would encourage her, it will either work or it will come back and bite us so hard we'll bleed.
Today, after a long discussion with H last evening, we told Sophie that if she gets a job, she can live here.
She can pay us £50 a week keep and she can turn the dining room into her own room, she can do with it what she will. When she has a job. We told her that this is a plan that will be up to her, it will be reviewed every 3 months, she cannot bring people back here, she will be responsible for her room and any behaviour that will be detrimental to the family will mean an immediate change of our minds, she must not speak to us with anything but respect, no more yelling and threatening behaviour. ( which I am almost loathe to say has been missing, hate to jinx that!) This is for many reasons, firstly for me because I cannot live another day with the uncertainty, I hate to see her floundering and afraid to get a job because she is afraid of what that may mean.
She has applied for and is following up on, job applications, we wanted her to have an extra incentive to find one and work. She will have to furnish the room herself and prepare for when she moves out, so buying her own bed, TV etc will ( we hope) encourage a feeling of worth and a desire to look after what she has.
She needs to feel as though she belongs, I want her to now that she has to play the game, that she can belong as long as she keeps doing her part.
She is here anyway, I can't see how that will change, we decided that she may as well know where she stands and hopefully see that this as a chance for her to be happy and work her way up to moving out on a good footing.
When I told her today I told her just how nervous I was to even tell her what we decided for fear of having it all backfire on us. She reacted just as I hoped she would and also immediately asked if she should go and thank H...I told her that words mean little to him and that we would both much rather she show us she is grateful by the way she behaves and use this chance we are giving her.
One step at a time, to help her change her life I just have to go one step at a time ....she had a Drs appt today, that she made and arranged, I reminded her that she should ask for a refill for her meds at the same time, she replied that she did that last week and it is waiting to be collected when she (or I) have the money for it. HUGE. ENORMOUS! She did that without a single reminder. Joy. I will find the money so she doesn't have to go without, I hate to risk any chance of a good thing being ruined.
Oh now I forgot what else I was going to list, hopeless, get off on a tangent and forget everything else. Maybe it will come back to me...maybe it won't!

Enough of that then.

That other post has been burning holes in my conscience. Also we may have a solution that half of me suspects will come back and bite me, I shall save that post until decisions have been made, so far just a discussion, an idea and a headache that is of the kind that makes one pace the floor moaning, laying down makes it worse, speaking....ouch and that desk top fan I can hear? That bugger is liquidising the inside of my skull, any minute I am going to opt for sweating quiet, any minute but not yet.
I had Joshua last night, all night...and I can put my hand on my heart and say that I adore that baby, however I understand that the Lord has reasons for making the wombs of most 46 year old women unable to expel newborn babies. It is a mere 5 years since I had Elijah, but oh my, the nights of being able to spring up and feed a baby and whisper and kiss and marvel...gone. Long gone.
I forgot how much noise little babies make and I think my grandson is the gruntiest and wriggliest scrunchpot ever. We were doing really well, I fed him at 8 and he crashed, all snuggly and comfy in his moses basket on the sofa, right by me where I could look over and adore him, where I could poke occasionally and then start to wonder if sleeping like this, at 8, 9, 10, 11....is this good? Do they do that little 7 week old babies and then sleep in the night? I forget.
I fed him just after midnight and he still slept, giving me several heart glowing grins in his sleep, as I changed his nappy and crooned to him
"Joshua, Joshua, sweeter than lemon squash you are. Oh. My. Gosh! you are, Josh-u Osh -u a"
great big smiles, even though he just couldn't open his eyes. I loved him even more.
I went to bed then, just after his midnight feed because I didn't know what his plans were and ...well I had no idea how I was going to do the sunday morning stuff with this little person around as well as all the regular madness ( and hoorah! Sophie....just took him in to her and said AUNTIE SOPHIE...its ME.....here I am!" and she was happy, perfect, I even managed a shower)
SO I lay and listened to the grunting and the shuffling and the little 'eh eh' noises that had me holding my breath waiting for him to wake up. 2am..he woke up....fed him again, settled him down....4am.....uh oh, H is actually sleeping and that is unheard of at 4am so I grabbed the moses basket and told the occupant that I adored him but maybe we could fall out, so he smiled and then I knew we no more likely to stop being friends......he was SO AWAKE, all smiley and happy to be with grandma in this unexpected way, how marvellous...... and we lay on the sofa the boy baby and me and we snoozed and soaked it all in, knowing that this was a one off, that after church I could ( and did) have a glorious nap while Joshua did whatever Joshua does on a sunday afternoon.
Mel was so happy to see him when I took him home and she called last night because she missed him, they both got back much earlier than they planned and I so hope that the night life is less appealing than it was, now they have this little man pulling their heart strings back home.

I wish my head didn't hurt so I could explain that bizarre rant about fat / thin in the last post. Basically I seemed to keep reading blogs that were either about Blogher ( which sounds like my idea of sheer hell, who in their right minds would think that thousands of women who all write blogs and want to be the funniest, best, most important, in one place vying for top spot and having to listen to speeches about how to be best, funniest, most successful and then feeling like a piece of crap when you don't get invited to 'the' party and no-one knows ( or cares) who you are unless you are in the top group of bloggers, well does that sound like fun to anyone? No thankyou. Boston for me, hands down.) Blogher or people talking about going to the gym and how fat they are and how so and so is so much thinner and then so and so leaving comments to say that she saw writer and OMG how THIN is she and then commenter felt like a cow and OMG so FAT....urgh.
Oh look, even with headache I whittered on...which reminds me does anyone get that twitter thing? IS it Twitter? Head hurts, can't remember but I did try to get it and ....I don't. Am going, head hurts. Am not so angry anymore, H helped, I am so glad I have him, unless he is getting on my nerves and then, well he makes me angry and off we go again!

Misery loves company...anyone for tea? Oh and....

At church today, one of the bishopric asked to talk to me and then asked me how I am .
Oh dear.
Actually I didn't cry, which you would think is a great thing, wouldn't you?
The thing is, for weeks now I have been trying to put a finger on how I am and what I am feeling and because he asked me, I tried to answer ( note to all, don't ask me how I am, I might believe you want me to tell you and then, tell you!)
I do know that for a long time it would appear that the only emotion I have left is anger and so much of it. I feel such ANGER...without a clue as to what I am angry at /about. Everything makes me angry, really, everything, really angry.
You? Probably make me angry.
Him...definitely.
Breathing? Don't do it near me or I might smack you in the head.
Eating, don't let me hear you is all.
Need me to cook for you? Clean for you? Think for you ( don't ask me to think for you, really. Don't)
Laundry anyone? Sod off and go au naturelle and pick your damn clothes up off the floor for the love of Pete and who IS this Pete, bring him here so I can give him a piece of my mind.
I am not mildly irritated, I am head explodingly rage filled. All day, every day. It is wearing me out and bringing the whole house down.
I wish I knew what was making me so angry because the relief I would feel at beating the living hell out of it would be great. I just wake up and what do you know? Here we go again, surrounded by idiots and with the world doing it's best to make me snap. Except I'm not and it isn't..so what is the deal?
This is when I have to accept that in my head things are not always as they should be. This is one of those times where I am probably going to have to suffer it ( though not gladly and what about my poor family?) until some long apparently forgotten misery comes back to haunt me. I have so much sadness and horror that I have hidden so well for so long I have forgotten much of it, every so often ( less often these days though for that am truly grateful) Something happens, or doesn't happen and it triggers a memory, I never suddenly remember what it is that is festering in my soul right away....it's more like a niggling ache, an occasional stabbing of pain that goes before it even registers properly and this goes on and on until right when I least expect it...it erupts and my heart or brain explodes. Sometimes both.
For months I have felt as though I am superfluous to this family. I have my uses and I do my bit relatively well, juggling the finances, making the calls, folding the clothes. Get up, deal with it go to bed, get up deal with it go to bed, lather, rinse , repeat. As for a real purpose or any great importance? Nah.

I am more heart sore about Sophie than I can ever let on and I am so angry, so blisteringly furious on her behalf and also at her. Always so angry at her, with her, for her.
She is beautiful and I want so much for her. She is infuriatingly hopeless at doing anything for herself. Every time I walk past what was our dining room and I see every single surface covered in her crap, when I see suitcases that were neatly stacked in the workshop scattered over the floor, when I see the mattress leant against the wall, pillows thrown where they land, makeup and girls crap spread from one end of the table to the other I am so incensed that I want, with every fibre of my being to charge in there and smash the whole room to smithereens.
For so many reasons, the obvious, that she has so little regard for us and our feelings right on to the fact that she has nowhere to go and not enough self esteem to believe she can go wherever she likes.
I am furious at every 19 year old girl with her future before her.
I loathe every younger than 19 year old girl who is happy, who is loved and safe. I hate pretty much every girl over 19 who has the same thing too.
I think I am beginning to see what is at the centre of my rage this time. Although I am unable to see what to do about it.
I want to be every body's fairy Godmother but I can't even be one girl's mother.
I want to change the world but I can't even change what is happening in my own dining room.
She tells me about a man following her in a subway at 2am......I stare at the wall.
She shows me a bite on her breast from some sick creep and I sigh.
She cries and I ignore her.
She yells and I yell back.
She leaves and I sigh with relief.
She comes back and I shut down.

She is....and I'm not.
I am all out of everything. No ideas, no energy, no hope.
I have many signs that the depression is back and it's raring to go. I don't want it here. I have been doing what I have always watched with horror in others' lives.
I spend way too much time and energy trying to get away. The problem with that is, when I get away, I have to come back and it's all still here, it isn't going anywhere unless I make it leave and I have no idea how to do that.
Back to square one then.

They say you are only as happy as your most miserable child. Indeed.

Oh and....
Why ..WHY do skinny people always go on about how unskinny they are and how so out of shape and how oh poor me, to look this way.
Look....being fat is miserable and only fat people should be able to whine about it, do not whitter on about how when you were jogging / at yoga / doing your workout you were so horrified at how fat and unfit you are/were. Bollocks.
If you jog/ go to yoga/ do workouts the chances are you are really NOT fat, not real fat, not huffing up the stairs fat, not weeping at the reflection as you walk past fat, not oh hell now this shirt is cutting the circulation to my arms off fat. Shut up and let us real fat people tell it how it is .
Skinny people get to whine about how cold they are and um, how skinny they are, shut up about being fat when you have an extra 3lbs hidden under your hair somewhere, stop stealing the stuff fat people are entitled to say but never will because if they do, someone will tell them to stop eating then lard arse.
Shut up.
( is it terribly bad to admit to how good whining is? I love it. Go me!)

Who needs words?

When we have so many pictures?
I think we can say that Elijah has had a happy day so far and the sun shone down ( so much that I may have a stinging and sore lobster face and the most fetching farmer's tan you ever might see)


His most precious friend Hannah.


Crisps and sunshine


and a treasure found!




Melon and brothers


new ball games


Chubby smiling babies, well just the one but he is glorious enough for several mediocre ones.


Sleeping chubby babies, 7 weeks old.


Briefly naked chubby babies


Playing in the water sprays

And watching other people having fun....


Argh! So HIGH! Sqeeeeeeeeeal!


You move...no YOU move!











There will be cake later and some snuggling on the sofa because you are still not too big for a blanket and a cuddle, even when you are five.
Happy Birthday Elijah Henry, we are so happy you are in our family. I think we didn't know what happy was until you were born.

Well, nobody lost a digit!

I am 46. I think I may have sworn more in the first morning of my 47th year than any other morning, it wasn't going well to begin with.
At noon, or very close to then I answered the door to discover a delivery man on the doorstep.
With these...from Cathy, in Boston

And things changed.
Life got good and kept getting better, right up until H and I went for dinner and my card was refused. ( and I wasn't in the least embarrassed because I knew I had more than enough to cover our meal, I knew it was their machine but still....not fun!
I took the boys out to run and jump and they did...




















The boys went to Jordan and Mel's house while H and I went for a delicious Indian meal, we may have left them there a bit longer than it took to eat, they played on the Wii and we got them just in time to go to bed.
I am going to take Eli to the Dr, he just cries all day, every day, this is not like him, he gets a fever, pukes, cries and sleeps, all randomly and when you are used to being such a happy go lucky soul, well something isn't right. I hope he has just got very tired and needs to catch up but it all seems weird to me, so we'll see.
For now, 46 isn't bad at all. I may hang onto it for a year and see how it goes.

Schools out for Summer!

I love that feeling. I loved it when I was at school and I love it now. Waiting outside the classroom and then seeing little people with bulging bags of classwork, projects, paintings. I love that the littler classes have their pictures taken right through the year and when they leave their first year of school, they have books of pictures documenting all the exciting things they did, all their friends and teachers.
I met Naughty Nathan ***** mum today, funny how she has obviously heard as much about Naughty Elijah **** as we have about Nathan, except she had to stand and TELL me all the naughty things that she believes Eli has done against her precious and innocent boy. Ptttttthhhhh. Yeah well, your kid isn't coming to Eli's party so there. I know my Eli never did throw Nathan's car over the fence, probably.
Isaac's go go crazy bones arrived today and in a perfect way I took them to school so he could play ( as we do) for an hour ...oh what joy, his face was alight as all his friends crowded 'round and asked if ALL those we HIS and WHERE did he GET THEM? He shared and I watched very closely as one little boy hid a few in his hands and nonchalantly started to wander away.
"Oh T...you weren't taking those go go bones away were you?"
"No"
"Good boy, you can stay and play but Isaac has already lost a lot of his go go bones this week and it would be very sad if that happened again, wouldn't it?"
Bless her heart, his mum frisked him as they were about to leave and had him put back the 2 that had somehow found their way into his pockets!
School is over for 6 weeks, we are all happily done with uniforms and lunch boxes.
The weather is so perfect for me at the moment, oh if we could have a few weeks of this with perhaps a smattering of rain during the night sometimes. Heaven.
If it's beautiful tomorrow I shall take the boys up onto the moors with a picnic and let them run wild, take pictures, breathe beautiful fresh air and forget I am 46.
46.
I just had a chat with Seth.
"Seth, what day is it tomorrow?"
" Thursday"
"Yes but what date?"
"24th"
"which is?" ( blood /stone springs to mind )
"Oh yes, the anniversary of me cutting the top of my finger off!"
Which is what he did right before my friends arrived for lunch on my birthday. Little snot.

You can skip this one, I'm only hitting post because it took SO long to write.

Now that is tired.
Just tired.
Can't stand another minute tired.
Being 4 years, 11 months and 3 days is just too hard sometimes.
When you are happily living life, taking a 3 hour nap every afternoon and suddenly someone tells you you are a big boy now and you get to go to school, every day for SEVEN hours, well you can go along with it for so long and then, after 7 months, it just gets too much and you can't. do. it. another. day.
The last week has really been too much for Eli, bless his heart he has grizzled and whined and cried and fallen over and wailed and it is all soooooooooooo awful for him.
He has a friend at school, I so wish I could write his name, and for some reason this little chap has become the bane of Eli's life. He makes us laugh every day because this little boy, who is the little boy that Eli plays with every day gets the blame for everything!
He is responsible for global warming according to Eli. Naughty bad boy. IF Eli falls over at home it is Nathans fault ( except he always used first and last name) This child is mentioned a hundred times a day
"Is it my birthday yet? Can Hannah come? Not Nathan ******! Don't let him come will you?"
" I had yoghurt for dessert at school today, Nathan ***** made me spill it"
" Nathan ***** always says bad words, he called me the F word, I didn't say any naughty words just only Nathan ***** says it"
I love Nathan ***** he is the sweetest little boy, and actually he IS a bit naughty,which ( spell check just told me that 'naughty, which' is not a word that maybe I wanted to write chattahoochee!!!)I sit opposite the school every day and I park right opposite the playground, I can see and hear Eli as he plays with Nathan and I watch his face light up every time naughty Nathan does something, he loves Naughty Nathan *****.

We're having a couple of weeks where we are having to rob Peter to pay Paul. I am always amazed at how possible it is to live on a tight budget. I am so able to do it. It is not difficult although I really don't like it.
For 2 years we have been paying towards something, moving so many times, 2 trips to America, moving again, fixing the car etc.
This week I pretty much paid everything off, the last bits of money owed for various bits and pieces. With rent due next week that means that we are counting each penny and then, after next week we are done. Home and dry ( watch some big old bill turn up now!)
I am sort of excited to try and keep living within the budget I have become used to, maybe the odd splurge as I try and vamp this house up a notch ( watch out ebay here I come, you have had a break from me the past year or so but I'm watching you right now!) but for the most part I am determined to try and keep spending low, change the way I shop and perhaps go back to that great system we had, with the different pots. When it's gone, it's gone. That worked so well and I stopped a year ago when we moved into the barn because H couldn't do the shopping, I had to drive and get it all. Now we are back in town and H walks to the shops most days, I can start up the kitty again and he can pick up the things we need. HE buys what we need, I am so sucked into the buy one get one free offers, even if we really don't need it, I stock up, buy 4, see things we don't need but oooooooooh must have it!
There are so many things we don't need. The bins tell a tale, when I see the amount of waste we throw out every day, all that packaging and greed. More and more it drives me crazy and I am becoming like a muttering old lady, tut tutting and shaking my head. It seems we are always hearing about recessions and times of hardships and I can honestly see how hard things will become if we don't start taking note of just how much we waste in our world.
It's as though none of us, in the world of wasy come easy go notice what we are doing. I go shopping and can't help but think of how much we take for granted.
H and I love to watch those shows that place families in another time and place. This week we have seen families put into homes in 1920's and wartime Britain. To see how hard it is in the beginning, to see how these people struggle and weep at how different and tough life is, but then after a few months ( I think they live this way for 3-6 months) the difference is astounding, always a change for the better in health, without all the pre packaged foods and the salt, the physical effort of hand washing sheets and walking 4 miles to and from work, beating rugs and scrubbing stone floors. Slowly we see the huge benefits of living simply. Always, at the end of the experiment the adults cry at having to go back to the modern world. The harder the trial, the greater the joy. We watched a few shows about families sent to live like pioneers in the harshest of winters. These shows are fantastic, we love them.
This weeks family had a toddler who didn't eat much but drank a lot fo milk. To see the mother crying as she discovered that she had no way of buying milk, that she had just enough money to pay the rent and only 5pence left, a bunch of carrots for the whole family was 10 pence and the travelling grocer had sold the last of the milk. The family lived 4 miles from the nearest store and 4 miles from the pits where the men and boys worked every day, the men came home tired and soaked from the walk in the rain to find dinner was a watery soup with a few carrots.
Such hardships compared to anything we experience these days.
The strange thing is that the families were happy, the communities pull together,the laughter and fun is incredible. No TV just a wireless, no toys or play stations, no laptops ( oh OK that's enough, I change my mind......) Families spend time together, the children become calmer, more obedient without all the insanity and chemicals of today.
Any day now I am going to join a commune and wear cheesecloth, grow my own cabbages and sing Kumbya. Not.
I do hope that I can take on some of the things I think will help us as a family though.
I know I am rambling and not saying what I am thinking clearly. I'm not sure I am even thinking clearly, just that somehow I am restless and need to shake this old house up a bit.
Ha...could have said that in the first place and saved myself a few rambling paragraphs.
Also, I really love the sunshine.
The end.

Am I ready for this?

2 more days of school. I feel I am ready for the 'break' I love not having a rigid routine, no packed lunches to make, no uniforms to iron, no having to be here and go there at certain times.
I don't like the chaos though. Especially trapped in this house, I dread it. I have been pining for the barn and it's acre of land, for the wilderness and the trampoline. Fr days of not going anywhere but out in the garden....friends spending the day and having feasts outside.
Oh well, tough nuts, we're here and we have to come up with a plan.
I do have a plan of sorts. More and more I am horrified by the waste in our lives, the endless shopping and consuming of crappy foods.
We eat so may crisps and snacks in this house, no matter how many I buy and hide, they get eaten at a ridiculously fast and greedy rate and I am so sick of it.
So, today I decided that I am not buying any easy snacks in the 6 weeks we have no school. That sounds like an easy thing but I don't think it will be. When the boys are at home, they graze all day long, especially Isaac.
The thing is all of us really love good food, really good food. We all love fruit and vegetables, the boys would choose olives and pickles given the choice. So I am going to give them the choice.
For 6 weeks we will have a fridge stocked with carrots and cucumbers, grapes, melon, apple slices, strawberries.
They can eat cheese cubes and pineapple. Red and green peppers, beetroot.
I know that they will be completely happy, which makes me feel bad for opting for the easy route most days. It's so quick to throw crisps and a cheese string in their lunch box. Who wants to stand for hours chopping peppers and carrots when their are school shirts to iron? So, while we don't have shirts and schedules, we can have time to try a new road.
I am bored with the shopping too, wandering around Asda buying the same old stuff week in week out, I shall try the markets and stalls, buy fresh and let the boys chop and scrape.
I have been so tired lately, pathetically weary, waking up tired, sleeping more than I ever have.
Sleeping is great but being awake and having energy to enjoy being awake is great too.
I am nearly 46.....somehow that number bothers me. I remember being that bothered by becoming 30. Ha!
Imagine being worried about being 30. A baby.
So I must make myself think about how, in many years time, 46 will seem young and fresh to me. I shall grasp the joy of being 46. When you think of the alternative...being 46 is pretty great!
I feel a bizarre kind of excitement about a change, we are all in a grizzly rut lately, I know the boys are ready to have a change. They are so grumpy and whiney it's untrue.
Poor Eli is on his last legs, he falls over fresh air and by 6 o'clock every evening he is so floor flingingly fed up with the world. This evening at bath time, brought forward a bit because he was falling asleep at 6pm, we had Little Richard blaring on H's super duper bribe iPod dock deal, we were dancing and washing and singing and he climbed on the side of the bath and somehow he fell and bit through his bottom lip, 3 teeth went right through. Poor little boy. Try being beside yourself tired, so ready to sleep but can't suck that beloved thumb because your lip bleeds every time you try. Big old fatter than usual kissy lip, leaky brown eyes plopping tears like nobody's business and the world is just a rotten old place to be.
He is fast asleep and looking comfy. He was awake again in the night. I can't work out what is going on with him, still happy enough in the day but having trouble sleeping and fractious at night. He needs a few weeks of taking it easy and having a nap with mummy in the afternoon. My littlest boy. I cant believe he is almost 5. Still a baby to me though.
The weather is glorious here at the moment, how I hope it stays like this for saturday so that Eli can have his picnic in the park with friends and all his cousins and a high school musical cake. Please don't let it rain.

Isaac came home from school today with 2 go go crazy bones. He went to school with 23 and a new case for them. I want to storm into that school and find the snotty little oiks that took his bones and make them cry. He seemed unconcerned and said he swapped them, trouble is the revolting brats didn't give him anything in return. When I think of H and his sojourns to W.H Smiths and the excitement when we got some go go crazy bones, whooppie!
Ack, H says it is a lesson learned and when his stash from ebay arrives ( hopefully after school finishes so we don't have to endure weeping because he is NOT taking them to school to give to little shites that take advantage of his not being able to say no to them) he will have a new stash to play with and they will NOT be taken anywhere that some horrible Henry can take them away.
H and I are good for each other because we always seem to balance each other out, I am ready to punch any kid who looks like they might be thinking about Isaac and his crazy bones, H calmly says that Isaac now knows that he either has to say no, keep his toys at home or lose them.
Another time, H will be about to blow and I will tut and say no big deal, let it go.
Heaven help the world if we ever get up in arms about the same thing, perish the thought.

Gemma commented that H looks like Pop Larkin in Darling buds of May, indeed he does! How marvellous. I loved that show and it is my idea of a heavenly life. Glorious Pop with his love for his family and adoration for Ma, who is twice his size, country life with their children and chickens in the garden. If H and his sideburns are to appear like anyone, I shall vote for Pop Larkin everytime!
I wish that would come back on, on sunday evenings, from start to finish. I might try and find the DVDs because I really think that was my favourite show in the whole world ever.
H is about ready to lose the sideburns, as soon as we have taken a glorious picture akin to the one he has of great great grandpa Greenhaulgh, they can go. I will be happy to see all of his lovely face but somehow the whole eccentric idea of them has been very touching and along with his sandals and socks and his floppy hat, he is altogether quite delicious.

Did I tell you about my dream? I keep meaning to.
I once had a dream ( when pregnant with Isaac) that I could see 2 little boys playing and another watching, the one on his own said that he was going to be a brother to the other 2 and that he couldn't wait to be with them. A 'man' told him that he wasn't going to be with them now, that the family had chosen not to have more children and so he would be going to another family. He cried and cried and said that he had chosen THAT family and that those 2 boys were his brothers, he begged to be with that family.
I knew then that H and I were to have another baby and every day I am glad that we made that decision. He is our joy.
Anyway, 2 weeks ago I had another dream, just as vivid.
I was walking along a street and saw a small boy sitting on a wall, he was looking at the ground and was swinging his legs. I walked past and felt that he was waiting for someone, that maybe he had been left behind or forgotten. I took a few steps back and asked him if he was waiting for someone.
"yes, I am waiting for you"
"For me?"
"Yes, I have been waiting a long time."
"what's your name?"
"Solomon"
Well, well.
Unless there is a miracle, I won't be having another baby. I am sure that I had all the babies that were waiting for me.
I was stunned for a day or two about this dream because it was so real.
Now I feel OK with it because lately, since Eli has been at school and no longer a baby, I have been thinking a lot about the babies I lost. Especially the one that I lost right before Eli. I was so sad when we lost that baby, I was so sure that it was meant to be, that this baby was the one that had cried in my dream, I couldn't understand why, if this was a good thing to do, the right thing, to have this baby that we had no idea how we would manage to look after ( H had no job, we had no home, were about to move back in with H's dad) I couldn't grasp why we would then lose the baby.
I got my answers, I learned that sometimes a baby needs only to get a body, no matter how small and that's it, that life is complete, sometimes the baby doesn't need to be born into this world to fulfill it's purpose. I believe that we will raise those babies, we will be a family, just not here, not now.
I wonder if my dream was that baby, telling me that he is waiting and just letting me know that he will be mine.
Solomon is a pretty good name, fits with the other boys names too and is certainly a name I would use.
If you ever come here and read a long running sentence about how even though H had a vasectomy and even though I am so OLD and even though this was not planned or even thought about but OH MY LIFE I am pregnant.....the baby will be called Solomon, unless it is a girl in which case she will be called um.......who knows, I will be in some lunatic asylum rocking back and forth just at the thought of having a teenaged girl in my 60's. I am pretty sure her name could be anything, I won't be in any state to choose it.

There's always a but....

So today was one of those days that was all fluffy and dreamlike, where it all seems to have worked out well, to my good. Life is fine.
Dan is down and he and Jordan said that today, dinner was up to them, they shopped and were going to cook, no need to lift a finger and my goodness, they were true to their word. They roped Sophie in as kitchen runner ( for a fee you understand!) she was to clear and run and be general dogsbody because chefs do not do the menial business. Oh no.
It went beautifully,

One chef,

two chefs

and a runner.


It was so good.
We ate, little people at little tables,



Big people at the big table



We had good conversation


And we had 2 roast chickens, one citrus and one garlicky, roast potatoes, honey roasted parsnips, broccoli, swede and carrots mashed, we had stuffing balls ( sausage meat, sage and onion and raisins) gravy and for dessert we had Lemon Possit, with cherries on the top. Does it all sound too marvellous for words, well it was. I tell you what. Delicious.
I felt a little giddy. I am so used to lovely family gatherings, living at grandpa's house we were always bursting at the seams with cousins and inlaws, friends and neighbours, file 'em in and fill 'em up, that's how we like it. My mum does a great family do, all the kids and grandkids. Heaven on earth I tell you.
What was strange and kept making me feel a bit spaced out and freaky was that I was the grandma, I was the matriarch, the person...the hub.
ME!
That'll make you feel old and also more than a little special and important.
Have no fear though because there is always a 'but'.
The 2 chefs? Totally ruined, completely precious and used to having some poor little school leaver as their pot washer. Now the plan was that Sophie be that person and she did indeed earn her money moving tables, fetching and carrying but we, H and I have a reputation ( he more than I) for being particular about how dishes are washed and being swished about in a sink of of tepid greasy water and then flung willy nilly into the drainer? Won't work in this house, so because the thought of dishes after a roast dinner is enough to stop H enjoying said meal, I said I would do the washing up today .
When I cook, especially a roast, I wash up as I go, I use one saucepan and cook 2 vegetables with it ( boil potatoes, steam broccoli) Chefs, used to having a lackey to wash up, well they could care less. Make a sauce...oh pan isn't big enough let's use this one...uh oh still not big enough. Can you see where this is going?
14 plates.
7 saucepans.
5 roasting dishes.
4 platters,
3 jugs,
2 mixing bowls,
16 glasses,
Every single whisk, fork, knife, spoon in the kitchen.
Sophie cleared the table and piled it all...ALL in the sink and drainer, like some hideous kind of monument to cooking.
It took me a loooooong time to do all that washing up but it was worth it. Today was such a gift.
Oh of course, while the cooking was being taken care of, grandma got to take pictures....






( I know that's the header picture too but it may not always be so it gets to be in here too, could it be any more perfect with that little curled lip? )
Today was a good day, a beautiful day.
Eli is sick again which is annoying, I wish he could just get well and stay that way, nothing too drastic we hope but the endless sickness that goes and comes back and an ear ache to boot.
Apart from that it has been a glorious day.
We love those. A lot.

Hello?

Do people read blogs on saturday? I don't think so, people ( other than me, for me saturday is like every other day but a bit longer and louder) don't seem to write blogs on saturday because I suspect they are out having fun and living it up. Me, I manage to do all that by 10am and the rest of the day is mine to whine about. So much for that song " Saturday is a special day" It is my arse.
So, if people don't read blogs on saturday I should be safe having a good old moan, vent, swear ( should the fancy so take me)
It's sunny..which is a great thing, we love that, sunshine and all. we had plans for today, Dan is here, well I say here, at Jordan's house which is understandably more exciting than mine, he has a shiny new BIG TV which as well know is one of my mortal and material desires, a great big TV, side by side fridge freezer ( check!) and a car that is new enough that it doesn't smell of wet dogs. I have extended the list of requirements for the car, because if you are going to dream you should do it big, so, no wet dog smell, doors that lock, full seat belts in the back and good on petrol. Leather seats would be great too, not essential but oh how wonderful that would be.
So, Dan is down the road, Jordan's house is very very close to ours, which is a great and beautiful thing. Usually. I am humbled and touched that my grown children love me so much. I am. Yep.
Sophie loves me so much lately that she is nearby very often, talking at me, about money usually. I might have been forced to wave 2 unopened utility bills in her face just now and told her that if I don't have the money to pay THEM why would she continue to think I have money to give her to go out? She still kept asking, as if, rather like I used to think when I was SEVEN, if she keeps asking, then surely answer will change. She even woke me from a nap this afternoon ( And truly, does this girl not know me AT ALL? Even when I told her through gritted teeth in a hissing voice that this had better be important, on a level with ' the house is on fire and I have rescued your young and dependant children, called the fire brigade and am now here to make sure you leap to safety' she STILL said 'oh, no but can you lend me £10 seeing as you have told everyone else NOT to?' Wouldn't any rationally thinking person think..hmmmmm she has told everyone not to lend me money and then just be annoyed and give up?...why does HER mind tell her hmmmmm she has told everyone not to lend me money, that means I should wake her up and ask HER for some.)
I think my kids have my blog address, they keep saying things that are on here. If you do, oh fruit of my womb....and you read it, don't whine. I don't want to hear about it, if you read it, it's true. If you don't like it..stop reading.This is where I come to unload my head and stop myself saying it to your faces or smacking you in the head, or losing mine. This blog is your salvation as well as mine.....I wish you wouldn't read it but if you do, don't mention it to me. I don't want to know and I certainly don't want your opinions. I love you though.

Also, if I am asleep, leave me that way. Unless the house is on fire or you win the lottery.

Isaac had a party invite today to a great and fun place, with his best friends and we were excited about it, we being H and I. Isaac?
"I don't want to go. Shall I not go, I think I hate that place"
So we did all the talking and the what funs, all the well just see how it is and then we can talk about what you want to do's.
We went and he said that he would stay if I sat at a table, with the shoes under the chair and promised not to move at all.
3 hours or was it 2, who knows it felt like 5. HE had such fun though that he was pouring sweat and OH JOY if they didn't give out free packs of CRAZY BONES, which made it all perfect.
I find that the older he gets the harder I find his inability to speak to people like his friends mums, when he was tiny it could be passed off as shyness but now he is nearly 7 and when asked a question as simple as 'what would you like to eat' by someone he has seen and known for several years, when he turns his back and stares at me in panic, well it feel sso much worse than when he was 4 or 5. Having to gently explain why this big boy can't stay at a party without his mum or dad right there is getting tougher, I have no idea why it's hard for me because everyone is the epitome of kindness and understanding, when I mention why he does these things, it is almost always the case that I can see a light go off in their heads and they will then say "Oh..I SEE! " and then I can see that they are putting it all together and 'getting it'
When he is asked a question and with his back to them he will give me the answer, I feel myself sighing a bit. When we leave and I ask him if he wants to say thankyou and he looks at me and mouths "you say it" I feel awkward, for him as well as me because I actually think he wants to say it himself.
But when I look at him and look past all that and see who he really is, well none of it matters, not even a bit. He is breaking boundaries his aspergers set and taking such huge stride. He is so beautiful and such a kind and gentle soul. He is quite perfect.

He is so worth it.

This boy is my joy. I adore him.

I have no idea what these little boys found so funny, the concert hadn't started yet they were just lining up on stage ready to sing.


He is such a little chap next to his friends.



Happy face almost all the time, day in, day out.