NotSheep

I don’t know where the time goes. Here we are again, with me doing (yet) another catch-up blog-post.

Anyway. On with the show and all that.

On Friday morning, I abandoned most of the children. Well, sort of. I had shopping I needed to get done, and I knew they’d all be bored stiff traipsing in and out of shops after me, so I phoned my friend T (also my co-leader at Beavers) and asked if she’d be free to have them for a couple of hours. She was up for it, so I left all except Toby with her and took her eldest, C, off to school. He was going in late, partly because his school-bus hadn’t arrived and partly because he wanted to miss geography anyway. When we were talking in the car on the way to the school, he seemed a bit… well, not quite the way he usually is… and after I dropped him off (only metres from the door), I thought, “If I hadn’t dropped you right at the school door, I’d be thinking you’d have skived off.”

I did my errands, then went back to T’s; she went and collected her younger son and the little girl she childminds from school (half-day since it was the last before half-term) and then made me tea and all the kids lunch. Oh, and her mother came and collected her younger son and took him back with her, to join his older brother who had - guess what? - not actually made it through the school-door after I dropped him off…

We left T’s and headed for the swimming-pool; Jack threw himself down the slide every which way (clearly traumatised by my forcing him onto it last week). Scratchy met us after swimming and took some of the kids home while others went to soccer and I worked out at the gym. Then it was home for dinner, after which Scratchy and Henry went to basketball.

Saturday morning started just like last week: Barney, George and Freddy to swimming lessons and me to the gym. It was assessment week for the kids, and George is to move up a level - putting him in the same class as Barney again, and leaving Freddy on his own. We came home for a snack, then I took George and Freddy to gymnastics, went to exchange something I’d bought, stopped at T’s to leave something with her, and ended up bringing her two boys home with me (collecting George and Freddy on the way). The boys spent the rest of the afternoon bouncing about (at times literally: the trampoline got plenty of use). Freddy complained of being tired, and actually went to bed and slept for a couple of hours - very unlike him (but explained today). T came for them later and we drank yet more tea and talked even more, then it was dinner and bed - though not sleep, at least not immediately, since somebody was setting off fireworks nearby.

This morning started slowly. Scratchy was working today and everybody was still wandering about in pyjamas when Henry’s mum and dad phoned. I’m not sure why, but he dissolved into tears during the call. I think we’re at a difficult point: the novelty has worn off, as has all the on-best-behaviour (for everyone), but he’s not quite at the point of viewing us as part of his family. He’s also deschooling to some extent, and being confined to the house a bit more than usual (with Barney’s chickenpox) didn’t help. After the call, I talked with him for a while and he cried a little but soon settled. His poor parents - having him unhappy on the phone must be so distressing for them I was very glad that they phoned again this evening and I was able to reassure them that this morning wasn’t at all typical of how things are going. It is sometimes difficult for him, and he is sometimes down, but he’s an eleven-year-old boy who’s away from his family, in a foreign country, in a very different environment to the one he’s used to, doing new things, and surrounded by people speaking a new language - and I think that he’s actually doing very well. If he really was unhappy all (or even most of) the time, I wouldn’t want him to stay. There are huge benefits to be had from an exchange like this, but they’re not worth six months of misery. If he wasn’t coping, I’d be doing something about it - including sending him back to France if necessary. But most of the time, he’s fine - and indeed he told Scratchy in the car this evening that “this is my choice, and I will stay for six months”.

Anyway, backing up a bit… while I made lunch, Barney commented that Freddy looked like he had chickenpox - and waddyaknow, he was right. Not just Freddy either. Jack too, and almost certainly George as well. In one way, it’s a good week to get it over with: it’s half-term, so most of the boys’ activities are cancelled anyway. In another way, it’s lousy timing: they won’t get to go trick-or-treating, and Freddy will miss at least one of the two ju-jitsu practices before his grading.

After lunch George and Freddy chose a DVD to watch, but Barney and Henry weren’t thrilled with the choice, so I set Henry up with a Neopets account and Barney “showed him around” the world of Neopia. It didn’t take long before I heard Henry shouting from the dining-room, “I love Neopets!”

The rest of the afternoon was mostly spent vegging in the family room, followed by dinner (brought home by Scratchy - it was just that kind of day), then a fairly early night for all. I can’t believe another week has gone by…