NotSheep

When it comes to blogging every few days, all I can say is, “Thank goodness for Twitter”. Because my memory is, uh, what was I saying?

Monday morning was spent running from one errand to another, including stopping to see the midwives and get blood taken to check my B12 level - and proving, once again, that I have horrible veins. Neither the midwife nor the student midwife was able to get a cooperative vein, and in the end they called a nurse from the treatment room to have a go. She managed to get blood - and only poked me once with the needle, which is good, but left a great big bruise, which isn’t so good. By the time we were through, I was late for Toby’s speech therapy, but the therapist being in late pregnancy herself, she was understanding. I also took the bicycle with the puncture (the one that was Freddy’s but was about to be given to Jack) to the bike repair shop, but they weren’t able to fix it until Tuesday, which wasn’t a lot of use since we were planning on leaving straight from there for the caravan. So I went back home and collected yet another bicycle - Toby’s smaller one - just in case we weren’t able to get it repaired. We did get it sorted out though, in the same shop that fixed it on Saturday, and they didn’t even charge for fitting the new tube or tyre (because of the running back and forth we’d had to do).

We got to the caravan and spent the afternoon outdoors, as it was sunny and reasonably warm - not tee-shirt weather, but certainly pleasant. On starting dinner, I realised we were out of bread, and then I realised I was out of cash, so I couldn’t even send Barney to the shop - so cheese toasties were out. I also realised we’d left the toothbrushes at home - there’s always something. So Tuesday morning found us driving into the big town, because although there is a chemist’s shop in the village, it’s not exactly large or well-stocked (they didn’t have Band-Aids when I went looking for those). I went armed with a meal-plan for the week and bought everything we needed. Back to the caravan for lunch, then the boys spent the afternoon in and out, as the weather allowed. They made friends with E, a boy about Freddy’s age whose family also have a caravan, and he ended up staying for dinner - he was kind of left hovering on our deck when I called my own children in for food, so I guesstimated how much spag bol there was and figured I’d feed him too, if he wanted. The dinner-time conversation was quite amusing - many home-educators find that people quiz their children to see what they’re learning, but my kids turned the tables and quizzed E instead: things like, “What’s the name for a number multiplied by itself?”

E stayed after dinner too, while they watched the rest of their movie (Spiderman 3 - really, really bad - I was almost praying for it to end!) and finally left about 9.30. I must have twittered quite a bit about the wind and rain, because when I said I thought there was only one other family there, Merry messaged me to ask where we were and ask if it was purgatory I think the answer to that is provided in the replies I got from the boys this morning when I asked when they wanted to go back to the caravan. Toby yelled “Yes!”, two voices said “Soon!” and the remaining two said “As soon as possible!” - so now we’re trying to make plans for the weekend and next week…

I woke on Wednesday morning to a very strange sound: silence. No rain beating on the windows, no blasts of wind…the silence didn’t last long when children started to wake though, especially with George, who was in chittering mode. Not chattering - chittering has a whole extra element of irritating. Never was I more grateful for getting-them-outside weather! I tried and failed to put my watch on - it’s usually quite loose as I wear it quite far up my wrist, but it was too tight, and when I looked at my hands, I realised how swollen they were. I’ve also got tingly fingertips, and I’m hoping it’s not the knitting that’s doing it, because I’m really enjoying knitting again

During the day on Wednesday the staff from the caravan park removed the caravan opposite ours, using a "big digger truck", as Toby put it, and thus provided great entertainment for small boys. We also spent a while down on the beach with bicycles - which Chris disapproved of because of the potential damage to gears and chains, but really, if you had the opportunity to cycle in and out of the Atlantic, wouldn’t you? In the afternoon, Barney asked to be taught to knit - he’s not usually the good-with-his-hands kid, but surprised me in how quickly he picked it up and got quite good at it. He proclaimed it “pretty fun”, and at bedtime was disappointed to be sent to bed because he wanted to stay up and knit (”it’s kind of addictive”).

On Thursday morning I’d a call from a midwife to tell me my B12 was now normal - which leaves me searching for some other explanation for my fatigue We walked to the shop in the morning - which usually takes just a few minutes, but took forever because my pelvis was so sore, and left me exhausted. We expected our friends K & J to be using the caravan from Friday, so planned to leave then, but I decided to leave Friday rather than have to pack up the car in the rain forecast for Friday morning. I spent the rest of the morning tidying and packing what I could, in preparation for leaving in the afternoon, while the boys cycled, skateboarded and playgrounded. I got the bicycles onto the car at about 2.30 - with difficulty, given that I have a big bump in the way of lifting them and that the carrier is designed to carry three bicycles and I had five… The boys played for another hour or so before we left, and Barney knit on the way home in the car. We arrived home at about 5.30 and the first thing I did was put on the water-heater - and oh did that hot bath ever feel good! Shortly after I went to bed, I got a text-message from J to say they weren’t going to be at the caravan this weekend after all - and I’d left the power, water and gas on…probably not a big problem, although the milk I left in the fridge might not be so good by the middle of next week. We could end up back there over the weekend, when the forecast is snow - now that could be an adventure…I promise I’ll take some photos this time if we do.