Yay! Summer was great! We did so much fun stuff, it was sunny and warm and London has so much to offer. We have ticked off carousel ride from the summer list, revisited the pirate playground, built an excellent den out of a broken table in the square garden with Barnaby, Noah, Casper and Ned, been to the British Museum, had dinner at Pizza Express, visited the local star attraction (ever since Brooke learnt to read she has been fascinated with Sheila's Cafe and who Sheila is). We went to Brighton to visit Erica and her beautiful daughter Mollie, we met up with Emma and Esme on the South Bank and allowed the girls to play in the Appearing Rooms. And then came the beautiful day when they donned their uniforms (winter ones, even though it's still very warm here, because Taya wanted to mark the departure from her tracksuit wearing days perhaps) and started in their new years at school - Brooke into year one, Taya into reception. They skipped in, and I skipped home. Happy, idyllic days!
KEEPING-IT-REAL TIME and things the photos don't show:
I made it. Summer holidays are over and we are all intact, sun-kissed and weighing only 1lb more than best work out weight (not so easy to go cycling with children in tow).
My purse is breathing a sigh of relief following it's recent hemorrhage and my ears have stopped popping since I now get 6 hours a day without small voices begging "Mumma, can I have something to eat?.... no, not that, something else... something else" followed by whichever food is settled on having a bite taken out of it and left on the sofa.
I am relieved to go into a supermarket without one nameless child having a furiously itchy bottom for no good reason, likewise not to receive pitying glances when one child emerges from the Appearing Rooms shivering and declaring there is a poo in their pants.
High points should not really be things like the gardener not being mad at the kids playing with things in the garden.
My sister got burgled. On her birthday, of all days. "Thieving scumbags" doesn't really cover it.
Visiting the fairground rides on Brighton Pier was fab but the thrilled faces in the photos don't capture the other, longer moments of "Oh but it's not FAIR! Waaaaaah!" each time they were found to be too small for the more adventurous ones and me indignantly telling them how lucky they were to be going on them at all and didn't they know how much these things COST? (Of course they don't, and that's my next mission)
There's also no way of demonstrating in photos the feeling in my stomach each time we were somewhere big (like Brighton, like the South Bank, like on the streets of London) and Brooke would just run off and I was left beseeching Alyssa to please run in whichever direction we think she went whilst I try to stride forwards, one arm pulled behind me with a much slower Taya attached to it complaining how she couldn't go any further. And then to cap it, when we found her I'd pull Brooke aside, crouch down to her and plead with her with stories of bogeymen, of having to go home without her and tell Chris sorry but she's living on the streets now, only to have her give me her best performance with jutting lower lip, wet eyes and dipped head, and then, without missing a beat, she'd shriek "Esme! Look over here!" gleefully and go right back to playing.
No one wants to hear me implore "Will you LISTEN to me!" any more, including me. I am yelling into a void with that one.
I love these girls madly, and they drive me mad in return. Day in, day out. C'est la belle vie. I am absolutely fine with all of this, but it feels strangely important to not get carried away with the pretty pictures. This stuff is hard sometimes. Doesn't mean I don't want to do it, just that I want to acknowledge it, especially with other parents saying "hey, me too with all that stuff".
| Image may be NSFW. Clik here to view.  |
| Made this hat for me... turned out a bit small! |
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| £1 birds from Tiger made for an easy bus journey home. |
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| Grumpy Taya |
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| Taya painting stones with nail varnish |
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| Had to beg Brooke to get in this picture. |
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| Alyssa crocheting - so proud! |
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| Of course my dressing gown wearing child is waving a flag on the South Bank. |
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| Taya declared one 15 year old skater to be her boyfriend and distracted him by calling out "My love you!" every time he went past. |
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| Brooke, Aaliyah, Ciyan |
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| Ella and Taya |
KEEPING-IT-REAL TIME and things the photos don't show:
I made it. Summer holidays are over and we are all intact, sun-kissed and weighing only 1lb more than best work out weight (not so easy to go cycling with children in tow).
My purse is breathing a sigh of relief following it's recent hemorrhage and my ears have stopped popping since I now get 6 hours a day without small voices begging "Mumma, can I have something to eat?.... no, not that, something else... something else" followed by whichever food is settled on having a bite taken out of it and left on the sofa.
I am relieved to go into a supermarket without one nameless child having a furiously itchy bottom for no good reason, likewise not to receive pitying glances when one child emerges from the Appearing Rooms shivering and declaring there is a poo in their pants.
High points should not really be things like the gardener not being mad at the kids playing with things in the garden.
My sister got burgled. On her birthday, of all days. "Thieving scumbags" doesn't really cover it.
Visiting the fairground rides on Brighton Pier was fab but the thrilled faces in the photos don't capture the other, longer moments of "Oh but it's not FAIR! Waaaaaah!" each time they were found to be too small for the more adventurous ones and me indignantly telling them how lucky they were to be going on them at all and didn't they know how much these things COST? (Of course they don't, and that's my next mission)
There's also no way of demonstrating in photos the feeling in my stomach each time we were somewhere big (like Brighton, like the South Bank, like on the streets of London) and Brooke would just run off and I was left beseeching Alyssa to please run in whichever direction we think she went whilst I try to stride forwards, one arm pulled behind me with a much slower Taya attached to it complaining how she couldn't go any further. And then to cap it, when we found her I'd pull Brooke aside, crouch down to her and plead with her with stories of bogeymen, of having to go home without her and tell Chris sorry but she's living on the streets now, only to have her give me her best performance with jutting lower lip, wet eyes and dipped head, and then, without missing a beat, she'd shriek "Esme! Look over here!" gleefully and go right back to playing.
No one wants to hear me implore "Will you LISTEN to me!" any more, including me. I am yelling into a void with that one.
I love these girls madly, and they drive me mad in return. Day in, day out. C'est la belle vie. I am absolutely fine with all of this, but it feels strangely important to not get carried away with the pretty pictures. This stuff is hard sometimes. Doesn't mean I don't want to do it, just that I want to acknowledge it, especially with other parents saying "hey, me too with all that stuff".