The Rage

I'm in a bad mood. Not just a little sort of rubbish day meh sort of mood but a big fuck off humdinger of a bad mood and I don't even really know why, well that's a bit of a lie I do know why but when I think about the reasons most of them are so petty and whiny that I want rip off my own head and play football with it. But then again this is my blog so I can be petty and whiny if I want to  and if I want to moan I will. *Stamps Foot*.

After the perfect day yesterday Lucy woke up in a vile mood and came down screamed at a few of us and told her sister that she would prefer her to be under a bus. This resulted in a trip back upstairs for Lucy and there she stayed for three hours sulking and refusing to apologise.

Lola was up in the night which was impacted by the fact that I didn't fall asleep until 2am which is because MRB has got new shitty hours which means he doesn't get in until 10.30 every night so to get any wind down time together (read time without the kids) we have got into this odd routine of staying awake until the early hours usually doing a lot of overtired hysterical giggling. I am not good without sleep, who is? But today my body has protested and slumped.

Surprise surprise we overlaid this morning and then Poppy decided her ear hurt so I gave her the benefit of the doubt and let her stay home. Big mistake my lovely never naughty 5 year old had pulled the wool over my eyes and lied. She has had the most boring day ever at home but has given me a monster headache because of her low level whinging about how bored she is.

The washing, the housework and the cooking.

The Son, I want my little adorable son back not this rage filled imposter who has come to live with us, he  confuses me one minute he is cuddling me and the next he is raging at me. Everything I do is wrong, everything his dad does is wrong.

Lola, I love her to bits of course I do but if she had been my first I don't think I would have such a large family she is a whirlwind and now I don't know if I just had abnormally well behaved babies and toddlers before and she is normal or if she has actually been sent here to destroy me.
She will not stop breastfeeding I know it's lovely that I've managed to do it for so long and all the rest but am I allowed to say it is really really annoying me now? I wouldn't mind if she just wanted a quick feed in a morning or at bedtime but she looks at me like I am a walking talking milkbar if I sit down she will crawl onto me and yank my top down, hence why I always look like a badly dressed scarecrow because she has wrecked all of my tops. 

My kindle, my replacement arrived this morning my second replacement and it's all well and good that Amazon are so good at sending new ones out but now I have lost all my samples and I am now terrified to use it in case it bloody breaks again.

My family, arghhh so since the row about two months ago I have not spoken to my sister at all and don't really want to if I'm perfectly honest. I have seen my mum once she came up and it was all very awkward I think my dad made her come although I can't be sure she doesn't ring anymore and we used to speak most days I miss my mum, I also miss my other youngest sister, this month made it  a year since we spoke. We used to be best friends and her son is my Godson I haven't seen him since Christmas although I did see her younger son a couple of weeks ago which was lovely. But I miss my youngest sister so much and she hates me she really really does. I saw a photo the other day of my mum and both sisters they had been out over the weekend and my mum looked so proud to be stood in the middle of these two beautiful girls that it made me wonder if I she has given up on me, they do the right things in her eyes and  I think to her I might be one big embarrassment.

And that is why I am feeling so ragey today so apologies for the mammoth ranty post but some things are better out than in.

Lucy Led Learning

So the Lucy-led learning is going ok. We have had a few hiccups but  things are smoothing out and coming along nicely.

I have been brave and put the feelers out with our local HE group and made a few plans to meet up with some other HE families, I knew this bit would be hard when we started HE  as I don't drive and have to stick within school hours as I have the other kids to pick up, so we can't go to the meet up's all of the time which is a shame as some of the sound fun. But hopefully we will make some new friends and work something out.

We have been doing loads I was going to take some photos but The Son has stolen the batteries from my camera for his X-Box controller. So you'll just have to put up with me wittering on I'm afraid.

Lucy made bouncy balls using this set  from Amazon. I was very surprised how easy it was and how quickly you go from crystals to bouncy balls (that really bounce) it literally took 5 minutes from start to finish for each ball and was so simple I can't recommend it enough.

It has been a very creative week. Lucy has been writing a lot of stories most of them seem to involve Lola which isn't surprising as she adores her and Lola really looks up to her and follows her around like a little shadow, it's very cute even though Lola can't say her name and walks round calling her Alice! But Lucy dosen't seem to mind too much.
They did some arts and crafts together this morning Lola sat with the play dough while Lucy made her a couple of cards for her birthday next week, it was a very peaceful hour which is a rare in this house.

A lot of reading has been going on we started reading The Railway Children which is one of my old favourites but my Kindle broke :( so we are waiting for the replacement before we can finish it. She is doing really well at reading aloud I love listening to her. I bought her this version of  Romeo & Juliet she pulled a face when it arrived this morning but  was hooked from the first page. The text is really simple and very easy to follow and she was hanging on to every word by the end of it which was brilliant as I have never seen that reaction to a book with Lucy before. It only took 15 minutes to read out loud and now she is full of questions about it so well worth 2.55.  I will definitely be buying some more of this series


We  bought some grow bags, seeds and compost over the weekend and will be planting those this week, we have big plans for the garden and I think MrB is finally taking notice and has offered to help.

Other stuff Lucy has been up includes searching her globe and looking up info about whichever country catches her eye, she has developed an odd interest in Taiwan and is full of useless  facts about the place.
She has been playing brain training on the DS and has just started doing a daily challenge on maths training.

So all in all a good few days, I hope it continues.

The sun has got his hat on

The sun has got his hat on hip hip hip hooray the sun has got his hat on and we've been out to play :d.

So Lucy's book arrived this morning, this one and it got her crafty juices flowing so we decided to go to the park and then pick up some art supplies on the way back.

The park was lovely still really quiet as it was quite early we went into the walled garden first and it really is like stepping back in time to a Victorian garden , its just really really beautiful full of arches and an old fountain with ducks waddling around, the roses smelt beautiful I could have stayed there all day, especially when  Lucy and Lola found a little hidden spot and we watched 2 squirrels sat on a picnic bench eating some breakfast, it was very cute.

We set off to the main park and discovered some new park equipment, a huge hammock and a climbing frame made from ropes, the girls had me pushing them around on the hammock and Lola had a huge tantrum and I had to wrestle her back in her pram.

Found a craft shop and the lady who ran it was brilliant she gave us loads of free loyalty points because it was our first visit and told us about the classes she runs one sounds interesting for Lucy filmo modelling, think we are definitely going to go along on Saturday.

DIY ANGST

Its been a pretty lazy week if I'm honest MrB had a week off and that tends to make me go into weekend mode and want to slob around in my PJ's /blush/ I do think it has the same effect on him as none of the DIY jobs he was going to do are done, the stairs are still banisterless  (is that a word?) and the bbanister is unpainted in the porch, the lawn is still long and the bedroom still has the old wallpaper up. I am hopeless at DIY but I am seriously thinking of looking for a local college course and learning some skills.

Thursday 5/5

Ok so the past two days have been fun, We have decided to get a rabbit, 2 rabbits if the kids have their way, 1 if I get mine and none if MrB gets his ! We have a hutch all ready now we just need to find a bunny or two.
Lucy had an art pack I picked up in Homebargains last week and it had instructions on how to draw a dog this led to Lucy drawing all kinds of things from a bee to teapots.
Cleaned the garden, Lucy read a chapter of Danny The Champion Of The World to me and then did some maths work online, we watched a recorded programe Junk Food Baby which was interesting and inspired Lou to research healthy food and plan a meal for next week, she also asked if we could have a go at making lemonade.
Today MrB, me, Lucy and Lola ended up messing about with rubber bands for the morning it was more fun then it sounds! Lucy has made a catapult and has basically played with it all day we worked out what stuff worked best with it and found out why lighter things went further then heavy things and she has been using old cans as target practise. We also tried to make whistles from sticks and failed miserably but hey ho never mind.
We were going to do some maths this afternoon but my brother and  nephew turned up and we haven't seen him since Christmas so we had a lovely afternoon in the garden watching Lucy, Lola and my nephew bounce around on the trampoline, he has grown so fast it was lovely to be able to give him a big hug I've missed him so much.

Baked risotto

Than is is a very simple midweek recipe brilliant to do after a busy day, it's just a chuck it in a dish and bung in the oven type meal (my favourite kind).
I have linked to the recipe below but I left out the prawns and added in bacon, it is the type of dish in which you can add anything to and is really filling.

http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/11451/baked-spanish-risotto

Onwards and Upwards

Am breaking blogger silence, I seriously can't believe how fast this month has gone! They say time flies when your having fun and we certainly have been with the hot weather and double bank holidays everyone seems to have been in laid back holiday mode, today was the first day of normality and routine for a long time.

We haven't done much apart from hang about in the garden and catch up with friends and family but the down time was very much appreciated and needed. It was lovely to just sit and listen to the children laugh and have fun outdoors, Lola loves to be outside and  toddles around examining everything she finds, the other girls love to ride round on their bikes or learn new tricks on the trampoline, even the teen ;) came out of his room and sat with me in the sun and he didn't mention Xbox for a whole 15 minutes.

I just hope this warm weather is here to stay until October for a while.

Have sort of lost our mojo with regards to Lucy's home education probably due to the other kids been at home from school and the fact that I have discovered that Lucy and I are just not the sit down and do three lessons a day type people [blush].

So I have done what all the books and forums said I would eventually do and decided to let Lucy take the lead, (I'm just textbook me!). Anyway instead of the usual mumbles I have been getting from Lou lately she was very excited and came up with loads of ideas including wanting to learn about Italy, baking, cooking French food, making her own bath products and trying to design and make candles, growing stuff in the garden and having her own small patch, making bouncy balls, photography, redesigning and helping to decorate her bedroom and so on and so on.
We have decided that on top of this we will sit down and do some maths at least twice a week and she will do some sort of written work every day, we will also continue with reading of course but after that I am just going to follow her lead.

I so hope that this new routine works for us, it does feel as though a weight has been taken from my shoulders I was trying too hard and it was almost as though Lucy was back in school and the strain was starting to show with both of us. We have only been HE for 4 months so I suppose we were bound to hit teething problems, but now the only way is UP :).