Move over romance, pass the remote controlled robot

Five years ago today I was lying in a hospital, staring at a small wrinkled creature who despite being only a few hours old was already demonstrating drama queen tendancies. My first born. I was a mother. I was bewildered and very, very tired.

Son 1 had very, very nearly been born on Friday the 13th (which might explain some of his devil like tendancies from time to time) but just made it into Valentine's Day. We should have called him Romeo. We didn't.

It was an amazing Valentine's Day. I got a brand new baby, an enormous bunch of roses and a shiny eternity ring from my lovely husband to say congratulations on pushing a 7lb 9oz lump out of my fanoir without saying fuck too many times.

Since then, the romantic music and candlelit dinners of Valentine's past have been replaced with the noisy toys and family birthday meals of hotdogs with jam donuts. Even if we have managed to remember that it's Valentine's Day, it's usually a card and small pressie thrown at each other as we charge around trying to find batteries for a new birthday toy. By the time evening comes, we're so knackered, the thought of going out or doing anything remotely amorous gets shunted in favour of lolling in front of the TV with a bottle of wine.

This year has been less romantic than that.

Today my husband completely omitted to get me anything - not even a card. This is very unlike him. He is usually the excellent gift giver and I am rubbish. I however got him a card and tiny red hot water bottle with a heart on it (because he keeps whinging that he's the only person in our house without a hot water bottle and that he has to warm his cold feet on me). In the past if I'd had no card or gift for Valentine's day I would have pretended that I didn't care but secretly would. This year I genuinely don't care.

All I want is for the batteries of the sodding new Wall.E remote control robot to die, die, die because it is the loudest, most obnoxious toy I've ever had the misfortune of coming across.

And I want the children to go to bed. The whinging has been going non stop since 7am. Son 1, the birthday boy, isn't 100% well. So he didn't want to go to the zoo or science museum (which was our plan). He didn't really want to go get the fish for his new fish tank. All he wanted to do was play game after game of Zingo, another new present (which thankfully is quieter than the Wall.E toy). That and accompany me for a trip around Sainsburys. I spent a small fortune on crap so that my husband can feed the children all of next week. He's taken half term off so that I can work. The only way any of them will survive is if there are snacks and plenty of them.

While in Sainsburys, I attempted another vague stab at romance by buying fillet steak and bits to go with it, pink champagne and some Gu chocolate puddings so that we can have a romantic Valentine's meal. But I think my husband would have preferred a curry and a shag.

Anyway, time to go bathe small beasts before transforming into a sex goddess. I fear my brown Tesco tracky bottoms that have shrunk to half way up my calf, set off nicely against my blue socks and baggy jumper, might not set the right tone for the evening. Wish me luck.

Smile and wave

Today in my inbox I received a mail about how to grow your business in 2009 despite the lamentable state of the economy. One of the top tips was to ensure that you come over as positive and optimistic at all times. You never let on that you might owe the tax man a billion pounds and that quite frankly things might be shit. You smile and wave, smile and wave.

I realised that I've been far from smiling and waving recently. More like scowling and flipping the bird at passers-by. So I shall now endeavour to be jolly and cheerful. Optimistic and smiley. Positive and happy.

Luckily I had a few things go sort of right today. (Ordinarily I would have inserted 'shock, horror' right there but that would be negative and sarcastic rather than chipper and bright so I won't).

For example, I took my car to be fixed and my lovely neighbour kindly came and fetched me and returned me when I had to collect it. And as said neighbour knew the mechanic, I think he had a few words on my behalf, and I was charged a grand total of £9.50 to have two fuses changed and a bunch of other things looked at. So that was good wasn't it? Had I taken it to the Ford garage we'd have to have remortgaged the house.

Also good.... My three year old wiped his own bum. This might sound as though I'm scrabbling around for things to be positive about. But this is quite a big deal. Our almost 5 year old has only just mastered this feat, but the three year old proudly demonstrated how he could do it all by himself. (In case you're wondering, it's not really a specatator sport). Now if he could just stop peeing in his pants, all would be well.

I had two new bits of business come in today and several journalists jumped at a story I put out. Always a good feeling. And I had a few others confirm that they'd meet me for coffee later this month so that I'll get to be a bona fide PR luvvie dahling for once and 'do lunch' and get dressed up and everything. (Again - reverting to my former melancholic self - I was about to say that I have no clothes to get dressed up in, but hopefully by then I'll have shed half my body weight and will fit into things I've not fitted into for years.)

Sadly, I weighed myself today and the dial seems to be stuck on the same number it was before. It's probably faulty. It was a cheap set of scales I got in Sainsburys. Either that or it's all the muscle I've built up in my marathon running sessions. Muscle weighs more than fat you know. That's probably it. I've eaten my body weight in chickpeas and beans this week, so it can't be my diet.

So you see, I can be smiley and wavey after all. Now it's just a case of maintaining it. I think Miss World contestants use vaseline on their teeth to help them hold their smiles in place. I might give it a try.

The eve of Back to Work Monday (and Supermarket Sweep)

Tomorrow is the big day. The day in which we all hop onto the hamster wheel of life once more and begin walking briskly, moving quickly to a fast jog and before you know it, running like loons trying to keep up.

Although the last two weeks haven't exactly been relaxing, it has been two full weeks of having my husband at home helping out with stuff. The daily routine and grind hasn't been there. For a start I've got to sleep-in quite a few times. There've been no lunchboxes to make, show and tell goodies to find, uniforms to wash. My emails have been limited to about 10 a day. And most of those I could ignore. I've had time to do some kind of exercise every single day and I feel a billion times better for it.

But tomorrow we're back to work and I definitely have that back to school feeling. This is ridiculous. I work for myself. It's not like I have to go into the office and get dressed up. I just have to saunter upstairs with a cup of coffee and crack on. Maybe it's because I know I have to make a small fortune to pay the tax man. Maybe it's because I'm scared about things going right back to groundhog dayville without it changing, and it should change, it's a new year. Maybe I just want life to always be a holiday. It would be nice, wouldn't it?

I refuse to feel like this. Beaming positive thoughts at my brain: Tomorrow I shall have the house all to myself. Tomorrow I will get to think creatively and earn money. Tomorrow is the proper start of a brand new year in which I'm determined that son 1 will learn to ride his bike without stabilisers, swim without arm bands and learn to read. Son 2 will stop peeing in his pants and finally get out of night nappies. Husband and I will spend more time together. And we'll all live happily ever afterly.

So that's sorted then. Who needs to pay life coaches thousands of pounds when a short sharp talk with yourself works just fine?


SUPERMARKET SWEEP
On a sort of related note, I went to the supermarket today. I had to stock up on a few things but I was determined to keep my shopping bill under £50 (part of my new make do and mend philosophy) - and it would have been had I not had to buy coffee and toilet paper, which pushed the total closer to £60 (it's a conspiracy those bog roll people have - they know people have to use the stuff so they charge a bomb for the priviledge. I might write a letter to someone about this...) I digress.

While I was at the shop, I noticed how the aisles of Sainsbury's serve as a mirror image of life. At Christmas time, the aisles were heaving, shelves groaning under the weight of produce. There was gluttony written all over the place. And people were happy. Frenetic. Slightly insane around the eyes, but happy.

Contrast that with today. The last Sunday before back to work Monday. The shelves lay bare, with a few dejected party canapes loitering at half price but not getting any takers. The vegetable aisles were ransacked with a few mouldy cabbages and the odd leek lying about. The end of aisle special offers were all fat free this or detox that. Except for the mini pepperamis that were going half price in a bid to lure parents into buying super unhealthy school lunch box stuff for their kids. People pushed very empty trolleys lethargically around hoping to stumble over a miracle diet or a wallet full of cash.

It was the world's most depressing place. Truly. Just a week ago you could feel the excitement and festive joy. Now it's a double of whammy of credit crunch / tummy crunch, no fun allowed type store. Luckily I won't have to repeat the ordeal again as we're now living on rations till month end and hopefully by then most people will have forgotten their new year resolutions and will start feeling slightly more optimistic about life.

On that cheery note, I'm going to enjoy a few hours of slobbing out and then off to early bed - it's a school night after all.

Twas almost the night before Christmas

I've had several billion things to blog about of late but no time to do it. Plus I've had my husband at home. This is a novelty. And it thwarts my ability to blog. I'm not sure why it does, it just does. But at this very moment he is downstairs wrapping my numerous, here's hoping exceptionally pricey, Christmas presents. So I am banished. I've retreated to my pc for a comforting blog.

You see the last few days have been a little frenetic. First we headed off to Lapland UK. This was the proper Lapland UK costing the same as a short holiday to France, not the dodgy one with stuffed reindeers and a couple of tatty caravans in the New Forest. No, our Lapland had real live reindeers, real live husky dogs and a real live Father Christmas who was so real that for a moment I forgot that I was a grown up and got all nervous and excited to meet him. The children got to wander in an amazing enchanted forest, they helped the elves make wooden rocking horses, the decorated (and ate) gingerbread men and they could have ice skated had they not been throwing tantrums about not being allowed to buy a piece of plastic tat from the gift shop.

It was all snowy and lovely. But the magic didn't seem to have the effect on the children that I'd hoped. I was pretty certain we'd be in eyes out on stalks territory. But they were very whatever-with-gallic-shrugs-type-of-thing about it all. They did brick themselves while they waited to meet Santa and in hindsight they were amazed that he knew their friends' names. But there was quite a lot of 'let's rush there and look at that, oh now I'm bored and would like to do something else, and yes this is all fabulous but I would have been just as happy eating a gingerbread man at home or buying a piece of plastic shite from Woolies.'

Am I getting old or are kids today getting more blasé about stuff? When I was a child (and yes I know that makes me sound about a bazillion years old) Father Christmas came down the river on a boat and gave us presents. It was the MOST EXCITING THING EVER!!! To this day I get excited by the prospect - just a shame I don't live closer to the river in question anymore. My children just didn't seem to have the same level of wet-your-pants-and-can't-possibly-sleep excitement about it.

They're not particularly spoiled. I buy their clothes second hand from eBay. They're limited to very few sweets and they get a reasonable selection of presents. Nothing OTT. Yet their attitude was very 'been there done that, if only there was a Wii Fit version of this Father Christmas world'.

Anyway, since then we've had drinks parties involving many drinks and quite sore heads the next day. And I braved Sainsbury's yesterday to do my GIGANTIC Christmas shop. Finding a parking spot took me 15 minutes alone. I had so much stuff in my trolley that I actually think I might have run some small children and OAPs over because trolleys don't come with mirrors. I couldn't fit all of my stuff on the conveyor belt at check out and the till guy had to call for reinforcements. They provided me with a second trolley, a helper packer and someone to push my second trolley to my car. I think you get this kind of service when you spend more than £300 in a single shop. So I qualified. Thank god for nectar points.

Then of course I had to embark on a bit of strategic fridge organisation when I got home to try and fit everything in.

And thus commenced the cookfest. I began gently yesterday with my cranberry sauce, while today I moved onto the lamb tagine, my stuffing, spiced nuts and red cabbage. Obviously the minute I started to cook I realised that I'd bought the wrong pomegranate juice so had venture forth into the evil world of pre-Christmas supermarkets once again. This time I thought I'd try Waitrose as I was only after one thing. I got there 15 minutes before it opened, not realising the time (your sense of time is skewed when you're woken at 5am by a child and start cooking by 6am).

The middle class masses were assembled outside the shop entrance, revving their trolleys, looking as though they were about to compete in the 'how much can you buy in 3 minutes' competition. The staff were actually trembling and quite pale just looking at us through the windows. It took the shine off the lovely warm glow of Christmas a bit, but I escaped in record time, stopped at the butcher, grabbed my excruciatingly expensive but exceptionally well cared for turkey and dashed home.

My day then vascillated between lovely and not. Lovely going outside to garden to pick some rosemary and coming back inside to warm, gingery smells. Not lovely trying to stop two small boys from killing each other. Lovely listening to Christmassy songs while pootling in the kitchen. Not lovely trying to stop two small boys from killing each other. You get the picture.

One revelation we have had the last two nights is the power of the torch. Our children are bored/excited/hyped up on the Quality Street tin and need exercise. But daylight is limited and parents are busy. So we've been arming our children with torches and telling them to search the garden at night for hedgehogs. Keeps them entertained for hours. Plus we've managed two 'midnight' (i.e. 6pm) walks in the dark across the muddy fields with torches. Again, splendid adventure for small boys and a welcome relief for grown ups.

All the presents are wrapped. My cooking schedule is slap bang up to date. The house is tidy. Ish. Our guests arrive tomorrow. Christmas is nearly here and all I have to say is: Bring It On.

Going to go collapse now.

Money - or rather the lack of it

Today I came perilously close to what would have been my most humiliating moment of my 35-year old life. I was once again in Sainsburys, adding to their profit margins. We'd had a relatively pain free shop, had gone through the checkout and packed all the bags. It was time to pay. First of all, the silly lady wanted to know whether this was a month's worth of shopping because it came to £155. "Ha ha," I said. Then realised she was serious. "Er, no actually it's just a week." She looked at me as though I was some kind of frivolous spendaholic. I wanted to point out rising inflation rates and how the cost of food was a global issue as discussed by G8 leaders but it didn't seem the time or place.

Anyway, I pulled out my card to pay and after punching in the code, she said in a furtive whisper, "I'm afraid it's been declined."Really?" I asked feeling the first flickers of panic. "Can you try again?". So she did. "It's been declined again," she whispered. Now it has been a while since I checked my bank balance and I know the cost of things have gone up, but I'm not normally completely broke.

Despite having a wallet full of cards, I only know the pin to one of them. The one that was declined. Actually, I know the pin to another joint credit card, but I'm sure I remember my husband saying that he'd cancelled it. So there I was, with a trolley full of melting ice cream, two small boys bouncing a new ball I'd got them so that it careered off everyone's trolleys and just generally got in the way, and there was the queue of impatient looking people standing staring at me.

I realised that not only would I have the very embarrassing situation of having to say sorry, I can't buy these after all, but I'd also have a house with no food in it and a small problem of no toilet paper, a situation that would stay that way until husband returns home on the weekend. I rummaged in my mental larder trying to imagine what I could make out of a tin of carrots I'd won at the tombola at the village fete, some dried pasta and half a cabbage that would last 3 of us for 4 days.

Growing redder and redder in the face, I said: "Let's try another card shall we." I pulled out a card, which since receiving it three years ago have never known the pin too. About a month ago I asked the bank to send me a pin code. They did. I looked at it. And promptly didn't give it another moment's thought. There are too many other things to be thinking about and remembering besides yet another 4 digit number.

So there I was, like a scene from Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, the clock ticking, the scary music playing (that was probably just in my head), I stared at the key pad thing and willed my brain to remember the code. I punched in a number that seemed vaguely familiar and looked at the lady, who was also holding her breath, to see if it had worked.

Miracle of miracles. The card had been approved. I could leave with my self respect and my groceries. A double triumph.

I came home and immediately checked my bank balance. It's true. I have no money left. I'm not sure where it all went. Perhaps I am a frivolous spendaholic after all. It's not a nice feeling being poor. I can see that my tinned carrots are going to come in handy after all, because once we've munched our way through this lot of food, that's it, we're reverting to WW2 rationing.

Postcards from the edge

So that's another Wednesday that I survived. It all went pretty well really, bar a few special moments. Here are some of the snapshots from my day:

Shortly after my morning blog post I was foolish enough to think I could poo in peace. I mean my husband spends a good hour in the loo on his own everyday. Thanks to my regular intake of All Bran I don't need such extensive visits, however, a few moments alone would be nice. This morning that was not to be. Not even 30 seconds in, urgent yelling came from downstairs. 'MUMMY! MUMMY! MUMMMMMMMMMMMY!' Assuming somebody was losing a limb, I yelled: 'What??' No explanation, just more of the same screaming, only it got louder and more emphatic. Assuming the worst, I hastily tidied things up and barrelled downstairs still doing my trousers up on route. 'What's happened?' I asked. Eldest child informs me that I have to guard his cushion from younger brother and that no matter what I must not let him have it. Slightly out of breath and a bit bewildered I say: 'But there are three identical cushions on the floor. What's wrong with those and why can't you guard your cushion? (And is someone on the verge of bleeding to death?)' 'Because,' he informs me already striding off, 'Jamie wants my cushion and I need to poo.' And off he goes to poo in peace leaving me to guard a cushion wondering just how that had happened.

The poo theme didn't end there. Oh no. Having just regained my composure, son on the loo calls me to wipe his bum. So I go, relinquishing the cushion which younger son immediately pounced upon causing more drama a few minutes later. I ask the poo interrupter whether he had attempted to wipe his own bum given he will be going to big school in a few short weeks time and that no-one would be doing it for him there. So he had a go, half a roll of loo paper for a cursory wipe repeated three times. This was flung onto of the world's largest poo. So once we were finally able to flush, the water level simply rose and rose with its contents threatening to spill over the top. Thank god it didn't. But it did result in me having to get the loo brush to break up the poo contents so that it could all eventually get down, while both of them cheered me on.

Moving on to about 10 minutes later, younger son was eating dried cranberries. He then sneezed at the same time. I was in the kitchen writing a shopping list. Shrieking ensued. Pen dropped, I raced over once again thinking that something absolutely dire had just happened. 'Look,' small child exclaimed. 'LOOK!' And I looked. And had the pleasure of seeing yellow snot coupled with saliva and half chewed cranberries that looked like blood globules spread across the back of his hand. I momentarily thought he might actually have a nose bleed, then spotted the cranberry lumps, wiped it up and resumed my shopping list.

I then had a shower and let the boys get in with me as a special treat. That was fine. However, getting myself dry afterwards was less pleasant. They decided to play 'Look at mummy's bum bum', which involves the two of them running behind me and attempting to force my butt cheeks apart so that they can 'see where the wee wee comes from'. Someone has to teach them some biology soon.

This was followed by naked bouncing on the bed (them, not me) and insisting on wearing odd socks to the shops.

We managed to make a hasty getaway to Sainsbury's and had a remarkably pain free shop, until we were packing the bags and younger son decided that the new loo brush (see above as to why it was needed) was the perfect thing for brushing mummy's hair. It was at that point that the check out lady said: 'Madam, are you sure you don't need any help?' I wanted to say that actually I could really do with a nanny but I don't think that's what she meant.

We then managed to squeeze in play group, lunch, a walk in welly boots and raincoats up the track to inspect our fort/look for snails/throw stones in the puddles, returned home sodden to make cranberry muffins which according to my two food critics tasted like lemons and are 'gusting' resulting in me holding partly chewed cranberries for the second time in a day, prepared dinner, read all of the Beatrix Potter books and broke up several fights about who was going to play with the orange car (I have no idea where the obsession with orange comes from - maybe they're part Dutch?)

Just before dinner, we had a double drama. Older son cut foot (tiny, barely noticeable) but which required lots of screaming, immediate attention and a winnie the pooh plaster. Younger son decided to wipe his own bum. I don't need to say anymore but it involved a lot of soap thereafter. Just as I was trying to get dinner on the table, I noticed one of the part chewed cranberry muffins had been left lying on the sofa leaving a lovely cerise stain behind. I then pulled out the big guns and said: 'That's it, I'm calling your father.' Cue extra loud wails.

Dinner went remarkably well. Older son refused to have a bath for fear of his winnie the pooh plaster getting wet and god forbid his foot falling off. There was a fair bit of screaming due to random leg pain which was instantly cured the minute the calpol bottle was promised.

And then they were off, away with the fairies. So you see, this stay at home mum thing is a lark... Seriously, I bow down to all who do it on a fulltime basis. Your alcohol habits must be worse than mine.

Getting an early start

It's not 7am yet but so far I have:

• had coffee
• sorted out a fight about whether to watch a DVD or cbeebies
• prepared milk and cunningly managed to let each small boy have part of an orange cup to avoid fights
• unpacked the dishwasher
• repacked the dishwasher
• folded yesterday's laundry from the line
• put load of wet washing into dryer
• folded dry laundry from dryer and put away
• put on another load of washing
• gone through email
• checked the world wasn't ending courtesy of BBC website as I never actually get to watch the news on tv

Am about to go make breakfast and then have the toss up: do I do my teetering ironing pile or do I get the kids out of the house and into Sainsburys really early so that we can be done in time for playgroup? If I choose the latter, it means I have the afternoon free of chores. But it also means trying to entertain two hyped up boys on a rainy day. At which point a trip to Sainsburys becomes quite appealing just to keep them entertained.

Decisions, decisions. I'm sure there are many hedge fund managers and other important people dealing with bigger decisions at this early hour, but this is quandary for now.

Wish me luck as I head into a full day without childcare coupled with torrential rain. I shouldn't have had the wine last night. I know it will be needed by the end of today.