Am I being unreasonable?

So, I'm sitting on the sofa with Him Indoors (HID) innocently chatting about how disruptive I think the Olympics will be to friends who work in London when I ask-"So your friends who are coming over for the Olympics...Where are they staying?"  You've probably guessed right at this point but, bear with me, I'll give you some background...
When the Olympic tickets were being offered HID's friend applied with a view to Friend, HID and their two friends from Denmark getting together to enjoy the spectacle should they be lucky enough to get tickets.  They did get some tickets-to things like handball!!
Anyway, back to the sofa. "I've said they can stay here," HID says.  You can imagine the resulting 'conversation' can't you?  His motivation was that the Danish brothers had put him up twice before.  I'm all for repaying a favour but I pointed out that he had told me that both brothers' houses which they also share with young families were large.  Our house isn't tiny but it's a normal three-bed house with all bedrooms already occupied.  I tried to explain that my annoyance wasn't with the fact that the brothers would be staying but the fact that there was absolutely no consultation.  Baby is due at the end of the month, so will still be quite young, my mum will probably still be staying with us as she has come to help out with Toddler and Baby.  Then HID did that typical man response-"It's not definite, that's why I didn't mention it."  Oh dear!!!!!!

Silent Sunday

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Has anyone seen my child?

By that I mean not physically seen my child but...I'll try and illustrate via a story of a lovely lady I used to work with.  The lady in question was, as I said, lovely.  She had been a teaching assistant at the school I was working at for a few months but on the day in question she had turned up late into the staff room and was looking really flustered.  Poor woman proceeded to burst into tears and when I asked her what was wrong she told me that she couldn't understand what had happened to her normally polite, kind and considerate son.  She went on to explain that he had turned into a horrible, rude and not very nice person.  At the time I was far away from being a parent so my reassurance that I was sure it was just a phase and that he'd grow out of it must have sounded ridiculous coming from me.  I now find myself going through the same thing with Toddler.  She used to be a really laid back person.  She really didn't care if another child wanted a toy that she wanted-She'd just go and find something else. Ditto with her own toys at home.  If I asked her to do something she'd do it-no problems with nappy changing, getting changed into clothes etc.  Now it seems everything is a battle.  If I say left, she says right and everything is peppered with whinging and/or crying. Of course I've heard people speaking many a time about 'The Terrible Twos' and it sure seems like they're upon us.  I've thought about that lovely lady a lot recently and hope her teenage son and she came out the other side fairly unscathed.

The greys have got me!

How did this happen? When did I get so old? I've pulled out a few 'grey' hairs over the years but they looked more like they'd been bleached by sunlight than actually proper white hair. I have now pulled out about six grey hairs in about two or so months!  I've always had very dark hair and I've never dyed it apart from a phase during my nine months at teacher training college where I suddenly decided it was a good idea to go for blond highlights (didn't look bad actually). I don't really know where I'm going with this post save the fact that the greys are coming and I don't know when they'll strike next. Going to have to talk to my hairdresser about colour options...

Bye-bye Mummy.

Hooray! Hooray! A breakthrough today.  I'm not going to be lulled into a false sense of security though.  Today was the first day (after about 6 sessions) that Toddler did not cry, did not fling herself on the floor, did not kick her legs etc. whilst going into pre-school.  She calmly waked in, turned around, waved at me and said 'Bye-bye Mummy'.

No such thing as a free book...

...or so I thought until I picked this up at my local branch of Lloyds TSB.

It's the tale of Billy and his saving up for a crocodile.  Along the way he has a few slips (buying a rather expensive remote control car etc.).  But in the end the ending is a positive and happy one.  Just thought I'd mention the book here as I was surprised how good the story and illustrations were.  It managed to hold Toddlers attention long enough for me to have a well earned medium latte in the village coffee shop so it must be good.  For older children it really makes the whole concept of saving for what you want clear and to the point.  It comes with a set of stickers that match some of the illustrations from the story and a poster chart that older children can record there spending and saving on.  I'd say as a rough guide the book would be suitable for children as young as 2 and as old as 8 depending on the maturity of the child I suppose.  I guess this post could have gone in the 'Reviews' section of the blog but what the hell.  If you're in your local Lloyds branch anytime soon look out for 'A Crocodile for Billy'.  For £0.00 you won't be disappointed.

Silent Sunday

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