Chocolate is not the only fruit

When we decided to adopt I knew the process would be long and intrusive. I knew we'd be asked questions by social workers, foster carers, adopters and other parents. I realised I'd have difficult talks with my older son and at some point with my younger son. However, I had no idea that I'd have so many fascinating conversations, that people would open up to me and share their stories with me. 

The Big Idea:

I know I'll take the kids swimming after school. Hubbie has a thing after work so he's going to be out until after their bedtime. This way I can tire them out and make sure they conk out and are washed all at the same time. I am a parenting genius. (high fives self)

The Preparation: 

Ok, I've got all the swimming kits in the car. I've been to vote already so that's taken care of. Have to make sure everyone has eaten as soon as they get home from school and have packed snacks for the inevitable post swimming cry of, "Mummy I'm hungry." Check off all of the above.

The Mission: 

So, the boys are fed. Well sort of. Brown Bear scoffed the pizza he made at school today, then ate both hot dogs I put on his plate. Blue Bear deconstructed his hot dog and left it on the plate looking like it had undergone a forensic exam. I've told them they can wear crocs to the pool as I know it's faster to put them on than socks and shoes and I need all the time savings I can get.

The Success Part:

Oh this is wonderful, the boys are splashing around and having fun. Brown Bear can jump confidently in at the deep end and is doing forward rolls in the water. Blue Bear is having a whale of a time practising how to get in and out using the steps and jumping up and down in the small pool. I've totally nailed this. I can't believe I was even worried about taking them on my own. Bring on the awards, Mum of the Year right here folks.

The Failure Learning Part: 

Ok, it's time to get out now boys. No you can't jump in just one more time. I've said it three times now. Remember what we talked about before we came to the pool about listening first time ? Under the showers please. Hold onto my hand Blue Bear. (He slips and falls. Screaming ensues). It's ok baby. I know it hurts, I'm sorry. Oh that is a nasty bump isn't it ? Let's go and get an ice pack from the lifeguards. I know your tummy hurts Brown Bear. Go the the toilet and you will feel better. Ok then go again and see if it helps. I'm going to get an ice pack and I'll be back. Can you get dressed while I'm doing that please ? (Ice pack administered). Brown Bear what do you mean your pants are wet ? Did you put wet trunks on top of them by mistake ? Well, that won't do you any harm, I promise. Let's get going home shall we ? I know your tummy still hurts. Maybe it'll feel better when we get home.

The Afterparty: 

Who wants Haribo snowmen and who wants the stars ? Yes I think they will help your tummy. Definitely. You've both been so well behaved at the pool it's a treat to say thanks for helping me. (and bribery to stop crying of course). It's ok Blue Bear it's almost time for bed. Yes you can watch Peppa Pig until you finish your milk. Brown Bear why is your towel still dry ? Did you have a shower at the pool ? Are you sure ? Well, have one now please just to be safe.

The Guilt:

What if Blue Bear has concussion ? Goodness I've had wine, if anything happens I won't even be able to take him to the hospital. I hope Brown Bear doesn't throw up in his bed. I'd better check on them every ten minutes. I'm such a rubbish parent. Not fit to care for my lovely, wonderful children. What if they decided we're incapable of keeping Blue Bear ? I don't know who 'they' are. Anyway, I have to make sure they're both alive and well so that when Hubbie gets home he doesn't suspect I've broken them.

The Confession: 

I'm sure the sausage chappati was delicious. Did you have a good evening Hubbie ? Good. Yes the boys are asleep. Yes I broke the baby, but to be fair he slipped and fell. Brown Bear always swallows loads of pool water, but I think it was worse than usual today. I suspect part of it was that Blue Bear was injured and Brown Bear wanted some of the attention too. Anyway, now you're home we can take turns in doing the concussion and vomit check.

I think I'll go back to swimming on my own tomorrow.

I experienced a moment of parenting today that I haven't had before. I wanted to punch a young lad in the face. Someone else's child. I don't know this kid or his parents and I don't even feel bad about it.

Big Boy had a try out swimming lesson at a different pool and he did really well. He was by far the youngest in his group, but as I watched him turning his head and sweeping his arms doing front crawl I was so proud of how well he was doing. I've been taking him swimming since he was a baby so he's very comfortable in the water, but he isn't so keen on change. I talked to him on the way to the pool and said that all I asked was that he do his best. If he enjoyed it that was great and if not that was fine too.

All of this preparation was because we went to a dance class yesterday morning and he just wasn't into it at all. Another mum from school teaches ballroom and had invited the children to try a class with her so as a lot of the children from his class were going I thought it was worth a go. Big Boy has pretty good co-ordination and I've been practising yoga with both boys at home so they are pretty flexible too. He stood at the back of the room and reluctantly joined in, but after a while it was clear that he just wasn't enjoying it. I accepted that he wasn't going to be on Strictly any time soon and moved on.

So when he seemed to be getting on so well this morning I was delighted. Until after the lesson. All the children of different ages went to the showers and my little boy went with his shower gel bottle in his hand. He took off his swimming trunks and showered as he always does after swimming. An older boy standing next to him sniggered and looked over at his friends. They were keeping their trunks on and were clearly too cool to have a proper shower.

I was furious. I wanted to shout at those horrible, snide kids. How dare they body shame my 5 year old boy ? Who on earth did they think they were to laugh at my boy ? I helped him dry off and get dressed and he said,
"Mummy I took my trunks off, but no one else did."
"Maybe they don't know how to wash properly. You don't keep your clothes on to have a shower do you ?"
"No. Two of the boys were laughing at me."
"I know baby. That was rude of them. If I see them I'm going to talk to them about that."
He wasn't upset, he was just telling me what happened. I felt upset on his behalf.

I was determined to have it out with those nasty boys, but they all looked the same and as they came out dressed I had no idea if they had passed me already. Big Boy sat at the table in the cafe eating his Hula Hoops and I watched every face that left the changing rooms for a clue. In the end I accepted that if he was ok with it I just had to be too. I'm not. Of course I'm not. The tiger mama part of me that wants to protect my cubs from any harm or humiliation is still angry.

I told Hubbie about it when we got home.
Me: "If that horrid boy is there next week I'm going to give him what for."
Hubbie: "Maybe it's best if I take Big Boy swimming next week."
 - pause -
Me: "Ok, I think that might be best."

Not really skiing - can you tell ?

We're a fairly active lot in our family. Being outdoors is by far our favourite way to relax and we have lots of ways that we enjoy spending time. Personally I love to swim, ski and me and Hubbie used to play softball before we were parents. I've also taken up Clubbercise recently which is brilliant fun and  is helping my overall fitness too.

Hubbie cycling and Big Boy scootering to school

At Christmas Hubbie told me he was going to start cycling to work and I had to suppress the giggles as I was so sure he wouldn't do it more than once. Well, he's proven me wrong and has cycled in torrential downpours and has even mastered the steep hills between our house and his office. Some mornings he and Big Boy head off together on their respective wheels.

My little skateboard champ

Big Boy loves all forms of wheeled transport and has been making the case for a skateboard for years now. We did take him to try out some lessons with his friends and he did really well actually. As the weather is improving we will probably do this again. I did promise him he could have a skateboard when he's older, but if he's into it and being safe it may be ok sooner.

Scooter boy

As an active child Big Boy has been proficient on his microscooter since he was 3 years old. In good weather I take him to school on his scooter and if it's just me and him going anywhere I will take my scooter too. One of his school pals had a birthday party that we rode our scooters to. I remember one of the other mums asking who the trendy mum was and I was delighted to realise it was me she was talking about. That isn't something that's often said about me !

Daddy and Big Boy on the move

Mummy scooting

Baby Boy is always trying to run off with his brother's scooter so we decided to see if there was one that would suit him too. The lovely folks at Microscooter recommended their mini 2 go scooter which I have seen toddlers riding when we've been out in the park. It starts off with a seat and a storage box for important soft toys to ride along and then you can remove the seat to make a short handled scooter and eventually raise the handle height until it's pretty much a full size microscooter.

The only time Baby Boy has used his mini 2 go scooter

We took Baby Boy out on his scooter one evening when we were all taking a walk after dinner - I'd love to show you lots of photos of him enjoying riding his fab new scooter, but I'm afraid he's not really interested. Hopefully if we take the seat off he will give it another go as it will be more like his brother's. For now I just have to take photos of the forlorn looking scooter that I pulled along when we went for brunch on Sunday.

Well, we love you mini 2 go

Baby Boy does love his scuttlebug and calls it his 'bike.' The lovely mums at Big Boy's school got together and bought it for him as a welcome gift when he joined our family. He can pick up a head of speed on it and I do have a job keeping up with him.

Off he goes into the distance

It is great when we go to the park and the boys chase each other round the track. Hopefully once they are both on scooters it's going to be more of an even race.

My boys - off on adventures

Disclosure: We were sent a mini 2 go scooter by the lovely folks at Microscooters.

On Sunday mornings I go swimming with some friends and last week the lady who gives me a lift to the pool gave me a gift of some tomatoes that her husband had grown. They were still a bit green so I put them on the window sill and now they are gorgeous and ripe. I can't wait to try these.



Baby Boy was delighted when he spotted this enormous "oof oof" in the window of a shop near the park. He does love dogs, but I think this might be a bit on the big side for home.

I went for my first swim in a week this evening. Having been poorly for so long I've missed it so much even though my hair and skin have enjoyed a break from being doused in chlorine. As a bonus the lovely manicure I had last Wednesday has lasted a week which never happens due to almost daily dips. Even better I had the pool to myself and it was so nice to be able to go at my own pace and not rush while I was able to steadily reintroduce my body to the exercise while supporting my aching muscles.

I'm rubbish at being ill. I don't sit still or go to bed early, or rest. Hubbie tells me to get to bed and sleep to feel better and I just don't. This evening I got in from work and my legs were all wobbly from being hungry, tired and just generally panicking about the state of the house. I haven't cooked properly in a week. The house is a mess. I've been too tired to vacuum the cat hair off the stairs. The washing has been piling up in the laundry basket and I looked at my wardrobe in despair this morning as every item of clothing looked like the cat had slept on it. To be fair he probably has.

It's hardly surprising that I've been knocked out like this really. I've been flat out since this year started. There's been something big going on almost every weekend. Either taking our boy to a kid's party o preparing for and taking part in the danceathon, then the pamper day the other week. Finally all this was behind me and I had a few days to catch up with things at home. The problem with days off is that I fill every waking moment with things to do. A typical day might include an early morning swim, picking up some furniture for the boy's room then coming home to build it. Shopping for the week and putting it all away. Sorting those boxes that have been taking up all the space in the spare room. Preparing dinner, folding the washing and finding time to write.

It's hardly surprising that my body has given in and packed up for a week really. I knew there was something wrong when it took me 4 days to fold a basket of laundry. Then I fell asleep on the sofa before 9 in the evening. I went to bed and woke up feeling like I'd been hit in the face with a large frying pan. Instead of taking a few days off work I carried on going in as I knew there was a lot to do and I even delivered training yesterday and today despite the risk of losing my voice at any moment. And now ?

Well, I'm not going into work for a while now so I hope to get round to sorting out the boxes. To folding the washing. To making a meal from scratch for a change. Maybe even getting out to the garden if the weather is good. More than anything I'm looking forward to my boy being off school so I can spend some time with him. So long as I'm not too tired to do that, that's all that matters.

Fruit for breakfast

I think it's fair to say I'm not a morning person. I used to work in an office where - unknown to me - it was widely acknowledged that it was best not to talk to me before I'd had at least one cup of tea. Unlike other 'super' Mums who are up with the birds and making lunches and preparing for the day I am lying in bed pretending not to hear my son asking if he can come in and watch the TV.

It wasn't always like this. There was a time when I would get up and go swimming at first light and go into work refreshed and invigorated for the day ahead. Now I'm lucky if I'm able to function before the cat - and that's saying something for an animal that sleeps for 20 hours of every day !

Toast for my boy

One thing I've never skimped on though is breakfast. I was raised to eat breakfast every day and my mother was zero tolerance about this one issue. She would ensure we had porridge or boiled eggs or cereal and would supervise to make sure it was eaten and not hidden under a rug or the middle leaf of the expanding table (totally not looking at my sister there - *cough*) When I was a teenager I would gulp a black coffee and run out of the house and she'd call out to me holding a piece of buttered toast, but I'd just shrug it off insisting I wasn't hungry.

Now I'm a grown up I am the same with my boy and make sure he has something to eat before he leaves the house, but I'm not as good at making sure I'm fed too. I can go until 11am (or later) without having anything to eat and it's not the best really. I try to remember to carry healthy snacks with me to make sure I don't fade away, a banana or an apple usually, but sometimes I just forget.

Magic breakfast biscuits

I wasn't convinced by the idea of a 'breakfast biscuit' - I mean surely a biscuit is a snack food and one that I avoid at the best of times. However, the Belvita range of biscuits has been created to be eaten as part of a healthy breakfast to slow release energy all morning rather than an immediate spike in sugar with the comedown afterwards. I popped a pack of them into my bag as an emergency and on one of my inevitable busy days I found them to be invaluable and quite tasty too ! I picked up my free cuppa from Waitrose and chomped an apricot biccie (or 3) with my brew on the bus on the way into town for a job interview. Now I'm not saying they are magic or anything, but I did get offered the job so you draw your own conclusions :)

I have to say that making a good start to the day does make a big difference whether it's...

Daily toast dilemma

Waking up to find that Hubbie has not only changed the toilet roll, but proven to me that he can actually do it and isn't relying on the toilet roll fairy

or

Being able to get out of the house without a row about brushing teeth, putting on shoes, finding socks, or breakfast, "I said Marmite on toast not jam Mummy."

or

Power walking alongside my boy's scooter to school without him swerving into the path of a car or into that pile of horses**t that's been at the top of the hill for 2 weeks now !

or

Dropping my boy at school then going for a swim so I've managed a power walk (uphill) and a swim all before 9am :)

or

Drinking a cup of tea before it goes cold - this is my favourite by far. Add a pack of breakfast biscuits and we're talking an Olympic standard #morningwin

The new Belvita flavours - yummy !

This post is an entry for #MorningWin Linky Challenge sponsored by belVitaBreakfast. Learn more at http://bit.ly/belVitaUK

• To save on cooking I bought the bargainous Asda 'vegetable' jalfrezi only to find it contains almost entirely cauliflower - which Hubbie hates. So much for saving time then. 

• Since we re-organised the sofas in the front room, the cat is able to take up the whole of one of them on his own. As there have been fewer sunny days this week it's been a bit of a bun fight for space on the sofas. 

A sunny spell outside for Neo

• The DVD player packed up so I swapped out a non-working DVD player and wired up a working DVD player into the TV without instructions and it works - go me !! 

• My boy took off his armbands in the big pool and stood up on his own in the water. He also learned how to play tennis. He's still not even 4 yet !! 

• I realised that when I listen to the radio it makes me very sad and very upset - and I'm not talking about the Archers, so I'm spending less time with the radio on these days.

• We've been very late to the party with Despicable Me, but frankly it is worth it for me just for this clip alone: 

My boy made me a special picture

I apologise for not writing a 'proper' post today, but it's my birthday you see. Of course I realise it's completely undignified to make a big deal about it at my age - don't be cheeky, I'm not telling you. Me and Hubbie rarely get time, just the two of us, so today he took the day off. This being real life he had to go into work this evening, but we still got to spend the day doing things we like.

A lovely surprise delivery today :)

So firstly we packed the boy off to nursery. He loves it when Hubbie is around for the nursery run, dontcha just love being the 'invisible,' less popular parent ? Then we went for a swim together. Usually one of us is keeping the boy occupied in the kiddie pool, but today we swam side by side. I'm a fairly solitary swimmer so it was a moot point, but still nice.


Then - after a bit of social media surfing (obvs) - I put on a nice dress, make-up and even heels (Hubbie nearly fainted with shock) and we went out for a nice lunch. I had a glass of wine and we chatted while the rain pattered on the windows and the staff effortlessly glided around us delivering delicious food. It was blissful :)

I've never bought into this idea that Friday night is for going out and getting hammered. When I was a single lady (oh oh oh, oh oh oh... thanks Beyonce) I used to spend Friday evening in the gym as it was quiet and I could watch telly while on the treadmill and not have to deal with sweaty people working at a maddening pace to achieve the body beautiful. If that sounds a bit sad to you please be assured that I did really enjoy it and preferred to not wake up with a massive hangover on a Saturday morning.

Of course now I'm a parent my Friday evenings are spent at home bathing the boy and getting us ready for a weekend of toddler activities. Often I'm preparing for my radio show - Are We Nearly There Yet ? - that is live on Saturday morning or talking to listeners during His & Hers - the radio show that me and Hubbie do together that goes out every other Friday evening. This is what we consider to be a Friday night in our house.

The new thing that we do on a Friday night is swimming. Since we joined the pool just down the road I've been swimming 4-5 times a week and often me and Hubbie take it in turns to have a swim when he's back from work. I used to go swimming with my siblings on a Friday evening when we were kids so the exercise on a Friday night thing is pretty traditional in my family. Tonight, however I was paddling up and down the pool in serenity and bliss ie. no one else was in there so I could pretend it was my private pool. I often do this and in my head I'm singing Julia Fordham 'Happy Ever After.' I recall she gave an interview where she said she swam every day and it helped her stay happy. It makes me happy too.

As I swam tonight though I was very aware of how much my body ached and hurt from walking all day on Wednesday for the Team Honk Baton Relay. It was a wet, windy, cold day and at one point when I stopped to get a cuppa at St Pancras with the lovely Gretta from Mumsdotravel I saw flashing lights in front of my eyes - this is not a good sign is it ? By the time I arrived in Fleet to handover the baton to Mummy Barrow I was very tired and hungry and my phone was down to 2% battery. I sent Hubbie a text saying what time I'd expect to get home and settled back in the quiet carriage with the half filled pizza box for the long journey back home. As I arrived at my station I saw my bus leaving so I took the tram instead and in a last flourish of energy scootered back home.


So you can imagine how chuffed I was to catch up with social media - once I'd charge up my phone -  to find out that while we were making our way around the Monopoly board in real life the hashtag #honkopoly was trending !! A few of us were taking photos and posting them as we went round and there was an army of social media helpers making sure that the attention was firmly on our efforts.



And if that wasn't brilliant enough we've also found out that not only are Team Honk top of the team fundraisers for Sport Relief, but our London team are top of the Freestyle Fundraiser category too !!

Totally worth it to ache all over, have bruises on my ankles and getting a bit wet and cold.

Now that's my happy ever after :)

Thanks again to micro-scooters for kindly providing scooters to so many member of Team Honk. 

When I became a Mum I figured I'd just know stuff. Like my Mum does. She knows pretty much everything that's of any use to anyone. I always assumed that as soon as I had a child I'd automatically know stuff too. I am now, slowly, realising that it's taken raising 4 kids for her to gather that kind of wikipedia-esque skill.

So far here are the questions I can answer:

My boy: Mummy can I watch Gruffalo please ?

Hubbie: Where are my swimming trunks ?

The Cat: Miaoooooow (translation: something to do with biscuits)

All of them: When do we eat ?

The Questions I can't answer: 

Why did the cat lick Hubbie's marmite on toast yesterday morning ?

Why is it always the one thing that is most precious that my son will drop on the floor and break when he's at someone else's house ? (sorry Janice)

When will I work out how much less shampoo and conditioner to use now my hair is short ?

Why do the bin men always leave the wheelie bin right in the middle of the drive after emptying it ?

And to prove how useful my Mum really is - here is a small sample of questions she can answer:


"Mum how do I programme the economy 7 heating system ?

"Mum, how do I prepare and cook [name of exotic vegetable] ?"

1. Me & Hubbie: