Finally, Summer Part 2

WARNING: As is now becoming quite normal, this post contains explicit references to poo. Do not read if you unable to cope with descriptions of defecation or suffer from a weak stomach.

Onwards. We eventually made it on to the road with our traumatised boys and bemused girls and travelled the hour and a half (as K did point out it wasn't as if we were going very far and we probably didn't need quite as much stuff as I had packed) to the glorious Suffolk coast. My mood improved as soon as we arrived at the holiday house and after some excitable running around the house from the children, K took the big three off to play whilst I unpacked with Cybs.

I must at this point stop the story and take you back a month to when Cybs and I returned home from a delightful lunch in North London with my old school friends and all of their many offspring, held at a very brave friend's house. For some reason, (potentially being with so many other children she decided it was time to move on a bit with her development), that evening Cybs removed her nappy and took herself off to poo on the potty, and then came to tell me about it. This was obviously lovely and I was justifiably proud of her and did lots of the usual excited 'Wows' and congratulatory kissing and cuddling that one is expected to react with in such situations. I didn't however, decide to potty train her. Having thought about it overnight, it seemed a bit of a hassle, I didn't particularly want to spend our entire holiday asking her if she wanted a wee, worrying about her wetting herself or worse, and trying to understand whether she was saying she wanted a wee a poo or something else that sounded just like it in her very babyish speech (her language skills are still lamentably slow and so an awful lot of her words sound extremely similar and you also can't rely on a nod meaning yes - hence all the 'do you need a wee' queries from me would have her nodding away but it wouldn't necessarily mean that she wants one at all - in her mind, she could be agreeing to go to a park and slide down the big slide.)  So, I did what all good lazy arsed mothers did and put her back in a nappy the very next day. The reason I inform you of such things is because that was not a once off. From then on she would sporadically do the same thing but with the added excitement of trying to empty it in to the loo herself with various delightful outcomes. Also wiping. With or without loo roll.

So, (back to the story) when she went for an explore whilst I was busying myself unpacking the millions of things we probably didn't need but I had deemed essential, I didn't think much of it. However, after quite a long silence I went to investigate and opened the door to the downstairs loo to discover that Cybs had discovered that there was no potty in this loo so had chosen to use the floor instead. My opening the door had simply helped to smear it in an artistic arc, over the tiled floor.  As we were renting this house I was already pretty worried about keeping it clean and well cared for, and less than an hour after entering, Cybs had managed to create quite a scene of devastation in the smallest room of the house. I set about clearing her up and then plonking her elsewhere whilst I dealt with the walls and the floor. As anyone who has read this before will know, I am most accustomed to levels of disgusting that most would find stomach churning, so that was not the problem. The issue I was faced with was that there wasn't actually enough room between the bottom of the door and the tiled floor in order to be able to remove the poo from it. Which meant that however much I cleaned the floor, one move from the door and it needed to be done all over again. That is when I hit upon my genius use of the now empty loo roll. I cut the cardboard down the length of the roll. slid it under the door and moved it back and forth several times. Et Voila! An ideal under door poo scrapper. (Patent pending so don't go stealing it). It did sterling work and very soon there were no traces left of the unfortunate event. Shortly afterwards K arrived back and decided to query why I hadn't managed to get any bags upstairs to unpack. As I say, things didn't start THAT well.

After that first rather un-holiday-for-me like day, things did mercifully improve. I do find that it takes a good three to four days for a family used to working separately to adjust to being together all day every day, and for us all to adjust to a 'holiday' pace of life. It took K that long to adjust to the change from work mode to holiday-with-four-children mode - it is a very different kettle of fish. I also became a tad upset when the boys decided to take against the beach for the first time in their lives. For me and Bea, the beach IS the holiday - it is the very thing that makes a holiday a holiday for me. Cybs loves it too but then for chocolate and a bottle of milk Cybs will do almost anything for anyone so I couldn't really use her in my argument 'for' spending all our days there. In an ideal world, the boys wanted to spend all day everyday playing on Minecraft and on the inhouse Playstation 2 unless a particularly interesting day trip was suggested. Eventually though, we all got the hang of it and we ended up, yet again, having the best holiday ever. Bea and I got more than enough beach time thanks to some unexpectedly good weather and some compromising with the boys, we also got a lovely bit of mother and daughter shopping fun (I am now the proud owner of the most fabulous Diane Von Furstenburg shoes which I will almost definitely never ever wear but will adore forever) and we saw lots and lots of friends who were either staying in the area or came up specifically to visit. Cybil LOVED turning two and having her birthday and K and I got to go out for one of the loveliest meals I have ever had. We flew kites, we played, we had great day trips, we went for lunches, we 'mooched', G and K even got to walk a dog which made them both extremely happy - all in all it was everything to everyone.

Although it wasn't without its problems, naturally. Unbeknown to us, Cybs had worked out how to open the garden gate and whilst K was in charge and momentarily occupied, she used her new found skill and went for an unauthorised walkabout - eventually being rumbled a few streets away by some very useful old ladies who then went door to door knocking on houses to try and find her owner; G trapped his finger in the car door the day before Cybil's birthday and I was almost ready to send him to A and E there was so much blood and tears, but thankfully the bleeding did stop and I used my very useful made up medical knowledge to decide he hadn't broken anything so he got to spend the day on the sofa playing Minecraft with K instead; G also fell out of bed the following night and split his lip open on the bedside table, which left him with a very fat and very sore lip for quite a while..... and obviously there was some less than wonderful behaviour from each of them at some point or other, but on the whole, for a family holiday with small children in England, it was marvellous. It was terrifically sad to leave, all bronzed and relaxed and happy together as we were, but we at least had the utter thrill of the loft progression to look forward to.

Bea stayed on with mum for five days as she had her best friend staying there, and I took the younger three back to London a few days after K returned for work. The stairs to the loft were in, the bathroom plumbed and the whole thing painted. It was amazing what had happened during our three week absence. The only down side was the quite remarkable levels of dust on the first floor. Up until they had 'broken through' to fit the stairs, the dust had been at a very manageable level and I was finding the whole thing very un-stressful. When I arrived home with a car full of our stuff, three children used to a summer holiday of entertainment and a house full of dust that needed at least a week of unadulterated cleaning, I became terrifically stressed very quickly. And very tired. However, as soon as was humanly possible (and well before the builders would have liked) we decided to 'move in' to the loft and Bea moved in to her longed for own room. We were effectively camping up there for the first week, there was no electrics to begin with, no carpet, we had to cover the bed every morning with plastic sheeting and for 24 desperate hours, we couldn't find the remote for the newly mounted TV (SUCH excitement - we have never, ever had a wall mounted TV - it feel JUST like being in a hotel room). Still, it was all desperately exciting and quite romantic and the children were besides themselves with the thrill of it all.

Before the carpet went down, every evening I had to hoover the stairs and the room to stop us getting very dusty feet, then remove the sheets and put the bed back in its position and put the rugs down etc etc in order for it to be habitable. After a few nights G decided he would like to do it for me 'as a surprise', Bea then got involved and eventually they were all insisting on bathing in double quick time, throwing on their pjs and running up the stairs to help with 'the surprise'. It was very sweet - Ted was usually on 'look out' and kept running down the stairs squealing with excitement and telling me to 'stay downstairs'. Bea and G went to great lengths to make sure all was perfect for us and even put the pillows in different formations each evening and then her and G photographed it so they could remember how to do it differently the following night. Cybs took to hoovering the stairs and the sight of her naked bottom struggling with the hoover at the top of the stairs will be hard to top. (Cybs couldn't wait to be pyjama'd so just got out of the bath and went straight to it). It was an odd end to the holidays but lovely nonetheless. Although I have to say that the last few weeks of 'freedom' could have been immeasurably improved if it hadn't been for the daily battles getting the big two to finish their holiday homework. It was, in some instances, like having root canal surgery without anaesthetic. Getting G to do more than a few minutes at a time was almost impossible. Every letter he wrote seemed to be simultaneously burning his hand (I mused at the time that Harry Potter made a lot less fuss when it actually did).

And then came Ted's 5th Birthday. Another triumph (I know - even if I do say so myself, but seriously - even I was proud of this one and I don't say that lightly). I managed to get a huge Spiderman helium balloon (it was crouching so it was difficult to measure him but he took up most of a room when in it and was noticeably bigger than K in a crouching position  - I know because I put them side by side and took photos.)  As well as many fabulous presents he also had a stupendous party in the afternoon - mainly thanks to the wonderful Magician who once again did an amazing job. I am not sure how it could have been better for him. (That is rubbish actually - I could have given him a live spider as a pet which is his dearest wish, but I have, I think rather reasonably, said that if anyone moves a live tarantula in to my house, I will move out. Oh and we could have taken him back to Legoland which he is incredibly keen to do....)

For the final day of the holidays I took them out for a last magical day in London to end on a high. We started off with the big three volunteering for cognitive studies at Birkbeck college (which oddly enough they all love doing - I would highly recommend - it's called The Babylab but they need all ages for different studies and they pay travel and hotels if you need to come from afar) then we did an amazingly efficient whistle stop guided tour of the British Museum, courtesy of a very patient and kind friend of mine from school who is not only a PHD and very important in the whole museum world, but is also able to seek out a 1cm squared spider, engraved on to the side of a small glass bottle, displayed on the bottom of a glass cabinet, inside the vast Museum in order to appease a spider obsessed, newly five year old. That to me is even better than a PHD. It took some looking and some phone calls and some searching on the internet to find it, but find it she did.  Although obviously their favourite part of the entire place was the shop. And actually they quite liked the loos.  But their favourite part of the day was an impromptu trip to Southbank and the beach there. G found (what he truly believes) to be a dinosaur bone, Ted couldn't believe I had kept this place a secret and we had an actual beach so close to home and they all managed to walk inside an epic sandcastle creation being built.  After some ice creams we wandered back to London Bridge for the train home. It was such a perfect day. The sun shone, the children were happy and I even bumped in to some school friends on our walk back to the station. It was such a lovely day it was almost sad to send them back to school the next day.

But send them I did. They were actually thrilled to go. In fact they were so excited they were up, dressed and ready to go by 7am and I was pretty pleased to finally get back in control of the housework in their absence.  Sadly since then the boys have reverted back to type and are now complaining daily about how much they hate school. Just as they did on holiday, they would like to spend their every day in pyjamas, watching TV, eating and playing Minecraft or watching Minecraft videos on You Tube (Stampycat and I are not friends...). School really gets in the way of that. Ted was fine for the first week when he was doing half days but as soon as he hit full days it has gone massively downhill. Reception has come as something of a massive shock to him. He is the very oldest in the year and I can't really understand why he is finding it such a shock to the system.  I also can't believe I have said goodbye to my third baby in to full time education. It seems madness. If I want to, I can send Cybs to nursery for three hours every day from next September.  Madness upon Madness. In my mind they were all born about five minutes ago and how we have managed to arrive here is totally beyond me.

So, there you have it, other than another wedding (I was bridesmaid again - so exciting) and a weekend away with the local mums (I know - my life is a social whirlwind at the moment) you are pretty much up to date with toute. Oh and I still haven't bothered to train Cybs. Although she does now have some very lovely 'nicks' (as she calls them) which she is very happy to wear, but is still so incredibly unreliable she is not in them full time. I will get around to doing it soon.... 

In the next thrilling instalment I will amaze and entertain you all with details of the great build and redecoration debacle. As per usual, it may be a while....

Until then my lovelies. x