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Not me! Life as a grown up is hard. Sure, there’s some fun stuff. Daquiris, nights in with DH, days out with the girls but honestly, right now I wish I could get off the ride! There seems to be an unwritten rule that if you think things are going well for once, then things will pretty soon turn a corner and you’ll be back on your knees again. It can be really hard to keep that cheery smile on your face when your car won’t start, your husband’s work is making him miserable and … well, I can’t think of the third now – I think maybe it was the 6 inches of cement we found in the garden when undertaking the usual ‘quick’ job.
But sometimes grinning and bearing it is all you can do. Planning your way out of a problem, understanding the options and working out your way forward are invaluable if you want to reduce stress levels but they’re not going to make it right. Head down, soldier on, hunker in and you know what, at some point, the rain will stop?
Let me know when someone can see my break in the clouds!
Since the tragedy in October, I’ve been veering wildly between desperately wanting new chickens and being terrified about losing them again. I finally bit the bullet though and collected Barbara and Bianca yesterday. Cue one very nervous night!
But yay, they’re still here and hopefully will be for a long while yet. It can be hard making the decision to try something again when something’s gone wrong, but wouldn’t life be boring if we always gave up the first time we had a set back? Set backs can be little things, or they can be huge things. It’s picking ourselves up, brushing ourselves down and trying again that makes us.
So take it one day, one hour at a time, but pick yourself up and try again. Learn from the past, but don’t let it hold you back. Move on, with strength, knowing that you know something more than you did before, and you can tackle it all over again. It might take some time, but that’s okay too. Just make sure it doesn’t keep you down forever!
What set back have you suffered lately? How are you going to move on from it?
 I love my weekends. I wait eagerly for them from 9am on Monday morning, counting down the days until they’re here. But my god, I HATE my weekends! I can’t wait for my lie-in but then it makes me feel groggy and lazy! I waste half the day, faffing around and then Wham! Before you know it, Monday’s ticked back round and the weekend has just been a total write off. So here goes, my plan to banish the weekend waste!
Appreciate a limited lie in!
Give yourself an hour extra, but then don’t hang around! Unless you’re suffering from some hideous, energy-sucking ailment (or are a new parent!), you don’t need a morning’s extra sleep. Get up and get going! You could even get up earlier – there’s something magical about the early morning and a great sense of achievement can come from getting the chores out of the way early!
Get the chores out of the way early!
A long task list can be a daunting thing. Being a working mum, everything builds up at the weekend and I find myself having a todo list as long as Noah’s checklist of animals. Which is depressing! But don’t let it get you down! Tackle it head on and get it out of the way nice and early. Is there anything more satisfying that ticking things off your list? Be realistic though, and it might be that the key to a good weekend is a hard week. Let’s face it, no-one expects to enjoy the week so maybe a little more pain on Tuesday will make the weekend that much easier!
Get outside!
I do see the outdoors in the week. I see it when I leave my front door and walk to the car and then when I walk to the car back into work. And then repeated on the way home. But I don’t see it. I don’t smell it and feel it. I don’t let it get into my lungs and make me feel alive! So make time at the weekend to embrace the outdoors. Even if you’re not a nature lover, nature loves you and it can just make you feel alive. If you’ve got kids too, you can earn yourself a smug mummy badge for getting them out and about!
Plan something to look forward to
I struggle with this, mainly because of finances, but try and plan something to do every weekend. If you’ve got some cash to splash, a meal out, a trip to the cinema, an evening dancing. If you’re living on the cheap, a nice dinner in, visiting with friends and family, a DVD and popcorn – entertainment or relaxation, whatever you need on that weekend, plan it in and do it!
Prepare for the week ahead
Honestly, how many of us don’t feel that sense of impending doom on a Sunday evening? That big long list of things we need to do at work looms large and hangs, oppressive, spoiling Sunday evening. Get it out of your head and make a task list for the week ahead. Knowing what you’re going to tackle this week can make it all seem much more achievable. You’ll lose that worry about forgetting something important and be able to focus instead on what’s good about Sunday evenings.
Try something new!
Make the weekends a little bit special and try something new! A new recipe, a new skill or just going someplace new – mix it up a bit and experience all those things out there that are just waiting to be experienced!
So, wish me luck people! I’ve a week to get prepared – ask me in a week’s time whether I’ve banished the waste!
I’ve finally cottoned on. My house is not a home. It’s a money-sucking, soul-destroying, happiness-stealing abode and I hate it. For a long time I’ve thought that it was just a need for decluttering – a few nice boxes, a little bit of chucking stuff out, and I thought everything would be okay. Turns out that I was 100% wrong.
So it’s a question now what I do about it. Live with it and let it slowly destroy my mental health and my marriage – or take action and move onwards and upwards. As much as my father in law is a kind and generous man, I’m sick of seeing him every weekend to work on some new project where we uncover that fact that our house was actually built by under-educated monkeys with tools. As much as I appreciate my husband, I’m sick of seeing a list of never-ending jobs every time I look at him and a rising sense of depression. As much as I like shopping, I’m sick of all our extra money going on things like plaster board and fence panels.
Thing is, if this was our forever home, I might feel differently. But this was only ever a stepping stone – and right now I feel like stepping off and drowning is a better option that standing here.
So, I’m on for scraping together every spare penny I can in a desperate attempt to earn enough money to pay the deposit on a house. Wish me luck – between teaching, tutoring, copywriting, marking and mothering, I may be gone some time!
p.s. Any tips for making £30,000 in three months gratefully received!!!
We’re having a bit of a struggle with B at the minute being something of a reluctant reader. I’ve always been a voracious reader – even before I found my English teacher calling – and to not want to spend every spare moment reading is just completely alien to me. Here’s the things we’re doing to try and make sure all of our girls grow up with a love rather than a loathing of literature!
Improve their confidence
A lot of reading is about confidence. So get them to start small and gain confidence reading short signs and things so that eventually they feel happy tackling a bigger book. Independent reading isn’t a skill that appears overnight – it needs nurturing!
Let them see you reading
DH really gets on my goat. I don’t know how he can sit there telling B how important it is to read when he’s picked up one book the entire time we’ve been together (nearly 12 years!) The kids rarely see me with a book out of my hands though and having a role model that reads is really important. If you have got boys, then seeing their dad read will pay dividends.
Make it easy
Anyone visiting our house would think we’ve got an infestation problem. A book infestation problem. They’re everywhere! And I don’t actually care much. I’m proud of the fact we’re a reading family and having books everywhere is part of that. They’re easy for the girls to pick up and flick through and then put away and having them easy to get to is one step in the right direction.
Involve them in book buying
Take them to a bookshop and let them choose their own reading material. Doesn’t matter if they’ve chosen it because it’s got a picture they like on the front, as long as it spikes their interest long enough to get them reading, who cares? There’s plenty of time to wean them onto more highbrow literature once you’ve got that passion piqued.
Start them young
So a baby can’t read, but they can listen. Start them young, reading stories and getting them just to hold and feel the books. A little bit of saliva and baby tooth never hurt anything and if it gets them familiar with the idea of books, you can’t go wrong. On the other hand though…
It’s never too late
Just because you didn’t read to your children when they were babies doesn’t exactly mean they’re illiterate for life. Just rediscover a joy of reading together – it’s so worthwhile! Lead by example and start experimenting with different stories.
Make it bonding time
Give reading a regular spot in your busy life and enjoy the calm and quiet it can bring to your home. Cuddle with the little ones while they read their best Biff, Chip and Kipper books and let the older ones delve into their own world of mystery. Can you think of anything better to do with a quiet evening than snuggling with your kids and a good book?
Show them that reading isn’t just books
Shh, don’t tell anyone I said so, but reading isn’t all about the books. Magazines, websites, poetry, the back of a cereal packet – whatever kind of reading appeals to your children, encourage it. Trust me, reading anything is better than reading nothing at all. Start small and hopefully an enjoyment will grow.
Share with them
Let them tell you about what they’re reading, ask them questions about the characters and plot, show them that you’re interested and they’ll soon be racing to tell you about this fab book they’ve just read.
Enjoy it!
DH is in danger of making B hate reading. But we’re looking for different things. He’s looking for syllable correctness, where she reads every word correctly. I’m looking for love and understanding. If she understands what the sentence is talking about, I’m not that fussed that she’s not said every word out loud correctly. Of course, reading is about knowing what all the words are, but loving reading is about understanding. So as long as they’re understanding it, let them enjoy it and enjoy it with them!
How do you try and get your children to read? Are you a lover or loather of literature and do you find it hard to encourage your children to do something you don’t enjoy yourself?
 I’ve fallen victim to a secret visitor. Somewhat like Eddie Izzard’s hair thieves, they’ve come in the night and they’ve stolen something from me. They’ve taken my girl, and left me with a pre-tween – AAAARGH!
Help me! Please. I’ve got One Direction posters stuck up on the wall, love letters in her school bag and a variety of girlishly crap music being sung at top volume, morning, noon and night. She doesn’t wear pretty dresses any more – she wears a uniform of leggings and t-shirts. I thought we still had another couple of years at least before this all hit!
So how do you hold on to your child’s childhood, while all around them seems to be urging them to grow up before their time? Is it a fight we can win, or should we just succumb to the inevitable and wave hello to our mini-adults? I thought we were quite well insulated – I loathe and detest all those Hannah Montana – Wizards of Waverley Place Disney rubbish and very rarely allow them on the TV. I still buy her beautiful dresses. I still make her call me ’Mummy’ and am ample with my displays of affection. So where do you go? Is it just too late? Should I accept that the younger two girls are likely to hit pre-tween even younger?
It’s a good job she’s stunningly beautiful – I’ve a feeling the transition through pre-tween, tween and finally teen is going to be a rocky road!
So, it’s January 2nd now, so I’m avoiding the New Year’s Day promises of miraculous change – this is like making promises but they’re slightly less serious than those you make on the first!
First off, apologies to anyone who does check my blog occasionally to see whether I’m still alive. I am. Blogging is something though that the more you leave it, the harder it is to get back into, and I’ve been avoiding it through shame. Shamefaced, I’m sneaking back in and hope to resume normal service! I can tell you all about how hard the past couple of months have been – I’m still bereft over the chickens and twin that with the all too premature and unnecessarily idiotic death of my lovely Grandma and you’ll see that irrespective of anything else going on in my life, Winter 2011 has been dark. Lots of bright spots too, birth of a lovely new nephew and survival of a whole school term as A Teacher are definitely highlights – but there’s been this overriding sense of trying to get up the down escalator!
So, I’m going into 2012 with a new set of priorities. Of course, as always, I want to lose weight and get fit. But I’m working on a different strategy this time – energy breeds energy is my new slogan and that’s what I’m living by. So much more could be achieved in my life if energy was boundless – it’s not the constraints of time that cause me problems, it’s the constraints of being a lazy arse!
Diet is about fuel, healthy eating to keep my body going. Exercise is about getting out there and feeling fab! And squeezing in all that organisation – no problem, because energy is my new best friend!
I am woman, feed me lucozade and hear me roar… maybe… we’ll give it a go!
You may have seen my twitter or Facebook updates, but it’s been a bleak weekend here. My lovely chickens, my lovely, lovely chickens, were brutally murdered by a fox. One loss I could have borne, but to lose them all just seems so cruel and unnecessary - and downright stupid on the fox’s part too I think – he destroyed a whole supply of potential future food and just left their poor little bodies strewn around the place. I’m completely gutted and can’t stop thinking about how I’ve let them down – especially the littlies, who hadn’t even laid an egg yet. It’ll be a long time before I can look out in the garden without a tear in my eye.
RIP my chickidees – you were the best chickens a family could have!
Is not going as according to plan as I would have liked. Mainly because of an inability to follow my own advice. Yes, I’ve survived one week, but I’ll be honest, my sanity feels knife-edge, my brain is worn out and my temper is beyond frayed! And that wasn’t even a full week of actual school, it included two inset days. So where did it go wrong?
1. Failure to set time limits
First weekend of working and my time limits left by the front door. All work and no play made Freya a very mardy girl, which meant a very fractious weekend which definitely was not conducive to good working. If only I’d followed my own rules and made sure I had that time out to regroup and focus. Chances are I would have been a lot more productive and a lot more positive.
2. Failure to avoid procrastination
I have not been an effective worker this week – I’ve dawdled around the Internet, played a few games of solitaire and then, finally, done a bit of planning. Blame it on the above, lack of enjoyment time, but whatever the cause, the effect was that my planning dragged on rather than being short, sharp and useful.
3. Failure to devote sufficient time to the household
What a mess! All my good intentions went to waste and my house is a mess. What I have done however is signed up to the Holiday Planner so I can start getting my house in order for Christmas – yes, it’s the ‘C’ word but I won’t apologise as I LOVE Christmas and am already in a state of delirium. But anyway, in the run up it’s time to get down and dirty, but that means I need to devote some time to the house in my busy schedule – it’s not going to get done by itself.
4. Failure to keep my patience with the children
The girls will be the first to admit that this week has been hard. Finding our feet in a new regime was always going to be difficult and we haven’t been surprised. Even with Moo generously farmed out to my mother-in-law, it was still tough getting everyone ready. Both me and DH have been stressed and tense and it’s generally not been a happy place. That’s not what I’m going to work for. The idea is to make us all happier, not all more miserable!
5. Failure to look after myself.
In between working, planning and mothering, there’s not that many hours in the day. But a few simple things would make it much more likely that I’ll get through the term in one piece – plenty to drink, plenty of sleep, some fresh air and a little bit of me time. This week I’ve forgotten my breakfast, not taken any water with me, gone to bed late and given myself a headache by being inside too much.
So it’s time to start over and try everything again! I’ll keep going until I get it right – that’s the best thing about admitting mistakes, is being able to do it all again!
Including just how tiring teaching is! I’ve only done one day of actual teaching and I feel like death – I am so tired! My feet hurt, my legs, ache, my head hurts and what I really need to do is go to bed.
Sadly, what I’ll have to do is some more planning!
So forgive me the brevity of this post – lesson to myself here is to make sure I schedule my posts over the weekend so I can rest easy knowing that the blog is taken care of!
Freya
xx
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