Skip to main content

Teenager alert!

Boris & Bean, the fat boys!
Last week before Abi turns 13 - eek, teenage daughter alert! This may be a major milestone, however I can't see that it's going to change much. Yesterday she and her friends were planning a get together in town for today and all we were asked to do was drop them off at the same time and then be back 2 hours later to pick them up. In between times no parents were required to hang around and so I went home and ran my normal 10 mile Sunday run - perfect time management! It does make for an easier weekend when this happens. I am conscious that we have our own things we want to do and I do feel very relieved that we haven't ended up with kids that do a host of clubs and practices from Friday evening through to Sunday afternoon. Izzy is trying to sort out a sleep over with her friend and between Stagecoach and a play rehearsal she's hardly free to do anything non-scripted. There's probably a happy balance between this and lazing around watching You Tube but lets face it, I'm OK with a little bit of mindless TV surfing if it means we all get to do something of what we want at the weekend.

Another good reason for not racing around this weekend is that Izzy is full of cold. She's been coughing a spluttering for most of the week and although it's shifting it has been pretty grim, not helped by the fact that she is the only one in the family that has it so limited sympathy. For her the extra pain is that a cold often brings out her mouth ulcers (still suffers horribly from time to time), and then on top of that blowing her nose meant her lips got chapped and cracked. For anybody else this would make it almost impossible to open your mouth, but my little chatterbox wouldn't let that combination stop her and she's managed to keep talking regardless!

 As if Abi knows she's moving closer to adulthood, she woke up this week, stretched and said "I wish I could wear a baby grow again!" Apparently she remembers the feeling of stretching and feeling the tightness over her feet. She'd also like, she informed me, to cry and have us pay more attention than we do now. Apparently the silent tears of a pre-teen aren't anywhere near as arresting as the howls of a  baby and so we just don't come running quickly enough. Hmmmm - I wonder why! I think for the moment we will celebrate the silent tears and hope for equally silent teenage tantrums!

We are sitting here watching Gogglebox in front of the fire with Bertie at our feet. I say we, obviously Glenn has disappeared into the garage because he never agrees with our TV choices! Googlebox is something that has passed me by until now - why on earth would we want to watch people watching TV??? In fact it's incredibly funny and (apart from the copious swearing and sometimes slightly inappropriate content) it's great fun to watch together. That said this one is the Stand Up to Cancer episode and it's had us all in tears, not least as we've just lost a friend to cancer and so it's all a bit close to home right now. Abi in particular has been very conscious of what it means for her friend who is the same age as her and now coming to terms with a life without her Mum. A horrible thought for both of us. It has definitely made me appreciate the little things - being able to sit with them both and just laugh, walks, cuddles, the little moments. Life can be cruel and you have to make the most of what you have.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Busy, busy, busy

Full English brunch for these two! Life is VERY busy and I don't feel like we have stopped for weeks (or is that months?) It seems like the 'to-do' list is endless and while I know we don't have to do it all at once, I have taken on the unenviable task of trying to get the Muppet to finish all the work he promised / we have paid for and that has been like pushing a mountain of water up a very steep hill. We've got to the point where I think we have got all of what we are likely to get and the rest we'd rather finish ourselves anyway. The electric gates are clearly a work of his imagination based on the gates / the electric cables he spec'd and the cheapo motor mechanism - there is no way they'll work so we have decided to not bother and source proper gates that do the job and look better as well. Knowing that we are almost at a point where we sever the ties feels very liberating. Looking back this last 6 months has been incredibly stressful and just didn...
Post a Comment
Read more

Bank Holiday sunshine

Off to meet FiFi and Grumps for a walk  (and yes, she is on the seat) Finally after weeks of rain and cold weather, the tide has turned and we have glorious sunshine for the bank holiday weekend and half term - hooray, it's about time.  Also just in time is half term as the kids were definitely ready for a break. They have both done brilliantly settling into the school, making new friends and finding their feet in an unfamiliar environment. Izzy has just had her exam week and felt it went OK given she hadn't covered all of the syllabus, and Abi's exams start as soon as she is back next week. I hope she's done some revision as she left for Devon with Claire, Adam and Mia today and isn't back until Saturday. There is talk of looking at some of her notes but who knows. My view is that a bit of R&R will probably be at least as beneficial if not more so than cramming all week so she should take the time to relax and have some fun - she deserves it. So we packed Abi o...
Post a Comment
Read more

Half term

Whatever happened to half term?? It seems to have disappeared in a flash, do doubt partly as I was working having had 3 days off the previous week for Kerrie and Ryan's wedding. The plan was to not have a plan - both girls have exam week coming up and so our major intent was for them to spend at least half an hour a day or so doing a bit of revision. This has sort of worked - we only had one day where I got an irate message from Glenn that Izzy knows 'absolutely nothing' about her maths... we'll see. With half term comes effort grades and if they genuinely know nothing, it's not for a lack of effort. Abi did really well, keeping up her average and getting a 6 (top grade) in French again. Izzy, who we always worry is apt to cruise if allowed, got the first 5.0 average grade we've seen from either of them and 3 6's in French, English and DT - well done Izzy! I tend to assume all the kids work hard but it seems not - according to Abi "all the boys always...
Post a Comment
Read more