Picking up from last Monday then...
Monday 7th
We all went into town for a few bits, mainly cardmaking essentials, and then had one of our very leisurely Monday pizzas. Very nice afternoon.
Tuesday
C kindly gave us a lift to Kids' Club, where F had her usual happy time, mainly playing with E and H and spending a lot of time out in the playground. I am so torn about Kids' Club - on one hand, obviously she really enjoys it, so there's no actual reason to stop going. On the other hand, since she tends to spend so much of her time just in the excellent playground, it feels like a particularly expensive trip to the park or something - £6 per week for 2 hours there, plus £5 bus fares, although C has given us a lot of lifts, so that brings it back down. And it's nobody's fault at all that it feels like that, just that the playground equipment and play space is very good quality and attractive, especially as we've had a lot of dry Tuesdays. And F can always do crafts at home, so logically she's almost always going to choose to be out there. And at the same time I don't want anyone stopping her, paradoxically, and making her Do Crafts Now with Everyone Else Because it's Craft Time and That's What We're Doing. Cos that's just school!
So there you see I'm torn, but it feels better to have gone through why, so thanks for reading. Having written all that, I actually feel more positive about it, funnily enough!
Whilst F was being Clubbed, I had a cuppa with C and nice chat, whilst D explored the tinsel and tissue paper possibilities around him enthusiastically. Can't believe he's already pretty much walking.
After Kids' Club, C took us all back into Lewes for our local home-ed group - I had started to feel a bit rubbish so sat with A, who was also feeling rubbish, in our self-declared Rubbish Corner. The Non-Rubbish were allowed to visit for brief intervals and demonstrate dancing as different trees and crocheting stars. Somebody had brought in a really nice wooden marble run set, which I admired from afar. It looked beautifully made. F was in and out, mainly out. The group is really thriving and I like it very much.
E and F had arranged for F to go back to E's after group and C had confirmed that that was OK, so I left group early due to Rubbish status and had a quiet afternoon at home on my own, feeling slightly queasy, but it helped to eat something and have a hot bath.
Wednesday
I still felt a bit 'not right' so we had a day at home and played a very long game of Mario Party, amongst other things. We talked about the Nativity story, particularly who visited Baby Jesus and why and what they brought.
F also did a bit of programming using Scratch - really recommend downloading that if anyone hasn't yet and your children (or you!) might be interested in trying a bit of simple games/storytelling programming. It works really nicely and is very easy to use. F has done a couple of things with it, mainly involving C, K and how to look after baby D, e.g. when the baby character makes a crying noise you have to click on a bottle of milk (despite never having seen baby D drink from anything other than his mummy, C!). Her most recent version features a very well-drawn picture of C and a much less representational picture of K, who is mainly legs. F gets very absorbed in programming, really concentrates and seems to work problems out by herself.
Also talked about time zones in the context of the New Year starting earlier or later in different countries, and about the word 'sonic', 9 being the square of 3 and other such random items. She also spent a bit of time stretching rubber bands over arms of a computer chair and testing length of stretch for change in note and telling me about it.
Thursday
We went to my mum's for a couple of days. Had an easy journey over there, after a tricky start when F got very stubborn about a tree that was apparently growing the wrong way and might eventually in 20 years fall over on the road, so I should ring the council about it NOW. Hmm...
When that 5 minutes that felt like 20 was over, it was all fine and we arrived at my mum's in good spirits, having caught the bus that gets us nearly to her house, and spotted some nice Xmas lights here and there on our way.
Had a nice evening, can't remember what we did. Think F did some pastel drawing/painting, or that might have been the next morning. I know we stayed up late both nights - generally lately F has been short of sleep, which doesn't make for good days, or at least leads to Moments.
Oh I know, we played Trivial Pursuit, family edition, which was quite fun. F was fairly successful with questions like 'How many King Henries?' and 'Which Royal family was Henry VIII part of?', and also with a question about which county is next to Cornwall. Sports was harder, for all of us, predictably! Think F also did OK with some weather/environment questions.
Friday
Friday is swimming day, by default, so we all set off for mum's town's leisure centre, with swimming stuff carefully bagged. Got there after bus and a bit of a walk to find that the pool was closed! Grrr, not mentioned on website, grrrr.... F was very disappointed. Had looked forward to grandma watching her swim, going in different pool, etc.
We managed to get past that after a bit of hoo-ha and walked into the park - Mote Park is probably Maidstone's best asset, really. It's a large landscapey park, with a lake and beautiful trees. More like a city park in many ways. Considering what Maidstone has chosen to do with its potentially beautiful riverside area (ASDA!) it's amazing Mote Park has survived. It's lovely, anyway, and looked very beautiful in the December sunlight. We managed to have a nice walk, fed ducks, had food, but F was really still rather feeling the disappointment over the swimming, along with not being at her best with cold/cough and tiredness, so there were some more Moments. Still nice overall.
Then we walked back into the shopping centre and took F to see Father Christmas, just for the fun of it. He was a nice Father Christmas and she came away a lot happier. Nice idea to sell snow-globes with photos of child and FC together!
Back to mum's by bus and F made a board game - very complicated, elements of Trivial Pursuit, Animalia and her own stuff. It was called F----world. There are 7 sections, coloured in each colour of rainbow and you start at red and work round. You move a number of spaces determined by throwing your little paper character (F, mum, grandma or daddy) onto some numbers 1 to 7. There are dark spaces that send you back to the beginning and shortcut spaces that take you to the next colour section, gems/spores that you collect if you answer a question correctly on a question space and different sections including Friends, Dance, Pets, Clothes, Sports and Babies. So we played that in the evening I think. It was classic F in that much more attention/interest had gone into the gameplay than the aesthetics. I have the same priorities myself tbh!
Saturday
F and I came home on the train - had been a very nice visit to my mum's - really want to go more often next year, instead of her having to come to us. Two nights makes a good short stay, with still plenty of time to do something.
Back home, we had the official Switch-On of our new LED white star on the top of the tree! Ta-dah! Very pretty, rather serene or something. Well, it's static and white, so compared to the hectic craziness of flashing colour that is the rest of the tree and living-room at the moment, it would seem serene I guess. Sedate even.
J's friend M came over for dinner and to stay over, arrived at about half 6. We had a lovely evening, though I had trouble convincing F that she really needed to sleep...
We had curry and watched Strictly Come Dancing, then Moon - really enjoyed the film, very good. M is lovely easy company, feel very relaxed with him.
Sunday
Next morning, we had a leisurely breakfast, then M went off to do his things and we set off to the station. Went into Brighton and met old friends A and C and their son R and daughter E, for a pub lunch at The George - many vegan options to consider! Had a lovely time with them, was so nice to catch up. Determined to do it more often. We went back to theirs for cuppa and more chat.
Really nice weekend.
Am nowhere near ready for Christmas, so lots to get done this week, in terms of presents, cards...
Work really dried up for about 3 weeks or more, but there's 2 jobs hopefully in my Inbox today/tomorrow, which should bring December up to a basic level.
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