Every Mother

I wasn't in the closet with my blog but a massive walk-in wardrobe, the kind I tell my husband that I dream of having in my dream house in my dream life (not going to happen!!! :D(()

And then he ousted me; and my twee (sic) blog design came out with me. It was called Autumn into Winter because it was supposed to be the length of it, it also signifies where I am at in the biological scheme of things, at the end of my Summer and heading for Winter (but with the help of Lancôme and l 'Oreal, because I'm worth it!).

Ever since I can talk/write I've had a tendency to go off on an existential tangent without a "By your leave!" (Bear with me!), so what for me is clearer than Waterford crystal is rather obscure and obfuscated to everybody else, so I decided to change the name of my blog to "Every Mother", which is who I hope to pay homge to and whom it will resonate with, and because that's who I am; like any and every mother/wife/daughter/sister, trying to be the best you can be by being the only thing you can be… you.

So here it is, with love and laughter… Me

Of lice and men

At least every week for about six years the children would get a note in their school bag announcing: "A child in your child's class has got lice…" followed by some scary stuff in capital letters and very mean looking font, telling us all about the perils of leaving it unattended and how it is my duty, nay, my mission in life, to defeat the ugly beast.

So I complied, and every time I would drag Júlia and Michael to the garden, having drowned them in hair conditioner first, and went through the motions of trying to find lice/nits. It is painful. Every single time. Our children are blessed with our genes: thick curly hair and thick curly hair cannot produce thin limp straight hair. But we went through the motions and every time with both zilch, nada, rien du tous, nothing; no lice or nits from either of them…

…until six months ago when Júlia started scratching her head as if it was going out of fashion. She's had eczema since she was a baby, and a dry scalp as a result, and so have I, so I knew that the scratching was way too frantic to be that; so I got out the Full Marks shampoo and the nit comb and went hunting. Sweet Jesus! I had a white paper towel to clean the comb and within minutes it was grey!!! I couldn't stop myself from exclaiming loudly every time a big lice showed up and Júlia would recoil with embarrassment: "Please mummy, can you stop doing that!..." but I couldn't. I am sorry Amorzinho…

Here's what the blighters look like:

It all just brings back memories.

I am the middle one of five, from rural Portugal, we didn't get letters from school but you knew when you had lice, on rotation one of my brothers would be scratching his head; my mother would regularly check all of us, whether out of duty or for pleasure, and make us (ie me as the oldest girl) go through her hair (she had hair down to her hips, thick as a blanket) if anything was found she would get flea powder cover our hair and scalp with it, tie a scarf and send us to bed. I can smell it now! This mixture of sulphates and ammonia, but dry, and sticking to the back of your throat, and the powder itself was really itchy! Apparently my blood was not good enough for lice and they just died on my scalp; never stopped my mother doing the treatment though…

Tonight Júlia and I had to go through it again, and she was so good! She asked "Please mummy can you not go OMG every time you find something? It's worse than the itching!" and I tried to but OMG, David Attenborough could do a documentary about the wild life on her hair…

I am sorry Amorzinho… I love you and all your nits!!!

Homework…

… the bane of my life!

Júlia just gets on with it and does the minimum possible acceptable; it would be easier to walk on live coals than making her do anything further, either that or once I'm through with Michael I don't really have the energy to argue. Reminds me when I asked my very strict mother why she was so lesser faire with my baby sister, and so tough on me, to which she replied: "After five children I just don't have the energy, nor do I care so much…", I wish I was the fifth one!

Michael and homework is like going into battle. As soon as he gets his bag he starts yawning; opens it, yawn; gets his homework notebook: "Can I have a break? I'm so tired!...", and I start pulling my hair, and reach for the first glass of Cava. He is extremely bright but with his dyslexia it means that a simple spelling test takes three times as long to prepare for and there are no guarantees that his working memory will not let him down on the day. In his own mind the smallest question takes on Herculean proportions even before he starts and then he gets intimidated by it and doesn't want to do it. The only way to get through that is with patience, which unfortunately I'm not blessed with, and praise, praise, praise and reassurance that he can do it and is doing it well.

And then there's the handwriting, don't get me started on that. He has to do his literacy homework (it was called English only last year when his sister was in year 4) with a blue fountain pen, in joined up writing; giving a fountain pen to a dyslexic boy with concentration issues and expecting neat handwriting is like putting boxing gloves on a needlepoint lace-maker and expecting a fine bridal veil, it's not going to happen within a viable life span.

Maths and reading is good. He has a sharp mind that gets the abstraction of numbers; and we found out that using coloured overlays really helps him to focus and brings the text to the fore, making him much more fluent, which in turn increases his self-confidence.

Once upon a time, before they started school, I thought it was going to be so easy: two beautiful, bright, well mannered children, school is going to be a breeze…

Channelling my inner Bridget Jones….

I've missed the two week reckoning so 18 days into the program here goes:

pounds lost/gained – 0

units drank – too many

miles ran – 30 plus

v. v. bad

lectures attended – all of P1

v. v. good

…anyway I was never in the Bridget Jones demographic, the occasional big pants may be the only think we only had in common.

Seriously though, need to get my act together and organise myself. I'm trying to master mind maps (www.thinkbuzan.com) as an aide to both revision, business, the universe and just about everything. Below my very first attempt with Buzan's iMindMap.

Julia is ten years old today!

My little girl is ten today, and she was so happy; she's been counting the days to this day, when she gets to double digits and is two years older than her brother.

Yesterday we went to Dulwich Park to learn to ride a bike, because I bought them both bikes, which will be ready today. My heart gave such a leap of pride when Michael just took off, half expecting him to fall, and then Julia did it too... within ten minutes both of them were going around as if they'd done it all their lives.

I remember the day I learnt it myself, on a great big men's bike, far too big for me and I had to crouch under the frame, I couldn't steer so ended up crashing into the side of a barn, breaking the side lights and snapping the dynamo off. I was terrified of my mother and used chewing gum to glue it together and of course it all come apart as soon as my mother picked it up. I was banned from touching another bicycle until I was eight when she went to take my brother to the Seminary.

I am really looking foward to this afternoon when she arrives from school and sees her new bike. She thinks she's had all the presents already.

When she's happy her whole world (and ours) just becomes wonderland and she skips and laughs, with her beautiful smile framed by her lovely shiny curls. How I love her...

Happy birthday Amorzinho!

Cats!

Why the big title picture? More than anything else in the world, my little girl loves cats, and anything about cats so this picture is here as a homage and a salute to her devotion.


Everyday we leave the house a few minutes early so that we can stop and stroke any cat we may find on the way to school, we have quite a good clowder by now:
Ginger, Window cat, aka Robbie Kitten, Password Cat, aka PC cat, Fat Friendly Cat, Not so Fat Friendly Cat, Baps, Leon, Splotchy, Cat Who Thinks He's a Dog, Stripe... and of course there's our two, Tugga and Star.


God bless you my Cat Girl.

First things first...

I have been toying with the idea of a blog for a very long time as a means of having some creative output in my life outside cupcakes or balance sheets, so here I go...

This will be a record of Autumn-Winter 2010 and how I cope with menopause at 45 and hormone replacement therapy, anti-depressants, anaemia, a 10 year old girl with Asperger's and a dyslexic 8 year old boy while trying to sit for ACCA professional level exams, start my own accounting services company, hopefully train for the London Marathon if awarded a place, loose a stone in weight and give up alcohol for the duration.

I think I need a lie down after that. :D))