Family...Colour Blind

I want to talk about colour and more specifically being colour blind but not the eye condition. I was thinking a couple of weeks ago about the colour pink. Because Youngest One loves it especially Disney pink and I have been trying to avoid it. The irony is that in its deepest hues this is the colour I love best. I particularly love fuchsia pink and any dark shade of pink after that. Purple is a favourite especially as my birthstone is amethyst which was requested as part of my engagement ring. That amazing shade of red that is on those heels, again thanks to my lovely husband I have a pair of those. The rich yellow that signifies gorgeous butter and a lovely 50's style dress I have. Green grass colour followed by its vivid cousin bright luminescent green. Cobalt blue, the colour of the sea and a particularly lovely coat I have. Can you see where I am going yet?

Black was my go to colour for years including at weddings and I love its simplicity. I was a Goth for a while, best phase ever, but I wasn't like other goth girls. I didn't do pointy shoes, lacy dresses a la Stevie Nicks in her late Fleetwood Mac stage - we are talking late 80's/early 90's here. I did wear blood red lipstick, still a favourite and occasionally crimp and back comb my hair. I even had boyfriends who used to come to our house armed with crimpers and gin and tonic but that's another story. I wore doc marten boots, chains around them, fingerless gloves with more chains, always trousers and tops in dark hues of black, purple, red. I had an amazing satin coat that had gold striped lining and bright rainbow coloured glasses. This was my Dad's favourite phase of my late teenage years. I had my hair in all colours too. 

Obviously time marched on and the phases changed, there was the floral ironic Smiths phase after they had split up and Morrissey releasing his first debut album. The girl in Every Day is Like Sunday could have been me! The athletic California phase with button fly jeans and high tops. The hippy phase with nefarious goings on at Glastonbry Tor. The working in Libertys phase coincided with Mature Student phase at 21. Then proper work phase. This often involved trying to work out what to wear whilst looking different and barely succeeding. I was quite subversive by having piercings in odd places - which doesn't seem so subversive now. I was desperate to break out but in the staid business world I worked in that wasn't the done thing. I got into burlesque at this time and have a few corsets to prove it. The phases that kept coming back; Surfer Girl, Goth, Snowboard Lady and what I like to call the Magpie phase. Then came the Stay at Home Wiping phase which involved not much sartorial splendour. I am still in this phase though I am re-emerging hence the pink hair. I'll mix colours or not. I'll wear three different colours with an additional colour in my hat. I want purple hair next and I'll  probably get shit for it. The funny looks, the fake "love your hair", "aren't you adventurous". This long lesson in my colour choices leads me to this. 

I am teaching my kids the meaning of being colour blind and not being a sheep where you can. Obviously the one we want to teach them is to be colour blind towards others, people are people no matter creed, colour, sexuality and all manner of life choices. When we had Oldest One I couldn't believe that clothing and shoe choices for boys were limited to blue, blue, blue, khaki, more blue and occasionally red. I adored H&M for their funky brightly coloured kids clothes and looked out for bold colours. I still can't stand the blandness of boys shoes and clothes. Where were the bright boots and shoes for them? Similarly since having had Youngest One the huge range of pink tones and cream - ghastly colour for kids clothes - makes me shudder. I sought out the brights, stayed away from the branded clothes, kept some of Oldest Ones clothes and dressed her in them. She rocks stompy doc marten boots, leggings, skirt, frozen tshirt and multi coloured tops just as Oldest One rocks stompy boots, long shorts, bright tops and hoodies. Both of my kids love colour, Youngest One tells everyone I have pink hair, Oldest One often chooses my hair colour!

I am acutely aware of the difference in toy stores of boys and girls segregated toys and wish that manufacturers would sort this out. I don't like the new girls lego not because it's disney etc but because I don't like the figures they use, why change the original? Why make bows and arrows in pink when in the woods you'd be picked off quicker than a deer as there'd be no hiding you. I want my kids to be who they are even if I don't like the disney princess pink or yucky blue. Because this isn't about me. Oldest One has been out in gold sequins and a Spider-Man mask. The clearly odd looks from adults riled me until we walked past a group of teenage skateboarders. I was ready to defend at all costs. Then they turned round en masse and said "Wow look, Spider-Man in sequins. Cool." I could have kissed them all. So here comes the crux of all this. 

Forgetful parent that I am, I kept forgetting to buy new swimming goggles. Today I finally rushed to that well known orange supermarket who found me the only pair of googles for about £2. Speedo ones too. The joy. They are bright yellow and purple. "Bollocks to it, they'll do" I thought even though I had a slight doubt mostly because I wasn't sure if he'd like the colours.

Swimming seems to go fine. Goggle success. Home time looms. Oldest One in a foul mood. He's had a shite day. Finally he tells me that some kids in his class have been calling him names because of the goggles. "You're a girl", "those goggles belong to girls", "you look like a girl" blah blah blah. He was feeling awful and really upset as these were fricking cool goggles. Guess who this name calling came from? Girls that's who. Bloody bitchy girls. It could have so easily been boys that did this which sadly I would have expected but girls! Really? On top of all this Oldest One has been coming home from school lately saying such and such is "too girlish" and "only boys can do that" so that I have had to remind him that his mum and sister are girls and there is nothing that we can't do or wear or be. I was fuming when I heard about this crap from his class mates. Sure kids can be mean and that sucks. But so young? And about colour too?

Since when did colour really belong to just one sex? What about the colour festivals across the world?What about artists who use all manner of colour? The snowboarders, surfers and skateboarders who wear lots of colour, his mum who has pink hair? Rainbows? The ocean? The countryside? Birds? Those shoes? Books? Shall I go on? Super heroes and Disney films are full of colour. The technicolor wonder if the Wizaed of Oz........Lets stop with this colour assignment to the sexes and let our kids love colour in all its shades.  As parents we need to help them see that boys and girls can be anything they want to be and colour is amazing. I have been as guilty as the next parent in my quest for righteous colour love in ignoring the colours they love. I have been colour-ist. This stops now. In our house any colour goes. 

As the responsible parent I am (!) we went over a few answers he could give in the future to the mean kids which mainly amounted to Fuck Off in 6 year old language and went on in our merry colourful way. My son loves his goggles and they are here to stay. 

Life...new year, new thinking, new ways......maybe

Happy New Year! The last year has been an exciting, strange, emotional and just generally an odd one! We ended the year completely poxed up. First Oldest One missed last week of term so a three week break instead of two and boy does that make a difference. Luckily Christmas got in the way so eased the pain. However Youngest One now has the pox and so we start 2014 in pox hell. Oh and a rush job on the latest homework which we have typically left till the last minute.

Last year was a great year for lots of reasons. Oldest One growing up and getting past that I've just started school look and really getting into it. I have found that school has worked its magic and mostly Oldest One is psyched to be there. Frankly the relief at having a child at school is huge. Let’s be honest for all of the joys you get from your kids, getting them to school is a major milestone to be celebrated by all. Yes there are bumps along the way such as a serious downgrading of control over your child, weird language games - our latest ones have been rhyming skanky with wanky, panky wanker and the delightful cranky wanky. The joy of suggesting to your child that silly language is just silly and they have a wider repertoire to choose from whilst trying not to collapse with laughter. We had already endured duck duck fuck fuck duckity fuckity so at least we've moved up the ladder of insults or down depending on where your personal proclivities lie.

I realised with a hard bumpy landing to my arse that I now exude far less control over Oldest One than previously imagined. 'Imagined' being the key. For all of my huffing and puffing I have serious lack of control than I like to think. After all I am the doyenne of practical self help books on childcare and love devouring new parenting programmes. There have been many an occasion where I took heart in the professionals’ advice but none topped the outrageous one from the Three Day Nanny. This has been a seriously sleep deprived house over the last year and I was frankly getting desperate. I watched this fab programme where the Nanny Superhero suggested blocking out the light in your kids room (despite having blackouts etc) with good old tinfoil. Yes tinfoil. I duly bought shed loads of the stuff and plastered my kids’ bedroom window with tinfoil much to the bemusement of Husband. Ta dah I said to Oldest One, you could be in a space ship! Little did I know what type of spaceship... Next afternoon we had a visit from the local police. I kid you not. Asking how long had we lived at our current address etc. It occurred to me very quickly that something was amiss - "you're here about the tinfoil aren’t you?" notice how quick I am on the uptake. I dragged the hapless cops into the kids’ room and said "blame Channel 4 and the Three Day Nanny". I hurriedly explained the situation regarding Youngest One and they left laughing. Good story for the station. Apparently some neighbour across the way were convinced they had the local drugs baron living near them despite the fact that we had to keep opening the windows to let in the light. Clearly they had not been watching Breaking Bad nor realising that in order to grow you go high(!) to the roof to evade suspicion!

It has been a year of firsts for Youngest One too. Going from not doing much to crawling, walking, laughing, pulling funny faces and saying first words. Hopefully sleep will follow soon. Youngest One is seriously funny and just loves Oldest One, following and copying but totally determined. A real streak of independence as well. It has been a joy this time round after having such a rough time with Oldest One, particularly afterwards. But you really notice the difference in parenting and I have had to pull myself up several times. Finding that delicate balance of making sure both get told off equally and that Oldest One doesn’t feel left out has been hard. Undoubtedly we have got it wrong on many levels but something must be working as Oldest One said to me the other day "I'm beginning to really like my sister". The age difference has meant some of this has been harder than expected but never look back. Just wait till Youngest One really starts talking and then let battle commence.

One of the biggest differences to me this year has been my iPad. I thought that it would make life easier especially with the blog but in some ways it has done the opposite. I realised how easy it is to connect and started seriously using facebook and sometimes twitter. But this has a downside too. My blog suffered as though I love the iPad I found it was harder to post stuff. Apps don’t always work. I can take fab photos, it’s so easy to check mail, zoom about the net and constantly stay connected. But there was no time to sit down, think and write. So today I hauled out the workhorse laptop and have started to write again. This is a definite change that I needed to make. What was also scary was that because I was more connected and how easy it was to stay connected it made me less connected with my family. How easy it was to pick up the iPad and connect elsewehere. So a resolution for me is to connect more at home and not my virtual home.

The realisation that the technology age is truly here and our kids are at the forefront of it has taken a while to sink in. I am quite an old fart in that respect. I cling onto the past and how things were done but I know that I need to stay on top of technology, use the websites and make sure I am clued up about sites like flickr, ask.fm, twitter, instagram, facebook etc and work out the updated rules for my kids. We have to do this and accept that their world is more instant and so different to the one we grew up in but that for the most part the rules haven't changed. I also found that I had to defend my right to not include photos of my kids or mention them by name on sites. This is a maze of rules to be navigated. You may have noticed that I use Oldest One and Youngest One etc. This is for their benefit as I choose to write but as kids they can't consent so I have to do it for them until they are at an age to work it out themselves. Maybe there is also a small part of me that wants part of our family life not to be instant. In the end whatever works for you and your family is all good. We all have to work out what is good and bad, what works and how do we get the best from what is on offer to us in this virtual 24 hour world.

Overall 2013 has been a happy one. Meeting new friends, having laughs on nights out and finding out how many pints I can consume but that’s another story. All I can wish for other than hauling my arse back onto the 5:2 diet and letting good old Jillian Michaels crucify said lardy arse is, that my family s happy, healthy ([pox free) and peaceful this new year. I also had help from a lovely friend to update this blog, so thank you Lisa. Will probably need more help from you to make this blog be more user friendly. I also hope and pray that my application to the Great British Bake Off succeeds. Must get the damn thing in though. So expect more from me this year and definitely more from the Rustic Baker. Back with a vengeance with hopefully some wit, more tin foil with a few breads and cakes along the way. Happy New Year to you all and may 2014 bring you joy, health, peace and happiness and a shed load of cake. Best get back to the sticky back plastic, cardboard and sellotape.

Love... the rustic baker

So in a week where Oldest One has been in and out of school and we've reached the end of a long week filled with an ear infection, a quick bake was in order this morning. I was reminded late last night by my friend Nikki that I had neglected to make flapjacks recently. This was strongly seconded by her other half Mark. So in between dealing with Oldest One, I was mulling over a few ideas in my head so I could make some in the morning. With Oldest One out of school again I whipped out the baking tray and a whole host of ingredients. 

I used the basic flapjack ingredients of 150g butter or in this case a margarine based spread, 200g sugar and a whole wodge of golden syrup, typically over 60ml. I whacked in a load of ground ginger and slowly melted it down. Then I added Fluff. Not sure if you've heard of this stuff, its like a spreadable marshmallow but vegetarian. I let that melt down then took the pan off the heat and immediately added 350g of porridge oats of different sizes and a wodge of dried cranberries and desiccated coconut. By a wodge I mean bung in as much or as little as you want. Put in a baking paper lined tray and into the oven for approx 10 minutes. 

Nikki and Mark I hope you love them. They tasted delish whilst still in the pan :-)

Love... the rustic baker

When your kid is off sick from school sometimes the only way to get better is going into the kitchen and baking something that tastes great. Luckily Oldest One just has an ear ache but he is still feeling a little crap.

I found this recipe yesterday and include the link because I loved all the comments with recipe ideas. As usual I ignored most of the recipe and added my own twist. These are a version of Millie's cookies, super soft and super yum. I added chocolate spread as I found an unopened jar under the sink, coconut and choc chips. The dough is absolutely delish. Baking time is variable but I am aiming for squooshyness. They look good enough to have with a big fat mug of tea. Yum

http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/1580654/?utm_expid=13353178-7

If link doesn't work look up Millie's cookies and it is the bbc good food recipe. Just to report I achieved squooshy-chewiness :-)

Love.....the rustic baker birthday style

To my gorgeous Oldest One a birthday cake supreme. We love Lego and Star Wars here so this year I decided to take the challenge of making a Death Star in cake form. My friend AtNumber29 sent me a link to a youtube guy who had made a similar cake. But as usual I wanted to go one better!

I used a recipe from Jo Wheatley's A Passion for Baking, yes I am a fan, but added a few twists like popping candy and using  ground almonds and more melted chocolate as I didn't have cocoa powder to hand. A lovely lady who sells cake decorating bits 'n' pieces gave me an excellent tip to make grey icing; use some ready made black icing and knead it into the ready made white icing. Genius. No black hands to explain to my child!

This cake had the works, allergy friendly butter cream courtesy of Betty Crocker, popping candy, chocolate, marzipan and finally icing. Must not forget Darth Vader!

Family........swallows and amazons

As usual the half term is winding down quickly and we had yet to start the homework That was set. Although the suggested project was an opt in I'm not sure how many parents - sorry kids - will go to school without a completed project. 

I knew that a boat required certain elements such as a floaty bit, a sail and somewhere to sit! Plastic bottles would do the trick as would fruit packaging. We duly collected the items and left them in a box to wait till the last minute. It really is last minute as supper and bedtime all happen in the next couple of hours......

Armed with scissors, brown tape, bendy straws and various bits of plastic and voila a boat that actually floats and carries plastic playmobil people. The sail is a triumph...... Oldest One will go to school with a boat and the rest of the homework we just spent the last hour doing. Hoorah! 

I want to say lots of piratey stuff but can only think of that drunken sailor song. So I'll be toasting this project with a glass of the finest and wiping the brow being thankful we did it. Obviously it was all down to Oldest One and he was essentially project manger whilst I did the grunt work.......typical.

Family........Bollywood

I am fast learning that when it comes to school there is always homework of some sort or another even for a Reception class. This is especially true if it is for extra curricular activities that occur on a Saturday. We've had a singing event and now the school is involved in a Bollywood-fest. Not that we will be there for the Bollywood march past on the weekend in question. But there is a catwalk show of sorts in the playground. 

So as usual the day before said event I am rushing around trying to find stuff for Oldest One to wear. All day. At school. 

What the hell does a boy wear as a Bollywood boy and why is it easier to dress a girl? Sparkly scarf and voila a sari. So amongst all the ideas which were hardly brilliant, I contemplated giving Oldest One a dirty t-shirt with the words in felt tip "slum dog millionaire" or a t-shirt with "slave labour made this" but rapidly decided that these were a political step too far. So I had a rummage in the dressing up box which is isn't a box at all but dressing up crap flung in all directions all over the house. Found a cloak I made for him last year. He looked like Frodo in it so decided that would do. I would make him an Indian Prince. Luckily the school obliged by having a sale and instead of digging out the sewing machine, I bought a ready made sequin shift top, reasoning that we would one day have a proper dressing up box and it could go in there. Found the superman belt and there it was, the basis of a good outfit. 

Next to the accessories. All Princes need to show their obvious wealth so I made a curved dagger, a crown of sorts and a cuff (Oldest One requested the cuff). It is amazing what cardboard, a toilet roll tube, gold paper plate, sellotape and a bunch of glued on plastic gems can do. We are the epitome of Blue Peter in our house. I am quietly chuffed with myself. 

Of course, Oldest One upon spying the dagger immediately said "Can I fight with that dagger?" Oh dear, not quite the Bollywood spirit..... I forsee plastic gems flying about all over the playground. 

Family...... Leave the duck alone

One day, Oldest One was messing about on our bed and refused to leave a plastic duck alone. I got more and more wound up by this simple yet, I felt, authoritative " leave the duck alone" statement. But he continued to ignore me. In the end I bellowed in a loud voice "LEAVE THE DUCK ALONE". Guess what happened next.........

I have a lot of parenting books living in my house. I flick through them in fits and starts - you know only when a crisis hits and then it's pull the books out, flip to the section you think applies, read another section because it sounds more interesting but totally irrelevant and then try to apply any of theory. I also have a guilty pleasure of watching Nanny 911 and Supernanny. I like to feel slightly smug and pretend that my children to not look or sound like the kids on TV. But Of course we all know that from time to time all kids and parents sound and behave like they should be on an episode of either of those programmes. Does any of this research work - NOOOOOOOOOO.

I then phone my Mum - often hiding in the kitchen behind the fridge - and she always has the sane and sensible advise that all the books and programmes are missing. You what I mean - kids can be a bloody nightmare but no child can be in charge of you, you are the adult, put them in their room to scream it out, it's just a phase etc.

I have noticed in these conversations with Mum and I ask her why? Why? WHY? (mostly with increasing hysteria after each why), she does that thing, you know that you are an adult and not the child...... Again why??? I want to be a child, I want to strop and I want to lie on the floor screaming but the screaming ball of tantrum just outside the closed kitchen door won't let me. So deep breath in  and deep breath out, I now have to deal with child and try not to act like one myself.

So in pursuit of a resolution and in a bar last weekend with my aunt and my mum, armed with a hefty glass of wine I sought answers to this very dilemma. This is the sage wisdom from them both and bloody good it is too.

1. You are in charge not the kids.

2. You cannot ever just be a friend to your kids you need to give them a grounding and a framework that works in your family.

3. When a tantrum starts or anything you don't like such as cheekiness, (within reason) take the kid by the hand, say "follow me" and lead them to another room. Don't say a word, put them on chair, bed or somewhere then leave, shutting the door if you can.

4. Let them scream it out and deal with after. This could take minutes or hours or loads of times over the day. Keep doing it. This is especially good for kids that do know the rules as my Oldest One quite clearly does.

5. Eventually boredom and parents ignoring screams equals kid who has calmed down and then apologises. Tantrums need an audience don't give it.

6. Even if in a public place, take child out or away from situation and put them say near a tree and walk a couple of paces away and position yourself so you can see them but they know you are ignoring them. Wait for storm to calm.

7. Really try hard to let the small stuff go. Try saying yes sometimes. I sometimes find myself in a permanent state of picking up on stuff and always saying no. 

8. Keep clear that this is for their benefit and yours. You want a happy house not a screech house.

9. Trust your instincts. Do what works for your family and ignore everyone else. 

10. Don't believe everything you read in parenting books. Or parenting blogs for that matter. 

Above all, when Oldest One wants to play with a plastic duck, let them. Don't under any circumstances get to the point of stupidity that results in a family legend. 

Big refrain now "leave the duck alone......."

Life..... Red Nose Day 2013

Far be it for me to detract from such a worthy cause especially since Red Nose Day is celebrating it's 25th year of raising around £900 million since it started but it's bought out the competitor in me this year. And this is not good. I can barely let control go at the best of times but the school Bake Off Competion had me thinking of all sorts of great recipes until the news filtered through that this was a kids competition. Ok time to scale down those grand ideas. But give over control of the bake - shudder.

In the end I did have total control of the bake because let's face it kids and ovens don't mix. It was still experimental because I had never made this cake before. I made a coca-cola cake. Yes it was the real thing. I couldn't taste this creation because it asked for marshmallows and I'm a vegetarian. But I did hand over control of the decorating to my Mum and the Oldest One. Thanks to my friend AtNumber 29 who gave me a pot of red edible glitter (sorry I need to buy you more), I left the kitchen.

I kept returning but made myself leave. To give them a blank icing canvas I did make the buttercream icing and apply to a double layer cake. However what is it with red food colouring and turning icing dark pink. We wanted red red not pink red. We added small amount of cocoa powder, coca cola and even purple food colouring. It was still red pink.

How do you make icing of any variety red red? i used a who.e tube and more of red food coloring. Answers on a postcard please.

However red glitter saved the day as did the red glitter icing balls and the red nose Mum went out to buy. The lure of competion is so bad that Mum suggested I shouldn't be too worried if I, I mean Oldest One, didn't win. I gave her a look. Seriously how bad is that. A small charitable competition to raise money and I want to smash the competition. Hang my head in shame, with a wink and crossed fingers for luck.

So deep breath I present to you the coca cola cake with marshmallows and red edible glitter icing.

family - where did all the time go?

I am seriously time deficient or rather I have simply failed to notice the passing of time. Is that normal when your Oldest starts school? It's now half term and I seriously cannot work out where all the time has gone. I had great visions of being able to do all sorts of things when the Oldest One was at school and being able to achieve so much.

Has that happened - in a word  - NO.

Why has time stopped and suddenly shunted me forward to half term?

On the one hand, thank G the first part of term is over - a few blips here and there with the Oldest One getting used to school and being in a class of 30 - usual stuff and the Youngest One and myself struggling to find a routine that works, particularly with sleep. But overall we're happy that Oldest One seems settled and raring to go each school day morning. Did I just say raring to go - maybe that was a bit ambitious.

Here are things I have learnt about the school thing (given I am now a veteran of 6 weeks)

1. I still don't know the names of some of the parents I say hello to

2. My child has learnt so much in his first half term - mainly "no one likes me", "I don't like you", "so-and-so doesn't like me" (notice a theme here) and "where's my snack?"

3. Talking of snacks - always give your child something to eat on the way home - gives you something to talk about - i.e. hyper screechy child - "where's my snack?" Parent - "Here it is - a lovely hummus wrap" or something similar. Sometimes I give Oldest One some sugar infused snack such as choc biscuits or flapjack and then other times in a fit of must be more healthy give Oldest One rice cakes. They smell foul but go down a treat especially as the far more sensible Youngest One dislikes them.

4. I don't expect Oldest One to wave goodbye at the door - which is a relief really as some children haven't made it into the classroom without some serious encouragement. I did feel offended at first and then had a serious talk with myself and realised this was a good thing.

5. I now do not ask about how the school day went as there was no point. Here's an example - me - "what did you do today?" Oldest One - "dunno" me - "did you enjoy PE?" Oldest One - "can't remember" and so the painful conversation went on till Oldest One screeched a lot. And that was before we reached the school gate. So lesson learnt.

6. Big realisation that our family has fundamentally changed for the next 16 years or so - what have we let ourselves in for.

So time has passed with no real achievement on my part other than the ability to roll out of bed, drag us all to school - we walk every day, including a nice hill before the school gates - roll home, try to entertain Youngest One, realised I have not written blog or done anything useful. Feed Youngest One then do lots of bits n pieces, then go back on school run and try to entertain 2 increasingly screechy children.

Is this what they mean that life stops when you have children?

Family - time to spread those wings

The S-day has arrived - our oldest is going to school today. He's only 4 years old and he's going to school. He's going to school. OMG he's going to schooooooool.......Can you sense there's a theme here....

This day has taken a long time to arrive and then all of a sudden it was here. I must admit for all of my "can't wait, he needs it and so do I!" attitude, actually I've really been in living in that place in Egypt - DE-NILE.

Last night it dawned on me that I hadn't labelled anything, I had only just bought his school jumper yesterday - he may have grown over the summer - he hadn't. So with Oldest One watching  "return to neverland" (which is frankly where I wished I was) I began the arduous task of labelling. Now according to my friend atNumber29 (fabulous blog) there has been great debate amongst parents about the sticky subject of labelling. Now I greatly admired her son's socks which had labels sewn in at the top - but they were black socks - Oldest One's are grey but I am lazy. Plus I only ordered my iron in labels from M&S last week. So I pulled off the fabric pen lid and wrote his name everywhere. Including said grey socks. But wait it doesn't end there. Do you put the full name or initials or a combination? I opted for a mix variety. Do you use handy shop labels so at least when you come to pass the item on it can be reused??? AAAHHHHHHHHH.

Bloody labels.

Also the school prospectus clearly states light soled plimsolls for gym. Have you found any? I bought cheap but classic looking ones from M&S but they were too big and had an allegedly non marking black soles. So in a fit of New School Parent panic I returned them and headed to that Shoe Emporium named Clarke's. He got measured - by the way - he has the widest feet fitting on their scale but they don't make shoes in that width???? Huh??? Explain. Anyway the young lad bought out plimsolls - not only were they foul looking - a little like old people shoes with velcro strapping but they had black soles - allegedly non marking. What the F???? Now I'm scared. I bought them because I was scared. I haven't labelled them and they're in his gym bag at school........ Should I ask the school how they feel about the alleged non marking sole in case I have to return them (hence the not labelling) and quite frankly buy a nicer but cheaper pair from M&S (thus saving Oldest One's dignity and my obvious good taste) or should I pretend that they don't exist and quietly forget about them. It's such a trauma.

So this morning we tried to keep it all on the down low but excitement and tension were in the air. Lovely husband made a man style breakfast for Oldest One - sausage and egg whilst I contemplated staying in bed and forgetting about the whole thing. I was duly dragged out of bed to feed Little One. I still at this point was travelling up that wonderful river in Egypt and gamely thought I know I'll do my exercise, get it out the way. This was at approximately 7.45am. Bear in mind we have to leave at 8.30am..... I thought that's ok I can time it right, it'll be fine. So I whipped my way through JM Level 2 and arrived at 8.15am totally wrecked and sweaty with a major red face. Plus both children screaming. So in full on Mother mode I gave out instructions, check anyway, put shoes on, get bag etc whilst simultaeously changing Little One, bunging her in buggy and finally changing me. I did have time to put Oldest One in front of cbeebies (line of least resistance). Then that time arrived.

Oh bloody hell we have to do it. So under guise of Happy Chirpy Mummy I drag both kids outside and whip out the camera. Nothing like a first day photo. I swear the fuzzy ones are the camera's fault and not me wiping the lens after being teary. So then we walked to school. Again I am seriously NOT thinking about this. I am arming my child with words of wisdom such as "ask the teacher where the toilet is" and "don't pick your nose" and although I deliberately have walked the long way round I realise we're getting close. A few people have stopped us and asked about his first day and I am still being Happy Chirpy Mummy.

So we arrive and the truth is dawning on me. I have to send my Oldest One (still a little boy in my mind) into the next stage of his life with a big smile on my face. So we did it. And I faced that dreaded school gate thing of everyone sizing each other up. Me, being the slightly out of breathe (there is a steep hill up to the school) red faced weirdo trying to control her kid and all the others who look laid back, slim and magazine perfect. I am the anti yummy mummy - there's not even a rhyming phrase for me!

They called all the kids together, got them to line up and took them in. The cameras and the iphones came out and there were a few tears from kids and adults. Me, as soon as he walked into the classroom I ran. Not because I'm mean but because of the tears. I promised myself I wouldn't cry but my lip wobbled and that was it! Ran down the hill and phoned the husband a blubbering mess. So once I got past that and took some deep breathes, I bunged on the headphones, pumped up the volume and cranked out Led Zeppelin and sang my heart out all the way home.

Yep a weird red faced looking woman pushing a buggy and singing.

By the way I caved and have ordered nice looking plimsolls - I will retrieve gym bag tomorrow ;-)