General update - end of week 3...

Well, one thing I've realised this week is I am only able to focus on one thing at a time on top of my general child care duties.

This week I had an assessment for starting the training course to be a lecturer in the lifelong learning sector. I totally freaked about the numeracy. I last 'did' maths in 1991 when I scraped a pass at GCSE. I have a hazy memory of a stats module during my degree, and I must've passed it because there's no way I would've done it if it wasn't compulsory. This was testing up to level 2 (so GCSE A-C) and I really wanted to get the level 2. As per my academic tradition, I didn't do much until the night before when I sat up most of the night doing the tests and seeing where I'd gone wrong. So on very little sleep, I managed to get a level 2 in numeracy, In fact (pardon my lack of modesty) I got 100%.

So that, combined with much harrumping about the fact that my husband had forgotten that he needed to take Thursday morning off to look after the wee one, took up much of the week - mainly at the expense of diet and exercise. I'm not weighing myself until next week!

Housework wise, the Naggybitch habits are getting there. I think I'm on the path to having some kind of tidy living space *most* of the time. And I like it. Since last weekend I have:

Have completely changed our bedroom
All washing put away
Loads of clothes sent to Oxfam - 5 bin liners
Shit magnet on top of my chest of drawers sorted
Swept under the bed
Ironed bedding and put it on
Chucked out our horrible wash basket
Sorted out all the bed linen and have only kept three sets. Rest to Oxfam. Annoying as I like all of them, but c'est la vie.

Still to go in the bedroom:

Tidy up the bookcase
Go through two drawers that R and I have used as a dumping ground for things we don't know what to do with.

In the wee one's room:

Gone through her clothes and charity shopped / given to nieces things that don't fit
Put all her washing away
Sorted through toys
Sneaked her art desk into the car and then the dump (she hasn't even noticed!)
Put the stuff under her bed into the crate she used as a sledge
Washed some dirty marks off her wall

As well as:

Keeping on top of living room, kitchen and bathroom.

I now only need to do the jobs in our bedroom and our hall cupboards and it's all more or less done. I guess an advantage to having a small flat is that the de-cluttering is taking a much shorter amount of time than I expected, it's just a question of doing a bit every day. This week I was out of the house from Wed-Sat so I'm pretty impressed with my list now I've seen it written down.

Another unexpected boon was my brother's girlfriend came to stay this weekend, and I could hear C showing off her shoe collection (good girl). I didn't have to cringe in the background wondering what sort of state C's wardrobe was in, because it was all beautiful. Hazzah!

Oooooh, just remembered I did a lakeland order and bought a new bin, new cutlery drawer, new mop, a new laundry basket and a ponsietta dish brush (the last one was bought to bust the free delivery threshold). I know you are probably wild with jealousy at my booty (not), but I am amazed at how thrilled I am to be getting nice things into my house.

I also suspect I am having a mid-life crisis. Eeek.

This week my goals are:

1. 4 alcohol free nights (I will only drink Friday and Saturday and one other weeknight tba)
2. 2 proper exercise sessions
3. 20 minutes of light exercise on the other days
4. Eat 6 fruit and veg a day
5. drink more water
6. keep up on the housework
7. phone one of the people I've been meaning to ring for ages.

More conversations with C

As her vocabulary improves, our conversations seem to be getting more and more surreal. We lay in bed last night and I was stroking her head as she fell asleep. It must've sparked memories of our late night breastfeeds as she sleepily asked me where my boobs lived. Smothering a laugh, I told her they live on my chest and she said 'but where do they eat? Where do they watch telly? Where do they sleep?' erm.... well they don't really do those things sweetheart, now go to sleep... to which she retorted 'but that means they'll be very hungry, very bored and very tired!'. I just told her to go to sleep. A couple of minutes later another little voice 'why do you need wings to fly?'.

I thought I'd conquered the little girl screaming as she hasn't done it for ages. On the way home from nursery she did it again and following my admonishment told me that her teacher, MissL had also told her that they didn't like it at nursery. I asked whether she had apologised and explained why you should say sorry if someone asks you not to do something. Some hours later she was in the bath: 'Mummy, if I do this AAARRRAAAGGGHHH (scream), and then say 'Oh, sorry!', would that be OK?'.

Lastly, the other day she was painting with Daddy. She told him she was doing pictures for her aunties. R asked her which ones and she said N and N. R explained that she had four aunties, N, N, K and E. She looked to me as arbiter 'Mummy, E and K aren't aunties are they? They're Mummies' (K and E have children, N and N don't!).

I suppose all this makes sense in her little mind, and there's a definite logic!

Moral dilemma...

You may or may not know that at the beginning of this year, I decided to order all my 'brand' goods from tesco online, and then do my top up shopping from Waitrose. Seems a bit silly to spend extra on the same thing going to Waitrose just because their other food is so tempting. It requires a bit more organisation, but I reckoned I could cope!

I had my first delivery due on Monday between 4-6pm. Of course, it went wrong. The called at 5.40pm to tell me they had van problems, but I'd get my food the next morning. I was mildly irked, and pretended to be more so, and they said they'd refund my delivery charge and £10. All went well the next day, I got my stuff.

So, I just got this e-mail from them:

Dear Ms A,

I am pleased to confirm that we have refunded the following items to the card you used for payment
Item Ordered Quantity Price Refunded
Pampers Easy Upscarry Pack Junior 20 2 £11.96
Garnier Nutritionist Night Cream 50ml 1 £4.74
Bold Powder Lavender & Camomile 28 Wash/2.24kg 1 £4.00
Andrex Toilet Tissue Aloe Vera 9 Roll1782 Sheet 1 £4.00
Inycon Ltd Edition Chard/Viog 75cl 2 £8.98
Anchor Butter 250g 1 £1.00
Whole Earth No Added Sugar Crunchy Peanut Butter 454g 1 £2.23
Jaffa Clementine Pack 2 £4.98
Febreze Candle Cotton Fresh 1 £3.06
Tesco Seedless Grape Selection Pack 500g 1 £2.37
Kleenex Anti Viral Tissues Twin Pack 1 £2.78
Quorn Swedish Style Balls 300g 1 £2.29
Kelloggs Special K Bliss Berry Crunch375g 1 £2.16
Tesco Make Your Own Pom Pom Pals 1 £1.65
Tesco Mango 2 £3.50
Cathedral City Mature Cheddar 400g 1 £1.94
Quorn Mince 300g 1 £1.67
Pizza Express Margherita Pizza 249g 1 £1.99
Pizza Express Sloppy Guiseppe Pizza 305g 1 £1.99
New Covent Garden Plum Tomato & Sweet Basil Soup 600g 2 £3.94
Tesco Italian Chopped Tomatoes4 X 400g 2 £3.40
Tesco Mangetout 200g 2 £3.00Weetabix 36's 1 £2.00
Danone Bio Activia Strawberry 4x125g 1 £1.67
Quaker Oat Granola 600g 2 £3.70
Danone Activia Forest Fruits 0%yogurt 4x125g 1 £1.67
Jamie Oliver Green Pesto 190g 1 £1.37
Frylight Stir Fry Oil Spray 250ml 1 £1.97
Glade Scented Oils Tin Relaxing Zen 1 £1.99
Tesco Egg Lasagne 500g 1 £0.80
Tesco Egg Lasagne Verdi 500g 1 £0.91
Birds Eye 8 Fishfingers Crispy Batter 224g 1 £1.00
Tesco Thick Bleach Fresh 750ml 2 £1.46
Ryvita Pumpkin & Oats 200g 1 £0.85
Cooking Onions Class Ii Pack 2 £1.96
Linda Mccartney 6 Vegetarian Sausages 300g 2 £2.00
Tesco Reduced Fat Houmous Dip 200g 1 £0.88
Wilkinson Sword Extra Ii Beauty Disposable Razor 5's 1 £1.00
Tesco Milk Chocolate Fingers 8pk 1 £0.88
Tesco Cheese & Tomato Flatbread 1 £1.00
Tesco Arborio Risotto Rice 500g 1 £0.95
Philadelphia Light Soft Cheese 300g 1 £0.91
Tesco Cheese Sauce 350g 2 £2.80
Hartleys Family Raspberry Jam Seedless 454g 1 £1.00
Tesco Babyleaf Herb Salad 90g 1 £1.25
Hovis Seed Sensation 800g Light And Nutty 2 £2.00
Macleans Total Health Whiteningtoothpaste 100ml 1 £1.00
A Bartlett Rooster Potatoes2kg Pack 1 £1.00

Erm, so the entire order then?

Would you call them and tell them or just sit quietly and see if the refund ever actually takes place?

I would be more inclined to honesty if it was Ocado, but I can't bloody stand giving money to that hideous Shirley Porter.

Actually, lightbulb moment, I could donate the £100 odd to Haiti.

NB. I have included the shopping list (even though it contain somewhat private items) because I LOVE knowing what other people buy at the shop. Do feel free to e-mail me your shopping lists for my perusal!

Birthday and Leaving party

Today our friends are having a party before they go to Hong Kong. It's also their daughter, L's 3rd birthday party. Here's C all ready to go...

(just noticed I really need to pull out the TV cabinet for some tidying!).

Shit Magnets

Well, so far today, I have sorted out our no.1 shit magnet - which is the dining table. In theory I sort this out every day before dinner, but in practise, I move the piles of shit onto the toy box in the living room or onto a chair (we have six chairs, there are only three of us) so that I can't see it.

It is properly sorted out now, and I'm going to do it again at around 3pm (or before or after if I'm out at 3pm) so that I can give dinner the justice it deserves. The dining table is also the first thing you see when you come into our flat, so it's kinda depressing when it's a mess.

I also spent fooking ages, and now regret embarking when there were so many other more pressing things to do, sorting out our DVDs so they are all in the right cases. I've got a pile to charity shop - I bet R doesn't let me

I've done two loads of washing, including stripping the beds. I've got to get to the bottom of our wash pile. We didn't do any washing at all over Christmas mainly because we kept going away from home and just took more clean clothes with us. It's totally out of hand... I hope and pray that by the end of the week THAT is sorted.

I did the above while playing Peppa Pig schools with C I was Madam Gazelle so I kept setting the kids work to do while I did my own thing. Cara was a bit contemptuous but I've told her that's what my teachers used to do, so she better get used to it

This afternoon C is at nursery so I'm planning to:

1. make some cupcakes
2. while they're cooking get rid of some clutter in the kitchen*.
3. make a quick dinner for R and C as I'm out tonight
4. pray to the God of tidy that Rory appreciates my efforts and doesn't spoil them all while I'm out tonight
5. do some more washing.
6. sort out at least one of the kitchen drawers (I do this often, pointlessly really)
7. do some exercise.

Hmmm, she's only gone for 2 hours. Might be a bit ambitious. Then again, if I drive I'll get back quicker, might be able to gain another half an hour on that one!

*our kitchen is tiny, but has many shit magnets - on top of the microwave being the main one. We acquired a lot of tins and things over Christmas - they can get stuffed. Bin, bin, bin.

Advantage to doing this when R is out - he can't tell me how useful things will be. I fall for it because I'm a sucker for *stuff* too, but enough is enough, and we have more than enough.

Week 2 photo

Housework and House admin - My reasons for change

1. To enjoy my living space

2. So the flat will sell easily and for a good price.

3. So viewings will be stressfree instead of a mad rush to get the flat looking OK

4. To be able to find things easily and to keep things nice - it's quite important to me that I don't spend money on things for them to be trashed

5. So when my neighbours knock to ask me a favour or tell me about something, I can invite them in for coffee instead of lurking at the front door.

6. So that C has good habits as a child so she doesn't have to learn these lessons the hard way at 34.

7. So C can play with her toys more easily - even she knows that she can find things better when it's tidy and she prefers it too.

8. I'm an annoying combination of liking things to be tidy, but being too lazy to keep it up. I can set up all the systems in the world, but I'm rubbish at maintaining them. I *do* manage the keeping the bathroom/floors etc. clean, I just don't keep things tidy - we all just sling things down and it's a right tip most of the time. We also need to get rid of a load of stuff as we just don't have room."

Week 2 - bit of an update

Today, I've really focused on getting some head space by doing jobs I've been meaning to do for ages - I've got quite into it now and made a list of 42 things I've been meaning to do around the flat or related to the flat - like finding a new mortgage, getting a valuation done for moving etc. I figure if I do at least one of those jobs a day by the end of February I'll have a beautiful living space and won't feel so down about my abilities as a mother. I think I'm fine in emotional terms as a Mum and good at doing *stuff* with C, but I can't get excited about housework and house admin and as a result things end up getting on top of me, which effects my self esteem etc. and I spend so much time looking for things it's untrue. I'm hoping that if I lead by example, C will be better at putting her stuff away - I want to pass on good lessons to C not all my bad habits. I really feel like I'm having a bit of a life change at the moment and it's liberating.

So today (I might be copying this onto my blog!) I sorted out my living room. C's dolls house is now less cluttered - she went mad and noticed as soon as she went in, but played with it very happily once she'd got over the initial hystrionics. I sorted out the rest of her toys and now they look very neat. Her books are on the bookshelf and my dining table is clear (often has bits of post / magazines etc on it). Have dividded the DVDs into sections and did washing - 3 loads. I also threw away a ton of old make up and now have a very neat and ordered make up drawer and a hat box full of hair straightners/serum/hairdryer/hairbrushes etc. all in one place so I can find them easily.

R was under orders to 'Mum clean' the kitchen. It looks quite sparkly, but I haven't yet opened the cupboards, so who knows what joys await me. He also sorted out his side of the bathroom cabinet.

I feel a bit lame because I came across loads and loads of duplicates when I was sorting out the make up drawer - how many mascaras can one woman have on the go (5 apparently), how many red nail varnishes can I own? I went to the hairdressers this morning and read an article about the Slumdog programme that's going to be on during the week, and obviously the coverage of Haiti. It made me feel Very Guilty Indeed. I do not look after my stuff. I am a spoilt adult. With that in mind I was literally chucking stuff into charity bags - loads of C's toys that I don't think she'll miss, clothes I haven't worn for ages, even lovely dresses etc. and I'm going to take them to Oxfam tomorrow, and remember it next time I'm about to buy something new. I don't want a joyless existence - what purpose would that serve? - but I don't want to carry on mindlessly spending money on *stuff* that clutters up my living space and ultimately serves no purpose other than to give me a quick thrill when I buy it. Shame it's taken me 34 years to get to that point, but hey, live and learn and all that.

Just had to get that down to remind me. I felt like hitting myself over the head when I handed over £100 + for my new hair do!

Amusing 3 year old comments of the week

1. "It's hard to do arabesque when you're wearing skinny jeans, Mummy."
2. Shooting into the loo in Sainsburys she locked the door behind her before I had a chance to get in. As I was admonishing her, a voice came over the tannoy "VISIT AILSE 47 FOR YOUR CHANCE TO TAKE HOME A DELICIOUS ROAST CHICKEN..." when it finished I heard a little voice "Mummy, quick, something has happened". "Open the door then so I can help you" (thought she'd wet herself). The door opens and she's still standing in dry clothes, "what's the matter?" "The talking door scared me, Mummy!".

Week 1 Update

1. to exercise once

Yesterday C and I did the Davina DVD. Wasn't too bad, although I'm achy today. I've decided to fit in doing some exercise first thing on the weekend to get into the habit. I've realised I am a creature of (usually bad) habits, so if I start by making it part of my weekend routine, hopefully it be easier to introduce more exercise at a later date. Have also ordered another DVD from Amazon as I felt a bit bored when I was 'doing Davina' again.

2. to have at least one booze free night

I managed two - and one of them was Friday!

3. to de-clutter C's bedroom

Did this today. One huge bag of clothes going off to Australia, one huge bag to the charity shop and another to the recycling bank.

Don't have much time to update today, but will be more conversational next time. Promise.

Photo of the week:

Aims for next week:

1. to exercise twice

2. to eat 5 fruit and veg a day (and make sure C does)

3. two nights with no booze

4. de-clutter the hall cupboards

Week 1

1. to exercise once
2. to have at least one booze free night
3. to de-clutter C's bedroom so that she has room for all her Christmas toys