Tea room 22- A Farmhouse kitchen, anyone for a cuppa?

[UniS]

Welcome to the 22nd incarnation of the tea room. This time we are watching for spring from a cosy farmhouse kitchen. There is an aga for baking virtual cakes and an inglenook with toasty fire and settles to rest weary bones on. The distressed chintz sofa and footstool have arrived safe and sound and the priest hole is around here somewhere. On the Window sill is an aspidistra its pot surrounded by a hand holding circle of nearly naked mohawk babies, they have placards and a brazier.

Outside in the surrounding fields can be found the tea room horses, Earl and Lady Grey, also a herd of bison AND a Ha Ha to keep the bishops from invading.

Usual rules apply, no fisticuffs, if you want an argument go else where. Mellors the butler / game keeper will supply all sorts of things on request. Welcome Mums of one, none or many to the tea room of requirement.

Sorry for the long-bum post ladies.

That was a great post, Scout.

TechnoGirl is a lot older than BabyScout, but I feel very similarly. I feel I have little enough headspace/time for myself as it is. I don't mean that I want/expect to spend hours on the distressed chintz sofa watching daytime tv and having Mellors rub my feet (nice though that would be) - simply that it's nice to be able to do something, anything for five minutes without being harassed to find the missing music book/fill in a form for school/offer an opinion on the finer points of the works of J K Rowling. I don't know how I'd cope with more than one, although that had been my original plan/expectation. (BoffinMum says it's easier with more than one but I just put my fingers in my ears and go la la la at that point. No offence, BoffinMum).

So, PracticallyImperfect, it does get better. It really does. Be patient and be kind to yourself.

Evening all. Long posts are good - it's how we get to know each other.

We live in a rural area, have friends who are farmers, know where eggs come from (our own chickens) and eat beef from friends' animals. I have never tried to hide facts from Wriggle; I have no idea where this incipient vegetarianism comes from. (Unless it's telepathy. I am sometimes not too sure about how I feel about this, as well as almost every other moral dilemma in life.)

for anyone?

anyone? Though looking at the time it might be a bit late on a Sunday to start....

I was born in the city and moved to the 'burbs around my eighth birthday. I remember in uni going home with some of my friends who were brought up on farms or who's immediate neighbors were family running the farm. Had THE BEST burgers and they were afraid to tell me it had come from their herd and hadn't been through the commercial process because I was "a city slicker." I shocked them all by asking for a second burger and devouring that one, too.

Used to work with some girls at day camp who had only ever seen pigeons and squirrels as wildlife so when they came out to camp were frightened of rabbits. When the travelling petting farm came to camp and set up on the main lawn I had some girls so afraid they were crying and shaking with fear. I hope, despite my "city slicker" status that BabyScout is never like that.

I'll grab a quick but am on my way to bed.

Good night all!

G'night Techno!

Evening!

Before our daughter was born, we both wanted 3 children, as we both have one sibling each

I realised by the time she was 2 years old I didn't want any more kids. The number of times I was on the phone to my mum (at the time we lived in Scotland, she was in the Midlands) in tears not knowing how to deal with her. She wasn't 'bad' or difficult, just me not being a very good mum

I know that financially and emotionally I could not have any more children. I was sterilised a month before I was 30 years old

Now we are getting problems again, but I suspect it is from a long time ago, we were told this week that I haven't bonded with her (woman from school we have been referred to comes to speak with us every now and then recently) and now has referred us to another place for some sort of counselling. Really hope it helps but not looking forward to it

How old is PurpleChild? How do you feel about being told that 'you haven't bonded'?

She is 14

Not sure how I feel to be honest! I know we are a tad on the strict side with her, and I know from speaking with colleagues about what they do for their kids or if they are young adults what their mum's do for them, I am there saying,'no way would I do that'

Gave up most of the time giving my opinion as got fed up sort of being made to be so mean and horrible!

But.....some of it I get from my own mum! I remember her saying to me she wouldn't make up my sandwiches for school every night, so I did them myself (she has no recollection of this!) Now she does virtually everything for my step dad, totally different!

With the bonding thing, she said it probably isn't any one incident (I was there racking my brain!) but somewhere along the line we haven't

I am kind of feeling picked on and the fact we are having all the current problems with her is all down to me :(

Do 14 yr old ever admit to being "bonded" with their parents?? I seem to remember 14-17 being a pretty grim age , and bursting into tears at little excuse.

I offer you chocolate and nice wool PKM.

Hi PI- would you like a nice glass of I've just had a very very nice half a bottle in RL. started with a roast dinner ( evening meal).

I've finally decided that something Boy has done at home is worth a "WOW moment" note to school. He read with no promoting some of the hymn numbers at church ( they are up on a board at front throughout service), as in, he asked us if we were about to sing 88, no said DH "we did that one already", is it 49 (the one above 88), asked boy, no said DH this one is 329, " that's in the hundreds " said boy. Hurrah, we have proof that he can read random 2 digit numbers ( bit vague about 13-19 tho, the ending teen seems to confuse him) .

For those who remember my adventures in playground supervison... not been on duty in the upper school playground ( with/ without named child) for a week or two. but done lots of lower school lunchtimes. just found out that one of the hitting thumping kids had a rather unsettled* last year... wonder if that will change my handling of his ( frankly dangerous) behaviour.

• Unis may be in line for understatement of the year with this comment.

Unis is also not sure how to change handling of a child who seems to have no idea that what he is doing is going to hurt people. Currently I'm going for "rules " ie "you do not swing ropes round your head" you do not put ropes round people necks" etc. Might have a chat with class teacher.

PKM, have no advice/wise words to share seeing as BabyScout is so young compared to PKMGirl but wanted to offer a warm cuppa of your choice. I wouldn't know how to react if someone told me I hadn't bonded with BabyScout so not surprised you feel the same way!

Bought BabyScout a "knight" outfit for his dressing up box today. Half-price sale plus discount voucher. Am thinking, since he's still too young to appreciate dressing up (just getting from pjs to clothes in the morning can be cause of wailing and flailing) that over the course of 2011 I'll collect things for dressing up and make a nice box and then he can have the box and all it's fab contents from Santa under the tree. (He will be 26 months come Christmas 2011 so much closer to being able to appreciate a box of goodies.) Fully anticipated an inquisition from MrScout as we were paying but he just said "oh, that's a good idea. Look, it has a little shield with it!" Um, yes, which was part of the allure of the little outfit -- the accessories.

Well done your son Unis!

Playground duty sounds fun! Must be hard to know how to deal with children like that

Oh thanks for the wool and chocs Unis! I have tonight just started knitting myself a rather attractive tunic 'thing' Don't know how else to describe it!

Am I the old lady on the thread with an older only?! :D

My daughter used to quite like dressing up, but some of the outfits are mega expensive, good to get them in the sale like you did! I once mader her a Little Mermaid outfit and she won! She had a red wig that was worn on plenty of occasions! Then in yr6 she went as an Incredible and won! Idea came from colleague, red tights, red top, mask made of funky foam and laminated the Incredible logo and stuck it on the front! I have my moments of genius!!

Oops, not quite got used to these smileys yet!

not the only one, IIRC a couple of the tea room denizens have teens, at least one of whom is older than yours.

UniS turns down teh lamps and pulls a quilt over the slumbering form on teh distressed sofa. night all.

MN ate my post.

Think that's my cue to put the clothes in the washer, ready for the morning, and get to bed. The nice car repair man is coming to our house stupidly early (well, between 8 & 9, so not so early, really) so want to make sure I'm up/dressed. I know the window cleaner man and the postman tend to catch me in a sweatshirt and pajama bottoms.

PKM, my FineLad is 18 and an Only so I suspect I may get the award for oldest only (and indeed ancient mum )

Good morning all. How are you? Would you like a nice cup of something from one of our fine men?

thanks amberlight! I have a rather big birthday later this year and feel really old at times! Doesn't bother me much but I just groan at times with colleagues when I think I am old enough to be their mum!

right better move and get dressed!

UniS passes chocolate cake and a large brandy down teh priest hole.

Purple, FWIW I think a lot of this bonding stuff is bollocks designed to make mothers feel guilty.

All you have to do is try to be polite, interested, and concerned at the appropriate points, and that is enough. Anything else has to be an optional extra.

Some children are inherently difficult to get on with and no amount of good mothering will make a difference. I have a daughter like this. She is very quick to tell me all the things I do wrong. However she manages to alienate an awful lot of people apart from me, with her selfish behaviour, which tells me less of it is my problem than she might think/say.

Luckily I have three other kids who think I am absoluetly wonderful. In the words of DS2, "Mummy is a lovely woman"! Had I not had subsequent children, I daresay I would be thinking I was a crap parent who could not bond, etc, as well.

Hmm. I think BoffinMum is on to something here. "Insufficient bonding" is one of those unassailable quasi-explanations that can be adapted to fit any situation, because (a) it's impossible to measure how 'bonded' one is, as nobody has invented a bond-o-meter and everything else is just conjecture and (b) however bonded one might be, it's always possible to argue that it isn't enough. There are similarities here with some people;s tendency to attribute everything to birth order, presence or absence of siblings and star signs. But I'm sorry to hear that you're struggling, Purple.

Mellors and Sebastian are now serving soupe du jour (jours were BOGOF in Waitrose) avec les petits pains tres suggestifs. Form an orderly queue.

Very well put, La Vie.

There is also a huge chuffing great industry out there 'teaching' people how to be proper parents. Hence (paid) parenting advisors and counsellors and so on giving their pennyworth, plus teachers thinking they have all the answers and parents are intrinsically and wilfully stoopid, force feeding their children coca cola and keeping them up all night, telling them homework is for wimps, yada yada.

Often kitchen table counselling is a lot more help in such situations. In the words of one electrician from work who listened sympathetically to my various rants over the years about DD:

"Well, she's a stroppy little madam. We 'ad one of of them but she's 30 now and 'er and the missus are the best of friends. It'll pass, love".

She's 23 but being a lot nicer to me now, so I reckon he was right. I am not doing very much that's different, but she just decided not to be so pathetic.