Tea Room the Fourteenth

[amberlight]

Welcome to the 14th instalment of the Tea Room. It's now officially spring, and we've moved the tea room to a Gipsy caravan pulled by the tea room horses, which is making its way up the countryside in an effort to follow spring. There are of course hedgerows filled with spring flowers, Mellors the handsome gardener/driver/handyperson, the usual virtual Bishops, and the assorted animals and characters from previous tea rooms. All are very welcome to join in with us parents of one (or indeed more!) for general chat and the occasional very odd conversation. Climb aboard, grab a cuppa, enjoy the view, relax!...

Night all

Don't worry UniS, the daffs are for decoration - it's only the slugs and squirrels that have been eating them

Wretched squirrels...

OOOOH I'll have a glass of red.....

I think DD definitely picks up on my sadness which is horrible and makes me feel awful.

I have just been looking at clubs online that she could go to in the holidays- just for a day a week or something, rather than hanging around with my mum all the time!! She is so shy and anxious though- cant help feeling like I'd be throwing her to the wolves!!

Am fast in danger of over-compensating and enrolling her for every club/activity possible....

Fun overload.....

'ello LT please make yourself at home - By the way - "She starts street dancing lessons in 2 weeks" - - well I think you are going to get the prize for being the coolest Mum around!!!

Donk - It really is sooo soooo lovely to see you. xxx

LT - I know what you mean about clubs overload. there is sooo much cool stuff for kids to do in holidays now. I'd have loved to spend my holidays climbing, canoeing, trampolining.. I do hope DS wants to too.

Breakfast muffins and posh coffee for all... YUM YUM!!!

I think I have mentioned before that I am trying to keep dd's clubs down to one...but which one is driving me insane!

At the moment I really like the idea of music and movement which will be forty minutes of skipping around with a tamborine until she is six and the club splits into two clubs - music lessons and classical ballet. I also know of a brilliant art class. It is more expensive but they make SUCH beautiful things.

If I am working ft on Wednesday she would go to a play centre where they do lots of arts and crafts, sports, singing, dancing and in the summer time stomping through woods looking earnest!

Eeeeeeeeek - my head is spining...

littletortie - Do you have any neighbours with children? My dd is in and out of our neighbours place esp. in the summer time.

I was watching the pony camp girls at the stables yesterday, and thinking that DS will love it there when he is old enough. Loads of people to play with, and there are enough organised bits, or chances to just commune with the ponies (or muck out), that it would suit most. They have a maximum of 10 children, so not too overwhelming either. Might be the sort of thing your DD might like ?
Actually, I'd like to go - perhaps if I do my hair in pigtails ? No ?

DMC - although going away for work can be yuk, there are def compensations like knowing you will sleep until the alarm, the chance to have a really long shower/do your hair in peace/put makeup on without a conversation regarding why they can't paint their tummies with your eyeshadow. And I rather like MNetting from bed

Morning! Well as I work full time, Gizmo goes to CM every day. But it is school holidays. But he has gone today so I can do some major cleaning up and some school work.

Although so far I'm not dressed yet and am drinking coffee! I think I deserve it after spending 5 days cleaning vomit and poo!

Hello all!

Welcome littletortie - hope you enjoy the slightly eccentric air on this thread!

I have been given Yet Another Reprieve - I now have another day to finish The Magnus Opus that is this index, which is just as well because my brain froze about an hour ago. So - glass of wine, short MN sesh and then back to it - at least I have done most of it now, but I have to tidy it up and do subheadings and rubbish like that, and I managed to sell it to my publisher that there wasn't much point me rushing the last bit to get it to her an hour before close of business today, when I could have a whole extra day to make it nice and she can start on checking it tomorrow.

I am Never Ever doing this again. Ever.

Can I say I am very jealous of you academics. It is what I would love to do. But I went travelling, then panicked, did my PGCE as a safeguard and 6 years later I am now a HOD, and well and truly "stuck" in teaching. Occasionally I dream of another life, but we now have a mortgage and a gizmo, so I imagine I will retire a teacher.

I also think that teenagers are my intellectual equal

I was playing with two children of 2 and 4 yesterday and decided that I'd definitely found the correct intellectual level for me I think mum despaired of the three of us...

they must have been very bright 2 & 4 year olds, then amber!

roslily - just to make you feel slightly better (maybe), this is my "swansong" of academia, if you like - I am a SAHM but this has been ongoing for a good 18 months, so once it's out the way my brain can return to it's slothful jelly-like state, unless I can think of something else to do with it

Well I have been marking some yr 9 essays on Jelly babies. A task to teach them about discursive essay techniques. Despite my attempt to make it upbeat they were surprisingly boring!

Going to pick gizmo up from childminder and take him to coffee shop!

Sounds cool Amber!

Reminds me of the mud "fight" I got in, down at the park, with my two, plus two teens who joined in. I'd have had more kids join in, but their parents didn't approve . We were CAKED in the stuff, but had the best time ever

I love the eccentric air on this thread but am starting to wonder if someone on here has actually named their child Gizmo

back later to chat- need to do dinner......

What's wrong with naming your child Gizmo, I'd like to know?

Hi all. What's on the menu today? I am SWAMPED at work. 9 - 6:30 today, fully booked, with half an hour for lunch. Which I will of course be spending in the Tea Room, shoveling in some food... But as of tomorrow (my birthday) I will be off for 10 days, so it's worth it.

LT - we generally don't use our child's RL name on here, well I don't anyway. For all I know Racing Snake's DD could really be called Wriggle (for example)!

I agree that Gizmo is a cool name for a boy, although probably better for a Dennis The Menace than a Little Lord Fauntleroy type! The sort of boy who would take part in a mud fight, in fact ....

Mine really is called AmberBoy!

JM, happy Birthday for tomorrow!!!!!!!!!!!!! (Well, this particular aspie sometimes gets the days wrong, so I thought I'd say it now before my brain wanders off).

And mines not CMOTiddler either

Bathroom just about finished (will take pictures tomorrow), and DS and I had our first bath in there this evening. Such bliss to have a bath with plenty of room for both of us, so he can wriggle round without me getting a foot in painful places

Bolly ?

Ooh yes please.

I am looking forward to the photos of CmotBathroomDeLuxe. Did you use one of the nationwide companies for the work?

No, a local firm that had good reviews on Which. I really can't fault them, the guys take a real pride in their work and are lovely, and the designer keeps a tight eye on them - she's been round twice, just popping in to see how it is going.

Any ideas on what you want in your bathroom ?

Ah. My bathroom wishlist:

Longer bath for more luxuriant sprawling

Taps which emit a gush rather than a trickle of water

Basin that sits on top of a cupboard (but not 70s style vanitee unit)

Lock on door

Uninterrupted wallowing time

Umm. Lovely cheesy rolls. May I offer a new dish I've taken from my Italian cookbook - Twigletto Sorpresa?