Thank you for the lovely 
we had an awful night. She went to bed around 1.40am, then woke again coughing at 2.15 and was up until just gone 2.30am. That woke DD1, who had to have melatonin to resettle. Then the dog decided he'd like a wee at 4.15am 
I take nortriptyline for migraines, which have a sedative effect, so taking them at 1.30am and trying to get up at 6.30am after that sort of night is pretty tough going!
DD2...where do I start. She had some homework to think about something that she's really good at, that she could teach someone else to do. She only had to think about it, because the plan is for the children to write a set of instructions that someone else can follow during the week. DD2 found this remarkably hard. Suggestions included 'flipping your covers off if you're hot' 'putting on a t-shirt' 'reading a book' - you catch my drift. So she was very anxious that she didn't have a good idea to take to school. I solved that by suggesting that she could write instructions on how to do a plait. The resource can be 3 pieces of string, tied at the top (there was a requirement that the resources to achieve the task must be low).
Then, she didn't have her sentence homework in her book bag. I told her it didn't matter, and that I could find out if the teacher just hadn't sent it home, or if DD2 had somehow forgotten. Homework is due on Wednesday, so time is ok. DD2 got in a complete panic, saying that her teacher prefers it in on a Monday.
DD2 has been reading a school reading scheme book 'what's inside me?' and she was getting very stressed about her brain being so busy. She said:
'I've lost my brain. I can't find it. When I'm asleep, it's awake, and when I'm awake, it's asleep. I just can't think at all, because my brain is just so busy thinking about this and about that. It's just sending too many messages from my brain down my spine.'
She said that school is very tricky because it's too noisy outside and it distracts her. She said that her classroom is very near to the road (it is, two pavement widths away) and she hears the cars. The road is a very rural one, but there are shops diagonally opposite the school.
She also said that the OT asked her whether she was a 'fidget bum' - she didn't tell the OT herself. I said to her 'oh, Mrs X said that you told the OT you were a fidget bum...' and she replied, instantly, 'yeah, because she asked me.'
So matchsticks were indeed needed. Especially as I had a Select Committee meeting today. I'm tireeed.