Different Colour Pens

 Eddie has just revealed a secret about his homework.

I don't know whether to be shocked by his deception or admiring of his ingenuity.

Before I explain, I need you to know that this confession has an important caveat: Eddie is, without question, a bookworm - and in any hours where he is not allowed on his tablet or the PlayStation he will be found with his head in a book.  I'm just saying...

So, he is required to complete his reading journal each week, updating it with the titles of books he is reading, perhaps the number of pages, and some comment about the book.

As third child, he is often left to fend for himself and doesn't have quite the level of attention that his siblings might have done, but for once I remembered to check up on the reading journal.

'Have you filled it in for this week?  Your teacher would like to see them on Monday.'

'Yes, don't worry, it's all up to date.'

'Oh, good.'

'Yeah, once a week I just fill it up with random titles that I've been reading. I put lots of entries and use different colour pens so that she thinks I've done it on different days.'

Help. I now can't unhear that disclosure.

Currently reading: My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante

Ready for Reading - Covid Time

Schools closed yesterday.

Now we prepare for 'remote learning' to begin. Eddie and Gertie have stocked up their shelves with books to read, while Gilby prepares to do plenty of garden football challenges.

I sometimes wonder why two out of the three are readers. In a way they all are, but Gilby prefers sporting autobiography while the others are happy with a novel. And he has to be coerced into reading while the others snatch every available opportunity.

Though Gilby was game enough to go to school as a female book character for the second year running on World Book Day. This time as 'Gangster Granny' (last year he was The Boy in the Dress). My pearls and high heels did not survive the day.

In an online 'decluttering' (now that there is covid-time to do that sort of thing) I found this video clip of an early reading session:

Eddie is four, I think (though he is so small that he seems younger), and Gertie must be eight.  I love that Gertie gets a little bit cross with her brother for not finishing a word, and that he seems incapable of sitting still, even for a second. Still, some early seeds of reading love were being sown in both directions.

Four years later Eddie's working his way through the third in the Harry Potter series and begging me to buy him a wand.

'Twelve pounds for a stick?' was Hearth-father's unimpressed response. I think remote learning day two might involve whittling a wand from oak.




Currently Reading: The Heart's Invisible Furies by John Boyne

Advent Books Adventure

Since Gertie was tiny I have wrapped twenty-four advent books ('pre-loved', in newspaper) and put them under the tree. I can't remember where I first saw the idea and stole it from, but it has become a real tradition in our house.

As they grew up, sometimes Gertie read the books to her siblings, rather than me reading. Last year, all three of them took it in turns to read the story out loud. 

But even Eddie is getting a bit big for picture books now. 

I didn't want to let the tradition die, but I also didn't know what to do to make it work this year. A book a day each seemed ridiculous (that would, after all, mean 72 books. I couldn't find, let alone afford that); and their interests are so different at 8, 10 and 12 years old that I couldn't see a way of pleasing them all with just one. Perhaps I could rotate them? But there still wouldn't be that lovely shared moment.

Suddenly, Agatha Christie books began appearing in the post. Anonymously. I couldn't work it out. Maternal Hearth Grandfather is the only one who sends books anonymously, and so we always know that they are from him. They must have been sent in error. 

But I was around 12 years old when I started devouring them, I realised. As had MHGF. Suddenly I had a little pile of them. And some old Arsenal annuals turned up. Perfect for Gilby.  Random years: 2008, 2013. And some Beano and Dandy annuals. Older, but exactly what Eddie would enjoy. All of a sudden, a book each for every day of December up until Christmas didn't seem so impossible.

So I went for it. A quick trip to the Lions Bookstore (thirty books for three quid) and plenty of newspaper later, we were there.

And then this sort of thing started happening:

I mean, they're not snuggled up together like they used to be, but you can't have everything. 

And this happened, when I wasn't looking and should really have been time for bed:

The only hiccough came when Eddie confessed about a week in that he was 'a bit behind with his advent books'. I think he thought he had to read the whole thing in one day to be ready to qualify for the next one. Whoops. I have reassured him that he can pick and choose.

So, for at least twenty minutes a night, silence reigns in our house. The only sound is the occasional turning of a page. Ssshhhh.

Currently reading: An American Marriage by Tayari Jones

The Last Lap

Eddie sat on my lap this morning, unprompted, to read a book and do a puzzle. He just tapped my legs for me to  uncross them and climbed up. It was a nice feeling and it suddenly occurred to me that it had been the first time he has done that for a while. I breathed in the still-babyish smell at the back of his neck greedily. He probably thinks that his mother is a weirdo.

He turns seven at the end of September, but has always been much littler than his siblings were at the same age, so he still gets carried up to bed sometimes, or picked up towards the end of a long walk. I wasn't physically able to carry Gertie or Gilby at the same age. It has been a long, long time since one of them sat on my lap. So it strikes me that I am on the countdown for lap-sitting. 

I hope that wasn't the last one.

How to Write a Good...Blarb

The writing theme continues in one of my favourite moments from Mothers' Day. In a clear step up from text messages, Eddie made a card for me. It was a card with a difference, though: It had its own, erm, 'blarb'.

In case your deciphering-a 6-year-old's-handwriting-spectacles are not to hand, it says:

Small boy cald Freddie rites mothers day card to his mum.

And there's not really much to argue with about that. Killer blurb-writing, I say.

In place of the usual flowers or chocolates, my gift was a brown moleskin notebook. They know me well, this family of mine. But another treat of the day was watching Eddie and Gertie perform in an Irish dancing version of Grease. Yes, you did read that right.

Mini-Danny definitely enjoyed having his Pink Ladies in tow.

And, finally, Hearth-Father got to celebrate too, with the keenly anticipated arrival of a hot-off-the-press memoir detailing his mother's childhood in India - courtesy of Great-Hearth-Aunt! Stories of his mother and her sisters dodging cobra-bites, collecting pods from the Tamarind tree, playing with pet goats and riding in a gharry provided welcome insight into his roots. Hearth-Father, it seems, is descended from three generations who served the Raj.

Currently reading: Front Verandah - Back Verandah by Anne Grieger. (When I can wrestle it from Hearth-Father.)

Future Careers

Gertie has announced, from the lofty position of Year 6, that she would like to be a 'human rights' lawyer.

I think she might be actually be headed into discrimination and gender equality law. This term's topic at school is 'Explorers', and asked to choose from the list of famous explorer names on the board one to research independently, she immediately raised her hand and asked why they were all male.

Then, this afternoon I went to pick her up from 'Girls' Football' club after school. I wondered why she looked completely dry given the drizzle. 'Oh no, we played in the hall because it was wet. We can't play outside when it is wet because we only do football on the playground, not on the field.' I enquired as to whether this was the same for the boys.

'No. But don't worry, Mum, I'm already planning to raise it at school council next week...' 🙂

Still we've come a long way since the Intelligent Parents' Manual of 1944, where I have reached this little gem: 

Currently reading: All That Man Is by David Szalay

Intelligent Parenting: In My Dreams

When I began writing these blogposts eight years ago, I think I envisaged a light-hearted look at the humorous escapades of my growing family. I don't think I realised that they would, in fact, be much more revealing of my own flaws and parental inadequacy. 

Take yesterday, for instance. After a week of living in close proximity to both the nuclear and the extended family over the festive period, my ability to cope with the constant mess resulting from incessant meal-making and food-production reached its limit.

'Right,' I snarled, staring in horror at all the crumbs on the floor at the end of lunch and after I'd already vacuumed once that morning, 'Things are going to change around here!' 

I paused, realising that I hadn't quite thought through precisely how they were going to change. 

Thankfully, inspiration struck. I stood Gertie, Gilby and Eddie in a line. 

'You are each going to take it in turns to clear up after every meal, including getting the Hoover out,' I yelled in the manner of Gunnery Sergeant Hartman in Full Metal Jacket. (Actually, it's a Dyson, but we're quite partial to a propriety eponym in this house.) 

I circled, menacingly, to deliver the final learning outcome. 'Perhaps that will make you more careful about dropping crumbs!' I finished firmly, and with a self-congratulatory nod to myself at the end.

There was a short pause, then some shrugs of acquiescence.

'But Mummy, I don't know how to use the Hoover,' remembered Eddie, suddenly.

Um, OK, well. I didn't realise that- how remiss of me - but it was easily solved. I was very patient and parenty as I helped him to do it for the first time.

When it came to Gilby's turn after dinner, I reminded him to wipe down the table before doing the floor. 

'No problem,' he agreed. 'Where's the cloth?' 

Now, I can just about cope with the fact that the youngest hasn't used a Hoover, but if Gilby doesn't know where the kitchen cloth is kept that must mean that he has never, ever wiped anything down in his eight years on this earth. 

And whose fault is that? It can only be mine. 

Luckily, Maternal Hearth-Grandpa sent me this:

I am confident that this 1944 edition is going to sort me right out.

Hearth-Father also saw fit to present me with this for Christmas:

So, between the two of them we are about to work out a few things in this house. 2018 is going to be a whole different place.

Currently reading: The Faithful by Juliet West (as well as the above!)

The Cost of Reading

As it is the end of the first week back I am playing perfect mother and am on it with the reading and the homework. This will last for another week and a half, approximately, when we will return to hastily scribbled made-up entries in the reading log and Sunday night homework conversations conducted through gritted teeth, but right now I am in the zone.

Biff, Chip and Kipper have a lot to answer for. Eddie was reading the fairly innocuous-sounding Victorian Adventure. The magic key began to do its thing and the children found themselves at Buckingham Palace in the nineteenth century. Spoiler alert: After getting arrested they are mysteriously released. Gran appears near the end as she is also in the adventure and has made friends with Queen Victoria. (Obvs.) The problem page was this one:

Eddie stumbled over the word 'scones'; in part because he didn't know what they were.

"Well," said I, "that is a problem easily rectified!" And off we went to a lovely little tea shop on the banks of the Arun. "I'll just force down an afternoon tea for the sake of your reading homework..."

I know how to take one for the team...

Moody skies, though.


Currently reading: The Secret History by Donna Tartt

Steven Gerrard Ate My Sausages

Getting to bed at a respectable 2am after seeing in the new year with friends and family, it is fair to say that I was nursing the suggestion of a teensy-tiny hangover first thing.  Given that I was clearly in the lower magnitude on the Richter scale of hangovers, and was not the only sufferer, discussion at the in-laws this morning focused on the merits or otherwise of different hangover cures. It is worth stating here that Hearth-Father visited the opticians yesterday. I am beginning to wish he had had his ears tested instead. For 'bacon sandwich', that well-known remedy, he heard 'baby cabbage'.

Even as a vegetarian I think I know which I would prefer.

The inclement weather meant that this new year's day has definitely been one for 'plotting up', a favourite expression in our household, rather than going out. I have thereby discovered that it is actually fun spending time with members of my family. Eddie has been running round earnestly completing pages of his 'Wreck This Journal', a lucky, last-minute choice by Santa, as it turns out. Gilby, obsessed by the trials and tribulations of Tom Gates has also begun keeping a journal of his own. Today's entry was entitled 'Steven Gerrard ate my sausages' which is an inspired interpretation of the morning's events.

I won't spoil the mystery by explaining exactly how that came about; suffice to say that is is, in a sense, accurate, (not the Steven Gerrard, obvs) and provides an excellent, if somewhat obscure, title for a blog post.

There has been some new year's brotherly love. I'm not panicking, it's bound not to last, but I enjoyed it nonetheless:

I spent two hours in the bath reading Anna Karenina, which means that I might just about have finished it in time for new year 2018 - but what luxury. Turns out you can do that sort of thing on New Year's Day. And Arsenal won, helped by a blinding goal from Giroud. Happy new year one and all.

And More on Reading

Just...a magical moment.

It may only have had thirteen letters of the alphabet in it, but, just in time for World Book Day one young man is mightily pleased with himself:

The journey begins...

Currently reading: Exposure by Helen Dunmore

On Reading

What if the English teacher, reading researcher and four-book-club member produced a non-reading child?

Gertie reads for England. I can't stop her. It causes late nights and all pocket money spent in the Lions charity bookstore. Thank goodness for them.

Gilby has to be bribed. Literally. Like - 'If you read me a chapter then you can watch another match on Match of the Day' (or play FIFA for half an hour, or anything else football related.)

Though I did catch him doing this:

Which I suspect means that he will take after his father in terms of reading habits.

Currently reading: Pica by Jeff Gardiner

Snapshot Review of Children

I feel as though I have known, from earliest days, the personalities of the little people in my household.

Among the zillion wonders of parenthood is the one about bringing up siblings in ostensibly the same environment, (alas, income hasn't changed dramatically in the last nine years) with the same genetic 'ingredients' and the same routines and values - only to find that, in spite of looking like peas in a pod, they couldn't be more different.

I have made predictions about the futures of Eddie, Gilbert and Gertie and, in the interests of not creating a self-fulfilling prophecy I shall elect not to repeat them. I merely offer a little snapshot as we near the end of 2015.

Gertie has come home from school today pleased with the carol-singing performance she gave at the old people's home. She practised her flute for a bit, intermittently lamented the immaturity of her brothers and then settled down with one of her new (read 'second-hand') books from the Lyons books store (10p each - ever a bargain).

Gilby (having blackened his fifth clean shirt of the week and lost his bookbag) was musing on the way to the Lyons book store about whether the Arsenal book he had his eye on last time would still be there (a weighty pictorial history at 30p; I love this charity shop).  On considering the awful possibility that someone else may have bought it, he consoled himself with the notion that if someone else had indeed made the purchase, that would mean that at least there was another Arsenal fan like him close by.

Eddie had a twinkle in his eye when I collected him from nursery.  'It's official,' explained one of the teachers. 'Eddie has a girlfriend. At this afternoon's nativity rehearsal he was found backstage kissing her.'

He's four.



Currently reading: The Taxidermist's Daughter by Kate Mosse and Little Red Chairs by Edna O'Brien (Two on the go due to December book-club clash)

Festival Fever

The summer of festival fun has begun. First stop was the Hay Festival.

"There's no such thing as fun for all the family," is, I believe, a Jerry Seinfeld quote, and something I have thus far held to be true.

Going to the Hay Literary Festival was a twenty year ambition of mine and when I finally  made it last year, I determined to bring the family back to experience it as soon as I could.  Accommodation is at a premium in the little town during festival time and we found ourselves with no option but to camp. Our few family camping forays have proved...somewhat challenging, so when I was offered an upgrade to a 'yurt', I seized it.

The first day passed in a frenzy of activity. There was face-painting and cartwheel-turning and letters to climb and dinosaur stories and and books to be bought and ice-creams to be eaten and Letters Live for Hearth-mother featuring performances by Sandi Toksvig, Stephen Fry and Jude Law. 

 

There was even, and this is where we get to the 'fun for all the family' part, a selection of West country ciders for Hearth-father to taste. Though 'taste' suggests a little more delicacy in consumption than perhaps might have been observed in reality.

We were all exhausted at the end of day one and I spent one of the best nights I've had for months - in the comfort of the yurt's double bed with cosy wood-burner at its foot.

Even more to do on day two, with writers to meet and journals to be wrecked and faces to be painted, and a pub-supper. See, something for everyone.

Then marshmallows to be toasted around a campfire before bedtime.

Two weeks until the Isle of Wight festival (though we are child-free that weekend, so it will be an altogether different experience)...

I love summer!



Currently reading: Cruel Summer by James Dawson

For Sale Signs and Errant Pants

So we've made the decision to try and sell the house.  Again.

There is no more money in the pot, but we need more room.  When we moved here, Gertie was just a few months old, not yet on the move.  For two adults and a tiny baby it was positively palatial.  We bounced around in our big house, and once she did start crawling, I might even lose Gertie for a few moments. These days finding five minutes alone in the bathroom is an unlikely proposition.  Now there are the three little people.  And they are not so little.  They have this habit of just growing bigger.  And bigger.  By the day. Moving towards a time when they will want to spend increasingly long times alone in the one bathroom.

I can remember all the empty rooms when we first moved in and wondering how I'd ever have enough furniture to fill them.  Ha. Now every corner is crammed full of stuff.  Each inch of wall space is covered in pictures and photographs.  There are thousands of books.  Everywhere.  And that count might go up to tens of thousands if you include the boxes in the loft. There are plastic toys in places where toys simply shouldn't be. Like in my shoes. And behind the washing machine. It is impossible to keep tidy. And therein lies the first paradox.  Because in order to sell your house you need to be able to keep it very tidy.  So that it can be viewed at a moment's notice.  Well, we had our first viewing today.  It took me four hours to get things straight.  That's not happening every time, I can tell you. And when we came home there was a pair of toddler pants smiling up welcomingly from the utility room floor, that I must have missed in my final tidy-check.  That subsequently looked like they'd just walked there themselves.  Which I guess they might have done, being Eddie's.

So now I follow the children around hawk-like, beady eyes scanning for any potential mess-making hazard. They will be the first to tell you that this is not fun.

And the house we have our eye on is...'in need of modernisation'.  In other words, a wreck.  And a smaller wreck than our current abode at that.  And it costs more money.  But it is a wreck with the potential to be bigger.  At some point, when the childcare costs stop sucking the lifeblood from our very veins.

We tried to do a similar thing a few years ago, but the wreck of a house we wanted then sold almost before we'd got ours on the market and it felt like a blessing in disguise.

So I've got my eye on the estate agents' window these days.  Today I was drawn to an attractive property in the top right hand corner.  It took me a second to register that it was the one I already own. ( I say 'own'.  I think we might own approximately a square metre of the floor space, by now.  But another paradox:  It looks lovely in the pictures, all tidied up and de-cluttered.  Like somewhere I might actually want to live.

As Easy as ABC

Gilby has been getting a little fed up with his big sister's reading prowess of late. She has taken over the reading of the bedtime story, to all intents and purposes and is decidedly 'showy-offy' about her abilities, using a really patronising tone to explain which episode of Little Bear they are watching as she reads the credit sequence. Her little brother is not allowed to be the teacher when they play schools as her superior knowledge means that Gertie herself must always play this part.

Gilby, three next month and entirely filled with his own sense of self-importance, (deservedly, as he points out that he can now climb by himself up into his car seat) has decided to take matters into his own hands.

He has begun to earnestly 'write his name' on his drawings as Gertie does. And, although a close inspection will reveal that this is nothing more than a series of zig-zagged lines, we all have to agree that it does, indeed, spell 'Gilby'.

And earlier this week he picked out all the Oxford Reading Tree Stage One books into a big pile, brought them to me and demanded that I teach him to read right there and then. He folded his arms determinedly in a 'bring it on' stance and prepared to do battle with the books. Since he knows all the characters and all the stories inside out, he was able to sound convincing from memory quite quickly and then sat back when he had 'read' a couple, completely satisified with his own literacy progress.

If only it were that simple...

In the Beginning was the Word

Gertie loves reading.  She has whizzed through the Oxford Reading Tree stages with remarkable speed and fluency through her reception year.  No bad thing, since I have had more than enough of Biff and Chip and that magic key beginning to glow.  But she is certainly a voracious reader, if such a thing can be said of one who has just turned five.  

For the last year or so we have been doing a book at bedtime.  Daddy does the bedtime story with Gertie and Gilby together whilst I am feeding Eddie.  But then, once all the goodnight kisses have been done, I sneak back into Gertie's room and we have a chapter or two of a grown up book.  I say 'grown up'; I mean things like Roald Dahl, Anne Fine or The Worst Witch.  Roald Dahl is the biggest hit.  We have worked our way through The Magic Finger, The Twits, Fantastic Mr Fox, George's Marvellous Medicine and James and the Giant Peach.  We are part of the way through Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and Gertie's engagement with the story is utterly magical to witness.  At this point I should probably give a spoiler alert as I discuss some of the narrative devices in the novel!

We reached the chapters after we have met all the horrible winning children, where Charlie longs to get the final golden ticket.  As each Wonka bar was consumed without golden ticket success, she got more upset. Her disappointment on his birthday was palpable.  Her confident prediction that Charlie would surely get the golden ticket when he first found the fifty-pence-piece was quickly shattered, then met with disbelief.

The delayed climax of the night of the winning chapter coincided with an evening when Daddy was home late, so we swapped roles: me doing the official bedtime story with the boys as well, then Daddy stepping in for the secret bedtime read.  So I missed the actual moment.  But I could hear Gertie's shouting, fist-clenching victory salute from downstairs.  Her joy when he finally does triumph was unparalleled.  She just had to share it with someone! 

I was summoned upstairs for some important news with a little wink from Daddy.  There was a great solemnity as Gertie called me in, but she couldn't stop the excitement from bubbling in to her little voice as she broke the news to me. 

I'll cherish the moment forever: the absolute enchantment of reading.  I am delighted she has discovered it so young.

Books, Bookcases and World Book Night

I have new bookcases.

Lots of them.

Joy unparalleled.

Who knew, a decade ago, that an item of bespoke furniture, costing more than our annual holiday, was capable of giving such pleasure? Finished on Friday, they now need painting, and since they line the entire length of the dining room wall I suspect that this will not be a quick job. So I will sit amongst the piles of books and general chaos a little while longer yet. Why do towering stacks of books look stylish and trendy in magazines but manage to give my house the appearance of a landfill site?

Daddy is not convinced by the 'home improvement', particularly not the expense or being roped into the painting, so they are going to have to work hard to prove their worth.

Helping to add to the mounds of books without a home, I have been selected as a 'giver' for World Book Night: tomorrow evening as it happens. My book is The Take by Martina Cole, and I have 24 copies to give away. So I am planning a rare trip to the local to begin distribution. They each have a unique identifying number, so if 'receivers' enter into the spirit of it I will be able to track their journeys. Where will they end up? Hopefully not on a rubbish tip...


Currently Reading: A Long, Long Way by Sebastian Barry

Slinky Malinki

Slinky Malinki, for anyone unacquainted with this shady character, is a cat belonging to series of books by New Zealand author Lynley Dodd, first published in the 1990s. They employ alliteration and assonance addictively, and my children love the rhythmic quality of the stories - of whom the most well-known is probably Hairy Maclary. As well as being chased by Hairy Maclary, Slinky Malinki is also a feline leading a dubious double-life, forced eventually to change his ways.



So, for World Book Day last month, Gertie chose to go to school dressed as this literary cat. I was delighted, as the costume was an awful lot simpler to create (ears on a hairband, fur-fabric tail, bit of eye-liner) than 'Mr Bump', which was her other suggestion. It also proved to be unique: she stood out from the dozen or so Cinderellas and Rapunzels in her class.

Gilby Dolittle

Gilby is fascinated by The Gruffalo. He would happily have that same story read to him every night, even though he knows it word for word and has fallen asleep on more than one occasion reciting the words aloud. For my own sanity I have to vary the choice of bedtime reading material. The Gruffalo's Child is second choice, not because he loves that story in the same way, but simply for the mention of the hallowed gruffalo itself.

Out walking the dog with me, or accompanying me in the car whilst driving down country lanes, Gilby will insist on searching for snake's log-pile house, fox's underground house and owl's tree-top house, because that way we might come across the gruffalo itself. These will be solemn, whispered, often urgent searches. See, I truly think he thinks that the gruffalo is real.

He definitely has something of the naturalist about him, even at two-and-a-half: he will always pick me flowers (will he still be doing that at fifteen, I wonder?), and can spend an inordinate amount of time appreciating a blade of grass. Today, for example, whilst we were at a birthday party and all the other children were busy on the treasure hunt, his 'treasure' was collecting dozens of sycamore leaves.

But I started to worry when he told me that the owls were 'talking to him' in the night. Was this a dream? I needed to get to the bottom of it. He was quite insistent about it, but wouldn't tell me what they were saying because they were talking to him. He even made the noises for me, which in fairness, were quite owl-like. It was only later when I saw collared doves fly off from roosting beneath his window that I realised it must have been their cooing he meant (not unlike the twit-twoo attributed to an owl.

So he doesn't talk to the animals, (yet), but is certainly convinced that they are communicating with him.

I wonder what that gruffalo will say, if he ever finds it.

Stop Hitting Me!

Gertie and Gilbert have invented a great new game.

They simulate punching themselves in the face Fight Club style whilst shouting, 'Stop hitting me, Mummy!' very loudly and giggling.

Now, although I came down firmly on the side of Harry in The Slap, Christos Tsiolkas' novel and recent television drama, I can state categorically that I have never hit any of my children.

So bring back Hooker-Mummy, it's a far less damaging cry.