The Morning After

It was three o'clcok in the morning when Lucy's cough had quietened down to something I felt happy with. Although she fell  asleep soon after she was sick the second time I didn't want to be sleeping myself until I knew she was alright. I didn't like her the idea of her being sick and me not being instantly there for her, or her being sick while she was asleep and me not knowing about it. I sat downstairs so I could hear her and quietly played The Sims on one of the old computers.

As you can imagine having not got to sleep late herself, Lucy didn't rise to late and for that I was thankful because at least it gave me a few extra hours sleep too. When she woke her cough sounded better than it had been overnight. It was like it had peeked and she was doing well coping with it. I check her temperature and she was fine and she seemed in good sprits and full of energy. It just seemed to be annoying her more than anything. 

The first thing she asked for was her breakfast which I was think is a good sign. I know with Emily and Catherine when they are ill the last thing they want first thing is food. Lucy, however was clearly hungry and finished all her breakfast while I got on with putting on the first of two loads of washing I had to do after the events of the night.

When I sat down eventually with a coffee we both started playing shops together. Thankfully her cough sounded a lot better than it did in the night and she had stopped feeling sick. We had a grand time and by the time Emily and Catherine got up she was zooming around on her tricycle like nothing had ever happened. You would have never know accept for the occasional cough and the sound of the washing machine washing all the dirty bedclothes that anything was wrong with her.

The girls played until lunch and I finished off all the washing got it dried and cooked a hot meal for them all. It was all rather a rush. Lucy was going back to her mummies at one and Emily and  Catherine were meeting these at just after two. I would have managed it but Lucy didn't want to go back to Oakham and she was crying under the table. Eventually we got her out and dressed in her clean clothes to go home in. The problem was she fell as she was going to the car and the clothes weren't clean any more. She cried and I gave her big hug until she stopped and we were on our way.

As always we chatted on the way and she was excited about coming tomorrow. It was how we got her out from under the table. As we got to her mummies house I told her to be a good girl for her mummy and she wanted a big hug and kiss before I left her. It was then we heard a dog bark from inside the house and when the door opened Kiz's sister was there with her little daughter and I guess her newly born son too. It was Sammie the dog who was by door that barked. Lucy just matched in to house as usual to handout her sweets as I explained about her knees. I wished I had some extra sweets for the other children but I wasn't expecting them to be there. I was hoping to see Kiz to tell her about her cough and arrange a time for tomorrow but that had to be done later by text, but it was nice to see her sister who looked well.

With Lucy gone all that remained to do was to take Emily and Catherine to there mum. It quite a contrast in drop off between the girls. I sat down with a coffee and talked to Abigail about the girls before I left, unlike the other drop off which in the past has had a door closed on me before I finish speaking. Thankfully that has stopped but it seems everything has to be done by text. Not really the way to bring up a child together.

Anyway, I can't wait to see Lucy tomorrow I have quite a lot planned for us to do together including some cooking and drawing as well as playing games. It has been along time since we have been alone together for the day. It's going to be great. I hope her cough doesn't keep her mummy up and she isn't sick again. Lets hope she is over the worse of it for tomorrow is going to be fun.

Oh Well...

Not a good end to the day. Lucy managed to damage my MacBook Screen by accident. I didn't notice it until the screen went dark and now I going to have to find hundreds of pounds for a replacement. Haven't got a clue where I will find the money from. It could take months to get that sort of money together. It was the last thing I needed. But it didn't end there....

The day thankfully didn't start as badly as it ended. In fact it was all very lovely and peacefully and Lucy was in fine form when she woke up. She was full of cuddles and hugs, which is always rather lovely. She hadn't forgotten about Wallace and Gromitt either and wanted to watch the "The Wrong Trousers" while she had her breakfast. It is amazing she just sits there and watches them and doesn't move a muscle. 

After she had finished at the table she came over to me after switching the TV on for a cuddle to watch a little bit of Cbeebies before we started playing. Out came the Peppa Pig snakes and ladders game followed by the her toy shop. We couldn't find any pennies around the house and I didn't have any in my pockets but somehow she had managed to find some of the plastic cards I hardly use on the old DVD rack and she had me using them to pay for all the things she was selling. It funny how they can associate plastic as money, but I guess it is the way of the modern world.

After we finished playing shops Lucy started saying she was hungry again so I started cooking a quick lunch for us both that we ate together at the table. I love the way they think your food is more interesting than their own even if it the same food. She was true to her word about being hungry when she had finished her plate was empty and she had polished of some of mine too.

After lunch we both went upstairs to sort out Lucy's bedroom a bit. Recently Emily and Catherine mum had given us some new books and they adding to Lucy's collection. Problem was we needed to move things around so we had the space for them. Lucy was really helpful passing the books and helping and soon the job was done and she started playing with her dolls house. 

The first of the girls to return was Emily and she was full everything that she had been doing, telling us all about the movies she had been watching and the things she had gotten up to. Lucy was delighted to have her back and soon they were upstairs and Emily was doing some face painting with her. By the time they had finished they had used up all the remaining face paint they had, but they had a grand time playing around with it and they were both soon cleaned up and back to normal.

It wasn't until late afternoon that Catherine came back from her friends in the village, once again Lucy was delighted to see her. Unlike Emily she is never full of herself and you have to extract information from her, but by all accounts she had a lovely time to and made some ginger biscuits  which Lucy loved. I tried one myself and they were rather good. Soon they were both playing together as I made dinner and making up for lost time.

It was after dinner that it all started going wrong. It was shortly before Lucy's bedtime and Catherine and Lucy had just finished playing a game of doggies, where Lucy is the dog and Catherine was taking her around the house for walkies and things. Lucy accidentally spun round with the lead, quite quickly, and the metal end of the lead smashed into the screen of the MacBook, The was a loud bang and I noticed when the screen when dark she had managed to crack the screen. It was the last thing I wanted, an official Apple repair and replacement screen is in the region of three hundred and fifty pounds and even a unofficial repair will cost me hundreds. I haven't got a clue where I'm going to get the money from but it will have to be replaced. I need the computer for work and with it to do preparation I going to be really stuck. It was the last thing I needed financially. we don't have any money to start with and spending it on the computer means we will all have to go without in someway. Thankfully it can still be used at the moment so there is some time to save, but I fear if it get any worse that will be that. I wasn't cross with Lucy I just showed her what she had down and tried to explain the best you can to a three year old why the have to be careful and what not being careful means. I think she understood and kept looking at the crack and saying sorry and "Daddy fix it".

It just after that we took her up for her bath, read her some stories and gave her cuddles and kisses from all she knows. She was tired but she went down like a dream. She looks so beautiful when she is asleep and I checked her fifteen minutes after I put down and she was sound asleep.

Lucy had been coughing all day and it had got worse as the day went on and it had started the day before as a cold. We didn't think anything of it because she didn't seem bothered by it at all and she didn't have a temperature, just a runny nose and a dry cough. Not once did she seem tired or out of breath or anything.

She had been in bed about half an hour before she shouted from her room. She had been sick. It seemed the cough that had been developing all day had got a lot worse as she tried to sleep. What she was doing was over coughing until the point she was sick. It was almost like she was making herself sick because she was panicking over the fact that the fluid from her nose was going down the back of her throat. The more she sniffed the more she coughed and once she could feel it in her throat she coughed even more until at first the fluid from her nose came up to be followed by her dinner. I managed to clam her and get her off to sleep again, but only for a three or four hours and then she woke coughing again and made herself sick again. I don't think have in the dummy helped as it stopped her breathing though her mouth, but she wouldn't give it up.

Poor lucy was coughing until the early hours and I didn't to sleep to late listening to her to make sure she wasn't going to be sick again. Thankfully she wasn't and I drifted off to sleep at about three in the morning.

Hopefully as I finish this post the coughing will stop and Lucy will get a comfortable nights sleep in the end. I do feel for her. All I want is for her to be well. Accidents happen, and although fixing the computer will cost me dear, she is far more important than anything else as is any of the girls. 

Wet Saturday

It would have been great it had not been raining and we had some of the lovely weather we have had odd glimpses of over the last week, but it wasn't to be, it rained nearly all day. It was the last thing I wanted but you just have to get on with things and make the most of it.

Lucy was first to wake up and I heard her calling from her bedroom. I went in to be greeted by a lovely smile as she gathered her juice bottle and soft toys and headed with me downstairs into the living room. Soon we were snuggled in chair together and watching CBeebies on the television, while we both woke up. 

With no immediate sign of Catherine getting up we had breakfast without her at the table, before Lucy headed in to the family room to play with her toys. At one point she was playing shops with George and you could hear asking him what he wanted to buy. He brought all kinds of strange things for a dog. This and her other games went on for a while until Catherine finally got up and joined her in the family room with a bowl of cereal in her hand. 

It wasn't long before they both decided that it would be nice to come and play around me in the living room again before settling down together to watch some television while they laid on the carpet. Eventually Emily surfaced from her bed. She really is a the practicing teenager. It is a strange age that Emily is at. Sometimes she seems so grown up and then at other times you can see she still has a long way to go. All the same is turning out to be a lovely person.

Just as I was making lunch Charlie popped in to see Emily. Lucy really loves Charlie and was delighted to see her and she went off with the rest of them into the family room to play while I got on with the cooking. All I could hear was the excited voices of children laughing and playing.

After lunch we headed out to Ashwell with Emily, Catherine, Lucy and Charlie to drop Emily off at her friends for a sleep over before heading into Oakham to do some shopping. Catherine, Lucy and Charlie had a supper time in the shops. They went off down all the aisles together looking at the things to buy and just generally having fun. At one point I lost them but I heard them giggling in one of the nearby aisles so I knew they were safe. After we finished shopping we dropped Charlie back off at her house before we went home to wait for Catherine's friend to call round.

While I put the shopping away Catherine played with Lucy on the living room floor. The started out playing shops and moved on to some board games before sitting down together to watch a little bit of television until Catherine's friend arrived to take Catherine to a sleep over at her house. As soon Lucy saw Cassandra she went predictably shy and hid behind me, peeking out from time to time to see what was going on.

With Catherine gone there was just me and Lucy in the house to tomorrow afternoon. We had a grand time playing until dinner time and when it came to making dinner Lucy did what she could to help, but to keep her out of the way while things heated up I put Wallace and Gromitt on the computer that was on the dinning room table. She loved it and she was soon enthralled by the two characters and their adventures on the moon.

After dinner she wanted to watch some more of the episodes on the DVD and soon she was equally taken by the story of the mechanical trousers and the penguin thief. I think she is turning in to a real Wallace and Gromitt fan. She loves them and before her bath watched them go to the moon again. 

With her bath out of the way, hair washed and teeth cleaned she was more than ready to go to bed. She even got her own night dress on after I dried her off and got in bed and snuggled herself down. She was more than happy just have the one story while she drank her juice and after her kisses and cuddles from everyone she fell sound asleep.

It was lovely have them altogether in the morning and equally lovely have some special time with Lucy on my own in the afternoon. I hope that Emily and Catherine have a grand time at their sleep overs and I can't wait to hear all about it when they get home tomorrow.

Just a Quote

We all have some favourite quotes that we like in our lives, this is one I really like and I wish I could live up to it all the time. So it is:

“Love is always patient and kind; it is never jealous, love is never boastful or conceited; it is never rude or selfish; it does not take offense, and is not resentful. Love takes no pleasure in other people’s sins but delights in the truth; it is always ready to excuse, to trust, to hope, and to endure whatever comes. Love does not come to an end.”

All you can do is try to meet the sentiments and ideals in such quotes while knowing we are all human and we do wrong, but may be that is were the words "Love takes no pleasure in other people’s sins", i.e knowing that other people aren't perfect either. I have always loved the end of the quote that "Love does not come to an end.". I believe that is true, but love can changeover time.

There is no thing such as perfect unchanging love that can endure a life time. The modern world doesn't allow us to do that with the pressures it presents to us or those we have had to endure. Times are often hard and we have to work through them and never give up. Compromises and understanding are the keys, while being entrenched will get us nowhere.

The key is loving yourself and not being dependent on others for validating your existence. You need to be able to do that for yourself. Sometimes we need help to be able to love ourselves because of our past experiences. That help is worth seeking if you feel so a shamed and guilty that you feel you have no place in the world. You have to find your place in the world within yourself and not from outside yourself. Being angry with those that truly love you will never help make you happy, nor will pretending to the world all is well when things are eating you up. Like it the quote say's love "delights in the truth" hiding behind a smoke screen won't help you love, for those closest to you that care will know the truth.

Now I didn't expect to write so much about a simple and old quote, but the values expressed in it are what we should aspire to and achieve if we can. True love never dies it just evolves to meet the circumstances of the moment If you love someone then you are always there for them no matter what, though the bad times and the good, it has no conditions.

Back to Normal

It was one of those misty starts you get at this time of year. The air was cold and damp making it feel much colder than it really was and that is how the day stayed. The sun did manage burn off a little of the mist for a while but as soon as the water on the ground heated up a little the mist returned. At least you know that winter is coming to an end when the first of the flowers appear in the garden. The snow drops are out and unlike last year they haven't had to break through a layer of snow and the daffodils are pushing their heads above the top soil.

The morning as always started with getting Catherine and Emily ready and off to school for the last time before half term. They are really looking forward to a week off of school and they are going to see their mum in Leeds for a lot of the holiday. They go away on Monday and coming back on Friday. Although next weekend would be the one they spend with there mum they are having their time with her mid week so that Emily can go ice skating with her friend next Saturday. 

After I dropped off Emily at school in Oakham I headed straight off to Peterborough to Toy r Us to get a car seat for Lucy that I had reserved the night before. The reason for going all that way is because they had a group one to three seat on special offer. Having a group one seat means it still has the five point seat belt that Lucy can use for next three months or so and offers that extra protection in case of an accident before she reaches the weight to move up to a group two seat. Hopefully the seat will last her until she is ten or eleven when she should be the correct hight to use a adult seat. It's a good seat and well worth the money even if it means that we will have to watch the spending for the rest of the week. Buying anything like this cuts in to a tight budget. 

When I got Lucy she was delighted that she was coming home again and she loved her seat. I was happy too because I missed having her around the house over the last week or so. This was made better because she is staying for three nights in a row, which with the Tuesday means I get to see her five days in a row. It was interesting that the quite moods of late gone and Lucy her happy self and was soon chatting away as adjusted the car seat so that it right for her. It was nice to see her happy again after the last two times I had picked her up from nursery. Especially last time when she burst in to tears for no reason at all.

Before we got home we popped to the supermarket for some supplies for lunch and dinner. We zoomed around having a giggle and soon filled the trolly with all the food we need and some of the essentials we were running low on, paid and we were on our way again. Lucy was still excited by her seat as she got back into and was very careful to keep it clean and asked me to clean her hands from the small sweet she chosen and eaten while we were in the supermarket.

When we got home we got a lovely welcome from George he was so pleased to see Lucy. His tail was wagging and he was dancing on his back legs. He is such a lovely dog and Lucy is his partner in crime. Soon Lucy head off to her bedroom to look for her toys and play with her dolls house and I put on some lunch on for the pair of us and had a cup of coffee. It was nice to have her back and calling my name. I miss any of the girls when they are not here, they make the house come alive with joy.

After we ate lunch together we got on with playing games and having fun until it was time to fetch Emily from school in Oakham. As I got Lucy strapped in the car seat we saw Catherine running towards and she clambered into the car next to Lucy and gave her a massive hug. She had been really missing Lucy. A few nights earlier she started crying when Emily was telling us how she had met Mary and Lucy with their mummy in Oakham and how Lucy was so excited to see her and hugged her leg and Mary gave her a wave. It was lovely to see Lucy and Catherine together again. Lucy returned the warm welcome she got from Catherine and by the time I drove off they were chatting away. Soon we were in Oakham, we picked up Emily and then headed home listening to music and talking excitedly. 

When we got home Emily was telling us all the things hey had been allowed to do on the last day before the holiday. It's Emily last day at the old VC School in Oakham and she starts in the new VC School when she gets back after the holidays. The teachers allowed them all to sign their names on walls of the classrooms in their last days lessons. Emily thought it was a rather neat idea, although it seemed some of the year ten boys took things a bit to far. I hope someone managed to photograph the signatures before they are lost when the buildings are destroyed and with it the history of the past they represent. It would be a shame to lose a record person record of the last pupils at the school forever.

Emily, Catharine and Lucy played together until dinner and after dinner they all settled down to watch some television and a DVD together on the carpet in the living room. Lucy must have been tired because she just snuggled into Catherine as they lay together and watched the DVD together until it was time for Lucy's bath, stories and bed. She is cute when I give her kisses and night time cuddles, it is like butter wouldn't melt in her mouth.

After Lucy was in bed Emily and Catherine got on with watching some television for older children on BBC iPlayer before going onto Facebook. Emily and her friends were having a great time discussing the demise of the old school and saying which teacher they hoped would stay at the old school and not move to the new one. All rather cruel but I can remember thinking the same thing about a few of my teachers at the same age. That took them nicely up to bedtime and after emptying dishwasher they went off to bed and to sleep after a long day.

It has been a super day and it so good to have Lucy back at home again after a week of hardly seeing her. I know both Emily and Catherine were pleased to see her and they had a great time with her. What is even better is we have her for another two nights.