Playing at being cameras

Charlie and Bev

Surreal conversation

Me - Charlie, Charlie where are you?
Charlie - Upstairs
Me - What are you doing hun?
Charlie - Sitting
Me - Oh, are you playing with your playmobil?
Charlie - No, sitting
Me - Are you thinking?
Charlie - No, sitting.
Me - Oooo-kay!

Last Weeks Apprentice

Huh? Why was Miriam fired? Sir Alan is a plonker! Paul should SO have been fired - he's about as much use as contraception is in my house!

Thanks to everyone for the birthday wishes and general thoughts about my state of vomit inducing happiness! It has been a long time coming for me after a really appaling run of 5 years of personal-life-bad-luck but for now everything does seem to be looking up and this time it seems very different and special.

I was pleasantly surprised by Beverley taking a couple of days off and coming down unexpectedly on Tuesday. We had a wonderful two days together and she went home after dinner last night. Still can't wait to see her tomorrow night though as she is coming down for the weekend as planned.

There has still not been much home ed going on - Charlie definitely seems to be unschooling himself and I am happy to go with the flow with that for now. Yesterday after our home ed trip to Westonbirt Arboretum he even came home and made a collage with Beverley - which was something at least!

Work is incredibly busy still and I will make an effort to blog later tonight with more about yesterdays trip and some photos!

Almost 30

Yikes I really need to blog more! No education has been done all week which is rather shocking but the main reason (apart from the love sickness) is because I've had soooo much work.

Another fantastic weekend with the new woman in my life - we went to the Mall and did some diamond ring window shopping and then as requested I took her to the BMW garage.....!!!

OMG - last few hours of being 29 - the big 30 tomorrow - scary stuff!

Sigh, sigh, sigh.

I was actually singing and dancing around my parents kitchen island thingy yesterday afternoon.

This is not good.

My hard image is really suffering now......can't work, can't sleep, can't eat, feel sick, feel 18 again - not good when you are about to turn 30......sigh

Well, yesterday was just lovely if not cold!

We made it to Taunton exactly on time to meet B, and promptly decided that there was nothing for Charlie to do there particularly so went back up the M5 to WSM (rolls eyes) so that we could go to the Sea Life Centre.

Gosh was it freezing walking from the beach car park to the centre - wow the wind was whipping. Charlie ran along the beach happy as a pig in muck whilst B and I walked along the front hand in hand.

Sea Life Centre was ok, we've been there before but its a lot of money for such a small one that takes only 15 minutes to get round. It was empty too which was fab, no bustling with the crowds to see the tanks. The coffee shop on the other hand was full. Had a hot chocolate whilst Charlie pretended to be short enough to go in the little soft play zone and then decided to come home.

We all watched Finding Nemo on DVD and then I cooked dinner assisted by B and Charlie.

Once Charlie was in bed (very late - and his own bed for the first time in about a year) B and I had dessert - say no more.

Lovely evening spent not quite watching whatever was on Sky Movies and another late night. Woke up very content and now playing that hideous waiting game where you're not quite sure where things will go next!

Woohooo - I've got a hot date

Yes, I know it's totally OT and nothing to do with home education but I have a date tomorrow and I am really, really,really excited!

Will blog on Sunday with home ed catch up and possibly some details.

After finishing my work today I did a mercy dash to a friend about an hour away(thats her gorgeous daughter in the pic below). She had a raging headache, no painkillers and two of the girls had been up in the middle of the night. Bless her.

Once said painkillers were ingested, we had a lovely afternoon playing. The 6 year old was continually trying to kiss Charlie on the lips - chasing him around the house to pin him down - it was very amusing. Charlie was clearly confused after pledging his allegiance last weekend to Fran! They spent a lot of time under the cabin bed whispering secrets and not letting the other 3 join in!

I bribed the two eldest with some extra pocket money for our trip to London on Monday, into tidying the sitting room for their mum as there was about 10 video shops worth of videos strewn on the floor by the two younger ones.

There was much begging to come and stay at my house (again) but it was eventually decided that as I can only get 2 extra children in my car (front air bags) that we would wait until we know when their father is next having them and then arrange for everyone including mum to come and stay. Charlie and I are staying at their house on Sunday and Monday night so that appeased for now.

Now sitting thinking about a 2 hour train ride with 5 children on Monday. Charlie will be no bother he loves trains, the 2 and 4 year olds might be interesting and the 6 and 10 year olds should know better! Just printing out loads of colouring pages, word searches and crosswords for them each to do.

Finding it hard to find good stuff for the 2 and 4 year olds as they can't read or do puzzle type sheets - any site suggestions welcome in the comment box.

I'm working, he's reading - jobs a good 'un.

A river of give

Not much has gone on today education wise. Charlie watched a heap of Discovery Kids this morning so I guess that counts - was very interesting most of it. A load of history (Egyptians) nature and science too. He has spent the remainder of the day reading The Wishing Chair - oh how I loved those stories as a child and am thrilled he does too.

I've commenced the huge operation that is tidying the sitting and dining rooms and am currently contemplating actually doing some work this week as I have a box of files demanding my attention. Nick - no telling the boss!

Raj should so have been fired! Star struck muppet.

An ocean of take

Today has been an interesting day for various reasons not related to home ed.

In home ed land, Charlie has done Sonlight and is still really enjoying Charlottes Web - even though its very easy for him, doesn't seem to bother him too much. He also coloured in a print out of a hawaiian lady to tie in with the clothing around the world topic.

He's also done a load of Easter activity/colouring sheets that I printed out before Easter but he didn't get a chance to do owing to illness and general busyness. There was a couple of colouring sheets, a word search and a crossword.

He's currently powering through several pages of Miquon maths - we are both still loving this scheme.

On a more personal note, I am getting sick to death of people taking advantage - I need to be meaner!

Enjoying the swing at Center Parcs

Charlie and grandad

Butterfly house Longleat

Center Parcs/General Catch Up

Photobucket is now playing up since managing to blog the last three pics - arrgggh - I do love the new straight to blog features on it though - very handy indeed.

The pic of Charlie on the slide is from Longleat Safari Park - they really do have the best playground I have ever seen. Been there twice with Charlie now over the years and he absolutely loves it.

Anyway, he was sufficiently recovered enough on Friday for us to zoom off to Center Parcs at Longleat - no signs of a temperature - just a bit full of cold. Journey was pain free as always - he is so good in the car - just sits and looks out the window and sucks his thumb. My parents left slightly before us and there was an irritating 15 minutes where I needed to top up my mobile phone in the CP car park whilst trying to find them.

Villa was lovely - we had a 3 bed executive two storey job - all the bedrooms had en suites and mine was much nicer than my bathroom at home. We also had an outside sauna and outisde shower which Charlie enjoyed running under fully clothed

Charlie and I sampled the pools and rapids on Friday - he managed ok on the rapids but the last part as you go inside again was rather dangerous I felt. Even I was forced under water and it was quite hard to fight the current there - ensuing panic as Charlie had gone down before me and I couldn't see him. We did the rapids twice and I decided that was enough for him. The outdoor pool was gloriously hot and lovely.

We ate in the indian restaurant on the first night and the food was amazing, even my parents were impressed and relieved as my mother especially was dreading the food I believe. It was the most exquisite vegetable korma I have ever tasted. Charlie had the pear sorbet for pudding and that was out of this world. I like that restaurant, it is reason alone to return to CP.

On Saturday morning I woke at 4am dying of pain in my ears, throat, chest, arms and legs - oh yes the flu had arrived!

We spent the day at Longleat Safari park which was most pleasant and after we got back Charlie and I went down to the Sports centre and I spent a small fortune in the shop there including an amusing t"shirt with a surf boarding - banana eating Chimp on the back for my chimp.

Sunday was a chill out day for us, although Charlie and my father went off on a guided nature walk which they seemed to enjoy. We did the fondue evening at the pancake house which was amusing.

We left at 9.30 on Monday morning and made it home 50 minutes later which was good going.

I am still full of cold and feeling really rough. My colds always last a minimum of 2 weeks, which isn't much fun at all.

Seriously cute

Charlie with Zosia (2)

An even bigger monkey house today!

We've just got back from a fab day in Cheltenham with our non-home ed friend and her four gorgeous daughters. Charlie had a wonderful time being mother hen and woke up this morning totally over the temperature despite burning up all night. He's full of cold though bless him.

I had a whale of a time changing the youngest cloth naps - she had just got two lovely fuzzi bunzs - lilac and turqoise. Charlie joined in changing her nappy too as he was desperate to change a cloth nap lol.

Going to do some packing now and get an early night for a change as we are off to Centre Parcs for the weekend - so excited.

The blog ring lurgy has finally reached Gloucestershire! Charlie had a high temp earlier and had such aching hand he cried when he picked up his beloved cuddly whale. Poor lamb. Sent him back to bed for a few hours, he laid there rather pathetically and a dose of calpol and nurofen and 4 hours later, he seems fine. Still snotty but temp back to normal and achey hands disappeared.

Currently spotted doing the drying up and helping to prepare tonights roast chicken dinner.

I really hope he stays well enough to a) go to our friends tomorrow and b)enjoy centre parcs on Friday!

Forgot to say that Charlie decided to keep a blog last yesterday. It's in the links bar as "Seagull" if anyone is interested.

Last night we did Sonlight catch up as we neglected it on Friday. Had a row about the writing he did which culminated in my erasing it all as it was nothing whatsoever to do with the subject matter!

This morning under threat of murder and against a timer has cheerfully re-done it plus the next part of writing and is now desperately trying to avoid writing about food around the world. He will finish it. ATM he is trying to walk around whilst writing - that is so not going to happen.

Miquon maths went down a storm again last night - he *really enjoys* this and it is still a surprise to me.

Had another quick look at Exeter maths last night after a link in someone's blog, but having looked through the rest of Miquon Orange and Red - they actually stretch further. A bonus is there is no reading for the little ones, not that that is a problem for Charlie, but still useful to know.

Need to work on:

Capital letters after full stops
Handwriting without strops! (considering Getty Dubay atm)
Times tables

Hello bubbles

Just keep swimming, swimming, swimming

Hehe - which one's mine?

Charlie on Saturday

Quite proud of this one

Poncy penguin shot at Bristol Zoo on Saturday

Charlie in Wildwalk at @Bristol

Charlie with the horse at the bottom of our garden

All this talk of country music

Must be rubbing off on Charlie. He has incessantly been listening to the rather fabulous Faith Hill cd for days now and insisted on having it on whilst we started Sonlight this afternoon. He likes it because it's "relaxing" apparently. Actually she's a bit more of a pop/country infusion which leads to it not sounding like country at all, but I love her music.

Monday was the @Bristol trip, I will gloss over the nasty bits at the beginning and just say that it was fab to see the couple of people I know already from South Glos HE again and really lovely to meet Alison,Merry and Joanna. Josie and Isabelle are both gorgeous, lovely babies and Charlie really enjoyed playing with the older ones. Alison - I am still shocked that he gave into T's authority! Such a sucker for the girls obviously.

I worked exceptionally hard yesterday and no education was undertaken, unless you can count trying to explain an issue estoppel? Always good to start his legal education early I suppose.

Just after lunch a rather large box from Sonlight arrived - so we now have the complete Core 1. Charlie was extremely excited, and after I spent 20 minutes or so filing all the schedules/papers in the IG binder and sorting the books out, we were ready to go.

We started with reading the first two pages of Usbornes Peoples of the World (grrr at the american use of the word Peoples) I got Charlie to write 3 sentences about what we'd read and he decided to choose Kenya as his country collection. I printed out some maps and flag sheets from the Enchanted Learning members site.

He then read the first 7 poems in the reader out loud to me, chose his favorite, wrote a sentence about it and drew a dog using DWN as his chosen poem was "My Dog"

Then we moved onto Charlottes Web which I've never read. I read one chapter to him and he read the second to me. He answered the comprehension and natural studies questions easily and already knew that untimely meant too soon - so that was the vocabulary covered and he can spell it too.

We then went off to my parents to pick up more work - groan. After dinner Charlie decided to start the Miquon maths. All I can say is wow. I was a tad confused initially about how to use it all but the workbooks are so flexible I love them. Basically each page in the workbook has about 3 or 4 different ways you can complete it, hard to explain but exceptionally useful. Its like getting 3 pages for the price of 1 each time. He used the cusinaire rods for the second two pages, and I can't believe he has memorised the values of each rod already - woohoo. He begged to do 3 pages and would have done more if I hadn't stopped him.

I found another maths curriculum which I think looks pretty good - and good value too. Its called Math U See and seems really good. I may consider getting this as well as the rod type systems seem to go down very well with Charlie.

Stupid blogger!

It won't let me leave comments on any of the blogs that I want to - grrrr

So a communal awwww and hugs coupled with good wishes for everyone that has poorly little ones - which ermmm, seems to be 80% of the blog ring!

Need to do a bit of a catch up now!

Mothers day was fab and apparently my 7 year old has a credit card.
Well I'm assuming thats how he ordered my flowers that arrived on Sunday(now I know what he was plotting with my parents when they threw me out of their office last week lol)

Ds is so cute. On Saturday night I was ordered (!) to set the alarm for 8 as we both usually sleep until 11am ish, as he had lots to do apparently! He spent Saturday writing plans and putting out clothes and banning me from his bedroom.

Anyway, alarm went off and he jumped out of bed ordering me to keep my eyes closed. He ran into his room, got dressed and then went downstairs. 5 minutes later he came up the stairs telling me to keep my eyes closed still.

Then he arrived in the room, told me to open my eyes lol Bless him. He had dressed in his suit and tie and had a tray with croissants and OJ on. He said he wanted to look handsome for me on my special day.He'd even tried to tie his tie - so cute. Apparently he was my servant for the day. So we had a lovely breakfast in bed and he'd made me such a cute card with " to a special mother" written on the front, the writing was so neat!

The flowers were beautiful too and apparently it was all his idea. So all in all a good day and he spent much of it tutting in disgust at the reports of various useless good for nothing hubbies not bothering on HB!

On Monday, my first parcel from Sonlight arrived. I am very, very impressed. I love the schedules in the IG, really fab, and you truly can dip in and out and not actually follow them rigidly. It really is as flexible as it claims to be and so easy to leave out all the religious stuff without it affecting anything. I am totally impressed and Charlie is over the moon - he really likes the History Spines and went doolally over the cuisenaire rods.

The rest of Monday and Tuesday were spent with mad working by me oh and new shoes for Charlie (again!)

Today Charlie has done a couple of pages in his maths workbook - helped by the rods. I also printed out some worksheets on roman numerals from abcteach.com as recommended by someone on the Sonlight forums. He really enjoyed this despite there being some rather clever maths sums on there too!

He's being doing yet more "birding" today - I am getting more and more concerned about breeding a bird watcher - it's just not cool!!

My parents got back from the Scilly Isles yesterday and we went and collected my work from them tonight. The Centre Parcs stuff came and my mind boggled at how much you can pre-book! All we've decided so far is to eat at the Indian on the first night, Charlie and my dad will do the 2 hour guided nature walk on the Sunday and mother and I will go get pampered

I've been pondering whether to start a seperate IVF blog rather than keep it in with this one. Especially after being verbally abused by a lovely comment leaver about being single, gay AND daring to want another baby. Well you know what Mr Whoever? It's been proven in several huge research studies that gay mums tend to do a much better job than hettie mums - so go stick that up your pipe and smoke it. (No offence to any of you lovely MP'ers!) You know what else? At least a child born to a gay mum isn't likely to be unwanted ever, because getting pregnant accidentally is bloody impossible! As for the comment about wasting NHS resources on my IVF treatment, for your information I am paying privately and NEED the IVF as I have serious fertility issues too. As if anyone would choose to inject themselves and suffer the side effects if it wasn't totally necessary.

Grrrrrrrrr

Anyway, to catch up with home ed stuff, we had home ed group on Wednesday which was fabulous. I am really loving this group and am quite nervous about the first meeting of the other group in a couple of weeks, because I can see that it isn't going to have the same vibe due to the person organising it.

The children played beautifully again, there were 6 families there this month, with one that I hadn't met before which was lovely. Charlie played really nicely with the younger ones again and was overjoyed to see baby J again. When the big ones started running round the tables at the end, he galiantly ran over, picked him up and carried him to his mum, as J was sat in their path and can only crawl or cruise with a hand held. Such a mother hen my little man.

Someone had bough Tip for the children to make things with, and all the children from the 3 year olds, right up to the 12 year olds, gathered round the table and made models with it. They were all helping each other too and it was so nice to see. Kept them involved for a good 45 minutes, and as always with these types of things, Charlie was still doing it when we were tidying up.

Some point this week maths and English were done, and a DWN picture too.He's done lots of drawing and reading and has finished "The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe" and "The Magicians Nephew" this week. He also shut himself in his playroom for about 2 hours on Thursday to make my mothers day card. I was forbidden to enter.

He has also informed me that he has plans for me tomorrow (a 7 year old???) I am getting breakfast in bed, and he has laid the tray out tonight with plates and cups. He also has other plans he says, and I'm not allowed in his bedroom! He says he is wearing special clothes and has got them ready.

In the car on the way to the supermarket this afternoon he asked if I could lend him some money so he could take me out for lunch tomorrow. After I finished pmsl, I gently told him that all the places would be booked up and it would be better if we spent the time together. He's so unbearably sweet sometimes.

Woohooo - salary arrived this morning so we've finally been able to book our Disney World holiday - yeehhaaaa. 250 days to go until we go to Florida.

Charlies' new passport arrived this morning too. He now has my surname as I changed it by deed poll last year and now his new passport has been amended too and he is over the moon. He hated having his dads name, and we never used it anyway, but this makes it more offical and means that long gone are the days where I get treated as a child abducter at the airport!

He's so excited over both things, I think he is going to explode!

Totally whinging,pathetic, self-pitying session is now over. Many thanks for the support.

Normal service to be resumed from hereon in.

Thought I'd better blog today as I haven't been around much anywhere on the web.

Charlie has been doing really well with his maths. The lower level workbook is working a treat and he is doing a couple of pages a day quite happily. He's finished his science and english workbooks too. He's reading The Magicians Nephew at the moment and building some kind of village out of boxes.

I had a friend from HB call me today because she hadn't seen me on HB for ages and I haven't signed into MSN since a couple of days before my egg collection - weeks ago. It was really sweet of her to call and we had a good chat but it just made me realise how sodding lonely and pathetic I feel right now. I couldn't really even talk to her about how I'm feeling, because I'm the listener and I'm the coper and I don't moan - I just pick myself up and get on with it.

I know part of this is still the hormones working their way out of my system and making me feel like crap. You can't take a lorry load full of 4 different types of hormones for 9 weeks without it taking it out of you a bit I guess.

I'm feeling really ranty too. I'm so bloody sick of seeing people treat their children like shit - don't they realise that children deserve respect, that they are people too? If I'm not seeing it in shops, I am reading about it in my work or reading it on crappy parenting web sites. It was always the one thing I hated about nannying, watching some other nannies and parents dis-respect their children constantly and having to make sodding polite small talk with them. Grrrrr

I'm so damn sick of waiting. All I have done for the last six bloody years is wait to have another baby. First of all I had to wait for the divorce to be finalised, then I had to wait as my girlfriend didn't want kids, then I had to wait because the next wasn't sure. Then I finally got to start trying and nothing happened. Then more waiting for test results, change of clinic, blah blah and then 2 positives and 2 early miscarriages. Then cue another year of waiting.

Then at last I get a real chance in having IVF and my sodding eggs don't fertilise. Don't get me wrong I am so pleased for the lady I donated too - she got pregnant after 5 years of waiitng too but when the hell is it going to be my turn?

As a single gay woman I had to jump through hoops that heterosexual women don't at the clinics. Unlike an infertile heterosexual I can't just BD, even if the chance is low. I have to wait for the clinic each and every time. It's not like I even have a choice.

Jesus, that all sounds so self-pitying and pious, it's not supposed to be. I don't begrudge anyone their children - well except maybe child abusers, and I know I should be grateful for Charlie, and I am. I adore him, he is my little miracle but I can't stop the longing for more children, it consumes me totally.

In fact right now I am sick of everything. I am sick of being alone, with no-one to cuddle, sick of not having any "real-life" friends here, sick of working, sick of living alone - I really hate it, sick of feeling crap and most of all sick of not being pregnant.

Don't mess with me

Yet another catch up post as I've not been feeling too fab this week.

Tuesday

A good day. Charlie did some maths and science in the morning, and then he went off for his short tennis activity at the leisure centre. He really enjoyed this but he and I both noticed that the instructor "had it in for him". I was really taken back by this as everyone normally takes to him straight away, especially adults and neither of us have experienced this before! I am utterly convinced it was to do with his hair cut.....! He made a fab coat of arms/shield as well.

Wednesday

Hmmm....he's sat down to do some maths and after about 5 minutes I hear "Mummy I'm too tired" Right said I, so off to bed you go (he'd only been up for 30 minutes) if you're too tired for maths, you must need a sleep. Surprisingly he went straight upstairs without a fuss, lay on my bed for 20 minutes, came downstairs and announced he felt much better after that rest. Ten minutes later, after a few sums had been done, the same thing was repeated. Moral of the story is here, don't bluff me to get out of doing maths - it isn't going to work! He did some English too. He spent most of the afternoon reading the childrens guide to Disney world I bought him for Christmas, and chattering away excitedly about what we're going to see and do in November.

Thursday

Charlie made granny a birthday card and did a beautiful butterfly from DWN. His writing was lovely and neat too, he was really pleased. We whizzed off to Cirencester to buy my mums present and whilst we were in Smiths, he raised his voice at me and after the second time and a warning I put back his Horrible Science magazine. Bizarrely a young ish woman came up to me and said "well done" and patted my arm. I was most bemused.

We've just had lunch and he's doing some maths now and then has proclaimed he is going to play in the garden because mummy has no imagination!

I hate Maths, I hate Maths

That's me not Charlie. At the weekend Charlie received a very belated christmas present from his fathers' godmother. Belated only because his father (I hate calling him that - he's so not worthy of the title) had negated to forward it any sooner. Anyway, it was a rather generous book token, which is a fabulous present for Charlie obviously. On Saturday we went into Cirencester to Ottakars to spend it, and as well as various novels and sticker books, Charlie chose two maths workbooks with it.

I purposefully led him towards dropping down a level to the 5-6 year old books, and today he started the first one. Now I don't know what it is with the people that write these books, but the stuff in it is definitely year 2 maths, so god knows why it was labelled as it was. Anyway, it is considerably easier than the CGP book, and he happily and easily did 8 pages of it this morning. Success!

I spent most of yesterday thinking about treatment dates and trying to work out when to take our much planned 3 week Walt Disney World trip. After discussion with Charlie, looking at my savings spreadsheet and considering what would happen if I do manage to be lucky enough to get pregnant in July, we came to a decision between us!

We have decided that whether or not I get pg in July we will take a 10 day trip to the States to do Disney World in November and then we will do a 3 week trip once we have a sibling for Charlie, so hopefully January 2007. If I do get pregnant in July then I will only be 18/19 weeks by the time our planned November trip comes around, and the weather in Florida will be a pleasant 70-80 degrees so pretty perfect and I won't be too big either. If I'm not pregnant then it will just be a really nice trip anyway. We haven't been abroad since we went to Disney World for christmas 2003 - so we are both looking forward to it.

I am very excited about all the potential shopping, both for me, Charlie and maybe some baby shopping too. I love the stuff you can get over there, far more variety than here, invariably better quality and always better prices! It will be perfect for picking up some christmas presents too. I know I will be heading to the Ralph Lauren shop at the Premium outlets for presents for my parents!

Clinic,Dinosaurs and Earthquakes

Thursday

We pootled off to the clinic on the train yesterday, I am so sick of sitting on London bound trains now! We arrived slightly early so went for a stroll down the Kings Road and came across a film crew - clearly something to do with the Camilla/Charles announcement zzzzzzzzzz. The female reporter was rowing quite loudly with the cameraman about the background to their "piece" lol

The doctor said that she was recommending ICSI as a way forward for me coupled with the egg share IVF. I was slightly dismayed as this means quite a huge expense, but it will be worth it. This has delayed my next try to July though as it will take that long to save up. I'm a bit miffed by this as I've been waiting 6 long years already but hey.

After leaving the clinic we went to the Natural History Museum to finish off our visit from about 3 years ago. Charlie enjoyed the earthquake simulator although he was really nervous before we got on it - bless. The thing I noticed about the museum is that its so damn "wordy" - I just could not be arsed to read all the millions of notes everywhere that were so long winded too. Charlie bought a whale and shark sticker book in the shop with a 99p donation from me to add to his pocket money and played happily with it on the train home.

Friday

This morning Charlie did some more of his roman project, choosing mosaics this time. He also did some English workbook too and I found a clear description of how to make a lap book, showed it to Charlie and he really fancies the idea, so we'll be off to Hobby Craft at some point for the card.

I won two Horrible Histories on eBay the other day and Charlie has started the Groovy Greeks now , he's been reading that this afternoon whilst I worked.

We've got a really busy next week, he has 3 half term sports activities at the leisure centre and also the home ed group has arranged an Illustrator workshop with a childrens illustrator. There's only Wednesday when we haven't got anything arranged which is unusual for us.

Tuesday

I deliberately left out Maths yesterday and Charlie chose to do English and Science workbooks. He really loves the Science ones and did about 10 pages without my even noticing!

He also did some more of his roman project, and chose coins from our previously drawn spider diagram.

I sent him out to play in the back garden and to re-fill the bird feeders, although one has mysteriously disappeared. We noticed last week that it was being knocked down from the tree every day by a mystery culprit and has now totally disappeared from the garden! Freaky animals must frequent our part of the woods.

Charlie was overjoyed when the little boy from next door, who is the same age, came out to play and I could hear them laughing and playing for ages which was lovely as he hasn't seen him for ages.

Wednesday

Again today maths was left out of the equation and Charlie did science and English work books, several pages in each. He also finished off the coin section of his roman project by writing about the various coins and which he liked best - an "as" apparently.

He's also done another Draw Write Now lesson and asked me to choose which one. So a penguin it was - and its rather good although the writing leaves a lot to be desired.

This morning he also wrote a letter back to my youngest cousin this morning after she wrote to him last week.

At the moment he is in the garden waiting for his friend from next door and is doing what he claims is "weeding" although in reality it is just an extension of the adult sized hole the two of them dug last summer in the bed!

Back to work blues

We've had a terrible day, probably the worse since I took him out of school.
That old chestnut of maths has reared its ugly head again. I'm not altogether sure that the CGP workbook is quite right in the level of some of the questions. I'm sure that the NC doesn't require 6 and 7 year olds in year 2 to minus really big numbers, I can't find any reference to that being a requirement, yet half way through the work book, the pace has really picked up and he can't cope.

I do get really sick of him dilly dallying around day dreaming and not trying though, that really bugs me! I'm not sure what we're going to do about maths as he can't cope with this level. I'm really stuck to know what to do.

After I finished todays work we did a whole load of jobs in town and went to the library. Charlie got lots of history reference books and I got a few crime novels too.

This evening Charlie has read - surprise - and has also done another DWN lesson - the dolphin this time as requested by me. His writing was particularly neat which he was proud of, although slightly too big.

Ha, I've rebelled and not used a title - blogger take note!

I was broadband less from Friday lunch time until Saturday mid-morning, apparently the exchange went down for the village - oh it was foul - felt so cut off from the HE world scary stuff.

Seems a bit weird on the blog ring at the moment, it hadn't even got quite back to normal after the mass CP exodus, and now there's the Melrose exodus too! Wish I had gone but hadn't decided to re-home ed until it was too late, and there was the treatment to contend with to. I intend on making the summer camp though - wild horses wouldn't keep me away, and looking through the archives has shown that Merry has historically posted the initial discussion on this very shortly after returning from Melrose - so that's something to look forward to! I won't be doing HESFES because ermm well its tents, and I so don't do tents, caravans I can just about cope with if I don't think about it too much, but tents no chance.

Charlie boy and I have just slobbed around this weekend, with both of us reading and Charlie drawing lots too. We played Connect 4 today and he really couldn't get the hang of it lol

Back to work for me tomorrow (well I work at home bykwim) - my box of work is sat here looking at me - need to fit in library, post office,rubbish tip and food shopping trips too.

In typical TMI mode, AF has turned up today 4 days early which never happens and weirdly I had no advance warning. I know that all the fertility drugs can mess with your cycle but I was under the impression that it typically makes people late, very late like up to 2/3 weeks. Oh well I won't complain really because it means that I will re-start the first stage of drugs in April slightly earlier. Getting sort of excited about my clinic appointment on Thursday and it will be good to firm up plans with doctor.

Titles should be banned

I hate thinking up titles, the box should be removed and the date should be sufficient. I am going to lobby Blogger immediately.

Charlie is still miserable about his hair, especially as I keep calling him Thug Bug, I think he looks like the Mitchell brothers.

Today he has played manically with the Geomag panels I bought yesterday, yes it's true, the evil mother that sold the ordinary geomags on ebay last year has relented after SOMEONE mentioned the offer on these in Woolworths on their blog. Why isn't there a warning when you join the blog ring about the compulsive buying bug you will catch? First it was DWN and now Geomag panels.

We paid a trip to the tip today with a car load of crap. Good thing I've got a Scenic.

I've just made some squidgy choc chip cookies and am eating one hot for the oven - yummy. Charlie is safe in bed

Still sobbing.....

The lovely lady at the barbers said there was only one thing for it as she went at Charlie's hair with the scissors. I hate it, he hates it lol He really doesn't suit short hair and my only saving grace is that it grows so quickly that I'm hopeful in 4/5 weeks it will be long again. He's really upset and says that he doesn't feel like him - awww bless



Home ed group was fab. Six families including us went, and I met two families that I hadn't before, and everyone was so nice and friendly. The child played so beautifully together. Ages ranged from 1 to 12 and there were 11 children and only one girl! We had a great time and Charlie picked up the youngest, little J and gave him a ride around the room, much to J's delight - he's such a mother hen. The parents sat around drinking tea/coffee and chatting and much fun was had by all.

Just for Alison and Sarah

He really didn't want me to take a photo lol No, he didn't do it, I am ashamed to admit that I did. I was trying to trim his fringes as it was all in his eyes, and well, on the bridge of his nose. He moved and my hand slipped at the critical time and I ended up cutting off far more than I intended! He really doesn't suit short hair because of his long forehead, and I can't look at him this morning. We are shortly off to the hairdressers/barbers for emergency work!

Thankfully his hair grows very quickly!

Hair disaster and other things

There has been a terrible disaster with Charlies' hair and the less said about it the better.

In home ed land, yesterday and today Charlie has done around 6 pages of a CGP maths workbook and today he has also done the Singapore Maths assessment so that I can try to decide whether to get that as well when I order the Sonlight Core next month.

Apart from that we have done a fair bit of cooking, rolls yesterday and scones today and Charlie has - yes you guessed it - read loads. Various non-fiction books today and yesterday. He hasn't picked up a novel since Saturday night. Going to have to do something about that!

It's the first South Gloucestershire home ed group in Cam/Dursley tomorrow afternoon - so we're both pretty excited about that. I'm just praying I can find a hairdresser kind enough to sort out his hair before then!

I am thoroughly enjoying my week off, although it was originally taken to allow me to recover from the HUGE needle being shoved in unmentionable parts and also to allow me to chill out after embryo transfer. Obviously the latter didn't happen, but I am still enjoying it.

Off to the clinic a week on Thursday for the review appointment with the doctor, so glad I have something positive to fix on, I don't do brooding. Well except over wanting a baby that is.

Charlie had the DK explore magazine last week and we did the plaster cast lion face yesterday but it split - Charlie was very upset! Must remember to look for acrylic paints tomorrow for his clay pot.

Life is a rollercoaster

Oh the irony. To start at the beginning - Wednesdays appointment was not good. There were only 7 leading follicles with the remaining 5 fallen behind and too small. This meant at this point that I wouldn't have enough to egg share as you must have minimum of 8 eggs. So I made the decision then that if they only retrieved 7 eggs, all were to go to the recipient.

Having got home I had to do my usual stimulating injection and then wait up until midnight to do the trigger injection. That was incredibly painful as it's a different drug, and still today the injection site is very painful.

Drug free day on Thursday - yay! I took Charlie to my parents and stayed for dinner and then my dad drove me to the station. Train journey into London was uneventful and I arrived at the hotel around 9.00pm. Food and drink were banned from midnight - sob.

I got up at 6.15 the next morning and made my way to the hospital to check in at 7.30. After sitting around for 40 minutes, eventually the porter came to escort me to my hospital room. To my surprise I was given a private room rather than being put on the day case unit.

More sitting around until at 11.30 they came to walk me down to theatre. I woke up 45 minutes later in the recovery room having been dreaming of lions! The nurse told me I had 12 eggs collected and I was over the moon!

After being taken back to my room I had lunch and several cups of tea and my dad arrived about 2.00pm. Eventually the nurse from the fertility unit phoned to say that the eggs had been split 50/50 and we left about 3.30pm.

I wasn't in any pain at this point but my legs were a bit shaky and I was over the moon about getting so many eggs when I had resigned myself to giving them all away.

The pain hit me around 8.00 that night, really high up and agonising. I didn't get any sleep on Friday night as the pain kept me awake.

The embryologist called at about 9.45 on Saturday to say she was really sorry but none of my 6 eggs had fertilised, and that it must have been the eggs as the sperm donor had proven fertility. I was devastated by this. I would rather have had no eggs for me, than have this happen, it was so unexpected.

I spent a few tortuous hours wondering how on earth I was going to be able to save up the required £6000.00 for a cycle of ICSI when at lunch time my lovely consultant called.

She was so sweet, saying she was so sorry, and they aren't really sure why this happened. But, the recipients half had all fertilised - yippee! Then I started crying (and I so don't do crying) with relief that the other woman had been successful and my eggs weren't scrambled. So, because of this I can have another go at egg sharing!

I have to ring the hospital on Monday morning to make an urgent appointment to go and see my consultant for a review meeting and discuss further treatment plans.

I'm still in agony, and rather gutted that none of my eggs fertilised but slightly relieved that I can have another go and better yet, help another woman achieve her dream of parenthood.

Just a quickie

Off to London again for what I hope will be the last scan oh and a blood test. Can't believe that I will have to be sat on that train again tomorrow night as well. I'm sure the train managers all know me by now.

Since starting these IVF drugs I have had such weird dreams - that never happened to me during pregnancy but on drugs - blimey. They are both vivid and bizarre and it's happening nearly every night - most strange what nuns piss can do to you!

Charlie managed something educational yesterday - the last 4 pages of his maths workbook. Two were just ordinary pages and the last two were the big test at the end of the book. He did so well and got them all correct which is a major achievement as the sums were starting to get really hard. He was so proud of himself and made me cut the certificate with all the stickers out of the back of the book and pin it on the drawing board.

Today's wake up was "Hi Mummy. Mummy do you know what the biggest lake in the world is". This child is truely strange, the way he can open his eyes and come straight out with these questions really amuses me!

Easter Bunny Came Early

Or at least that's how one friend put it when I gave her the clinic update.

So, things are looking really good. I had 10 huge follicles yesterday which is very promising and a nice thick womb lining which is even better, as that is the biggest indicator of IVF success. The lady who will be receiving half of my eggs (anonymously) is all nicely lined up and in tune with my cycle, so no delays there which is fab. Apparently she is extremely excited, having been on the donor egg list of 700-900 women for the last 5 years or so.

So next visit is Wednesday for another scan to check the follicles and a blood test to check estradiol levels. If that all comes back ok it will mean the nasty evil trigger injection at about 1/2am ish on Thursday and then the big operation/egg collection on Friday.

Charlie was so excited to see the follicles or eggs as I put it to him - he was jumping up and down in the scan room! Poor little mite is sooo desperate for a baby sibling.

Last night's injection really hurt, more than any of the others so far - ouch. I have to keep sniffing too - why oh why - that stuff is so disgusting.

I was really impressed that I stayed bright eyed and bushy tailed all day, I didn't even feel sleepy on the train on the way home! I did go to bed really early last night though - 10.30pm.

I must be nuts...

..as I've just stayed up all night on purpose to ensure that I don't do my usual trick in going back to sleep. I've now perfected the "wake up to BT wake up call,sit up in bed, stick sniffer up one nostril, sniff once, puke, lie down again and stay comatosed until 10 or 11am" bit. So drastic measures had to be called for today with needing to catch the train to London. Might be meeting my brother for lunch as he's doing a site visit or something like that anyway.

Lazy, lazy day

Although I did manage to get up considerably earlier than yesterday.

Charlie and I played Jungle Book Groove on the playstation this morning which was pretty amusing. That boy hates to lose!

After that he made lunch - oh how I love having a child of this age - so capable.

Then he did some maths and science workbooks, and really surpassed himself maths wise. His maths confidence has really improved since leaving school and it's great to see.

I spent some time researching costs for our planned Disney World Florida holiday. It was a bit weird filling in "infant" for a child not yet conceived, but necessary just in case this first IVF works!

We're off to London again tomorrow for the very important follicle checking scan. I realllllllyyy need to have a good amount of follies and more importantly, for them to be good sizes. I really need to stay on track with the timetable they have given me or else there'll be real problems.

Todays injection hurt like hell, and I now am sporting two huge bruises on my stomach from the injections that made me bleed last week - pah!

Errmmm unschooling??

As we've done bugger all "educational" the last 3 days in a row can I claim unschooling?

Charlie has basically spent the last 3 days with his nose firmly wedged in non-fiction books. Does anyone else have a child that wakes up, looks at you, says "Morning Mummy, what's a silo?" or is that just my boy? He's always doing this, waking up and asking random questions before I've even thrown the alarm clock across the room to shut it up and silo's it was today!

We returned our library books and got some more, predictable Charlie's are non-fiction although I grabbed Tales of King Arthur for him and he has started that and appears to really enjoying it.

I've looked everywhere for the first issue of Horrible Science and I just can't find it anywhere, so I'm off to check eBay in desperation in a bit.

After we came home we had to take my work back to my parents and pick up my train tickets for Monday. Yet more discourse between my mum and Charlie, she really winds him up the wrong way and he in turn is rude to her to the point of shaking his fist at her and throwing cushions. Sigh. I don't know why but when I ask him, he says he hates the way she teases him and the way she always echoes what I say. What he means by that if I say "Charlie get off the table" she will say it either straight after me or at the same time. It makes him feel like she is trying to mother him, which she is as she is soooo controlling and that winds him up. She had agreed to stop but she hasn't and today her pearls of wisdom were that I had to stop him as by cuddling him when he's upset over his run-ins with her, I'm making him a wuss. FFS!

I'm now really worried about what will happen when I have to have my egg collection as he will have to stay the night with them as my mother refuses to come to the clinic with me and take him out for a few hours whilst I am in theatre. There is no-one else to look after him, I don't have any grown-up friends here as I've only been here 2 years and work from home, so I just don't know anyone. He cried and cried when I told him he will have to stay with them, he really wants to come with me but he just can't as there is no-one to look after him whilst I'm in theatre. He's fine with my dad - loves and adores him, but steadily over the last 2 years his problem with my mum has got worse and worse.

Poo in the pool

Thursday

Lovely! So we turn up for the first lesson at the swimming club, nearly make it to the changing rooms when we are told that some dumb mother didn't put a swim nappy on her child, despite it being the rules, and it delivered a present in the pool. Nearly 3 hours later the levels still weren't safe so no lessons in the learner pool. Grrrrrr. Now I hate driving in the dark at the best of times, so that just put me in a worse mood. Sigh. So off we went to the supermarket to do our shopping and oh its lovely and quiet at 7.00pm - bliss - no queues anywhere.

We had a non-descript kind of day. Charlie coloured and drew all day and finally finished his huge farm picture. He was so proud and impressed with himself and it's pretty good.

I worked all day - bleugh - and managed to make myself bleed with my injection today. Must have nicked a capillary. I'm starting to get nervous now, as potentially this time next week egg collection will be done. I have to be at the hospital at 7.30am - groan - so we are definitely going up to London the night before as the earliest train from Kemble doesn't arrive in London until 7.32am.

Now that I've moved onto stimming the time is whizzing by, just keeping my fingers crossed for Monday, as I really need to have e/c on the 28th.

Managed to get myself all depressed last night by watching some crappy marriage thingy on Sky. They even managed to have a fairly awful lesbian couple on there, and that finished me off. I'm normally the strong independent type, but seeing that just set me off wondering how the hell I am ever going to meet anyone again and how this has been the longest I have ever been single. I am a very independent type but also miss having someone. Wah, I don't want to die an old maid. Ok, enough patheticness now!

We've had a really nice day today. After breakfast, Charlie decided to do some maths, more subtraction, then some handwriting and finally he did about 6 pages of his Science workbook.

He also did a little more of his huge farm picture which he is basing on various drawings in his Draw Write Now set.

We had a terrible bereavement today. Frosty lost his head. We're not sure how it happened as the clay had dried out, but Charlie was incredibly upset about it, and he has now been buried in the bin.

After lunch and my injection (3 down now) we whizzed off to Home Ed group. This was the first I have been to and it was at K's house as the hall has yet to be secured for the venue. It was really nice to meet people and let Charlie play with other children. He really enjoyed it and I really noticed a difference in the way home ed children play compared to school children. It may be cliched, but there is no tension, no teasing that I heard and everyone was so friendly no matter their age or sex - it was just lovely.

One of the mums who lives in Gloucestershire - not very far from here - has managed to secure a hall in Cam once a month so that has now been sorted, but I think the expectation is that those whom live in South Gloucestershire might not come as it's a bit far for them. For us it's fine though as we live exactly on the Glos/South Glos/Avon border.

So we're just waiting for the South Glos venue to be sorted, and we should hopefully have two groups to go to.

I managed to sort out some swimming for Charlie. The coach from Yate called to tell me that they only offer private lessons to special needs/disabled children but that the swimming club does learn to swim lessons and there is only 3-4 children in each group. So we are off for a trial tomorrow to see how he gets on.

So a great day all in and I'm going to watch the Chicago DVD I treated myself too now!

Big catch up time

First of all thanks to everyone for Charlie's birthday wishes and mine for my hospital appointment. Charlie in particular really appreciated his birthday wishes, as none of his school friends sent him a card, despite all the birthdays being on our contact list, so the poor mite had a fairly minimal card haul, although his useless so called father remembered a card that actually managed to arrive on his birthday and not a week after. Does he think that buying the largest card in the shop makes up for having walked out of his sons life forever 2 years ago?

Saturday

Anyway, he had a lovely birthday. He opened his presents from me and was absolutely thrilled with his Draw Write Now set - he thinks its the best present in the world despite his expression in the second photo!





We whizzed off to Waitrose to buy some bits and pieces and were there for opening at 8.30am (groan), then went on to the party shop in Cirencester to purchase the table confetti. He has loved this ever since I bought some for his birthday last year. We got gold and silver stars and "happy birthday" logos. I also treated him to a happy birthday helium balloon and two more Horrible History novels as well. Incas and Tudors I think were the ones he chose.

We finished tidying the house and Charlie began to get really impatient waiting for my parents to arrive. Arrive they did at 1.00 and after opening their presents - some lovely clothes and a glass painting set - we had lunch, just the usual sandwiches, pringles, yellow and red peppers, carrot and cucumber sticks and tzatziki and another dip too. Then it was cake time!



After lunch Charlie wanted to do one of the Sand Art pictures I bought for his birthday. It was good fun and we did it together which was nice and Charlie was really pleased with the end result.



Then he dragged my dad into the playroom to play on the playstation - what a palaver! They couldn't quite work out the eye toy between them, my mum and I just sniggered.

At 5.30 my dad took Charlie here to watch the floodlit feeding. Charlie apparently loved it, and was really well behaved. My mum and I stayed here as she had no interest in going, and we watched ET and chatted and I cooked dinner.

My parents left after Casualty ended and a very happy Charlie collapsed into bed earlyish for a change.

Sunday

We had a very artistic day today which was a big change. First of all Charlie wanted to do something from Draw Write Now so he chose the robin and was thrilled with the results.



Even I tried it and was impressed and I hate drawing with a passion best reserved for other things!

Then after lunch he got his new clay out (another birthday present) and decided to make a roman pot and a snowman he has christened Frosty - so original.







He *really* enjoyed this and took great care over every aspect of it - it was definitely a hit.

We snuggled up on the sofa after dinner and watched some of the programs on Animal Planet, he really loves that channel and it makes me so happy we have Sky now.

Monday

It was a mad rush to get to the bank before catching the train, but we made it with about 5 minutes to spare. In fact rushing around was a bit of a theme today! Train journey to London was uneventful as ever, Charlie read and did another Draw Write Now picture, and we arrived into Paddington on time at quarter to one. We had a quick look in WH Smiths for the Horrible Science magazine but they appeared to be in the middle of a refurb and didn't have it or much else for that matter. We caught the tube to Sloane Square and then the bus down to the hospital - that was quite exciting as it is only the second time Charlie has been on a bus - we normally get cabs around London.The hospital has a bus stop right outside which was handy.

Everything at the clinic went very well. I have nicely down regged and Charlie loved seeing the scan. The lady was great pointing out the womb and ovaries to him, and he was visibly moved and said to me "wow Mummy - that's where I grew" bless. The nurse then sent me down to the Pharmacy to pick up my drugs and then more sitting around before going in to see her. She showed me my injection and new revised sniffing schedules and then made up one injection and made me do it.

Then the embryologist came in to discuss the donor sperm. Unbelievably there is only one available with blonde hair at the moment, so it was him I chose as both Charlie and I are blonde. He's some kind of super brainy student doing a PhD in astro physics or something like that, he's also very sporty, which considering I'm not, was quite amusing.

Then it was time to pay the bill and book my next scan. That will be next Monday to check that my ovaries are growing lots of eggs. Charlie keeps stroking my tummy and saying to it "grow eggies grow" rofl, he's so funny.

By this time we had been at the clinic nearly 2 hours and I was getting worried as if we didn't make the 4.16pm train home we would have to wait until 7.30pm. So we ran up Chelsea Bridge Road, threw ourselves into Sloane Square tube station and then ran all the way up from Paddington tube to the train, making it with 30 seconds to spare! Pretty impressive for an unfit 29 year old and a just 7 year old I thought.

Another uneventful train journey home, stopping off to pick up my work from my parents and then home for dinner.

Tuesday

Today Charlie has been quite busy. He's done two pages of maths, quickly and all correctly, which is great because it was subtraction and he usually struggles with this. He coloured in his DWN picture from yesterday and wrote the sentences too.

He has been most helpful and helped to tidy the sitting room too, and made our sandwiches at lunch time.

Straight after lunch I did my injection, and it is really quite a faff to set it all and takes a while. Charlie was sweet when he could see I was hesitating whilst pointing the needle at my stomach, gave me some reassuring words and stroked my back. He is very interested in the big supplies bag they gave me, with all the syringes, needles, ampuole covers etc in, and he particularly likes the sharps bin!

I would just like to blog here that it hurts a bit when the needle goes in, and the menopur does sting as it goes in, but it isn't as bad as HcG injection I had to have over the years for the IUI's - now that really stung.

Charlie outright refused to go to swimming lessons today, as he said he didn't want to get in trouble. Hmmm, anyway we have negotiated that he will go next week.

I have booked him into 3 activity sessions at the leisure centre for half term week that he decided he would like to do. He chose football, trampolining and short tennis.

We're going to our first home ed group meeting tomorrow at K's house, we are both looking forward to this. Although I've yet to work out how to fit my injection in whilst there as it's due in the middle of our time there!

Hi-ho hi-ho it's off to London we go.....

Just a quick blog before we go off to London for my scan. I was just thinking how nice and easy it is now that I don't have to arrange for someone to pick him up from school. No faffing around when I get back either, having to collect him from somewhere. I am looking forward to all the stares I will get on the train from having a child of obvious "school age". The looks I got in the supermarket on Friday were amusing, some of them were dying to ask why he wasn't in school seeing as he clearly wasn't ill!

He had a lovely birthday weekend, and thanks to everyone for their good wishes. We did lots of creative stuff as well, so I will update later with pics too.

I need to finish all those millions of consent and donor forms before I go too, yikes. Not looking forward to getting wet either - its set to rain everywhere today including rain according to the Met Office.

Right, I'm off to get dressed and sorted out. I'm a bit excited now because I am hoping they will say that my ovaries are down regged and I can start stimming injections today. Is it a bit strange to look forward to having a great big 15cm long phalic shaped probe shoved in your nether regions? I think I answered that myself. Think of me lying there legs akimbo with no dignity at all (again)

Quiet day

My very first down reg headache hit me at about midnight last night and was still there this morning when I woke up. It really felt like my head was going to explode, I have never had a headache like it except when I had a minor brain bleed a couple of years ago. I threw 2 ibruprofen down my throat and collapsed on the sofa, until it finally lifted around 11am. I am so lucky that Charlie has been more than capable of getting his own breakfast for the last 3 years!

He made me a cup of tea too and bought me a banana. At the moment, when he is awake for my sniffs, he rubs my back, it's so sweet!

I did some work whilst Charlie played in his room with his playmobil. His playroom is so under used! After lunch, I made the chocolate biscuit crunch for his birthday tomorrow and Charlie played with more playmobil and sorted out yet more unplayed with toys for the charity shops.

This evening, he has been emptying the bins, tidying his room, putting his clean washing away and he started his new book, which we bought at the Baths last Saturday. He absolutely loves this and has been laughing all evening.

About ten minutes ago, another down reg headache hit me, so I'm off to take more tablets. Can't go to bed yet as I got behind on my afternoon sniff, and the next one can't now be done until midnight!


I can't believe that this time 7 years ago I had been induced and my waters had just broken. My baby will be 7 tomorrow - how is that possible?

All systems a-go

AF arrived today so I rang the clinic to book my initial scan, which is on Monday and they gave me the following rough timetable (so exciting)

Scan on Monday - if ovaries are down regged then I get the pleasure of starting injections ( way earlier than I had anticipated)
24th Jan- Scan
26th Jan - Scan - if I have responded nicely to the stimms then:
28th Jan - EGG COLLECTION (yeehaaa)
31st Jan - EMBRYO TRANSFER

The nurse gently reminded me that depending on how things go for both me and the recipient this could all go out of the window, but still I am very excited now, its great to have an rough idea!

Just an ordinary day here

Yeuck, whatever Charlie had last night, I managed to catch but was pretty much recovered by lunch time and Charlie has been fine all day.

Went back to sleep after my 7.15 sniff and we didn't get up until 10am, I was exhausted.

After breakfast, Charlie played on one of his new cd-roms, Jump Ahead Year 2. He played the mixed subject one that covers all the curriculum. I have to say I find these cd-roms very frustrating, on 2 different games it was completely unclear about how to "do" it if that makes sense. Basically you had to make the goldfish eat the bubbles containing the correct answer to the maths problem. Ok fine. But it doesn't tell you how to get the goldfish to do it. So there I was manically using the arrow keys and trying with the mouse and all sorts. After ten minutes of frustration for both of us, by accident I click on the jar of worms and figured out you had to place the worm on the bubbles. Why oh why didn't the narration say so?? It was one of the reasons I sold the Year 1 cd-roms last year, because we just couldn't work out how to play half the games.

Anyway, once he got going he really enjoyed it and played 6 different games.The thing I really like was how each game was repeated with slight changes about 6/8 times so he really got to practice each skill. We stopped for lunch and then he went outside to play in the garden and do some weeding for me apparently. Two of the horses in the field came and put their heads over our low wall and Charlie fed them some grass and stroked them. We both love this interaction with these horses. There are about 10 in all, and a couple in particular are very affectionate.

Charlie has read some more of The Scarecrow and His Servant and also read a poem he liked,to me from the book I bought the other day.

I managed quite an amount of work myself today, and am left with only one file. A fairly big one, and not very pleasant. A father that murdered his 6 week old daughter in 1999, served only 3 years sentence, now wants contact to the two older children. Reading the injuries that little baby suffered in her short life, has really upset me tonight.

Splish splash

Another joyous wake up call and early morning sniff is done. Last night's sniff was horrendous and made me sick and then dry heaves for 10 minutes or so. Good thing Charlie was fast asleep.

Today has been a horribly bitty day which I hate. First of all G's mum came to collect G's stuff on her way back from school, and said she couldn't come in because of her car battery. Hmmm.....?!

Then it was off to the parents/bosses house to collect work, and we went in for a bit as I was summoned to the offices. I have been ordered to be at their house tomorrow morning at 8.30 to spend the day so that mother can join father at the head office, as they have an extremely important court hearing to prepare for, and they have decorators in doing their kitchen at the moment. Bah humbug, I hate their house. Its big and rambling, and far too many antiques and priceless stuff hanging around, and it always makes me nervous that Charlie will break something, or damage something. Or he will lock himself in the cellar or something. It's so big that when you are upstairs in the office say, you can't hear someone downstairs. So I have to be on my toes and can't relax.

Anyway, got back home and started sorting out the @Bristol trip and updating the database of numbers and ages I started last night.

Charlie wrote some more in his diary about Bath, and then I read him a couple of poems and asked him to draw a picture of what one of them bought to mind. I asked him to really concentrate this time, and tried to explain that one of the reasons he gets so frustrated with his drawings is that he rushes them and tries to put too much detail in and then scribbles when colours. He really concentrated hard, and apart from thinking his person was rubbish, he was clearly pleased with the result which makes a change from the usual tantrums. He is actually a really good drawer, or was, since the start of last term, his drawing skill drastically reduced, which I think is quite telling. Its important to him I think, to try to build up his confidence again, hence the Draw Write Now purchase.

Off we went to swimming lessons. Does anyone else think the way they are run is ridiculous. It really struck me today that 4 teachers yelling to 4 groups of children to make themselves heard, whilst the children are in the pool, and the teachers out, is hardly an effective way of communicating. I really noticed that he hasn't come along much in a year, in terms of stroke development and I am convinced the method of teaching is to blame. Half the children were talking to each other because the teacher hadn't attracted their attention.

I think I may let this 5 week course run as I've paid for it, and then pay for private lessons.

After getting back from the pool, Charlie became struck with a mystery illness, necessitating 5 trips to the bathroom in an hour. Hmmmm, he was very pale and cold afterwards so we snuggled up together on the sofa with the blanket.

By about 8.30 he had recovered a bit, and read his rocks and minerals book. He then demanded to be allowed to watch Child of our Time. He is really addicted to that programe!

Day 1 in the Big Sniff House......

Sorry couldn't resist. I am 2 sniffs down out of 3 now, just have to wait until 11.15 for the 3rd and final one for the day. I had to do the second one whilst I was out and it was much worse than the first. When the time came for the repulsive stuff to trickle down my throat it actually made me sick! The thing that really gets me is that everyone says this bit is really horrid but it only gets worse from here on in, symptom wise and then of course the injections start. Ok, I'll stop moaning now promise.

Oohhh his Draw Write Now set arrived today, yay! Thats the one birthday present he doesn't know about. I sneaked a look at it, and I am sure he will love it.

So, work wise, Charlie did maths, english, science, French and some of his diary.He was really messing around by the time he got to his diary so I stopped him as it was clear he had set too many goals for one day!

We went off to the Mall after my work crisis had passed to let him choose his birthday presents. I know that sounds odd, but unless I buy on the net, he will always see what I buy! I bought all his xmas presents on the net, because I knew exactly what to get, but with his birthday so close to christmas I had ran out of ideas.

In the end I explained to him that he could have one big thing with a few little bits, or he could just choose a variety of presents (upto a set value I had in mind) from different shops. He wisely went for the second option.

This is his rather impressive haul:

From ELC - artists paper, glitter glues, weird metallic bubble holed stuff, bucket of 100 felt tips, modeling clay, glittery pom poms for sticking, huge wad of activity paper, a sand art set and a mini etch a sketch.

From toysrus - Cadoo, DK Oceans book

I also got him the Jump Ahead Year 2 Pack for home ed purposes!

His best friends mum from school is coming round in the morning to pick up some stuff. I asked her on the phone today if G would like to come to play next week after school and that I would pick him up. She was really funny with me and we are quite good friends, so I'm not sure what that was about. She said she would ask G later and get back to me. Huh? We've always just arranged it between us before, so not sure what that was about.

First swimming lesson tomorrow afternoon, as well as B coming and going to my parents to pick up more work. It will be interesting to see how the swimming teacher copes with seeing him not in his school group. I wonder if she will say anything?

Grumble, moan, whinge

I'm not sure whats worse, having to get up at 7.15 or the really repugnant taste of the nasal spray as it trickles down your throat and lingers there for a couple of hours.

Verdict on day 1 sniff 1, is probably unblogable, but unbelievably I have already had my first hot flush and it was most unpleasant, add to that the fact that I've been up since 7.15 and I can still taste the revolting stuff.....

Don't ever do what I did and mistake a plastic dolls bottle for your nasal spray, bloody painful I tell you! I'm going to kill Charlie!

Apparently this morning he is going to do:

1. Breakfast
2. Teeth
3. Sort his playmobil trees out
4. Maths
5. English
6. Science
7. Roman project
8. French
9. Diary
10. Mosaic picture

Hmmmm we'll see.

Defeated by a nasal spray

Yes its true and official I am stupid. It took me fifteen minutes to work out how to assemble my nasal spray which will deliver my initial IVF drugs. The damn thing had 4 protective caps, outer container, nebuliser and spray. It's all assembled now ready for the first 2 prays in the morning. Oh joy. I may post a photo of the offending item tomorrow, then I can print it out and use for dart practice.

Charlie has read, read, read, read and read some more today. Oh and made a few pencil marks on his huge castle picture.

Just had to book a wake up call, as the spray has to be taken 3 times a day 8 - yes 8 hours apart.

Next time I blog I will have officially started my first IVF cycle and will quite probably act like a menopausal screaming banshee.

Aquae Sulis

We had a fab time at the Roman Baths. I've been before prior to Charlies arrival, but it was his first time. He absolutely loved it and listened very intently to the audiogram thingymibob.



Stone blocks that made up part of the temple



The Great Bath



The Great Bath again



And again....



Minerva's Head

We went and had brunch in the Pump Room, very scrummy and Charlie tried some of the hot Spa Water, which he says he liked. Despite disliking water I tried it too...hmmm interesting taste.

Charlie demanded that we went into Bath Abbey too, so despite being an atheist I agreed.The stained glass windows there are beautiful and some of the ornate plaster work is lovely. On the way out there was a street entertainer, and he was really rather funny. Charlie was literally rofl!

We came back home and whilst my parents were here we booked our easter weekend at Centre Parcs - whooppeee. We paid extra for a central villa, and yep its central! My mother moaned saying it would be noisey, but I was sat at the computer clicking so ignored her!

Charlie has been reading and playing his History Explorer cd-rom and now is consideirng drawing a castle, or so he tells me.

Very productive day

After finishing my work this morning, off we went into town to return our library books. We dropped some stuff into the charity shop on the way, and then ventured into the health shop for some remedies. Managed to find something for Charlie's achey legs as well as nausea and insomnia tablets for me.

When we got back Charlie poured over the new books from the library - he had typically chosen all reference books. The we had a chat about what other stuff he wants to cover apart from Romans and he came up with Castles and Electricity. which was spurred on by his asking in the car "What is electricity".

So we made some spider diagrams to identify what he thought he would like to know about Romans and Castles. He's been pretty extensive which is great and really gives me confidence in this whole HE thing.

We moved all his playmobil upstairs today and out of his playroom into his bedroom. The reason for this is that I have really noticed in the last 3 months that he doesn't really play with toys anymore, he is so obsessively reading. Also, as he isn't even sleeping in his bedroom and he now has a new cabin bed, the space underneath is perfect for storing it all neatly as its all too big for his shelves. He has the airport, plane, holiday home, swimming pool and pond. Oh and ermm 5 different playmobil boats too.

Clearly it all out of the playroom means he doesn't need to tidy it up when he does play with it and means that it has freed up more shelf space. We cleared out some soft toys too, they will go to the charity shop. At the weekend I will pack the dolls cot and teddies from his playroom into the attic too, freeing up more space in the playroom ready for his computer.

Finally off to Bath tomorrow with my parents to see the Roman Baths, we're both looking forward to it.

Great day so far

The day's not even halfway through and its going well so far.

1. Amazingly there is a space for Charlie for swimming lessons, and even better its at the same pool he was going to with the school, so he will know the swim teachers and be able to stay on the same schemes too. He starts on Tuesday.

2. I'm getting a rise (almost definitely). Going to put the difference straight into a building society account and start saving for the maternity leave I will hopefully need to take!

3. Looks like we're definitely off to Centre Parcs. Charlie phoned my parents this morning after seeing the brochure that arrived today, and demanded to know if they were coming with us. We're going to Longleat as it's closest and we're only going for the weekend at Easter. Even better, because the parents are coming we're having a swish 2 storey executive villa with a sauna and lots of other luxury extras

4. Another amazon order arrived this morning, all Usborne internet linked, Castles, World of Plants and Childrens Encyclopedia, all gorgeous and Charlie was sooo thrilled to see them when he woke up!

5. I was up at 9am! Ok, so I will just gloss over the fact that its only because the postman knocked this morning with my amazon delivery!

More later.

Busy bees

Charlie has worked like demon today and all of his own doing too. We got up late - again - 11.00am this time, and whilst we were eating breakfast I casually asked him what he wanted to do today. His surprising reply was "brush teeth,maths,english,science,roman stuff" Ermm ok I said as I hadn't specifically meant "work" it was more a generalisation.

So off he went and did all those in that order whilst I worked. He did 1 page of maths - it was quite difficult subtraction, 2 pages of english, 4 pages of science and has nearly finished his Horrible Histories Rotten Romans sticker activity book!

I was overjoyed today to get an e-mail from Amazon saying that my Draw Write Now is on its way! Originally when I ordered it for Charlie's birthday it said it wouldn't arrive until the end of the month, which is no good when his birthday is the 15th, but now the delivery estimate is 11th-13th so I'm over the moon after reading so much great stuff about it on the blog ring.

I also got a £20 amazon gift certificate for taking part in a survey, so that's spent too. For a change I spent it all one me, although I did order the first 3 Unfortunate Events books, which I suppose is really for both of us!

Been desperately trying to work out when some of my visits to London to the fertility clinic will be, but I guess I will just have to wait until I have my baseline scan some time in the next 2 weeks ish. I really want to stay up there for a few days, I desperately want to see Jill Halfpenny in Chicago as she was so fabulous in Strictly Come Dancing. She starts on 31st January I believe. I loved the film and had wanted to see the stage show even before that, so when I found out she was going to be in it, seemed like the perfect time to go.

Only problem is Charlie will have to come with me, and from having seen it on Musicality as well, I've been trying to rack my brains about how unsuitable it might be. To be honest, it doesn't seem any more "sexual" than the average pop video these days, it doesn't really have any violence in it, so I can't see the problem. But I'm just a little uncertain. Views anyone?

Amazon delivery = good day

We haven't actually done much day, ok in fact Charlie did nothing remotely education like. He finished his Faraway Tree collection last night so today he started and finished (!) another book from the library, and has now started The Scarecrow and his Servant, he's about 4 chapters in. The speed this child reads at is starting to scare me now. I mean I was fast as a child and still am now, but whoa nelly!

He played with play money for a bit, lectured his soft toys about something or other and generally played quietly in his playroom this morning.

I managed some work today, finished one file and broke down another, makes me so mad how some people treat their children and social services do NOTHING - arrgghhh.

Still pondering the curriculum or not question.

I'm getting a new pc from work soon, to enable me to give this one to Charlie for his playroom for his birthday on the 15th, although I am keeping the flat screen! He can have the ordinary one from the office. It's really seriously high spec this Dell and I love it, but not enough memory and thats causing problems. When I started talking to my dad and brother about all the probs, we came up with the above solution as Charlie often wants to be on the pc surfing Usborne quick links sites at times when I must have it for typing up work and e-mailing it in! My brother will buy a wireless network card and his present to Charlie and then the printer can come downstairs and go in the playroom with the computer, whilst my new one stays here in the dining room with me.

Talking of the curriculum, when I can actually start to print things from enchanted learning which I joined, the need for curriculum will probably fade as their unit studies look great as a jumping off point.

Need to make further headway into work tomorrow, although I am sat here seriously considering staying up again all night and doing some work, as I did the other night. I didn't fall asleep until gone 3.30 last night, which predictably meant we didn't wake up until 10 again. I don't mind sleeping in at weekends, but when its winter I hate afternoons and evenings as I feel really exhausted by 3.30 and can never be arsed to do anything!

Charlie is on the waiting list for trampoline lessons, and I really need to get him on the swimming waiting list or consider paying for private lessons. He had lessons included at his school and made amazing progress so need to keep that up.

Beware, we cooked!

We had a pretty busy day today. Charlie did 2 more pages of maths this morning, this time it was subtraction. He did ok, but needs more practice. He then asked to do some of his science workbook and did a couple of pages of classification and life cycles and then moved on to do 2 pages of a french workbook.

Then the dangerous task of cooking began. We made Shrewsbury biscuits - yum. Charlie weighed all the ingredients very nicely, and did pretty much everything else but needed assistance with the creaming!











Pretty pleased with himself there!

Then we whizzed off to my parents to give them some of the biscuits and then off to Tesco's for the bits that I forgot to have delivered this morning!

We've arranged to go to the Roman Baths in Bath on Friday with my parents as part of our roman project. Charlie has been surfing the childrens pages of their website intently tonight, this subject has really gripped him.

I didn't do any work today - whoops!

A picture from the other day, playing with his magic kit.

Other Stuff

Considering I didn't even go to bed last night I think I am doing quite well today. I did fall asleep on the sofa for a couple of hours. Charlie was sweet, he bought his chair next to me and sat and read by me whilst I dozed!

I have seven more days to take the pill as the first part of my IVF drug treatment and I am really sick of it. I feel sick all the time and quite fragile and now slight spotting has started which I never get (sorry if that's TMI)

I am also really dreading the down regulation drugs which have to be sniffed up each nostril 3 times a day. Apparently they make you really ill, migraines, sickness etc. They start on Monday.

I had all the consent forms and paperwork out last night that I have to complete. As I am donating half my eggs at the time of egg collection to an infertile woman, I have to fill in loads of extra forms. There are two parts of one form that have me baffled. One is entitled "Goodwill message to any child born as a result of your donation" and the other is a huge section of A4 proportions entitled "Describe yourself, personality, what kind of person" etc.

I just have no clue what to write for either, I hate answering those types of questions and the message to the child really freaks me out. What on earth can you say that a child at 18 would want to know?

Home-edish stuff

I'm going to do seperate posts today, one for home ed and one for IVF.

So, Charlie did another 4 pages of maths workbook today, I was incredibly impressed as he chose to keep going after 2,and did really exceptionally well with adding up to 160. I really hope that addition has clicked fully now. He also had to do counting up and down in tens from 50 to 150, and managed that beautifully. Fingers crossed he has got this now. I know some home edders won't approve of the prescribed maths work, but he really needs this very structured approach to maths or he just loses it. Interestingly introducing counters/manipulatives totally messes him up and he can't do it with them!

More of the romans project was done today. As he had spent around 2 hours surfing the net using his romans books and the Usborne quicklinks, I asked him to choose to write something that he had learnt today from those. He wrote about roman houses, and says he will illustrate it tomorrow. His spelling ability really makes me laugh, he's not quite 7 and can spell "archipelago" and "ambulant" and today he spelt "conquest, mosaiac,thatched,defending, and villas" without help but had to ask how to spell "was"!

He's nearly finished his Faraway Tree 3-in-1 novel today so that makes a total of 12 novels in just under 3 weeks. Not bad at all.

Tomorrow, we're going to do some cooking, but not much else planned as it is an official work day for me, boo hiss.

Test

Totally random ramblings

Spurred on by Merrys' post about her CM planner, I have once again done the rounds of the curriculum sites.

Thinking about why a curriculum appeals to me, I'm sure it must be somehow connected to all those years of nanny training and day care management. You have to have yearly, termly, monthly and weekly plans done, so that it can be easily seen what the children will "learn" in relation to the ELG's each day. I also guess it would appeal because then I can say to myself "right Charlie has learnt about x,y and z because we did a,b and c".

At the moment I am very much child led (with the exception of workbooks for maths,science and english) in that Charlie literally started us off by pulling out his Romans book the week before christmas and asking to do a project on that. This is something I would like to continue, but I am just not that creative enough to suggest to him "what" to put in the projects if that makes sense.

So that led me to thinking that a mix of child led and curriculum based would help. Following something like FIAR or AO, and also continuing with his projects along the way, which would satisfy my feeling that all the curriculums out there are US based and so this way I can help to guide along more UK/World based lines as well.

FIAR seems to me to be more US specific than say AO, where because it has its origins in England, there seems to be more flexibility there about how to guide at least some of the content. The thing about either of those though is the reading aloud to Charlie. I'm sure he'd far rather read to himself, and to be honest I really can't bear the idea of reading long stories out loud.

So, in conclusion, I don't have a conclusion and will continue to go over and over this in my mind. Makes it worse that I am the one that will have to make the decision as well!

Magic Man

Yet another lie in day....we are so lazy I really have to do something about this.

After breakfast we started to do the mosaic kit we bought yesterday. Its more involved that I realised and I need some newspaper so we are going to do it tomorrow now.

Charlie has been reading again today, and has also made a start on writing things down for his roman project. He did a page of general intro and drew an amphitheatre too. He seems to have retained quite a lot of what he has read in books and on the net so thats all good. He has expressed an interest in learning some Latin, so we will do a little of that as part of the project.

We watched the make space for nature thingy on BBC2 which was really good. Charlie loves any sort of nature programe and we both really enjoyed this one. We had a nosey around the website too - which is fab. BBC sites really are useful.

He's been playing with his magic kit for the first time tonight, been going for an hour now and not showing any signs of stopping. I've got some pics but can't post them until my new domain goes live and my dear brother sorts the gallery for me.

Happy New Year

An interesting start to the new year with a visit from a fire officer as the numb skull who filled the oil tank up yesterday morning managed to leave the valve open. Cue huge spill, panicking Claire due to the fumes in the house. Anyway I won't say anymore except look out oil company when you open on Tuesday! I won't be paying for the oil and you will be sending someone to clean the spill up!

Whilst sitting here bored this morning, I found out the Mall was going to be open today so decided to take Charlie there as I knew he wanted to buy some sort of mosaic kit and mooch around Hobbycraft.

We got there just before 12 and I was shocked that both the M4 and M5 were very quiet as was the Mall itself - it was fab. Charlie bought some Nemo stickers in the Disney Store sale, a crystal in Natural World, I bought him this book, this book and this book

I've definitely come to the conclusion that overall the Usborne books are much nicer and more appealing to children. The DK ones seem to have lovely covers but are nowhere near as colourful or "stand outy" enough inside. This is something I've been pondering for some time, being a sad "bookworm". Usborne definitely have it for me on the content and attractiveness front. As a total bonus the internet linking is fab, the links are extensive and particularly good for home ed as they aren't all work sheet links, but there is plenty to print out and do if you want that.

Off to Hobbycraft we went and he bought a mosaic kit, he loves that shop and I have to be really firm as the first time we went in there I spent £150!!

The weather is supposed to be sunnyish tomorrow, so we may go to the zoo to use our membership.

The last day of an interesting year

I'll start with some photos I took yesterday:


With his fave cuddly



Started by being woken up at 7.30 this morning by the noisy inconsiderate heating oil delivery man. Grrrrrr. At least the tank is full again, just wish it wasn't so damn expensive. Double grrrrr.

Charlie did 4 pages of maths including making hundreds. He did really well at this I was suitably impressed. A couple of pages of a CGP science workbook were done and enjoyed as well.

After lunch Charlie had his bike ride that I had been promising him for 2 days!



So a very happy new year to everyone. See you next year!

Beware the Phantom of the Opera

We started the day with the excitement of a bank visit followed by a supermarket sweep and then, saving the best shop till last, a book shop visit. Bought Charlie 5 new books, fab, all reference books and designed to slot in with future planned projects as well as general reference resources.

Had a quick lunch and then the parental unit arrived to take us to the cinema. I loved, loved,loved the film, it was fab, very true to the stage show and brilliantly acted and sung and the sets were amazing. Charlie enjoyed it too, jumped a few times when the music was loud and refused to watch the chandelier crashing, but the second Harry Potter filmed scared him far more than Phantom!

We had dinner and then I packed him off to bed early for a change, although he was still awake ten minutes ago when I checked! Anyone know any useful insomnia cures for an almost 7 year old?

It's a miracle

We're actually up before lunch time. Special thanks must go to my dear mother for phoning at 8.45 which woke us up

Just about to do some maths and English workbooks and then off to see Phantom. More later.....