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Stages of the day
Jun. 5th, 2010 09:29 pmBreakfast was quick and we all had it separately. Then Rob and the children went out - to the Farmer's Market, where they had back-up breakfast of sausages and apple juice, and on to run various errands in town, almost all successful.
After they got home, we sorted through clothes and laundry and things, and I reduced the children's in-use wardrobes to a more manageable "about eight outfits" so that the laundry doesn't get out of control again. They may decide to swap different things in and out later if their favourite clothes aren't available but it's less work this way. Rob also hoovered the hair clippings and sand from the ground floor.
We had salad in the garden for lunch; it was very companionable, the four of us sitting under our new ginormous parasol so no-one got burnt. The children waved over the fence at a child two gardens away whom we see out and about occasionally, but everyone was too shy to hold an actual conversation, so they stuck with waving.
Rob went to the train station with Emer to buy his first train ticket for work - just a three-month one to start with; we're hoping to pay it off and save for the next one simultaneously, haha, but it's hard to know whether that will work. Even the children are beginning to look forward to his starting the new job, which is a relief, because Emer was very angry for quite a long time. She's particularly annoyed about missing their Friday evening swimming sessions.
There was a broken bottle in the cyclepath just at the junction with the 4-lane (or is it 6? I can't remember) IDR. So the rear tyre of the trike is thoroughly punctured; the tube will almost certainly have to be scrapped, not patched. Luckily we have some spare tubes, but the rear wheel is the one with all the gears and fork and so on, so it's a lot trickier than replacing a tube on the front wheels, which is just a pop-old-off-pop-new-on job.
While they were out, Linnea watched The Magic School Bus again and I napped very thoroughly.
Then Rob, Linnea and Emer went out the front and invited the child from two doors down out to play; she's 4 years old and her family are from Nepal. Tomorrow she might come and play in our garden if we can get organised enough. She's very shy and didn't speak to Rob or Linnea or Emer at all, but they all seemed to enjoy playing together.
We had cold roast chicken for dinner, with potato salad and things. Again in the garden, again a sort of blissful idyll going on. And then there were peaches and Booja Booja ginger icecream for dessert, which was just about right.
And then Rob and I sieved all the sand in the expletive deleted sandpit to fish out the censored Playmobil toys, including teeny weeny fairy wings and so on. All the Playmobil in the house is going up into the attic now. The time and effort and money I put into acquiring reasonably-priced second-hand Playmobil is nontrivial and we really can't replace it if they lose or destroy it through forbidden activities like burying it in the damn sand. We added 20kg of sand to that sandpit on the explicit condition that they not shovel the sand onto the grass and not put Playmobil or Lego toys in it.
So then it was bedtime, and Rob is reading Emer her story while I sit downstairs in the moderately tidy front room feeling huge, hot, happy and exhausted.
After they got home, we sorted through clothes and laundry and things, and I reduced the children's in-use wardrobes to a more manageable "about eight outfits" so that the laundry doesn't get out of control again. They may decide to swap different things in and out later if their favourite clothes aren't available but it's less work this way. Rob also hoovered the hair clippings and sand from the ground floor.
We had salad in the garden for lunch; it was very companionable, the four of us sitting under our new ginormous parasol so no-one got burnt. The children waved over the fence at a child two gardens away whom we see out and about occasionally, but everyone was too shy to hold an actual conversation, so they stuck with waving.
Rob went to the train station with Emer to buy his first train ticket for work - just a three-month one to start with; we're hoping to pay it off and save for the next one simultaneously, haha, but it's hard to know whether that will work. Even the children are beginning to look forward to his starting the new job, which is a relief, because Emer was very angry for quite a long time. She's particularly annoyed about missing their Friday evening swimming sessions.
There was a broken bottle in the cyclepath just at the junction with the 4-lane (or is it 6? I can't remember) IDR. So the rear tyre of the trike is thoroughly punctured; the tube will almost certainly have to be scrapped, not patched. Luckily we have some spare tubes, but the rear wheel is the one with all the gears and fork and so on, so it's a lot trickier than replacing a tube on the front wheels, which is just a pop-old-off-pop-new-on job.
While they were out, Linnea watched The Magic School Bus again and I napped very thoroughly.
Then Rob, Linnea and Emer went out the front and invited the child from two doors down out to play; she's 4 years old and her family are from Nepal. Tomorrow she might come and play in our garden if we can get organised enough. She's very shy and didn't speak to Rob or Linnea or Emer at all, but they all seemed to enjoy playing together.
We had cold roast chicken for dinner, with potato salad and things. Again in the garden, again a sort of blissful idyll going on. And then there were peaches and Booja Booja ginger icecream for dessert, which was just about right.
And then Rob and I sieved all the sand in the expletive deleted sandpit to fish out the censored Playmobil toys, including teeny weeny fairy wings and so on. All the Playmobil in the house is going up into the attic now. The time and effort and money I put into acquiring reasonably-priced second-hand Playmobil is nontrivial and we really can't replace it if they lose or destroy it through forbidden activities like burying it in the damn sand. We added 20kg of sand to that sandpit on the explicit condition that they not shovel the sand onto the grass and not put Playmobil or Lego toys in it.
So then it was bedtime, and Rob is reading Emer her story while I sit downstairs in the moderately tidy front room feeling huge, hot, happy and exhausted.