‘Mummy! I’ve done loads of development work but no refining!!’ It was Josie. It was the Art. I clapped my hand to my mouth and did my I’M SHOCKED! look, though I had no idea whether this was brilliant or terrible news. ‘Cup of tea?’ usually covers it. ‘I can’t eat, I can’t drink’ she panted, ‘I have too much work to do. I am in crisis.’
She is doing a PhD in Art – cunningly described as a GCSE - entailing about six hours of work daily, responding to this, developing that, describing the journey ya? from eye-balls to ice-cubes, dunes to decomposing apples, culminating in – tada! – the Final Piece, all for one measly GCSE. I am not thinking about what is expected in the A Level - the Podium in Trafalgar Square?
First it was the working space; her tiny bedroom was rearranged and a space for a large table magically tessellated (by me), only downside being you now have to take a running leap over the table to reach the wardrobe. This was cutting off my nose to spite my face since I’m the one who picks the clothes off the floor and puts them back in the wardrobe, which I think I’ve probably winged about before. The arrangement is doing wonders for my high-jump.
Next, my purse and I were invited to Cass Art in Islington for materials – parking impossible of course, so it was queuing in Sainsbury’s on a Saturday afternoon (clever) in order to spend ten quid for ‘free’ parking, thus missing home delivery of the Tesco shopping I did want...but at least the materials for the Final Piece only came to £60, including a canvas for Bonnie (‘I’ve always wanted a canvas - how come Josie gets all the cool stuff?’) on which she has painted one eye, then left as a catch-all on the kitchen table with the general debris.
Josie’s Final Piece was an extravaganza of silhouettes, windows, styles from different decades…the theme was similarities and differences (you knew that) and the whole thing – why not? – was to be lit up from behind. I knew she’d request my technical assistance with the illuminations, it being a bit hot and tiresome lugging florescent tubes home from Homebase, but I was pleased to help, though I would have been more so if it had not been 8pm the night before show time. But when I staggered in with the pile of wood, florescent lights and screws (£50) I did have a sense of satisfaction; ‘Good old Mum saves the day again!’
...which lasted for two minutes, for when we opened the lights we realised that florescent lights need to be screwed to a ceiling and connected to an electric circuit in order to produce light – sticking them onto the frame and crossing your fingers like a dummy wasn’t going to do it. ‘You want to use push-on LED lights’ said Alan, from behind the paper. ‘They’ll be much better for the job and you can get them anywhere!’ ‘Thank you so much for your timely contribution’ I said, thwacking him over the head with a four foot florescent. I did some shouting at Josie too about everything always being at the last b----y minute which may have ruined all my good work with the cups of tea, but made me feel a lot better about rearranging the next day, to fly around north London sourcing push-on lights (‘get them anywhere’ my foot) as she sat her exam, and delivering them to her at school asap, Sa!
Showing posts with label education. Show all posts
Showing posts with label education. Show all posts
Sunday, 8 May 2011
Saturday, 5 February 2011
Hallelujah!
HALLELUJAH!! With Secondary School just a few months off, Alfie has come in with the Big One; he is reading Harry Potter!!! His impressive reading bank now comprises Beano, Captain Underpants, Wimpy Kid, Match Magazine and Harry Potter! (I could include Top Trumps, but that would be gilding the lily)
To celebrate, I have thrown caution to the wind and bought new copies of the Harry Potter volumes at full price, an extravagance hitherto reserved for the School Book Fair when the Head is watching. ‘They’re classics, Alfie,’ I drawl ‘so we should buy nice new copies - maybe your own children will read them one day!’ (He reads a chapter book, next thing is I’m asking for grandchildren!’)
This zeal for self-improvement is down to his new teacher, the inspirational Ms P: ‘She writes words after my work instead of just ticks!’ ‘Never!’ ‘And she’s made this huge chart of conjgetives!’ ‘Con-nec-tives?’ ‘Yes!! D’you know about them too??!!’
Before Ms P (BP) literacy was as interesting to Alfie as a wet carrot. I’d find some ripped up piece of paper with illegible markings in his pocket, which I would waggle in front of him, wondering if he was planning to blow his nose on it. ‘What is this?’ I would say. ‘This is my story’, he’d reply, biting his lip to repress a snort of laughter. ‘I’ll read it to you: Billy Whizz got his lovely dinna and he got his shinny spoon and he put all the dinna in his mouth yum yum the end’
We have a little prayer of thanks for Ms P:
Our Ms P, who art in heaven
Hallowed be thy pen
I thought I couldn’t write
Till you shone the light
But now I can spell ‘eleven’
Amen
Same story wih Maths – he’s on fire! ‘Mummy! Can I do another mental maths test? Please?’ ‘That’ll be ten tests, Alfie’ pinning my eyelids open ‘Ready? Two.. Thousand.. Divided.. By-‘ ‘SLOW DOWN MUMMY!!..’ The minute the test is finished ‘Mark it! Mark it!’ hopping from foot to foot – ‘What d’I get??’’
By contrast, the lovely Maddy, with GCSE courses a few months off, is in danger of sleeping through her entire secondary school career, though in her opinion it is the school that keeps tests and homeworks a secret from her. (‘Why didn’t you know about this homework???!!! Were you in the class??!!!!’ ‘Yeah, obviously’) She has to choose her GCSE Options: ‘So what do you want to do at GCSE, Maddy?’ ‘Nothing’ she says. ‘OK..er…well that’s as good a starting point as any...’
But she doesn’t have a Ms P, only me, so I decided this weekend it was time to pull out the big guns: ‘Maddy, I’ll do anything you want if you will just get your act together. I will buy you Supernoodles for a month!’ ‘Now you’re talking, Mummy!’ she said, putty in my hands. ‘Give me a pen – I’ve got work to do!’
To celebrate, I have thrown caution to the wind and bought new copies of the Harry Potter volumes at full price, an extravagance hitherto reserved for the School Book Fair when the Head is watching. ‘They’re classics, Alfie,’ I drawl ‘so we should buy nice new copies - maybe your own children will read them one day!’ (He reads a chapter book, next thing is I’m asking for grandchildren!’)
This zeal for self-improvement is down to his new teacher, the inspirational Ms P: ‘She writes words after my work instead of just ticks!’ ‘Never!’ ‘And she’s made this huge chart of conjgetives!’ ‘Con-nec-tives?’ ‘Yes!! D’you know about them too??!!’
Before Ms P (BP) literacy was as interesting to Alfie as a wet carrot. I’d find some ripped up piece of paper with illegible markings in his pocket, which I would waggle in front of him, wondering if he was planning to blow his nose on it. ‘What is this?’ I would say. ‘This is my story’, he’d reply, biting his lip to repress a snort of laughter. ‘I’ll read it to you: Billy Whizz got his lovely dinna and he got his shinny spoon and he put all the dinna in his mouth yum yum the end’
We have a little prayer of thanks for Ms P:
Our Ms P, who art in heaven
Hallowed be thy pen
I thought I couldn’t write
Till you shone the light
But now I can spell ‘eleven’
Amen
Same story wih Maths – he’s on fire! ‘Mummy! Can I do another mental maths test? Please?’ ‘That’ll be ten tests, Alfie’ pinning my eyelids open ‘Ready? Two.. Thousand.. Divided.. By-‘ ‘SLOW DOWN MUMMY!!..’ The minute the test is finished ‘Mark it! Mark it!’ hopping from foot to foot – ‘What d’I get??’’
By contrast, the lovely Maddy, with GCSE courses a few months off, is in danger of sleeping through her entire secondary school career, though in her opinion it is the school that keeps tests and homeworks a secret from her. (‘Why didn’t you know about this homework???!!! Were you in the class??!!!!’ ‘Yeah, obviously’) She has to choose her GCSE Options: ‘So what do you want to do at GCSE, Maddy?’ ‘Nothing’ she says. ‘OK..er…well that’s as good a starting point as any...’
But she doesn’t have a Ms P, only me, so I decided this weekend it was time to pull out the big guns: ‘Maddy, I’ll do anything you want if you will just get your act together. I will buy you Supernoodles for a month!’ ‘Now you’re talking, Mummy!’ she said, putty in my hands. ‘Give me a pen – I’ve got work to do!’
Friday, 17 September 2010
Reading Time
The Summer Holidays are over. ‘Congratulations!’ I said to the children ‘During your six weeks of leisure you have read an average of twenty-three pages of a book each, that's including the Captain Underpants pages that are just a picture plus ‘SPLAT!’’. I issued a queenly directive that Reading Time was now mandatory (thirty minutes a day is sufficient, I am not unreasonable) before anyone was allowed to switch on a computer or TV. ‘OK!’ they said ‘No problem!’.
I spent the following week being model mum, welcoming them home with a little snack – home-made banana muffins one day ('what’s that stink?') – before offering to play a non-electronic game ('uh, no thanks'), asking them how their reading was going, then morphing into cop-mum, prowling around the house hiding behind doors and leaping out “HANDS UP! PUT THE DS DOWN! READ YOUR BOOK! GRRRRRRRRR!!!!!!!!!!’.
A week of them flouting ‘our agreement’ and I was a wreck - mute with fury and disappointment. It was me and the humble book against the world of high tech wham bam super-stimulation and I was beat unless I could remove the competition. ‘How was your day?’ said Alan, invigorated from a day of tricky meetings handled well.
‘THE CHILDREN ARE TURNING INTO VEGETABLES. I AM SERIOUSLY DEPRESSED ABOUT THIS AND NO-ONE CARES! I’D LIKE TO THROW THE WHOLE LOT OF THEM OUT OF THE WINDOW!’ (the computers or the children, I was past caring).
Alan’s ears pricked up at this for I can be rash and he likes his technology. ‘We can’t turn back the clock thirty years;’ said that sensible man, ‘we are where we are’ (that is very helpful - thankyou.). The children were jittery (‘She’s gone mad – she might actually lob the lot out in the road!’) and suddenly I was awash with desperate pledges: ‘No computer-time during the week, quarter an hour at the week-end if we’re good…’ ‘No, five minutes once a month, or you cut our ears off...’
But of course the next morning…trot trot trot…the Wii was on, 7am. I stormed in and slammed it off:
‘DO YOU NOT CARE ABOUT MY FEELINGS? DO YOU NOT LOVE YOUR MOTHER ENOUGH TO DO WHAT SHE SAYS JUST A LITTLE?’
Oh it was good, it was very good. Reading Time was conducted in complete silence – exam conditions – broken only by the occasional terrified whisper ‘have we had half an hour yet’ ‘No!’ I grunted. I am thinking of selling the idea to a Young Offenders’ Institution.
Later Bonnie came to me with a little membership card she’d made to hang around her neck. There was a photo of herself, and she'd penned the following caption: ‘Bonnie Grant-Pyett – Member of the Family’. She put her arms around me and said ‘I’m sorry I’m so bad, Mummy’. Oh God. Arrest me now.
On the upside, the children are positively queuing up to get out of the house in the morning and go to school – no separation issues whatsoever. Alfie is enjoying his SATS year, (after the initial struggle remembering how to write his name) mostly because there is a builder in his classroom whose trousers show ‘loads and loads of his BUM!’, and because after school he's exploding coke with mentoes with his chums. Bonnie is being entered early for her Arguing The Toss GCSE:
‘Mr Goolam Possum is in our old classroom now’
‘Do you mean Mr Goolam Hossen?’
‘No, Mr Goolam Possum’
‘A Possum is a fluffy long-tailed animal found in Australia’
‘No it’s not, it’s a flower’
‘That’s a blossom’
‘No it’s not’…
Maddy has shifted out of stand-by mode (dressing-gown, remote) and into Year 9 with her customary enthusiasm (‘How was it???’ ‘Uh.’) and Josie is on the verge of a nervous breakdown one week into Year 11 because she hasn’t completed phases 1(i),(ii) and (iii) of the 97th draft of her colour-coded revision schedule: 'Oh my god I am like so exhausted you have no idea and I’m not kidding seriously I’m going to mess up all my exams do you think my ears are weird..?' so it’s best I shut up if she needs to go shopping again for relaxation purposes, and make her a cup of tea when she gets back. Unless we’re reading..
I spent the following week being model mum, welcoming them home with a little snack – home-made banana muffins one day ('what’s that stink?') – before offering to play a non-electronic game ('uh, no thanks'), asking them how their reading was going, then morphing into cop-mum, prowling around the house hiding behind doors and leaping out “HANDS UP! PUT THE DS DOWN! READ YOUR BOOK! GRRRRRRRRR!!!!!!!!!!’.
A week of them flouting ‘our agreement’ and I was a wreck - mute with fury and disappointment. It was me and the humble book against the world of high tech wham bam super-stimulation and I was beat unless I could remove the competition. ‘How was your day?’ said Alan, invigorated from a day of tricky meetings handled well.
‘THE CHILDREN ARE TURNING INTO VEGETABLES. I AM SERIOUSLY DEPRESSED ABOUT THIS AND NO-ONE CARES! I’D LIKE TO THROW THE WHOLE LOT OF THEM OUT OF THE WINDOW!’ (the computers or the children, I was past caring).
Alan’s ears pricked up at this for I can be rash and he likes his technology. ‘We can’t turn back the clock thirty years;’ said that sensible man, ‘we are where we are’ (that is very helpful - thankyou.). The children were jittery (‘She’s gone mad – she might actually lob the lot out in the road!’) and suddenly I was awash with desperate pledges: ‘No computer-time during the week, quarter an hour at the week-end if we’re good…’ ‘No, five minutes once a month, or you cut our ears off...’
But of course the next morning…trot trot trot…the Wii was on, 7am. I stormed in and slammed it off:
‘DO YOU NOT CARE ABOUT MY FEELINGS? DO YOU NOT LOVE YOUR MOTHER ENOUGH TO DO WHAT SHE SAYS JUST A LITTLE?’
Oh it was good, it was very good. Reading Time was conducted in complete silence – exam conditions – broken only by the occasional terrified whisper ‘have we had half an hour yet’ ‘No!’ I grunted. I am thinking of selling the idea to a Young Offenders’ Institution.
Later Bonnie came to me with a little membership card she’d made to hang around her neck. There was a photo of herself, and she'd penned the following caption: ‘Bonnie Grant-Pyett – Member of the Family’. She put her arms around me and said ‘I’m sorry I’m so bad, Mummy’. Oh God. Arrest me now.
On the upside, the children are positively queuing up to get out of the house in the morning and go to school – no separation issues whatsoever. Alfie is enjoying his SATS year, (after the initial struggle remembering how to write his name) mostly because there is a builder in his classroom whose trousers show ‘loads and loads of his BUM!’, and because after school he's exploding coke with mentoes with his chums. Bonnie is being entered early for her Arguing The Toss GCSE:
‘Mr Goolam Possum is in our old classroom now’
‘Do you mean Mr Goolam Hossen?’
‘No, Mr Goolam Possum’
‘A Possum is a fluffy long-tailed animal found in Australia’
‘No it’s not, it’s a flower’
‘That’s a blossom’
‘No it’s not’…
Maddy has shifted out of stand-by mode (dressing-gown, remote) and into Year 9 with her customary enthusiasm (‘How was it???’ ‘Uh.’) and Josie is on the verge of a nervous breakdown one week into Year 11 because she hasn’t completed phases 1(i),(ii) and (iii) of the 97th draft of her colour-coded revision schedule: 'Oh my god I am like so exhausted you have no idea and I’m not kidding seriously I’m going to mess up all my exams do you think my ears are weird..?' so it’s best I shut up if she needs to go shopping again for relaxation purposes, and make her a cup of tea when she gets back. Unless we’re reading..
Sunday, 15 August 2010
Packed with Fun
We did it, today, we did it! We went to the library!! ‘Mummy, what are we actually doing in this place?’ said Alfie, mystified. ‘This is the library, Alfie – remember we used to come here every week - for videos – before the DVD machine and catch-up TV?’ I whispered. Then, booming loud: ‘You need a nice book to take on holiday tomorrow, don’t you?’. ‘But I’ve already got my Horrid Henry Annual!’ he declared, which was true, but hell, why not try something new this year?
I’d extended the invitation to all, repeatedly, through gritted teeth - ‘Hey, isn’t it lovely we have time to go to the library!!’ - but the girls were up to their eyes finding anything but that to do. Only Alfie, who had no plans except hanging upside down all day, accepted.
The library’s Summer Reading Challenge was on to tempt us! Six completed books (one a week being the idea) earnt a smashing certificate and stickers (‘d’you get any money?’) handed out at the end of the holidays at the Presentation Ceremony. What's more, there was a free magic show - bookworms have fun too you know! - though my older two would rather eat mud than be seen dead at this…
Last year, Alfie had met the Challenge head on, choosing six baby books - 'Boo Baby Boo!', 'Splish Splash Splosh' and the like. He’d read them all by the time we got home from the library, so we were back there the next day to pocket the goodies, instead of a week later, exchanging one quality chapter book for another and guess what? forming a healthy reading habit! No, according to my lot, why would you spend lazy summer days reading Enid Blyton under the shade of a tree when you could satisfy your literary appetite by scanning cereal packets for theme park vouchers which, who knows, you might be taken to one day? Now that would be fun.
I grabbed a few thin books (I’d be doing the carrying once we left for our holiday and Alan’s bad back kicked in) and returned home to dread the next day getting four children with Nintendo withdrawal and a mild-mannered husband with freak outbursts closely associated with being with us lot, from London to Lake Garda. ‘We’ll have such an adventure children!' I exclaimed – 'let’s count all the modes of transport we're gong to use! First the car, then the shuttle to the plane, then…’
‘IT’S 3 O’CLOCK!! – SCREEN TIME!!!!’ They'd gone.
‘..then the plane, then the Italian underground…’ I trailed off. Anyway, it was time to pack, which presented a problem. The girls had been much much too busy shopping for yet more necklaces with clocks and birds and teacups hanging off them, and resting from these arduous excursions over lunch with friends, to find a single moment to unpack the dirty clothes or cheese sandwiches left in their bags from Latitude two weeks ago! I must have forgotten that crucial 45th reminder. I now had to decide whether to get stroppy and make them do the work, thus missing the plane, or do it all myself, which would make me stroppy. I’d give them a break – Lord knows they needed it – and do it myself.
But first, I yanked open the marital bedroom door to check Alan wasn't lying down, instead of doing his packing. Far from it! - Imelda Marcos himself was stuffing three pairs of identical brown trainers into our one hold bag ‘in case the other pairs get wet’(!?) ‘We are going to Italy Alan not Wales’ I said. ’Monday and Tuesday: sunny; Wednesday to Friday: cloudy and sunny’ he replied (obviously been googling the weather again). ‘Quick! Get the galoshes! ’ I said, but he wasn’t in the mood…wet socks were no laughing matter.
I’d extended the invitation to all, repeatedly, through gritted teeth - ‘Hey, isn’t it lovely we have time to go to the library!!’ - but the girls were up to their eyes finding anything but that to do. Only Alfie, who had no plans except hanging upside down all day, accepted.
The library’s Summer Reading Challenge was on to tempt us! Six completed books (one a week being the idea) earnt a smashing certificate and stickers (‘d’you get any money?’) handed out at the end of the holidays at the Presentation Ceremony. What's more, there was a free magic show - bookworms have fun too you know! - though my older two would rather eat mud than be seen dead at this…
Last year, Alfie had met the Challenge head on, choosing six baby books - 'Boo Baby Boo!', 'Splish Splash Splosh' and the like. He’d read them all by the time we got home from the library, so we were back there the next day to pocket the goodies, instead of a week later, exchanging one quality chapter book for another and guess what? forming a healthy reading habit! No, according to my lot, why would you spend lazy summer days reading Enid Blyton under the shade of a tree when you could satisfy your literary appetite by scanning cereal packets for theme park vouchers which, who knows, you might be taken to one day? Now that would be fun.
I grabbed a few thin books (I’d be doing the carrying once we left for our holiday and Alan’s bad back kicked in) and returned home to dread the next day getting four children with Nintendo withdrawal and a mild-mannered husband with freak outbursts closely associated with being with us lot, from London to Lake Garda. ‘We’ll have such an adventure children!' I exclaimed – 'let’s count all the modes of transport we're gong to use! First the car, then the shuttle to the plane, then…’
‘IT’S 3 O’CLOCK!! – SCREEN TIME!!!!’ They'd gone.
‘..then the plane, then the Italian underground…’ I trailed off. Anyway, it was time to pack, which presented a problem. The girls had been much much too busy shopping for yet more necklaces with clocks and birds and teacups hanging off them, and resting from these arduous excursions over lunch with friends, to find a single moment to unpack the dirty clothes or cheese sandwiches left in their bags from Latitude two weeks ago! I must have forgotten that crucial 45th reminder. I now had to decide whether to get stroppy and make them do the work, thus missing the plane, or do it all myself, which would make me stroppy. I’d give them a break – Lord knows they needed it – and do it myself.
But first, I yanked open the marital bedroom door to check Alan wasn't lying down, instead of doing his packing. Far from it! - Imelda Marcos himself was stuffing three pairs of identical brown trainers into our one hold bag ‘in case the other pairs get wet’(!?) ‘We are going to Italy Alan not Wales’ I said. ’Monday and Tuesday: sunny; Wednesday to Friday: cloudy and sunny’ he replied (obviously been googling the weather again). ‘Quick! Get the galoshes! ’ I said, but he wasn’t in the mood…wet socks were no laughing matter.
Saturday, 31 July 2010
Biff Boff!
Alan and the girls returned from Latitude Music Festival as gentle as lentils: ‘That was cool, man.’ The girls demanded a further unauthorised absence from school to recover horizontally from doing nothing all weekend, but Alan shot into work before his tan faded to model the designer stubble which was just too much hassle to remove until a straight-talking first-born said ‘I didn’t know you were going grey’, whereupon it disappeared pretty much immediately. ‘No ponytail, absolutely not’, I said, ‘it wouldn’t match your brogues, and the smock – bedwear only’.
Josie had a heavenly glow about her and I knew for sure she’d had an amazing experience: I was right – she’d borrowed her friend’s leggings: ‘They were so soft!’ She put her arm around forlorn me, ‘But don’t worry, Mummy, I don’t know how people stop their washing being rough and hard either’. Maddy and her mates were escorted back to Alan, lying down in his tent, by a security guard, who'd found them in the S&M tent. Glad some-one was keeping an eye out.
One more week of learning before the Summer Holidays! By Tuesday, ALfie and Bonnie were bug-eyed with film-watching while their teachers hid the best rubbers for next term. Teacher presents! I'd planned to give the teachers ice-cream, but Bonnie was on it:‘You are no way giving boring ice-cream to my teacher, that sucks’. I searched the emergency presents drawer. It was the last day of term. 'What about a fluffy Winnie-the-Pooh hot water bottle, Bonnie?' I said, but it was ‘Oh man, are you kidding?'. A football motif whoopee cushion and a glow in the dark IKEA toilet bag rounded up the selection, the latter winning by a whisker. That meant that Alfie’s very un-fluffy teacher would get the fluffy Winnie-the-Pooh hot water bottle – it could double as a missile when she was breaking in her new class. 'What do you think, ALfie?' I said 'Biff boff' was the reply, so that was decided. I was imagining my dreadful presents lined up alongside the organic chocolates and Estee Lauder, but Alan put me straight: ‘Don’t worry, those teachers must get all sorts of junk’, which made me feel alot better, I think.
I wrote the last crawling notes of apology to the girls’ teachers with some relief: ‘Dear Miss, Maddy couldn’t do her homework and watch Hollyoaks, Misfits and The Apprentice, so she prioritised the good TV. She is so very sorry and will never ever do it again, Yours Sincerely, Sucker’; ‘Josie has no tie, I don’t know why, Where can it be? She should have three!’
Maddy tumbled in after school with her friends in a 'school's finished hysteria' throwing together a pancake mixture, pink this time, some of which made it to the kitchen table where it was eaten off the large sheet of paper I had stuck down to encourage everyone to draw their vision of the holidays to come (I am the sole contributor so far). The rest of the pink gunge was welded to areas of high use – the kettle, door knobs, microwave, cutlery drawer, and the bathroom sink where they had thought to wash their hands so's they'd be clean and comfortable. They kindly moved up to our bedroom so that the cleaner (me) could get started on the kitchen, and they could eat crisps on my bed and discuss how annoying mums are. I quite like it when they're at school.
Later, still grumpy from spring-cleaning the kitchen and not being able to shout properly until Maddy’s friends had left, it seemed like the perfect moment to announce my holidays rule, with effect from the next day: ‘No screens until 3pm - you are not zombies’. The obligatory caterwauling ensued, all of them placing bets, once my back was turned, on how long I’d last if they kept to their rule of continuous aggravation by all and any means, though they did expect a better effort than 12.45pm the next day, by which time I had the mother of all headaches, and was turning the wii remote over in my hand saying ‘this looks intriguing – what is it?’ until they got the hint and asked please to go on it. ‘Just this once’ I said. ‘BIFF BOFF!’ whooped my boy.
Josie had a heavenly glow about her and I knew for sure she’d had an amazing experience: I was right – she’d borrowed her friend’s leggings: ‘They were so soft!’ She put her arm around forlorn me, ‘But don’t worry, Mummy, I don’t know how people stop their washing being rough and hard either’. Maddy and her mates were escorted back to Alan, lying down in his tent, by a security guard, who'd found them in the S&M tent. Glad some-one was keeping an eye out.
One more week of learning before the Summer Holidays! By Tuesday, ALfie and Bonnie were bug-eyed with film-watching while their teachers hid the best rubbers for next term. Teacher presents! I'd planned to give the teachers ice-cream, but Bonnie was on it:‘You are no way giving boring ice-cream to my teacher, that sucks’. I searched the emergency presents drawer. It was the last day of term. 'What about a fluffy Winnie-the-Pooh hot water bottle, Bonnie?' I said, but it was ‘Oh man, are you kidding?'. A football motif whoopee cushion and a glow in the dark IKEA toilet bag rounded up the selection, the latter winning by a whisker. That meant that Alfie’s very un-fluffy teacher would get the fluffy Winnie-the-Pooh hot water bottle – it could double as a missile when she was breaking in her new class. 'What do you think, ALfie?' I said 'Biff boff' was the reply, so that was decided. I was imagining my dreadful presents lined up alongside the organic chocolates and Estee Lauder, but Alan put me straight: ‘Don’t worry, those teachers must get all sorts of junk’, which made me feel alot better, I think.
I wrote the last crawling notes of apology to the girls’ teachers with some relief: ‘Dear Miss, Maddy couldn’t do her homework and watch Hollyoaks, Misfits and The Apprentice, so she prioritised the good TV. She is so very sorry and will never ever do it again, Yours Sincerely, Sucker’; ‘Josie has no tie, I don’t know why, Where can it be? She should have three!’
Maddy tumbled in after school with her friends in a 'school's finished hysteria' throwing together a pancake mixture, pink this time, some of which made it to the kitchen table where it was eaten off the large sheet of paper I had stuck down to encourage everyone to draw their vision of the holidays to come (I am the sole contributor so far). The rest of the pink gunge was welded to areas of high use – the kettle, door knobs, microwave, cutlery drawer, and the bathroom sink where they had thought to wash their hands so's they'd be clean and comfortable. They kindly moved up to our bedroom so that the cleaner (me) could get started on the kitchen, and they could eat crisps on my bed and discuss how annoying mums are. I quite like it when they're at school.
Later, still grumpy from spring-cleaning the kitchen and not being able to shout properly until Maddy’s friends had left, it seemed like the perfect moment to announce my holidays rule, with effect from the next day: ‘No screens until 3pm - you are not zombies’. The obligatory caterwauling ensued, all of them placing bets, once my back was turned, on how long I’d last if they kept to their rule of continuous aggravation by all and any means, though they did expect a better effort than 12.45pm the next day, by which time I had the mother of all headaches, and was turning the wii remote over in my hand saying ‘this looks intriguing – what is it?’ until they got the hint and asked please to go on it. ‘Just this once’ I said. ‘BIFF BOFF!’ whooped my boy.
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