Coming Home

It is kind of enjoyable being back at work for a protracted stretch, but I do so very much prefer being at home. This week, these are a few of the sights that have greeted me upon my return:

I have also come home to:

:: small, hot, sticky children being gratifying pleased to see me and thus dispensing kisses with abandon
:: a clean bathroom (Yay!)
:: some proper good dinners
:: a husband who misses me
:: a HUMUNGOUS bottle of ketchup in the middle of the living room floor. (It's still there. I'm waiting to see how long it will be before W notices)
:: small lego and playmobil persons in unusual places
:: a crunchy sofa
:: crushing tiredness brought on by not having done full time hours since I went on my very first maternity leave seven years ago, coupled with a lowered threshold for tolerating leaky anaesthetic gases. SLEEPY! Oh yes! I reckon in about three weeks I'll have shouldered it all and Normal Service will be resumed.

Hope so anyway...x

Yesterday we took the bears for a day out to the country park.

20 yards from the car Miss T stood in dog poo. We discovered this 40 yards from the car when W lifted her onto his shoulders and wondered what the cheesy smell was.

Meanwhile, I am attempting to have my usual pre-day-out talk with the big ones, which goes like this: Don't run off, walk with us, don't go around any corners without us, if I can't see you, I don't know what's happening to you...

They run off.

100 yards from the car Custard gets stranded in the middle of a muddy boggy bit. Mouse sinks up to her ankles in it and starts sobbing. FHB goes at full speed to help his brother, slips, skids through the mud and ends up top to toe brown. W, who has now finished cleaning Miss T's shoes, strips FHB down to his pants and gives him his tracksuit top. FHB now looks like he is wearing a dress.

I am laughing so hard I think I may have a problem.

We decide to give up on the walk. W insists we have our picnic, so we sit on the nearest bench, kids on a blanket on the floor. We are then bothered by a large, off the lead labrador. Mouse screams and runs away.

Oh, she's fine says the owner, helpfully.

Your dog might be, but my daughter is clearly not, I say, irritated.

At this point, Miss T starts eating crisps off the blanket like a dog and we decide to go home.

What fun!