The Golden Ticket Saga - How would you deal with this?

On Saturday we ventured to the open day at Sacrewell Farm with my sister and her two beautiful children.
It is an amazing place and I would recommend it to the young and old, if you have children or not.

We had a really fun time in the play barn, a great time seeing the animals and all of the children had a go at playing pooh sticks.

Now, when we first came in to the farm, a lovely lady told us to look out for the hidden golden tickets that are all over the farm in the chances of winning a prize.

We were lucky, not only did we find one, we found three tickets. One for each of the children..........phew!

For the last half an hour of looking at the animals Tor would constantly ask, "when do we get to hand in the golden tickets?" I distinctly remember a golden ticket song starting up!

We arrive back at reception and Tor excitedly hands in his Golden Ticket. He gets offered a bowl with raffle tickets in and he chooses one. The number on the raffle ticket  matches one of the fantastic prizes on the table in view.

Both of Tor's cousins do the same and receive a cuddly pony and a puzzle. Perfect prizes and smiles all round.

Tor is handed his prize. Its a bottle of blueberry cordial.

Silence.

I am not really sure what to say to him.

He is not really sure what is happening.

As you can imagine, for a seven year old boy, this is not really the prize that he was expecting or would like.

I would like to say now before I venture further into the story that all of the prizes that Sacrewell Farm had on display (including the bottles or cordial) were brilliant prizes and I in no way would expect them to have done anything about the poor luck that Tor had been dealt.

So, we were then on the receiving end of a rather tearful, cross and confused little boy. I did feel very sympathetic and could understand the tears. What I struggled with was the anger and the fact that he expected something would be done about it if he cried and stomped and generally had a strop.
As far as I am concerned that he does need to understand that sometimes life isnt always fair. It is how you react to things that is more important.
I started to get very cross with him, at his back biting and his tears. I would not back down and I expected him to calm down.
I did tell him I understood why he was unhappy but until he calmed down that nothing could be our would be done about it.

So in the middle of the entrance to a very busy place, filled with families, I told him off, I shouted at him. He cried and tried to sit down. I told him to stand up.

I do have to praise my beautiful niece and nephew for being extremely calm, they looked affectionately at their cousin and obviously cared that he was upset.

My Sister was a saviour. Unbeknownst to myself and Tor, she had purchased a tiny little cow for him. She came over and backed me up and explained that he needed to calm down.

We left after a few deep breaths and drove back to my sisters house. It was not until Tor had completely calmed down and that I had said that it was OK, did my sister hand him the little cow (affectionately known as Moo-Moo now).

Tor was very pleased and very appreciative. I was very appreciative. Thanks big sis!

So, how would you have dealt with the situation? I look back and do not know if I acted the right way. But, at the same time I am not sure how else I would have dealt with it.

I am definitely open to ideas from everyone!

Last week according to Tor - w/c 19th January 2015

Monday
Tor: "Chocolate for breakfast, please"
Torsmum: "No"

He looks sheepish when I collect him from after school club. The manager hangs her head.
Tor: "Can I watch TV tonight?"
Torsmum: "No"

Tuesday
Tor: "Chocolate for breakfast, please"
Torsmum: "No"

Tor: "I can't find my gloves"
Torsmum: "They are on your hands"

Big thumbs up when I collect him from after school club

Torsmum: "We need to get milk from the shop"
Tor: "Can I go on my own?"
Torsmum: "Yes"

He was brimming with pride when I watched him cross back over the road from the shop holding the carrier bag with a pint of milk in. He had remembered to put the change in his pocket and the lovely man from the shop had given him a receipt. He counted out the change to check it was right.
Proud does not quite cover it. Big smiles from my boy.

Wednesday
Tor: "Chocolate for breakfast, please"
Torsmum: "No"

Broad grin when I collect him from after school club

Tor: "I was phonics superstar and I got a house point"

Torsmum: "Ooh Im so happy I could squish you"

Proud does not quite cover it. Big smiles from my boy

Tor: "Today is the best day of my life, getting a house point"

Thursday

Tor: "Weetabix please"

Torsmum:..............silence due to the shock

Tor: "Today is the best day of my life, having Finlay to play after school"

Torsmum: "So you are excited then?"

Tor: "Uh-huh"

Tor: "Is it bed time yet?"

Torsmum:.............silence due to the shock

Friday

Tor: "Have we got lemon curd?"

Torsmum: "No, we have jam"

Tor: "Have we got honey?"

Torsmum: "No, we have jam"

Tor: "I'll have jam on toast then, with butter, no not with butter, oh no, yes with butter, put it in a sandwich"

Torsmum: "So, thats a toasted jam sandwich with butter?"

Tor: "I hope you are going shopping for lemon curd today.

Torsmum: "hmphf"

Saturday
Big cuddles watching television in the morning, five minutes of bliss

Tor: "Chocolate for breakfast, please"
Torsmum: "No"

The Golden Ticket Saga and Aunty Abbie to the rescue (next blog post reveals all!)

Sunday
Tor: "Woooooaaaaahhhhh!"
He's just seen the most amazing bouncy castle at his cousins birthday party
Tor: "Woooooaaaaahhhhh!"
He's just seen the popcorn cart at his cousins birthday party

Homework time, Torsmums' least favourite part of the weekend..................

Homework time, Torsmum is very proud. No squabbling, no moaning, neat writing and a great result.

Tor: "Mummy, I've just had a nightmare"
Torsmum: "No you haven't, you haven't been asleep"

The television bug

Anyone who knows me well will agree that I am not one to preach or to tell people how they should live there lives. Everyone is different and thats how life should be. Therefore, this is not a post that tells you how you should cope with a child who would like to watch television every minute of every day, this is just how I have gone about it and how it worked for us.

We managed to get ourselves in the routine of having the  television on when we ate breakfast, when I was having a shower, when I was washing up, when we ate dinner, when I was ironing.....the list goes on. I did not like this routine. Tor did.

I have to admit it was easy, that it meant I had time to relax or time to get things done but then on the other hand I found it over stimulated Tor and resulted in some not great behaviour patterns. What I did was on a whim, it was not planned but it worked. So here are my eight steps for cutting down on television time that helped me and have helped Tor.

1) Come up with a reason of why you should cut out television for a whole week. Now I was lucky, (ummm maybe not too lucky) as my reason just blurted out of my mouth without thinking. Tor had a pretty bad destructive behaviour day. I was at the end of my tether. I was fed up with the whinging, I was fed up with the answering back so it came out. "RIGHT, THATS IT, NO TELEVISION FOR A WEEK". And yes, it was said in capitol letters. So after the crying and the whinging he took it like a six year old boy/man and went with it.

2) Be ready to be asked if the television can go on the minute your child wakes up. Be ready to bite your lip and say no. I had to hide the remote from myself so I did not give in. Actually I forgot where it was for three days!

3) Come up with fantastic Mummy ideas of what to do instead. Or in the real world, panic and pretend you have thought about the whole thing and then come up with hair brained ideas. I only had one day of darting around the house collecting paper and pens and sellotape as then Tor started coming up with ideas of his own. So chances are you will be left off the hook on this one.

4) Audio books are your friend. Have a selection at hand to put on during meal times. Then laugh as your child seemingly stares at the cd player as if its a television. But, there is a warning, you will find yourself not wanting to nip for a shower as you want to find out what Bilbo Baggins does next. Its more captivating than Nanny Plum in Ben and Hollys little Kingdom!

5) Be ready to have your house looking like absolute carnage. You will have so much fun playing lego, making snakes out of cardboard and reading books that you end up with a who cares about the washing up attitude as you are having so much fun.

6) Make sure you have more than one audio book as Bilbo Baggins may get on your nerves after 8 cd's.

7) Ensure you find the remote control by the end of the week so you can cuddle up and watch and film as a treat to you both. I recommend having popcorn so that you can choke on the popcorn kernels. Yes, fantastic fun.

8) Have lots of fun. Your child may ask at odd moments to ask television but in my view they are so easily distracted from the lust of squeaky voices and annoying theme tunes when there are giggles along the way.

Now when the week is up and you have watched television again, try not to let yourself fall into the old routine. I say this with utmost confidence and amazing Mummy knowing as I have managed one whole day after the week ban of not going back to our routine. Its amazing hey?

This morning I offered an audio book to listen to and he jumped at the chance. After school I said lets play with lego and he was very excited. So today Tor has only watched 20 minutes of television.

I am sure that come thursday and I start to become tired that the enthusiasm and hair brained scheming will become laborious, I may crack. I may rely on the brain numbing powers of Power Rangers.

So I leave you with some great pictures of the silly things we have achieved when we said NO in very loud voices to television, for a bit!

Yes, its a mothers day post!

Its not often I post about single mummyness. For me it was a choice to become a single parent and one I will never regret. Parenting on the whole is extremely difficult and that goes for all types of families so I do not feel anyone has the right to say who has it worst off or have a martyr attitude.

Today, however I wanted to post on how amazing it is to be a single mummy on mothers day. I have to admit I have had some rather stressful or disappointing mothers days previously and maybe that has had a lot to do with silly expectations and/or my attitude leading up to the day.

This was my 6th mothers day as a mother and my 3rd as a single parent.

The run up to mothers day has been very quick, I don't know about you but this year and especially March has been absolute mayhem and is going very fast. On the odd opportunities of reading fellow bloggers posts I have come across people excited for mothers day and also people loathing it and seeing it as commercialism gone too far. I have mixed emotions.

I see it as a time to be able to express your love and thanks to your family. To share the goodwill to your friends. But most I see it as a special time to make the day spectacular for my son as well as giving myself something to look back on with happiness.

As a single mummy you do miss out on the things like being given a lie in or breakfast in bed. Maybe some years you do not get a card or a present. This completely depends on the age of your children, your family and your children's father.

I am a very lucky single mum.

My relationship with Tors dad is very good at the moment. We are able to chat freely about Tor, able to organise visits easily. This was a bonus this year as he very kindly took Tor to the shop to pick out a very lovely card and helped him to write in in. It was a very lovely surprise and Tor was very proud when he gave it to me. And yes, I sent his dad a thank you text to say I appreciated the thought. Simple things make such a big difference.

My amazing mummy sneaked in a gorgeous little token for Tor to give me and I have had at least four coffee's in it already (can you guess what it was?). Such a lovely thought and her way of ensuring I do not miss out on the things that a lot of two parent families experience.

Ok, now I realise I am rambling on. I will get to the point!

Having a fantastic mothers day for single mothers I think has a lot to do with your own attitude. I woke up feeling positive and thinking whatever happens it will be a lovely day. If you wake up scared of it then I do believe you bring on negativity yourself. Although this is easier said than done.

I thought of the things that both Tor and myself enjoy to do. This day isn't just about me its about our relationship. Lets face it, I wouldn't be a mother without him!

So mentally I listed the things I thought would be great.

1) Nice breakfast
2) Making Tors Pterosaur wings - he has been asking for ages and the first attempt was a definite fail!
3) Reading together
4) Baking cakes
5) Tickling and hugging

When we both woke up and he proudly showed me the card and yes, you guessed it my new cup (with little bear) we went down for breakfast. Tor who is a weetabix monster had his usual, I treated myself to croissants. No television was my rule, and as it was mothers day there was no whining! So we had it as a picnic on the living room floor.

Breakfast over by 6.30am and I told him I was going to make the Pterosour wings. There was a "woohoo" and a "really?" and then the cutest "oh your amazing mummy".

I set to work whilst my six year old sat on me, climbed on my back, wiggled when I tried to measure him, played with lego, sat on me, wiggled, tripped over the lego. Halfway through I remember I am on call for work and I rush to check for messages.......phew there was none. I take a break, I have a coffee. My neck hurts. The happiness and excitedness that Tor was showing made it so worthwhile.

Tor was over the moon with the finished wings. I have to admit I was quite impressed with myself!

After a lot of flying off furniture and flapping about he asked if he could watch his walking with dinosaurs video. Now I am cracking down on the amount of television watched. But, today, why not. I said yes. He hot footed it upstairs and I enjoyed a coffee and time to post my silent sunday picture.

When he came down he asked if with could go to the museum. Now this wasn't on my mental list. What a fantastic idea! Yes, yes, yes, I would love to go to the museum. So we did! Tor flapped his way donning a pirate hat to the bus. Flapped his way down the street to the museum and dashed straight to the dinosaur room. We had lots of fun. It was very quiet so we were able to jump from room to room and I let him show me everything. There was lots of "oohs", lots of "come and look at this". I was blessed to be with my boy so excited.

The rest of our day involved baking cakes, reading, homework, watching The Little Mermaid, eating cakes, reading, laughing, hugging.

Generally it was amazing. It was happy and it was perfect for me.

So, single parents out there, you do not need to miss out on the celebrations, you make it how you wish. If you want to be stressed you will be. If you invite hostility it will come. But, if you hold your head up high, if you laugh, if you smile, It will be the most amazing day of the year.

Mmmm, yummy cakes!

 Happy Mothers Day to everyone.

My little mad scientist - spy style

Tor has been asking for ages to make some spy gadgets. After an early morning wake up from him and playing vets whilst he was adorned in his Doctors coat he turned round and said, "actually Mummy this coat makes me look like a scientist!"

I did my normal Saturday morning clean up of the house and then we sat down and finally started to make some spy gadgets. We cut. We got tangled up with sellotape and then it was time to go into work so we left the piles of paper and went to work for a few hours. I am very lucky that Tor really enjoys coming to work with me and both of my bosses are very welcoming to him.

One of the things that Tor was very determined on was to utilise the work printer to print out some pictures of grappling hooks. So we did this before returning home.

After the mad dash outside to retrieve my damp washing from the garden (sudden downfall of rain!) We again sat down and Tor was very adamant that today was the day to make the best spy gadgets of all time.

So still with the scientist/vet/doctors coat on and in a sellotape frenzy we came up with a watch that shoots out lasers and a "Super Spy Rucsac" that has its own grappling hook!

We had a lot of fun, but the fun had only just started.

As Tor was now a scientist he decided that he had to test out all of his new gadgets which I had to admit was definitely the thing that all good scientists do. So I came up with the idea of filming Tor during his testing. The filming had us in hysterics. I was so proud of my boy and you can see in the films below how much fun he had!

Super Spy Rucsac - Test 1

Super Spy Rucsac - Test 2

Super Spy Rucsac - The Strength Test

The Laser Watch - How it works

The Laser Watch - In action

So there you are in a nutshell, the fun we have on a Saturday. Happy Tor, Happy Mummy

Little Whinging

If you are a big Harry Potter fan like myself and Tor then you will know that 'Little Whinging" is a town in Surrey. Actually, I think it is a real place. In the last month I have thought that I lived in Little Whinging just for the amount of whinging I have had to endure. Its been relentless.

So putting the fantastic Mr Potter aside, this has been my morning and evenings for the last few weeks.

So where do I start?

I start with the moment I wake up to Tor clambering onto my bed with the delightfully amazing bright chirpy voice of  "Morning Mummy, what's for breakfast?". A good start. I already know the answer its going to be Weetabix. We go downstairs and Tor is already asking for the television to be on. Now this is a normal occurrence in our household that TV can be watched in the morning. The first problem though is getting dressed for school. Now we tried the laying out his clothes for him to get dressed whilst the television is on and this has resulted in me almost taking him to school with his pajamas on. So, the rule is the television gets turned off or paused whilst he gets dressed. This rule was imposed nearly two months ago but still every morning.......

"Muuuuummmmmyyyyyy, don't turn the tv off, I waaaaannnnnntt to watch the tv"

I have never ever given in to whiny moaning, so why on earth does he do it.......every morning! Without fail! In fact I only have to count to three to myself after I say to him its time to get dressed for the same words to come out of his mouth in the most annoying nasal whiny moaning sounding voice.

"Muuuuummmmmyyyyyy, don't turn the tv off, I waaaaannnnnntt to watch the tv"

Oh my word!

Fast forward to picking Tor up from after school club, we have had a nice chat, its all smiles then......

"Muuuuummmmmmyyyyyy, I neeeeeeeeeeed a drink, can we go to the shop?"
"Why can't we go to the shop, I neeeeeeeeeeed a drink!"

"Muuuuuummmmmmmyyyyy, I don't want to read my book when I get home!"

"Muuuuummmmmmmyyyy, my legs are sooooo tired!"

Ouch, my head is bursting.

Tor is a very happy, very bouncy energetic boy. I can cope with the boisterous behaviour (just about), I can cope with the energy, I can even cope with the slip up every so often of being rude.

I cannot cope with whinging.

I only hope this is the phase of a six year old.

I am still not giving in. I am far too stubborn for that!

Jobs for every day

Tor is always talking about when he grows up. This morning whilst walking to school he started a conversation that made me think about how I saw my future as a young child.

I have to say that I probably did not tell my parents that I wanted to be a supervisor for a company that repaired floor cleaning machines!

My sister was always determined to be a teacher and that is exactly what she has done. I am very proud of her for this. She had a goal and went for it.

I would like to think that Tor's ideas for his future will come true for him but maybe this mornings ideas are a bit far fetched!

Tor has decided that he will have numerous jobs. In fact he is going to have a different job for each day of the week.

MONDAY
"Mummy on a Monday I am going to be a Police Man but then I want to be a Vet but that will mean a very busy day as I will have to help lots and lots of animals that get caught in the rubbish people drop on the floor. But I will need to make sure I have time to help keep alive some special pets that my son would like to keep."

TUESDAY
"On a Tuesday I will be a Fireman but only in the morning because in the afternoon I will come and visit you."
So I ask him where will he visit me. Won't I be at work?
"No Mummy, you will be at home because you will be an old lady, but it is OK because I will come and make you a cup of tea".

WEDNESDAY
"On a Wednesday I will be running my Toy shop that is just open for my family and friends but especially for my son so he gets to choose what ever toy he would like. When the shop shuts I will take him home and his Mummy will make us dinner, I think we will have cheese and onion sandwiches because we both like them a lot,"

THURSDAY
" I will take my son to school on Thursday and whilst he is there I will practice doing a puppet show so I can do the puppet show when he gets home and then we will watch lots of films together."

FRIDAY
"On Friday I will take my son to Church because that's important and then we will spend the rest of the day playing in the toy shop"
(Church? Where did that come from?)

I ask him, "so what about the weekend? What fun things will you get up to then?

"Oh Mummy, I think I will be tired after that week!"

I just hope he has a very supportive partner that does not seem to get a look in! Maybe she will get to choose what to do at the weekend?

The Tooth Fairy Machine

Every night when Tor is attempting to wash his teeth without drowning or choking, on what he thinks is the most evil thing in the world, I ask him "any wobbly ones yet?"

Tor so far has no wobbly teeth at all. Not one. We both seem to be slightly perturbed by the fact. I am not sure who is most disappointed though!
Tonight he told me he was really excited about having a tooth come out. I obviously asked him why with a big grin on my face knowing what the answer would be.

"The tooth fairy leaves you a penny!"

I did smile some more with a bit of relief. One penny I can manage!

"So how much is the penny worth?" I ask. "Just one penny. the tooth fairy can't give you more unless you leave more than one tooth." He says this in a very factual way probably wondering why I do not know the ins and outs of the workings of a tooth fairy. He looks at me rather perplexed.

"You see mummy it takes one tooth to make a penny in the tooth fairy machine."

Oh

Didn't see that one coming.

Now all this has taken place whilst toothpaste is spirting from his mouth and he is gargling with his water so it actually sounded like "foot lairy mckeith" but I think I have translated correctly.

You see, the tooth fairy machine comprises of a lot of cogs, big hammers and a stretchy outy conveyor belt. The tooth is taken from under your pillow and put in one end.

"A big hammer then squishes they tooth."

Hammer actions start up and his toothbrushes flies out of his hand and into the hallway.

"The squished tooth then goes through a swirly bit to make it round."

Hula hula hips to the towel to wipe his face and head butt the towel rail.

"And then the long bit comes down"...........imagine him unfolding his arm from his elbow......"and the penny just plops of the end!"

I am starting to worry that my parent duties were not fully explained.

I ask, "so can you use the tooth penny to buy things at the shop?"

He looks at me as if I've just asked him the stupidest question in the world.

"What else would you do with it Mummy?"

Talking of fairies

Six o'clock this morning and I hear Tor's alarm clock issuing its current tune of 'Happy Birthday To You'!

I realise that I have fallen asleep on the sofa

I hear the gentle thud of him getting out of bed and going into my bedroom followed by "Mummy, muuuummmmy, are you downstairs?" I manage to wake myself up enough to say "U-huh".

The graceful patter of a herd of elephants then echoes through the house as he trundles down the stairs and he appears at the living room door clutching his puppy dog (teddy borrowed from Grandma).

After asking very nicely if he can put the television on he squeezes himself onto the sofa and I am immediately awake with the sound of the Wot Wots whilst I try my best to open my eyes.

I have to admit it takes me to at least 6.45 before I am awake and coherent. Tor turns the television off and decides that what I need is for him to put his One Direction CD on at full whack and dance around in his superman onesie!

It did make me smile.

After the normal morning routine of Tor eating his Weetabix whilst watching Ben and Holly, me having a shower and shouting downstairs at least fifteen times for him to get his school uniform on, I then go downstairs to do the final push to get us out the door. We have managed to get to the stage where coats and shoes go on he says....

"Mummy, can we make a fairy house?"

So in true tired Mummy style whilst physically pushing him out of the front door I mutter the likes of  "yes of course we can honey when we get home".

The school run and walk to work goes as normal, a busy day engulfs me and before I know it its six pm and we are walking home backwards singing 'you can fly, you can fly' from Disney's Peter Pan film. We get in the door both ravenous and I am picking up the trail of coats, gloves, shoes and book bag that have suddenly littered the floor.

"Mummy.....so this fairy house, where should we make it?"

Woah, its 6.15pm, I am tired, I am hungry, I have just stepped on some lego!

I am trying to remember....Postive Me, Positive Tor, Positive Life whilst my stomach is shouting 'food, food, food'!

So I clear the kitchen floor, I put down the plastic sheets, I get out all the glitter, paint, glue, sticky on things. Ask Tor to put on his pj's so he doesn't get paint on his school uniform. Boil the kettle, get the frozen beans out, get the smash ready, put the oven on, stick in the quiche. Pick up Tor's pants and socks, put them in the washing machine, put his pj's back the right way round whilst he stands on his head giggling.

Tor is enjoying himself. I just want food.

Dinners on.

Together we put all the different glitters in a pot and add some white paint. He starts painting. The beans bubble over. We mix in red and he loves the pink it makes. He paints some more. He adds green and orange. We have made a poo colour. He thinks its hilarious.

And then...."Mummy, it needs a sign post!" Well yes, it most certainly does. We find card, we find a pencil. He cuts, he draws, he glues and sticks.

I turn round from the oven and he is sitting there beaming from ear to ear.

"Mummy, do you think the fairies will like this?"

Oh yes I do. What a proud Mummy. I am not hungry anymore. All I want to do is shout to the world about how amazing my little boy is.

         "Mummy.........when is dinner ready?"

We Made It! - 20th January 2014

Wow! So this my first post to link up to my new "We Made It" blog hop.

So I am going to start with the subject of Lego and Dinasours! These are two of Tors favourite subjects and this evening both subjects intermingled when I heard the cry of "Mummy lets make a dinasour out of lego!"

Superb idea I thought and the lego is spread out on a sheet on the floor.......

Tor then starts straight away at the building hunched over on his knees and I cannot see what he is up to. He keeps looking over at me and asking, "what are you building mummy?"

I love building random things but I have to say I was lost for ideas this evening. I then took out my trusty phone and googled 'make a lego dinasour'. Oh google how I love you sometimes!

I found this!

Due to the very random lego that we have acquired of the years I did build it with different colours!

And the end result after a bit of tinkering from Tor................

Tor then revealed his dinasour which I thought was amazing because he just used his own imagination!

We Made It!

The magic of Christmas has started in our house

Mummy - "Did you have a good sleep?"

Tor - "Yes, I was just dreaming about Christmas."

Mummy - "Oh yes? What were you dreaming?"

Tor - "I was thinking that if on Christmas night I wake up and see Father Christmas I will be able to go in his sleigh to the North Pole and help him deliver all his presents and then he will deliver me back here ready for the morning."

Mummy - "Oh that sounds amazing. If you do go will you leave me a letter to say where you have gone?"

......................Silence

Tor - "Of course I would!"

There is me thinking I would get an invite to go as well!

My boy

My boy, he's definitely got character.

When leaving the school grounds the other day he decided to show me in the middle of the pavement that he can do press-ups.
I am jealous, never been able to do them properly and here is a 5 year old doing about ten perfect press-ups getting wet hands due to the rain.

Well at least I know he's strong.



My boy, he's definitely got imagination.

This morning he decided he wanted to fly to school so requested that we get down his precious angel bag and use his fairy dust. His angel bag is a small bag that he received after being blessed at the Goddess Temple when he was small. An amazing lady, Georgina conducted his blessing for us. His favourite item in the bag being his fairy dust. 
So off we went this morning and his face was sparkling, along with his school jumper! 

I cannot say he actually flew but I had to cycle quite fast to keep up with him.

I know that all 5 year olds are amazingly active and I do not believe my son to be any more active than his peers, but does anyone else wake up to load thus two or three times a night because their child has yet again fallen out of bed?

This week, whilst investigating said thuds, I have gone into his room to find him:
1) Asleep on the floor no duvet
2) Asleep on the floor with duvet
3) Asleep on the floor the opposite way round to how he lies in bed
4) Asleep with head on bed, bottom on floor
5) Lying on the floor giggling to himself
6) Asleep on the floor a good few feet away from his feet

Quite glad he is choosing to sleep in the bottom bunk.

Maybe the fairy dust does actually work?

Sometimes a treat goes a long way

Myself and my boy have had a "just getting through it" week so I decided to give us both a treat this evening.

We watched Madagascar 3 (very weird film) and I let him have anything out of his treat drawer for dinner.

After half a chocolate bar and a couple of haribo he announced "Mummy I am still hungry but I want something sensible to eat".

After picking myself  up off the floor I made him a proper dinner (end of my treat of being lazy!).

I have just put him to bed with 3 stories but the biggest treat of all for him was that I let him keep his school uniform on in bed!

I would never have thought of saying to him "as a treat today you can stay in your clothes and eat sensible food" and that probably wouldn't of worked.

The treat for him was that he got to decide for himself what his treat would be.

Another lesson learnt by mummy.

Endangered and Extinct

Whilst walking to school this morning my son stated "I would like to help save some endangered animals"

On asking if he new what endangered meant he answered my question with a very good explanation.

"Endangered means if there is not many animals left because people keep killing them. I am going to draw a picture of a saber toothed tiger and write on it. Please help me save this endangered animal it is a saber tooth tiger"

This was followed by lots of saber tooth tiger noises.

After a while I asked him what animals are endangered? His response was "Tigers, Pandas, Polar Bears and Parrots".

I asked "isn't there lots of parrots in the rain forest? To which he replied "No mummy because people keep chopping down the trees where they live so they can make camp fires and have holidays in the rain forest"

After lots of chopping down tree noises and continuous tiger noises we went on to discuss the meaning of Extinct. To my suprise he knew what this meant as well. He only knew about Dinasours being extinct so I described the Do Do to him to which he said, "no wonder they are extinct if they were fat and couldnt fly, I would be able to catch one of those birds myself even when I wasn't batman!"

He ran into his before school club still being a saber tooth tiger and I walked to work wondering when did Batman come into this?

It's amazing

It's amazing that his feet are too tired to walk to school but he can do somersaults off the furniture.

It's amazing he can read that his favourite television programme is on but three words in a book elude him.

It's amazing that he is no where near hungry enough to eat an apple but just enough room in his tummy for Haribo.

It's amazing when I tell him its his head thats skewwiff not his super hero mask.......He checks his head

It's amazing that he cannot find his favourite bow and arrow but my leg finds it when I crawl into my bed.

It's amazing that he cannot remember where his pants and socks are kept but he can find is red Power Ranger within seconds.

It's amazing I have a red lego brick in my handbag - It has been there a week

It's amazing that if I take his Power Ranger disk to work with me that I get "special concentrating powers"

It's amazing that I cannot use the dinner table as it is currently a tent

It's amazing that the expertly organised lego is now expertly not organised

Amazing..........Good and bad.........He amazes me every day.

I cannot help but be happy about that.

Lego Conversation

Whilst playing with piles of Lego this evening we had so much fun, bedtime was nearly 40 minutes later than usual.

Our conversation went a bit like this........

Tor : "I'm going to make a jail"
Me : "Great Idea"
Tor : "Mummy, I'm totally on it"
Me "You're on it"
Tor : "Yeah totally on it, I'm on it, on it, on it"
Me : "I'm glad your on it"
Tor : "On it on it on it.... Mummy what are you doing?"
Me : "Fixing your star wars ship, I'm looking for this brick"
Tor : "Found it, you see mummy I'm totally on it,
Me : " You are definitely on it"
Tor : "Totally"

Silence

Tor "What does totally on it mean?"
Me : Cant talk for laughing!


I have now linked this blog up with http://theoliversmadhouse.co.uk/magic-moments-211013/. I love this concept and thank you for the opportunity

Hearing but not listening and using maths to your own advantage

Having a day with my son feeling full of cold but still just about ok (and realising that Truckfest doesn't start till Sunday) I decided we would have a "mooching" day.

"Mooching" meaning doing what we fancy but nothing too strenuous.

The day started with watching a film whilst eating weetabix. I told my son I was going to have a shower, I didn't get an answer. 10 minutes later I received a shout coming from downstairs...."Mummy, where are you?"
Later, it took 5 attempts of shouting for him to go upstairs to find pants and socks.

Later, it took 5 attempts of stern talking to get him to sit down on the bus.

Later, it took 5 attempts of trying not to laugh to get him to stop walking in to people whilst in town (he was holding an ice cream at the time)

Its 3pm and I get the impression that he is hearing me but just not listening.

After falling asleep on the bus home (we had a lovely time bowling by the way) I realised that he maybe was a little under the weather and agreed that being cuddled up on the sofa watching films was a great idea. We watched Treasure Planet followed by Bambi 2.

I then managed to encourage him to read his school book which I must say he did very well and I was very proud.

Fast approaching bedtime he asked for another film which I replied "but Tor you have already watched 3 films today". After a moments pause he gave me a wide grin and held up 3 fingers. "Mummy if I was allowed watch one more film....." followed by another finger being held up ".....that would make 4"

Very proud of his obvious mathematics skills I tickled him until he couldn't take anymore and ushered him to bed.

Lets hope he takes Maths at school just as seriously!

That's what families are for

After a trying day at work I have to admit I arrived to collect my son from after school club rather tired and slightly low.

One of the ladies said to Tor "You need to be a good boy and look after Mummy because she is very tired"

During our walk home and after dragging tit bits of information of my sons day from him ( a bit like getting blood from a stone!) he stated......


"Mummy, I will look after you this weekend and you always look after me". To which I replied "That's whats family is for" with a big smile on my face.

As always you never know what the next comments are going to be...............

"Mummy when you are blind and I have to help you cross the road, if a car comes to crash into you I will make sure you get out of the way"

Fantastic! That is indeed what Family is for.

Poo Pies

When collecting my son from his after school club I find him looking sheepish and rather dirty.

As soon as he asked me if he was allowed to ask TV tonight I realised that some monkey business had occurred.

Ingeniously my son and a friend had found a way of lifting up a drain in the playground so they could reach the sticky mud....when asked why he did it I received the reply "but Mummy we wanted to make Poo Pies"

Its very hard not to laugh so after biting my lip so hard I found out that the great staff had already spoken to him and discussed the reasons why it was not a good idea.

I cant help but (silently) applaud the imagination he has.

Bath time was interesting but a squeaky clean boy by the end of it.

Lets hope the Poo Pie idea has run its course but look forward to the next insight into my sons reasoning and imagination.

What? More Snot?

My boy is 5. Today he went to school with his book bag and book. Today he came home with his book bag, new book and a face covered in snot.

Scientifically how can that happen? How on earth can a 5 year old produce so much snot?

The only question been able to be answered today was...."Does he wipe his nose?"

Answer being "No, I am five mummy, what do you expect?"

I look forward to the snot monster tomorrow morning