And so we arrive at another weekend.

This has been a big week.  Mom is retired yesterday AND it's her birthday today.  Lizzie started preschool.  Tommy went back to school after nearly a month off.  Eli got a promotion.  And guess what happened to me? I worked.  I have been quite busy at work and finally on Thursday night my boss decided to finish the project we've been working on.  And so, we worked all night.  This is not a lie.  I sent a text to my sleeping husband at 4:45am to tell him that I was in the taxi finally on my way home.  The sun was coming up over the river and it was a sweet London moment.  

So, we're all very happy that it's the weekend and we've celebrated by having a very relaxed day.  I hope your weekends are just as lovely. A better blog post will come as soon as I can think normally. xo

Wellies

It rained all day long today.  I overheard on my way to work three separate conversations about the fact that May is meant to be the worst May on record in a century.  When I look at the weather on my phone, it shows rain every single day. 

And, today was Miss Lulu's first day of preschool.  So I first walked Tommy to school, and then returned to get Lulu and Mandy and go to Paint Pots.  From Paint Pots, I took a bus to the Tube and then the Tube into work. 

So I did what any smart person would do.  I wore my rain boots.  Here, they are called wellies, and mine are navy blue with bright pink trim and small white polka dots.  I bought them from J Crew on sale for $25 about five years ago.  And they work.  My feet stay dry.  I like that. 

Imagine my surprise when more people commented on my "wellies" than about the weather forecast for May.  It began with parents at Tommy's school and stretched into every single person I saw at work before I could get into my office and kick them off my feet!  Even the security guard who stands at the door all day said (with a smile to his credit), "I see you've come prepared!" 

Why, yes, I have, thank you. 

Is this not the land of "wellies"?  Don't we all wear them? Why is this comment worthy? 

First Day!

It was raining, and she was unhappy to be put down (that's right, she's old enough to go to preschool but insists on being carried everywhere) and unhappy to be out from under the umbrella.  But she loved school!

???

 

Sometimes I find myself walking around writing blog posts in my head.  I always forget them, but today it startled me to realize that having done this for two years it's become something of a habit.  I don't get twitchy in the way that I do when I skip the gym (like today) but I notice.  All that to say that this is a random one because we are busy and I am a bit scattered (what else is new).

Tommy has received birthday gifts from so many of you and while you should look for a thank you card with some big wobbly letters in your mailbox, I must take this opportunity to tell you all that it is really so lovely to realize how many people love my kids (or at least care about them enough to send them birthday cards and gifts).

One of our London friends braved a trip to Hamley's and then sent the perfect Lego gift along with a birthday card that had a poem (she calls it a rhyme, but then, I consider this blog writing and I'm sure there are many people who would not) in it.  I think the poem is so cute that I'm going to attempt to do them from now on -- but as I tend to be last minute with gifts, this will be a stretch for me.

The Lula woke up in a pool of vomit this morning which I must admit I did not even see, so awesome is my husband.  Lulu and Tommy are both on the couch next to me watching Dora while I decide which things on my mile-long to-do list I want to accomplish before noon when Mandy comes and I head back to work.  I have been at work quite late for two nights and it looks as though I will be at work all weekend, and so while I should be just relaxing and spending time with my children, I am unable to do so.

I am unable to do so because Friday is my jobs day AND because our totally unreliable cleaner canceled yesterday AND because we have notice that we received a package and I think it might have my new shoes in it (please God).  Eli says our cleaner comes 50% of the time and I would put her attendance at 65%, but either way, you know she's a freaking awesome cleaner that I deal with it.  Because the fastest way to grumpsville is (1) to ask me if I'm crabby and (2) a dirty house.  Anyway, it is particularly important to me that the kids' spaces are clean and so I have just done a quick vacuum and bathroom clean upstairs.  And do you know how much laundry a two-year-old with a tummy bug generates?  Do you feel sorry for me?  Have I mentioned that I'm so tired that I'm dizzy?

But look!  I have found ten minutes during which to publicly complain about my pretty much perfect life (and I do not say that whole thing about perfect life flippantly).

We have a new member of our group at work -- she seems awesome -- and on Wednesday morning we gave a presentation to the larger group of which we are a part.  I was really anxious about it but you know what? My part went well and during the rest of the day people streamed into my office to tell me how entertaining I was (one woman said, "it must feel good to make people laugh" and I thought "why, yes, it does, but I'm not sure that's what should've been happening during today's presentation") and how interesting I made construction law.  Let's stop and examine those words:  how interesting I made construction law.  My boss does not believe that there could be anything uninteresting about construction law but we all know the truth don't we.  So, I consider that my presentation was a huge success (even if I did seem a tiny bit silly).

Tommy just looked at me and said hopefully, "do five-year-olds still have to go in a car seat?"  He is disappointed to say the least that he will still be in a car seat when we next ride in a car (June?).

And Lulu's been meowing.  Especially when she wakes up in the morning.  No more "good morning" or "hi" just meeoowww.

Happy weekend!

Totally random, but maybe we'll say the subject is mostly Lego

I took the kids to Gambado on Friday.  It's a soft play area, that is enormous and chaotic and I lost Lulu twice.  The first time our friends found her at the top of the slide.  It's not a gentle slide, it's very high and fast.  The second time, I found her because I could hear her crying (this is impressive given the noise level of that place) but I couldn't see her.  She was in a tunnel, just sitting there crying.  So I got her and then I got the kids some lunch and she had about four bites before she tried to run away again.  "But you were just crying in a tunnel, honey," I said.  "No, no, not!" she replied.  Sigh.  But also.  I'm impressed that my peanut of a daughter is independent and confident and not at all worried that I won't find her if she chooses to cry for me while in a hiding spot.

So let's talk about something that is killing me.  It's the fact that despite investing a fair sum of money in very un-earth friendly plastic bins, playmobil and Lego keep getting mixed up.  Yes, obviously I am a bit OCD and I don't say that in any sort of flippant way.  I know I am.  For example I will not touch anything on the Tube and then touch my face or my hair so I have to always hold on with the same hand so I can move my hair out of my eyes or scratch my nose with the clean hand.  (And shockingly I am the only person I ever see using hand sanitizer as I exit the station.  Does everybody else wait until they're at their office? I don't understand.)  This subway situation, however, is manageable because I control it.  But I do not control the toy bins.  This morning I forced Tommy to go through them with me because I cannot identify each piece and he can (well, except for one which I put on his nightstand so that we can ask Eli tonight).

To make matters worse, Tommy and I "built" one of his new Lego sets together and right when I was feeling proud of our progress, he announced that he had to use some of the pieces for his own ship.  And so we (I) couldn't finish building the real ship because quite a few key parts were unavailable.  I am embarrassed to confess that this also drove me crazy and I kept taking deep breaths and reminding myself that if Tommy doesn't care that his Lego is never built as pictured on the box, I should not care.  But!  I do!  I want the satisfaction of completing the Lego.

These are the parts of parenting I never would have imagined would be tricky and they're the ones that require extraordinary amounts of patience and maturity on my part (and let me confess right here that the patient and mature parts of me do not always win).

******
Yesterday, we went swimming (after Gambado, so without the aforementioned neurotic behavior on my part, I would have been the best mommy ever) and two eight-year-old girls got into the pool with us and headed straight for Lizzie.  They wanted to hold her and know how old she was and her name, and her big brother was very jealous of the attention.  "Her name's Lizzie.  She's my little sister, but she likes to play by herself.  You know what you need?  To play with a FIVE-YEAR-OLD!"

And then today, we were walking down the road and he asked me if people ever wake back up again after they die.  Again, a challenging parenting moment which culminated in talking about advances in medicine so I'm sure he is completely confused about death at this point.  Sigh.

FIVE, part deux

The stack of gifts (not all from us):

 His birthday cupcakes (yes, I made them when I got home from work at 8pm):

 Birthday dinner -- pasta with pesto and no vegetables:

Five, Part 1: Legoland

Well, Eli and I have a five-year-old.  I knew it would happen but I didn't think it would happen so quickly.  (Yes, I sound like my mother.)

Tommy had a great day yesterday.  He woke up quite early, and I presented him with bubble gum to occupy him until Lulu woke up and he could open his gifts.  He chewed the gum for about thirty seconds and then admitted that he had swallowed it.  (This happened two other times during the day, so if it's true what they say about gum staying in your stomach, he's got a decent sized ball of gum in his.  Note to friends with children:  push the gum chewing age a bit later if possible.)

When Lulu woke up, we went downstairs to a huge pile of gifts.  He tore through them quickly, and then opened up all the boxes to begin playing Playmobil and Lego.

But we were in a hurry because we wanted to get to Legoland when it opened, so our first bump in the day occurred when Tommy realized that he couldn't actually play with all his new toys.  We put a few things in a bag and set off.

The trip to Legoland is not too far, but it took a combination of the tube, two trains, and a bus.  We were all happy to be there when we arrived, and walking in and seeing huge dinosaurs of lego made all of us very happy and excited (okay, maybe not me, but the rest of them were thrilled).  Then, because we had never been to legoland before, we went to see all the cities made of lego.  Eli liked it best.  

Here are some photos -- pictures of the rest of the day will follow in another post (I hope).

Tommy's Story (because I've been typing away and ignoring him)

It's about Harry Potter.

Jeff ran away from the dragon.  And then a knight came to rescue Jeff.  Then a witch came and didn't let Jeff go.  And then the witch is a goblin from Harry Potter and then he tries to beat the witch-goblin.  Then the knight helped Harry Potter.  And then they were two friends.  The end.

And here's a funny story about a conversation I had with Tommy this morning.
We were discussing school and how many grades there are (all the way to twelve??), and I said that he might decide to go to college when he finished with twelfth grade.  He said, "I didn't decide" by which he meant that he was not going to go.  I said I thought he would go because it's really fun.  He asked how come? And I said it's the first time you get to choose the things you want to learn about.  To which he replied cheerfully and enthusiastically, "lots of playtime??"

Yesterday,

Eli and I had Mandy come and we went shopping.  As we walked through the mall (that's right, we're Americans so we sought out one of the only proper malls in London), discussing something I don't quite remember, Eli described something as "daft."

"Excuse me, honey, but did you just say 'daft'?"  I asked.

"Yes, I'm trying to use it more," he replied.  And he meant it.  So I invite all of you to mock him when he uses it around you.

Another funny thing that happened is that Eli tried on a shirt that fit him really nicely, but decided not to buy it.  I could tell he wasn't sold on it, but I really liked it.  So we shopped a couple of hours and I told him I was going back to the store to buy it, and he was really resistant.  I didn't understand why, but I marched him back to the store and purposefully walked toward the rack.

And when I found it I saw that it had a huge EAGLE FEATHER on the shoulder that had completely escaped my keen powers of observation when Eli had tried it on before.  So I started laughing hysterically and all the people in the store thought I had lost my mind.

Of course Eli was so relieved that he didn't have to buy the shirt that he didn't care that I was acting like a freakshow.

It's only a week away...

So some of you may not know that it is Tommy's birthday next Wednesday, but HE KNOWS and so do the rest of us.  Since the 26th of December, we have been counting down the days and his excitement that it's only six days to his birthday is, well, really amazingly sweet.

Yesterday morning our children slept late and when Tommy meandered into the kitchen in his underwear requesting breakfast Eli said, "guess what? Only EIGHT days until your birthday!" and Tommy said, "WHAT."  He was firm (and loud) but also seemed like he couldn't actually believe it.

The birthday plan:

1.  French toast for breakfast.
2.  A spiderman cake.  He does not care that I cannot make a spiderman cake, he does not mind if I buy it.  (This will help me stick to my no sugar rule, so I am okay with it.)
3.  A surprise trip to Legoland.
4.  A toy that he has been requesting since he saw it at Harrods after the Christmas photo (which I never posted).  It's a sword and he keeps reminding Eli about it.  I believe this is because he thinks Eli is nicer than I am and will buy the sword.

An interview of sorts

I have been asking her if she's a baby or a big girl for the past six months, whenever she looks at me like I should be talking to her.

A sad day indeed when I realized I needed to ask if she's a big girl or a little girl.  Luckily, she always tells me she's a little girl.

I should stop asking before she decides to say she's big.  That will be a tiny bit heartbreaking (yes, that's a glass-is-half-empty attitude but give me a break, she's my baby).

Some cute ones of the Lula

(I know I have another child but my perhaps my iPhone forgot?)

As I type this post, Lulu is in her bed yelling for her daddy -- she doesn't want to go to sleep and she knows he's more likely to come than I am.  (And in this situation, one might consider this laziness rather than discipline.)

We had a fun and busy weekend which was good because we all woke up feeling sad that Grandma Sid had left.  On Saturday we got the house in order and went to swimming lessons ("wee-ming") and then we made pesto (Tommy's choice).  And today we had Eli's boss and his lovely wife over for brunch and I honestly don't know who enjoyed it more: Eli & me or TOMMY.  Actually, I do know. It was Tommy.  I am not kidding, they played lego with him for two hours.  Then, we all went to Bishop's Park to discover that the newly renovated playground is open.  Lulu got run down by a scooter but Eli just picked her up and brushed her off and she barely cried.

Sometimes I can't believe how boring I am.  May I take a moment to thank you for reading?

Happy week!  Here in London, we are working toward a four day weekend.  Two holidays is way better than a big rabbit coming to your house at night, don't you think?