Life is a Roller Coaster, just gotta ride it …

I am not sure I’m in the right mood for blogging but I feel the need to share the roller coaster week I’ve had.
The high was definitely Monday, surprisingly. I am normally rather Boomtown Rats about Mondays but on this particular one I finally admitted defeat in the housework stakes and engaged a cleaner. Admittedly it took me 2 hours to get the upstairs rooms in a fit state to actually dust and vacuum, i.e. being able to see the floor and furniture tops. I would usually have found some distraction or other after half an hour, like some drying paint that needed watching. But the knowledge that someone was sparkling the downstairs and wasn’t going to stop until the whole house was finished spurred me on to get down behind those shelves in the playroom and fetch out all the bits of toys that hadn’t seen the light of day for several months. Rose called me at one point and quickly asked if she’d got me out of the shower or something as I sounded slightly odd when I said hello. Oh no, I reassured her, I was just under Pickle’s bed trying to reach his stash of Thomas books that were piled up under a pile of dust underneath it.

Anyway, long story short I’m glad I’ve got some help and she’s coming again next week and doing the ironing as well! Result! Nobby walked in that evening, took a look around and asked me what had happened. I assumed he meant the clean, tidy house and not the vision of me slumped on the sofa with a glass of wine - that last bit is quite normal at nine o'clock at night. That’s when I knew I was safe to hit him in the wallet to help me keep on tops of things. Of course he’s expecting some gourmet meals from now on as I should have time to spare, but I am happy to indulge in a bit of Nigel Slater-ing if I know the bog has been cleaned within the last 7 days.

Thursday, however, was a definite low. We took Poppet to the hospital to have her cast taken off her leg and we had all been looking forward to the big day when she might finally be able to walk again. However, the surgeon took one look at the x-ray and said, ‘oh, well that’s not quite healed yet, better put her back in plaster for a few weeks.’ And that was that. The poor little might couldn’t face school that afternoon because everyone had been expecting her to walk in with both shoes on. I hadn’t been quite prepared for the muscle wastage on her thigh or the stiffness in her knee so I don’t think there would have been any actual walking happening for some time anyway.

But the new cast only goes to her knee and they have set her foot at a right angle so she can actually put it to the floor if she wants to. And I decided this morning to do away with the double pushchair on the school run and tried out my French on the policeman to reserve a parking space right by the school gates so she can walk in on her crutches instead. Of course she only hobbled as far as the gate this morning before claiming exhaustion so I had to carry her across the rest of the playground, but we’ll get there. I feel some tough-love coming on. My girl will not wimp out any longer!

Naturally, though, left to my own devices after getting back from the hospital, I fell head-long into Guilty Mum Mode, blaming myself for the lack of bone-knitting because I’m not feeding her an adequate diet. Luckily my straight-speaking Dutch friend, I’ll call her Blossom here, you know who you are!, quickly put me in my place when I told her and verbally slapped me about a bit telling me that it’s not my fault. She’s very good at it, like being walloped in the mush with a wet haddock. Its. Not. Your. Fault. Why do we mummies feel so guilty all the time?!! As a result I hit the books instead and tapped into font-of-all-nutritional-knowledge Rose to find out how I can get more calcium into her and it looks like it mostly comes down to cheese.

Poppet doesn’t eat cheese.

But she used to – so I embarked on a quest to the cheese counter in our local shop where I used to be able to get this orange coloured ‘Cheddar’ she once claimed to like and bought some this morning. The little monkey ate loads of it for lunch! And half a packet of corn tortillas which are also apparently a calcium source so I think we are sorted. Phew. Big thanks to Rose and Blossom for sorting me out.

Anyway, we’re off to another clinic tonight to try to find out what else Pickle is allergic to as he’s been having some episodes lately and we’re not sure why, since hay-fever season is over and we’re not aware he’s been in contact with any cats. Luckily it’s not all the way into Paris but I’m still not looking forward to making my way into the outer rim on a Friday night. I think we're probably looking at switching from the roller coaster to the dodgems for the journey. Oh well, the new car needs a few scratches.