Love 'em

I wish you could have been at our house at about 8 o'clock this evening.

The kids were both outside having a game on the trampoline.

Poppet was pretending to be a princess in distress and screaming with each bounce.

Pickle was just naked.

Back from ze 'olidays

Sorry for the long absence, I felt the need for a wee sojourn in gay Pareee with me mate Rose over Easter and I have been trying to catch up with myself ever since. Plus, I have been working. Yes, me. Not getting paid mind you which doesn't sit well with Nobby the former accountant, but still, it gets me out of the house and away from Ikea. And guess what I've been doing? Teaching, no less. They trusted me with a class full of nine year olds and I can honestly say it wasn't so bad. No lasting injuries, either mental or physical, were sustained and I have been invited back this coming week and they may even help me get certified if I want to. (I thought I would need to be certified in another way as they all piled in saying 'what are you doing here' last Monday but I managed to escape with my wits intact.) This could be the start of a whole new career for me, I am quite excited. Tiggy is most dejected as she doesn't get to come on the school run any more poor thing, but Nobby is happy that I have given up the idea of getting a second dog if I'm not going to be home as much. I decided we need a cleaner instead... ha!

So anyway, France. How weird was that to go back to my old road and hang out in Rose's kitchen for a mooty lesbian tea with a taffee chaser? (that's 'herbal tea with milk washed down with espresso' to the uninitiated.) The first thing the kids and I did when we rocked up on Sunday afternoon was to go out and find Jesus. It was quite a search I can tell you. We looked all over the garden but we eventually found him under a bush and were much relieved. I should probably mention that Jesus is the name of one of Rose's tortoises... along with his parents, Mary and Joseph, they are a cute little band of walking rocks which the children had a great time moving around and watching them grow legs and scurry back into the undergrowth. Jesus has wanderlust though and kept escaping across the lawn prompting frantic searching before someone stepped on him.

We enjoyed a week full of play dates with all our old friends as if we'd never been gone for the last nine months. Except that all the little people have grown a startling amount and the ickle baby I was cuddling all last summer now has a mouth full of teeth and is crawling around at alarming speeds. The children all just picked up where they left off and made themselves right at home. Poppet and Peony's middle daughter decided the best place for lunch was under the cot and proceeded to make a nest under there. I forgot to go and clear it up before we left as it was the usual mad dash trying to round up the brats into the car at home time. Gathering kids is somewhat like herding cats, non? I only hope the chicken bones and crisp crumbs didn't stay under there too long. I enjoyed re-visiting the local Shopi and stocking up on some of the pre-packaged crap the kids have been missing - pre-rolled chocolate crepes and long-life croissants. I also bought a bag of grapes which I neglected to wash and got myself a violent case of food poisoning that night. Nice. Luckily I managed to keep the noise down and didn't wake anyone up, although it would have been nice to have a companion to hold my hair back for me.

Meanwhile Nobby was all alone in Hungary pining for his family... yeah, right: he kept phoning from the golf course! And when he collected us from the airport we could barely get the cases in round all the golf equipment, gourmet Tesco shopping and bedding plants he'd had stashed in the car all day long. Still, he appreciated the little Eiffel Tower Poppet and Pickle insisted I paid huge great wadges of cash for at the airport and the Cream Egg from me.

So it's been back to the grind ever since, I may get round to unpacking the suitcase sometime next week. Meanwhile the children have turned into total teenagers this week, I don't know what's going on. But that's a whole other post. I can only recall one cute comment lately. Pickle was watching Charlie's Angels with his sister earlier and one of the bad guys (a woman) said 'Never send a man to do a woman's job.' (I think one of her henchmen just got his arse kicked by Cameron Diaz in high-heels and tight trousers.) Pickle pipes up with 'Yes, and never let a man do the cooking, that's Mummy's job.' Hmm.

Boing!

Spring is here.

I know because my nose is streaming, my face is itching, I can barely get 5 minutes of regular breathing between sneezes and my eyeballs (yes, the actual white bits) have swollen up. Furthermore, I am losing the power of normal speech; Nobby and Me will be brought to you today in the total absence of the letters ‘m’ or ‘p’, presented by ‘Bubby’ who will be talking about Bobbet and Bickle.

I have a spider bite on my shin already which is rapidly expanding to look as though someone squished a strawberry on my leg. I just pulled 3 ticks off the dog and Pickle hit the hard drugs this morning as he’s starting to look hay feverish.

But, you know, it all looks so pretty outside with the blossom on the trees and the daffodils and tulips. I dried 3 loads of laundry in the sunshine in 2 hours flat and everyone is happy and jolly now that they’ve been able to finally stow away the snow-boots and ski-jackets for another year. The birds and the bees are doing what birds and bees do, and Poppet has had three proposals of marriage this week.

Spring has definitely sprung. Ah-choo!!

Have you heard the one about the brunette who goes to the Dr complaining that she hurts all over her body? The doctor tells her to show him, so she touches her knee with her right index finger and yells 'Ow!' Then she touches her head and yells 'Ow!' Then she touches her tummy and yells 'Ow!' So the doctor says, 'I'm guessing that firstly, you're not a natural brunette and secondly... you have a broken finger.'

Well today's typing is something like that as I just gouged a hole in my index finger trying to fix the front gate. I make no secret of my blondeness but I really shouldn't push my luck and reach for the tool box. I didn't even feel it until the blood started to drip down the screwdriver, yuk. The gate has been a right pain for some time. Not so long ago it wouldn't stay shut, so the landlord and his Handy Andy Man had a go at it, and now we can't open it without a battering ram and a small army. I was particularly keen to get it open just now because my friend had turned up and invited my kids to go swimming in her pool. Never one to pass up a couple more hours of peace and quiet I agreed and conducted a swift search for a crowbar to enable me to get them off the premises.

My kids continue to live in a social whirl, I don't know how they do it. I keep taking them places then coming back empty handed as another parent gets suckered into an impromptu play-date. I do actually do my share - I had 5 kids here for tea on Friday night. But I am pleased to report that the Dog Show did not happen. We were out all day Sunday anyway at yet another birthday party at the bowling alley, so if any pampered pooches did turn up they would have found Tiggy guarding the gate all on her own without so much as a rosette in sight, let alone a year's supply of Pedigree Chum .

On Saturday we benefited from the newly discovered and highly delightful 'Double Sleepover' where we get free babysitting (although I did drop in a bottle of wine and some chocolates to take the edge off,) a pass to stay out as late as we want, and no kids waking us up in the morning! I can really recommend it. I'm not sure I'd recommend the bar we went into in Budapest - my friend and I were feeling our age a bit watching all the bright young things dolled up in trendy gear pile into the place (apparently shorts worn with tights and knee-length boots are the current fashion over here... er, no thanks) when the DJ in his wisdom decided to put on Rick Astley 'Never Gonna Give You Up'. Well. We bolted. Despite the fact we might have impressed the crowd with our intimate knowledge of the lyrics, we would know it was from the first time round and no-one wants to be reminded of that.

So we managed to blag our way into a post-fashion-show private party further down the road. Nobby and his mate were very enthusiastic at the prospect of rubbing shoulders with a few models for the evening. And so were about a hundred other blokes - the place was packed full of men! Only one model showed up but Nobby was most disappointed that he didn't fancy her. Oh well.

At least I showed him a good evening out last Wednesday when I was given tickets to the Hungary v Malta World Cup Qualifier football match at the stadium in Budapest. We took both the children because the tickets came via the school and Hungary won 3:0! Plus the kids were able to participate in their first Mexican Wave in between goals and I witnessed first hand the Hungarian obsession with eating sunflower seeds at football matches. Nobby had told me about it before but I didn't really appreciate it fully until the chap next to me stood up at half time, leaving a small mountain of seed husks on the floor as though I'd been sitting next to the world's largest budgie.

Anyway, my finger is really throbbing now so that's all for today, I have every excuse to leave all the housework alone and enjoy the peace and quiet (and sunny 23 degrees, tee hee) till the rabble get home. TTFN.