School's Out!

The holidays are here! Blimey I never thought we'd make it but finally I have a morning where I can switch off the alarm, wave Nobby off to work from the comfort of my bed and not worry about occupying small people.

That is until Pickle decides he wants breakfast, Poppet needs some particular item of clothing and Tiggy's begging to go outside.

Would someone please invent a cure for little boys' backwards internal clocks? Every day of term I have to drag the little bugger out of bed, usually dressing him in the process to avoid the show-down later, but on weekends and holidays he is up at sparrow's fart wanting to get on my computer. I have a perfectly good alarm, which is OFF, did I mention, so I do not want appreciate waking up to the strains of Fred ranting away on YouTube.

It has been a busy couple of weeks at school, although I did manage to snatch a couple of days off when I caught a cold to go along with my tree allergy and couldn't make it past the bedroom door let alone the school gates. Somehow my class all managed without me thanks to my fabulous Teaching Assistant and colleagues and to make up for it we've been in full-on Blue Peter mode ever since.

I'll spare you the details but my final day at the 'office' saw me and 16 tinies up to our eyeballs in plastic eggs, glue, feathers, melted chocolate, cornflakes, tissue paper... and a live rabbit.

So far the holidays have been about as relaxed as a chimpanzees tea party, with football matches, lunches, parties - all for the kids of course. Today saw me braving the 'other side of the river' to find the Laser Quest establishment. Wow that took me back a lot of years to one certain 'team building' activity at that large company I worked in when we spent a happy evening blasting holes in our colleagues in the name of improving working relationships.

The kids played for about 2 hours and had a ball. Pickle decided after a while that stealthy hiding and creeping up on people was too much like hard work and became Rambo instead, stalking through the darkenss blasting anyone who crossed his path. Poppet was slightly more controlled and surprised herself with how much she enjoyed it.

Personally I naffed off to the local shopping mall for a sneaky burger and a mooch around Mango. We are off to Rome, daaahling, for the Easter weekend, so I wanted to get something new to pack. (Women's logic, don't try and analyse it.) The shopping centre was something of a maze though so I had to suck it up and brave the Customer Service Information point.

Rather a contradiction in terms that, could just be renamed The Point, although there is little point to it either. When faced with half a mile of mall which branches off at various places, 'downstairs on the left' holds very little meaning. Took me fifteen minutes to finally discover the toy shop where I was greeted with a vapid shrug from the assistant when I asked if she had such a thing as a frisbee.

Meanwhile I was fighting off the make-up demo stalkers left and right. Seriously, did I look THAT bad? I wasn't exactly the height of chic in my brown slacks and t-shirt, a fact that was kindly rammed home by a bunch of lads who I thought were checking me out at one point only to clock the high-heeled, tight-jeaned peroxide blonde they were really staring at. Am I bovvered? Really? (OK, a little tiny bit.)

Luckily Rose was at the other end of my texts to reassure me I looked great and translate 'eff off' into passable Hungarian for use on the slap-sellers.

The cruel truth is I should have had company today in the form of Ma and Pa but sadly they had to cancel their trip. After 2 weeks in and out of hospital with nose bleeds my Dad was finally persuaded of the logic of not hurtling through the air in a pressurised tube when just sitting on the sofa can start an episode. Poor lamb is miserable as well as somewhat sore round the nasal passages after all the stuff that's been poked up there lately. Fortunately he was OK when the kids and I Skyped him tonight so Poppet didn't have to wonder if he'd been snorting mice - apparently the weapon of choice for recurrent nosebleeds such as his is a Tampax up the schnozzer. Nice.

Get better soon Dad!

The tooth, the whole tooth and nothing but the tooth

It's a good sign someone's had a rough week when they pick up the intercom for the front gate and try to make a phonecall on it.

The perplexed look on Nobby's face while he tried to work out where the number pad was so he could dial was absolutely priceless.

Bless him, but I am not surprised he's disorientated with trips to both London and Paris this week on top of Vienna and Eger last week. I am expecting to find the car keys in the fridge any day now.

But I needed a bit of a giggle after my own rough week - it looks like Poppet, Pickle and I will be taking up residence at the dentist's from now on. We popped in to get a check up on the infamous capped tooth yesterday evening and ended up embarking on root canal work because the tooth has died.

That poor girl will rue the day she ever tried contortionism within splatting distance of an immovable object.

I have to say, watching her getting pumped full of anaesthetic and the dentist boring a hole all the way up into the root of her tooth then calling me over to have a closer look hurt me just as much as it shook her up. I now have the task of keeping the hole clean by squirting Listerine up it twice a day and inserting a miniscule spring to spruce it up like I was getting the gunk out of the plug hole. SO happy about that.

Luckily, now she's over the shock, there isn't any actual pain and I am continually impressed how kids just take stuff on board and carry on. Following our 2 hour stint in the chair last night it was 8pm and we'd had no dinner having gone straight from school after Poppet's pottery club (she's gonna switch to ceramics and get to work on a new tooth now, hee hee!)

We spotted a MacDos on the way home and stopped in for the easy option and somehow Poppet polished off a McNuggets McMenu and a chocolate McDoughnut still with half her face numbed and a tube sticking out of the borehole in her tooth. I had to have a Big Mac just to get over it (well, that's my excuse.)

So now Poppet is the class celebrity having worked out she can freak out all her friends by showing them her pet borehole. Though she wasn't impressed by the class who played an April Fool on her class by stealing all their clothes while they were in a swimming lesson...

The rest of us guffawed of course, a classic prank, nice one.

I managed to avoid all April Fools and instead my own little brood became April Stars by performing 'The House That Jack Built' and 'The Mouse and the Lion' in assembly. I nearly exploded with pride. We repeated the show for all the mums at the end of the day and I definitely saw some moist eyes amongst the audience (when all the camcorders moved out the way.)

Anyway, at this moment Nobby's just popped out to get beer and there's curry on the way so I think, barring any mishaps, Friday night wind-down should be good. This week can only get better.

Every Cloud

There are words you don't really want to hear when your husband and 10 year old are using your precious laptop which contains all your work, studies and irreplacable family photos.

And which you haven't successfully backed up for two months.

Words like, 'Oh, no! Quick, run and get a cloth!'

Now my little Poppet had the best of intentions, letting her Nana, who was calling on Skype, admire the lovely flower arrangement Daddy brought home for Mummy. She just doesn't realise yet that you don't have to get objects within two centimetres of the camera to be able to see them AND that if you tip up a vase of flowers, water will out.

There are sounds you don't want to hear from your precious laptop after a dowsing with flower water. Sounds like 'beep beep beep beeeeeeeep.... [silence]'

To say I was angry would be a gross understatement but I channelled my passion into flipping off the keys one by one so I could wipe up all the water. I knew that sandwich year placement in technical support would come in handy one day.

Thankfully the machine still works, apart from the left mouse button which I think may still be having a lazy soak before towelling himself off and returning to work.

...and I now have a full backup.

Bookworm

I came downstairs this morning to find Pickle sitting cross legged on the floor reading a dictionary. Not a kid's one either, the full house-brick-sized Oxford one, with Thesaurus, that Nobby and I use to help us with the Telegraph crossword.

'Wow!' said I, very impressed with his thirst for knowledge, 'have you been finding out what words mean?'

'Sort of,' he replied, 'I'm looking up swear words.'

'Oh. Did you find any?' I said, hoping that ours is a concise version without a full compliment of expletives.

'Not many, but did you know that 'crap' is also a game?' he said.

I suspect he meant Craps, but at least he learned something new.

Tales of the Unexpected

I learned early on, after having babies, to lower my expectations considerably. I think it was about day three with Poppet when I finally realised that having a shower and getting dressed were about all I could really expect to get done in a day with a screaming newborn around.

Nobby took a while longer to adjust. I swear he uttered those immortal, marriage limiting words 'What have you been doing all day?' more than once when he came home to wall-to-wall baby toys, nappy sacks, breast pads and no dinner on the table in the early days.

But he too adjusted and soon started to try and praise his poor woolly headed wife for all the things she had done rather than the thousand and one things she hadn't. 'Thanks so much for washing my pants, don't fret, I'll eat tomorrow night, dear.'

The children have seen fit to throw us a curve ball or two over the years. Like Pickle and the 100 foot tree episode. He still likes to tell the story now of how he could only see the top of my head as I wandered beneath a fir tree looking for my four-year-old son who I could hear calling 'Mummy!' but couldn't actually see... until I looked up.

Then there was Poppet on that bouncy castle and the resulting ride in a French ambulance to fix her broken leg.

I should have seen today coming, and indeed with my history and parentage I full expected the diagnosis. I still remember the day I was told by the school to make sure and give a letter to my Mum after one of those 'routine' doctor visits when I was seven years old. Not the nit nurse this time though, a proper doctor.

I did my best for them, marrying a bloke with disgustingly perfect vision. But I was startlingly unprepared for the Hungarian Opthalmologist telling me this evening that both my kids have succumbed to my batfink gene and developed myopia. It was with a heavy heart that I walked them downstairs to the specs shop to pick out frames for their new glasses, which in their own mysterious, chummy little way will be exactly the same prescription.

They, on the other hand were chuffing delighted!! You never saw more excited parading in front of the mirror, weighing up chunky pink versus delicate lilac frames, and Cliff Richards versus John Lennon. I am insulted by the choice they get as well. That miserable day back in 1977 when I was told to pick out some NHS specs my options were pink, blue, clear plastic or tortoiseshell.

I kid you not, Pickle tried on three pairs and looked amazing in every one, the little bugger. Poppet took a while longer but ended up with some gorgeous dark red 'Chippies' with tiny puppy dogs emblazoned on the arms. We are collecting them on Wednesday and they absolutely cannot wait.

I really didn't expect that at all.

Going round in circles

Spring has sprung... off.

To be precise, Spring sprung into Budapest, hit our trampoline, performed a triple salco and a double backflip and sprang back out again. The tulips haven't noticed, there are shoots a-sprouting all around but it's chuffing chilly again since Boy-Next-Door took an optimistic dip in their swimming pool on Bank Holiday Tuesday last week.

Poppet has been moaning that the house is cold - er, that'll be because I confidently turned the heating right down when the sun came out - but it could also be because she will wander round the house dressed in summer tops and cropped trousers. Not because it was sunny on Tuesday; she's been doing it all winter long. I sometimes wonder if she thinks she may be in the Big Brother house, treating every day like a fashion parade.

But the happy mood has remained and I heard some fantastic Yankee-bashing banter at the kids football practice yesterday which I feel the need to share.

Another kids Dad was asking me about the Cricket Club that just started up - and which my kids LOVE. An American friend standing with us started giggling, claiming he can't take the sport seriously.

We thought at first maybe the word 'cricket' must make him think of what is known in proper English as a 'grasshopper' and he was picturing chaps in white leap-frogging all over a grassy field. But no. He went on to say, 'All those grown men running backwards and forwards between two posts in their pyjamas just creases me up.'

Oh dear.

English Dad retorted, 'Well, at least our 'pyjamas' don't look like our Mums shrunk them in the washing so they're skin tight, unlike your beloved baseball gear. And we know how to put our hats on the right way round.'

That got him on the back foot, and he confessed he didn't really know enough about the game to argue further. Which was a red rag to a bull of course.

'See, with cricket we don't need gloves to catch the ball, we use our bare hands like real men.'

'The bloke behind the stumps isn't wrapped up in a duvet and a Hannibal Lecter mask either.'

'And there are no funny hand signals looking like you're scratching away at your nuts on live television.'

(Actually at this point I thought, 'yes, but they do rub the ball on their crotch before everyone goes round handling it with their bare hands...' but I didn't say anything.)

All in all I reckon it was England 3 : USA 0 by the end of the last over. But it still doesn't explain why you can buy baseball bats, balls and gloves a-go-go here in Budapest but after trawling the three biggest sports stores we find there's not a single cricket bat in sight. Maybe Hungarians prefer running in circles as well.

I found out last week that they like to dance in circles, though...

Nobby and I had one of our rare nights out having secured the kids a double sleepover (hurrah!). First we did a wee spot of shopping without the lilting sounds of 'Can we GO now?' 'Do we HAVE to go in here?' and 'I'm HUNGRY!' while we browsed.

Then we popped out to the theatre to watch 'Cats' at the Andrew Lloyd-Webber-obsessed establishment in town. So far we've seen 'Phantom', 'Jesus Christ Superstar' and 'Joseph' so we're working our way up to a full set. I'd never seen Cats before but thanks to the subtitles not working on the night I've now seen it twice because we had to borrow the DVD starring Elaine Paige afterwards to find out what the hell was going on.

In order to recover from the obligatory Community Clapping (I guess that counts as applauding in a circle, no?) we hit Time Warp Central, the bar in town I normally go to with girlie friends and end up leaving in the wee small hours not having noticed the night slipping away. There was a band setting up in the main dancing room so we took a turn around the rest of the place while we waited for them to finish.

Nobby and I love a bit of people watching. This bar has a balcony from where you can watch all kinds of goings on, such as the Stag Party approaching the Hen Party for a bit of joint revellry. Oh deary dear. Miss Blondie McTits-on-Show soon had Mr Speccie McGeek leaning in way too close for comfort - the music wasn't that loud, I reckon he was just trying to get a better view down her top. Her companion Ms Feisty McBallsy clearly didn't appreciate the attention, despite pulling the chief stag and was soon showing him how she could use a rolled up magazine as a lethal weapon.

Anyway, we eventually headed back up to see this band and could not quite understand what had been going on while we'd been absent. The entire room had turned into a long chain of people holding hands, doing some River Dance thing with their feet before swinging their arms up and down and moving on to the strains of some gypsy-cum-Turkish-cum-Greek style music.

Perhaps it was the Hungarian version of the Locomotion?? No idea, but there was definitely not enough rum in my coke to persuade me to join in. And after Nobby got stepped on for the third time and we were gradually being boxed into a corner by the dance we decided to scarper.

Gimme cricket pitches and square dancing any day.

Next day when I went to collect the kids to find they were staying in a circular house...
I am expecting meet myself coming the other way at any moment. I'll let you know.

Boys Behaving Badly

I had a glimpse into the future today.

Nobby somehow persuaded Pickle to accompany him on a long dog walk 'up to the flagpole' this morning. I suspect a bundle of bribery was involved but anything to get the little screen-hopper out into the fresh air. Especially considering today was one of those strange mid-week public holidays which we always reckon we'll use as an opportunity to get in the car and get out of the city but then we always sleep in late while the kids hit the electronics and can't be torn away from them.

And the air has been LOVELY today! Hopefully, touch wood, I can stop moaning about sodding snow and cold weather and finally pack the thermal socks away for a few months. Spring would appear to have sprung over here. I even saw a snowdrop at the weekend. So I did not mind at all shelving the three hours in the car to go visit a castle (which would probably be shut when we arrived anyway from past experience) and instead I got busy with the home-made compost and some long-overdue gardening.

I also collected all the dog poop off the lawn now it's not buried in snow, but that may be over-sharing. Gives a whole new meaning to the phrase 'what a bag of shite.'

So at lunchtime Nobby invited Pickle tell us girls about the lovely chat they had enjoyed during their walk (having previously informed me that Pickle had almost talked his ears off for forty minutes).

'Oh yeah,' says Pickle, 'we were talking about how Tiggy wags her tail when she's happy.'

'That's nice dear,' says I, 'she wags her tail a lot doesn't she.'

'Yes, well, I told Daddy I was wondering if a boy dog could wag his willy when he was happy instead of his tail!' he continued, gleefully.

'Oh really?' says I.

'Yeah! And then when a girl dog was happy she would waggle her boobies!' he guffawed and then proceeded to model what waggling boobies might look like... ON ME.

What a charming child. Meanwhile Nobby is sitting there grinning away and high-fiving the creative genius.

So now I know what is to come once Pickle reaches beer drinking age. It'll be like having Gary and Tony Behaving Badly on my very own sofa, trying to decide whether they prefer breasts or bottoms.

Can't wait.