Revelations of a Slummy Mummy

B has a particular passion for peculiar sensory experiences. He has been diagnosed with a sensory processing disorder; simply put his brain is wired up differently and the way he perceives things through his five senses is fairly topsy turvy in comparison to you or me.   Where we can filter and subconsciously decide important objects versus background objects in our immediate environment, B struggles with this. Often this will play out in either sensory seeking or sensory avoidant behaviours, which can in turn result in the most comical situations for us as a family. Most of the time I will try these things out with the purpose of understanding B that little bit more, but even I draw the line at poo-smearing. I was wandering around Sainsbury’s one day with B when he was a lot younger. He was, as every two year old in Sainsbury’s seems to be, wholly unimpressed by the supermarket scenario, despite my best undignified mum attempts to entertain him. Four wheels on the bus renditi...

Disclaimer: If you fall into the ‘Let’s rejoice, the holidays are here!’ category I apologise in advance for raining on your parade. However, please don’t feel the need to call me out on my poor pessimistic parenting, I may just feel the need to punch you in the face. ;-) I don’t know about you, but I am one of those people who slightly dread the school holidays- no sooner do they start and you’ll find me counting down to when they finish. I love spending time with my kids, I really do, but when there are four of them and one of me, the ratio doesn’t swing too well in my favour. Our respite for B won’t stretch to cover an extra pair of hands for every day and S is usually working, leaving me the daunting task of keeping four children alive by myself for a whole two weeks. One day in and I am full of forced optimism for the coming fortnight, reminding myself of all the lovely things we can do now there’s no school. Delusions of grandeur dance through my head as I imagine skipping...

There’s a small five word phrase that’s banded around a fair bit by us (less than reputable) parents. We normally wrap it round our dubious parenting techniques to justify our behaviour like the only limp lettuce leaf in our ‘healthy’ option BLT sarnie. Treating our little darlings to a nice hot bubbly soak in the tub; translation- seeing how much child-free time we can possibly steal to snatch a hot cuppa or a five-sentence conversation with the hubby. This often results in small, cold, raisin-like children removing themselves from the bath when they feel the first chills of hypothermia beginning to set in. The stealth off each morning as small people emerge one by one in your bed, apparently materialising from nowhere and clambering all over your poor tired self. You pull off an Oscar worthy performance, so convincing your other half actually believes you to still be asleep and surrendering to the epic foot in the face manoeuvre admits defeat and gets up. Score. And the ...

One of S’s conditions in agreeing to baby number four was that I learned to drive. Fair enough, I could see how, from his point of view, playing taxi driver to three small people and me, plus always being the dessie driver by default because he was the only driver could get quite tedious. To add insult to injury, I rarely drank when we went out, normally for one of two reasons- namely pregnancy or breastfeeding. I think we calculated that I’ve spent 37 months of my life pregnant, and 44 months of my life breastfeeding the products of those pregnancies. (If you’re wondering about the extra month of pregnancy- all of my kids were hugely inconsiderate and rocked up late. Big dislike) Before I learned to drive my main mode of transport was, in the words of S, the dreaded ‘peasant wagon.’ This amused me in the extreme, having happily used buses my entire life since my mum never drove a car, but to S the mere thought of sharing a vehicle with strangers (and possibly unwashed, germ-ridde...

Firstly, apologies for the slackness in this very tardy blog. Secondly, I love every one of you brilliant, encouraging, fantastic, supportive, awesome individuals for taking the time out to read my ramblings. It means more than you can know. It hasn’t been the easiest few weeks. In fact, epic crises the size of Everest have seemed to strike one atop another like angry waves battering the shoreline in a particularly gnarly storm. My resolve to remain rock like is rapidly eroding into sand, but I figure there are some sand attributes that aren’t so bad after all (but that’s a whole other blog post!) My eyes have recently been opened to a whole other realm. A realm untalked about by the masses- funerals and death 101. I have no previous knowledge or experience on this slightly taboo underworld-it’s not something that generally pops up in the everyday chirpy dinner party conversation. On the occasions I have seen it attempted with such casuality the result has been fallout akin ...

Don't grieve for me, for now I'm free I'm following the path God laid you see. I heard him call. I took his hand And travelled to a better land. A land where I am whole and strong Where life is beautiful and long The colours bright, the music sweet A place where I have found my feet Pure joy, full peace-my God is here I know you wish I was still near- But resting with Jesus, I'm safe in arms Protected from all that once caused me harm *  *  *  *  *  * But Mum, you're missed, you've left a hole Your loving heart, your gentle soul Your laugh was infectious, your humour was great (I'm not sure your cooking was worthy to plate) You never held back in the words that you spoke- 'I'm so proud!' 'You're awesome!' 'You chose a great bloke!' Your art was amazing-your beauty shone through Your talent, your flair and your thoughtfulness too No more pain, no more suffering-of this there's no doubt You're...

Snow Day (through the unique eyes of a special family!) ‘Twas the night before Snow Day, and throughout the UK , Excitement was building- skies were indeed grey! You’d think this whole snow thing was rarer then gold- Oh wait, this is Poole and it is, so I’m told. The kids came home chattering with dreamy eyed sighs, ‘Miss L said snow’s coming.’ (And teachers don’t lie) Said I, trying to rein in their zeal, just in case, ‘It’s not teachers who lie, it’s those stations in space.’ At last they were nestled all snug in their beds, While visions of snow angels danced through their heads. The hubby and I had a cheeky nightcap, And settled our brains for a (brief) winter’s nap. Awoken next morning-4:30, oh dear- I crept to the window-had this white gold appeared? Mixed feelings arose as I peered through the glass, A star for Miss L- white stuff here at last. Now for those of you non-Brits this is gonna sound crazy, But we’re not used to snow...