10/1/2013 – Concentrating

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2012, 365, children, family, home, photoaday, photography, postaday, UK

Keeping it short and sweet today. I think the photo says it all 🙂

4/1/2013 – Bright Lights, Big City

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2012, bus, childhood, children, christmas, family, Harrods, holiday, home, lights, london, night photography, Oxford St, photoaday, photography, postaday, UK

365 Photo a Day Project Photo

“London by Night”

A day at Matt’s parents’ house in Chiswick including a visit to the park…

…followed by a trip on a big red London bus…

to see the Christmas lights before they were taken down.

We finished off with a trip to Harrods to enjoy being tourists going up and down the Egyptian escalator – and wandering the food halls marvelling at the expensive delicacies.  Matt’s Dad treated us to a Harrods sandwich for tea (the boys tasted the roast beef and roast ham before deciding to share the latter). We ate it in style – on the bus home 🙂

31/12/2012 – New Year’s Eve

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2012, children, family, home, hospital, party, photoaday, photography

   365 Photo a Day project photo

“Happy New Year”

The rambling part…

(Apologies for photo quality – today was a day of experimenting with my new iphone – the first time I have had a phone with a camera on it!)

Dx still no better this morning – standing on tiptoes and walking like a drunk 😦 We rang the hospital who wanted us to go in at 3pm to get him checked.

We had been invited to friends’ for New Years Even to celebrate with them and stay over so it was going to be last minute whether Dx and I were able to join the rest of the family or not. Matt was unable to come with us to drop us at the hospital as he was cooking a pasta dish to take in the evening so I had to struggle carrying Dx (full of Christmas chocolate and cake and weighing a ton!) through the car park, down the stairs to the reception where luckily I intercepted a porter with an empty wheelchair and he kindly agreed to wheel Dx to the ward.

Luckily they deemed him fit enough to go home again – we have been given an “open door” pass should he get any worse but otherwise we just need to go back on 8th Jan to get his blood checked again (which he is quite excited about as it means he gets another cool plaster!)

So off to friends – for food drink and some silly board games (I do like silly board games! Especially when they are mixed with food, drink and friends).

(Gx’s fondness for salad always makes me smile – he will happily eat a plateful!)

Even Lx had some chicken nuggets without making a fuss.

There were 12 children in the house and they all played so well together – the house was littered with foam Nerf gun bullets afterwards but there were no rows and nothing broken! Lx made friends with the other girls – and they created their own little “club” with rules and everything.

We counted down to the New Year with the children and a glass of Harrods champagne – and watched some of the fireworks on TV (Dx thought us doing Auld Langs Syne was hilarious).

We all managed to keep going till about 2am before we had enough and all collapsed on various couches, mattresses and roll mats round the house.

30/12/2012 – Hospital Drama (Season Finale)

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2012, 365, children, christmas, family, home, hospital, photoaday, photography, postaday, son, winter

365 Photo a Day Project Photo
“Home where he belongs”

After a night in a children’s ward in hospital – I am more than happy not to repeat the experience and feel so bad for those who are in there for long periods.

I didn’t mind the noise of the baby who cried and cried for hours and couldn’t get to sleep – I just felt for her poor exhausted parents as they tried in vain to distract and settle her. And the little girl who screamed for about 30 minutes as they tried to take blood tests/insert a canula? Poor little thing. Both kept us awake but I just was so sorry for them being so upset and in so much pain.

What I DID mind was the couple who came in about 1.30 with their daughter and then talked to each other (not even to her) at full volume. In the end I went over and whispered to them that perhaps they weren’t aware that we could all hear every word…which worked for about 10 minutes before they carried on as if I had never spoken. As only one parent can stay, the Dad disappeared about 2.30 and came back at 6am and resumed his conversation – which included a number of swearwords and some subjects not entirely suitable for a children’s ward.

But overall it made me feel very lucky that Dx was in there for something so minor. The “noisy” couple were there for their daughter’s broken leg, fractured in 3 places and requiring 5 weeks of traction.Only 3 and she needs to spend 5 weeks lyingon her back 😦

Also in our section of the ward were a boy of about 14 who he told us “suffers from depression” who had injured himself so badly “jumping off something” that he will be there for 3 months before he can attempt walking. He was watched 24/7 by two social workers at a time who never spoke a word to him while we were there.

And opposite us was a lovely young boy struck down with a mystery illness which has seen his weight plummet, his skin break out and seen him spend the last 4 weeks in hospital, undergo numerous tests and with still no answers as to what is wrong with him.

We were lucky indeed.

After breakfast we saw the consultant who helped Dx to his feet and found he can now stand a little – very wobbly but a big improvement on yesterday. It turned out from the blood tests that his ear infection has spread infection through his body and it is affecting his muscles. But the great news was we could go home.

We sent a text to Sx on his mobile from Dx…(the missing word is “funny”)

and soon Matt came in with them all to take us home. THe children had a play in the ward playroom while we waited for Dx’s medication to be delivered from the pharmacy

Then lunch arrived – and as Dx is so picky, Sx was happy to help him out by eating his roast pork! D x wasn’t even very impressed with the jelly!

When the medication came, we set off for home…via McDs!

I am so proud of my littlest boy. We had a bit of a wobble about the idea of blood tests(but not even a wince when they were done) and a bit of concern about staying the night and not going home. But then he just got on with it. EVen when it looked like we might not make it home today. He grinned at the Doctors, tried everything they asked him to do even if it hurt and laughed when they pulled his body into obscure positions. I am so glad to have him home.

29/12/2012 – Hospital Drama

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2012, 365, boys, children, christmas, family, finland, holiday, hospital, photoaday, photography, postaday, son

365 Photo a Day Project Photo
“Small Boy – Big Bed”

Dx woke up after everyone else and we knew he was awake from the cries coming from upstairs. his earache was better but his legs hurt and he had tried to get out of bed only to find he couldn’t put any weight on his feet.

We thought perhaps he had slept so deeply under the influence of the drugs that his legs had gone to sleep and just let him rest for the morning. At lunchtime he went to go for lunch and crumpled on the floor as he tried to stand. We put him to bed for a nap but he was just as bad afterwards so we set off to the out of hours Doctor.

We were warned of a 1.5 hour wait so I took the iPad for Dx and a book for me but he wasnt too under the weather to concentrate on the iPad and was just bored. He was in quite good spirits, quite chatty and laughing at my jokes but just couldn’t stand. After a couple of hours, the out of hours Dr saw him and was mystified and sent us to Accident and Emergency.

We saw a nurse after about an hour who dosed him up with Paracetemol and put some “magic cream” on his hands in case he needed any blood tests when he saw the consultant.

Another hour passed in the waiting room before we saw a consultant who had just heard all the details and was about to examine him when she was called away to an emergency. We were allowed to wait in the triage cubicle while waiting for the paged paeditrician to come and see him.

We played “Eye Spy” using the fantastic wall murals for inspiration.

We then saw a wonderful SHO who won Dx over and checked everything out while explaining to me what he was doing and how everything was looking good at each stage. His legs moved as they should, the nerves seemed ok, the joints weren’t swollen, everything looked good…until he asked Dx to try and walk. Then he could barely stand on tiptoe, his legs all bent out of shape and he was obviously in great pain. Time for a blood test 😦

Dx was so good about it (he and I looked at a dinosaur book while they took the blood from his hand and he didn’t even wince.

He even managed to find me a heart in the book  – how brave is he!!

He got a special plaster and they told us we would be staying the night to keep an eye on him.

I have done really well not to ever have any of the children stay in hospital before – I tried to sell it to Dx as being a special experience. He played on the iPad while we waited for Matt to come in with my overnight bits and some food for us both as we were STARVING!

27/12/2012 – A Day of Rest

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2012, 365, childhood, children, christmas, cooking, family, holiday, home, meal, photoaday, postaday, UK

Everyone was pretty exhausted after so many late nights and so much food so we spent the day in our PJs watching films (Horton Hears a Who) and playing new Wii games. (and of course poring over the hundreds of photos of the last couple of days – most of which you are spared as I don’t like to expose the rest of the family to internet fame!!)

After the excesses of the previous two days, We managed to find a little room for a big brunch though 🙂 And for just the one photo.

28/12/2012 – Leftovers

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2012, childhood, children, christmas, earache, family, holiday, home, leftovers, postaday, rest, UK

The day of rest went down so well yesterday, we had another one today 🙂

Dx and Lx were a little under the weather and had naps to try and get them up to full health. We introduced the older boys to the old “Airplane” film (which they found hilarious) while the little ones napped.

I was going to make a chicken ham and corn pie with the leftovers from Christmas but was thwarted by a lack of corn till the online shop arrives tomorrow so I just made the sauce and mixed the meat in for now.

Watched Home Alone 2 – Lost in New York in the evening before bed…and then Dx got an earache about 10 minutes after going to bed. By the time I got him downstairs he was SCREAMING with pain. Matt had gone out so I dosed him up with Calpol and gave him a wrapped hot water bottle to hold against it but the screaming was unrelenting. Eventually I gave him ibuprofen on top (I had been hoping to spread it out) and after another half hour he became calm enough to take to bed and get him to sleep with me.

Sx had an earache a few years ago and it is the worst pain I have heard my children in. Dx was no better poor little thing.

 

26/12/2012 – Boxing Day

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365 Photo a Day Post

“My Boys in Blue”

The rambling part…

For Boxing Day we set off to my brother’s house to spend the day with my side of the family.

There was more food…

more crackers…

more presents…

(After finding there were NO photos of me on Christmas Day – I was pleased to discover that I had evidence in the photo below of me being there on Boxing Day)

a christmas cake (decorated by my clever neice – aren’t these little figures amazing?!)

and some silly games (don’t worry – we just used the poker chips as counters as there were so many of us!)

And of course – Sx was STILL obsessed with his phone

Dx couldn’t take the pace and fell asleep on the couch for a while!

All of us…

25/12/2012- Merry Christmas!

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365 Photo a Day

“Merry Christmas”

The rambling part..

We woke the children up at 7.30am (!) to go and open their stockings.

The children all got tiny MP3 players – Gx didnt quite understand how to separate the earphone cable and nearly garroted himself!

Gx was very impressed that Santa’s elves had even managed to wrap tiny pencil sharpeners!

Then we started on the presents under the tree…

Gx got quite a few presents with an arts and crafts theme

We had our traditional breakfast of pain au chocolats which Lx helped Matt make…

Gx had a little sing around the Christmas tree to the Christmas songs we had playing

Then we made our way through the remaining presents…

Sx was so pleased with his mobile phone – and managed to get the words “my mobile” into most conversations that day!

While I was out with Gx the other day – Lx had painted a butterfly box and Dx had helped Matt make some chocolates for me. In the shape of hearts obviously!

We got ready to go up to london with a quick photocall before we went.

Up in London, Matt’s brother’s Andy’s family was there too…to be continued…

25/12/2012 – Christmas Continues

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Quick trip up the motorway to Matt’s parents for the rest of the day.

Christmas lunch with all the trimmings…  Margaret had found a candle her father (Matt’s grandfather) had made with wax from his own bees

The traditional treasure hunt for the children to find their presents (each child with a different colour)…

The crackers had little whistles in – each with its own “note” denoted by a number and there was a song list with the tunes written down (321321654 etc). I was conductor (phew!) but there was a lot of laughing as our tunes sounded nothing like the real song. I wondered how Sx kept guessing what the songs were but it turned out he was working out what the numbers were and he had identified his “note” was E so he was playing the tune in his head as I pointed. His musical ability is a real gift and astounds me!

The Christmas pudding wasn’t remembered til after lunch and took 3 hours to cook so we had it for tea!

Instead of traditional Christmas cake there was a a Snowman cake