Saturday 30 May 2015

A birthday, some booze and of course, a boob.

Good morning! It's 11am on the 30th of May and today is my Mum's (Grandma P's) birthday. It's not something I would usually write about, but it's a special birthday. She has told me not to 'write anything on Facebook about my age' and I won't. However, if you can guess my age then you can probably guess hers.  Please see my craftily added emoticon at the end of this post.

It all started so smoothly. I woke leisurely at 8am (after being up at 11, 2, 3.30 and 6 - when do they actually sleep through?), hung the washing out, put another load in, got a shower and actually washed my hair. I even dried it too. So it was all going to plan. The other half was happily playing with the children upstairs whilst I started 'operation tidy up' downstairs. 'Operation tidy up' usually involves me throwing things in the dining room and closing the door and then vowing to vacuum it and clean it properly in the morning. I'll just add that I was (and still am) in my dressing gown at this point.  Suddenly, I saw something in my peripheral vision outside.  Was it a ladder? Window cleaners! Bugger.  All the curtains in the house were open, I wasn't dressed, there was underwear drying upstairs, there was probably a disguarded breast pad in every room of the house.  Not wanting to be caught in my purple M&S fluffy dressing gown, I ran toward the stairs, did a combat roll down the landing (just to add to the drama) and dived into the girl's room. She was playing at having Chicken Pox (as you do) and laying inside her make shift 'hospital bed' wardrobe. Daddy was taking her blood pressure and the boy was doing his usual ninja flipping and face planting the bed.
'The window cleaners are here!'
'Have we got a tenner?'
'I have loads of jobs to do and I am trapped.  Help!'
He put down his stethoscope, (in my mind) did a hands on hips Superman style pose and dashed off downstairs.  
And that kind of brings us to now. I have been stuck in the girl's room for the last hour feeding behind closed curtains. The girl, the Ninja Flippin' Dude and I are all in a state of undress and Grandma P arrives in an hour. It was all going so smoothly too.  However, I can add that the other half has completed my jobs downstairs. Bless that man. Upstairs however, it looks like one of the window cleaners could have chucked a grenade in through an open pane because we didn't have a tenner (we never do) and it would pass unnoticed.  Upstairs looks like hell on Earth.

It's now 9pm and remember when I said that Grandma P was due to arrive in 'an hour'?  She should have arrived at 12.30pm in order to have a drink and leisurely open her presents.  At 12.25pm I was still rocking the purple dressing gown and was downstairs ironing the clothes I was going to wear.  I had managed to straighten my hair and do my make up, but I was also sporting a Peppa Pig hair clip in my fringe as I am currently starting to resemble to Dulux Dog.  At 12.40, we were all ready.  At 12.50 we were still all ready, sitting together on the sofa just waiting.  At 12.55, we got a 'just setting off' text.  At 1pm, the boy started to kick off.  At 1.10, I cracked open the bottle of champagne and by 1.15 I was feeding again.  Finally, at 1.30 Grandma P decided to show up.  I greeted her with a pile of dried washing in my hands (I knew that my doing a job would inevitably summon her arrival), shoved a discoloured Kir Royale in her hand and led her to the living room where we ripped open her presents, got a tad emotional for about thirty seconds and inhaled our rust coloured Kir Royales.  The creme de cassis was definitely pink when I bought it pre pregnancy number two.  Who knew it 'could go off'?  We drank it anyway though; we're made of strong stuff...    

For personal reasons Mum didn't want a party to celebrate her birthday (see my last post) so we decided to go to Wentbridge House near Pontefract for a late dinner.  It was all very lovely and we got to see a beautiful bride as we were entering.  The girl was being well behaved, the in laws arrived, we ordered drinks, sat down and the boy woke up.  Therefore, a delightful game of 'pass the baby' began.  I panicked and made some formula (no way was I feeding in a posh restaurant) but he didn't want it.  I then got frustrated with myself for making the formula too early as I hate wasting it.  Have you seen how much it costs? Between us, we eventually got the boy to sleep and made a make shift bed with his legs resting on mine.  Ten minutes passed and it was calm.  I ordered the lamb.  The lamb arrived.  I moved my chair a millimetre closer to the table.  Rookie move right there.  I should know better by now.  Of course the boy woke and once again 'pass the baby'commenced between mouthfuls of lamb, haddock, steak and burger.  Will I ever get to savour a meal ever again?

We ordered our desserts and I went to go and change the boy's nappy in the toilets (poshly named the 'powder room'.  Unsurprisingly, there was no changing station so I plonked him on a posh stool, thanked the Lord that there was indeed no stool in his nappy and did a lightning quick change.  He screamed the place down so I caved and went to feed him in a toilet cubicle.

After about fifteen minutes, I made it back to the dinner table only to find that everyone had eaten their dessert and mine had been returned to the kitchen to keep warm after the other half told the waitress that I had been on the toilet for the last twenty minutes.  Thanks love.

With our faced well and truely stuffed, we returned to our house for a bit of tea and cake.  The boy had mellowed so the girl decided that it was her turn to shine.  She was placed on the naughty step twice for stealing a ball from the boy because it was hers.  She hasn't so much as looked at the ball once in two years, but now it was all she wanted in the world.  Finally, at 6pm we all decided to call it at day.  Grandma and Grandad said their goodbyes.  Within minutes, we noticed that Grandad had left his phone so we called Grandma to to let him know.  Then Grandma P said her goodbyes and once again, within minutes, we noticed that she too had left her phone but we were unable to contact her to let her know.  Ten minutes later, Grandad returned to pick up his phone and said his goodbyes again.  Ten minutes after that Grandma P returned to pick up her phone and said her goodbyes again (she had made it half way home before realising and turned back).  A rushed bathtime and bedtime hour passed smoothly and for once we successfully divided and conquered the kids and got them to sleep with no meltdowns.  That brings us nicely back to now. It's 9.54pm. I have had my cuppa and another bit of Grandma P's home made birthday cake and am pondering on what I can take away from today.  I have learnt then to: always expect a grandparent to leave something at your house, don't move an inch with a sleeping baby on your lap as he will wake before the lamb touches your lips and don't ever leave it to your other half to explain the (entirely fabricated) reason as to why your sticky toffee pudding needs to be returned to the kitchen to keep warm.

Good night!

Pictures:
An excited little dude snoozing over dinner (for at least ten minutes) and the girl with Grandma P and her emoticon covered cake. 
Oh, and one with me on it after 'being on the toilet' for twenty minutes. 





4 comments:

  1. This is really funny, we must all have had days like this. Partic like your comando roll down the landing!! and drinking kir royale that's off! Thanks for linking up to #sundaystars

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  2. Ahh, thank you. The window cleaners caught me blumming breast feeding a few months back too!! It was my first linky too. The first one I have found straightforward.

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  3. Just had me cracking up reading this! And men need to learn we are NEVER on the toilet, especially not if someone phones, my boys still find it hilarious to say Mum's having a poo down the phone even if I'm actually up making the beds grrr!

    Stevie x

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    1. Ha! Aren't men great?! I read your bucket list post yesterday and tried to leave a comment. Not sure whether it worked or not. As you know, I am not very good at all this! I managed to change my Facebook page though, so thank you for that and thank you for reading the post. x

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