But I had a stroke of genius (I do that sometimes), and on to my weekly grocery order I added some of the ‘takeaway’ chinese meals – two boxes of the set menu’s for two, plus a range of extras (they happened to be on 3 for 2, which was a bonus!). I hid them, and then printed this up, and posted the envelopes beneath bedroom doors;

Cue much buzzing and twittering and combing of hair choosing of smart shirts upstairs. Princess dress optional – but deemed meet and right so to do.

Downstairs there was a huge operation afoot – have you ever tried timing 18 packets of food to be ready at the same time? Madness. Wrappers EVERYWHERE, and of course they got mixed up and had no clue as to the contents of certain trays. Whilst I was busy swearing in the kitchen and burying the dog in cardboard outers, C had a genius secret brainwave, and stole down to the shed, retrieving the box of chinese lanterns we hung in the garden about 15 years ago. He single-handedly hung them on garden string he strung between the curtain poles across the ceiling. Totally totally magic.

Naturally, I managed to delete the photos I took – but what a night we had! Such a fantastic start to the holidays. We spent ages around the table, just being our favourite Supersix; chatting, remembering holidays and telling inanely stoopid unfunny jokes.

Special night.

If only I’d managed to not delete the pictures… *shakes fist at self*

Four.

Which obviously means I’ve had four pregnancies.

And whilst I obviously grew older and much much wiser with each passing child, I have also had to rethink my thinking each and every time.

Because each pregnancy was entirely different; as unique as the child that appeared at the end of it.

Each baby had different wants and needs to the one before.

Each time; each pregnancy, each birth, each baby taught me something new. Taught me, actually, that I know NOTHING. And that no matter how prepared I thought I was, they were there to trip me up a little and remind me that I had No Clue, really.

So, as Aptaclub, on the launch of their fab (and FREE!) Preparing for Birth app, have kindly asked us parents to answer “If only I’d known…”, I thought I’d share the sum of this vast collected wisdom… (*cough*)

If Only I’d Known…

1. Maternity pads. You need them. In fact, you may want to wear two for the first day or two. Trust me.
2. Breast pads. See Point 1.
3. Baby socks – Baby Gap socks are the only ones that actually stay on.
4. Muslins. Get them. Keep them nearby. Cherish them. They will make every part of your life easier for years to come.
5. Breasts are unreliable. They get leaky valves. They spray in every direction. They may attempt to drown your child. See point 2.
6. Your new baby does not need a bath the day you come home from hospital. Taking 45 minutes to prepare the perfect temperature in the baby bath with the perfect hooded towels and the perfect baby sponge and a doting grandparental audience will simply mean you get very very stressed, and baby cries pitifully throughout like a small goat. Don’t bother.
7. You don’t need a baby bath. You will use it five times, then it will sit in your loft and collect old baby clothes.
8. Clearly mark any videos/discs of baby video with red pen and shiny stickers and loud alarms. That way you won’t tape over them when you’re building a Teletubbies/Waybuloo collection.
9. Time moves into a new dimension with a new baby in the house. A ‘lie in’ consist of 30 minutes not 4hrs. Conversely, going out takes 4hrs not 4 minutes.
10. Spontaneous will be officially removed from your vocabulary. Planning becomes your new best friend.
11. Pelvic floor exercises. Not up for discussion. Just do them. A lot.
    

But actually – the “If only I’d known…” is bigger than all of those small things. It’s the thing that everyone tells you, and that you never ever truly ‘get’ until it’s almost too late. If only I’d known how fast that time goes.

I’d have stopped more to inhale every single bedtime sleepyhead – teenagers simply don’t let you do it, and frankly they just don’t smell as nice as a new baby anyway.

If only I’d known that as I look with pride at my amazing young men approaching adulthood way too fast, I wish I’d known how much I’d achingly MISS the golden babies they were.

This post is Mamafour’s entry into the Aptaclub ‘If Only I’d Known…’ competition

There I said it. I’m OUT.

Actually, it’s never been much of a secret – I’m just not one of those people who can act cool. If I like something, people know about it. Think less ‘elegant Siamese cat’, and more ‘enthusiastic labrador puppy’ and you have me sussed. I’ve always been the same – at the supposed height of my aware-of-the-need-for-cool-behaviour, at age 16, I bumped into THE girl in my form at school. You know the one – effortless glamorous, hatefully lovely, gifted academically, athletic champion… the one we all want to be friends with. We were in HMV, looking at music – and she stopped and said hello. Instead of fainting away in pride and pleasure that I was worthy, what did I say to Queen of the 5th Year? “Oh, I’m just trying to find a John Denver album I don’t have yet”

*face palm*

So – like I was saying. I love John Denver.

I love him for his lyrics, his passion, his melodies, his ability to make music soar like an eagle (no really, it does), his sense of fun… and that he was there with me through a lot of my formative years, singing me the lyrics I could relate to. I love many many of his songs, but one in particular has a special place in my heart – Sunshine On My Shoulders. Weirdly, it was released the year I was  born, but I discovered it when pregnant for the very first time, and I played it repeatedly to my unborn child. And it’s the song I sang all my children to sleep with. Many long hours spent rocking in darkened nurseries, small heavy-with-sleep baby bodies pressed against my chest, my face nestled into the warm silky softness of their heads, listening to their huffling breathy sighs, gently singing this song.

Now – skip to last night. Another band I probably enjoy on the same level as JD is Train. And yes, I do know that the two really don’t have much in common – except my love of their lyrics and their joy in what they do. Anyhoo last night, Train were in concert live on Radio 2. Oh, rapture and joy.

I had a baking session planned, so I whipped the children to bed, turned the radio up and settled in to enjoy. Naturally, being the good social media type that I am, I tweeted my excitement:

“Singing loudly to @train on @BBCRadio2 in the kitchen. Ignoring the fact that I’m baking a cake, and pretending I’m THERE dammit.” (from my @LittleStuff account)

Imagine how I sploshed the washing up water when, during Ken Bruce’s interview after the concert he read that tweet out. TO TRAIN THEMSELVES! Pat Monahan laughed at MY tweet! *faints*

So. All Train-ed up as I was feeling, I had a quick saunter around their blog, and came across this little notice:

We will be featured on the upcoming “The Music Is You: A Tribute To John Denver” album

What song will they be singing?

Why, Sunshine On My Shoulders.

Obviously.

A couple of months ago, I had a VERY exciting phone call. From a VERY exciting company. Asking me to go for an interview with them.

Yes, me.

A real, live, PROPER job. With a salary, and everything.

It wasn’t like I’d been looking for a job, but this one kind of fell out of the sky at me, and it actually sounded ideal. Mostly work from home, good package, doing pretty much what I do anyway…

Excitement quivered.

The day of the interview arrived, and I was a we-e-eny bit afeared. I had to actually think hard to the last job interview I had. 11 years ago. ELEVEN (how am I old enough for that number?)!

But the interview went well (if you discount me getting lost, falling off my heels in the middle of Oxford Street, and arriving hot and flustered with a bare 2 minutes to spare), and I allowed myself to start actually thinking the “what if’s”.

What if I actually landed this job?

How amazing would that be?

No more monthly worry at the erratic income to pay the achingly-regular bills. No more hateful responsibility for it all – someone else would pay the mortgage, even if I took a two week holiday. And the sheer kudos for working for such a great company. Oooo-weee, I got excited.
And I *may* have mentally spent the first 3 months salary.
What a feeling that was.

And yet…

It wouldn’t go away.
That thought.
That “what if I actually GET the job” thinkings thing.

Once I got past the giddy thrill of a salary… what else would I get? More importantly, what would I NOT get?

The giddy thrill of working for an exciting company? Pffft. WAY too long in the tooth to care about that for more than 5 minutes. A job’s a job.

More importantly, I’d have a boss again. That pretty salary would come with handcuffs.
I’d be explaining the way I spent my time to the salary payer. I’d be answerable to someone else if I chose to take the morning off to bake cakes. I’d have to check in when expected, instead of when I was ready to.
I’d have to travel – a bit is exciting, but regularly committing would mean time away from home.

10 years ago I made the decision that never again would I be answerable to someone else’s schedule.
I would be in charge of my own destiny while I watched my children grow.
Never again did I want to pay someone else to see more of my children than I did.
Never again did I want to go cap in hand and ask permission to take a four day weekend, to justify the request when it was simply a just because.
Never again did I want to feel powerless if I needed to earn more money, or work less hours.
Never again did I want to feel that impotent frustrated “I could do this SO much better if they’d let me do it my way”
Never again did I want to greet a poorly child with an “Oh no, I simply CAN’T TODAY!” thought.
Never again did I want to get up and get that hideous sinking “Oh. I have to go to work”
Never again did I want to spend the week counting down to the rare glory of a weekend with my family.

In the dazzling shine of the golden salary ticket being waved in front of me, I had forgotten all the reasons that I LOVE working for myself.
All the really good, valid, solid reasons that led me to leave a well paid job 10 years ago.
And I started to worry not about what if I didn’t get the job – but more about what if I DID?

In the end, I didn’t get the job.

And that was okay.
It was actually more than okay.
It was A Good Thing.

I’ve realised how incredibly lucky I am -  just to be happy with my life. Genuinely, deep down, contented with my life balances.

Poor, yes. *nods furiously*
But Happy.

Why would I think about messing with that?

(admittedly, my wardrobe now hates me, and mutters as I pass. I had promised it all SORTS of lovelies to look after with that shiny golden salary ticket… )

No.1′s attendance record for High School – he missed 3/4 of the last two years of primary school, too.

No.1 has been absolutely fine, good, GREAT. He’s in school full time, has discovered a real love for Rugby that’s not dented by stud marks in his head form the latest scrum (his head was dented though), and we really thought that the CFS was finally behind us for good.

But since he began Yr 9 in September I’ve been quietly watching his energy levels drop, his mood quieten and his health slowly decline. Today he is off school with a  very swollen throat – but he has no temperature, no other symptoms beyond very swollen neck glands and an achey tired body… And it all just feels far too horribly familiar.

Is it just me being over-paranoid, or do I still, after all this time, have to watch him and be ready for a return of the dreaded CFS?
Should I be cutting back on his activities? Making him drop out of his new love Rugby in an effort to head off anything before it starts?
Force him back into being marked out as ‘the odd kid who’s always off school’?
Or should I just not worry so much, accept it’s simply normal start of term tiredness and let him carry on?

If it is the CFS again, I know that just keeping on will inevitably make him worse, and that I need to start managing the situation now.

If it is not CFS and just run of the mill teen bugs, then stopping his activity will lose the benefit of the exercise and enthusiasm he has so recently gained, along with his long-fought-for social circle (long term illness as a child is the most lonely place you can possibly be). Not to mention the school work he’ll fall behind on AGAIN.

How the hell do I judge this? My perception of his health is totally screwed. It’s my job to be his advocate, but how can I see him impartially? Am I just an over anxious parent? Or am I being the one person who can spot this and stop it before it starts and ruins another two years of his life?

How the fark am I supposed to know?

**GULP**

SATs week.

Bloody stupid, hateful, waste-of-time nonsense.

In the last few weeks Boy has done nothing but practice papers. Homework? Oh, practice papers please – but make sure your parents go through them with you and correct them, and teach you the bits you don’t know.

PE? Well, how about we get those young legs out and stretch them with a nice game of… golf.

Yes. Golf.

Last week, the week before the SATS? Let’s keep them nice and fresh by doing nothing but Maths & English test papers. Morning and afternoon.For PE? Oh, lets do Cup Stacking (concentration practice, see?).

SATS week? Well, how about you lovely 10 and 11 yr olds have two days of English papers, and then we’ll give you some homework.

Homework.

Bloody HOMEWORK?

50-odd maths questions on a sheet. The night before the Maths SATS.

Seriously – if you haven’t managed to teach my child in the last six years, there’s fuck all a few more questions are going to do for him the night before.

Except, perhaps, to kill off any small remaining spark of interest he may have in his own education.

Foolishly, I hoped two more years experience would have taught this particular Yr6 teacher a thing or two. Make him relax a little. Take them less seriously. Teach his class properly, throughout the year, so they can sail through the tests with a breeze without really noticing them. take account of the fact his class is filled iwth 10 ans 11 yr olds.

You know. Children.

Young, impressionable, worried children.

Stupid, vain and foolish hope.

I got up this morning and my first thoughts were about the things I want to get done today – the things I NEED to get ticked off my scary-long To Do list.

So (unusually for me, believe it or not) I flicked on the computer BEFORE I headed towards the shower and the kettle. So by the time I came back from the shower, mug in hand, everything had whirred it’s way into a humming state of happy, and I could flick through my mails whilst badgering children to eat/brush/dress/no-not-that-filthy-jumper-there’s-a-clean-one-in-your-drawer.

But in my emails was my Bloglovin daily update. Which had an interesting-looking post from Nickie over on Typecast about last week’s Blogcamp that I just had to quickly read…

And naturally I had to go and see what she was talking about on Sandy’s blog.

And then I HAD to just pop on the link to see what the Snarkiness had been about….

And THAT’s why I was late for school.

See? Not my fault at ALL.

*tuts*

Why does everything happen all at once?

I set myself up with it nicely with truly a mentally scarring Period-from-most-hellish-corner-of-hell episode (entailing couple of hours with clients in the studio, and thanking my lucky stars for black skirts and red cushions), so being drained and feeble I’ve entered the next 10 days of No.1′s 1st concert (guitar solo), and Boy being in mahoosive-important football tournament finals, and another all day football tournament, the dog with an infected paw that won’t heal, the MADS launching (for which I have been spectacularly brilliant behind the scenes *cough*), C’s been in hospital for an unpleasant procedure, 3 out of 6 of us fighting off a throaty-coughy-temperature-THING, an overnight press trip to Chessington which’ll be awesome sauce (but for which I spectacularly failed to think about dog care for…), and C, Boy and Jolly off to Old Trafford till 4 in the morning (school trip!), an inbox threatening to get up and walk out it’s so sick of me stuffing more into it, and trying to get a PR to actually follow though with their offers of a holiday for my poor knackered crew…

Roll on the bloody Easter holidays!

*and bre-e-eathe*

Okay, as you were. I’ll leave you with my What I Saw on My Walk Tonight. But it was MUCH prettier in real life. A phone with low battery doesn’t do it justice. And you just can’t photograph the sheer delicious SMELL of fresh spring damp earth, can you?

I’m turning off to go watch the Help. Or maybe curl up with Book 4 of the Game of Thrones. Which is bloody brilliant. Night all. x

We’re missing on No.1′s parents evening tomorrow – C is taking boy to Old Trafford, and now No.1 has an ear infection, so I can’t possibly take three children, one ill, to sit in the school half an hour while I trot round the teachers.

But following the snitty message from the school yesterday (“just to inform you that No.1 had a maths test today that his earache has happily stopped him from having to take – I wanted to reassure him that it WILL be waiting for him upon his return” – i.e. “your son is skiving AGAIN with fake illness, and we wanted to be sure you know that we know...”), we called the school today, explained the situation, and asked that teachers call us if they wanted to chat.

I’ve spoken to just four teachers – not one of which seemed to really grasp how ill he’s been (really? his attendance was 43% last year, and you didn’t KNOW this?). Nor did they understand quote how much school he has missed in primary either.

The head of year is also his games teacher, and he was fantastic – very understanding, apologetic and positive. English and French were both mortified when they understood the nature of his illness, and actually how proud we are of just how far he’s come. I think they were both taken aback initially when I refused to be apologetic about his absences – but soon switched from despairing at his lack of commitment to being thrilled by his progress when they understood the odds he’s been up against.

His maths tutor is also his home tutor. She was fine with me – not exactly warm, but more understanding now. We shall see how it goes as the term progresses.

Why do we always feel like we’re starting from the beginning? It really shouldn’t still be this HARD – thes epeople have been teaching him for 18mths, and you’re telling me they had no real clue about his health?

*heads for the gin*