Redneck Mommy's Questions!

Redneck mommy kindly 'tagged'(is that right, don't know all the vocab for blogging yet, suffice to say, she asked for someone to answer some cool questions and I begged to be picked!) Great questions, really made me think and that doesn't happen often!

If you could only listen to one musician for the rest
of your life, who would you choose?

Mmmm, oh this is so hard but I'll go with what first sprang to mind and that's Joan Armatrading, I can listen to 'Love and Affection' till the kids beg me to turn it off, when she sings it reminds me of past loves and really pulls at my emotions. I first heard her on on a late night radio concert, didn't know who I was listening too so stayed up late into the night to hear the end of the concert to find out the artist and have been hooked ever since. I actually don't listen to her that much, I sort of save her for a special treat or (cough) occasion if you get my drift...

If you could go ANYWHERE right this second, where
would you go?

The moon, sounds silly I know but I would love to look at the Earth from somewhere not on the Earth!

You meet God in an elevator. What is the one question
you would ask him?

Now this is difficult, as my upbringing religion wise is weird, half my family are good honest folk, never had so much as a parking ticket, drink a small sherry at Christmas and generally do as they would be done by but don't belong to any local church or religious establishment, the other half are Witness's which means they go to 3 meetings a week and 'door knock' every Saturday. And I'm somewhere stuck in the middle, I'm not a witness and only attend the yearly event 'The Memorial' to please my dad but I don't disagree with what they have to say. So if I met God I'd ask him simply 'Why?' if he has the almighty power to change everything and he will one day, why not now, why let us destroy our planet and each other, why not prove your existence and sort us all out?

A magical fairy swoops down and turns you into a guy
for one day. What are you going to do in that day?

This one makes me laugh, I have no idea as I've never thought about it, even as a five year old I told my mum that I was glad I wasn't born a boy, simply because I thought girls had so much of a better choice in shoes! I guess I'd like to experience an orgasm as a bloke (with a woman, not much point on your own!) but I might need more than a day!

Do you twirl your spaghetti or cut it?

Lol, I don't eat spaghetti, pasta makes me bloaty and windy! C, at the age of 6, swirled a huge spoonful put it in her mouth and swallowed with out chewing, she started to choke, half the ends came out of her mouth so I just grabbed them and pulled and hey presto, all the spaghetti came out!

Lazy afternoons

Do you ever have afternoons you wish you could save and keep in a little box? We've come back from shopping with a new puzzle which Jude has done on the floor, with the sun streaming in through the windows, we have a cd of childrens songs playing softly in the background, fairy cakes are baking in the oven made by J's fair hand (only he will eat them, so germ transference is low risk!) Its just nice, even outways the fact that I have the headache I always get on the second day of my period, no matter how much I try to stay hydrated, keep my blood sugar levels up and take enough painkillers to keep an elephant happy!
Oh and J is feeling better....!

Saturday mornings

My children and I have very different ideas about what saturdays entail, I like to have a small lay-in, maybe 9am 9.30 at the latest but C idea of a lay-in stretches way past noon and longer if she wasnt yelled at 3 or 4 times. Now we usually catch the bus to shop in a town two towns over, grab a burger and a pointless toy that will languish in the bottom of my bag for weeks till I throw it out, shop around for things we dont really need but its the pound shop, how can we resist? But before we set off on this merry jaunt, I'd like all three of us to be smelling fresh, dressed nicely, I'm not talking sunday best here but C dragged a very crinkled pair of jeans out of her ironing pile and declared them 'not too bad', see what I'm up against here? I'd also like the house to not illicit groans of despair when I walk back in, washing up down, the hoover ran around, a load of laundry in the machine, just normal stuff so we can flump down when we get back, read the paper, watch a dvd etc and not have to think too much about housework, it just makes for a relaxing teatime and pleasant evening, now that doesnt seem to unreasonable does it and with three of us being quite capable of all the above it shouldnt be too hard? So explain to me why I was last in the shower, yet am fully dressed, make up on, contact lenses in (thats no mean feat, 2 years I've been wearing them now and still cant do my right eye first time!) I've loaded the dishwasher, washed up the non dishwasher stuff, hoovered, put laundry in, put laundry away even done some ironing and where are the children, still faffing around upstairs, its 1.30pm and we havnt even left the house yet! grrrrrrrr.....

Anyway as I was yelliung words of encouragment up the stairs, I realised that every family has its own vocabulary that no one else would understand, for instance, Jude loves his froggy kandoo soap dispenser so when ever he showers he has to be reminded that letting the water just run over you doesnt get the smell away! So we say 'have you kandoo-ed your bum?', which has been shortened to 'did you kandoo?' 'are you sure you kandoo-ed?' 'dont forget to kandoo!' what phrases do you have in your family that make perfect sense to you but nothing to others!

We have new antibiotics and they are not splattered over any of my floors! Rang the doc and he agreed that four days of the initial standard antibiotics should not still have J delirious at 1am with a 39 c temp, also sweet talked him into prescribing more calpol so I wouldnt have to pay for it, have spent £15 over the past week on meds and it didnt help that I knocked the bottle over in the wee small hours and being the scrooge I am, I grabbed an egg cup and tried to catch some of the precious liquid as it poured over the worktop and onto the floor! Good job I had sanitized the worktops after dinner last night or I may have given him more germs than he already has! He's pretty good in himself, but every four hours as it weres off he starts to go grey and shake with cold even though he is burning up, but give him the mooty, he will fall asleep and in 20 minutes be fine again!

From my hips up I am a lovely light brown, my eyes look bright, my teeth look whiter and I appear to have lost 10 pounds, but my legs..arrgghhh, thank goodness its not summer yet, even after careful exfoliation, moisturising, they look like I let J paint me with a large paintbrush and brown powder paint! There are whole areas missing, its like someone sneaked in and wiped off random areas! So they are on a strict scrub and heavy moisturising plan for a week then will try again, maybe I could just wear long white trousers all summer?

J was awake at 1am with a 102 temp again, have to ring the doctor in 5 minutes for his opinion, am concerned that the antibiotics don't seem to be working or the infection is too big for it too handle and that unless J is taking nurofen and paracetamol every four hours then is temp is that high and he skin feels like its burning. Four days of living on kiddy meds and weak juice and antibiotics cant be good?

that orange glow...

I took two painkillers for my aching back, ran a nice hot bath, dug out a compliation cd that I hadnt played in ages, annoyed the neighbours by singing 'lifestlyes of the rich and the famous' very loudly, shaved my oh so hairy legs and then covered my self in that 'build a tan day by day' fake tan for light skins, if you knew me well you would now that I'm as pale as a sheet of copier paper and even by the end of the summer I have a healthy glow and thats it, so even this lightlylightly stuff is like varnish on my skin, will let you know in the morning whether I glow in the dark or not!

Just a quick update that the mice have gone, they do hate lavender! Havnt seen a single little poo, seen any scurrying and the humane traps havnt been touched! So if you ever get mice, just a buy a little bottle of lavender oil and sprinkle near a mouse hole, you wont see them for dust!

Bleeeauuuggghhhh

I'm so tired, J is still running a 101 temp, has been sick twice and is sleeping a lot, trouble is I cant sleep when he does as I'm worried he will wake up throwing up, he's seen the doctor twice, the second time was only becuase I rang to say 'if he has just thrown up his pain meds and antibiotics 30 secs after taking them, should I give them again?' and the receptionist told me to bring him straight in. We only live five minutes away so I took him in only for the doctor to look oddly at us and ask us why we were back, It sounded lame to say he had thrown up, what did I expect with a sick child? Anyway, same old, plenty of fluids, rest and mooty to keep the temp down if he can keep it down!

101 degrees F

J woke me at six this morning, calling from his bed that his neck, arms and legs hurt, nothing like the threat of meningitis to have me hurtle from my room to his, he sleeps in just pants so I quickly checked him all over for a rash, nothing but he was a little toasty, always fifficult to tell with J as to how hot he is as he always feels hot first thing in the morning from being under the duvet, even his forehead but cools upon getting up, but this time he lay in bed, eyes glassy, cheeks red and that hot smell kids have when they are ill. I couldnt call the doctors till they opened at 8.30, so decided to get us ready in case they said bring him straight in, they didnt deem it too serious when I rang so he was seen at 11am. A quick check-up and a history taken that he had had a slight cold and cough for a while and that yes he had a fever and probably a sinus infection as his head hurt whenever he coughed so we're on a course of antibiotics, the first course he's had since he was 18 months old and was hospilatized with pneumonia, took him home, gave him one dose, and within 10 minutes he was sound asleep, sat with him and within 20 mins he woke with such a fever it frightened me, 101 isnt that high as illness's go but J rarely gets one so to see him slightly disorientated, so hot you could hold your hand an inch away from his skin and feel it and unable to get up was scary, then the realisation that we had no kiddy meds left in the cupboard! great, scooped him up, put him in the pushchair for which he is far to big and almost ran to the pharmacy, was in such a panic as he was grunting by this point that I knocked over a display on my way in, assistant wasnt too impressed till she saw J looking dreadful in the pushchair, gave him a dose of paracetamol liquid and one of ibuprofen and he lay back down, within half an hour, he sat up, asked where he was and was it lunchtime? Been fine ever since and he giggling at 'Happy feet' on dvd, you'd never know I was worrying about febrile convulsions a few hours ago!

To shop, perchance to dream

C my 12 year old, loves to shop, just like me, nothing soothes the soul like browsing and buying things we dont need, we want! But is it a female thing, my son hates to shop, rejects new things, I slide new clothes in amongst the old ones and pretend he's had it for ages, family have long since learnt not to give a gift with great gusto but rather to leave it on the side and casually mention if he knows anyoe who might like it...? Shoe shopping with J is so difficult, every pair will be declared "too small, they huurrtt!" and clenched teeth (me) and folded arms (him) are always part of the bargain, but C will try on every pair in the shop, declaring each pair more wonderful than the last and we may leave with two pairs for her and none for him. (I've just realised how much I'm a mum, my kids have new shoes and mine have a hole in each heel, I'll replace these tomorrow!) J is very self-concious, one of the reasons he does like new things is because "people will look at me and smile" where as C wants the world to look at her and admire the lashings of eyeliner and shapely figure that makes me look like a sack of potatoes in comparison. But clothes shopping with C is dreadful, I want her to have a nice wardrobe of good fitting basics, ok clothes that dont make any male of any age look at her, and she of course wants the opposite, to her there is no point buying white t-shirts or any other such staple when you could have the ripped black affair or the low cut top with the inapropiate comment across the front, she wants her moneys worth, actually that goes across the board for C, she likes to wear all her fashion at once, as much make up as is humanly possible, the highest heels (mine) and all the jewellery she owns, I never thought I'd ever have to say "You're not going out like that!" but its become a staple part of my vocabulary!

I'm even excited that its food shopping day tomorrow, its not a chore for me, I like planning what were going to eat although the kids do complain that they have to eat vegetables with every meal, I'm such a cruel parent, trying to get goodness into their growing bodies, although thinking about it, if I stopped, they wouldnt grow and I would have to suffer the clothes and shoes shopping..? Yep stunt their growth and bind their feet and then I can spend all the money in the pound shop!

MICE!

We have mice!!! I love small furry things but only if invited and kept in cages! My lounge is an old basement converted so it is underground, the garden backs onto a park and there are 5 takeaways at the top of my road, so a constant trail of chicken, chips, kebab meat etc is often left down my road for the rodent population to feed on. Now I'm not tidy, never have never will but I am clean, you wont find my toilets unbleached or my kitchen floor not clean but I dont mind the children having toys in the lounge and piles of books everywhere, its a balance and I like it but I am so so bad that we should have mice! I found a few droppings, didnt realise what they were, hoovered them up and thought nothing more about it until, a mouse shot across the floor one night, wow can they move?!?! I dont want to put poison down because of the risk to the children and pets and dont like killer traps as its me who has to dispose of the two halfs! So we bought the humane ones, caught 2 and took them to a park a mile away and set them free. But I read on the net that mice hate the smell of lavender, its does something to them, I forget what, so I put some lavender oil on a tissue and left it near where I have seen one and there was a dead mouse there in the morning! Coincidence maybe, but have bought more oil, the house smells like the post office on pension day but have not seen one since, will keep you updated!

Did anyone else know what a moon or diva cup was? Its a plastic alternative to a tampon which you wash and re-use, kind of like a silicone egg cup! I dont know whether I'm freaked out by it or think its a great idea, I just cant believe I've only just found out about it!

Le weekend

lol, I'm still so new to this, was feeling a little disheartened that I hadnt had many comments, then I found there were three I had to moderate first, oh my little heart sings with recognition!!! Its a funny business this blog writing, before I wrote one and just read lots I would think of things all day that I would one day put in my blog and now I am completely blank! Umm, ok, well, pottered aroudn the house saturday, then took the children to a fun bounce session at the local leisure centre, C used to trampoline competively until she reached secondary school and also began to suffer aches and pains from growing so fast and exercising so much. When we arrived I quickly realised that it was just mums and kids and no one from the actual training groups, this is always fun as they just jump up and down and all slow to look at C when she starts flipping and somersaulting and doing lots of other moves that I never learnt the names of! Its that secretpride, ok gloat when they all start elbowing each other or calling to their parents, "mum, LOOK!" Then C tells me off for grinning, anyway this is all short lived as jumping up and down on a bouncy surface always has a particular effect on J that requires clean pants and baby wipes! He suffers from encoperisis (I think I spelt that right?) and without getting too graphic, his body makes poo's to big for his little bottom, its hurt a lot to 'go' so he holds it in, then the nerves get ignored and the situation gets worse, its better than it was say this time last year, he needs plenty of fluids, fruit veg and the orange fish oil IQ stuff helps too! But yes bouncing moves things along, to the point where we have a little exercise trampoline and 5 mins on that will have him running for the toilet!

Sunday my dad turned up to find us all in our pyjamas at lunchtime and offered to take us out for the afternoon, 15 minutes later we were all showered and dressed and heading out the door, we like days out but as I dont own a car we dont get very far, so the offer of going further afield is always met with excitement! Into his van we tumbled and headed off for 3 hours at the local country park, few lambs, ducks and lots and lots of open space for J & C to just run and run, J has gone from the pushchair addict who wouldnt walk anywhere to a muscly legged sprinter where ever we go, I cant remember when he stopped asking to be carried whilst whining "My legs huurrttt!" I dont know how to yet to post a photo within the blog but I know how to post it at the bottom of the blog page!

So a nice weekend, we're fresh air freaks, nothing gives me a headache more than sitting around the house, Easter holdays next week for two weeks, so lots of going to the park or even just in the garden as the weathers nice, my two squabble if left in the same room for more than 3 minutes, so difficult to entertain a 12 year old and a 5 year old, I have to change my whole 'interaction technique' (?) when trying to amuse both at the same time, very difficult and they both feel left out and the other gets a second more attention that the other, one will go go to grandmas in the holidays on some days so I can have one to one with the other!

Mooncup?????

How, in 32 years, 2 children, plenty of in depth conversations will female friends and so much time spent on the net have I never ever heard of such a thing? What a great, green idea! Tell me, had you heard of them? Google it if you have no idea what I'm talking about!

Hints and Tips

no, not the housework variety, dont care much for it, those who have visited will nod their heads and make mmm-mm noises whilst raising their eyebrows! What I need to know is how to make this blog better, banner across the top maybe? I can do lots of digital picture things so could design something but have not a clue on how to get it on my blog? and how to I list my fave blogs, they are the ones that inspired me to start this so deserve big recognition! Any suggesttions gratefully received! xxx

Satisfaction...

A commenter on Mary P's blog made a lovely comment on how satisfying it is to see kids all bundled up warm in snow suits and hats on snowy days and I thought what me makes me feel like that? Clean washing is one that I think most mums love, I have long white linen curtains and they get very grubby and seeing them fresh and smooth gives me a kick for ages! What gives you a little glow inside? (rude answers will be giggled at and then deleted!)

I need to get a life...

mary or 'mahweeeeee' as I like to think of her read my first post, hi mary! And I got my first comment, I'm in a really good mood! On a serious blogger note, I've had a good hard look at myself and realised that when I have left not entirely positive remarks on other peoples blogs, not my faves of course, that while I'm only being honest and expressing my feelings that I'd be devasted if someone who didnt even know me made judgement based on my words and left a comment reflecting it! Havng a blog for only a few hours has made me a humbler person already, its doing some good even if I only have one reader so far! lol x

Jemimas new rambling blog!

Mmmm, the media student is me says I should know who I'm aiming this blog at, I'm really not sure, if I let everyone I know read it then I cant say anything but good about them, I guess I'm writing a blog as some sort of therapy, not that I really need it (no comments on that idea thankyou!) but just to get the thoughts that go round and round my head some days out on paper? I know its not paper but the tech equivilent, does anyone else find that writing something by hand feels strange these days? I'm rambling again, the title says it all!

I had all these ideas for things to say on my blog and cant think of a damn thing, bloggers-block on the first day, its not going so well!

I suppose I need to intrduce myself, takes me back to those days at college when we had to do an excersise where we told the other person all about us and they had to introduce us, it brought out the control freak in me, I'd correct them all the way through, no point telling the class about me if you cant get it right! Well, I'm 32 years old, I have two children and look after other peoples, people say I must have so much patience to look after others but stranglely I find it so much easier, I dont take it personally when they strop in the middle of the pavement/supermarket/anywhere they choose as I didnt give birth to them! When my own children play up I have to curb the desire to yell "I gave birth to you, you owe me to behave!"
I live on the south coast of England, smack bang between two medium size holiday towns, it always amazes me that people holiday here, I think its smelly, crowded in the summer but I once travelled 'up north' and discovered a new love of my surroundings in comparison!
I'm a great love of blogs, it all started with Catherine Newmans blog on parent center and has grown from there, I realy shouldnt get such a kick of clicking onto someones blog and seeing its been updated, i realy do need to get out more but thats not going to happen now I have my own blog!

Ok, I feel the need to reach out and start some communication and while I dont ever want this blog to be a mummy-bashing forum, I keep seeing things that other parents do which makes me clench my teeth and wish they wouldnt do that, the following was witnessed at my sons school this morning - a mum holding her sons chin in one hold, tilting his head back and clearing out dry bogies (slight heaving from me here, can deal with my own childrens snot and the ones I'm paid too but other peoples kids-eurgghhhh, and have they not heard of tissue? This woman could have used a spoon the way she was in there!) What do you see other mums do thats not realy wrong but you just wish you didnt have to see it?