Another  Thursday morning and the day started the same way as usual. My 5 year old refused to brush her hair and refused to let me do it for her. Little Miss Independent, she loves to do things for herself. My daughter is very much a girlie girl which is lovely, but somehow she keeps finding hair clips and hair bands at school. She tells me that her friends give them to her, I am not so sure. So this morning she went to school with her hair a complete mess with a hair clip shoved in it. I am hoping that the school realise that I do try and brush her hair. I don’t intend for her to go to school looking a mess. Does anyone else have this problem? Or is it just me?

On arrival at school, I had to parallel park, the kids were shouting as I was trying to concentrate on parking. Hearing the words, “mummy you’re to close”  is very distracting when you are trying not to hit the car behind or in front.  The black cat was not there again, I hope it is alright. We always cross the school field walking into school. This morning they went running across the field kicking a ball they found as they went. Then my little girl was playing in the leaves just outside the front door.

After leaving them I went to work, not too much of a drive this morning and was glad to work from home this afternoon.  The house was lovely and quiet till the kids were brought home by grandad. I went from being able to hear the hum of my laptop to not being able to think straight. The shouting and the “I want”, the plea for toast and the refusal to behave. The mess in the front room with the rug being used as a blanket.  Chairs taken from the kitchen so they can crash on the keys on the piano, despite me asking them to leave them and the piano alone.  This all adds to our parenting nightmare.

My 7 year old had rugby club today and came home muddy again. I should have realised when I signed him up for it that it would mean lots of mud. So this weekend I need to wash his plimsolls and PE kit again. It also meant that he needed a bath. Rather than waiting for me to run the water for him, he started running it. By the time I got to him the bath was full of mostly cold water. I had to let water out whilst putting hot in to get a warm bath. Why can’t kids just wait when you ask them to? He then kept moaning about the water temperature. As the bath was full of mud it was only a short bath and in my mind the water was warm.

They did both eat most of their dinner tonight but getting them to bed was as difficult as always. The refusal to get changed and jumping on the bed, shouting and laughing.  My 7 year old threw his toothbrush at me when he had finished with it. It caught me on the arm, which caused most amusement for him. He then demanded that I read the remainder of the ‘Secret Seven’ to them.  I refused, as it was late and they were not behaving. Other parents tell of kids that just go to bed, then have a story all nice and calm. Not here, bedtime is anything but calm.

They are both asleep now, looking very cute now in their beds. Kids always do look cute asleep but when awake they are little horrors.  I am looking forward to my day off tomorrow, I’m hoping that I achieve more then I did on Tuesday. I still want to find some time to read my book. I have three books sitting neglected by my bedside. One is ‘The foreigner’ by Stephen Leather as Jackie Chan starred in the film. I found the film very good so I’m expecting the book to be even better. I often find books better than the film.

Daddy fixed the Amazon echo this morning, he pulled the plug out and plugged it in again, she is now playing Blur. So simple and I was planning on phoning Amazon for help, I’m very glad I didn’t.

Anyway, I’m now going to get some rest before the stress starts again tomorrow and the demands of being mum.

The morning started in the same way, but daddy shouted upstairs to make me get out of bed.  The downstairs Amazon Echo is not well and I still need to phone Amazon for some help.  We got out of the house on time and joined the queue of traffic to work and school.

After parking the car outside of the school the kids ran over the road to the house where the black cat lives. My calling to them was ignored as they just continued running up the strangers drive. They then noticed two of their school friends coming out of their house. Running to them they almost ran straight into their home uninvited, still ignoring my shouts. Why do kids do this? My two love to run and they have no awareness of when they could be perceived as rude.

I left the children at breakfast club and headed to work. I had a busy morning and then battled the traffic back to then start work again at home. It was nice to see the kids after work. My 7 year old had got very muddy doing forest school this afternoon and my little girl was happily giving biscuits to my parent’s dog, whilst climbing on the kitchen cupboards.  My daughter is fearless with her climbing as my parents have a quarry tile floor. She already knows how much it hurts to fall on it but, yet she still climbs. We always pull her down anxiously.

My little girl is very accident prone. The amount of accidents she has had is scary. She takes after her mother. I have scars across my forehead that tell the tale of an adventurous child who would not stop climbing. So how do you stop a child climbing? How do you make them realise that they need to be more careful? Falling makes no difference. Though to be honest falling never stopped me either. I loved going up trees, thinking back it is actually scary how high I would go.

So, this evening once home, my daughter was crying for her dinner. I had to cook it first. She was then climbing for chocolate spread, eating it straight out of the jar. When I finally put it on the table  I thought she would eat it all.  This was fish fingers one of her favourite foods. She kept getting up and hiding by the fridge. She then left most of her meal but did want a yogurt.  I then realised that she had hidden a bag of crisps by the fridge and was worked her way through the packet. Not a daft child but frustrating.

It got too late tonight to read to them. It was 8.30pm when I left my 7 year old in bed. My little girl came back downstairs trying to find her slippers and asking for one of her toys that has a light on it. She would not just go straight to sleep, anything to delay going. I would love to go to bed at 8.30pm, but there is just too much to do as an adult. However, when I was her age I’m not sure if I went straight to sleep either.

I was the child who would read in bed every night, by the glow of the landing light. My parents would ignore it as when I was reading in bed I was being quiet. Admittedly there were occasional days when I didn’t go to school due to being too tired and exhausted. I’m hoping my kids do not do this, though there are days where my 5 year old has tried to fall asleep at school.  I’m not sure how much school I missed but this was really not the best plan.  Admittedly my mum didn’t work so keeping me home just meant her day was disturbed. For me I work, so tired or not they really need to go to school.

My 7 year old was asleep tonight by about 8.45pm, my daughter by about 9.30pm. I’m hoping that they are alright tomorrow. I am conscious that being tired might reflect in their school work. However, how do you make a child just go to bed and go to sleep? I need a magic answer.

I am now going to try and get some rest now, I am watching ‘The Heist’ on ‘Sky one’. Tomorrow will be here all to soon, back to work and back to the morning drama of being mum.

Another Tuesday today started as every weekday except this morning our son asked daddy to get up at 5.15am.  We both responded together, “no, back to bed.”  He then curled up under his duvet and fell asleep on the floor. About an hour later daddy got up with him and then went downstairs. Soon after I woke our daughter and got her dressed. After the normal morning hassle, we were soon in the car all heading towards daddy’s work and then school.

Once we arrived at school my 5 year old insisted on putting her pencil case and glasses in her book bag. We had an argument in the road as nasty mummy put her foot down.  Her pencil case is very pretty, ‘My little pony’, I’m sure appealing to many 5 year olds.  The glasses I’m not sure where they come from. They might have been a McDonald’s freebie but she insists that she can’t see without them.  They have clear plastic lenses.  I’m sure her teacher would prefer they are left in my car rather than having to take them off her in class.

I left the children at the school breakfast club looking forward to my day off today. I had planned to read some of my book. This did not happen, once I had loaded the washing machine I switched on my lap top and then got lost in the world of the internet. An email from eBay led to me buying a care bear for our 5 year old. However then followed the complication of using the wrong eBay account and having to then cancel one order to then reorder on a different account in order for the discount code to be honoured.  I phoned PayPal once, eBay maybe four times and the seller in Glasgow maybe 3 times.   If you ever get an email from eBay with a discount code, ensure you are using the account that that email is attached to. Then ensure you have entered the code before you check out with Paypal.  I found my laptop would not let me enter the code, but my tablet then did. Why is nothing ever simple? Or why do I have to complicate things?

In between the phone calls, I washed a Hug rug, put the washing on the washing line and put another load in the machine.  I vacuumed the house and tidied some of the front room. My day flew by and I was soon back in the car, driving to collect the kids from school.

I had then planned to help them get their homework finished.  The first thing the kids wanted was toast and then they were jumping on the furniture whilst I was tidying the kitchen. Why do they have to jump on the furniture? “The floor is lava”, I get mad at them for not respecting the furniture then remember they are just 5 and 7 and they are having a lot of fun.  Not so fun for my nerves though, as I don’t want them or the furniture broken as they leap from arm chair to arm chair, run across to settee then leap back to the arm chair. As a child, I can not remember doing this. I’m sure if I had my parents would have gone mad at me.

Both children did not eat all their dinner again, maybe due to our well-meaning neighbour giving them a large bag of crisps as we arrived home after collecting daddy from work. Telling them they could not have them till after dinner did not work as we had a huge tantrum from both of them.

Getting them to bed was difficult as they both wanted daddy to put them there. They continued to play for quite a while, refusing to go to bed. I could still hear them at 9pm, they are quiet now. I am assuming they are both asleep in my 7 year olds bed so I will be moving my 5 year old later.

They argue a lot but they are also best friends, I really hope they continue to be. I do tell them that they need each other, she needs to look after him and him look after her. I think that this important and it is lovely when they are playing nicely together.

Anyway I am now going to get some rest before the morning stress starts again tomorrow and the drama of being mum.