Another Sunday, but different today with Christmas preparations and kids excitement.  The children we all downstairs when I woke up.  They had woken him at 6.20am, after we had had a late night talking to 1.30am.  Sometimes as a parent, you have to get quality time when you can. When the kids are asleep making the most of time alone together and just talking is nice.  However, I think daddy was hoping to be able to stay asleep longer then he did.

Daddy decided we were having ‘toad in the hole’ for dinner.  I’m wondering why it is not called ‘pig in the hole’ after all sausage is pig not toad.   The internet says that toad is edible but I certainly would not fancy it.  Whilst daddy was cooking, my 7 year old and I went for a little walk to the shops for bin bags.  The fresh air and the walk did us good.  The car park at Morrison’s was packed, you can tell it is Christmas as it is so busy. The walk was worth it over driving circles trying to park the car.

When we got home, daddy served up dinner.  My 5 year old ate most of hers but left her vegetables. My 7 year old decided his was yucky.  He enjoys sausages, he likes Yorkshire pudding, so why will he not eat toad in the hole?  This meant of course that daddy and I shared his between us, would have been a shame to waste it.

So last night before going to bed, the elves were left sitting in my daughter’s doll pushchair.  Both children claim that this morning when they came downstairs, one was in the kitchen and one was in the bathroom. If this is true then we really do have problems, creepy things.  The children are inventive and they are sticking to their story.

I had another search for my Kindle Fire and I still can’t find it.  We even lifted the mattress on our bed.  There is a lot under there, including Christmas cards that I had lost. One day I need to pull it all out and sort it, however, it is like the loft, it’s up there and it’s staying there. Exploring under the bed properly could take hours. Any ideas where it might be hiding?  or where a 5 year old might have put it as she is the one who uses it most.

This morning my daughter managed to smash a photo frame on the wall by the stairs. I think she must have been bouncing to knock it but she had broken the glass.  It had held five old photos of her and her brother. She was a baby and my son was 2, and I could not bear to put them away.  They are now in a new frame, not as long as the previous so hopefully not so easy to bounce near and break.

My 5 year old made us a Christmas card at school, she also drew a picture of a Christmas tree and reindeer.  I feel proud of what she has achieved.  My son gave his handmade card to his teacher, so we have not seen it.  I would much rather my daughter does her art and craft on paper rather than on her bedroom wall,  I still need to repaint it.

Sitting here this afternoon thinking about things I still need to do, I realised that I needed to check the Clarks shoe sale.  Then I found that a lot of sizes have already sold. My daughter has been wearing old shoes that belong to my niece to school. She claims that her shoes are too small. Hers are a size 10 and a half F my nieces are a size 11 F, I have ordered her some in 11 and a half F. I then looked at her feet and her own shoes, they fit perfectly, the size 11 are a little bit big. Maybe I need to hide the tatty size 11 and make her wear her own.  Problem is though she also likes to hide her shoes so we have to let her wear the bigger pair.   

Her shoes are patent, the others are tatty, seen better days leather. I do not understand why she does not want to wear them, her new pair will be stored in the bedroom for when her feet have grown along with some new trainers.

My son’s shoes are already too big for him, due to refusing to wear his shoes with laces in. His trainers are 13 and a half F, his school shoes are 1 and a half F. I have ordered two pairs of trainers to see which pair we prefer, but they are also a G width. I am hoping they are quite a narrow fitting otherwise they are not going to fit, there was no more F fitting left.  Again they will be put away until they fit properly, Clarks shoes are so expensive so I try and make the most of the sale. This all adds to the expense now but saves money in the long run. There is so much to think about as mum trying to manage the household.

The children both went straight to bed tonight. I have just been up to turn of their lights. My daughter had her duvet pulled up over her face, so I have pulled it back off her.  Daddy is back to work tomorrow, I have the children and mince pies to make.  It is going to be a busy day, I am hoping not to stressful but this will be up to the kids.

I am now going to go and get some rest, we are watching ‘Seal Team’again.  Hopefully, we can get an earlier night tonight and I can build up some energy ready for the hard work tomorrow of being mum.

For some present ideas see, https://justmuddlingthroughlife.co.uk/2018/12/27/ideas-birthday-presents/

Today started as a normal Saturday, the children were all downstairs with daddy when I first woke up.  A little later I was woken again by my son bringing me the telephone.  My mum was on the phone offering to buy us a turkey.  I usually visit my parents on Christmas day and they give me some turkey to take home. This year we can now cook our own, it says for 8 – 9 people, so that should keep us busy.   She has also now bought us some gammon and chipolatas, so that’s our dinner sorted, Christmas day and boxing day.

Morrisons today was quiet at 9.00am but by 10.00am, when I finally left after seeing people that I knew, it was getting busy.  The car park was also filling up, so I am glad that my mother phoned me early.

When I got home I could see that presents had been moved around the tree.  In the times that the children had been left unsupervised, they had been trying to look at them.  I have bravely moved them back under the tree.

I decided today that I would clean and vacuum behind the television.  This then led to dusting my dragons.  I have a small collection that never gets dusted as they are heavy and I do not want to break them.

There are more on the shelf below hiding behind photos.  They are now a lot cleaner and I am no longer looking at cobwebs whilst watching television.

We also tried to have a general tidy up which ended with me cleaning,  dusting and getting stressed.   The children were not helping and daddy had disappeared upstairs annoyed with my bad mood.  This added to my bad mood, the front room is not finished but is better then it was.  I also achieved a load of washing, one load washed and one load put away.

A few days ago  I realised that my Kindle Fire was missing. It normally sits next to my side of the bed.  We have now searched all over the house and can not find it.  As far as I am aware it has not been out, so it must be in the house somewhere, the question is where?  In my mind one of the children must have left it somewhere, I can not remember when I last used it.  My daughter uses it most with Kindle for kids.  My hope was that it would help her with her reading.  Now it has completely vanished, maybe it will turn up one day when I am not looking for it.  I am worried that it is sat broken somewhere. However, I would like to think that if it is broken then the children would have told me.

Today my free blog has become self – hosted,  I am hoping that I have made the right decision.  I have kept the same theme as I like it but there are differences.  My posts can no longer be easily reblogged and I am now sat typing on my laptop as was struggling to write a post on my tablet.  I look through the site and I realise there is so much that I have to learn.  The plugins of Jetpack and whether to enable speeding up my site which in turn might affect my photos. Setting up an email address and whether to have people subscribing.  My head is spinning right now.  

WordPress has been emailed to reinstate my blog stats, now at 12 views today when they were at about 2700 since October 2018.   The worst thing though is that all my likes have now gone.  I was messaged a while back to say I had reached 500 likes and I had my top 10 posts showing.  Without the likes, my blog does not know my top 10 or is this more related to the number of views? I am not sure.   However, I still have all your comments, the likes can be rebuilt but the comments cannot easily be rewritten. 

Time will tell on my decision to go self-hosted, I guess once I know what I am doing then things will get easier.  It will then be a question of affiliate links, Amazon and trying to make enough money to cover the cost of my blog.  It would be nice to think that Christmas next year might be easier financially with the help of my blog.  The main thing though is that I continue to enjoy writing it.

The children were upstairs with daddy whilst I was sorting it out and still tidying the front room.  I was a bit worried because they were all in our bedroom and the Santa presents are in there buried under cushions and teddy bears. Daddy says they have not seen them, hopefully, they will not.

The two elves are still watching the children, but they continue to not help and not do as they are told.  They are obviously not bothered by the thought that the elves might report their bad behaviour back to Santa. They have no fear of the naughty list. I found a broken decoration whilst I was tidying up and typically it was a new one.  The hard work and the battle goes on.  The tree in my featured image is now about 20 years old. and has great sentimental value as purchased from a work friend.  Any baubles missing off it are due to my children messing around with it.  The Angel next to it falls off the main tree hence we have given up putting her back on.

We had dinner late tonight, then my daughter would not just go to bed.  Our son was alright, it was already late and he pulled up his duvet and said goodnight.  Our 5 year old kept returning downstairs with excuse after excuse.  They are exhausting especially when you really need some time to wind down.

I did not make mince pies today, I have decided to do them on Christmas Eve so they are more fresh Christmas day.  The children need to behave whilst I am baking and yes I will be relying on the iPod and iPad.  My two are not great at helping me bake. We will have eggshell with the eggs and flour everywhere. Then arguments and tears over who is doing what, it becomes very stressful.

Tomorrow we plan on seeing Grandma to exchange some presents, another busy day.  I am now going to get some rest, build up my energy ready for the hard work and stress tomorrow of being mum.

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