parenting Rosie The Elf Riddles Advent!November 30, 2019This is the first year I feel like we can really start feeling the magical side of Christmas with the girls. Aella is definitely of the age where everything is exciting.So, this year we have brought in the elf! Our elf will be with us from the 1st December to the night of the 24th when Santa will pick her back up. We have decided to use our elf a little differently to the normal ‘Elf behaving badly’ things I have seen over the past couple years. Our elf will be riddling out the girls advent. Which saves me from having to move the elf each day or having to rush downstairs before the girls of a morning, to tip over a bag of sugar and sit the elf on it, whilst crying about the fact I’ll have to clear it all up later in the day! So how is our riddling elf advent going to work?Well, each morning the elf aka Rosie will be holding a piece of paper, which will have a riddle written on it. Aella will have to solve the riddle to find where her (and Tahlia’s) advent gift is hiding. In the hiding spot she will find a little red and white box with a number on. Aella will need to be able to tell me what number it is, for the box to unlock! In the box there will be a chocolate for each of the girls, a little note with a Christmasy activity that the girls can do that day and a note with a film suggestion for the evening. I am so excited about this and i’m hoping that the girls really enjoy it every morning.... The Diary |14 June 2019June 14, 2019WELL! What a busy few months it has been. So after what felt like forever trying to find a house, we finally found one and have moved in! We received the keys on early May and all the furniture was delivered the next day. Dan traveled back to the old house to finish any cleaning whilst I stayed at mums with the girls and then began unpacking.Unpacking was the weirdest feeling, it felt so pointless that everything had been boxed up because now it had to all be unboxed, but I knew there was no other way of moving all our things. We have been here over a month now and slowly we are settling in, there are still small little jobs that need to be done and we need to get ourselves into a better routine but otherwise we are very much enjoying our new home. So much more space, although we seem to have filled it very easily. Aella have been offered a place at our first choice school, which was all a little bit stressful. Any parent of school children knows that the deadline for school applications is in January, but we were moving, we just didn’t know where to. We had applied for schools back in Peterborough just to be on the safe side, but by the time we found out her school, we had already found a house. So, we then had to go through late applications but there is barely any information about the process online, after contacting school admissions, we filled in the forms and emailed them across and then declined the school she had been offered, gave a reason and a copy of our new tenancy agreement. After that, it was just a waiting game. No matter how much I searched, I couldn’t find something that would tell me when I was likely to hear about schools which I found really unsettling and stressful BUT… whilst out Costa sipping on a latte, I received and email from one of the schools (our 2nd choice) saying we had a place there, fantastic. I could relax now, I was sent letters from them, and had been in contact with them, only to receive a letter 2 weeks later from school admissions offering us a different school (our first choice)! After an hour and a half of panicking, not about the situation but about having to make a phone call, I called school admissions and they talked me through what had happened. Basically, we was offered our second choice, but Aella was first on the waiting list of her first choice and a space became available. Typing this, it doesn’t sound stressful at all, but I was pulling my hair out over it. If you’ve read this far, well done… i’ve been wanting to natter on about that palaver for a week or so now but there isn’t an easy way of writing confusing and stressful situations. Amazing news though, first choice school and yesterday I received a letter from them confirming Aella has a place and informing me of the meeting I need to attend! Not sure right now if the smile on my face is because I’m so excited for Aella to start school, or a smile to fight back the tears because I don’t want her to start school. (Yep you read that right… wanting her to go and not wanting her to go at the same time.) Anyway, thats’s enough of my ranting! Next week I’ll give an update on my smallest human. Happy Friday and enjoy your weekend! Simone -x- P.s I haven’t read any of this post back because I have pots and pans screaming at me to wash them, so I hope it makes sense!... Feeling Low About Baby No2February 13, 2018Back In school did anyone new ever join, they came to your class and joined your ‘group/squad/gang/girlies’ and suddenly the dynamics changed, you felt a little pushed out because your best friend of the group took more of an interest in the new person (yet you was probably doing the same and your bestie was possibly feeling low too.), they wanted to know everything about them, spent a little extra time with them and what felt like a ton of less time with you. You’d get upset because you felt like your best friend was being stolen, you felt jealous because attention was divided. I guess this is how i’m feeling about the imminent arrival of our 2nd baby. For the last (nearly) 3 years, I have been a stay at home mother to Aella, 5 out of 7 days it has just been me and her, she is my best friend, my little mini me, my absolute world and I can’t imagine life without her. In less than 3 weeks i’m due to give birth and life as ‘Mummy and Aella’ isn’t going to be anymore, it will be ‘Mummy, Aella and Baby’. Of course this is an extremely happy time for us all and we are all very excited for our new addition but there is a small part of me feeling sad because everything is about the change. I will have to involve another little person, my lunch dates with Aella will include another person, our cuddles on the sofa, our days making cake and painting, our silly little games, they will all have to be shared and I guess that makes me a little sad. I think it gets more confusing because not only am I feeling all the above, but i’m feeling extremely excited! I can’t wait for our new arrival and all the new adventures we will go on, I can’t wait to see Aella’s face when she gets to meet her little sister for the first time and then having the pleasure of watching a beautiful relationship blossom between them. Aella tells me daily how much she loves her baby sister and wraps her arms around the bump and kisses it, she tells me how she is going to share all her toys and help me change baby’s nappy. I know Aella is going to be amazing as a big sister, it’s just going to take some time to adjust as a family of 4 and settle into a new routine. Back...
