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RuthsArc

~ Looking forward, looking back & enjoying now.

RuthsArc

Monthly Archives: November 2014

Mental challenges and daily photographs

30 Sunday Nov 2014

Posted by RuthsArc in all about me, creativity, more to life, remembering / musing

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curiosity, me, photos

Mid August I found a “photo a day” challenge on a blog and I decided to join the Facebook group. I challenged myself to post every day. Today I have completed my 100th consecutive day.

Friends are suggesting that I must have too much time on my hands if I’m able to post a photo relating to the daily word prompt but in reality it only takes a few moments.

The up side is the thought process to decide what to photograph, the inspiration of seeing other people’s interpretation of the prompt and seeing other people’s pictures. It has released a level of creativity that I certainly was not using in my working life. The prompts for the next day or two are in the back of my mind, and random ideas jump into my head. Some days it has been difficult to chose a particular idea or photo.

One day the prompt was “loud”. I thought of fireworks, balloons to be popped, music practice when the girls were younger (sax, trumpet, drums were definitely loud, keyboard and flute, less so), local church spire as thursday evening bell ringing practice is loud. I thought of volume buttons on tv, radio, stereo, iPhone, or all the cd’s sitting on shelves. The photo I finally posted was of a loud kids game that I found whilst sorting out a cupboard. Other people have posted photos of tools or machinery, loud colours, aeroplanes, motorbikes, noisy kids, as well as some of the ideas I had above.

I am looking at the world in a different way. When the prompt was “triangle” or stripes” I was seeing those shapes or patterns everywhere. I guess I have time to notice, my days are not such a rush now. Stripes – bannisters, the fence, socks and tops, book covers and ring binders, pencils lined up on the table, venetian blinds, a zebra crossing, lamp posts down the road, a row of trees in the park. Triangle – a piece of toast, the dogs ear, a broken paving slab, a give way sign, petals of a flower, triangles are everywhere in architecture, in bridges, buildings, windows. Other ideas were of kites, sailboats, pizza or cake slices and toblerone pieces.

Is this gestalt? The brain looking for sequences, repetitions, order. The need to straighten a hanging picture or mirror. When you think of buying a new car, you suddenly notice that model of car everywhere. With a prompt in mind, my brain is unconsciously searching for examples to group together. I’m happy to think of this photo a day challenge as positive mental stimulation, more enjoyable then a cryptic crosswords or a sudoku puzzle. It’s making me think outside of the box, away from the obvious. As I look back on three and a bit month’s of photos, it reflects my “journey” during these months, some reflection but also each day, right now.

Long may this happy snapping continue.

PAD lists 100 days

PAD August collage

PAD September collage

PAD October collage

PAD Nov collage

Keeping tidy

19 Wednesday Nov 2014

Posted by RuthsArc in all about me, making changes, my place

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home

Our house is back on the market after the original offer fell through. So we’re with a different estate agent. Yesterday their photographer came round. We spent a while cleaning the house, tidying up. And yes, hiding things. The house looked lovely.

So why, this morning, does it look messy again. Just looking at the dining table, there are some papers, a pen and notebook, my purse, a scarf, a phone and laptop. There is a bag on the sofa, reading glasses on the coffee table, dirty mugs and plates on the kitchen bench, oh and wine glasses and an empty bottle. It doesn’t sound like much and I know it is a sign of a lived in home. But it doesn’t look good.

A new day, lets tidy up again. Let’s try to keep tidy today. I can’t blame kids, or teenagers. It is just Aussie Mate and myself, mainly me! I am not a minimalist person.

So, here is my plan……
~ to sort post as it arrives, deal with it, bin it or file it
~ to put things away as soon as I have used them, not leave them lying around
~ be smart, hide things, but remember where I have hidden them (!?)
~ keep tidy will be my moto

I’m thinking how good it will feel when we have a phone call advising of the next house viewing, and it all looks tidy, so we won’t need a half hour rush to make the house presentable.

Oh the joys of house moving!

Scotland – Falkirk, Stirling and Pitlochry

17 Monday Nov 2014

Posted by RuthsArc in all about me, days out

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architecture, art, holiday, photos, Scotland, trees

Falkirk Wheel is a fascinating piece of engineering and ingenuity. Rather than creating the usual series of locks to link two canals that are at different levels, this wheel has been built as a rotating, counterweighted boat lift. The glass roofed visitor centre explains the process and has a café where you can watch the wheel in action. As one gondola, containing boats and water, descends from the higher canal aqueduct, the opposite gondola rises from the basin and lower canal. All performed with minimal energy due to the Archimedes principle. Clever stuff. Usually there are tourist boat trips on the wheel but due to annual maintenance last week, we could only see the wheel and not experience it in motion.

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Falkirk has another tourist attraction, The Kelpies. Two beautiful horse sculptures, thirty metres tall, made from stainless steel, which stand in the Helix parkland, beside the canals. We walked through the park to view the sculptures from a distance and up close. We also joined a tour, which told about the mythology of the water horses, the local history of the canals and heavy horses who worked the area, also the millennium vision that created the kelpies. The bonus of taking the tour was going inside one of the horses, seeing the internal design and engineering of the structure.

We stopped later in the day, at dusk, as the horses were floodlit from inside and the light reflected in the canal.

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Stirling is another Scottish town full of history. It is the site of battles against the English, such as Bannockburn. The Wallace Monument sits on one hill, the castle sits on another hill. The castle was both a fortress and a royal residence for several hundred years. The tour guide refreshed my Tudor and Stuart history, Mary Queen of Scots, crowned as a baby, her son, James VI of Scotland who became James I of England. The castle staterooms are displayed with minimal furnishings, as example, a simple four poster bed frame to indicate the nature of the room, while paintwork and ornate ceilings were emphasized. The kitchens have displays and soundtracks to indicate the hustle to feed a full castle. A workshop was in use where replica tapestries are being woven by hand. Our afternoon was an interesting snapshot of history.

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Back in 2011, we drove across the Forth bridge, up around Perth and on to Pitlochry where we stopped for coffee and a walk around. We took the kids for a walk to the river, over a suspension bridge and up past the fish ladders where the salmon swim up and through the dam, into the loch above. The scenery was stunning with the autumn colours. There was some cloud and even mist on the hills as we drove up, but we had some sunny spells. Aussie Mate and Aussie “soon to be” son-in law were on a search for some snow but it had not been cold enough that October, so there was no snow even on the Cairngorm Mountains. We drove back along the banks of Loch Tay via the Falls of Dochart.

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I’ve enjoyed all three trips to Edinburgh. First class train travel was an added benefit, travelling via York, Durham, Newcastle Upon Tyne, Berwick on Tweed. The section around the English and Scottish border is lovely as the train tracks hug the coast and passengers get glimpses of the sea, cliffs, coves and beaches.

Scotland – Edinburgh

17 Monday Nov 2014

Posted by RuthsArc in all about me, days out

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architecture, holiday, photos, Scotland

We are just back from a few days in Edinburgh. This was my third trip in three years. One was an autumn family trip as part celebration of 18th and 21st birthdays, with C~M, S~E and Aussie “soon to be” son-in law. One was a mini break in spring with my mother, ladies who lunched and enjoyed some civilised sightseeing. This has been a couple’s break. So I’ll write about this trip to the city, Falkirk and Stirling but with additions from the previous visits when we ventured to Pitlochry and Roslin Chapel, toured the Royal Yacht Britannia.

Edinburgh is a beautiful rugged city, built on several volcanic hills. It has lots of history, grand buildings, alleyways, steep stairways and open spaces. It is a busy cosmopolitan city with various foreign accents mixing with the lilting local Scottish accent.

It is exciting to go to a new place but it also nice to return, to know the landmarks and your way around. We still browsed and found new routes to new points of interest but we did not need to get out the tourist map as we walked along.

The castle looked striking in the dusk and evening floodlights. We went back in daylight to get the views of the city, estuary, surrounding countryside. We didn’t go inside the castle this time, but have good memories of wandering around the grounds, the apartments, seeing the Scottish crown jewels, the memorial, the prisoner exhibition and cells. The Great Hall exhibits old weapons, swords, guns, spears. St Margaret’s Chapel is a tiny little chapel but pretty with colourful stained glass windows. We had joined the crowds outside, to see the one o’clock cannon that is fired each day.

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Heading north, roads and stepped alley ways lead from the castle via gardens or The Mound to galleries and museums, to Princes Street, the shopping area, the tram network and further towards the Georgian area of the city.

The Royal Mile leads east from the castle down hill to the Palace of Holyrood House and the Scottish Parliament. The view opens out to the surrounding hills and crags. The Royal Mile is one of the oldest streets in the Old Town, now populated with tourist shops, tartans and whiskey, amongst the historic houses and churches.

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Edinburgh is famous for it’s Fringe Arts Festival that takes place every August. There are comedy clubs open all year and a variety of art, music and theatre worth enjoying, along with the varied pubs and restaurants.

The Royal Yacht Britannia is moored at Leith, north of the city, on the Firth of Forth. The tour around he royal yacht is fascinating, with lots to see, history, photos. We had sight of the royal bedrooms but actually walked through the royal decks, sun room as well as crew quarters, the state dining room and lounge, reception room. There is a Tea Room so we stopped and had refreshments. My Mum and I had a pot of tea and a scone on the royal yacht.

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Musselburgh is also on the Forth estuary, a town a few miles east of the city, with a pretty little harbour and a lot of fishing history. Roslyn Chapel, the Knight’s Templar chapel mentioned in “the Da Vinci Code” is to the south of the city. It is a little place, tucked away in a village but only a few miles from the Edinburgh ring road. It is a very ornate chapel with unique individual carvings and stories.

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Our house, our home

16 Sunday Nov 2014

Posted by RuthsArc in all about me, my place, remembering / musing

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animals, home, me

This house has been perfect for us, for our family through the teenage years. I don’t want to let the current frustrations of selling it, to mar the happy memories.

We spent a few months house hunting at the time that S~E started secondary school. We saw a dozen homes that were not quite what we were looking for. One day we viewed this house and it clicked. It had the bedrooms we wanted, an ensuite and separate family bathroom, it had the separate utility room, the secluded garden.

It is close to local shops, to train stations, there are buses at the end of the road and the girls could walk to school. As they got older, they used the buses, including the night bus from central London or bars and night clubs . We were not the free taxi service for our kids that some parents seem to become these days.

The girls decided that we could have a dog at this house, before we even moved in. In our previous flat, we’d progressed from two goldfish in a bowl, to four foot long fish tanks, one with tropical fish and one with marine fish and shrimps. Aussie Mate did not want little furry pets, the girls did not want the snake or lizard that Dad might have allowed. We are not cat people. We looked after the school guinea pig a couple of times, which came to stay for weekends in a large wicker picnic hamper. Life moved on, the fish tanks went.

Jade, a Jardine parrot, joined our family. She learnt to speak a few words, a few phrases, not necessarily the things we tried to teach her, but perhaps comments she heard a lot. She said her name, hello, good night, good girl but also “be quiet” and “shut up”. As she matured she developed orange feathers on her head and shoulders. She liked flying around the lounge, sitting on shoulders and on the top of doors. She imitated all the various bells and buzzers in the house, oven timer, phone ring etc.

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A few months after we moved in, with secure fences in place, we chose Oska, a schnauzer puppy, and brought him home. He soon settled in, and we all enjoyed being dog owners. Less than a year later, Izak, a mini schnauzer, also joined the family. There were some challenges to establish the pecking order in the household, with mutual respect between the dogs and the bird. Oska was always top dog, a guard dog, who thought he was well up the family hierarchy with the girls way down at the bottom.

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We enjoyed the garden, the fish pond with frogs and tadpoles, the birds that came to the feeders. We read Sunday papers outside, had barbecue meals every day of the week as weather allowed. We enjoyed the garden in the snow too.

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As we moved in, the girls chose their bedrooms and we decorated, one purple, one turquoise. A few years later, when S~E got an electronic drum kit, we insisted the girls swapped rooms so S~E was above the garage. Even with headphones, we didn’t need to hear the kick drum from the room above, whilst relaxing in the lounge. So more decorating, turquoise again and now orange for C~M.

The girls grew up in this house, from pre-teens to young women. Music tastes changed, the tv screen got bigger, computers and smart phones became the norm, but we still shared meals and watched favourite tv shows together. We never had televisions upstairs in the bedrooms.

It has been a great family home for us. Hopefully, soon, someone else will view the house and it will be right for them too.

Waiting, waiting, moving and cheese.

12 Wednesday Nov 2014

Posted by RuthsArc in all about me, making changes

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home, me, quotes

Selling a house is a slow and frustrating process. It’s a waiting game, involving others who do not have the same sense of urgency that we have.

Applying for an Australian visa is a slow and costly process, although they do advise it takes eight to nine months to process.

Our personal wait continues. There have been highs and lows, anxiety and stress. So I have just re-read a much loved book which helps me “let go and trust what lays ahead for us”.

“Who Moved My Cheese?”
by Dr Spencer Johnson.

It follows four characters, who look for “cheese” (the things we pursue in life to make us happy – relationships, job, health, money, possessions, recognition, etc).

It is set in a “maze” (where we spend time looking for what we want – our community, work environment, within our relationships).

We all have our own idea of what “cheese” is, we become attached to it, and it can be traumatic if we lose our “cheese”.

This book is a short parable about dealing with change in our lives, in our work environment. It is a lovely tale, which helps us to anticipate change, adapt quickly, enjoy change and be ready to change again and again.

What is your “cheese”?

Remembrance and reflection

09 Sunday Nov 2014

Posted by RuthsArc in remembering / musing

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WW Remembrance

As we commemorate the 100th anniversary of the First World War on this Remembrance Sunday, I’ve been reading back to notes from my journal – August 2011……

Whilst visiting family in the Netherlands, we spent a couple of days in the regions of Belgium where significant battles took place during WWI. We wanted to learn more about this period of history.

We stayed in Ypres, which was where one of the main roads to the Front Line began. Thousands of British and Commonwealth troops marched out through this town.

The Menin Gate in Ypres is a memorial to The Missing, dedicated to the British and Commonwealth soldiers who were killed in the Ypres Salient and whose graves are unknown.

There are over fifty four thousand names carved on various sides of the monument.

The crowds began to gather, the roads were closed and the ceremony took place, with the Last Post played and flowers laid. An incredible experience and amazing to think that this short ceremony has taken place at 8pm every evening since 1928, except during the Second World War. I’m honoured to have experienced it.

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The next morning we set off for our day of First World War history. The book and map that I had borrowed, were very useful and informative. It did take a while to get an idea of distances on the map. Our sat nav was no use to us today as we wanted to just ticky tour around. We went along one road where I was looking for a particular junction and side road, but I felt we had gone too far. When we turned around and drove from the opposite direction I saw the junction straight away.

“Vancouver Corner” had a stunning tall monument with a soldier’s head and arms on the top, as memorial to Canadian soldiers who fought and died in the area. We got out and looked around. We then drove down back lanes, through open countryside and farmland. There were lots of fields of maize corn. But small road side cemeteries and monuments.

The second place we visited was “Tyne Cot” cemetery, the largest Commonwealth military cemetery anywhere in the world. We went into the visitors centre first which had informative displays and artefacts. The glassed in area of ground, beneath the glass cabinets gave a particular impression, once farmland with tools, then just grey mud with war rubble. The walk along the side wall of the cemetery showed the scale of the place, then inside to walk amongst the graves. It started as a dressing station in October 1917 when 354 burials took place. These are the randomly spaced graves in the centre by the Cross of Sacrifice. There are 11,954 graves there, 8,367 of which are unidentified British and Commonwealth servicemen. The grave stones are identical stone and size, with names and regiments where known, others are simply marked “Known unto God”.

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From Tyne Cot, we drove on to Passchendale and visited the Memorial Museum, which is housed inside an old manor house. That was also very interesting. I liked the fact the events and history was covered from all sides, Allies, German and local. And all interactive displays were in four languages, English, German, French and Dutch. Whilst talking to our Dutch relatives, it was obvious that their history of WWI has different emphasis to my British view. We often forget that aspect of history.

We then stopped at Hill 60 or Sanctuary Wood, where there was an odd little museum with lots and lots of old bits and pieces, wartime relics all jumbled together. There were fascinating photograph machines to look into, to see still photos reflected as 3D images of the town of Ypres, its destruction during the war years, But the remarkable part was the original trenches outside in the woodland. The trenches and the shell holes, even in our summer, some filled with rain water and mud. What would they have been like in winter and constant rain or snow. How did the men live in those conditions?

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We drove back into Ypres, coming in via the southern gate, with the river below battlements and another cemetery. We went into “In Flanders Fields” museum, which is in the Cloth Hall in the main square. It was a excellent exhibition, for all ages, lots of information and interactive elements. As we went in, we each took an auto generated card, listing the name and nationality of a real person who lived at 1914. Between us we had a British serviceman, a Dutch nurse and a local Belgium girl. As we moved through the museum, there were stations to enter the card and get an update on your person as the war progressed. My local girl became a teacher. Again, it was fascinating to see the war depicted for all sides, German, local as well as the British and Commonwealth view point.

It feels wrong to say we enjoyed this trip, but as well as the emotion of the loss, destruction and cost of human life, it was a positive, worthwhile trip where we certainly gained insight into the reality of those four years of war.

My lasting memories of the whole area are the graves, the cemeteries at the side of the road, or down a footpath at the edge of a field. Also of poppies and cornflowers in the hedgerows.

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“They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning,
We will remember them.”

8th

Raising teenagers in a new millennium

04 Tuesday Nov 2014

Posted by RuthsArc in all about me, midlife, remembering / musing

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family, me

The girls got older, more independent. At times, the girls seemed close in age, interested in similar things, played nicely together. At other times they were miles apart, on totally different wavelengths. As parents, generally we stayed one step ahead of them, prepared for the next age and stage. Occasionally they raced ahead and we had to figuratively catch up.

The girls had swimming lessons on Saturday mornings. I aimed for lessons as late as possible and for S~E and C~M who where in separate groups, to have classes at the same time. Just as I got this organised, one girl would be promoted to the next level and it would all get out of sync again. My nightmare was when S~E reached the top class that started at 7.50 am. For a working Mum who had to get the family up and out five days a week, this was an unwanted commitment for a Saturday morning. The girls often told me off for chatting with the other Mum’s and missing their achievements in the pool. C~M wanted to go ice skating but lessons were on Sunday mornings and I needed one day a week to relax, not have to be anywhere at a fixed time. So no ice skating. Sorry kid.

Secondary school was a whole new experience but S~E soon settled. She made new friends and got involved in school activities.

Our girls went to the local infant school, depending on the catchment area where we lived at the time. We were very lucky with the school and the principles it instilled. General good manners, respect for others, walking inside, no running, sitting quietly for assembly. Each class took assembly, even from reception class, so the kids were used to standing up in front of the whole school. It gave them all such confidence.

Their secondary school was also very good with the life skills, and social awareness, the school did not just concentrate on academic achievements. There were the usual sports, music, art and drama but also recognition for being “ good citizens”, there were prefects but also “big brother / big sister” mentoring programmes.

It is great now that our girls are adults, to see these values are an unconscious part of their character, to see them live these principles in their daily lives.

S~E’s first concert at secondary school – She played saxophone and a girl friend played clarinet. They wanted to perform a duet in the Christmas concert. Fine, we had heard them practice and knew what to expect. We weren’t prepared for the sixth form boys who were the backing band. I turned to Aussie Mate and asked if he was ready for our 12 year old daughter to be friends with these 17 year old lads. He hadn’t thought of that!

The girls were untidy, their rooms were a mess. Constant nagging to clean up resulted in a clean room, until you opened a wardrobe door, then an avalanche fell out. Both girls enjoyed rearranging their rooms. They both tried having the bed out across the room, half way along the wall. Until I realised that it all looked tidy from the door, but stuff was hidden on the other side of the bed. We’d always had “no food upstairs” rule, so it was always a clean mess, no dirty plates, or food packets or mould experiments. As older teens, we accepted that they had “floordrobes” and generally looked crumpled. They certainly didn’t iron any clothes.

At one point, Aussie Mate stated that as owner of the property we had rights to enter all rooms, without notice, to inspect or search for contraband, illegal substances! But we chose our battles and eventually accepted the untidy bedrooms as long as it didn’t encroach on the rest of the house. We did nag when clutter spread out on to the landing. “Clear this mess, you do not have a porch to your room!”

We all need rules and boundaries. “A river without banks is a large puddle.”

S~E asked for a lock for her bedroom. We said no. As she was fed up with her little sister “borrowing” things from her room and never returning them, one day she pushed her bed up to the door so that only she could get in. She was the skinny one in the family. This lasted for a few days until I stated it was as fire hazard and she moved the bed.

We needed new strategies and disciplines for teenagers. We docked pocket money, we insisted on additional chores, the worst being to clean the toilet. We grounded them on occasion. The girls called us “the meanest parents in the whole wide world.”

At one point we removed a bedroom door for a few days. That was very effective and got her attention. Teenagers certainly value their privacy. It wasn’t an original idea, we had seen it in a film.

She wrote to an agony aunt in a teen magazine, with the usual “It’s not fair” complaints. And she asked me for a stamp in order to post it. I gave her the stamp. “Sometimes being a good parent is knowing when not to parent, to let life takes its course.”

The Will of a thirteen year old…
“Dad – nothing
Mum – half of my savings – don’t share with Dad
Sister – half of my savings – don’t share with Dad
Friends – my toys and stuff.”

S~E was studying music, played sax, keyboard and didgeridoo. She wanted to learn the drums. Oh joy! She began constantly drumming, tapping, beating out a rhythm, with anything, pens, cutlery, toothbrush, my knitting needles. We gave in and bought her an electronic drum kit for her sixteenth birthday. It had headphones but we still swapped the girls bedrooms so drums were over the garage, not above the lounge. She was a happy girl though.

We had many conversations / discussions / rows (?) with a girl sat on the stairs, me standing on the downstairs hallway. Talking through the bannisters as if one of us is in jail. We had the silent treatment, stomping, doors slammed. But they knew the rules in our house. Just as when they were little, they pushed the limits with us, at home, and were generally well behaved when out. That is the way it should be.

They changed, developed, did well with school work (most of the time). They lolled about the house and had phases when everything (and I mean everything) was an effort. They had pyjama days during the school holidays when they didn’t get up until the afternoon.

After S~E had sex education class at school and had seen the teacher put a condom on a banana, I gave her a packet of condoms so she could open them in her own time, know what they felt like. I didn’t realise that she carried them around in her school bag and her friends all knew about them and that “S~E’s Mum gave them to her”. Oh.

Then…. Gradually…. You realise that life is quieter, there are fewer moans and groans, normal family conversations resume. You realise that tensions have eased, that the girls offer to do chores without being asked, that perhaps you are coming to the end of the teenage phase.

I knew I was winning, when I returned to studying, and a seventeen year old S~E told me that I wouldn’t concentrate on my homework properly in the lounge, reading an astronomy book with the tv on. Also when C~M was minding a friends children in her late teens and told the little kids that they couldn’t play with bouncy balls on the bus as they’d bounce away. To hear some of my own words and warnings come from their mouths proved that all my nagging had obviously been worthwhile.

We successfully completed “the parents of teenagers” challenge. Thanks girls for making it relatively easy!

Raising kids 1990’s style

03 Monday Nov 2014

Posted by RuthsArc in all about me, midlife, remembering / musing

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family, me

As we pack up our home, I’ve now started to re-read the journals that I have kept over the past twenty five years.

The first few books were fairly mundane, covering pregnancy, baby milestones, juggling work and parenthood. There were details on well remembered events such as our first family trip to Australia, first meetings with my in-laws. There were comments on some world events.

We were obviously rather frazzled as parents of a three year old and a baby in the first few months after I returned to work. There were several diary entries about our morning hassle to get out of the house on time, drop the girls at our child minder, Aussie Mate to the station and myself to work locally. The girls must have sensed our stress and pushed the limits accordingly.

“I don’t like you Mummy!”
“ I don’t care whether you like me or not, you still have to get dressed!”
Tough love on our part.

A year later, another morning, the usual “Hurry up, we’re late” and the reply ”But you chose to have two babies so it’s your fault.”

One morning I followed the girls into the bedroom to find both jumping on the bed. Toddler rolled off.
“It wasn’t me Mummy. She fell up by herself”

During potty training phase we let her wander around without a nappy. Not such a good idea when she stood beside our bed and wee’d on a clock radio that happened to be on the floor. Fizz, bang, dead radio.

When trained there were still occasional accidents. She wet her knickers in the supermarket, but I didn’t realise until we got out to the car. I don’t know what sort of trail we left around the shop. Most of it was in the shopping trolley seat and over Aussie Mates beers.

Two days before a fourth birthday.
“I can’t bloody do this Mum!” whilst trying to cut out a paper snake.

I’d forgotten that she didn’t like going to nursery.
“They make me do work and make me cross my legs too much!”

Words she couldn’t pronounce – aminals and hostipal.

“Do you want cheese on toast?”
“Yes but without the cheese.”

We didn’t have baby monitors. If the girls cried or called we’d respond accordingly, go to them if it seemed serious, leave them a while if they just wanted attention.

We only had baby gates at the top of the stairs, they soon learned to crawl up the stairs from the lounge and to slide down safely on their stomach or bottom. At times we put a coffee table in the way to stop them climbing if we couldn’t be there to watch them.

Younger kids certainly learn from their older siblings, but C~M also tried things that her sister never thought of.

I undressed her one evening and jumped a mile when I found a big black plastic spider inside her clothes. I don’t know if she put it there, or one of the boys at the child minder’s, but she knew it was very funny.

“Major achievement today was finding all the pieces of C~M’s toys. S~E has had a name train for two years and we’ve never lost any of the shapes. C~M has one for two days and there is only one piece left! I found one part in the laundry box, one hidden in the bathroom, one in a bag of paper rubbish.”

She used to climb down from her sister’s top bunk, to sit on the waist high windowsill to look at a book. She did fall off a few times but that didn’t deter her.

We tried to enjoy relaxed Sunday mornings as a contrast to hectic weekday mornings. Tea and toast in bed with Sunday newspapers, while the girls pottered about. There were occasional dramas…
…..C~M (aged two and half) went to the bathroom to do a wee. S~E (aged five and half) went downstairs to get another drink. She suddenly shouted DAD !!!. He ran downstairs to find water dripping through the kitchen ceiling. I met C~M coming out of the bathroom, soaked from her neck to her knees. She had both taps on and the plug in the sink and yes, a good waterfall.
…..Less than two weeks later, we had water through the kitchen ceiling again. We were downstairs, the girls were upstairs starting to get washed and dressed. S~E was in the bedroom, C~M in the bathroom. The wrong arrangement of people and rooms! More mopping up. We removed the plug from the bathroom sink!

The tone of my journals alters when we changed things, when we were obviously more stressed. When I started a new job, commuting back into London. When we had a nanny for a year, after four years of a child minder. When she started school.

I didn’t get to be at the school gate very often as I worked full time. But I made a point of getting to know some of the Mum’s. They were helpful to bounce ideas, discuss concerns, share views and suggestions of family friendly places to visit. This informal network was invaluable, especially when they had older kids and had been through the various age stages before. This is an aspect of the old style extended family format that modern society misses out on.

“Life doesn’t come running to you – you have to go chasing after it.”

Some years were tough, but those years prompted us to make changes in our lifestyle and work life balance. Aussie Mate was a house husband for a year, happy being one of the few Dad’s at the school gate. The family dynamics changed considerably, less money but more time together. The girls had a much closer relationship with their Dad, even thought C~M told him that he didn’t know how to play dolls properly.

In her first week at school, we discovered one afternoon that she’d forgotten to put on knickers when she got herself dressed in the morning. “But Mum, my teacher doesn’t know I went to school without knickers, because the day I forgot them, Mrs H forgot to do PE”.

Things changed again with both girls in school. Aussie Mate got a local job on permanent night shifts. This worked for us, as he continued to do the school run and sleep during the day.

At five and a half, C~M wanted to leave home on Saturday morning. She was cross with me. “Mum, I’m going to leave home but I need you to take me to school. Once I’m there I know my way to C’s house, but I don’t know my way from here, so can you take me?” I persuaded her to wait until after swimming. Back home, she packed some clothes into a bag. Then she wanted to go to the park first “but I’m still leaving home later!” When she realised I wasn’t going to take her, she sat out on the garden wall for ages.

They grew up. Friendships developed. They pushed the boundaries at home but knew there would be consequences. The girls remember having to stand in the naughty corner (not sit), if they were both in trouble, sitting back to back on the lounge floor with hands on their heads, or fingers on their lips. At times I made them write lines. They remember no jumping on the furniture, no watching tv whilst doing homework, table manners and asking to leave the table at the end of a meal, helping to clear the table, wash dishes, put dirty clothes in the laundry basket. But they learned to contribute to the family and they learned self discipline.

Then we were parents of teenagers!

“By the time we realise our parents were right, our children are telling us we are wrong.”

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