Kicking your brother in the head, not a good idea after the week I have had

So far this week I have been informed that I may be about to be made redundant, and if I still do have a job I will have to spend the next 3 months fighting for it through a series of interviews and other such fun activities.

I have been going through that time of the month, which is never a good thing with all my gynae issues.

I have had to put up with freezing my arse of every time I step outside the house, and freezing my arse of whilst working in the house. I will give you a hint I do not like freezing my arse off.

I have completed 2 months of 3 kids birthdays, Christmas, a toddler group party for 50 kids, and then a birthday party for 40 kids, I think this gives me the right to feel like a bit of a grump. I spent over an hour wrapping well over 40 layers on 4 pass the parcel presents, and that does not even begin with the help I gave Santa wrapping presents and the wrapping for the kids birthdays. I have the coordination of slug, so I am not good at the wrapping thing.

I am losing weight, so I even feel guilty about a good old bit of comfort eating.

The dog has taken to weeing on the hall floor at ever chance she gets, cleaning or walking through this while in a rush is not my idea of fun.

So today what happened after 6 hours of work ( and before starting 3 hours more), after dropping off 3 kids at school, and 1 at the child minder ( and all the preparation that involves),after making a very lovely but time consuming beef stew with veg,  then picking most of the kids up, but having to wait an hour for drama club to finish for Alex. Well I was breathing a sigh of relief with home in my sights. I get all the kids in the car, and turn to answer another mums question. I turn back and all hell has broken loose in the car. For some bizarre over tired reason Alex decided to kick Aidan in the head.

Now I have a loud voice ( from a childhood of calling in the cow's for my dad to milk), so imagine the volume and extent of the telling off Alex promptly received, this was accompanied by her brothers load sobs and upset, her sister asking inane questions and her baby brother screaming.

It is not a good idea to do something so ridiculously silly when I am already fed up. So Alex for future reference do not kick your brother in the head, you are not the Karate kid, or any other Ninja type person.

I have a dream...

I have a dream, and in this dream is a world where:

I can go to the toilet and actually do my business without a child coming in to have a chat or a cuddle. Who on earth likes to cuddle and chat to someone while they are taking a massive dump, surely this is just weird.

Just for once I can make a cup of tea and drink the bloody thing before it has reached room temperature. Pouring that hot water into the cup is almost a signal to somebody in the house that they must immediately shout me at full volume.

Bums are wiped by anyone but me. I am happy to wipe my own butt, don't get me wrong I am not that lazy. However having a baby who needs regular bum area attention, and two girls who love to holler on a regular basis "mummy come wipe my bum", will the day ever come when I go for a whole day without having to see someone else's backside.

7 am is not the signal that I must be out of bed and immediately start tending to other people's needs no matter how tired, ill or hung over I am.

I can eat a meal or snack without little hands sneaking onto the plate to steal the best bits, or little voices requesting "mummy please can I have some of yours", or pleading little eyes making me feel guilty for eating my own food.

I can wear items of clothing such as jeans or tops for more than one day before they need to be scrubbed in bleach and sterilized. How can four children manage to cover me in more crap, food, dirt, dribble, wee, and general debris than they actually get on themselves.

Going to get a forgotten pint of milk involves me jumping in the car, and returning with said milk 5 minutes later. Instead of the current 15 minutes to round the kids up, 10 minutes getting their coats on, 5 minutes strapping them all into the car seats, 5 minutes getting the actual milk, 10 minutes getting their shoes off, and then 15 minutes persuading them to put their coats and shoes away.

Where my laundry pile is lower than the ceiling height, and contains no items with smears of poo that are likely to catch me off guard.

I have a dream, and one day I hope for that dream to become a reality (maybe in about 16 years time)

Is it wrong to pull a 1 year olds teeth out

Whom in their infinite wisdom made babies ( with their limited understanding), and then decided to add to these slightly thick little dudes the most sharp and vicious teeth ever created.

I think I may cry if Elliot sinks his teeth into me again, or takes a bite while I am checking his new teeth.

Elliot is an amazing little man and I certainly don't wish him any harm, however why is he allowed a dangerous weapon to hand at all times, surely he should have some kind of licence for those things. If he carried a knife or had a razor blade I am sure someone would soon ask questions. However he has these razor sharp perfect little inflictors of pain, and no one wonders if its a good idea.

I guess they need teeth, but why can't evolution just get rid of teething, and skip to a full set of shiny white teeth at an age when they are responsible enough. Maybe they could have them delivered in the post as a 5th birthday present, when they have the sense to brush them, and also the empathy to not sink them into any other human beings.

I know the advice for a biting toddler, a firm calm no and put them down away from you. That's all good, but how the heck do you control the yelp of pain or the full on swearing fit that is a natural response to a sneaky little bite. I think its even worse that it usually accompanies a nice cuddle or excited little action, so they lull you into feeling relaxed and happy before they strike.

I don't think I am exaggerating in comparing it to a mini shark sneaking up on you and promptly without warning taking a bite of any delicate bit they can get hold of.

So broken nights when he is screaming in pain, not eating his food as his mouth just hurts too much, dribbling and being constantly soaked, getting into trouble for biting, all of this against just not having teeth, let me think which option I would prefer.

What git decided that!

I am well and truly fed up with having massive bumps and bruises half way down the front of my thighs. Have I been drinking too much and falling down the stairs, maybe I have been doing some exciting dangerous sport, or possibly the kids have been giving me a good kicking.

Nope I have to say that the cause of my injury is those nasty sneaky stair gates. Every now and again I walk whack bang straight into the corner of the open stair gate. This hurts more than seems proportional to the actual injury, and the bruise always seems to come up so much bigger than you would expect for a little bump.

Did some evil mum hating person sit down at their computer to actually calculate the average height of a mum, and then spend a long time working out the ideal height for a stair gate to cause the most injury.

Do you think I can sue the person that first set the standard height for stair gates?

Poo part 3, yes there is more, sorry - top 10 poo mysteries

Some poo mysteries:

How is it possible that my children can produce poo that is actually bigger than they are, is there some kind of Dr Who tardis thing going on in there intestines?

Why is it that babies know that they are having nappy off time and promptly decide to deposit a large pile of stool directly onto the floor?

How is it possible that babies time their nappy explosions for the exact second that you are in a rush and trying to get out of the house, leaving that dilemma of be late and change, or pretend you haven't noticed for 10 minutes and ignore other peoples noses wrinkling as they get a whiff when you walk by?

Who thought it was a good idea to design people with their butts on the back, making it impossible for children to wipe properly, so you can be guaranteed plenty of skid mark teeny pants?

Is it worse to have a boy, and to have to fish for poo around their boy bits, or is a girl worse and the futile attempts to keep the poo away from their lady bits when cleaning them up?

Who decided that leaking up the back is a fair thing when they have a runny bum, you clean them up, you get excited that their clothes are clean, then on closer inspection you find the mass leakage heading up towards their neck?

Is potty training not hard enough with wee to deal with, how cruel is it to add poo to this huge challenge, for crying out loud, why?

If you have ever had a toddler that goes through a poo smearing stage, ( we have been through this once and never again please please please I beg), this is beyond gross. Imagine finding poo on the walls, floor, curtains, bedding and liberally coated on the toddler. Why the hell do toddlers sometimes think its fun to play with poo, surely the smell alone should put them off?

Not exactly poo, but how can children fart and make stenches that would kill a horse, surely this bubbling inside their little tummies should make them actually explode?

Not a person poo one, but why do kids make a beeline and seem to walk straight through any cow poo or dog poo left on the ground?

None of this rubbish odd steps, get a move on boy

I don't want to wish this time away, but I do want the little man to get a shifty on with his walking, come on boy move it., here are some of the reasons why:

* No longer having to cart his big butt around constantly either side saddle, in the sling or in the buggy.

* Having hands free to actually do exciting things such as do up his siblings coats.

* Stopping the struggling for ideas of what the hell to do to keep him entertained. Can't leave him in the buggy all day, can't plonk him on the floor when out, half the time the house floor is not exactly clean enough for crawling, and don't even get me started on the filth on the floors in most toddler group/ community centres.

* Get some use out of his little shoes that I spent a fortune on, rather than them acting as expensive foot warmers only.

* Have the joy of walking along holding his little hand.

* Chucking wellies on him and watching how filthy he can get in lovely puddles and mud.

* Currently I hold his siblings down so he can crawl on them, pull at their faces and generally dribble on them ( they love it really honest), once he can move he will be able to catch them himself.

* Turning him into my little slave, nothing better than saying "child get me this, do that, take this there... and so on", its hard to do this if they can't even walk.

* Going to a park and having more options than just chucking him in the baby swing for ten minutes.

Finally  - giving him more freedom, so when he has nappy free time he will be able to spread the wee and poo accidents even further faster ( strike this one off, I clearly have gone bonkers)

Why babies and dogs don't mix - top 10

This is our first time having a baby and dogs at the same time, so its certainly been an experience. Each day we vary between deciding to put the dogs or the baby in the bin, depending on which has been the biggest pain in the arse.

The combination of the two can be a challenge, it can be daunting and sometimes its just gross, so here are my top 10 reasons not to have dogs and a baby in the same house:

1 Dogs roll in the most foul smelling badger and fox shit you can ever imagine, baby immediately touches and strokes dogs as soon as in the house, hence stroking the big patches of smeared shit.

2 Dog biscuits and dry food rolls off  across the floor and hides in any corner available, baby then finds these are cheerfully munches on them for a while, yuk why would you think putting those in your mouth is a good idea.

3 There is nothing babies and toddlers like more than water, so in those seconds when you turn you back baby is at the bog water bowl converting it into an indoor paddling pool, not only is this gross, but it also soaks the floor and baby.

4 There is a huge temptation in hanging off of a dogs ears or tails, and dogs don't like this!

5 The dogs love begging at the table, we all ignore them, whereas baby has great joy in holding out his food and squealing with joy when they eat out of his hand, then screaming like a man wronged when told no, don't feed the dogs.

6 Baby slings are great, I love mine, but its not exactly practical when you need to bend to scoop the dog poop ( unless you want to drop baby out directly into the aforementioned poop).

7  Having a clingy baby and trying to multi task opening and scooping out stinky dog food tins, while holding baby and trying to prevent baby from getting a big handful of food to chow down on.

8 Our garden was once lovely, but is now a minefield of dog poop. Poop here there and everywhere.

9 Trying to hang onto a buggy and a dog lead, the potential for tangling, tripping, dropping lead, or decapitating baby if lead cuts across buggy is high.

10 Walking dogs in freezing cold, soaking wet and heat wave conditions, while baby has to sit in  buggy to either cook or freeze his arse off

Some of my top parenting cock ups

I think its hard for us mums to admit that we make mistakes, or that our parenting is not perfect. Well, I can not lie sometimes as a mummy I get it spot on right, sometimes I sadly don't. I certainly sometimes do things that would make my health visitors hair stand on end.

So here is some of my top naughty parenting moments:

1 - On birthdays and special occasions we toast with a little bucks fizz. I will first tell you how my daughter relates this event to people "I drank to much alcohol and was very sick". I can hear the call being made to social services, ring ring. In actual fact she had a teeny amount, the bubbles set her off coughing and she promptly puked everywhere, nice.

2- One morning about 2 and a bit years ago I entered Caitlin's bedroom to find what looked like a murder massacre scene. After some investigation I found a cut over an inch long under her chin, which explained all the blood. She still has a very large scar, but luckily its exactly along her chin line, so generally its invisible in everyday life. However from that day to this I do not have even a clue how she did it, there was nothing in the room that could possibly have injured her in that way. My guess is she climbed in the window jumped down and split her chin on a solid surface, but as she was only a toddler at the time this would have been an impressive feat.

3- Elliot is a nightmare crawling and getting into everything. I am not a neurotic mum, and I do tend to be on the grubby side of clean. In fact I think a few germs are good for the kids immunity. Elliot seems to agree and can regularly be found munching on a dog biscuit after rooting it out from some invisible corner.

4-  Aidan came home one day moaning that his friend had sat on his finger. In general Aidan is tough and does not moan unless in real pain. I had a look and it certainly looked sore. At home he was drugged up to stop the pain, and I said we would see how his hand was over night and in the morning. He slept like an angel, woke in the morning with only a mild discomfort. So I checked his hand to find his finger had ballooned up to a phenomenal size. At A and E they diagnosed a buckle fracture and strapped it, as they felt it was on the brink of breaking. Turns out he had his finger down a slat and his friends had piled on the bench, twisting and then buckling the bone in his finger.

This is just part one, I am sure there are more that I will remember and more cock ups that will happen in the near future.