What To Do With Myself Now The Kids Are Getting Older?

Next week the girls go back to school and Layla will start doing more hours at playschool now that she receives 15 free hours each week. This is a huge help to us not having to pay for playschool right now as the husbands wages have gone down yet the bills have predictably gone up. It was also a huge reminder of just how fast my children are growing up!

Jingle Bells Jingle Bells and Repeat.

Today was the day of a little Christmas show around Gracie's playschool. For the past few weeks I have had countless renditions of Jingle Bells sung to me because Gracie of course needed to practice as much as possible. Although I was really looking forward to the live version of Jingle Bells, I was secretly hoping that there might just be a couple more songs to listen to as well.

So this morning I had one excited 3 year old all ready to be dressed up like 'Christmas', I wasn't exactly sure what dressing up like Christmas entailed but was informed that it actually meant wearing her Mrs Santa dress. I also found out that what she was actually excited about was getting to wear her white party shoes, it's the little things!!

It was definitely a proud mummy moment watching Gracie sing, last year she wasn't quite old enough to remember all the words, so it was lovely seeing her not only singing but joining in with the actions too. And I am happy to report we got treated to performances of Christmas pudding, twinkle twinkle little star, little snowman and of course jingle bells.

And an even better moment was when she spotted her Uncle Alec in the crowd, I've never seen a smile so big and she couldn't wait to tell her teachers just who was there.

Once the performance had ended each child was then presented with a Christmas gift from playschool, Gracie wasn't overly impressed with the orange that she found amongst the sweets and chocolate, I have a feeling she might have the same reaction when she opens her stocking Christmas day ;)

This performance was actually a bit emotional for me because it was Gracie's last Christmas performance at playschool as next year she will be starting primary school, just doesn't seem possible.

Have you been to watch your children in their Christmas plays or concerts yet?

xxxx

Making Mummy Feel Guilty

I think as a mum, I was very lucky with my two eldest kids, they always slept through the night, they will eat anything you give to them. Even when it came to going to playschool and school, I didn't even get a goodbye, they just ran off and started making friends.

So when Gracie arrived I thought I knew what to expect, how wrong I was. She was like the polar opposite of her sisters. Up until she was a year old, I was the only one that could calm her down, she refused to go to anyone else, if she did she would just cry and cry some more. When it came to feed times, it was a daily battle to get her to take her milk, I thought things would get better when she started on solids but even now she eats like a sparrow and changes her mind on a daily basis on what she likes to eat.

The one thing she did was sleep through the night, this managed to keep me sane!

When she turned two she started to go to playschool with her older sister Freya, she was happy, went in like her sister without complaint. Playschool were always commenting on what a happy little thing she was, a far cry from what she used to be like as a baby. Even when her sister left and went to big school, she remained content, making friends and drawing lots of things to put on my fridge.

3 weeks ago this all changed and she has started breaking my heart on a daily basis. I don't know what happened, when we are walking to playschool she is all smiles, even as she is walking through the door, the smile remains, as soon as I go to leave, the bottom lip comes out. She has started to cling to me, the teachers have to pry her off of me and I have to listen to her scream as I walk out of the door. I hate leaving her like it but after 10 minutes or so she is fine and when I pick her up she is back to being her chirpy self. Myself and the teachers have tried to get to the bottom of the problem but all we get is that she doesn't want me to leave, I might be able to understand if she had always done this but it has come out of the blue and I feel extremely guilty leaving her upset.

I'm not quite sure how to go about rectifying the situation, it is something I've never dealt with before, seeing your children sad is a very difficult part of parenting, I really wish I had a magic wand sometimes!!

I'm hoping some of you lovely readers can offer some words of advice, perhaps you've dealt with a similar situation, or maybe you are going through the same thing as me now?? Would really love to hear from you.

xxxx