Apparently, today is the day that “the whole country gets an extra hour in bed”.
However, the writer of that comment is not a parent. For, in reality today is the day that small children get up an hour earlier.
Less
More
Archive for October, 2006
It would be nice to have one night where I can sleep all night long without interuption. If I’d known this was going to happen I’d have slept all day as a student instead of just until lunchtime. Last night was just an example of a typical night. We are woken up by Ryan being sick. He has a wonderful turn of phrase, inspired by Charlie and Lola and told us he was “a little bit ill”. He was okay actually and I put it down to too many sweets. In the morning, he seemed okay, but very pale. He was “ill and feeling a little bit poorly but ok”. Meanwhile the parents are said to be “a little bit bloody knackered”.
Tooth update: The tooth is still in, but seems to be quite mobile. It is now in the place where the other tooth had been and at about 45 degrees. We dare not touch it to see whether it still moves. Gabby fell over backwards attempting to walk last night and the tooth stayed in, so fingers crossed on that.
I try to be organised, I really do. Yet, I somehow always manage to forget something. This time I forgot two things; our seat numbers and money. Let me explain how I forgot the seat numbers first.
At Reading, there is a marvelous system where you stick your membership card into the card reader at the turnstile and you are let into the stadium. It means you can never lose your tickets for the game (you can lose your membership card but I’ve not managed to do that). This means you just need to keep your card in your wallet and just turn up and get in. However, I’m not a season ticket holder and so the seat number will be different each time you buy a ticket for a game. There is no way of getting the seat number off the card so you have to make a note of the seat number (on a ticket sized piece of paper for example) and bring this note with you.
So I forget to bring the piece of paper with me, and remember on the car on the way to the ground. Due to the wonders of the internet I was able to resolve this issue. I phoned my Dad and asked him to log into my GMail account and find the email confirmation with the seat numbers on it. I think the only other alternative would have been to wait for the game to start and take the only two empty seats left in the stand.
Of course, having all the valuable information about seats on the membership cards means that they are far too valuable to leave in your wallet in case it is stolen, dropped or left in my draw at work. This lead me to not having any money on me when I got to the ground. When I carefully remembered to put my cards into my wallet, I realised that the wallet was overfull with receipts and other bits of rubbish that I seem to aquire, so I took out all the receipts and other bits of rubbish and a £20 note. A £20 note I had carefully remembered to put in my wallet the night before.
Anyway, the game was forgetful from a Reading point of view, but Arsenal were very good indeed and I hate to say it, a pleasure to watch. Ryan particularly liked it because we were five rows from the front and got very close to Kingsley the mascot. The highlight for me was a chorus of “oxf*rd off mourihino” when Stephen Hunt was unjustly told off by the ref for closing down a Arsenal player (It was a fair challenge and the only reason the ref was having a go was because Mourhinio had painted Hunt just so).
Well, I’m not one to brag, so I’m not sure I should write this down, but I think some record of it should exist; if only so we can laugh at it in years to come in a “to think, your teacher said that!” sort of way. It the middle of Jeannie’s parents evening, her teacher referred to her as a genius.
Okay, it was only in reference to Jeannie’s bedroom being such a mess (she is not like this at school apparently) but it was pleasing to hear that she is doing so well. This is her first proper year at school and she had fit in really well. Apparently, some of the other children have found it hard to settle down to working all day as last year (in Reception) there was a lot more play. Jeannie on the other hand found last year quite boring, and is enjoying school much more.
Her reading as we know is very good (reading age about 8 or 9) and she has already met this years targets to reading (so her current target is part of Year 2). Her teacher is determined to get a Year 3 level piece of work out of her by the end of the school year.
Of course, it is not all perfect all the way down the line. Her handwriting has some odd non-conformities such as her “d” being the same height as her “a”’s for example. However, this isn’t just a thing she has got wrong. Her teacher is sure she knows how to do it properly, she just doesn’t want to. When told about it, she will just smile. And it is such a mischievous smile. In a way, I think this is better than her being a perfect little girl. She is quite the stubborn one too.
Her maths is strictly average, but she always adds interesting points to the class discussion. I think this comes from her asking the most awkward questions at the most inappropriate times, like when we were with some quite religious friends and she asked me “Which is older, the Dinosaurs or Adam and Eve?” Not knowing our friends really well, I didn’t know how best to answer it without causing possible offence.
After a rather sleepless night, everyone was tired the next day. Luckily Ryan was off to the childminders again, but Tina decided not to work. Gabby’s mouth seemed quite sore but she was fine. Except, she was hungry as she was not able to eat yesterday.
At lunchtime, Tina tried her with some yogurt which was fine. Then she tried a grape. Unfortunately, this managed to dislodge her other lower tooth and set her gum bleeding again. A quick call to the dentist and he could see us straight away.
The dentist said that the second tooth may come out as well as the gum around the area was damaged. It would either come out, or repair itself pretty quick. Whatever happened it would have no long term effect. The tooth is now at a 40 degree angle and there is a cut on Gabby’s lib, but it hasn’t affected her. She was her normal, happy, loud self in the dentist’s and made the nurse laugh.
So, now we wait to see what happens with the other tooth. And we won’t be giving her anything as hard as a grape again.
I was picking up Ryan from our childminder when I got the phone call from my wife, Tina. “Can you get over to the nursery, Gabby has had a fall?” My wife sounded worried, but gave no details away.
I rushed over as soon as I could and went into the baby room to find a lot of worried looking faces, and one very sad looking Gabriela. “We didn’t want to worry your wife, but she fell over backwards and has lost a tooth,” explained one of the carers. She showed me a small bundle of tissue paper which I presumed contained a little baby tooth. I picked Gabby up and gave her a big cuddle.
They explained what had happened as best they could as they couldn’t explain how the tooth had fallen out. Gabby had been cruising around the side but suddenly found herself standing with nothing near her to steady herself. In effect, it was probably her very first steps. Next thing that happened was obvious. She fell over, but she went backwards and on a soft matt. So, how she knocked her tooth out we have no idea. She lost her lower left front tooth (she only had four) and she only cried when they had to get it out of her mouth to stop her swallowing it.
My wife arrived and we took her first to the doctor, and then to our dentist. They did all they could, checked her out and made sure she was okay. The odd thing is that she has no bruises from the fall, she fell backwards so didn’t knock her teeth, so how did the tooth come out?
We are a bit shocked, but at the end of the day, the tooth will be replaced in a few years anyway. It’s just a shame that it was her first tooth and we went through a lot of sleepless nights to get it.
