Family ties

I firmly believe that family and friends shape and influence our children and the way they will grow up to be. Matthew,Leah and Sienna are fortunate to have lots of family and friends that love and understand them. Each of my children remind me of one of my siblings.Leah is very artistic like one of my sisters, Matthew has the same temperament as my brother and Sienna looks and acts just like my other sister Effie.

During the school holidays Effie agreed to look after Sienna for four days. She had very kindly taken the time off work to spend with her and i knew that together they would have a massive adventure. As i phoned to speak to her Effie relayed tales of her finding Sienna straddling her dog whilst trying to clip clips into his hair and screams of 'Oh no Sienna, not the Ralph Lauren!'. Sienna hiding the cupboard key whilst playing shop which no amount of bribery would lead her to reveal it and the demands of 'i need to watch Fifi whilst i sleep'.

I laughed so much as i pictured Sienna doing all of these things and my heart warmed as i listened to Effie laugh and giggle calmly as she recited each story. It reminded me of times when we were younger when we would team up and lock my brother in the cupboard or convince him to lie down whilst we wrapped him in toilet roll as he could only ever be the 'sick' patient while my sisters and I were the doctors. Life was full of laughter and adventure back then. The only point to note is there were three of us up to mischief and only one of Sienna that weekend. She dosen't need any encouragement to be naughty, she can pre plan all on her own.

I do think i love my sister more as i have grown older. Life experiences bring you closer together. As an aunty i respect her greatly and as much as i wanted to divorce her when i was younger i wouldn't swap her for anyone else. She has always held the role of 'big sister' and i 'little sister' which i love and still feel has alot of mileage in!. I only hope that my children are as close as they get older.

Life through a Vacumn

Do you ever get that feeling that your constantly being pulled from one direction to the next?.

With 'Back to School' at the forefront of my agenda life has become a juggling act of lunchboxes, school uniform coats and shoes!. The past seven weeks have flown by and whilst I am looking forward to returning to 'normal' life routine I can't seem to get my head around the fact that another school year is about to begin. My life seems to be a series of threes. Three children, three of everything. I listen and smile as my friends tell me how their school labels have arrived thanks to the internet and hope that my children won't be disappointed with the fact that mummy has used a black marker instead. Perhaps they will be thankful that this year I have remembered the right teacher and class!.

Last year did not get off to the best start. We had hurried along and i was feeling ever so pleased with myself as we set off to school.The children looked smart and clean!, no term time stains! and as we approached the school gates I noticed that it was surprisingly empty. What could have happened you may ask?. Oh yes, inset day! so all of the excitement of school had to be carried over to the following day.

As Matthew stood in line a sick feeling washed over me as i realised that he was labelled right down to his underwear in the wrong class name!. How you may ask had this happened?. I had concentrated so hard on getting everything right that i had infact got it very wrong.

The look the children gave me needed no words to follow, it was one of complete understanding.