Linkies & Guest Posts

- Sarah 8 Comments

The garden centre (The Ordinary Moments #13)

I love linking up with Katie at Mummy Daddy Me for The Ordinary Moments. It’s nice to take a few minutes every week just to appreciate the little things that otherwise might pass us by.

Coffee and cake

This week we had our monthly visit to the local garden centre for coffee and cake. For £12 a year you can be come a member of the Dobbies Garden Club. With that you get 10% off all plants and bulbs, earn reward points, and, the most important part, you get vouchers for two free teas or coffees every month. The best part about this, which is already a pretty good deal; we paid for our membership with £4 of Tesco Clubcard vouchers! I really do love a bargain.

And so once a month we go to Dobbies, we use our vouchers for free drinks and we treat ourselves to a cake. This is the second year we’ve had membership of the Garden Club but since Toby was born he’s been coming along too. In fact, his very first trip out after he was born (other than a walk round the block) was a visit to Dobbies. It really is an ordinary moment for him.

They had these really cool garden sculptures which we’ve never seen before. I’d love one – if we had a spare £150 or so! Toby wasn’t that impressed though.

Garden sculptures

mummy daddy me
- Sarah 5 Comments

Longer school hours?

mumturnedmom

I’m linking up with the lovely Sara at mumturnedmom again this week for her linky ‘The Prompt’. This week’s prompt is a headline:

Lengthen school days and cut holidays, says former Tory adviser’ The Guardian (online) 29 Jan 2014

This story about longer school hours has been big news this week and lots of people have already blogged about it. I wasn’t sure whether or not I was going to add my voice into the mix but this week’s prompt has somewhat forced my hand!

Lots of people have been getting their knickers in a twist about this news story and perhaps rightly so. As a teacher and a mum I think the idea of lengthening school days and shortening holidays is absolutely ludicrous. I could go on to make the same arguments as many others; kids need time to be kids, to be at home, to play; they need time out of school for extra curricular activities like dance classes, sports clubs, Cubs, Scouts, Brownies and Guides; parents need to spend time with their kids, not pick them up from school, feed them and put them to bed. As a teacher I would ask anyone to come into a school at 3:30 pm and look at the kids; if anyone thinks those tired, worn out, fidgety kids, who have already been learning for six hours could manage until 6 pm then I would like to see them attempt to teach one of those classes. I teach at secondary school – even my 15 or 16 year olds would struggle to stay focused until 6 pm. How could anyone expect primary school age children to do it? And what about homework? Sometimes kids need time outside the classroom to consolidate what they have been learning, in their own time. If we were expecting them to be in school for 45 hours a week when would they have time for homework? And that’s not to mention finding teachers willing to teach for 45 hours a week, 45 weeks a year. According to the former Tory adviser, Paul Kirby, “This increase by two-thirds in the time that kids spend at school is designed to allow all parents to work full-time without the need for additional childcare.”  Does this mean an increase in teachers’ salaries by two-thirds as well? And if we’re teaching until 6 pm then when do we plan lessons, mark books, set assessments and all the other things that most teachers spend at least a few hours doing every day after the kids have gone home?

Anyway, those are all the arguments against a longer school day that I could make. But actually I’m not that worried about these proposals. Because that’s all they are, proposals on the personal blog of a man who doesn’t even work for the government anymore. And although it would appear Michael Gove seems intent on ruining the English education system with one unworkable, nonsensical policy after another, I don’t think even he could bring these proposals into practice. Teachers are already leaving the profession in their droves, if they were expected to teach for 45 hours a week, for 45 weeks in a year I don’t think there would be any teachers left!

Reasons to teach

- Sarah 1 Comment

What is he thinking?

mumturnedmom

I’m linking up with the lovely Sara at mumturnedmom again this week for her new linky ‘The Prompt’.

I’m taking a slightly different angle on this weeks prompt, I hope you enjoy it.

Sweater, n. Garment worn by child when its mother is feeling chilly. Ambrose Bierce

I open my eyes. It’s dark in here, apart from that blue light coming from behind the chair. I think I’ll just lie here for a bit. I might try out some of those noises I’ve been working on.

Still here. That woman who is always around usually comes and gets me after a while. I’ve rolled on to my tummy but now my hand seems to be stuck down the side of the mattress. Maybe I need to make my noises a bit louder. Ah, I heard someone moving. She’ll be here in a minute.

The light is on now. It’s very bright after I’ve been lying here in the dark. The woman has got my arm out and turned me on my back. I don’t want to be on my back. Oh, now she’s taking my out of the cosy thing and…jeez, it’s cold in here. And I bet she’s going to put me on that cold plastic mat thing in a second. Yep. I knew it. It’s OK though. I’ll just roll onto my front again. I can see what’s going on then.

Why does she keep turning me back over. Doesn’t she know I want to be on my front? Ooh, what’s going on now. I’ve suddenly got a cold bum. She’s taken that massive nappy off that I’ve been wearing all night. That’s better. I can kick my legs more now. I can probably get that foot in my mouth if I try hard enough. Or maybe I’ll roll over again. Oh, and look. If I push with my arms it makes me move backwards. That’s new. I want to try that again.

Damn it woman! Stop turning me over. No, I don’t want another nappy on. It’s harder to get my feet in my mouth when I’ve got a nappy on. Alright then. I’ll lie here just for a minute. It’s done now, are you happy? What? You want to put those trousers back on again? You only just took them off! No my feet aren’t cold. Why are you putting those socks on me? Never mind though, I know how to get those off. What do you think I am, a baby or something?!

I’m hungry now. Where’s my milk? No, don’t put me down. I don’t want to play with that stupid squeaky animal thing. Although, ooh, it’s quite nice when I put it in my mouth. But then I can’t fit my thumb in there. And what’s that outside? Why is that tree moving? And, hang on…I’m still hungry. I suppose I’m going to have to cry if I’m ever going to get what I want round here.

Yes. That’s what I wanted. Milk. It’s not warm enough though. You know I don’t like it when it isn’t warm enough. No, don’t just put it back in my mouth. I pushed it out for a reason. Ah, I think she’s worked it out. It’s warmer now. I’ll just lie here and suck for a bit. And I’ll try and grab this dangly thing coming off the woman’s jumper. Why won’t she let me pull it? What was I doing again? Oh yeah, milk, that was it. I’m bored of sucking now though – I think I’ll push it away again. Maybe just look at it for a minute. What happens if I pull on this rubbery bit? Oh milk in my eye! Actually I think I’m still hungry. Give me that bottle back! No, don’t sit me up. I don’t need to burp. Why are you rubbing my back? Can’t you see I’m still hungry? Oh, for god’s sake. Why do you never listen??

 

Wouldn’t life be easier if we knew what they were thinking?

 

- Sarah 12 Comments

Me & Mine: A Family Portrait (January 2014)

I know,I know… Another photo linky! Me & Mine is about capturing our whole family in a photo every month. I have hundreds of photos of Toby, quite a few of him with his dad, even less of me and him and hardly any of the three of us. So by participating in this linky, I’ll be sure that we’ll have at least 12 pictures of the three of us by the end of the year. I only just found out about this linky so I’m a bit late with the January post but hopefully you’ll forgive me this time! This also means this month’s photo is taken in our living room – in months to come I want to try and capture our family when we’re out and about.

Family Portrait January

January has been a fairly quiet month in our house while we recovered from travelling to see both our families after Christmas, and we also recovered from a £1600 bill to replace the hip tiles on our roof after some storm damage – just what we needed a week before Christmas! So this month has been a month of frugality and waiting for pay day. I’m very much looking forward to a nice short February, the nights starting to get lighter again, and hopefully having some adventures.

- Sarah 12 Comments

Looking (The Ordinary Moments #12)

Another week and time for some more Ordinary Moments with Katie at Mummy Daddy Me.

Looking - The Ordinary Moments

Every morning we get up, Toby gets a clean nappy and then we come downstairs. Even though usually he hasn’t had any milk for the last 14 hours or so, Toby needs to have a little awake time before he works up his appetite for breakfast. So I put him on his play mat (we just got a new one with lots of space) for a wriggle and he likes to look out of the window and see what’s happening in the garden. There’s not much to look at at the moment but as we head in to spring he’ll be able to see the bulbs coming up and everything getting more colourful. For now though he seems happy enough just looking.

mummy daddy me
- Sarah 6 Comments

Living Arrows 4/52

This is now week four in the I Heart Snapping Living Arrows project – I can’t believe how fast time is going at the moment!

This week I decided to post two pictures. In both pictures I have chosen Toby isn’t looking at the camera and I love the serious expressions he has. I’ve also done a bit of editing on both photos to make them almost black and white. My husband has Photoshop but seeing as I have to borrow his laptop to use it I’ve been doing a bit of experimenting with picmonkey.com. It seems pretty good for what I need it for, for the moment anyway.

Here’s the shots. I’m really pleased with them but please let me know what you think.

Serious baby

Baby in a bear suit

living arrows
- Sarah 14 Comments

Bath time (The Ordinary Moments #11)

I’m linking up with Katie at Mummy Daddy Me again this week for some more ‘Ordinary Moments’.

Baby bath time

Toby usually gets a bath about three times a week. Bath time is very much daddy’s domain and up until now we’ve been using a lie-back bath support but Toby has started to get very wriggly (both in and out of the bath!) lately. We decided that a bath seat might help and got this one in the Kiddicare sale. It has suckers to stick it to the bottom of the bath but also swivels on its base to make it easy to get your baby in and out. Toby seems to quite like it so far although daddy reckons it’s harder to wash him in it.

Toby doesn’t mind the bath at the moment but I wouldn’t really say he enjoys it. He got some bath toys for Christmas but isn’t too interested in them yet. I’m really looking forward to the days when bath time becomes a fun end to the day…and we can make soap sud mohicans!

mummy daddy me