We started off with a requirement to go to London, to join a Mass Lobby of Parliament. We thought about the logistics, decided we would need to stay overnight in the capital, and really didn’t want to, so we settled on a compromise – a day in London, followed by a night at the Travel Inn in Windsor, some time exploring Windsor the next day, and home.  The two things I totally didn’t want to do, were take my kids on the tube (don’t ask me to rationalise, it just sounded like a horrendous idea), and keep them in a hotel in city centre. The route to Windsor from the city is by overland train, and Windsor is a fairly suburban place, with tourist attractions of its own, so it seemed like a solution.

Then it dawned on me that we hadn’t seen our friends on the south coast for a while, and maybe we could spend the preceding weekend with them, making a much shorter drive on the Tuesday morning for the Lobby. They were reasonably enthusiastic, so then we had a plan that looked a bit like a holiday, so when my mum told us about the nice holiday cottage “with stair gates at the top and the bottom” that was not (very) far from Hastings, we started thinking about booking it for the second half of the week, and making a grand tour of it.

Then it dawned on us that the train to Battle only took 20 minutes longer than the train to Windsor, the cottage was cheaper by the night than the hotel would have been, and it gave us a whole house to play with, rather than the four of us trying to sleep in one room. So we ditched Windsor, and booked Birch Cottage instead.

It was much the best idea. I really dislike London, and the relief of knowing we were spending the day there, but sleeping in a lovely little house, a mile from the nearest village, made the whole thing into an adventure that I could enjoy.

Hidden

As a plan, it felt very gallivanty, and unfettered, and I rather liked it. And I have to say, it worked beautifully.  We spent four days with our friends, chilling out in their house, thoroughly enjoying the mildness of the weather, and the seaside, and the woods, and the farm we visitted. Then we piled into the car, and drove across Sussex to Battle, and checked into the cottage, before driving straight across to the station, to go up to London.

We’d planned to get to London in time for a demonstration/picnic affair at 1pm, but the driving across Sussex part took longer than anticipated (“Mummy, I need the toilet,” and “Henry’s being sick!” rather got in the way of our timescales), so we were two trains behind on the plan. I was impressed with myself though, because I didn’t care. I could have got in a tizzy for not being where I wanted to be at the time I wanted to be there, but I opted for doing the things we had to do in the order we had to do them, and if that made us late, then so be it. As a result, we arrived at the Palace of Westminster at about 2.30pm, which was when the Lobby itself was due to start. We didn’t get to talk to many people, but we queued, we went through security, we went to the Lobby, we filled in a green card, we waited for our MP (who didn’t come, but I wasn’t surprised), we chatted with a few people, then we left – calling in at the subsidised cafe on the way out.

Daisy knew why we were there – “To tell the government to leave home educators alone,” and the basics of where we were and what the government do there, and I think she was rather impressed by the sense of occasion. Then we crossed the bridge, and wandered along the South Bank in the sunshine for a bit, by way of some exercise, and seeking some tea. Henry had a nice sleep in the wrap on Daddy’s back, and Daisy watched the skateboarders under the bridge, and we got the 6.50pm train back to Battle, and the cottage.

It was a big day, but it was great. Daisy learned so much, and actually, so did we.

The next day we spent at Battle Abbey, learning things that none of us knew about the Battle of Hastings (like, it happened a good five or six miles away from Hastings, for a start), and again, Daisy amazed me with her interest and engagement with it all. She was gripped by the video in the visitors’ centre, fascinated by the examples of weapons used, and even mostly interested in the walk around the field, to see where it happened, which we were all borderline Too Tired To Do, really. But we coped, and it was good, and there was learning, and today, when she asked me to tell her the story of the Battle again, I was able to give her detailed strategic descriptions, that I didn’t know about a week ago. We found the altar stone in the abbey, which supposedly marks the spot where Harold fell. I have to say, we found the flowers that had been left there, and the little notes referring “our last English king” a little perplexing. It was a thousand years ago – the Normans invaded, and became part of what England is. Get over it.

Hidden

On Thursday, we went to Hastings, and looked at what’s left of William’s castle there, as well as riding on the funicular railway, and working out some of the physics behind that. And throwing stones in the sea, naturally. Then on Friday we visitted Bodian Castle, which has the combined merits of being in very good nick, for a castle, and having its photo in the Usborne Castles book – that probably means nothing to you, but we got very excited.

On Saturday, we had the trip home, but we added a twist. We didn’t intend to add a twist, but as we passed a road sign on the M25 saying “Services 64 miles” at just the same moment as Daisy said, “I need a wee, Mummy,” we suddenly found a need to find suitable amenities outwith the normal motorway servicing system. Instead, we got the National Trust Handbook out, and used the facilities at Claremont Gardens, near Esher, instead. We used the toilets, had a snack in the cafe, used the playground, and stretched the children’s legs by walking around the lake – essentially, all the things we normally do at the motorway services, but in much nicer surroundings.  We were so pleased with ourselves that we were then on a mission to only stop at National Trust properties on the way home, which we just about managed. We had lunch at Baddesley Clinton, which is a stately home near Solihull (there are lots of NT places around that part of the M40, but not all of them have a cafe, and we really needed to eat). Again, we used the facilities, we ate, we did a whistle stop tour of the house (Henry liked the roaring log fire, Daisy got naughty in the library and had to be taken outside), then got back in the car, and carried on driving. At one point I thought we might also stop at Tatton, but we realised that, unlike motorway services, National Trust cafes shut at 4.30pm, so we ran out of day. Anyway, the kids were coping pretty well, at that point, so we just kept on going for home.

It’d definitely do the NT as Services thing again – it added some interest to the day. Whilst the cafes aren’t cheap, you get more for your money than you do on the motorway, and finding suitable properties to stop at is good, clean, nerdy fun.

So all in all, really good week. Good as a holiday, good experiences of Small Children On Long Journeys, good to be counted by the government on the Lobby, good to see old friends, and fantastic Education, all over the place. The kids couldn’t move for all the Education going on, it was fab!

It’s questionable that we ever were; we we’re never the party animals, concert goers, clubers and even most movies just passed us by – but we were at least keeping up with the TV, comings and goings in most of the things ‘other’ people talked about, and then we went to India.

India – is (well it was in 2003) a bit different to the UK (well the 2003 version of it) – it was a culture shock, not as much as you think; because well you always just cope when you’re in the thick of it; it was however quite a life event, ‘an expericene’ is the best way to describe it – coupled with the near abandonment thing in New Delhi airport when our return Kergystan flight was cancelled, did make it one of those things we annoyed almost everybody with for many years to come.

We did however return from the ‘experience’ back to the lovely cosy – fast driving western world, and to recover from the shock we went to Bowness-on-Windermere – the most diametrically opposite place to Delhi we could find -it’s just looking back what we’re not sure of is if we ever returned from Bowness.

Here we are now in 2009 (apparently) as we are just so out of touch with everyone else – we’ve never seen x-factor (2005) – we don’t even watch strictly come dancing – and the last film we went out to see was I-Robot (2004); apparently there are all sorts of trendy bands and stuff now. increasingly conversations revolve around things we have little or no idea about – someone mentions how X on strictly has just done Y -

• “who’s X?”
• “o you know the one off – (some programme i didn’t even realise was still on - usually Holby City – which is some form of Casulty spin off i think)”

It’s not that we are living in the past – we’re very technically literate, and absorbing all sorts of things from the world, they just don’t appear to be the things everybody else is absorbing – so culturally we are stuck in bowness on 15th october 2003 – and if i’m honest – it’s quite nice.

Anyway, the thought of that made me sad, so I’m making a concerted effort to write things, and thereby convince him that it’s a good thing.

In recent times, we have been on holiday to the Isle of Wight (yes, it’s true, we always go on holiday to the Isle of Wight), with my mother and my aunty, and got very lightly sunburnt in the process – which isn’t bad, in April.

HiddenHenry is occasionally astonishing, particularly with reference to his understanding of shape and form. I forgot to blog, a while ago, about his two-years-early drawing of circles, and about a month ago, he distinctly drew a circle, with three small circles inside it, before pointing to the bottom one and saying “mouth”. At 20 months. Frankly, that takes me beyond Proud Mother Boasting of His Advanced Development, into That’s Just Scary. Similarly, while we were away, we went into the gift shop at the Ventnor Botanic Gardens, part of the decor of which included a trellis-type design, which made green diamond shapes against a panel. It sounds odd, but it looked fine. Anyway, H pointed at the diamonds, and started singing Twinkle Twinkle. I remember being astonished at Daisy’s recognition of a triangle at a fairly early stage (in the face of her dogged refusal to get colours at all), but not this early. 21 months?! He scares me…

Overnight it rained, and the outlook for today says it might rain this afternoon. Just now we’ve got moody sea under gray clouds; there is an increasingly large patch of blue so it might still be another fab day.

Yesterday was the obligatory middle of the holiday flake out. at one point Henry, Ruth and me where all asleep – it lasted until daisy finished her yogurt; then she jumped on me and I was awake. I might have told Daisy that i was a nocturnal teacher during a game of school – and we drove to freshwater mainly because it’s a forty minute drive and we where trying to trick them to sleep.

One of the reasons for the tiredness was all the walking on Tuesday we walked the cliffs from woody bay to the botanical gardens. Daisy walked all the way, and told us she had ran out of banana energy quite a lot, until she saw the playground at the end of the walk, where she found some magical playground energy.

Another reason for being tired is the 5am starts. We still haven’t quite worked out why, but Henry is waking up almost on the dot of 5 every day. we are taking turns with the lye-ins so we swap the role of noughty parent daily.

OK now it’s blue skies and sunny – So I’m going to go and take the same photo I’ve taken for the last 6 days.

So far we’ve done pretty much everything, the weather has been so nice that – not wanting to miss anything – we’ve ran around the bits of the island that you always want to make sure you’ve ticked off.

Friday – we travelled down to Portsmouth and stayed at the Rinaldi’s house. night-time travelling yet again easing the journey, although Henry didn’t take well to being woken up and then asked to sleep again, we are considering doing the return trip late evening and stopping for tea.

Saturday – nice lazy morning, followed by a short trip to the ferry. being out of school holidays it was empty. we took the scenic route across the island very sunny. Daisy really wants to go the seaside, build sandcastles and stand in the sea.

Sunday – really sunny, so we took daisy to the seaside (shanklin) so  that she could build sandcastles and stand in the sea. the rest of the day was spent in the garden Daisy made a friend and we just let her run around.

Monday – really sunny, so we ventured into Ventnor, did the shops (although most of them close on a Monday, never understood that). then Ruth took Henry to the Winter Gardens and had tea and Cake while Daisy and Me went the beach to build sandcastles and stand in the sea.

Daisy and Henry are sharing a room, which has gone reasonably well but we were beginning to feel guilty about expecting Daisy to listen to Henry’s 10 minute cry before bed, so I took her for a walk to Woody Bay. I took some pictures and then we threw some stones into the water. a thoroughly nice day.

Tuesday (Today) – really sunny, we will probibly go to the beach, Daisy really wants to build sandcastles and stand in the sea.

Chirk Castle is the last Edward I castle still lived in today (as you will know if you followed the link above).

[Historians look away now!] Edward I was the King who built loads of castles in North Wales – he spent £80,000 on castles in the 1280′s that’s a lot of money. The Main aim of the castles was to keep the Welsh quiet. They didn’t really think England was all tat great thanks, and much preferred the hilliness of snowdonia and the wild coast that was to become scouse-wales. Edward I (who was the fourth King to be called Edward) was recently voted 94th Greatest Briton – maybe because he conquered Wales, or maybe because he did quite a lot of law reforming.

None of that really tells you about Chirk Castle, except why it was built. As it is the only castle of that time still lived in, it doesn’t really resemble a 700 year old Castle it’s more of a stately home squeezed into a castle. It’s still very interesting and warm. unlike those ruined 700 year old castles. the Café is nice, and there where chickens in the car park.

New Camera

Really for us it was an opportunity for me to try out my new camera. The weather wasn’t great, but still we got some good shots. The zoom is cool; We have some fab shots of animals, the type you think you are going to take with your camera, only to discover you have a dot in the middle of a field of grass; well on my camera you get a full picture of the animal.

The Colours are really good to. It’s not until you get a decent camera do you realise just how over saturated some cameras can make photographs – of course this means I will have to start taking pictures of everything again. for one it’s 8 mega pixel which means good shots can be blown up real big and stuck on the wall.

A couple of quick things we learnt on the way there and back.

1) putting your kids to bed in the car works for long journeys.

We set off at 6:30 after giving Henry and Daisy baths and dressing them for bed. Daisy even got her bed time story on the M62. after about an hour of hyper excitement from Daisy they where both asleep. we had the odd murmer later on but all in all it was better than 4 hours with to children awake.

2) The Toll Road Rocks

The M6Toll last night was emptier than the M58, we did the journey in 4:05 and that includes stopping for 15 mins. Google seems to think it should have taken 4 hours 21 non stop. but it makes certain ‘assumptions’ about speed.

of course we set of Thursday night and got home around 10:30 last night, and now it’s Tuesday and I have to go to work. which is a bit sad. unfortunately the leave situation for me is such that this is all we can do until June, eek out as much as possible from bank holidays.

We went to sandybrook country park in Derbyshire, which is like a very mini version of centre parks (well it has wooden lodges and a swimming pool).

Daisy went swimming twice, although she is still to traumatized to go into deeper water. It’s going to take a few months for recovery I think.

Last week, we spent five days at a cottage, on a farm, about two miles away from the road, and about 4 miles from Coniston. The fact that it rained almost constantly wasn’t a problem. We’re not silly people – we more or less expected rain in the lakes in late November. We have adequate waterproof stuff, and we’re much more wander-around-the-town types than trek-across-the-fells.

The problem was that we were twenty miles from the nearest A and E when Daisy came down with croup, and the GPs in the local area are a bunch of doddering quacks.

We arrived on the Monday, and settled into the cottage. It was lovely – small, but not too small, directly overlooking the main sheep-fold, with interesting views of sheep being herded around for various mysterious purposes. Daisy was delighted that her bedroom had a window at more or less floor-level, and the double room was plenty big enough for Henry’s hammock as well. It was very nice, and I’d go again.

On Tuesday, we went to Keswick, to wander around the town, since I’ve never been. It’s a nice little town, only slightly marred by the whingey awkwardness of my daughter (whose zenith that day was to knock over a display in a shop, and then shout and cry at the generously philosophical assistant for picking it up again, because she wanted Daddy to do it…). I wondered then if she was coming down with something, but she could have just been tired.

Anyway, in the early hours of the next morning, she woke up with a raging temperature, a classically croupy cough, and the harsh wheeze which is the difference between croup you worry about and croup you don’t. We weren’t in a wild hurry to take her twenty miles to Barrow/Kendal, so we went for some old-fashioned nursing remedies – we filled the bathroom with steam, gave her paracetamol for the temperature, and tried to get her calm enough to be able to breathe properly.

It only kind of worked, but she calmed down a bit, and we decided to put her back to bed, with one of us sharing the twin room with her. Kevin drew the short straw, which turned out to be shorter than he realised, since the excitement of having Daddy in her room make her refuse more or less point blank to go to sleep.

One of the things with croup, is it’s worse when they cry, so the medical types advise keeping her calm. Poor Kevin didn’t want to have the stand-off with her, but as a result, she didn’t get back to sleep until 6am, and at one point I believe they were downstairs watching Shrek at 4am.

The next morning, we took her to the local GP, and told him what had happened. She was still coughing, and still wheezing a little, though going out in the car helped a little. The GP, unfortunately, was an idiot. We made a point of telling him that she’s had it before, and that it was treated at Alder Hey with oral steroids. He said, “Hmmm… yes, steroids is a common treatment,” but then prescribed antibiotics. A bit bizarre – croup stems from a virus, not a bacteria, so antibiotics are a waste of time. Daisy’s first ever set, too. He also prescribed linctus, which is tantamount to spending NHS money on Lockets.

We duly administered the prescribed treatments all day, whilst sitting around the cottage recovering from the bad night, but by tea-time, it was becoming apparent that, not only wasn’t it working, but she was starting to deteriorate with the approach of night time, so we whisked her back – or at least, whisked her to the guy who covers for the first guy on Wednesday afternoons, when he’s off.

He seemed more willing to admit that steroids were the appropriate treatment, but didn’t prescribe them on the grounds that he didn’t stock them in his dispensary (bizarre country doctor thing, dispensing you own medicine). “It sounds worse than it is,” he said. “She’ll be fine.”

Hmm.

On the second night, I shared her room (since I am proven to be a much less exciting person), and was woken up about every hour and a half, either because she was coughing and needed a drink, or because the extra fluids had caused her to wet the bed (with the natural effect that I spent most of the night in a wet bed – just as it was drying out, she wet the other one, and we swapped back. Who’d be a mum?).

So on Thursday morning, we took her back to the first GP again, and came back with a Ventolin inhaler, which also had no noticeable effect.

We gave up on the local health services at that point, and said that if we didn’t have a significantly better night, we would bring her home in time to see our own GP on Friday afternoon. That night was a little better, but not much, and in any case, it was pouring with rain the next morning, and we decided that appeal of trudging around Ambleside in the rain wasn’t sufficiently great, when set against the option to get Daisy to a competent doctor. So we paid the lady, packed the car, and came home.

It was a huge relief to sit on my own doctor’s office, and have her instantly start behaving as if not being able to breathe properly does, in fact, matter.? She heard the wheeze as soon as we walked through the door, and actually thought it was Henry, the very idea of which nearly gave her apoplexy. Discovering that it was actually the three-year-old calmed her down a little, and she started to prescribe the steroids that I’d been trying to get hold of all week, but then decided that she wanted her on a nebuliser, for which we had to go to Alder Hey.? So she made a call, wrote a referring letter, and send us away.

The paeditrician at A&E reckoned that ventolin – in the form of inhaler, or nebuliser – doesn’t help with croup, and just gave her the steroids anyway, so all that achieved was to postpone the treatment for another two hours, but if it meant that the GP could sleep over the weekend, I don’t really hold that against her. Though if I end up in the situation again, I shall argue with her.? I think the fact that it was Friday night went into her decision making, though – if she could have said, “Bring her back in the morning,” I think she might have done that instead.

So, two hours at the GP, followed by three at Alder Hey, made for two very tired children, and two equally tired parents.? And no, not the greatest holiday we’ve ever had.? Still, at least the wheeze has gone, now.

It’s not all been Organised Activity. We’ve been to the dentist, and a birthday party, amongst other things. However, with the implementation of my new No Telly Between 10am and 5pm rule, and Henry deciding to sleep for a solid three hours this afternoon, Daisy and I were left to have a very lovely time. No background noise, no distractions, just rather a lot of glue and glitter.

Turning the telly off is starting to look like a really significant decision. I have as many good intentions as the next person, but we’d slipped and slipped until it was on all day every day, again. This week, she’s been playing properly again – by herself, as well as with me – and having to think of things to do, which is much better for her. And today, we’ve both really benefitted from winding down a little, and being able to relax.

Next week, we’re going to the Lakes, so there’s been a bit of a party atmosphere around here, since Kevin came home. I do hope it’s nice. Going away with the kids can go either way, really – either it’s great to spend some time together, or it’s not much of a holiday, because you’re doing all the same things as you have to do at home. I’ll let you know which way it goes…