Simple musings of a 4YO

Dada did u know I like Mummy the best? But Daddy, you are my favourite... 

Look back in wonder

Okay so here's the deal. I travelled a lot when I was younger. I use the word 'travelled' loosely, as it was more like bumming around at the time. The more I saw and experienced, the more my senses were alerted to new cultures and countries, and the more I fell in love with writing about my time away from home detailing the where, what, why, when, who?! I wrote journals and letters mainly, but also sent emails when I could find the Internet. Ha! Seems nuts now, but back in the 90's, the net had not quite reached all four corners of the globe - and trotting around it meant you arrived in cities excited for the consequent Post Restante, where you'd pick up and pour over yearned for news. Five years later, I was back in the UK, working as the professional nanny I had trained to be. It was hard to settle though and I ended up doing a degree instead. Media Writing at Southampton. My thesis was based on a travel writer; Lindsay Hawdon and her hugely successful weekly column in the Telegraph, entitled 'An Englishwoman Abroad'. Her use of the first person narrative was fresh and exciting, but also successful because it meant everyone could travel with her, transported to each new destination, and from their armchairs. I liked her style and using the journals I kept and the letters I sent, I found my own descriptive narrative - and the inspiration for my dissertation. I put this particular piece into a travel writing comp which closes at 11pm tonight if you're interested in that sort of thing - a comp allowing travel writers the freedom to write as they please, rather than have to conform to the often oppressive structure of a magazine. (Really I'll use any excuse to get back to Oz). Anyway, please share if you like what you read... Thank you.

http://scholarships.travel/writing16/tanami-desert-western-australia-june-1999

26/52 The GraceFaith year long art project

Choosing a favourite piece of art, each week of the year...

Fish Pond by Fia

HYSTERECTOMY - 10 Reasons for and 10 reasons against

10 NOT SO GREAT reasons to have a Total Abdominal Hysterectomy

1) Major operation comes with all sorts of risks.
2) Meds to help can equal nasty side effects.
3) One being you can't shit for days - bring forth laxatives, stool softeners and suppositories and hope...
4) Trapped wind brought on by laxatives, stool softeners and suppositories can end up causing more grief on its mission to break free than the actual surgery - have you ever felt wind in your shoulder of all places?
5) Having to eat all manner of food stuffs to get the digestive system working again such as prunes and papaya causing yet more wind in a freakishly continually evolving catch 22 scenario.
6) Being observed for blood pressure, temperature and oxygen levels around the clock, which although a necessity is of course a tad annoying on the sleep front.
7) A bloody great scar.
8) Post operative blurred vision (this might have been down to the epidural rather than the anaesthetic, either way, it's getting better a bit too slowly for my liking).
9) Bed rest boredom. Although to be honest, I am toying with the idea that this is actually not a valid NOT SO GREAT reason at all, for I'm enjoying the rest immensely and am yet to be bored. (I know you're hearing me mothers of small children).
10) Watching the dust gather due to being unable to vacuum for weeks on end (actually, what am I thinking, this surely needs to go on the list of GREAT REASONS)?

10 GREAT reasons to have a Total Abdominal Hysterectomy

25/52 The GraceFaith year long art project

Choosing a favourite piece of art, each week of the year

Okay, so this week I came out of hospital and Esme Grace (my brave 7YO) presented me with a card. It now sits with a whole host of unexpected wonderful well wishes, except this one, instead of saying Get Well Soon, speaks the mind of a 7yo daughter who has lost her Mummy to bed rest...

24/52 The GraceFaith year long art project

Choosing a favourite piece of art, each week of the year...



Underneath this beautiful flower, the nursery teacher wrote down Fia's thoughts:
"I hope you are better.
Soon we will come and collect you.
We miss you so much.
We love you so much.
Love Fia. xxxx"

23/52 The GraceFaith year long art project

Choosing a favourite piece of art, each week of the year

22/52 The GraceFaith year long art project...

Choosing a favourite piece of art, each week of the year...

CRAZY SPECTACULAR Bank Holiday cheese roll?

Want something to do (in Gloucestershire) this May Bank holiday Monday?

Why not take part in the very bonkers annual cheese roll in the village of Brockworth, near Gloucester. People have been doing so (officially and now un-officially) since at least the 1800s, choosing to throw themselves with gusto after a rolling wheel of cheese.

How very British... no not the fact that people run fall down the ridiculously steep Cooper's hill chasing after an 8lb Double Gloucester, but the fact that they still do so after the event was shut due to health and safety concerns six years ago. Hey, what's a broken bone here and there?

Now a very much spontaneous event that takes place with no management whatsoever, if you fancy a bloody big cheese, and you are somewhere near Gloucester, this could prove to be a winning weekend for you. And if you don't fancy winning a cheese, you might just enjoy observing this crazy spectacular instead!

The Happy Nappy Wetsuit - A review

DETAILS

SPLASH ABOUT HAPPY NAPPY WETSUIT

Available: from birth to 24months+

Suitable for: Newborn and sensitive skins - including eczema

Price: £22.99 - £24.99

splashabout.com

Innovative and unique, the Happy Nappy Wetsuit is worth making a splash about!

EXAM SEASON STRESS

Encouraging children to do their best

When it comes to exams, recent news highlights the severe stress exam season can cause young children. Meanwhile, around five million students are in the throes of sitting their GCSEs right now across the country. So how is best for them to prepare? And what advice can we follow when it comes to best identifying and helping children through any exam stress?

IDENTIFYING EXAM STRESS AND HELPING CHILDREN COPE WITH IT

Child psychologist expert Dr Ramya Mohan, a Senior Consultant Psychiatrist and Medical Educator with the National Health Service UK, gives her top tips to identifying and helping children to cope with exam stress:

21/52 The GraceFaith year long art project...

Choosing a favourite piece of art, each week of the year



This week Fia's painting took on more detail than ever before

The Alphabet with Bella - A book review

DETAILS

TITLE: The Alphabet with Bella

AUTHOR: Lorraine O'Garro

PUBLISHED BY: Clink Street Publishing (June 2016)

PRICE: £5.99

AVAILABLE FROM: All good book shops & online here

IDEAL FOR: 2-5 year olds

Want to teach the alphabet and at the same time introduce your child to worldliness and other cultures? If so, this colourful book's for you...

20/52 The GraceFaith year long art project

Choosing a favourite piece of art, each week of the year...



Fia's vase of flowers

OUT IN THE SUN? What advice to follow...

Did you know that this week is sun awareness week? I’d like to highlight this important date in the calendar for those of us that are parents, grandparents or employed in the field of caring for children, for it is our responsibility to protect them. But what advice should we follow when it comes to being out in the sunlight? 

The Amazing Dinosaur Detectives - A book review

DETAILS:

Author: Maggie Li 

The Amazing Dinosaur Detectives 
For ages 5+
On sale: 23/05/2016

RRP £9.99 

ISBN 9781843653073

Published by Pavilion Children's, an imprint of Pavilion Books

The Amazing Dinosaur Detectives is billed as an interactive visual guide. Essentially, a plastic magnifying glass is stuck to the front of the book. Gimmicky? A little. But the idea that children can inspect Stegosaurus spikes, Pteranodon skulls, Velociraptor claws etc and find the extra tiny hidden details on each page, will no doubt send them into a dinosaur detective fantasy world frenzy.

19/52 The GraceFaith year long art project

Choosing a favourite piece of art, each week of the year...



Sofia's bus

LIFE AS IT IS - This week in... May 2016

Praising the sisterhood, periods and apathy

In the week we found out that Madrid dog owners who refuse to pick up their dog poo will have to clean streets, I got the painters in. Physically and metaphorically. Our lovely neighbour is doing a fab job for us, and the kitchen is coming to life as I write. I on the other hand feel anything but lively sat here. At least the sun is shining. And at least I found my purse (after cancelling my cards, of course).

So yes, as I was saying the painters are in. I've got my period. And as I type that sentence I'm faced with the actuality that it is my last period ever. Period. The final monthly cycle I will ever experience - after over thirty years of bleeding every single month (give or take a pregnancy here or there of course). That is a bizarre feeling.

18/52 The GraceFaith year long art project

Choosing a favourite piece of art, each week of the year...

This week, Fia paints her family...

Mummy

Daddy

Esme

Coeliac V Stomach ulcer - Tummy Troubles (4)

So I have this bulbous stomach issue - more on that later. Anyway, they went in looking for coeliac disease, and came out finding an ulcer. Consequently I was left high and dry, given Omeprazole to heal the stomach lining and told to lay right off the booze. I have. It has been an impressive ten weeks now - give or take the one night I fell off the wagon (in a most dramatic way).

Tomorrow they go back in again (down not up) to see if  said ulcer has healed. And how do I feel about that? Hopeful. Fingers crossed that the hard work has paid off.



FOOTNOTE < ADDED 5 MAY 2016

IT HAS PAID OFF! ULCER HAS HEALED. PROUD OF MYSELF!