mother's day

how was yours?

my day started well before 7.00 am with 3 gifts and cards, promptly presented, all having been carefully made and equally carefully saved until the special day. Joshua assures me that the iced gems on top of his peppermint fondants, won't fall off, because he had to lick them to stick them on. I am persuaded to try one of these delicacies before my head is even off the pillow.

I then decide to get up and let out the chickens, to spare the cottages guests any further wake-up calls from the cockerel(s)- should only be one, and will be one again soon, but the three silkie chicks we reared, have turned out to be cockerels as well, and have now begun crowing. The plan is to go back to bed with a cup of tea. By the time I get back upstairs with cup in hand, the silkies have settled in our garage (even closer to the cottages) and are calling in unison to the large cockerel who is outside one of the bedroom windows. I go downstairs and outside again, this time with a watering can, and chase off offending birds. It works for about as long as it takes to drink my tea.

I'm in the shower now, having given up on the lie-in, and hastily get out, get dried and dressed, as I can hear the dog going beserk downstairs, which means someone is at the door. Turns out, one of the toilet pipes in the cottages has come away - water all over the bathroom floor, and there is no hot water in fact, in any of the cottages. We go over, to diagnose boiler problem - the gas tanks need changing over, (which I gratefully hand over to Henry to do, while I mop up water, and reassure guests that all will be well again) and all this is before second cup of tea and breakfast!

As the weather has been quite savage today,we have spent the day close to home, doing outside jobs with frequent 'recovery' periods inside, with more cups of tea and snacks. I make a mother's day promise to spend time with each child, doing an activity of their choice (I regret to say this does not happen very often) - so I play football in the yard with Joshua, fortunately everyone else joins in, to save me from sporting disaster, I write a story on the computer with Natalie, and Celine shows me how to create basic animation. I enjoy it all, and vow that I should make time to do this more often.

The day has a kind of poignant end for me, as I find that Celine my eldest, has cleared out some of her 'kiddie stuff' and passed down 'pink bunny' to her younger sister. Pink bunny has been everywhere with us over the years. I have washed and stitched her, and on one occasion, travelled many night-time country miles, to retrieve her for a desperate little girl who couldn't go to sleep without her. I wasn't expecting pink bunny to appear on the school bus or at disco parties, but I wasn't expecting to feel this kind of sadness and nostalgia either, at the 'passing down' ceremony of a cuddly toy - but that's all part of being a mother isn't it? I know these moments will come thick and fast from now on, so I'd better get a grip of the technology my daughters are trying to teach me, and improve my football skills, so I can keep up as they move forwards!