Another false alarm last night – this time at 1:40. Louise was woken by strong Braxton Hicks contractions & was worried for a bit. Not the panic of last time. She left me dozing in bed wondering what was going on & went to get a hot water bottle for her back (I did offer to go & get it.. I did!). She says the baby started wriggling about & the contractions abated & she fell asleep again.

Train home

Brain was not working this morning. Dull head, not from having been awake in the night, I’m sure, (I was not awake that long) but probably just a general thing. Curiously, with Louise ranging about in the night, the kids slept through again.
When I got home Hamish & Amber were playing as well. Then Hamish wanted to go home (I think he perceived a slight when we asked him not to do something). He suggested that Jack come over to his house, as Jack did not want to go, so I went to check this was OK (it was) & then Eve wanted to follow Amber as well. So Louise & I had the house to herself for a little while… weird. Queue mad bout of tidying up after finishing of a crossword.
Further weird was that Jack decided he wanted to come home, but Eve wanted to stay there a little longer. Jack & I hoovered the stairs & then hoovered the stairs to the attic with the Lazarus dyson, & then washed the filters for it when I realised that they were so clogged that the suction it was giving was minimal. I went to get Eve when tea was ready. Was initially greeted with a couple of defiant “No!”s, but she trotted back to ours without any further encouragement. She really does like plying with Amber. Before they went off to her house Amber & Eve were pushing dollies in pushchairs, (actually amber’s pushchair was the baby walker with the dolly asleep in a toy shopping basket, but hey). “Bye-bye!… Catch a bus.” they say & stroll off to the back room” No doubt similar play at Amber’s house. It’s all quite encouraging if they need to spend some time there while Louise & I dash off to the hospital in the next few days due to new baby arrival. Called Louise from work & she does not think the baby will be long waiting now.
Jack was ‘naughty’ last night before bed. He’d had a good day in general & we were playing with building bricks in their room before we got round to running the bath. I popped downstairs for something or other & Jack was rolling about on his bed. Louise took his shoes off because he was in danger of knocking the wall & marking the wallpaper. He was resistant to the idea & Louise explained that it was to stop the wallpaper being damaged. He immediately decided to pay too much attention to the wallpaper. Louise warned him against messing about with things & came downstairs to get the milk for their bath time drink… That might have been what I went down for, as the bath must have been running. Anyway on returning upstairs we found him picking a little hole in the wallpaper! Louise was upset with him, I remained calm (no point in both of us raging). He was in tears quickly as he really dislikes being told off by Louise. They were only tiny bit of paper he took off, but it looked bad. Eve starts to get upset that Louise is upset, (“Mummy fed up!”) Jack is crying & I walk off downstairs… Time to get some glue. Stick on the bits taken off with PVA glue – which I think will be sufficient. I’ll need to paint over it again to ‘hide’ it better though. Louise is immediately regretful that she lost her temper… she almost never does with them even under extreme provocation. I think she was so shocked that he would do such a thing after he has been so responsible & generally good of late. Jack has a cuddle a calm down with me & a few words as to why it was such a silly thing to do – for which he makes no attempt to try to make excuses for, & conceded that it was wrong (which I take as encouraging).

Happy New Year…
It’s so cold out his morning it’s taking an age for my thought processes to kick off…
No, Paul – it’s because you’re tired…
Oh, right…

Our town goes firework crazy in the first minutes of a New Year. Even if you wanted to sleep the New Year in, you could well have difficulty. It didn’t wake Jack, but Eve stirred.
I’m not really sure why, but we don’t celebrate New Year that much… I guess I have an aversion to hangovers. We never celebrated as a family when I was a kid maybe mum & dad needed to convince us that it was ‘just another day’ so that they could run the pub with ease. I don’t ever recall being woke up by the pub’s New Year ‘bong!’ but that may be wishful thinking.
So, I had the day off work yesterday – which was nice. I did daddy practical things – like putting up a shelf (ooh – drilling) & getting the old dyson to work (actually – I’d rewired it earlier & was stumped why it did not start working again… but I just had to change the fuse – duuuh). Jack enjoys this sort of activity, so it kept him occupied for a while, on an otherwise potentially tedious day. He watched an animated film all the way through in the morning. Sat on my knee most of the way through it. It was called “The Lion of OZ” & I had seen it before, & it is …OK as these things go, but I was mildly surprised that he managed to keep his attention on it for what must have been at least near an hour. Eve was good as well – she played around us for the most part. She is good like that though. She’s quite capable of occupying herself with some form of play, be it with dollies, snipping cards, Jack’s cars or trains, or her little playmobil house.
Brain shutting down – train snooze beckons…

Last day (of the year)
Reluctantly heading to work once more. I really would prefer to stay at home with Louise & the kids, as it’s been a very pleasant low key weekend. Still – I don’t have to go tomorrow.
Heh – quiet train this morning – just the mugs like me.
Having a full moon to watch as the train speeds by is odd as well – give a certain feeling of unreality.
Snowed over the weekend, which excited Jack no end. He was up & dressed & outside as soon as he could be. I got a garden spade out & he had a good old time pushing that about like a snowplough. He had nearly cleared all the back street on Saturday pushing it back & forth. The snow was no good for actually doing anything with though, as it was too icy. There was barely an inch, but at least half of it seemed to have melted slightly & nearly frozen again. It snowed again in the night & Jack was off again in the morning. This time it had left a renewed inch of snow (by the end of Saturday it was starting to be a bit of a dismal layer) but again it was not right for snowmen: too cold & powdery. We scooped up some snow with the spade & made a pile or 2, from which we made a star & a ‘J’. We also made a couple of little snowball sized snowmen, but trying to roll a bigger ball just did not work. Curiously, those piles of snow disappeared off the back street & a squat snow woman appeared in Hamish’s back yard – heh.
When we got back from the afternoon’s supermarket jaunt Jack was straight out into the snow again. It being later in the day, the snow had warmed up a bit, so it stuck a little. Still a bit too cold for rolling, so we compacted it with the spade in his toy wheelbarrow & built a little one. Had stones for eyes & bits of ice for arms sticking out at the side. Louise thinks it looks cuddly.
There seems a lot I want to write of, but I cannot get my brain to properly kick start this morning.

Train home

Neil (my brother) & Jess were going to come over on Saturday, but they didn’t make it. They set off, but they met a pile up on the M6 around stoke on trent (j18?). They did not crash, but someone else crashed into them. They are OK & everything, aside from the loss of the car & everything like that… which I imagine is going to take a while to sort out… what a drag. They’ll hopefully make it up sometime when the new baby is due. Neil called on his mobile sounding really put out by the whole thing.
I called mum in the evening & had a good chat (I don’t actually talk to my folks that much. They are busy enough. They’ve just moved into a new place, so mum had been painting & regrouting the bathroom & dad had been knocking a wall through from the utility room to the pantry (making it bigger for some other use) & filling in another door in the kitchen that is not needed with the leftover bricks. This is a day off; hols from running the restaurant. I wish I could be that industrious & practical sometimes. Mum said that she does not want to travel on the motorways in the daytime again. When they come to visit they will set off at some unearthly hour (as they currently do) & go back at night as well. This is good! We should have a whole day next time we visit.
Mum was a little disappointed that I’d called as she was going to call me in the morning so that she could speak to Jack… so I called her in the morning as well & passed the phone to Jack. They had a nice little chat & then Jack hung up… I didn’t get a chance to say goodbye there <pout>.
Louise & I were chatting last night about how he kids are gearing up to the arrival of the new babe. Louise does not think that Eve is fully aware of what is about to happen yet. She gets told about the fact that there’s a ‘baby in mummy’s tummy’ & she seems just happy that mummy has a tummy… if you know what I mean… no… ah, whatever. She loves her dollies & all that – dolly mad she is sometimes, but a new baby… no she’s not twigged that yet. Jack had when Eve was born. Granted he was fractionally older, but you could converse with him more – he did understand that there was a baby due. He told Louise that he remembered going to hospital with us & Louise having an antenatal scan. In a way you could believe him, as it’s a funny thing to happen – darkened room – mummy on a table, odd telly screen with a baby (?) on it… but it’s difficult to say that he does – he may be confusing it with something else. Still, I would not put it past him – he seems a clued up kid. He remembers stuff better than I do. OK – well try this bit of the telletubies site (for Eve)… “no paul – it doesn’t work”. hmmm how does he know – I think it should work – besides its been well over a year since we were last year…
DOH! Computer crash!

Ug – not enough sleep.
We had a false alarm last night. Louise had a very wriggly lump that was causing her significant back pain (she gets a lot over lower back pain in labour) & some heavy Braxton Hick contractions – so we were up at 1:30 running about trying to ensure we had everything & so forth – trying to find a yellow pages for a taxi as the hospital is sure to deny us an ambulance (they did last time & it seems from talking to other mothers they generally do nowadays). It’s not like we have a car & can pop over – but perhaps that’s the thinking. I’m sure a couple of the neighbours wouldn’t be too annoyed at us calling at that time for assistance, as they have expressed a willingness to help, but still – it’s something we feel we cannot impose.
Still, after getting ready for the off, we calmed down & went back to bed & I certainly fell asleep quickly enough as I held a hot water bottle against Louise’s lower back.

Weirdly enough – with all this kerfuffle, both Jack & Eve slept through.

It seems Eve was a little terror yesterday. Jack was playing very well, & Eve would not let him have a moment’s peace, but still he did not really react to provocation… Louise got him doing some Xmas cards for his friends at school & Eve was making it very difficult – wanting the book he was writing on or the pencil/pen he was using – things like that. When I called home to tell Louise I would be a tad late home from Work Jack answered the phone when I called with a quite responsible “who is it?” . You wouldn’t think he was just 4. Louise was a bit non-plussed at my bad timing as things were just getting a little hectic. Jack was unwilling to give the phone to her to start with, but did surrender in the end. When I had the shopping list I spoke to Jack again & he complained that Eve had stood on his arm… I would imagine that this would have been when he was trying to write or draw. He wanted to chat a while, but I had to tell him that daddy had to go. He does not quite have phone etiquette yet as he just put the phone down me. I could hear him say (rather forlornly) in the background to Louise, “Daddy had to go…” <Click>
Sigh – heartbreaking.

nurgh – this does not feel like Tuesday – my body clock is convinced we’re later in the week… must be the working Saturday that done it.
Well – having been to the doctors (we still had to wait 10 mins after I arrived for Jack’s appointment) he ‘officially’ has impetigo. His friend Jessie has the same thing, & we saw him arriving as we left. Actually he had the same sort of over ebullient hyper that Jack had as well – lurching round his mum with a cheeky grin. Louise says that she was glad that I arrived when I did as Jack was starting to try to be naughty to provoke her – which he had been doing a lot that day. He calmed down a bit when I arrived & wriggled about on the chair next to me jumped on me a bit – but for the most part stayed with us & didn’t run about (which he has done on previous visits). He also told a lady who came to sit near us that, “When you get really really really old… then you turn into a baby again!”. Not sure at all where he got that one from – that’s not very CofE (as per his school) – sweet tho.
We popped in on his school on the way home to pick up his ‘Santa outfit’ which he was to be wearing at the school concert that evening. One of the teachers we say said that it was a shame & all that & she hoped that he would be better enough for their Xmas party on Thursday. Louise hopes so to as she has her weekly midwife visit then, & it would be all the easier with just Eve to manage. Jack was apparently to be one of the Santas for the ‘I saw Mummy kissing Santa Claus’ routine… as was Jessie – they were going to be 2 mummies without Santas that evening…

Definitely a morning to be asleep, rather than writing, & going to work? Out of the question… funny how I’m doing both then <sigh>.
Quite a pleasant Sunday all n all we seem to be doing quite well at them at the moment. At home – no adventurous wandering – we did that Friday after I got home from work – dashed off to Burnley on the bus with Louise & Eve. Louise’s mum picked Jack up from school & took him to Bradford to see the Xmas lights. That was the plan anyway, but they only got as far as Halifax & looked at some lights there… Louise’s mum seems to say that it was Jack who wanted this, but… perhaps not. We got a few bit of Xmas shopping done in Burnley, but not that much really.
Tried to fix the old Dyson by taking out the bit of shorted wiring, but it did not work. The wire going ‘bang’ has either had a more serious effect on the wiring or the motor… ah well – I tried a little bit.
Jack’s bang on the head mentioned last week needs to be looked at further. I thought it odd that an area that looked like a recovering bad graze had no bruising associated & have been keeping an eye on it. Just past his hairline, there is this area of scabbing dry skin… & it’s starting to behave more like an infection (getting a little bigger) – so he’s going to school this morning, just to check with the teachers as to whether it’s OK for him to be there. He is likely to be going to the doctors at some point in the day. If he cannot go to school, then that blows his appearance in the school Xmas presentation – which is a bit of a shame – I was kinda looking forwards to that. Not sure how Jack will react to this as I’m sure he would like the opportunity to show off.

Train home

Phoned in on home to see how things were doing. Merry hell – Jack was playing up by the sounds of it – Louise is tired because Eve was at 6’s & 7’s in the night – making a fuss & wriggling about, so she did not get the nights sleep she needed.
Jack has not gone to school today as they suspect impetigo… poor lamb. He has a doctor’s appointment at 2:45, (someone cancelled) so I will go there directly from the train. In all likelihood they will not have seen a Dr by the time I get there – it’s just the way the surgery runs, but you never know! Jack confessed while on the phone, in whisper that I was just about able to catch, that he was ‘mad’ (angry) today – thus his bad behaviour with Eve & Louise I guess. Interesting that he confessed this… but what he is mad about? I don’t now, & if I get a chance to ask him, I don’t think I’ll get a straight answer. Perhaps it’s just not going to school that has set him off? He does like his routine. He will also, as mentioned, miss his school concert.
Eve is also delicate for the same reason that Louise is – she will not have had a good night’s sleep, & on top of that, she has not had a sleep in the day for a few days now. She can do this; miss daytime naps, but she does need to ‘catch up’ every few days to with a daytime sleep. Jack being at home will rule that one out, as she will want to play.

Homeward bound – amazing, I actually caught the correct train home this Saturday shift – I was not late nor nuffink!
I muttered a while back that I was putting some of my old comics up online last month… I finally got round to some finishing touches today – so it’s now accessible. Quite pleased about that – still a little bit of tidying to do on the html, but it’s basically presentable enough now (fussy me). Now all I have to do is… a shed load more :)

Jack & I made Xmas cards yesterday… well – we made drawing & scanned them into the computer & fiddled about. By the end of the evening I had actually got what was in my head down onto paper – which I was quite pleased about. Printed off a couple & left them there. Was late to bed though – although falling asleep with Jack as I tried to get him off to sleep offset this. He didn’t seem able to ‘switch off’ last night – a few stories & so forth & he still did not seem relaxed, so had to do the, “OK it’s time to turn the light out now” thing. We rested & he chatted a bit about this & that… The attic in his house, I think; he has his own imaginary house & boys & a whole town for that matter. I drifted off to sleep & awoke a little later – I would normally be free to leave the room at this stage, but as I moved, so did Jack – uh-oh, caught. Sheepishly: “I was just, um checking you were OK”. Back to snoozing & it was already late before I stirred again.. Still, I got what I wanted done (the cards). I just have to print a load out & try to sort out the other designs as well (already done, but how to assemble…). Didn’t get anything done in the attic for the 2nd night in a row… but – well – what the heck – If I’m not back up there tonight it will be tomorrow.
Eve was over tired yesterday & was in a mess of tears at bathtime – completely a mess. Louise managed to get her to bed & start reading to her, & suddenly she starts to perk up again, coming to see what Jack is doing in the bath & messing about laughing & all that. Suddenly she’s a bundle of energy again – not able to sit still & preferring to sit up to be read to rather than lie down. She did succumb to sleep eventually without too much fuss. She has been, on the whole in a really jolly mood of late.

I resisted telling Louise I had managed to do the cards last night, so that when she came downstairs this morning & saw them she was pleasantly surprised & was pleased with the way they looked – which made me chuffed :)