The good start was largely due to a very successful violin practice with Josiah; we had been struggling to help all the children understand the difference between playing a piece once, and practicing a piece – to the extent that Joe made me ask his teacher last night exactly how many times he should play a piece in order to practice it! 5 down this morning, 5 to go this afternoon (not counting the review pieces).

It’s a fun song to play anyway, as Mr Featherstone has taught him the alternative ‘actions’ to do while playing each bit (plucking instead of playing open strings with the bow, turning around during the arpeggios, going down on one knee and then up again in other arpeggios, turning the bow upside down in the middle ‘sad’ section, and then some stamping during the triplets at the end). If anyone’s really interested, the piece in question is Theme from Witches’ Dance by Paganini – I searched on Youtube to find vids of the actions but couldn’t find a good one so you have to make do with this amusing double act! When Joe’s ready he might oblige and let me video him … or then again he might not

Other than that, over the past week or so we’ve just been winding back up into normal life with all the activity that entails; we had a weekend where Steve worked and the kids and I didn’t do very much at all, friends round to play on Monday, and school started again on Tuesday. One person came to miscarriage support group that evening, but hey, as long as it’s helping even one person a month then I don’t mind giving my time.

I’m in the middle of what seems like a very long interview process at the Apple Store – there was an interview seminar on Friday night, and then a further interview yesterday, but I won’t actually know the results until early next week.

Steve and I are both delivering cars long-distance this week; he went up to Oxfordshire yesterday and I’m going down to the bottom of Cornwall tomorrow.

But that’s about it, hence the lack of blogging – ‘life as usual’ doesn’t make for a very interesting post, does it?

Steve’s dad is on holiday for a couple of weeks, and Terry our mechanic is ill with a horrible inner ear thing that means he can’t stand up, so we were awfully short staffed today. Meant that we had to give up on the home ed group trip we were meant to be going on but hey ho, that’s life.

Once the girls had gone to school, Josiah and I ended up at the office for the day, which was fine – we chucked a load of stuff in a box and de-camped there quite instead (as long as I have internet I’m happy!), the phone didn’t even ring until 11am so not too strenuous.

Joe did violin practice and then some of his Roman lapbook project; today he wrote out a few vocab words for a flappy thing in the lapbook, and we learnt about Pompeii and Mount Vesuvius too – looked at lots of pictures online. The whole Roman thing is making Joe want to go to Italy, he keeps saying that would be a good Home Ed trip to go on (the Roman Baths not good enough!). Went home for about an hour to scoop Abbie up then back to the office for the end of the day.

Then violin practice as usual, but with the addition of a pair of chopsticks! These are stuck into the holes of the violin at right angles, and serve to stop Joe’s bow veering off at strange angles down the fingerboard.

Don’t know if other teachers do this sort of thing as well or if it’s just a Suzuki idea but I imagine it will help a lot if he practices with them over a longer period of time. For a while he had an old 35mm film pot tied around the fingerboard to make sure his left hand didn’t collapse inward, and that helped a lot (although he still has to be reminded about the left hand shape sometimes!).

Steve came home mid-morning and we worked all together on the garage – it is now completely cleared out, and a garage full of crap (really should have taken before and after photos as it is an incredible difference!) has been transformed into a mainly empty space with tools/decorating/gardening stuff stored tidily on shelves at one end, and bikes at the other.

The girls got home after school and everyone had ice pops on the patio and played with the guinea pigs for a while. Then Anna went off to do music practice and Joe & Abbie got ready for swimming. Joe’s doing really well with his swimming at the moment, and his teacher rang over half term to say she wanted to give him a trial in the next class up. This means that he’s in the same group as Abbie! At first he was pleased about the move, then said he didn’t want to change groups [my heart sank, dreading yet another swimming lesson related trauma!]. I later managed to ascertain that the only reason he didn’t want to change was that he thought it might mean no time in the bar upstairs (where there is a tv, snack machine etc.), so we went up and watched the Simpsons as usual. He was still a bit nervous, but made a good effort. The trial’s extending to next week, mainly to help me out as if I get used on jury duty I can’t get them both there until 5.30pm anyway! Joe’s a bit titchy compared to the rest of them, so hasn’t got the physical strength/stamina of most of the class, but he kept up well enough, I thought. And perhaps him catching up will spur Abbie on, too

Saturday we cleaned the house and generally got ready for the invasion This included finally glueing Abbie’s jigsaw together and popping out to get a very cheap clipframe for it. Not sure how long it will last, but at last there is something that covers up the picture-sized smoke-stain in the hallway that I have been intending to decorate for the past three years now Did a last minute dash to Sainsbury’s too, then came home and baked until N&L arrived.

The evening passed in a combination of Larry Boy, chatting, and San Juan. Doctor Who was recorded and saved for another time! While we were playing a game we had a few very involved conversations so I’m surprised any of us could concentrate on the game by the end of it – but it was a great evening

On Sunday we were all up early, in fact the kids were all out in the close at 9am playing some superhero game or other in a variety of caped outfits – what lucky neighbours we had! Also made time for a violin playtogether first thing in the morning. Mimi and Joe both enjoyed playing together and comparing suzuki notes.

The very committed went to church, leaving the less committed at home doing hama, drawing, Lego Star Wars, dinner preparation, and more general chatting. Had lunch and afterwards headed up to Haldon for a cycle ride.

This was generally a good afternoon despite some very annoying wailing from Abigail (who, having given up her bike for John, then proceeded to whinge a lot about the old bike she was riding – kind of detracted from the generosity in the first place, but never mind!). It was Joe’s first proper bike ride and he did really well, we were so pleased that he bombed off with the rest of them and loved riding as much as we’ve been telling him he would

The sand in the play area up near the car park had finally dried out enough to be playable with so the children spent ages there while we made a cup of tea in the van, and would have spent longer if we hadn’t dragged them away! Home for more playing – with the wooden castle this time, roast dinner and a relatively early night.

Today was pretty much back to normal; work/school first thing, we said goodbye to N&L in various combinations at various times, and then I stayed on at work to catch up on the one bit of admin I do these days. Came home for a late lunch then spent the afternoon sorting out the van, which has had a winter of neglect so needed a good clean all round.

The girls both brought home excellent reports from school, so we were all pleased with those. Anna proceeded to spend the next couple of hours agonising and stropping over some homework though so we do sometimes still wonder if they both have complete personality changes between school and home! Seriously, both reports were fantastic and we are very proud of them both.

Our friend Maria popped in and we provided cups of tea and chatting (me) and engine oil (Steve) … we’re nice, aren’t we?!

After bathing/hairwashing/nitcombing (yes, aargh, again!) all three children and finally getting Anna to the end of her Literacy homework (decided we couldn’t face the numeracy as well, it was a blonde evening!), they went to bed, and we vegetated in front of tv this evening – catching up on Casualty from Saturday, then Play it Again and Louis Theroux from yesterday. And now it’s bedtime.

Abbie spent most of the day with Grandma & Grandpa. She was pleased about this for a number of reasons, not least their undivided attention! She had already asked Marg to help her with a viking tunic, so they did that together which was a great help (ok, I know even I could have managed to cut/sew a tabard, but now I don’t have to!). The other main reason Abbie was happy was so that she didn’t have to get dragged around to the other two’s musical events!

Anna played in a cello concert this morning – very well as usual. Annoyingly so, in fact, as she’s been rushing through the piece sounding like a screeching horrible out of tune thing at home!! So she might find me the most annoying mother in the world (and i’m sure I am) for making her practice daily but she does at least admit that it pays off, when she knows she’s played nicely and receives compliments from other parents.

From Anna’s concert, she, Joe and I went on to have lunch in town. I haven’t been to Macdonalds in town on a Saturday lunchtime for a long time and I’m not sure I want to repeat the experience anytime soon, but it did make for some fascinating people-watching.

Then we carried on from there to a Suzuki Group lesson in a village hall out on the other side of town. I have been quietly dreading it for weeks, given my experiences with any combination of Joe, violins, and groups of unknown people before now! However, it turned out really well. We got there early enough for Joe and Anna to play in the park for a while beforehand, then went in and got started. Josiah started to do his usual ‘I’m not going to join in’ routine, until the point where it got so exciting that Anna dashed back to the van to get her cello so that *she* could join in, so he decided he would as well. Anyone want to know what the excitement was? Oh yes, they were balancing hula hoops on their bows. You would have thought Anna had never eaten a hula hoop before, she moved so fast!

Anyway, Joe joined in then with a number of games/activities before giving up towards the end; he didn’t ‘perform’ either of the pieces he’d prepared to play with the others but he’d given the whole thing a good effort so I was really pleased with him. He finds this sort of group thing really really difficult, especially with a bunch of people he doesn’t know. He wouldn’t stand with the others, but had to stay near me – that was ok though as the line of children snaked around to where I was sitting anyway! It was definitely a help to have Anna there joining in with him (and she enjoyed it too – must make sure she can manage to play Twinkle on her A string before the next one!). And tbh they played one of the performance pieces a fair bit faster than Joe’s been playing it so I’m not sure he would have kept up even if he had joined in, so probably better (for him at this point in time) not to have done it and failed, than to have tried and felt like a disaster. I think he actually enjoyed himself, which is just the best outcome I could have wished for, that is the whole point of learning an instrument and playing with other people. I really enjoyed it too, actually

So that was our day. We picked Abbie up and stopped for a cuppa with Grandma & Grandpa, then came home. Cleaned out the hamster, hoovered downstairs, washed the kitchen floor, then settled down for a film before dinner.

Who knows. The mind of a 5yo (or this particular 5yo) is unfathomable to me at least and I feel pretty much ready to give up parenting him as I have reached the end of myself over and over and over again and I just don’t know what to do with him. (just a minor aside there!)

Meanwhile Anna was pretty grumpy owing to a sleepover last night at which hardly any sleep was had (unsurprising I suppose) and Abbie was grumpy due to being largely ignored between the antics of the other two.

Still, it was a pleasant couple of hours, the children who did play played beautifully and I have to say that the later Suzuki repertoire is lovely to listen to, I really enjoyed it despite all the agro with my children. And that is the reason why we’ll persevere, I guess – because so did Josiah, actually. He’d enjoyed listening to the children playing before his section – then fell asleep – then half way through he woke up and the 10yo boy who is in the lesson before him (so we see him every week) brought him a chocolate mini-roll, which perked him up and he enjoyed the last part of the afternoon. I finally met the lady who runs the group lessons that we missed the other day and I hope we’ll manage to get to her group in the New Year so that by the time the summer concert comes around, Joe will know the other children and be a bit more ready for the whole playing together thing.

Oh, and Steve’s home, there’s a roast dinner in the oven, and a bottle of wine open. Not sure which of those I am the most pleased about!

He can actually play all the pieces that they’re playing very nicely, and if he does make a mistake he can usually pick it back up and come in again where he’s meant to.

But I know what he’s like, I know that in a new situation he very often goes to pieces, especially if he doesn’t know people and what to expect of them, and when he does that he ends up curled up in a ball on the floor, or clinging onto my leg refusing to do anything, which is all very tiresome and embarrassing to say the least.

Still. I feel as though we’ve prepared him as much as we possibly can. He’s been to the big suzuki concert and it won’t be anything like as big or as posh as that. He can play the pieces really well, as demonstrated in his lesson this evening. Honestly, when he puts his mind to it he can play beautifully (only so often he does the stubborn ‘I’m not going to do it’ thing instead ). As much as I can (because of course I’ve never been to anything or met any of the people before myself either!) I’ve told him what might happen, what the group teacher might say, and his own teacher and I have both encouraged him loads that he will be fine.

Only time will tell! Of course these things are both this weekend when Steve is away at the Wales Rally which means I’m dreading them more than usual as whatever happens I’ll be on my own – so either he’ll miss the complete meltdown, or if all goes well, he’s going to miss Joe’s first proper performance Ho hum – more will undoubtedly follow here as the weekend unfolds!

We had a lovely time celebrating their son John’s birthday over the weekend with a bowling party, as well as fireworks in the garden, marshmallow roasting, and then pancakes for breakfast the next day Had a lovely walk through a park in Birmingham that I did ask the name of but can’t remember it any more!

The other reason for stopping in Birmingham was so that we could take Josiah and Miriam (also just started learning suzuki violin) to the National Suzuki Concert which was at the Symphony Hall. Fabulous concert overall, we really enjoyed it, and the playtogether part at the end really was amazing to see. Hundreds of children and the odd adult as well all playing either the simplest of piece, or an accompaniment to the simplest piece, which just sounded fantastic together.

The standard throughout was excellent, at all levels of ability. Perhaps next time our two will be joining in?! They enjoyed their own playing together, anyway

Home relatively late on Sunday so we just fell into bed and left sorting out the detritus in the van until the next day!