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Middle Child

Weekend Round Up


Posted in: Family, Middle Child, Twins

Saturday morning Michael had a storytelling thing at the school. He was quite looking forward to it but it didn’t totally live up to expectations. Daniel’s GAA match was cancelled (oh rejoice!). Michael went to drama in the afternoon – how he loves drama class – and I did some mild Christmas shopping while waiting for him to emerge. I know, I know, it’s only November. Herself, briefly emerged from her room for mealtimes but basically stayed put recovering from the rigours of the week.

This morning we cycled to 10 o’clock mass in Irish (basically realising Dev’s vision for Ireland). I see that they are making the extraordinarily named Solanus Casey blessed. I think that’s step one on the road to canonisation. I was already conscious of this from my contacts within the religious world (hi Mark) but my contact, being American, neglected to mention that Solanus’s parents were Irish. An essential point, you would have thought. Also adding to the mystery of his first name. Was he perhaps Solanus in religion and christened something less exciting? The mystery continues.

We then cycled into town (freezing) to see Fanny’s Journey as part of the French film festival. It’s about a group of young Jewish children trying to flee into Switzerland from France. I cried from frame 1 and to the end of the film. Then we split forces and the Princess and I after a brief stop for sustenance went to buy her trousers for school. As she points out to me, she has been campaigning for school trousers since third class. I’m not quite sure why I resisted for so long but I did. I think in my oppressive, conservative, internalising the patriarchy way, I quite liked the school skirt. Anyhow, I have now accepted the error of my ways. Really.

When we got home she took herself off upstairs to do homework. Daniel was the only child even slightly willing to go into town to check out the organised Christmas fun at Smithfield. It was freezing. I bought Daniel a migraine inducing coloured light thing which sang a tinny jingle bells as his reward for accompanying me. We queued for 40 minutes (timed on my phone) for crêpes. That was a low point. Post-crêpe it was all mildly appealing, far too few stalls and an arctic east wind but loads of entranced kids running around and people on stilts and local kids singing in a choir. There was also a chance to hold the Sam Maguire Cup which Dublin seems to be consistently winning these days.

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Still we were glad enough to leave and get back home to the fire. Final weekend items – Daniel lost a tooth and my brother was in Dublin for the rugby match and did not visit his loving family, my wrath will be terrible etc. And how was your own weekend?

More Fun with Logistics


Posted in: Middle Child, Princess, Twins, Youngest Child

So, last night I got back from exotic Sligo quite late. This morning, the Princess begged for a lift on the grounds that if she had to cycle she would be late and it was freezing. I acceded on the grounds that I have been away a lot and I still feel guilty about sending them out in the lashing rain when I had the car in Kilkenny earlier in the week. I said to the boys that I would give them a lift home from games club which is on in school after their Friday half day. End times can vary so I asked them to text me when it was over and I would come and get them.

A minor crisis at work meant that I didn’t get out of the office until about 2.30. I rang the boys a couple of times as I cycled home but no answer. Then Daniel called me and as I answered my phone died. I rang Mr. Waffle from my work phone (he got his number so long ago that I know it off by heart unlike any of the children’s numbers) and asked him to ring Daniel and tell him I was on my way. When I finally got home, I tied my bike to the railings in the front and leapt into the car to drive to the school. At the traffic lights, about half way there, there was a banging on my window and there was a tearful Michael who had walked home from school alone, as he thought I had abandoned him. He had seen me in the car but, sadly, I had not seen him and he had had to chase after the car for two streets with his enormous bag on his back. We drove to the school where Michael spotted Daniel who had just begun to trudge home. Daniel was more resigned than tearful, he has lower expectations for me, I suppose. He told me that he had forgotten his school lunch as well but had managed with donations from friends.

When we finally got home, herself was in bed sick and Michael reminded me that I had promised to take them to the Science Gallery again to check out the catastrophe room which had been fully booked when we visited the exhibition a couple of weeks ago. I got a quick bite of lunch and we were back in the car by 3.45. I tried a number of approaches to the Science Gallery but encountered grid locked traffic in all directions. It took us an hour to get there; it’s normally about 10 minutes. We parked some distance away but the walk made a pleasant change from sitting in traffic. The visit was great. The kind, lovely student guides played disaster card games with the boys; we got into the catastrophe room and Michael got to be president of the citizens’ assembly and had a veto on all the suggestions which he enjoyed very much. The scenario was that a tsunami might flood Cork in the next 500 years and to my chagrin he moved everyone out of Cork rather than build a defensive wall. My Dublin child. Daniel was very patient about Michael being president. It was clearly a role he might have liked himself but he refrained from undermining Michael and was actually quite supportive.

It was nearly 6.30 when we left. I got a call from herself asking when we might be home as she was entertaining saintly T, the childminder turned French conversation class, on her own and felt that in her ill state she needed a bit of support. I rang Mr. Waffle to say that there was no way we were going to make Michael’s hockey training at 6.45.

I got home and lit the fire and moved the language party out of the kitchen and in to sit by my lovely fire so I could start dinner. I had decided to have braised lentils which take forever but I was going to be home Friday afternoon so I would have time, I had thought. Sometimes I find that I can be curiously inflexible so even though it was 7.15 when I started dinner, I still made the lentils so we only sat down to eat at 8.30. As dinner was late, the boys were late to bed and a bit cranky and started rowing with each other upstairs which actually hardly ever happens. Parents were required to separate the tired combatants; all is quiet now but it is almost midnight.

If there were no weekends, I think I would die.

Note to File: We are a One Car Family*


Posted in: Middle Child, Mr. Waffle, Princess, Twins, Work, Youngest Child

I was away overnight for work. Usually I take the train to meetings if at all possible but due to a combination of difficult times and location, I drove on this occasion. I rang Mr. Waffle from the hotel this morning to see how things had gone in my absence. “Fine,” he said, “but I felt a bit bad sending the kids out on their bikes in the lashing rain.” “Not that bad,” I thought to myself, “or he could have given them a lift.” When I got home this evening, Michael was a little ball of bitterness about his damp school commute. “You should have asked your father for a lift,” I said. “And where, mother, was the car?” “Oh right, yeah, Kilkenny, sorry about that.”

*I have spent more time trying to decide how to capitalise this title than writing the blog post; advice welcome my lovely readers.

Hockey v Hurling


Posted in: Middle Child, Twins, Youngest Child

Michael is now doing hockey every Sunday morning and he is enjoying it; they want him to do Friday night training as well and my heart slightly sinks at the prospect of adding more items to our after-school activity list. Also, the hockey club are keen that Daniel come along also having seen him in action once but he is unenthused.

As he and I were walking up to mass yesterday morning, I asked him again whether he would consider hockey. He looked at me seriously and said, “But Mum, I play hurling and hurling is the anti thesis of hockey.” There was a pause while I digested this and then I said, “You know it’s pronounced an-tit-hesis.” Poor Daniel, honestly the English language is a series of traps, even for the wary.

Saturday Night at the Movies


Posted in: Dublin, Family, Ireland, Middle Child, Princess, Twins, Youngest Child

Mr. Waffle, the boys and I went to see Paddington last night. In the cinema, we met a) Daniel and Michael’s friend and his family who had just seen Paddington – they recommended it b) a friend of the Princess’s (she remained unmoved when I told her that her friend was there and thought that Paddington – which the Princess had refused to see with us – was a worthy film) c) a boy from Daniel and Michael’s year in school and two second years from their school and d) a neighbour from the bottom of the road and her two sons. I used to think that Dublin was an anonymous big city; I think I was misled.

Anyhow we all quite enjoyed Paddington in a mild way. The Princess joined us afterwards in Milano’s (funded by my brother’s Tesco vouchers, thanks Dan) and we explained the plot to her though we had some difficulties (what did happen to the treasure? and the book?) she surveyed us in mild contempt and said that if we were having plot problems with Paddington then she despaired of us all. No change there then.

In unrelated news, Daniel won the hamper raffle at school. It was in aid of the student council where herself is a leading light. There’s a hilarious picture on the school’s twitter feed of her handing the hamper over to her brother with a forced smile while he is receiving it with unalloyed delight.

Any Given Monday


Posted in: Dublin, Ireland, Middle Child, Princess, Twins, Youngest Child

So, today, I cycled home from work in the rain. I got home about 7 to my latch key children and decided not to take Daniel to GAA training as Mr. Waffle would have done, had he been here (he is, sadly, away for work). I then gave the boys pizza for dinner (yes, they had pizza for dinner last night as well for their birthday party; our house is a temple to healthy eating at the moment). I burnt Michael’s because I am truly on top of my game. Herself and myself had Thai take-out. €36 for two on a school-night Monday. I can feel you judging me. I’m judging me.

I signed homework notebooks for the boys. Michael forgot to bring in his art materials today and Daniel forgot his home economics ingredients (“Did you not get to make anything then?” I asked. “Yes, I got ingredients from the cupboard and made scones, they’re in the bottom of my schoolbag,” he said. For all I know, they’re there still becoming ever more appealing as they are crushed by the weight of school books). Daniel also forgot to do his history homework and spent much of the evening frantically writing his history essay now due tomorrow on pain of death. This despite the fact that last night they faithfully promised me that they had in their school bags everything they needed for today. Signed a form allowing herself to go on a school retreat. Revised Michael’s months of the year in German for a test on Thursday. Refused to help herself with prep for her German test on the grounds that at this point I am more likely to put her off than assist. As she corrected my dates in German for Michael’s benefit, she was forced to concede that I was correct.

While the children cleared up after dinner (more a throwing out of cartons than a real clean up), I went to do some work on the computer. Herself went back upstairs to do more homework after cleaning up and, once the boys had packed their bags for tomorrow (Did I double check? I did not. Is this wise? I think we all know the answer to that.), the boys and I watched an episode of the “Big Bang Theory” and then they went to bed. I turned back to my labours for the office (big all day meeting tomorrow) and at 9.45 herself sidled in. “The blueberries didn’t come with the shopping and I need them for home economics tomorrow.” Was there any point between last Thursday when the shopping came and 9.45 the night before they were needed when this might have been mentioned? “I don’t need them until after 11.30,” said she. Usually her father can be relied on to perform these awkward errands but he is away and I am not at liberty to leave my meeting in the morning for blueberry hunting. This is why I found myself in Tesco at 9.55 this evening looking for blueberries, insert your own joke about late stage capitalism and the Americanisation of everything here (it’s far from blueberries we were reared etc.).

OK, I have updated my blog and finished my work for this evening; I’m going to bed now to reread Harry Potter and nobody can stop me. Judge away, it’s all I’m fit for.

Updated to add: The cat can stop me. She’s supposed to be put in the utility room for the night, otherwise she travels around the house mewing in people’s ears. Mr. Waffle normally stows her away. He did not stow her away tonight. Possibly my husband should go away more often so that I can fully appreciate all the things he does around the house. Mental note: why is laundry basket overflowing?