A 16th Birthday

I'm not entirely sure how.... but somehow I have managed to keep another human being alive for sixteen full years! Pretty impressive, don't you think? It is hard to believe that my first baby boy has just turned sixteen. I wasn't much older than him when he was born. The years are flashing past at a scary speed.

Since becoming sixteen only happens once and is a bit special we had a good old shindig for him, out in the front garden. Shockingly the sun shone for the entire day (it was one of the only sunny days we've had this summer!) which was perfect for outr outdoor party.

Now, in my opinion, one is never too old for a good bounce! So we hired a big adult sized bouncy castle, and some sumo suits for the crack. We erected a gazebo and filled it with air beds and cushions to create a sort of lazy area (which little Rosie mostly hijacked to keep out of the sun) and we kitted out the garage with food, helium balloons and music. Marty was in charge of the barbecue since he's obsessed with fire, and meat.

Family came, and lots of Badgers school friends and it turned out to be a pretty damn good day. I hope he enjoyed it and remembers it for years to come. Happy birthday to my baby boy who is now practically a man!

Video of Christmas 2010

Christmas 2010 from Sam Mayger on Vimeo.

We come in peace....

This just cracked me up.

I really should be in bed. It's almost midnight. Why do I refuse to go to bed when I know that the kids will be up at the crack of dawn, and at least one child will probably be up during the night? I guess it is because it is 'grown up time' and I don't want it to stop!

I harvested a big glut of blackcurrants and raspberries from our garden today. The vegetable garden that I cherished and tended to before we went to America is a big patch of weeds now, save for some lavender and an overgrowth of mint. But we do still have raspberries, blackcurrants and redcurrants growing in abundance out there. The only problem is, that to pick them one has to trample through 4ft high weeds. It happened to be raining when I had a spare half hour to go outside, so I stood in the pouring rain with Barney, harvesting our fruits, so that I could use some of them to make baby food for Rosie. Marty is going to make a fruit crumble with the rest. Yum. I think I am allergic to weeds! When ever I do the weeding I come out in rashes. Today, since I was wearing shorts, I came in with itchy rashes all up my legs.

I spent another hour in the garden planting some marigolds, lavender and some other type of flowers (can't remember the name though) into pots. They are all out in the front garden now, and at last our house looks semi respectable...... I often wonder if the neighbours get fed up with us! They are all well off working professionals who take great pride in their gardens. Ours usually needs mowing, and weeding, and has a scatter of kids toys all over it. We certainly look like the chavs in the street. I forgive myself though, as I know that we are the only house in this cul de sac with four kids to take care of.

Barney has been enjoying the start of the summer holidays. I am still reading books on Aspergers and still pondering over it all. He hasn't had too many panic attacks this week. He has grown out of his junior bed and really needs a proper single bed, but we just cant afford one at the moment. Anyway his mattress got wet and I put it out to dry, then it rained on it and so he couldn't sleep in his bed! So we dragged the futon mattress up to his room and made a bed up on the floor. He has slept on it for two nights, but he hasn't settled easily. He has started back to feeling ill and panicky at bed time. His tummy hurts and he thinks he is going to be sick. He doesn't have any clue why it's happening, but I know its just because he isn't sleeping in his normal bed, and his body doesn't like changes.

He is still having the most awful panic attacks whenever Rosie cries. Last night she awoke at 2am wanting a feed. She was crying in the bed with me and before I could get my eyes open properly Barney had burst into the room in a total panic. He was shaking, hyperventilating, screaming, then ran out of the room and down the stairs into the hallway where he ran up and down in a panic, not knowing where to go, but wanting to run away. Marty went to calm him down whilst I fed Rosie. Its very upsetting to see. Loud noises really upset him and he has absolutely no control over his reactions at the moment.

The bigger kids school reports came in the post yesterday. Tarja got almost straight A's, a glowing report. She did particularly well in English and Art. Her French teacher said that she is a natural linguist, to which Tarja was very surprised! Badger's report was also good. He attains good results, but almost every single teacher commented that he could do extraordinarily well if he concentrated and got himself more organised. I'm quite impressed that he can do so well without concentrating! Think what he could do if he really knuckled down!

So many options!

Phew! What a busy day it's been! This evening I spent the evening up at Badger's school talking to various teachers about GCSE options. Apart from his maths teacher, everyone said Badger was doing very well! I was so pleased, and a little surprised. Ok, so to be honest, I didn't speak to the teachers of subjects he is not considering for his options (French, History etc) so maybe they wouldn't have been so positive. But the ones I did speak to were pretty happy.
He could do better in maths, but as I tried to explain to the teacher, he is in a maths class that is too easy for him, and is totally bored. She agreed but won't move him up until he proves himself worthy. Lol.
His science teacher (who I thought was a complete idiot, personally - one of these people who likes to think they know my kids better than I do) said he should get at least a B in GCSE double award science, and that he could definitely manage an A if he knuckles down. I was impressed as I failed terribly in the sciences at school.
His English teacher said that he is extremely creative, very intelligent but not at all academic. Which I already knew. She wants him to take Eng Lit GCSE, which is only offered to a few children, as she thinks he has a natural talent for English. But shes worried about whether he will put the effort into doing it or not. He seems pretty keen when I talk to him about it. I think the fact that the teacher likes him and believes in him has spurred him on.
His drama teacher said he's a fantastic student and was delighted that he's planning on taking drama GCSE. She said the drama GCSE course is always over subscribed and she has to turn students away, but she guaranteed me that Badger would have a place on the course because he has remained dedicated to the subject through-out the years, attending drama club and taking part in school productions.
The ICT teacher said he shows talent in the subject but the ICT course is over subscribed and he may not get a place on it. I told him that if he doesn't get into ICT the only other option for him is child studies, which he is not at all keen on (no boy has ever done that course in his school before!) He put a question mark next to his name saying he was possible for a place. I saw in his list of names that he had one tick, about 6 question marks, and a lot of crosses. So I batted my eyelids at him and told him that he spends a lot of time at home doing ICT type projects. I managed to get him to turn that question mark into a half question mark/half tick. Lol. He's still not guaranteed a place though.
(equivalent of 2 I also spoke to the teachers of business studies, and media BTEC. Both of them are in the same option category. Badger wanted to take both of them but can only pick one, which is unfortunate. So I spoke in depth to both teachers and we have decided that media BTECGCSE's) is more suited towards him. It's completely practical, no written exams at all, and they do things like make movies. They learn how to direct, produce, edit, and how to film. Just his cup of tea I think.
He was very excited to talk to me about it all when I got home.