… is it that you actually get to relax and enjoy your house? Or is that the point you move and start a new project?

We bought a fairly new house (under 10 years old) so I really thought there wouldn’t be much to do to it. Somehow though, there’s always something that needs doing: the lawn needs aerating & reseeding, the fences need painting, decoration inside and out… something always needing repairing of some description. The list is never ending and by the time it’s all done, the beginning stuff needs doing again.

How do these people who have immaculate, magazine copy houses and still have under-school-age children manage it? Are they just rich enough or deeply in debt enough as they pay someone else to do it all in one go? Or is there some other secret I missed? Did I miss the memo?

Shall I, shan’t I?

For those who haven’t a clue what I’m talking about, NaNoWriMo is a month where lots of delusional people write a ‘novel’ of 50,000 words in the space of 30 days in November. I managed to complete it two years ago, but last year failed dismally (although having a 6 month old in the house at the time, probably had an impact on that).

This year, Akra Jr is off at school and Li’l Bhaji still takes a two hour nap in the middle of the day. Technically, I should have time to do this, shouldn’t I? Only, if I’m going to do it I really should start thinking about doing some preparation work now.

Like working out what the hell I’m going to write about…

… just not an awful lot getting done.

I really don’t know where all the time goes in a day, I really don’t. I feel like I’m behind with everything at the moment. I’m not getting any writing done, I’m a mile behind with household chores, my to do list is ever expanding, my accounts need desperate sorting, I wanted to do something with the garden before the weather went kablooie, I don’t even feel like I’ve done much playing with the kids either…

So *what* have I been doing with the time?! Where’s it all gone!

Roll on autumn term. Bizarrely, with activities starting up again, I’ll actually have more time to do things in…

… while cooking sausages for tea No. 523:

accidentally knock the grill pan on the side of the oven while taking it out, spilling boiling hot sausage fat all over your foot.

Ouch.

I think I’ll repeat that for effect.

Ouch.

It’s just not my luck at the moment. The last couple of days have seen me ill *again* (some stomach/muscle achy bug this time) and only just starting to get some sort of appetite back. I’m guessing a lot of it is due to the kids bringing back bugs from their peers, either that or my immunity levels have plummetted as I’m getting older – I always seem to be recovering from something…

In an effort to get out more without spending too much money, we’ve recently joined the National Trust. The membership cards finally arrived in the post yesterday morning, so a couple of hours later we were visiting Hanbury Hall, a rather elegant country house with huge formal gardens and parkland surrounding it.

Well, it was great. I’m so glad we took the plunge and became members. Both boys LOVED having a good run around the gardens. Akra Jr took us exploring completely on his whim and even tolerated a super-quick tour of the house (allowing for very short attention spans of the small). There was no feeling of “having to get our money’s worth” as our entry was free as members, so the second the kids got bored we left. We’ll be going back again to do the 2 kilometer walk around the parkland at some point as well, and when we get bored of there, there’s plenty more properties locally to explore.

Surprisingly, being a Saturday in the school holidays, it wasn’t overwhelmingly busy – perhaps a sign of just how huge the grounds were. So plenty of opportunity for the boys to burn energy without disturbing anyone. I even got some photos taken (see my Fotothing). All in all, a very satisfactory result for only

… Wintermute!

In other news, both my chief messmakers are at Holiday Club and nursery all day. Just WHAT am I going to do with myself?!

Answer: whatever I damn well want to!

… I know the jabs have worked.

Akra Jr has been generally okay, bit of a swollen arm near the injection site but otherwise okay. It’s a booster, so I’m not expecting any great reactions as I’m fairly certain it took first time around.

However, Li’l Bhaji is following in his brother’s footsteps and reacting fast to the MMR. For those not in the know, there are several “stages” to the reaction to the MMR – after one week, the measles component kicks in and they can have high temperatures and maybe a rash, after two weeks another component kicks in (sometimes getting a rash from the rubella part) and then, just as you think it’s all over the final component kicks in (with the potential to get swollen glands in a mild form of mumps). Akra Jr was lucky and didn’t suffer the last two side effects and I’m hoping that Li’l Bhaji will be the same. However, what both of them seem keen to do is not wait a full week and get the high temperature within a few days of the injection.

So poor Li’l Bhaji has been on permanent calpol/nurofen coverage the past 24hrs and is looking absolutely shattered. I don’t think any of us slept well last night, and I think an early bed might well be calling. He’s supposed to be going to nursery tomorrow, but I guess we’ll have to see how he is in the morning. Seems a little unfair to send him if he’s still feeling so under the weather.

Not even going to try and describe it, and I’ve completely forgotten where I picked it up from now (so if it was your blog, my apologies!) Vanilla – my feeble high score is 14.1. I’m sure you can beat that.

Well, Akra Jr and Li’l Bhaji both went for their jabs yesterday – both had the MMR and Akra Jr also had the DTP-polio booster, and all due respect to them both, hardly a tear was shed.

Okay, that might be partly due to the HUGE bag of sweets shoved in their mouths seconds before the needle went in, but still…