Not enough hours in the day

Too much to do (and yet I have found a small window in which to blog!)

My to do list never seems to get any shorter. How can there be this many things to do? Planning, marking, planning, marking, meetings, paperwork blah, blah. Not that I mind. It's just the whole feeling guilty for spending time doing anything but work.

Ben's list gets longer still, with his first golf lesson today. He seemed to really enjoy it and was practising in the dark in his bedroom at 8.30 this evening (having woken Charlie up with a dodgy putt). Both boys have had a haircut tonight and look far more respectable. Short but long of course!

It better be true about the threes thing

Saturday turned out to be a day of tears, tantrums and tans. Not all applying to small people.

We decided, very reluctantly, on Friday that we would have to abandon the holiday plan as we are struggling to save enough to go and have a comfortable time. We'd have made it - flight and accommodation in full - but probably not enough for spending money to make it enjoyable. thank goodness we had made that decision as then, as fate would have it, Grant reversed the car with the door open into a lamp-post causing £600 of damage - insurance job of course but £150 excess means even tighter on the holiday fund. I cried.

Ben was fine about the whole thing. He wants to go to Legoland and Longleat and on an open top bus around London! It's a relief in a way as now we can save for next year and go knowing that a) we have paid for the whole lot by ourselves no credit involved and b) we will have more than enough saved up to properly be able to relax and not be worrying about what we're spending.

To top it all Charlie has woken up with the Devil in him and had drawn on the carpet with felt tip pen. Thank goodness it came out. What else can happen this weekend?

I am a bit down about it all but only because it seems like there's nothing to look forward to now. But that's a bit melodramatic. As Tom says: No one has died.

Boycotts and tennis balls

So here I am for the second day in a row. Don't get used to it!

In today's school news SATs boycott going ahead! Whoa. We will still sit the tests albeit the 2009 ones but not have them externally marked and therefore reported as league table data etc. Scary but ballsy. No rant necessary after all. Until an election canvasser comes a-calling and then I'll put them on the spot.

On the home front had two incredibly grumpy boys today. Charlie needs a sleep in the daytime and for whatever reason this doesn't always happen when he's with his childminder. Unsurprisingly he was not impressed with the idea of sitting (in a very cold wind) watching Ben at his tennis lesson. Ben was equally grouchy - and typically irrational, the after effects of a busy day, a tiring week and maybe the first negative side effect of the migraine medication. I don't want him to grow up too quickly but I'll be happy when his level common sense matches his intelligence. Will that ever happen?

Anyway, after an interesting evening with one eye on the leaders debate and one on marking English (and a third eye on Facebook and Twitter), I am now more aware of what my political view is, know what colour I favour and am happy that my school children can now generally use commas - (full stops not so much!). And with that its off to bed. Friday has crept up on me this week, like a very welcome friend.

Welcome along

Hmmm. Apparently I am unsatisfied with the amount of things currently keeping my brain active from 6am - 10pm and have decided to embark upon a new adventure, blogging. As to how often I will blog (is that a verb?) I guess we'll have to see, but for anyone who is actually reading and is vaguely interested in my general ramblings I'm hoping you'll 'get me' through the medium of text.

So what makes me worthy of such ramblings? Well, I'm a wife and mummy of 2 gorgeous boys. That's life number one. Life number two is being a primary school teacher, my vocation. You'll get to realise fairly quickly that teacher is not what I do. It's what I am. Somehow for the past 5 years I have managed to balance these two lives rather well without any obvious negative side effects. Being a parent makes me a better teacher and to some extent being a teacher makes me a better parent. Occasionally I look down on myself from a vantage point far away and wonder how I can do what I do. I know I am fairly good at both my jobs. I also think I may have superpowers and one day the Kryptonite will come too close and it might just fall apart. But for now I am more than just muddling through.

So here begins the double-life diary. Full of anecdotes, thoughts, jabberings and generally me stuff. I was going to start with my first school topic - SATs Rant - but I think I'd better finish marking my last 5 maths sheets and head off to bed. The rants can wait. I'm sure there'll be plenty!