"The Age of Amazing-ness"

How can I not sit here today and take a moment out from my washerwoman duties to highlight the fact that this is the first time in a millions years (okay...over a decade anyway) that I can sit here, however briefly, kiddie-less, in our House of Shambles and NOT hear the distant drone of CBB's telly on in the background...or plaintive wails of "I'm hungry...what should I eat?...I want something crunchy...no something soft...no something _____"

It's true.  I think I jumped the gun yesterday when I announced that our last, littlest weeny sprog had hatched the nest so to speak, and ventured off to Nursery for the first time.  Really it's today that must be marked as truly historic, for after dragging a reluctant Squit off to school, I actually got to leave him there and have a little bit of time to myself.  (Shamefully, I got round the highly traumatic 'leaving' issue by setting him up in the little kitchen and rattling off a litany of foodstuffs I expected him to prepare for lunch upon my return.  The little guy totally fell for it, and began mixing and pretend pouring in earnest as I hightailed it out of there, expecting a plaintive wail which never came. Well I'll be...maybe after all this time the little guy is in need of more stimulation that he's thus far gotten watching me clean, launder and grocery shop these many months.)

So what did I do with my newfound freedom?  Nip off to my local coffee shop, laptop in hand, and celebrate with a double shot cappuccino? Come back and have a leisurely bath and rearrange my wardrobe? Catch up on a few chapters of my latest book with a cup of tea?

Nope.  True to form I spazzed 90% of my first day of freedom on kitchen cleanup, bed making, yet another load of laundry, and concocting a killer green juice from scratch courtesy of my Dualit juicer (which unfortunately takes eighteen times as long to clean as it does to conjure up said juice.)

Anyway, in two minutes I must dash across and collect little Squit and then likely get told off the entire way back about how i deserted him and be informed in no uncertain terms that there is no way he is going back.

I have news for you little man.  You are SO going back and moreover, tomorrow I shall not squander my 2.5 hours of morning freedom.  Oh no...housework be damned.  I am going to use my time decadently artistic fashion and see what comes of it.

Perhaps a new tune is just waiting to be put down...or that novel that for years I've been meaning to write is going to be birthed at long last...or maybe I'll just get to grips with the mountains of paperwork and documents which need to be sorted and collated in order to move us out of here and into a new home.

Whatever it is, I do know that last night when the husband asked me whether I had felt teary dropping off our youngest 'onto the conveyor belt of the rest of his life', it took me a millisecond to realise that I had not.  Not at all.  Yes, it's the end of an era, and yes, that munchkin voice and eggbeater run of Squit's is on the way out...as are tiny jeans, baby breath, and blowing kisses.  I know that in a blink of an eye I'll be a ladyshape in the midst of four big menfolk, sniffing the testosterone in the air and being held ransom by infinite smelly sweat socks.  But...I will also get my life back.  And while the boys grow monstrous and come to see me as little more than a meals on wheels/drycleaning service, I shall quietly be concocting my next move on the sly.

I am already daydreaming my future incarnation into being as we speak...

"And Another One Bites The Dust"

Today was the first day of the rest of Squitty's academic life - and if early indications are a sign, then he will be a-okay in my opinion (as long as none of the nursery teachers peep below his waistband and spot the tell-tale crinkly nappy sticking out).

Yes, it's true (sigh). Despite swearing to the contrary (and now feeling an absolute failure as a parent) I have indeed sent my 3.8 year old child to school whilst still in nappies.  The shame of it.

Still, you can't really blame me.  Especially if you had say peeked through our bathroom window yesterday and seen me trying to hoist a half-naked writhing toddler onto a big blue plastic potty seat whilst he screamed and tried to punch me all the while making sure I knew who wore the (nappy) pants in the family.

"I will NOT go on the potty!  Never, never, never Mama!  You can't make me!"

It would appear the little fella is spot on.  I couldn't, didn't, haven't and hold very little hope of being able to at some future point.

All that remains to be seen is how long into term we can get before getting caught out...and by caught out I mean having to drop whatever I'm doing in order to race over and deal with a steamy poo-pants mess. I dread it already but know it's inevitable.

This morning Squitty and I went to nursery together for just an hour as it was his first day, but tomorrow he goes by himself (though if you were to ask him to confirm that fact he'd deny it vehemently).

We arrived and after blatantly ignoring two friendly teachers trying to say hello, he showed mild interest in a giant Tortoise named 'Lightning' (it moves bloody fast - no joke), which they kindly took out of its cage for him and plopped onto the grass, only for Squitty to nearly step on it before losing interest completely and making a beeline for the play-dough inside.  (I of course felt obliged to take OTT interest in said Tortoise since they'd gone to all the trouble of taking it out, so subsequently ended up in stilted conversation about tortoises with a bemused Frenchman who was no more interested in the subject matter than was I.)

Meanwhile Squit was fashioning up blue play-dough sausages elsewhere and making a messy glue and feather paint picture - which he informed me he had no interest in taking home with him.  Fickle artist.

As I could have predicted, we ended up in the sandbox. There he commandeered the shovels such that his only other companion - a shy blond little french girl - was muscled out and ran off, only for Squitty to tire of the whole thing and take off for train tracks and dump truck manoeuvring elsewhere.

So that was that.  A cursory glace round suggested that Squitty's class is made up of all rather nice children from all rather nice homes...the progeny of all rather nice parents.

As for me, the only interesting conversation I had was with a 22 year old blond Aussie nanny from Bondi Beach with a strong accent and a rather striking undercut.

Says it all really.

"Egg....Egg...And Away!"

This morning the alarm went off at Stupid O'clock (ie. 6am or so...) as the husband was determined that Egg not be late for his first day of Secondary School.  Given that our sole family vehicle is a stuffed-to-the-gills Camper Van and that only one of us is in possession of a valid UK drivers license, the plan was that the husband would drop Egg off in a taxi and the monsters and I would collect him later via the 37 through Brixton.

Last night over a Spaghetti dinner, we tried in vain to convince Egg that he absolutely had to have his hair at least trimmed for today, as his shiny dirty blond locks fall over his eyes and we know there is absolutely no way his shaggy muppet hairdo is going to fly at his new school.  He begged to differ.

Egg has this thing about his hair.  As in, no one is allowed to cut it or alter it in any way.  Every few months or so, we have an almighty row, screaming matches, and it all ends in tears and an uneven jagged hairline after I am at last allowed to make say five snips before Egg catches his reflection in the mirror, declares that I have ruined both his hair and his life, and tears out of the kitchen in hysterics - stubbornly donning a hoodie for the next few days to make a point.

Auntie Ba had begged the husband and I a few weeks ago to make sure that we gave Egg a relaxed send off to this new chapter of his life, and this promise was ringing in my ears last night when Egg predictably refused to allow me to rearrange even a millimetre of the hair obstructing his lovely green eyes.  I shrugged, put away the scissors and calmly told him that I would wait until he was asleep to give him a trim.

"Whatever Mama!  I'll just stay up all night then...you'll see!"

I smiled...continued washing the dishes, and an hour later, did just what I told him I would do.

The husband looked incredulously at the snippet of hair I triumphantly held aloft before binning.

"I can't believe you did that.  Wow.  Egg is going to lose it when he wakes up.  I'm not sure you should have done that...invasion of privacy and all that..." the husband mumbled.

Sometimes I find it's necessary to make good on the odd threat...keeps people on their toes. And also, believe it or not it's actually easier to trim Egg's hair when he's unconscious and passed out in a pile of perspiration on his pillow than when he's dodging me in the kitchen, trying to whip sharp scissors out of my hand and shrieking "No! No!" as we try and negotiate the number of snips I'm allowed (I bet even Nicky Clarke couldn't cut under those conditions).

Anyway, this morning Egg woke up, donned his new uniform, and I barely noticed the mockery coming from the husband over my diabolical name tag sewing-on efforts (hey, I'm good at lots of things but sewing ain't one of them), so curious was I to see if I'd get rumbled.

I didn't.  Go figure.  Although somewhere between the husband sorting out Egg's tie and Squitty trying to nab my iphone, I managed to sneak in a few snips and mostly even out his fringe.

Having neglected to remember to purchase Egg new black school socks, I instead handed over a new pair of mine (we are now the same size...!), took some pics, gushed at how handsome and grown up he now looks (when did that happen?!) and ushered Egg and the husband out the door and into a taxi in the nick of time before collapsing with the September issue of Vogue, and a cup of Earl Grey as I stared out the window and watched them pull away.

Life is so weird.  Birth to Secondary School...like that...in a heartbeat.

"I Love To..."

Never one to shy away from a dare - especially one made under the influence of a rather poky Mojito - I found myself traipsing about Toronto the other day adorned as such:

It's kind of a running joke with my sister that for years now, whenever I come back to Toronto for a visit, I derive a rather primitive joy from power walking through the city's downtown, shoving aside dawdling,waddling passersby as I (earphone clad of course) rework my own version of Massive Attack's 'Unfinished Sympathy'.

However in my case it's more like 'Unfinished Shopping' as whenever I'm here I get this kind of 'Betty Crocker on Crack' panic, and feel I can't rest easy until my suitcase is bulging with baking supplies and other foodstuffs not available in the U.K.

Whereas others might flit about buying designer wares, I scamper excitedly through giant grocery stores, filling baskets to the brim, which eventually become too heavy to lug around, thus forcing me into transferring goods into a giant steel trolley, which even I can't pretend will translate into an acceptable luggage allowance of 23kilos at the airport.

My sister always smirks when she catches sight of the mounds of bags propped up by my suitcase after such excursions.  I think - no sorry, know for a fact - she thinks me a mentalist, but she also knows by now that somehow, I always get the stuff back home.

There's the time that I sat with a giant glass biscuit jar stuffed full of 'Freezies' on my lap for the entire eight hour flight.  And the time I wore not one but three winter jackets (one of which had a fluffy Eskimo hood) home in the dead of summer - shuffling through security like a Marshmallow Man - thereby necessitating an unfortunate detainment for questioning. And of course the time I almost missed my flight running through the airport with pockets stuffed full of lingerie which I couldn't cram into my luggage, and had to endure the humiliation shortly after take off, of a man three rows ahead quietly returning my satin pink push-up bra which had fallen in the aisle as I boarded.

When it comes to luggage, where there's an iron-clad will, there's a way - even if it means wearing a 'Jaktogo'.  Seriously...check it out...it's on my wish list for Christmas:

Anyway, I digress.  I simply wanted to point out that I love being in Toronto - even if it's mostly because I live in London, England and can thereby, by virtue of not feeling 'stuck' in the country of my youth (however lovely a place it may be), appreciate its finer qualities when doled out in sunny summer holiday-sized portions.

As a child I vowed that one day I would live in London.  My father had adored practicing medicine in London for seven years before I was born, but ventured to Toronto for a six month research project, met my Canadian mum and the rest is history. Blame the bands, the lifestyle, the culture, the accent...even biting sarcasm.  Whatever it is, it got hold of me when I was but a wee thing, and when the husband and I permanently decamped in '96, we didn't look back...not even once.

So, I found it fitting that I should at the very least make my 'City Crush' public, and proudly wear an overpriced (thanks for springing for it Sis!) piece of 'Toronna Tat', proudly proclaiming my stance.

What I neglected to realise, until after an hour or so of wearing it in public, was that when paired with a somewhat bold hat, big sunnies and lashings of my usual lipstick, certain male members of the public would find it too difficult to refrain from calling out, "She loves to...______!!"(insert various lewd rejoinders).

(The bloody shirt designers had unfortunately decided not to spring for the two periods/full stops needed in order to read 'T.O.' instead of 'To...', thereby proving too tantalising not to comment upon for some.)

Oh well.  I still love my shirt, and plan on wearing it in London too.  And my suitcase is going to once again prove a logistical challenge to pack.

And today, even though I'm off to the dentist shortly, I can't help but feel a touch smug that the sun is blazing hot here in T.O. whilst in London it's about to be a deluge for the next three days and there are rumours that more tube strikes are imminent.

See why I love T.O.?

"Let's Talk About...Labiaplasty"

The monsters and I are currently on a whirlwind, late summer trip to see family in Canada.  This hasn't been without its trials (namely vomiting, onset of Noro Virus to various family members, and last minute decision to get bad UK dental work remedied).

Yesterday, on my way to spending several hours in a dental chair (which thoughtfully came equipped with inbuilt 'kneading action' like the kind you find in pedicure spas), I was most amused to find this huge ad above my head on the 'subway' ('tube' to all you UK luddites).

"LABIAPLASTY & VAGINOPLASTY"

I suppose the constant rumbling motion of train on tracks might induce some discomfort in long rides, which might lead to a casual cursory thought regarding ones undercarriage, which might in turn - with a haphazard glance upwards - lead to thoughts of tampering with ones ladybits.  Or maybe not.

You do wonder why this particular advertisement is chosen to be one of a dozen on a train.  It must be profitable for the company to spend a fortune advertising here.  But even more confounding is the red hot sexy picture of a supermodel type, seductively smirking like a smug temptress who knows that her previously standard sweet meats have now been rearranged into the Taj Mahal of vaginas and given this fact can barely restrain herself from getting off (and I don't mean the train).

Seriously?  The irony is that if one looked like THAT, one could easily 'get off' without the help of a Vagina Doctor - no matter what sort of shambolic state ones bits were in (for example if one had just had the misfortune to give birth naturally to sextuplets).  I found the juxtaposition disturbing.  Let's just leave it at that.

My other 'deep thought' of the day whilst riding the 'subway/tube' was how small and compact and claustrophobically tight the seats here are:

Seats this size would never fly in the UK...

Now, forgive me dear Britian, oh adopted land of my youth, but your people are too large-ish and too 'het up' most of the time to tolerate such intimately narrow and restrained seating.  I mean, I'm average size, and when a hygenically-challenged man sat down next to me, sealing together with vacuum grip our respective thighs in the 90 degree heat (one hairy and sweaty...the other smooth and lotioned) I did what any self-respecting Brit would do:  I sniffed aloud (but not too loud - that wouldn't do), wiggled myself over as much as I could, and went out of my way not to make eye contact or even acknowledge the man who had so rudely infringed upon my personal space.

I can't even imagine the amount of fights that would break out in London tubes with such close proximity.  People would become 'Fat-ists' and glare menacingly at their extra-large fellow commuters, intimidating the very people most in need of 'taking a load off' into remaining standing for the entire journey lest they be hacked to death with biros in random acts of 'Tube Rage'.  

As is the case with many things, those 'extra few inches' that we have on our tube seats in the UK make such a difference, and really, the only choice people of a certain circumference would have, would be to lunge for a rare aisle seat and then perching ever so delicately on the edge, attempt an epic splay and steady themselves for the journey.  Not unlike this woman here:

A very well executed 'splay'

Anyway, I digress.  Though not even loaded up on pre-op painkillers (a fact I would later come to bitterly regret) with their usual accompanying dreamy thoughtscapes, I just thought I'd share my two insights of the day en route to what would ultimately be a rather lengthy, tiresome and painful procedure, and which in hindsight, would make labiaplasty and vaginoplasty seem like a walk in the park.

"And Survey Saaaaaaaaays........"

I certainly didn't have to wee on a stick to put myself out of my misery this morning.  All I had to do was turn on my laptop.

I saw the familiar email address from the agent, followed by one from the husband.  And then I just knew.

Deliberating momentarily I couldn't decide whether fashioning a frothy cappuccino was in order before clicking to read my fate, but decided in favour of a short, hard, fast shock to the system.  Either way I just wanted the suspense to end.  And it did.

Were we going to live happily ever after in 'Dream House No.3'? or were we destined to continue wandering property porn websites like addicts in search of the elusive 'hit'.  Were we going to find ourselves chucked out on the street in a few months time, into some lacklustre rental stop gap?  Or would we be roasting chestnuts on an open fire at Christmas?  (I mean this literally as it so happens that 'Dream House No.3' has a delightful working fireplace positioned regally between two banks of bookcases in the grand Front Room.

But never mind all that.  We didn't get it.

Of course we didn't.  It would have been too easy, too seamless, and too perfect to have sold and found a new house all in the space of a week. It would have been too good a story.

Besides who likes chestnuts anyway?

"The Million Pound Question"

I lie in bed tossing and turning, half drifting off several times before admitting defeat and venturing out of the bedroom and onto a comfy sofa to tap away on my laptop until sleep comes...if it comes.

You see I'm wired.  I feel as though I've just necked seven Redbulls and despite it being long past midnight, I can't blame my insomnia on the chubby fat toes of my youngest, who has crawled into bed with me and has taken up his usual                                                                    vertical positioning.

No, I am properly revved up.  For you see, after about a year and a half of trying to sell our three bedroom London flat, we have finally done it. Last week we officially declared defeat and did what we should have sensibly done months ago: lowered our asking price by a ridiculous amount and accepted a ridiculous offer even lower than that.

Bingo.

So that was that.  I guess like that old sage Kenny Rogers says, sometimes you've got to know when to fold 'em. We finally did, and the mixture of relief/disappointment/excitement/hopefulness and finally despair (after a sobering look at the over-inflated property prices in our area revealed that realistically we should be looking for a four bedroom closet with a cheeky thatch of grass out back) was something to behold.

Needless to say, minutes after our solicitor had been instructed, I had already compiled a shortlist of half a dozen properties to view - most of which were technically in reach should we get a deal and one or two which would mean food stamps and cold baths for the next ten years. At least.

Typically, I ignored the first rule of house hunting:  Do not let agents talk you into seeing properties both you and they know you can't afford.

The first house I viewed on my own, after which followed a frantic call right then and there on the sidewalk, to the husband, the agent looking on with a smirk.

"Can you leave work early?!  I think I've found the one!!"

(Cue disinterested typing on laptop in an office far away and a barely audible grunt having nothing to do with the bomb I've just dropped.)

"Seriously!  How soon can you come here?  The agent is willing to stay late to show it to you!"

I won't bother to recount the rest of the conversation, but suffice it to say it included a variety of expletives, some marital telling off, and ultimately a refusal to comply.  I was gutted...and started to feel panicky.

Not unlike a physically sub-standard fella who has inexplicably bagged the hottest supermodel on the planet and is about to go off to Dubai for six months while she resides at the Playboy Mansion, I was distinctly aware that the house I had just viewed was so 'special' that it was inevitable that some other bugger was going to nose in, discover this, and slipping his black Amex card across to the agent, break our hearts all over again (ie. a repeat of what happened to both 'Dream House No.1' and 'Dream House No.2' we had both loved and lost in the preceding year and a half).

So I did what any (non)sensible wife would do.  I shut up about it and secretly booked an early morning appointment for the next day.  I then coerced the husband into going (maybe I threatened to stop doing his laundry for a month or feed his three children...I don't remember), then proceeded to follow him around the viewing, totally invading his personal space and whispering excitedly all the amazing points the house had - until he stopped in one of the rooms, did a sudden about-face and told me to shut the heck up as he wanted to think/see/feel for himself.

I managed to keep quiet and backed off for as long as I could (sixty seconds tops?) before resuming my creepingly close, 'Gollum-esque' stance - the nervous rubbing of hands and excited whispers proving impossible to stifle.

All this to say, the predictable thing happened.  The rest of the homes we saw paled in comparison. This was likely due to the fact that they were all pretty much in our realistic price range as opposed to a post lottery win.  And the other "Would have to sell our best kid on the black market" one was temptingly huge but stuck in the Edwardian times from a design perspective, and given that even putting up a mirror in our home takes months, I knew we would always be living in a place with old-fashioned bright yellow creepy crawly wallpaper so....

...here we are.  I'm still unable to sleep, despite trying to rid myself of all the anxious excitement generated by the latest (YAWN) property adventures of the severely middle-class.  For you see, we have predictably/stupidly been bidding low on the magical house for the past week, and just tonight put in our final, literally can't go five pence higher, final bid.

After rejecting every single offer we've submitted, with a polite but firm 'NO', the vendors have at last decided to put us out of our misery, promised to discuss things one last time tonight, and let the agent know first thing tomorrow whether they'll give it to the salivating Ex-Pats or whether they're going to take their chances and hold out for the next Chelsea Banker to stroll past and buy it up as casually as one buys Park Place with a lucky roll of the dice.

Do you see why I can't sleep??

"My Wee (Wee) Problem"

Squit and I have a problem.  We have reached an impasse.  At 3 1/2 he is clever, funny, and easily possesses the best disposition of anyone in our entire family - extended or otherwise.  But he's still not potty trained.  Not even close.

In fact, if there was a neutral position on the subject, he would be to the far LEFT of that.  It's not even something he's willing to discuss anymore, and should I be foolhardy enough to drop it casually into conversation, he will stop what he's doing, fix me with a unwavering glare, cross him arms insolently and leave the room (usually with an entirely age-inappropriate expletive that would have Super Nanny huffing in horror).

A few weeks ago he had an induction afternoon at the nursery he starts part-time in September. There are strict guidelines regarding the soiling of oneself, and should I fail to deliver a wee-free toddler in  6 weeks, he shall not be going to nursery and I shall not be kiddie-free five mornings a week.  This cannot be allowed to happen.

One day a few months ago, whilst untangling the daily mountain of damp towels on the bathroom floor, I noticed that someone had placed the blue potty seat on top of the regular toilet.  Further inspection revealed a few tell-tale amber droplets left behind and a big sopping wet discarded nappy I had NOT had any dealings with, plopped triumphantly by the bidet.  Now curious and confused, additional sleuthing in his nursery revealed a turned over top dresser drawer, an empty plastic packet devoid of its new undies and an incredulous peek at Squits bottom downstairs revealed the tell-tale Gap band peeking above his little Levi's.

I was flummoxed.  I assumed it had been a brother job, but Egg and Dumps were as astounded as me. It suddenly dawned on all of us that incredulously, Squit had quietly taken matters into his own hands, potty trained himself, and had gotten on with it stealthily and without fanfare.  

At that moment, believing that I had given birth to an utter genius, excited calls to Aunties and Grandparents ensued, and an impromptu family celebration was declared for the evening: pizza, popcorn, chocolate, a movie, sleepover with his brothers, etc.  For the remainder of the day Squit was treated like a Saudi Prince - no request too big and no pleasure denied. The little man plopped himself into the best chair in the front room whilst we all scurried around doing his bidding, practically worshipping the chunky little deity for his ingenuity and potty pragmatism.  Shaking our heads in wonder and awe, laughing at the absurdity of it all, we couldn't believe that months of worry could be over just like that.

That night after bath time he insisted we cover his chubby white bottom in a nappy again.   Which he promptly then soiled. 

The new Gap superman undies were flung with derision across the room, landing unceremoniously askew on his little stuffed monkeys head. Squit stood with his arms crossed, stubbornly clutching his little elbows and refusing to budge.

So there you have it.  Impasse.  I need to be smarter.  I need to be brimming with cunning maternal genius and resolve.  I need to attack this situation with the military precision of a general.

Instead I'm sitting here defeated in my front room, in our home which will not sell, staring glumly out the window at the cold wet grey day that perfectly encapsulates the state of my aching head and spasming back. Our cleaner arrives in a few hours and two out of three of our bathrooms are currently not fit for human occupancy.  Squit is demanding his third breakfast of the morning and I am dimly aware that in a few days we shall potentially be heading to the Suffolk countryside for a weekend of likely WET family camping.

I am not feeling particularly powerful.  Nor optimistic.  Rather I have the sinking feeling that Squit is purposely holding out on the potty training for the sole purpose of putting off further education indefinitely and staying ensconced in the safe cozy realm of 'Mama-land' here at home.  And who can blame him?  A bit of wet discomfort in the nether regions in exchange for lie-ins, endless repeats of Mr. Tumble (fyi I swear I might top myself if I have to listen to even one more jovial exclamation from that televisual terror of an entertainer) and of course - three breakfasts daily.  

There's no competition.

"Latitude Festival En Famille..."

Like everything fun in life, there is always a price to pay.  And as any 80's kid will recall, that hard-as-nails dance teacher in Fame said it all: "Fame costs...and here's where you start paying!"

Tell me about it.  Festivals cost...and laundry, camper van clean up, and three nights of bad/no sleep is where I start paying.

Truthfully we had a blast.  Once I accepted that every morning was going to be HELL (nothing worse than three bored little people screaming/jumping on you/fighting each other/chucking food around the camper van at stupid o'clock, while you nurse a hangover of apocalyptic proportions and would happily donate a kidney for even a micro second more sleep) the rest of the day was a lark in comparison.

Five of us in a camper van was a stretch.  The two big boys slept up top, and the husband, myself and the ever increasing in girth Squit shared what amounted to a small double bed down below.  What fun.

I spent the nights swatting mosquito's (which involved slapping myself repeatedly in the face and head like a mental patient), tried (to no avail) to ignore the husbands bear-like snoring, and got bashed about the head like clockwork by Squit.  Sleep not an option, I was sorely tempted to venture back into the festival for late night frolicking.  Had we not been camped in the furthest outskirts of the festival, and had I not already removed my contact lenses (having stupidly omitting to pack specs) I most certainly would have been found dancing the Honkstep in the hilarious and rowdy Ukrainian tent we stumbled upon one night in the forest.

The boys (11, 8, 3) had a great time.  How could they not?  Hitting us up for cash on an hourly basis in order to stuff their faces with ice-cream, chips and whatever overpriced junk food they came across, was bound to please.  As a large group of us went together, the children formed a tribe of their own and spent most of the time wandering the grounds like a sugar-crazed pack of orphans...figuring out new scams to rid the parentals of pounds in order to buy all manner of leather bracelets and bubble guns.

The husband and Squit proved best bosom buddies - the pair of them loafing about like groupies in various tents and fields listening to bands like 'Warpaint' and 'Young Fathers'.

Me?  As with most festivals, in hindsight it seems like a good 40% of my time was spent queuing for the toilet.  Seriously.  It was so baking hot that liquid intake was a necessity and hence....you get the picture.

Speaking of toilets, one of the worst things is having to go wee in the night and stumbling for ages across damp fields to the portable loos.  So a few years ago I found a solution:  "Travel John's".  A genius invention, they allow one to quietly and discreetly empty ones bladder in the privacy of a tent.

The husband duly set up a small two man tent next to the campervan for 'Mama's loo'.  Brilliant. Except one morning Dumpie poked his head in whilst I was mid-stream, tights around my ankles, and yelled out to all and sundry, "Gross!  Mama's weeing in the tent!"  I shooed him out only to have Squit pop his head in moments later to confirm for himself that his mother was indeed 'weeing in a tent.'

Predictably, a short while later whilst queueing for the toilets with all three boys in tow (giving the husband a much needed quiet 'moment' to read and finish off an entire pack of Bacon himself in the glorious morning sunshine), Squitty shouted out in front of perhaps fifty odd people, "Mama, why did you make a pee pee in the tent this morning?"  Dumpie snorted with laughter and I died a small death.

"Squitty" I stage whispered, "Mama did NOT make a wee wee in the tent...ok?"

"Yes you did Mama!  I saw you!  You had your trousers down and were making a wee wee!" he confirmed with glee...grinning at his growing audience of amused onlookers.

By now, the rest of the queue, most of whom had been queuing for almost half an hour, were not even pretending to not hear.  Many of them were downright shaking with laughter and sneaking peeks back at 'Wee Mum'.

I thought it couldn't get worse, but of course...

"Mama" yelled Squit after a few moments "You made a poo poo in the tent!"

"I did NOT Squitty!"

"Yes you did...you made a huge big smelly poo poo in the tent I saw you!"

Yeah, so at that point I gave up trying to maintain any sense of dignity.  Squitty is a natural clown, and with such a rapt audience I knew there was no point.  Whatever.  (For the record, I did no such thing...just sayin').

So that was our festival: Fun, chaotic, messy, no sleep, junk food diet, hot sun, great bands and hanging out with friends.

We shall be going again next year.  And in the meantime I'm going to practise my Honkstep.

"The GRINCH (ie. 'Chelsea Banker') Who Stole Christmas"

I came across this blog post which mysteriously was never published this past Christmas.  It perfectly encapsulates how gutted and unhealthily possessed i have been in this mammoth housing nightmare for the past year.  It is testament to how fixated one can become over something as basic as a home...losing sight of L.I.F.E. in the meantime and letting a loss derail your entire life...(sigh)

Okay fine, I'll admit it.  This year, for the first time I can remember, I am finding it near impossible to muster up any sort of 'Christmas Spirit'.  I've been meaning to blog about this for a few weeks now, but couldn't quite bring myself to wax prolific about such a 'first world problem' and out myself as the entitled brat that I clearly am.

For you see, the entirety of 2014 has been spent in the attempt to finally procure a bigger home for our ever increasing brood.  (Relax - there are no future offspring on the agenda - I just mean that the three little boys we already have are increasing in mass in what feels like a daily basis, and we are desperate for more space...like yesterday.)  I yearn for a kitchen where I can scramble around, possibly hungover, without being hip-checked by various members of the family whilst trying to assemble some sort of packed lunch which won't have Jamie Oliver reporting me to the authorities (Cheesy fish, fruit roll-ups and a blueberry muffin do NOT a lunchbox make.  I know this.  Truly I do.)

I yearn for a KitchenAid mixer.  For me, "The Queen of Baked Goods" not owning one is like Katie Price not owning a bra, or Kim Kardashian not owning Spanx in every colour of the rainbow, to contain that famously bulging derri-scare of hers.

But I digress.  I've put off begging the husband for one (bless him I know he'd get me one in a flash if I bartered with a series of killer back rubs for which I am semi-famous) because I've nowhere to put it! I've long ago run out of counter space, cupboard space, and let's face it - headspace.

So it should come as no surprise to find that having found the house of our dreams, one street over, earlier in the year, and having dedicated ourselves to procuring said PERFECT HOUSE for our family, with a desire and singleminded attentiveness we haven't even applied to parenting thus far in our lives, to have lost it - suddenly and permanently - in one fell swoop last month, has plunged us (and by us I mean primarily ME) into a severe, dark, deep depression which appears to have no escape.

I hate myself for it, I really do.  I hate that I have become so bloody middle-class minded that the loss of this dream home has rendered me void of all joy and hope for the future - despite it being my favourite time of the year, having all my family around me - healthy and well no less - and having so much more to be grateful for than the majority of humans.

HOWEVER...it was a damn good house.  The best.  The biggest.  The most beautiful.  And I am a lesser person for having coveted it so badly that I lost sight of everything else important in my life for so long, that now I can't find my way back to 'normal'.  You see, the house was magic.  I've never in my twenty odd years living in London seen a home I loved as much as this.  It was like someone read my mind and created a home encapsulating every last wish and whim I've ever had since I was a child.

This past year (fantasising in this covetous head of mine) I lived through 'Nigella-esque' Christmas parties, caught Egg making out with his first girlfriend downstairs in the basement, had candlelit baths by the dozen in the sumptuous en-suite bath, hosted brilliant outdoor cocktail parties in the twinkling garden, and had friends to stay in the glorious guest suite.  In short, I found 'the house' that was going to transform our shambolic lives into something resembling a Hollywood movie.

Now I must backtrack from my year-long fantasy, shake off the deep, deep despair, and make a call to our estate agent this weekend, telling him that we are taking our home off the market until the Spring.  The housing market has flatlined, we are NOT moving in the foreseeable future, there are no other properties that even come close to being 10% as perfect as the one we lost, and as we speak there is a Chelsea banker with his (probably) beautiful wife and (only) one bloody child, making plans to move into our dream house in the New Year.

In the meantime, I'm going to grudgingly attempt to bake my Christmas biscuits this afternoon, make myself promise to stop running past the dream house every morning like some sort of stalking freak, and try and get into the Christmas Spirit by purchasing more tree lights this afternoon and finish decorating the tree which has stood magnificent but essentially unloved and only half-decorated for a week now in our front room due to said bad attitude.

The other morning in bed the husband asked me what I wanted for Christmas.

"That house" I replied.

He groaned, rolled over and told me to grow up.

He's right.  I officially (and now publicly) SUCK.

(But I still love that house and always will, and cannot promise not to turn this frown upside down in time for the 25th.  A girl wants what a girl wants...what can I say?  Maybe it's time to sell and/or give away all our possessions and move back to India and live like the happy beach bums we were.  Either that, or pool all our money into Egg's further education at the best schools money can buy and hope that one day in the not too distant future our Maths genius will become horribly wealthy and buy that dream house from the Chelsea banker...in cash...one Christmas morning in 2034 with a "Here you go Mama - now will you finally stop sulking and get up and make me your famous Christmas shortbread biscuits already?")