6 posts tagged “scouts”

The girls got to their positions at the hotdog stand half an hour early on Sunday. Of course, when we dropped them off they were fighting over who would carry what. Instead of one of them carrying the two bags with the small cupcakes and another taking the big box with the banana cake, both of them took a bag with J laughingly leaving her sister to take the box as well. Of course, with it being H, this did not go down well. She cursed, she shouted, she hissed and begrudgingly took the cake box out with her and upon catching up with her sister, dumped it, rather unceremoniously on the grass and stormed off. Ah, again, the joy of twins.

They were only due to be there for two hours and eventually came home seven and a half hours later, absolutely shattered and with sunburnt faces. They'd enjoyed some parts of the day but felt that as they'd stayed on for over five hours more than was required of them and helped take things back to the scout hut that maybe they could have been thanked a bit more. J was actually quite upset that when she pointed out that someone was mistakenly filling up my cake box with the cub's plastic cups that she felt as if they were accusing her of trying to gain a free box. When the cub's missing cup box was found she didn't get an apology and my children are really keen on things being balanced and she said so. That didn't go down too well. There were a few other things that upset them, but they felt the good parts were good experience and H's banana layer cake sold for £5.

The twins came home from their annual night hike exhausted. J was straight upstairs after a kiss and a hug. H on the other hand, decided she wasn't tired. I pointed out that KT mentioned she'd been bouncing her head against the window like a fly trying to escape in the world beyond a pane of glass on the journey home and she went up without any further comment.

I don't know much about the results yet, other than their team completed the course, though I am sure when the snoring is over and I get mugged that I will find out more!

These summer hols even the kids were complaining that the weeks seemed to be going on forever, and I think that they are happy to be back to school. We spent a week visiting family back in Northampton, 2 weeks being visited, a weekend being invaded. The girls joined in with a worldwide renewal of their Scouting vows and were featured on a report for our local online tv station and then spent a week at camp in Essex. They were lucky enough to be chosen to go on a visit to the World Scout Jamboree on their 12th birthday and came home utterly exhausted but having had a great day, well, at least until their dad called later and was mean over the phone and the Saturday girl at The Little Icecream Company had a go at J for something she hadn't done. We'd gone in with the intention of buying a whole heap of icecreams and came away with just the one that had already been made after everyone decided to boycott the shop.

We spent a few fun afternoons up on the cliffs having a picnic and playing bat and ball games - I even managed to get some photos of S where he wasn't sticking up one finger!

 

 

 

 

 

Some of my arty farty shots from our last day on the cliffs...

 

I got some fab shots of an old guy flying his kites but managed to lose the whole lot before finding them on my computer instead of KT's - I just can't bring them over as mine is too old to do much. Boooo!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We went to Felixstowe Carnival and enjoyed some fab music - Badness, The Bohemians and Storm in particular were excellent. This was the weekend I got invaded, first by my brother and then by his girlfriend who surprise, surprise, was dumped by her mother on a day trip to the very sea side resort where her bf was stopping with his big sister and then each day found she couldn't go home for yet another excuse. They shoulda just asked in the first place if they could have stopped! 

We (KT, his folks, Del, Bethan, Bethan's friend and meee) got rained on by fireworks on the last night and literally came home with clumps of sulphur (we think it was) and big chunks of thick cardboard stuck in hoods, hair and down the backs of our necks. Still, they were great fireworks!

 

 

Apart from that, I've spent the last few weeks feeling pretty rotten. I've managed to pick up a cold on top of a chest infection and would feel more sorry for myself except KT's picked up a cold and is a reet old misery with it - fingers crossed it's worked it's way through everyone before it gets too much colder.

My babies are growing up. The fact that they are blossoming into young women and soon will be heading off into independance seems to be snowballing into my mind. One of them went through a phase fairly recently of not wanting any love - no hugs, no kisses, no feet rubs and when I was so used to doing that, it was a shock to suddenly have to show this new child respect for her wishes. However, she's decided she's not too grown up for all that and I now often find myself with a foot plnked on my lap for a rub or if I am sitting on the floor she might come over and make me into a floor cushion - aww.

Anyhoo, the purpose of writing this was to say Hoppy Burpday to the girlies and to let them know how proud of them I am. They've always done well at school and when we decided to move just before the end of Year 5 they took it all in their stride and although they were a  little apprehensive, they made new pals quickly in their new lower school. They joined a group called PALS which meant they had sponserbiliries in looking after the very junior children at lunchtimes and this was featured on Teachers' TV. They spent a few years singing in a church choir alongside one of their brothers until the choir had to be disbanded and like their brothers were part of their lower school choir back in Northampton, which traipsed into town twice at Christmas to sing carols and raise funds for Save the Children. When they moved here, they were chosen to participate making a CD and singing at the local theatre - something they really enjoyed even though the day they were making the DVD we had to collect a very upset H as a rather large child had barged into her in the playground and broke her tooth. They were also chosen to be part of a small choir at a teacher's wedding.

They've participated in two football tournaments including playing football for the school - a very good result there when their team wasn't expected to do well and they've both represented their school in cross-country. H was team captain of their Tag-Rugby team and J got incredibly exhausted doing a Paarlauf for her lower school here but boy did she run. They've played netball for the school and then spent a lot of hours going back there this year to help coach other kids at it. Their swimming ability has come on leaps and bounds in the past few years and now they regularly go swimming at the weekend with friends - just another symptom of growing up. Still, if J ever tries swimming to the Netherlands after a flipping football again like she did last week, I will throttle her myself. 

H was chosen as a librarian and J as an assistant one at the lower school here, a job they loved as they helped me back in Northampton with the same tasks. They enjoy going to Scouts, and have found a great love of camping and outdoor activities. In fact, they've really done so much over the past few years, it's almost been a whirlwind of activity. They still make me smile and are even funnier than ever - I think they're going to be fabulous young ladies.

 

 The girls at 10

 

... at 11

 

... and at 12 - what a difference a few birthdays make!

Since coming back from our break away in November, things have conspired to keep us away from shopping for the last few remnants of Christmas shopping that we need to buy, including getting anything to eat.  KT has been laid out with 'man flu' and I've been looking after him and getting myself all bunged up all at the same time. We attempted to get a few things on Saturday (I know! I told him it would be insane, but he insisted) and were hopeful, after bagging a parking space on the second attempt, that we might have half a chance of getting at least half of what we needed. Not a hope in Hell. Town was packed, mostly it seemed, with the dregs of the barrel. Seriously, I don't consider myself better than anyone else, but whole gangs of Chavvy families roaming round and feeding their kids Flumps for lunch is just too much. There is no excuse, in this day and age, to feed your kids junk food when out and about; not only are there plenty of affordable place to get Good Food from, or you can take a pack up in with you - my children are more than happy to sit on a bench and eat home prepared rolls or this cabbage salad thing I sometimes make. I am almost always completely skint and I flatly refuse to let the kids dine on a bag of Doritos and can of Coke for a meal! It seems as though the country is slowly de-evolving and it saddens me that my grandchildren, if I have any, will grow up in this society, and believe me, if the majority of little kids running around Ipswich Town Centre last Saturday grow up to be anything like their parents (standing in large groups, loudly 'debating' and swearing; naked, bloated bellies erupting over large belts, talking 'Wigga' and chain smoking), it's going to be a very Sucky Monkey world indeed.

Anyway, back to the purpose of this post. We needed to get new school shoes for both the twins - H has done brilliantly and hers have last two! years,but the soles on J's, from August, were falling off. J also needed new school trousers. Well, in the hour we were in, we managed to get the shoes, but no trousers. We all also managed to get bumped, many times, barged into, rammed with buggies and generally, quite stressed. We gave that end of town a miss and decided to head to the other end and let the girls loose with some money for trousers. We parked up and listened to the footie on the radio, whilst watching a never-ending queue of people try to escape from the car park next to us. Much more amusing than anything else we'd witnessed in a while, but the couple in a silver SEAT who hurtled down the road and almost rammed one car before narrowly missing a pedestrian because, it appeared, they were late for a hair appointment at the trendy studio next to where we were, appalled us. No trousers were found, so we decided to go home.

We tried again yesterday, without the girls. We had a very specific order of shops to visit and all started well. We headed for the first shop and joined the two sets of Mum, Grannie and buggy that were waiting for the lift. It finally arrived and the first trio went in - the second, not only decided that then was a good time for Grannie to take the occupant of the buggy out so the two of them could go up the escalator, but Mum decided that as she wasn't going in the lift that time, neither were we. The first trio held the door but the second Mum wouldn't let us past. Eurgh. KT and I discussed her actions quite loudly and when she swung her buggy round for two seconds I used to opportunity to get closer so we were first in line. I even considered closing the lift on her for two seconds, but that would have been completely petty and far too much like the kind of thing everyone seems to do these days. We wandered from shop to shop and as town got busier, we decided it was time to go home, we could always get the last bits tomorrow. We got to the van, noticed we had more than enough time to collect the twins from school as they were expecting and were feeling pretty good. That was until, when the van was going through it's pre-journey test check, KT pushed the brake forward and there was a loud snapping noise. The lights that go out when everything is fine, did not go out and a loud siren beeped insistently. We looked each other and wondered what on Earth the snap had been and KT switched off and tried again. It failed. I got out and went round to his side to check and see what things looked like in the box where the brake/accelerator lever goes. Everything looked fine, but a third go at starting up produced the same whining bleep as before. By now, we were going to be late for the children, so I tried calling the school... only to have the battery die. Have you any idea, just how difficult it is to find a public phone these days? Here in Ipswich and Felixstowe, it's especially hard - back in Northampton, I would have known where to find one, but there wasn't a phone to be found. There was nothing else for it. KT tried the brakes and they worked so we drove home a tad more slowly then we would have done. I managed to get my phone to switch on, but it wouldn't make a call without dying, so I turned it on and left it. Thankfully, we got a call, from KT's flat, which meant the girls were home, safely, so I could stop worrying about them. 

KT called the people who adapted the van when we got back. They confirmed that they think a brake cable has snapped, but they have no-one available to collect it, which means KT's dad will have to drive it all the way there on Friday morning. The darned thing was only there a month ago for it's MOT and that cost a bomb - now it's got to go again. It also means I have had to cancel dentist, doctor, nurse appointments and we have to figure out how on Earth we are going to get to the church on Thursday for the school Christmas Concert. KT's battery wont last for a toodle that far and there aren't many adapted taxis about. Hopefully, the van will back in working order quickly on Friday as the twins are supposed to be present and correct at the Scout's carol service on Friday evening. It also means we can't go shopping again until at least next week - which means raiding the cupboards - oh well, at least they'll be cleared out for a decent shop - if we have money left over after the bill for this cable!   

Bit late with these, but here are my before and after pics - both taken tonight before the girls went off to get drenched in woodsmoke.

 

Sheesh, they stink now.