It's been a while...
Caleb Tobias is already 12 days old and I must say he is a fantastic baby!! I had prayed that he would be easy and on the whole he really is. He has pleasant awake times when he is all eyes and observation and the rest of the day he sleeps. About tea-time he wakes up and is quite figidty then until his bedtime (lots of feeding, pucking and squealing). But come 11pm, we bath him, and then he settles down, has a big feed (I try to save him a full side) and sleeps soundly. The last two nights he has slept 11-3 & 3.30-7am! Then this morning he dozed off again until 9am and gave me a lovely lie in while Paul got the kids breakfasted, dressed, the girls delivered to playgroup and the boys started at their Bible study. 
School has been 'ticking along' - Paul has been holding the fort a little and I have contributed where I have been able (mostly in the afternoons), but the last couple of days have been quite disrupted with visitors arriving mid-morning and not leaving until after 2pm. Then the boys have been at an after-school club for 4pm, which is part of our NANTWICH FESTIVAL OF CHRISTAIN FAITH week. So we've acheived a bit, but it's certainly not been a full-curriculum this week. Yesterday though, we did do a little more on our 'plants' project and learnt a bit about different types of trees and different types of leaves. Also we talked about what function each part of a plant has. The lesson seemed to be well enjoyed. I'm not sure how much Phoebe is remembering, but she is enjoying gatheringing things (leaves, flowers, etc...) and colouring in lots of lovely pictures of trees and flowers. Abbie seems to be absorbing a fair bit and she too is enjoying making little mini-books and the sticking, gluing and colouring involved. Jacob enjoying the project, itseems, and is regurgitating information back to me, by picking up leaves and telling me what type they are (just exactly the kind of concrete facts he likes!!). Joel does not seem so enthralled about the whole thing, but I think when we do some more 'hands-on' he will enthuse a bit more. We did have some leaves on hand to look at and discuss, that the girls and I had gathered in the park the other day, but Joel was a bit switched off for some reason. The plan was to do some planting seeds in the afternoon, but both yesterday and today we simply ran out of day before the boys went to their club. I just hate breaking promises and the girls are so keen! 
I'm looking forward to putting the whole project together. The aim is to have a pre-school lapbook and a Primary lapbook, to look back at at another time and re-learn/build from.
As far as 'normals' (to coin a Merry phrase 
) are concerned we're plodding on, but I must confess it can be a real struggle at times! Maths word problems are a real stumbling block for Joel - he just cannot seem to work out what the question is asking of him and what kind of sum he has to do to reach the answer. Jacob doesn't struggle so much with the mechanics of maths itself (i.e. he is fine as long as he is presented with plenty of numbers), but when confronted by the need to draw simple tables or bar charts he gets completely thrown, panics and throws and "I can't do it!" wobbly! So we are gently, gently leading through these things and hoping that with plenty of repitition he might become less 'scared' of these things and more able to work out for himself what he needs to do to produce the required result. For the most part he simply has had to copy a chart out of his textbook into his 'squares' book, but he is such a perfectionist and is too worried that his work might not look exactly the same as what he is copying, that this worry is, in actual fact, what has caused him to panic. Despite our repeated attempts to reassure him that so long as his work is legible and clearly represents the information, it does not have to be an exact replica - he is not convinced! "It won't look right" is his regular cry! Oh, the mind of a rigid 8 year old!!
English is making good progress though I am glad to say - for both boys and Jacob's creative writing, although it still needs a lot of helping along and prompting at times, has definately come on in bounds this year - phew!!
Yesterday we were visited by our summer holidays 'mother's-help' (a young 17yr old girl - G ) and her Mum. G is in the middle of college studies for a Diploma in Childcare and Education (was NNEB) was looking for a family to 'help out' over the summer. Not one to miss an opportunity for an extra hand I volunteered!! G is lovely and the kids loved her too. She joins our family at the beginning of July and stays right up until September (with a week off mid-August).
It will be great to have her about to help me a little, especially with Paul starting work (more on that in a mo).
On the work front: Paul has managed to land himself a job (without really intending to so soon!). It's only answering calls in a call centre (something to do with the train network) and it's only 20 hours a week (10-2 M-F), but the first week (which starts Monday) if full-time (9-5 M-F) - aaaagh! The pay is reasonable, but... He also has an interview on Thursday evening for an NTA post at a school in Crewe. I think this would be more his 'thing' and there is a f/t and p/t post going - he's applied for both. The f/t holds more responsibilities, but I reckon he's up to either!!
We also had a visit today from a Pastor of a church in Cannock (N.Birmingham) which has the possibility of a position (unpaid) for Paul, but to be honest it didn't feel quite right to us. We need to pray more on that one...
In the meantime - our landlord has had requests for references from the estate agent reagrding the house we like, so that looks like it might be happening too - BUT we don't want to move now and then again in 6 months time - we need to make the right choices now- and that's the hard part!! We really love living in Nantwich and have firm attachments to the place, but how do we detatch ourselves enough from that to know what the right decision is regarding moving on?! This is really tough!
So that's where we are at just now. And while Caleb kips (unusually for this time of evening) I must go help Paul put the others to bed - whilst I have spare hands!!
). We had 'family church' tonight and normally the kids love it, but tonight because the boys had been SO silly all evening and Jake was flailing his arms and legs eveywhere - meaning a small was bound to get hurt should he be allowed to continue - we told the boys they had to sit and not dance tonight & just enjoy watching the girls dancing. A hard request, but sadly a necessary one we felt. Unfortunatly, although Joel was willing to conform, this led to Jacob sulking in the hallway and refusing to even try and enjoy things. Later when we tried to talk to him rationally about it he said, "I can't sit and have fun. The only way I can have fun is to jump around. When I have calmed down I can't make myself happy again. It's all your fault I feel left out because you won't let me have fun!" This was rather telling I think. It means he, in his little mind, equates fun & happiness with 'hyper-ness' and calmness with unhappiness - boy - how hard is that a hurdle to jump?!! But rather an insight into his thinking and pretty expressive for Jacob too.
. And as I am so fat and usless (no, really I am) at the moment he's had to do more around the family and house than I would have liked too - for a birthday boy. I didn't even get him a pressie, because he wants to choose his own (a new MP3 stick), so, all in all I feel a bit of a naff wife today! 
) ! Anyway, I've got my family here for a few days so I'll blog when they're gone on Friday - or get Paul to if we have the baby, so you'll all know he/she is here, but don't hold your breath..!
