A lovely few days.

Most of my posts come about from some event or situation out of the ordinary, today is not one of those days, we all woke when we were ready, Princess woke first and watched her tv quietly, she loves Milkshake and Peppa Pig, so she was happy while we snored on. My bladder wasn't gonna let me stay in bed late, so I was awake about 8am, went to the loo and climbed into bed with my Princess, she grabbed her Nursery Rhymes book and sat and sang/read lots to me, with lots of cuddles in-between.  The boys joined us by 9, so we sat and chatted as usual, planning the day, we opted for a stay at home and potter about a bit day. So we all got dressed and they tidied their rooms up, we swept up and fed the animals, then sat with breakfast deciding what to 'work' on and learn today. Princess had already been working on her science workbook which she had taken into her bedroom to do, shouting Stuntman for help when she got stuck.

I remembered a history thing I saw on Facebook, so read it out to them: They used to use urine to tan animal skins, so families used to all pee in a pot & then once a day it was taken & Sold to the tannery.......if you had to do this to survive you were "Piss Poor"

But worse than that were the really poor folk who couldn't even afford to buy a pot......they "didn't have a pot to piss in" & were the lowest of the low

The next time you are washing your hands and complain because the water temperature isn't just how you like it, think about how things used to be. Here are some facts about the 1500s:

Most people got married in June because they took their yearly bath in May, and they still smelled pretty good by June.. However, since they were starting to smell . ...... . Brides carried a bouquet of flowers to hide the body odor. Hence the custom today of carrying a bouquet when getting Married.

Baths consisted of a big tub filled with hot water. The man of the house had the privilege of the nice clean water, then all the other sons and men, then the women and finally the children. Last of all the babies. By then the water was so dirty you could actually lose someone in it.. Hence the saying, "Don't throw the baby out with the Bath water!"

Houses had thatched roofs-thick straw-piled high, with no wood underneath. It was the only place for animals to get warm, so all the cats and other small animals (mice, bugs) lived in the roof. When it rained it became slippery and sometimes the animals would slip and fall off the roof... Hence the saying "It's raining cats and dogs."

There was nothing to stop things from falling into the house. This posed a real problem in the bedroom where bugs and other droppings could mess up your nice clean bed. Hence, a bed with big posts and a sheet hung over the top afforded some protection. That's how canopy beds came into existence.

The floor was dirt. Only the wealthy had something other than dirt. Hence the saying, "Dirt poor." The wealthy had slate floors that would get slippery in the winter when wet, so they spread thresh (straw) on floor to help keep their footing. As the winter wore on, they added more thresh until, when you opened the door, it would all start slipping outside. A piece of wood was placed in the entrance-way. Hence: a thresh hold.

In those old days, they cooked in the kitchen with a big kettle that always hung over the fire.. Every day they lit the fire and added things to the pot. They ate mostly vegetables and did not get much meat. They would eat the stew for dinner, leaving leftovers in the pot to get cold overnight and then start over the next day. Sometimes stew had food in it that had been there for quite a while. Hence the rhyme: Peas porridge hot, peas porridge cold, peas porridge in the pot nine days old. Sometimes they could obtain pork, which made them feel quite special. When visitors came over, they would hang up their bacon to show off. It was a sign of wealth that a man could, "bring home the bacon." They would cut off a little to share with guests and would all sit around and chew the fat.

Those with money had plates made of pewter. Food with high acid content caused some of the lead to leach onto the food, causing lead poisoning death. This happened most often with tomatoes, so for the next 400 years or so, tomatoes were considered poisonous.

Bread was divided according to status. Workers got the burnt bottom of the loaf, the family got the middle, and guests got the top, or the upper crust.

Lead cups were used to drink ale or whisky. The combination would Sometimes knock the imbibers out for a couple of days. Someone walking along the road would take them for dead and prepare them for burial.. They were laid out on the kitchen table for a couple of days and the family would gather around and eat and drink and wait and see if they would wake up. Hence the custom of holding a wake.

England is old and small and the local folks started running out of places to bury people. So they would dig up coffins and would take the bones to a bone-house, and reuse the grave. When reopening these coffins, 1 out of 25 coffins were found to have scratch marks on the inside and they realized they had been burying people alive... So they would tie a string on the wrist of the corpse, lead it through the coffin and up through the ground and tie it to a bell. Someone would have to sit out in the graveyard all night (the graveyard shift.) to listen for the bell; thus, someone could be, saved by the bell or was considered a dead ringer.

And that's the truth....Now, whoever said History was boring

This triggered lots of questions and conversations, as well as how true the above could be, Stuntman decided he wanted to do some drawing, so we had half an hour together discussing and practising drawing skills. While he drew a picture of a guy doing the graveyard shift, Einstein opted for some maths, he's heading towards the end of KS3 stuff (3 years in front of his peers) and is starting to find stuff he doesn't understand, my maths skills are not great and I have no idea on most of what he is learning, so we are learning together (the answers usually help me lol), Princess used the french e-course on the laptop then watched a little tv, while me and the boys carried on.   

We broke for lunch and to swap some washing, and whilst eating the chocolate cake we made yesterday we played with the new youview tv box, looking through the old programmes and found that Bang Goes the Theory has a new series, so we sat and watched that, discussing plastics. Of course this triggered lots of questions and discussions. Princess wasn't too interested so she has been playing games on my iPhone and listening to music.  

The boys are now playing skylanders on the PS3 whilst Princess is still on my iPhone, she's running a bakery shop, popping bubbles and listening to classic rock. I'm snuggled up on my newly covered (by me) chaise longue with my laptop thinking I should really go and do some washing. 

Yesterday was music lessons, the kids have been having them for just over a year now and are all doing extremely well, we found a tutor that is willing to work on what interests each kid, so Princess flits between her electric guitar and the keyboard, the tutor has to make a conscious effort to remember she is only 5 years old, as, in her words she's 'never taught a 5 year old' nor has she ever known her 8 year olds in school 'be at the level she is at' she really has found a talent.  Stuntman mostly plays one of his guitars, mostly his electric, but he's starting to find that different styles can sound better on the acoustic, he doesn't learn from books, but rather chooses a piece he likes and learns it with the tutor, Stuntman has a brilliant ear for music and beat. Einstein sticks mostly to the keyboard and works through books, he is really talented and yesterday the tutor mentioned that he could easily be doing exams if he chose to and can not believe in a year how much he has learned. So that is something he is going to consider. The afternoon was spent drinking tea with a very good friend, Alison, her daughter played with Princess while her teen son, read then played on the computer with the boys for a while, it's always good to see friends in the flesh and not just online or on the phone, but since I started home ed, I find I just don't always have the time to organise meet ups, but the plan is to see friends more, especially this one.  Thanks to Alison, I have now been with the fella 5 months, if it hadn't been for my passion for fighting LA's and getting to know Alison, her friend, my now fella wouldn't have added me on FB. 

We had one of those weekends that are calm and smiley, the fella arrived on Friday, we picked him up at the station and went straight to his sisters, an hour and half drive away, it was the first time I'd met her, and she was lovely, it's so refreshing to meet the fella's family and be liked, the ex's family hated me with a passion, well I'm not exactly every mother's dream partner for her little boy LOL.  So that's his kids and now sister, all lovely, I feel so excited and positive about our future :)

Saturday was a quiet day pottering in the garden in the sun, quick trip to the shop for food for tea, the fella cooked, well he tried to stop me, I've been having some hip pain so was ordered to stay sat down and watch, I just couldn't help myself hehe! it was lovely cooking together, playing with the kids, and lots of cuddles. Sunday we only had the morning together and the kids had a friend over, so we went to the park for an hour, the fella went off with the lads to kick a ball around, I couldn't stop smiling and laughing, they are all really rubbish lol but they all had a good time, me and Princess played on the swings and she went on the climbing frame and slide. We dropped the fella at the station and said goodbye again, I hate this part of our weekends together, I miss him so much and only get to see him once a fortnight, hopefully one day soon he will be able to come up north and be closer. The rest of the day I spent planning a holiday down to Cornwall, whilst all the kids had friends in to play.

So nothing too exciting happened, but lots of smiles and happy mummy.

oops it's been a while!

There's been a lot going on here, we have been very busy, whilst the weather hasn't been great, a touch of cabin fever started to set in, so we were glad of the snow. It was lovely watching the fella pulling Princess on her sledge whilst the boys built a snow fort in the garden. It was hilarious watching the kids attacking the fella with snowballs and mostly missing, note to self, some extra visits to the park with a ball to be made this summer. Once we dropped the fella at the station for him to go home, the snow was a good excuse to wrap up warm and go to the park.  We had the whole slope to ourselves, apart from one other family, we assumed the other kids would be in school. Days like that remind me why we home ed,  we were in no rush, we were able to enjoy the snow together and had lots of laughs.

Einstein's long term friend has been acting very weird of late, his attitude since going to comp has changed, he is throwing strops and stomping off in a mardy hissy fit. He is physically attacking other friends and storming out my house slamming the door. After an awful incident, where he hurt another child, I really wasn't sure that I would be comfortable welcoming him in the house again. He had refused to come back and apologise and the injured kid's mum was now refusing to let him near her house again, I can't blame her, but I have known this kid 9 years nearly, I know his home life is awful and I know he sees my place as somewhere safe. Only a couple of weeks previous I had thrown a tea party for his birthday because his mum had not even bought him a present! I'm not at liberty to share any more info, but her priorities are elsewhere, I love this kid like one of my own, so I was really hurt that he had been behaving like this. Einstein was devastated that he may not see his friend again, he actually sobbed for hours, thinking he could have done something to stop his friend being like this, he has no understanding of why he is changing. Einstein is showing no signs of puberty, he's nearly 12) but his friends are and he doesn't understand it at all.  We were really lucky that his friend eventually came here and apologised, cried his heart out on my doorstep and told me that he knew he really shouldn't behave like that. I brought him in the house and had a lovely chat with him and a hug, he then went to play on the ps3 with the boys. I think this is going to be the first of many issues we have as his home life is changing dramatically soon.  I just hope he knows he will always be loved here.

There was a second apology that same week, it came from a lady that I have not got on with for a fair few months, a big difference in opinion sent us our seperate ways.  I am not going to go into details, but something happened that was triggered by her, she realised that she had done wrong and apologised to me, she talked with me, explained what had happened and that she had not meant for any of the bad things to happen. I of course accepted her apology, it is a shame the friendship is way beyond repair, but it warmed my heart that there are some good people out there willing to say 'shit I got that wrong'.

To my surprise there was another huge apology that week, this time one that made me sit down, the clinical psych phoned me, he had received my complaint and wanted to invite me in to discuss it.  As child care options are limited for me I explained that it wouldn't be possible, that I was happy to chat on the phone about it. He went on to apologise for making me upset and for speaking to Einstein in an horrid way. He really sounded sorry, as well as obviously not wanting to get a bollocking from bosses.  He offered to amend the report and address the concerns I raised in writing, which he has now done.  The SALT (Speech and Language Therapy) is next week, she is coming to mine, and will be a couple of hours, of history and then assessment.  The clinical psych is speaking with the ed psych too, both have agreed that Einstein is showing signs of Autism. So maybe one day soon we will have the diagnosis that we have waited 10 years for!

Other happenings have included my FB group has had a massive surge in numbers, we are nearly at a thousand members, many of the newbies to the group are new to home ed, misinformed by dodgy LA staff. My workload is huge, I know I said I was slowing down from it all!, but everyone else's workload is huge too! The difference this year seems to be that LA's are asking for help with re-writing their written info, I have 4 of those on the go (of course once me and the locals involved and the LA reach a final version, I suggest that they send it out for consultation with all the local families), my own LA is behaving badly still and the draft policy has still not been sent out for consultation. SS involvement with home ed seems rife at the moment :( mostly newbies being threatened with SS if they don't let ehe/ewo/cme in. So lot's of sod off, here is the law type letters are being written daily.

Me and the fella were meant to travel to meet up with his best mate and his wife, and his best mates sister (my friend), but the snow made us cancel, instead we stayed in a local Travelodge and my mum had my kids, it was the fella's birthday, so we had a lovely 26 hours just the two of us, I won't share the details, but we did have a really amazing time :)

I have been struggling with a really foul mood and not been able to quite pin point why, then I woke a few days ago, feeling a little more calmer, more at ease, then I found out my Great Uncle had died, I wonder whether my mood was my psychic side telling me that he was ill, maybe I knew, I don't know, but I know it's not the first time my mood has altered before a big event has happened that i had no idea about.   Now I know I wasn't close to Uncle R, but he was my Grandad's brother, the last link to that part of the family, my parents are now the eldest in the family, it scares the crap out of me, cos I am the eldest of the next generation down.  I am gonna be in London visiting the fella next week, the day after we return is the funeral, a friend is having the kids for me, so I can go.

I'm looking forward to our visit to London, we will get to spend time with the fella and also meet his kids, I have now spoken with them both briefly on the phone and I am petrified that they won't like me.  The fella plays a huge roll in their lives, which is fantastic, so it's really important to me that they like me, cos if things get serious with us, he might end up moving up here, I want his kids to want to visit, to stay here too. Time will tell on that one.

In other news Stuntman is having memory issues again, not just when something has been taken/broken etc, but silly little things that are of no consequence that I know he has done, like drawing a picture on his sister, which we all found hilarious, but he had no recollection of doing it! I've got no idea what's going on with him, but he is really hard work at the minute, I am trying to give him more time and attention, more hugs, in the hope that he settles again. He is being like a little dad at times, he makes me smile cos he can be so loving and caring towards his brother and sister. He talks like me sometimes, just tonight, the kids were helping by cooking tea whilst I finished hoovering up (after a huge clearout of the boys room) and I heard him saying to Einstein 'if you aren't gonna help then get out of my way and do something useful' so me! lol :)

Princess is learning so fast it's scary, she picked up a KS1 science workbook the other day and read it to me, words like healthy, diet, abracadabra, etc, without any help and without ever looking at it before, she is only just 5 and a half ! So amazed with her.

So I'm gonna shut up now, well done if you made it all the way through this :) I shall endeavor to blog more often with shorted pieces :)

Living life in the slow lane is fab

 I never expected myself wanting to be living life in the slow lane,  choosing a quieter, simpler life is really working out for us.  It's nice to be having some quiet family time, time with the fella and Christmas. What an amazing, fabulous time we had. The fella came up for a couple of days and left on Christmas Eve, for a guy that claims to be rubbish at gift buying, he did remarkably well, I loved every single gift, he bought the kids a lovely gift each too and we loved watching him open his huge photo collage of me, my kids and his lovely kids too.  Spending time cuddled up watching the kids play, all sat together playing a board game or watching a film was perfect. The smiles were infectious.  


Christmas day was manic as is to be expected with 3 very excited children, their grandparents came round and spent a good majority of the day with us, was lovely watching dad joining in on the PS3, not having a clue what he was doing, or hearing him and my princess singing to queen (very badly).  Once they left we had some quiet time, reading books, playing games and eating the left over party food.  We have still not fully cleared and tidied, the dining table now has various jigsaws, puzzles, paint your own trinket box and airfix cars on it.  The decorations are away, apart from our one piece of tinsel that we leave out all year, just cos we can!

Christmas can be a little overwhelming for kids, let alone kids with ASD, but the joy of home ed has meant we can relax and do calming things when anyone has felt manic, our education style relaxed a good month before Christmas and we have been chatting this week about how we want to start the new year, the kids have decided that because we are so busy that we need a schedule of some sort. So today whilst the younger 2 were with grandad, me and Einstein (his new nickname courtesy of his best friends) waited at the car garage (bloody MOT repairs) and came up with a loose plan. It includes a list of subjects/projects we'd like to do, and also a weekly plan,  it's very flexible but might be enough to encourage us all to do more together.

Over the holidays we didn't have many days where there weren't extra children in the house, one day there were 5 boys aged 9-13, wow it made the house feel small lol, was lovely watching them kicking a ball about, or playing the ps3, or running around playing spies, all the time making sure my princess was joining in.  She often had her friends in to play, they baked or played with the dolls. There were many nerf gun battles and i was the target many times :)

I have more time with the kids now, so we want to use it wisely, I have added more admins to the FB groups, a wide variety of lovely folks, all with different outlooks and different home ed stories,  so I am able to step back a little, I have also chosen to hand over some of the larger LA cases I was working on,  as Doncaster LA is about to release it's draft policy for consultation and I have a feeling we could be in for a bumpy ride, luckily we have lots of local families wanting to be involved in the process.  So with all this time I am reading more, cuddling my babies more, catching up with friends and generally smiling more.

The kids are thriving and happy and its such a difference from 4 years ago. We have some amazing things planned for this year, we can't wait to take the caravan out lots, a trip to London, and they're already making plans for their birthday outings, even the wet weather isn't going to dampen our spirits.

Happy new year to you all, it's wonderful to see so many people interested in reading about our lives. Feel free to leave a comment.

Clinical Psych's and their obnoxious ways

A couple of months ago we finally got the appointment through to see the Clinical Psychologist, he is part of the Autism diagnostic team.  I was hopeful but nervous, as I know Einstein doesn't sit still for long, I expected him to be wandering around the room, looking, reading, touching and then hassling me to hurry up. We arrived early, guy was running late, we waited more than half an hour, he was now bored, we entered the room and the guy demanded that Einstein sit on a specific chair (both chairs were the same (apart from colour) and were next to each other), he took an instant dislike to the chair and asked me if he had to, I was about to say no, when the doc said he had to, so I replied 'no you don't have to sit in that chair if you don't want to' doc scribbled something down. I knew this wasn't a good start.

I made sure he had his book and DS and drink, he then asked the doc how long we were going to be, the doc replied 'we will be done by 1', Einstein responded with 'how long will we be?' the doc looking very angry answered 'we will be done for 1'. He looked confused and looked at me, i checked the time and said it was 12.03. He took a second and replied 'ok, we will be 57 minutes then, that's a long time'. The doc scowled. I already didn't like him.

What pursued was mostly a waste of time, he wanted to know why the boys dad wasn't around, i told him it was none of his business and not something that had any effect on Autism.  He then pressed to know the story of my princess's dad, by now I was really pissed off, I again told him it was none of his business.  I know parental history can be important, but all this is on Einstein's file from previous appointments, but to ask about a child's absent father, with the child in the room, is not on, what would have happened if Einstein had never thought about his dad, didn't know his name etc?? Not on, not on at all!

Then came the dreaded 'which school does he go to', 'he doesn't', conversation. So it went like this:
 'which school does he go to?'
'he doesn't'
'huh?'
'I home educate my chilldren'
'how does that work?'
'they don't go to school and learn at home'
'and what do the authorities think to that'
'nothing cos it's my legal right to educate them'
'how often do they send ofsted?'
'they don't'
'well who checks on you?'
'no-one'
'but who checks they are learning the curriculum'
'they don't learn the curriculum and I am responsible for making sure they learn what they need to'
'but...'
'it is the parents legal responsibility to ensure a child is educated, suitable to their age, ability, aptitude and suited to any special needs they have, the local authority have no duty to intervene'
'oh!'

I love putting twats like that in their place.

The doc kept referring to 'his problem behaviours' the 'things of most concern' I explained that nothing he did was a problem or a concern, he was just different, as is everyone around us, the doc said everything in such a negative way, and for a kid that is already struggling with his differences and still recovering from the hell caused at school and the way other adults and even family have treated him. He was depressed at age 6 because of a school, I wasn't going to let this doc knock his self confidence more. I reiterated that we didn't have problem behaviours, that he was perfect how he was and we weren't looking for therapy to change him, we just want a diagnosis, so he has the answer to what's going on in his head and also to aid with exams and college access.  Doc scribbled again.

He asked very little to be honest, so I had to make sure he knew all the traits that I was aware of.  Einstein was clearly bored as the doc had not engaged with him, beyond demanding which chair he sat on,  then he started to bounce up and down gently on his chair, 'we won't be having any of that in here' the doc barked at him,  he looked at me absolutely petrified so I pulled him close and he lay his head on my lap, I rubbed his head. 'Do you let him do that a lot?' he barked at me 'Yes I fucking do when dicks like you scare him' is what i wish i had replied, but instead I said 'yeah when he's overwhelmed or just wants a cuddle'.  By now I was getting really pissed off and wondered whether for my son's sanity we should leave or not.  We stayed and it got worse, Einstein sat back up and put his hand inside the waist band of his jeans, the doc shouted at him ' young man we won't be doing that in here'. I nearly cried, but knew we must be nearly done cos i had said everything I had wanted to. (yet we'd only been there 30 minutes). The doc said we were done and as we got up he noticed what the book was and asked my son if he liked chess, he looked at me as if to say, 'would I be carrying a book about chess around with me if I didn't like it?'  He didn't reply to the doc.  'well can mum pick out the grammatical error on the front page, she's home schooling you so she should know' WTF???? I was ready to swing for him (plus i couldn't see an error) 'I responded that we had more fun things to learn about than being pedantic about grammatical errors'

The doc asked again about the school situation, I reminded him that it had been 3 years since he was in a school, but the doc was insistent on contacting the school. I told him I didn't see any point.

I can't remember how, but the doc started asking about idioms, Einstein said 'of course I know what one is' so the doc asked if Einstein knew what this idiom meant (I can't remember which example he used) 'no I don't cos they are stupid' (I really thought he was gonna add 'and so are you').  The doc said to me 'he hasn't engaged much at all, I expected him to talk to me more' I really wanted to say, 'be nice and he might' but i just said 'well he engages when he chooses to'.  As we walked back to the car, he replayed the whole meeting, telling me bits I'd forgotten to say, the bits the doc had got wrong and it was clear (as i told the doc) that he had been listening and absorbing every word that was said.

When we got home I spoke to a couple of people and decided this guy was acting like he'd never met a kid on the spectrum before, he was out of line, so I rang the matron on the department and spoke to her, she agreed that he had not acted appropriately and would have a word with him, also that I could make an official complaint if I wished to. I made sure that she knew that under no circumstances was the doc to contact his old school.

That was the last we heard till last week, more than 2 months after the appointment, we get his report. Oh where to start?
His name is wrong more times than it is right!
It says I Home School, AGGGHHHHH!!! I Home Educate, there's no schooling involved.
It states that he has Occupational Therapy, that's wrong as it stopped years ago.
It says Einstein didn't track the conversation, erm yeah he did mate!
There are minor errors all over the place.
And, right at the end, this report is copied to SALT (speech and language therapy) and SCHOOL!!!! he has sent a copy of this report to his old school.

On a plus the report does say that he shows signs of being on the Autistic Spectrum and a referral to SALT for further assessment is made.

So from here?? I will be writing back demanding amendments be made to the report, I will be demanding an apology from the doc for the school being notified, I am now considering a formal complaint against him, his attitude was awful, but as he is the only Clinical Psych in the area, I know i have to tread carefully, cos we are likely to have to see him again, to get the diagnosis, but my baby has said he is not going back if he has to see him again, and I will respect that decision.