Silent Saturday

The Gallery 161 - Sulky Lucy - Like Mother like Daughter

This week's Gallery Prompt from Tara over at Sticky Fingers is One title: No words. (oops words were already on the edited picture hope that's ok :) )

Locked In

I just read a post on CupcakeMummas blog about getting locked out of her house whilst her little boy was inside http://cupcakemumma2011.blogspot.ie/2013/10/when-faced-with-locked-door.html .

This made me think of a similar incident that happened to me last December. Stupidly I had left the key to the bathroom door in the lock, on the outside of the door. Jack had been playing upstairs the day before and I wanted to keep him out of the bathroom so I had locked the bathroom from the outside and I forgot to take the key out later on.

So the following morning I am in the bathroom with my daughter who was 14 months old at the time. The bathroom door was ajar and Jack who was 3 at the time was pottering around upstairs. He closed the door then I heard the key turn, I could honestly feel the blood drain from my face. I tried the door and yes it was locked, Jack was laughing at the otherside of the door until he realised he couldn’t turn it back again and that Mammy and Lucy were stuck in the bathroom then he got really really upset. I was trying to calm him down, and I could hear him trying to turn the key but typically the lock was a bit stiff to unlock and the poor little fella had no chance of opening it.  I then heard him go downstairs and then I began to panic, not due to being locked in the bathroom but because Jack was pottering around the house on his own.  I was extremely thankful that I had Lucy with me as she had been walking from 10 months that would have been disastrous, although the only other place she would have been without me would have been in her cot, hence why she was in the bathroom with me at the time!

I tried kicking the door in, but no joy, I tried shouting out my bathroom window hoping one of my neighbours would hear me.  I am at this for ages, screaming my head off and nothing! Thank god there wasn’t a fire or something. Eventually one of my neighbours heard me and I managed to get her to call the OH’s parents who have a spare key, but just as she had called them, I see a towel rail still in the packet hidden in the corner, the OH had been meaning to put it up for the past year. So I got that and managed to put a hole in the door, I called Jack and he came back up to the door, I used a screw from the rail to poke the key out of the lock which fell on the floor and Jack handed me the key through the hole and then I got myself out.  Panic over thank god!

The key for the door has now been put away to stop that from ever happening again.  Thank god the OH didn’t put the towel rail up.  It seems like a funny story when telling people, but at the time I was frantic, I certainly learnt my lesson that day.
  

This is my bathroom door with the hole in it !

Pirates Village - Liffey Valley

Last Saturday took the kids to Pirates Village in Liffey Valley, Dublin. When we got there Lucy fell asleep so she didn’t see much of it. Jack loved it.  He’s such a little dare devil. He loves the tallest inflatable slide. My nerves were shot the first few times he went on it but he is well able, I probably need to realise he’s not a little baby anymore he’s a proper little boy who is able for these kind of things. 

I would have got photos of him actually coming down the slide but a little boy fell on him on the steps and he was a bit upset and that was the end of the slides for the day!

When Lucy eventually woke up, she had a go on the baby bouncy castle after a little encouragement but she wasn’t sure at all, even though she’s been on them before. Then she saw a smaller version of the slide Jack was going on and she wanted to go on it. She was definitely too little for it on her own she wouldn’t have made it up the steps. So what happens mammy has to bring her on!!

Going Back to Creche

Earlier this month I started back on my course. This is the second year of the 2 year course. Which also meant after 10 weeks off the kids started back at the crèche, which I was dreading as last year was a bit of a nightmare. They would both cry every morning when I was leaving them in, and just as they were beginning to get use to the idea of going they started getting every bug under the sun. So they would have time off from going, this made the whole settling in process even worse. I don’t think they really settled in properly until after Christmas.

This year was completely different they were both fine going in. I thought Jack might have been the worse out of the two and I was a bit worried as I was having problems with toilet training him. I had to keep telling him to use the toilet/potty. He hadn’t quite grasped knowing when to go on his own.

But kids being kids completely surprised me Jack has been great going in and going back to crèche has helped his toilet training no end.  I think it is because he sees all the other kids using the toilet. I have seen a great difference in him he may have one accident every couple of days and is now doing better than some of the other kids in his class. This was a great relief as he was trained quite late.

Lucy's 1st dat at Creche 2012

Lucy's 1st back at creche 2013

Lucy still isn’t overly impressed going in, but I think most of the time she is having me on. She is fine in the car and as she is getting out of the car she’s happy and says “we go and see jenny, we go and see Jenny” (Jenny is her carer).  Then as soon as we get to the door of her room she snuggles into me and looks real sad. I hand her over to jenny and she is still sad but as soon as I have left (or she thinks I have left) she is fine, I usually hang around outside the room for a couple of mins and have a look in on her and she is playing away.   When I go to pick her up she is full of chat and telling me all about her friends.    

Jack's 1st day
in pre-school 2013

            

Jack's 1st
day at
Creche 2012

Jack started back at crèche in same class as last year for a couple of weeks then he moved up to the Pre-School class.  The difference I have seen in him since changing room is unbelievable.  He is so eager to go in and even asks to go in at the weekends. He absolutely loves it, his talking and toilet training have improved massively.

Jack and Lucy's
1st day
back at creche

Jack & Lucy 1st day
at creche 2012

Last year I felt so guilty leaving them at crèche that I nearly dropped the course. I am so glad I stuck with it. This year I feel really good knowing that I am doing the right thing by them. The activities they get to do are wonderful, they get fed really well and healthy (they eat a lot better in crèche than at home, must be my cooking lol) and it is great for the social aspect of it as well. 

Dublin Half Marathon

So it’s been a while l since I last posted on here. I have been busy training and then getting over the half marathon.  So you saw my last post expressing my disbelief at getting the unluckiest race number on one of the unluckiest days of the year, well I certainly got my 3 lots of bad luck on race day.  It started early in the morning I stepped onto my bed to open the curtains and as I stepped off the bed I stood on a shoe and went flying and twisted my ankle, thankfully after about half an hour it felt okay.  Then after I got dropped off at the phoenix park I realised I had left my phone holder thing at home, I was trying to call the OH to see if I left in the car, but as always at these events there was no phone signal, so this meant I had to hold the bloody thing for the whole race. Then after all the faffing about I was too late to meet with a group of runners that I had agreed to meet.

Thankfully that is where my bad luck ended. I felt absolutely fine for the whole race; I kept my pace at around 5.30 mins per km whereas my normal pace would be just under 5 mins.  It was only as I was getting to the last couple of miles my legs were beginning to get sore.  It was a very warm morning compared to the weather we had been having recently, which was typical, but I was glad I had thoroughly hydrated myself all morning.  There had been warnings that temperatures would get up into the 20’s There were quite a few people who got into trouble I seen one guy being given air at about 8 miles and quite a few people had to stop and walk.  I have to say thought I think it was rather cruel of the organisers to leave the hilly part of the run to near the end I think it was between 10 and 12 miles. I think it would have been better at half way or near the beginning of the race.

For some reason I had it in my head that a half marathon was 20km, when the Endomondo lady in my ear informed me I had done 20km, there was no sign of the finishing line, it was a little soul destroying.  It was actually 21.1km!  When the finish line came into sight I managed to find a surge of energy from somewhere and sprint the last 500m. I finished in 1hr 57:34. I was delighted!

As soon as I got through the finish line and stopped running the whole bottom part of me got very sore I just had to sit down for about half an hour. I did a few stretches but probably not as many as I should have.  I then had to walk about 2 miles to get back to the car carrying my 2 year old who refused to go into her pushchair or walk for that matter.

When I got home I was absolutely shattered, legs and knees were killing me and that was me for a good few days afterwards. Laid up with very sore legs and all I wanted to do was sleep. I was actually shocked at just how much it had taken out of me as I had been doing 18km runs the last couple of weeks and had been feeling fine afterwards.

I was extremely sad to hear that some poor young man had collapsed on the run and subsequently died. It’s always sad when you hear that kind of news but it really hits you when you hear it was a fellow runner and they were at the same event and doing the same thing that you were doing only a few hours ago.  My thoughts and condolences are with his family and friends, it really took the shine off the event and I will probably think of that young man whenever I take part in similar races.             

It is now Thursday and the legs are still a bit sore but I am feeling a lot better in myself, I have got my energy back. I honestly don’t know how people do the full marathon. I am hoping to do it next year for my 35^th birthday, I will have to look into getting some proper nutrition advice and training for that one I think.    

Friday the 13th!!

I go running a couple of times a week. I love it! It's my stress outlet, just me and my music or an hour or so. Anyway I have signed up to do the Dublin half marathon on the 21st September and I got my race number in the post today, today being Friday the 13th  of September. Take a look at my race number, is someone taking the pi$$ or what ?!