We’ve had a pretty full on day today. This morning Bill and Bridie had swimming lessons. Usually I would take Bill and Paul would bring Bridie and Beth up a little later as Bill’s lesson is at 11 but Bridie’s doesn’t start til 12. I’m not sure why we didn’t do that this morning. I wish we had! We’ve had a couple of late nights this week, Thursday night I had a shoe party which kept the kids up and mucking around a bit, then Friday we had the school disco. I took the littlies for 6 to 7.30 and then Paul took Beth from 8 til 9.30. Bethie loves these dances and literally bops til she drops. She was exhausted when she came home but for some reason still woke up at the ungodly hour of 6am this morning!
Anyway, back to swimming. Bill went in for his lesson so Beth and Bridie were in the play lane. Beth was all over the place, flinging herself in the air and backwards, without bothering whether there were people behind her or not. Often there were. She was jumping up and down and making all the noises that she does. She lay across the width of the lane, not moving when people were trying to get past at all. She was having one of those moments when it appears she is deaf and is her own little world. Problem was the moment went on the whole time! In the end I got her out with the promise of a hot chocolate from the machine in the foyer. Of course when we got out there they had run out of cups which pissed her off mightily!
We went to Bev and John’s house for lunch. Paul caught Beth drinking something from a little medicine cup that she had found. Now don’t tell me that autistic kids can’t lie. We think she had just mixed some soap and water, there’s never anything dangerous left out when Beth’s around. But the lies she told! She said that it was some chocolate that she had found on the kitchen counter, and had a very good and reasonable explanation as to how it got into her cup and why she drank it. She kept saying bye as she wanted to go home and putting her hands on her hips as if to emphasise her seriousness. I can laugh about it now but at the time it frustrated the hell out of me. When she’s like this she’s sooooo autistic!
I must say it’s been a pretty big couple of days. Yesterday was fabulous, just confirming to me what a wonderful school Menzies Creek is. One of our teachers has a lymphoma so we decided to register the school in the Worlds Greatest Shave. We ended up with the largest team in Victoria. Not bad for a little country school! We are the 7th highest fundraising team in Victoria. It was such a overwhelming feeling of community spirit. We even had a representative come out from the Leukaemia Foundation who had been watching our progress online. He was at a loss for words when he spoke of how we do a walk to school on the mornings that Rianne has her treatment, giving a gold coin donation to go towards the Leukaemia Foundation. We were all teary when Tanya spoke of what a brave and selfless person Rianne is and how loved she clearly is by the Menzies Creek team. Beth and Bridie had their hair sprayed before we went to school and I had my hair coloured for the fundraiser. Bree shaved the back of her head (and her legs which hadn’t been shaved in 15 years) and Prue shaved her whole head as did a couple of other brave mums. Bree even drew an eye on the back of Prue’s head to prove to her kids that mums do have eyes in the back of their heads! Beth decided that she wants to colour for a fundraiser next year so I think it’ll be a family effort.
We have Beth’s birthday outing tomorrow so we’re really looking forward to that one. Off to Alice in Wonderland followed by lunch at Hogs Breath, a real grown up treat. Can’t wait, will let you know how we go, hopefully with a few photos. xxx
