Beth’s got the day off again today as she woke up with a dreadful croupy cough. It’s a hard one as she’s seemed well all weekend though the cough has hung around for the last week. It started up again last night and the sceptic in me was thinking “ok, it’s Sunday night, is she starting now cos we’ve got school tomorrow?” She punctuates each cough with “I’m sick” or other things just to emphasize the fact that she really is sick. I’m sure if she was born in the olden days (even before I was born) that she would have been one of those ladies who fainted with their hands to their heads and needed smelling salt as she does ill very well.
She’s not happy with me as I’ve confined her to her room and told her that she has to read a book if she’s not well. On the way home from dropping the kids off she asked which dvd she could watch at home. I haven’t banned tv completely and have said she could watch in the bedroom but of course the bedroom tvs don’t have a set top box so it’s the boring channels that are left at this time of the day. She’s barely coughed at all since we’ve been home. She did let a big one out though when I argued that if she was well enough to sit and play on the computer then she was well enough to go to school. She’s going tomorrow no matter what!
We had a pretty good weekend. Paul couldn’t sail on Saturday as the weather was dreadful so he took Bill to basketball for the first time. I took Bridie to her swimming lessons and Beth tagged along. Bridie’s teacher was so impressed with her that he asked if we had thought about competition. She’s a real natural swimmer and I of course was so proud of her when he suggested it. I think they have to be 7 or 8 so we’ve got a while yet. Bridie told me on the way home that she’d like me in the audience at the Olympics to which I of course said yes! It’s a big commitment to train for swimming but I figure that I spend so much time and energy on Beth that it’s only fair that I do the same for the other kids.
After lunching at Bev and John’s I took Bridie off to a pirate party where I spent the afternoon in the company of all my prep mum friends. We always have a good laugh, I love getting together with my girls.
Sunday we had a quiet one. We were going to look at some display homes to get ideas for the house we are building but Bill and Beth just wanted to stay home. I figured that it was fair enough, we have a very busy week with school and extracurricular activities and are usually out all day Saturday too. It’s nice to just have a veggie day sometimes.
Beth and I stayed for a special assembly at school this morning before coming home. We have a little girl in grade 1 who has liver and lung cancer and all the kids and staff had written on material for her. This in turn had been made into a beautiful quilt that was presented to her stepmum at assembly. It was so special and once again there were tears from most of the parents. It really brings to home how precious our babies are. Also what a wonderful school my kids are at. They’ve organised counselling for kids who need it at school and have done so many wonderful things. They really are a community orientated school, looking out for each other, especially in times such as this. As a parent I think many of us feel quite helpless as there’s nothing we can really do. All we can do is appreciate what we have and not take it for granted.
