Mouldy update

Incase you were concerned, the mouldy ones are improving rapidly. Hooray!

I gave them their last dose of fever medicine last night at bedtime. They went to bed early, at about 6:15 (7 - 7:30 is normal) and Spike woke up at 7ish and 8ish... and I thought 'oh no! this is going to go on all night!' but that was it from both of them until after 7 this morning. So that's good.

They both came to church, and have eaten properly all day (a huge improvement on yesterday when Spike barely ate anything and Dude ate no lunch, just lay on the sofa feeling mouldy). There has been no fever since last night and they have been fine. Dude took himself to bed tonight at 6:45 and fell asleep before Spike came in after his shower, but considering that I was thinking I was going to have to take him to the doctor on Monday he is fine. I think he will even go to school tomorrow. He did his homework this afternoon, with no more complaints than usual, and has since been playing lego happily with Pip... perhaps a bit more tired than normal this evening, but otherwise just fine.

And the antibiotics have certainly done the trick for Spikey's chest infection. He was really poorly on Friday evening, coughing up great wads of phlegm (tmi?), totally miserable and very hot and sweaty. Today, after 2 full days of meds he is just fine. Snotty, sure, but not even coughing much, which is great!

So I am one relieved Mummy!

Thank God for the NHS - I got an appointment an hour after I called, was seen by a lovely nurse, and was home with the antibiotics (which were free because Spike is under 16) by 10:30am. And I got my (free!) flu jab that afternoon - and I had only booked in that morning when I was in the doctor's office! I know we pay for it with taxes, but 'what the eye doesn't see the heart doesn't yearn after!' The convenience and security is so worth it. One big reason to live on this side of the pond.

And that's as political as I am going to get. Nighty night, folks. I am off to listen to the sweet sound of children breathing peacefully in their sleep.

Mouldy Children

Dude told me today that he was mouldy.

"Mouldy means", he said, "when you're not feeling very well."

An odd correlation, but I know where he's coming from.

Both Dude and Spike have a bad cough and a fever. Spike has been worse, and when I took him to see the 'nice nurse' on Friday she listened to his chest and said it was very congested and gave him some amoxycillin. He is improving a lot. Dude hasn't, and if he isn't much better by Monday I'm going to take him in to visit her.

Feeding Frenzy

I filled up the sunflower feeder this morning (aka 'giving the birds their breakfast'). By lunch it was empty, so I went out a few minutes ago and refilled it, plus I topped up the peanuts and put two more fat-balls in that feeder too.

This so thrilled the birds that we had a veritable feeding frenzy on our hands! A huge flock of sparrows, FOUR goldfinches and a couple of greenfinches decended en-masse and the lot of them flapping around and jockeying for the best angle on each feeders. Amazing to watch.

Earlier we had been visited by our woodpecker, not once, but twice! He goes for the peanuts. And we had THREE collared doves moseying around on the grass below. I had only seen two before, so now I am wondering if this third might be a chick, all grown up now. Do collared doves mate for life?

I get such a lot of pleasure from these little guys. Worth every penny I spend on bird-food.

So Proud!

Probably the proudest Cub Scout in the world...
Pip's Cub pack had a 'race night' tonight. They had been given a project. 3 weeks to turn a block of wood into a racing car... towards some badge or another. The variety of cars was incredible and there were prizes for all sorts of things - best wheels, fastest car, distance, originality, 911 look-alike... It was a lot of fun, and we raised money for Children in Need which is always a good thing.

And Pip-squeak won the 'best paint-job' prize! He was so proud of himself... I just wanted you to see.

Thoughts of a flea-brained mother

Dude is on his way to being entirely toothless. Another one fell out on Friday while he was brushing his teeth, and yet another one is wiggly! I have warned him that it may be a diet of soup and porridge for him. He thinks it's hilarious - being gross is his favourite pass-time. Well, he is a 6 yr old boy!

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Since the bird-feeding-tree has lost all its leaves I have started re-filling the birdfeeders. We have fat-balls, peanuts, niger seed and hulled sunflower seeds. Sunflower seeds go fastest, followed by fat-balls, then peanuts. Niger is a very poor last favourite. I rarely see any bird there. Even the goldfinches (Niger is supposed to be their absolute favourite) ignore it and scoff the sunflower seeds.
This morning I counted 7 species while eating my breakfast:
goldfinches, sparrows, chaffinches, greenfinches, a wren (ok, he was hopping on the fence behind the tree, but still), collared doves pecking at the spillages on the ground, and, joy of joys, a greater spotted woodpecker!!!!

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Good mother/bad mother. You judge.

Bad:

Yesterday Pip had his bestest friend over for a serious Lego session, and what did I do? It was a gorgeously blue day, so I winkled them out of the bedroom and outside to help me fill my new leaf bags, which I ordered the other day. They weren't impressed and being press-ganged into child labour, although things looked up when I offered them 50p a bag (there were 5 bags) each to spend at the Church Fair that afternoon.

Good:

This evening Pip and I painted designs on his 'design a car' project for cubs. They got given a piece of wood, about 2.5" by 6" by 4", a few metal washers and the instructions to turn it into a car by adding bits/ taking away bits/ decorating it. They were allowed help since it was bound to involve saws... I now have red and yellow gloss paint on my fingertips from holding it in the wrong place. *sigh*

Tooth Update

Dude's wiggly tooth has fallen out... so now he is entirely gap-toothed.

And wonder of wonders, the Tooth Fairy didn't 'get lost' last night and actually managed to leave a golden pound in exchange for the newest brick in her Tooth Castle. Way to go, Tooth Fairy!

Halloween

Just thought you might like to see my Halloween gouls and ghosties:

They were very proud of themselves and enjoyed being scary...

And here is Dude with his pumpkin-teeth, just in time for Halloween he lost one and the other is so wiggly he can turn it around in his head. Quite disgusting, really!