Pretty Productive Day :-)

I had a "pull your socks up" talk with myself and decided that I've got to stop despairing over the fact that I'm nowhere near ready for Christmas and do something to get ready!! So this morning me and Princess Lollipop got up at the same time as Mr Messy and Little Prince, the boys got ready together while I got Princess Lollipop breakfasted and ready. When Mr Messy returned from dropping Little Prince at school he swapped the car seat into his car (we definitely need to get a second seat for his car!) and took Princess Lollipop to OUR shop with him. I then got on with wrapping presents, well first I went on a Treasure Hunt - where HAD I hidden all the pressies lol. When I had finally found them all, I started to blitz the wrapping. I got a phone call from Drama Teen (College closed early for the Christmas hols and Mr Messy had gone to pick her up) at about 11.30am to warn me that they were almost home and to hide all evidence! Luckily I was wrapping in Princess Lollipop's old room, so all I had to do was keep the door shut. Mr Messy put the car seat back in my car, mutter about what a nuisance Drama Teen was the whole time lol, and then he headed off back to OUR shop. He was due another huge delivery of Christmas orders from our framers, and various clients due in to pick up their orders so he had to rush back. Before he left he pointed out that I had two very flat tyres and told me to make sure I went to the nearest garage to pump them back up before I went anywhere!

I got Drama Teen to look after Princess Lollipop, while I went back upstairs to finish wrapping the presents. And I did it, I did it :-) I got everything, absolutely everything wrapped and hidden away - and all evidence of what I'd been up to safely put away :-) By now it was past the time we should have left to drop Drama Teen off at her friend's house for a Christmas party. As the friend only lives a couple of villages up the river, I decided to take a chance on my tyres and go straight there. It had been snowing on and off all morning, but nothing significant seemed to have stuck on the ground, so I set off down the river road. As we left the village it became obvious that the road was EXTREMELY slippery and at one bend in the road we had a spectacular skid, zigzagging all over the road before we made it round the corner! It really scared both me and Drama Teen, especially as I had already been driving at only 30mph and had barely touched my brakes!! After that I drove even slower and we skidded a couple more times but not nearly as dramatically, thankfully!

Once I had safely dropped Drama Teen off, me and Princess Lollipop drove straight to the supermarket garage to get air in the tyres. There was someone using the air line, so I had to wait, and the way the garage is configured meant that I had to wait off to one side - so it wasn't immediately obvious that I was queuing for the air line. When the first person had finished I'd just put my car in gear to move, when some cheeky blighter nipped from the pumps to the air line!! Bleeping hell!! So once again I sat there and waited, with Princess Lollipop getting more and more agitated and crying louder and louder - she wanted "UP Mummy" and she wanted it now!! Then some cheeky *bleep* nipped right round me and pulled up right behind the person still using the air line!! I wasn't taking it lying down this time, and I pulled right up the bumper of the queue jumper - there's no easier way to annoy an English person than to push in front of them while they politely queue!!! We'll get so disgruntled we'll even MUTTER at you!! The person who had queue jumped must have noticed my reaction, or got bored waiting for the doddery old bloke to finish checking every single one of his tyres, and he just drove off. YES!! I was NEXT :-) So I finally got to pump up my tyres - which were VERY VERY low on air according to the air line meter gauge!!!

Princess Lollipop was a little better now I was actually driving again, but as soon as she saw the McDonalds she started shouting and crying for "hot hot hot" (her name for Macs). We had no time as we had to get straight onto the motorway and make our way back to our village to pick Little Prince up from school, she cried for quite a lot of the journey :-( We were a little bit early when we got back in the village, which meant I had time to nip home and pick up the Christmas cards I needed to give out at school. Princess Lollipop as usual wasn't impressed at having to walk in the snow, despite her boots and snowsuit keeping her warm, and she minced and complained the whole way lol. She was even less impressed that Little Prince wasn't coming home with us as he was going to play at his friend J's house! So I stopped at the village shop to get her some Chocolate Buttons on the way home as a treat - chocolate always cheers me up :-) We had a nice quiet snuggly hour or so to ourselves when we got home, which Princess Lollipop seemed to really need as she hardly left my lap the whole time. I also managed a quick call to Lil Sis, to let her know that I am hoping (depending on the weather) to get over to see our Mum and Dad tomorrow to drop off Christmas presents at her house (including the ones for Lil Sis's children). We also had a chat about our boys, as Lil Sis's son who is a bit older than Little Prince is also undergoing various tests to see if he has similar problems to Little Prince - its funny (coincidence funny, not funny haha) that we are both going through such similar issues at the same time, as our boys aren't blood related. But I do find it helps to have someone who totally understands to chat to about it all - so thank you Lil Sis :-)

I was a little late collecting Little Prince from J's house, but the boys seem to have settled down somewhat now that me and J's Mum are limiting the number of times they play (once a week at alternating houses) and keeping the time fairly short. We (the mums) aren't so frazzled and tearing our hair out at the end of the visits now lol. Then we called round to Post Lady's house so that I could drop off a picture of her daughters with her. Mr Messy had used the photograph for a promotion he was running last year, before we fell out, and when the promotion had finished we didn't know what to do with it! Its too good a picture to just throw away, but he didn't want to use it in any other promotions as the family could have complained or objected. So we've just stored the picture at our house ever since the promotion finished. Now that my friendship with Post Lady has resumed, although a lot more distant than we were before, it made sense to give them the picture. I got a message from Post Lady later saying how much she loved the photograph and how much she appreciated us giving it to her.

We then had to drive back to the motorway to go and pick Drama Teen back up again. We got to the major junction near OUR shop, and were delayed by a serious accident right in the middle of the junction. There only seemed to be one car, but the front end was completely concertina-ed. There were two Ambulance men working on someone in the back of the car, which worries me as it could be a child :-( Someone is probably going to have a pretty bad Christmas :-( The Police eventually allowed me to turn at the junction, and we carried on our way. The traffic was very heavily built up, so I decided we would visit the supermarket and pick up some more bits and pieces before coming home, to give everything a chance to clear up. Once we picked Drama Teen up, I got her to ring Mr Messy and let him know that's what we'd be doing - she was already worried about where I was as I was 20 minutes late! And after our skidding about earlier she was worried I might have crashed!!

Mr Messy asked us to call in at the DIY Shop to see if they had any of the cheap heaters they'd been advertising on their website, to use to warm up OUR shop. He's been freezing in there all week!! Unfortunately they were sold out, but they gave me their number so that I can ring and check if they've had another delivery and reserve one before going to pick it up. I'd left the three children in the car, as Princess Lollipop was fast asleep - she'd woken up moments after I'd left and had been sobbing for Mummy ever since :-( Even adopting her so young and having with us for over 18 months now, and me barely having any time away from her, hasn't negated the fact that she seems so insecure about whether or not I'll come back :-( I'll just have to keep on with the attachment parenting and hope that one day she does feel more secure.

We managed to get everything we needed/wanted from the Supermarket - even our normal weekly 6 loaves of bread - yes SIX loaves of bread per WEEK!! I laughingly assured the checkout girl that I wasn't panic buying - this is normal for us!! It was quite late by the time we left the supermarket, so we went over to Macs to get the littlies a drive through. As I was ordering Princess Lollipop was behind me bellowing "Titchin hot hot" (chicken hot hot otherwise known as nuggets!) I'm not sure what the server made of that lol.

It was a good two hours or more after we had first driven past the accident near OUR shop, when we drove back through the same junction. And they were only just moving the concertina-ed car! It must have been pretty bad for them to be only just moving it :-( I hope whoever was involved is ok and just has a smashed up car to deal with..

When we got home Little Prince decided he wanted to watch an underwater archaeology programme with Daddy. However, he was way too excited and hyped up to even look at the TV, so eventually I persuaded him that it would be a lot more fun to go and read in bed for a while instead. This lowered Mr Messy's blood pressure as he was trying to watch the programme, which was all about recovering a crashed WWII Lancaster from the sea. Once Little Prince was tucked up in bed I put our tea on, sorted out some more washing and cleared up the kitchen. Princess Lollipop snuggled up on her Daddy's knee, until I came back and she demanded to get down and go to Mummy - I know this upsets Mr Messy but I don't know how to change it :-( At the moment Princess Lollipop seems to be getting more clingy to me rather than less :-(

After we'd eaten our tea I got the very tired Princess Lollipop settled down for bed, and then helped Drama Teen empty the shopping out of the car. We got it all put away, but trying to fit anything else in the freezer was a nightmare!! We had to play freezer tetris, to try and fit everything in - but we finally managed it :-) Then Drama Teen made a batch of buns, as part of her Christmas present to her Boyfriend. She is going to ice the buns with one letter each of "Merry Christmas" :-) While we were getting the shopping from the car and putting it away Little Prince came downstairs multiple times, and ended up getting shouted at before actually staying in his room and settling down! This seems to be his new norm, rather than wake up at a ridiculously early hour he stays up later and later each night!

Once he was finally settled and I was sure he wasn't coming downstairs again, I got to facetime chat with LMS :-) I love love love this application on Mr Messy's phone, and its so special to be able to see my biggest (well oldest at least lol) baby while chatting to her :-) I really cherish our chats and never want to hang up, I usually flatten the battery on Mr Messy's phone we talk for that long lol. It is beginning to really hit me that she won't be home for Christmas - the first time EVER she won't be with us for Christmas. I've been pushing this fact, quite successfully, to the back of my mind and its only now as Christmas is almost upon us that it is actually sinking in. I'm trying to be brave and hold onto the fact that LMS is where she wants to be and with who she wants to be with, but it still hurts so much that she isn't here. I miss her so much :-( I know you read this blog LMS and I'm not saying this to get at you, or to try and make you feel bad - I'm just recording my feelings. I hope that you have a fantastic Christmas with your American Boyfriend and that you start to make traditions that will follow you through your future together and memories that you will always cherish. And although you will be sorely missed here, we will still have a fantastic joy (and toy lol) filled Christmas, and we will be able to share a little on facetime too :-)