Life

What a busy couple of weeks it has been.

A lot of time has been spent at lawyers offices fixing up trusts & setting up our own family trust. There has been numerous trips to the other side of town to check the post office box & go to the gym or swimming, and then there is always the boys activities.

Brent especially, is very busy this term. I have kind of made it that way in hopes that maybe by doing more sporting activity he might burn off some of the energy he seems to have. he seems to have hit a phase of "silliness & show offness". It gets on my nerves after a while & then there is still the talking back. It just might be a phase but he seems to be enjoying the activity so that is nice. He's not going to be a great sportsman, he'll probably be a muddler like me, can turn his hand at any sport & have fun doing it. He still doesn't seem to have that competitive urge except if it is against James.

So what is Brent doing? On Monday's at 7:25am he has an hour long tennis lesson. He has really only just picked up a tennis racket this term & he really seems to be enjoying it. On Tuesday lunchtimes he has his football practice. On Wednesday mornings at 7:40 he has about 20-30 minutes of fitness at school. Thursday after school he has an hour long football practice. That's the one that Scott goes to & lends a hand at, because he is actually the team's manager. On Fridays at 5:00 both boys have swimming lessons, still out at QE2. Then on Saturday he plays his football game. The fitness that he is doing is starting to show in his football game now which is wonderful.

That's the activity & then on top of that there is the school work, the homework & a few extras that weren't on the list last term. One extra is that both boys have to learn the words to a particular hymn & a particular song (Somewhere over the Rainbow) for the music evening that is coming up on 1 July. Brent also has enrichment this term. Enrichment is when the boys pick a topic to research & do a presentation on. Brent has chosen Christchurch history. He has already found a couple of intersting links to his ancestors. One of them was finding out that the Manson side of the Criglington family arrived with William Deans before the first 4 ships. The other fact is that a Jackson relative (the Francis side of the family) built the first church in Christchurch.

James is also busy this term. I have kept his activity minimal but some of it is school enforced. He has Perceptual Motor Program (PMP) on Wednesday morning with the other year 1 & 2 boys. On Friday he has swimming lessons & on Saturdays he plays football within the Burnside Football Club. He is still struggling with his reading, spelling, writing & maths, so he is going to remedial reading. This means more homework than other boys & it has been a big workload, sometimes I don't think his teacher realises how much work he has. I have been limiting the amount he does to more than the minimum but nothing excessive & sometimes he still doesn't get the worksheets completed. He has had a success this term already in that in the last week he has been moved up a spelling group! I am really thrilled, because it has come about since I bought magnetic letters & got him to start off learning to spell his words by putting the letters on the fridge. I then also get him to write them down (he still has letter writing issues on B, D, P Q & his N & H can look a lot alike) & then he says it to me. This happens each night & it takes about 10 minutes but it really is starting to help him I think. Now on top of that he has to also learn those same two songs as Brent & he is also learning about 6 -8 dances for folk dancing night on 19 June.

So really it is not just me being busy ferrying boys to & from school & various times of day but they are full on too.

Mum had her third round of iv chemo go in last Thursday. It would seem that this time it has really knocked her about. She has not been feeling at all well & can't seem to be very far from the toilet. I have been ringing her up to check that she doesn't need any groceries or anything while I happened to be over that side of town clearing the post box. I also took up some fruit & veges on Friday so maybe she can just make herself some pumpkin soup when she has just a bit more energy. Jo seems to be worried about mum getting isolated up on the hill, & yes I think that could happen if we let it, but I will try not to let that happen. At the moment I think mum would just like to die peacefully in her own bed up on the hill. She is certainly not in the mental zone to buy a new house on the flat & then it really isn't a good time to be selling a house anyway. She should have sold last year when we suggested it but she didn't want to. Even now she says there is too much stuff that needs to be done around the house before it could be in a decent state to be sold. I really think a better option might be to see if we can't get a private nurse in, if needed, rather than put mum through so much upheaveal at this time in her life.

So after having the thought that she was dying compartmentalised away in my brain & not really thinking about it, trying to stay positive, all of a sudden I am faced with it again. I suppose this is going to happen more times & maybe each time it will get easier to face, but right now I want to bury my head back in the sand or in my case, in scrapbooking the living, the memories, however I can't seem to scrapbook anything to do with mum. It feels wrong to say that & rather stupid not to while she is still here, but it hurts already.