Too much?

Triumph. Mog managed a full week in school. The first full week since July. Here is the sweet face of success.Hmmm.

Not even the prospect of showing off these,her most fabulous princess boots, could raise a smile. I think I could even have gotten away with mentioning the fact we introduced some of our friends to the delights of the shoe shop without her finding the energy to frown about it.

I'd say it was a peaceful afternoon.

Well, I'd say it, but it wouldn't be true.

Little Fish, having spent the morning in awed silence following the sight of a clearly terrifying toddler (terrifying to her, he seemed more or less ok to the rest of us), decided to make up for lost time.

She had planned to come home and play some more with this stuff
Which was absolutely fine by me; it keeps her beautifully happy and it dries to a fine dust so I don't need to worry about trying to tidy it up.
But sadly our cleaner decided to bin it. I guess she isn't as relaxed about fine dust as I am for some strange reason.

So instead of sitting quietly in one place sorting fake snow into different containers, she beetled about the house in her chair chattering about how many buses and cars we saw in town, how Jack sat next to her and how she wanted more cheese and little bitta juice pleeeeeese Mummy and story and scissors and cutting and then a quick drawing of breath and oh tubbytubbies, tubbytubbies, until Mog and I got tired of the incessant whitter and decided she needed bed.

It's been a strange old week. I've opted out of much of it, some through choice and some through necessity. The girls have had to cope with having other people care for them - and I've had to cope with letting other people do the caring. I'm realising that there are holes in our system; too much of the girls' care is a case of finely tweaking things on a daily basis. That's fine as long as I'm around to tweak. But when I'm out of touch, things get left, tiny things in themselves, but they've mounted up. Little Fish was extremely uncomfortable yesterday as a result of several days of tiny things not being done. Tonight she's several pounds lighter and comfortable once more, but I hadn't foreseen that being a problem for her. We need a bowel management routine which isn't reliant on my personal judgement several times a day, but which is robust enough to cope with my absence. Sadly the one the doctors favour seems to involve surgery and I'm not convinced that's really the best plan right now.

For Mog it's been a good week. I had to throw school in at the deep end on Monday, having run out of alternative care arrangements whilst in court, and they coped. We were in contact, staff have received additional training, and I think it is safe to say she's reasonably happy about being back again. She even managed swimming this afternoon, which I think probably caused the energy overdraft, but was also a nice reward for her for managing school all week.

And me? I am thinking about dipping my toes back into life again. A lovely morning just sitting with friends watching the world go by and setting bits of it to rights. Carers and sitters and school have rallied around and thankfully I haven't had to do very much at all for the past few days. Now it's the weekend and I'm thinking that just possibly I'll have the energy I need to not just get through but hopefully enjoy it too.

That won't happen though unless I get my sleep. Little Fish is snoozing and her Nippy is puffing gently. Mog's music has just finished and she is snoring and snuffling. Two cats are curled up on different but equal cushions, and the house itself is making little night-time noises - the wind blowing down the chimney causing the boiler to flutter slightly, gentle creaks as the letterbox shifts with the breeze, water clinking through the pipes, and the computer's fan complaining quietly. I should let it, and me (and possibly the comma key), rest.

Tia