Katie is 10! & Christmas 2013

Katie is 10!
How did that happen?
I have been telling her for a long time now (purely from a selfish point of view)  that I will keep her forever "my little girl" and that means she can never go into double figures! She must stay forever 9!
But now she is 10! And I couldn't be more proud of her.
Of course, it's silly to imagine I could keep her forever my baby, but I have so enjoyed every single minute being her mum. She was a "surprise" baby ; such a surprise_ I couldn't imagine how we were ever going to cope. She arrived during the saddest part of my life. Mum had just died, after a very short illness, and I was so, so low. I couldn't see a way forward. A new baby was the last thing on my mind but my mum had other ideas.

My mum knew about Katie. She knew, even before I did. She talked to me about a "baby" just before she died.
They never met, mum and Katie, and yet it's like they know each other.

I am grateful every day for the wonderful mum I had, and for the little girl who was sent to mend a broken heart.

Happy Birthday Katie. Can't believe you are 10 already!!
 

Once again we made the trip to our motherland, otherwise known as "Newcastle" to visit our respective families this Christmas.
In one weekend we managed to fit in two shopping trips to the Metrocentre, two visits to my dad's house, a visit to my sister's house, with a cuddle from her gorgeous new baby "Lil Dottie" and a visit to Dave's boys' home, where, once again I managed to drink too much wine! Thankfully, Dave's ex managed to get herself more drunk than me so I don't feel so guilty! Well, it is Christmas!



We love the Christmas decorations in the Metrocentre

Katie and her big brother at Nando's

Jaime, Tony and cheeky Charlie arrived a few days before Christmas. Our house was so busy and noisy and messy...but filled with LOVE

Charlie loves playing the piano!

 Charlie helped his Nanny with the housework. Well...you have to get the place tidy for Santa coming! Charlie is definitely on Sants's "good list".

Jaime left Christmas Eve to spend the holidays with her dad in Newcastle.

Normality and order were resumed in our home, but it is so so quiet! How can one little cheeky 2 year old make his presence known so acutely?

Christmas Day was just the three of us and everything was perfect.

I still wonder what I have done to deserve such a lovely life and a beautiful family.
Truly Blessed.x

The Mayor's Chair

Katie in the Mayor's Chair

I have purposefully not blogged about this, but my little family has become quite political where home education is concerned. Back in June we became "known" to Bedford LA and since then it has become a roller coaster of a journey trying to "educate" them regarding there duties towards HE families and exactly what they can and can't do! Unfortunately, Bedford are more interested in what they can't do, and go and do it anyway!

Recently Bedford announced they were reviewing their HE policy. Great we thought...at last they must have read the Law on HE and the Guidelines issued to them by Central Government and we rather naively thought they we amending their (dire) policy for the better.... nothing could be further from the truth!

There was a consultation meeting in Bedford yesterday to discuss the new draft policy and of course we wouldn't have missed it for the world. And, what an education for Katie : 9 years old and attending her first council meeting.

The meeting was surprisingly civilised considering emotions were running high. The EHE officer, who has far too much to say in her letters to us (visits, evidence, reports etc) was noticeably quiet. Of course she already knew how people felt about the appalling policy as most folk had already submitted a written response. She'd even called in a mediator to keep the peace as she feared it would all kick off! Ha Ha!  Fortunately the lovely families who turned out for the meeting were intelligent, eloquent and civilised. And the children were all amazing.... and so patient with what must have been a boring meeting.

On the upside, Katie had a turn in the Mayor's chair which she informs me is most comfortable. After the meeting Katie and her friend Lara were treated to a visit to the Mayor's Chamber.

All in all it was a positive meeting. I think our many concerns were taken on board and hopefully the draft policy will be put in the bin and re-written from scratch!
There are to be further work-shops in the future with Bedford to discuss the new policy. Hopefully, with the insightful input of HE families the new policy will be truthful, honest and open. Maybe then HE families will be more willing to engage with Bedford LA.
Now our new LA here in Lincs....arrggghhh! that's a different post!

Baston Fireworks

 Bonfire Night is here again. Sunday gone, we saw the most spectacular Fire-Work Display in Baston

(a village just down the road for us) The village is small and there were a lot of people there! The parking was a nightmare, but it was so worth it! And...it didn't rain! It always rains on Bonfire night!

 

 

Bonfire night always reminds me of the day I gave birth to my eldest daughter Jaime. Nine months pregnant and Jaime's dad decides we should go and see our local bonfire, on foot. Trouble is it was miles away, and it was bloody freezing. But I went anway, because we were at that glorious stage in our relationship when we would do absolutely anything for each other. By the time we got back home I felt ready to drop, literally! I went into labour later that night and Jaime was born the following day. That was 28 years ago but I remember it like it was yesterday.
 

Happy Birthday to my darling daughter Jaime.x



Jaime

 

 

 

Halloween!

Katie and I headed off to Marston Vale in Bedford for their Halloween Disco. Actually, we had chauffeur as Dave has a break from work for the next two weeks (his first beak in 18 months!)
We went to the Marston Halloween Disco last year when we lived in Bedford and Katie had such a lovely time, we thought it was well worth the hour's car ride to go again.

This time Katie's friends came along too and they all had a great time. It was good to catch up with my friends too ; I do wish we all lived closer so we could get together more often.

All together, Katie had a very busy day! In the morning she had her first Piano Prep Test in Spilsby. In spite of her nerves, she did amazingly well. She is now inspired to carry on and practice hard for her Level One. When she gets to Level One, we have promised her a proper piano... Best start saving now then!

 

"Not Back to School Day!"

This post is a little late, because our "Not Back to School Day" was a couple of weeks ago. However, we had such a lovely day, I thought it was worth a mention!

Katie and I took a trip to Jaime's new house in Shotley Gate, near Ipswich. We had a lovely day with Jaime and Cheeky Charlie! Charlie is growing up so quickly! He is Super-Cute and Cuddly Gorgeous!!
The weather was beautiful so we all headed to the harbour and had a scrummy meal in a pub overlooking the bay.

Charlie insisted on holding Katie's hand (and only Jaime's hand!) on the walk back home. He walked such a long way, and only retreated to his pushchair when he physically couldn't walk any further!

 

What a lovely way to spend our Not back to School Day!

 

Puppy Love

Katie and I took a trip to Bedford to visit our friends; we do this every 2 weeks or so, as we haven't been able to find any friends closer to home yet. This was an extra special trip as we got to see Carys' 4 week old Morkie puppies! Katie was so excited about finally getting to see and cuddle the puppies.
Just too cute!

The Birthday season has begun in the Shovlin House. We celebrated Dave's birthday with a delicious meal in our local pub, followed by a scrummy chocolate Birthday Cake!

Whose next?....Ah, I think it could me me!

Summer's End

Actually, it really isn't "summer's end" at all, not if today's weather is anything to go by. 
So, I haven't blogged all summer, and I have no excuses! Of course, we have been busy as always : lots of ups and downs (mainly "ups" I'm pleased to report)
The biggest news is that we are finally settled into our new house in Bourne and are finding our way round nicely. Sadly, there is nothing happening around us HE-wise so we are keeping in touch with our Bedford pals. We have been meeting up at Marston Vale, and although it's an hours drive it is worth it. Katie loves playing with her friends and I enjoy catching up with the other HE mums.

The schools go back this week, so we are looking forward to that..everywhere is less crowded, and more quiet. Bliss!

We have found a lovely new piano teacher and Katie is progressing well. In fact she is sitting her first exam next month! She is nervous about "performing! but excited too! Then, we have Brownies here in Bourne, starting up soon. So, we are still getting plenty of socialising, because as we all know...socialising is very important for a home-ed kid!

Grimsthorpe Castle

Katie & Maisie...growing up too fast!

 

Still in Stagsden!

Well, we are still in Stagsden, and not moved into our new house yet. But, all is not lost ; today we got final confirmation of our mortgage and the removals are booked for the 17th June!

We went to see how the house-build is coming along last weekend and we were pleasantly surprised! The house is lovely and looked to be almost finished! The carpets were down  and the gorgeous floor tiles. The bathrooms were just about finished and the tiles (which incidentally, I took ages to choose, what with me being so indecisive!) looked lovely! Only trouble was, they (the builders) had put them all in the wrong place! We have 4 bathrooms, so I guess it was an easy mistake to make? Errr, not when you've paid £800 for them! So, we have expressed our disappointment, but it really is going to be BIG job to remove all the tiles, re-plaster and re-tile, and we really don't have that much time left! So, we're waiting to see what happens next. Perhaps a nice discount off the price will soften the blow. We'll see!

Jaime and Tony's house move went well and they have settled into their new home nicely. Their house is lovely and in a really scenic area with lovely walks. It's nice to know they have their own home now and I hope they have many happy years there.

The weather has been quite horrible recently.....rain, rain and more rain! Katie and I haven't been out and about as much as we'd like although she is still enjoying her piano, swimming and Brownies. She's working towards her Computer Badge, and she's working extra hard so she can earn her badge before we move house.

We had a lovely visit from Katie's big brother Stephen recently. She loves spending time with him and the older she gets the more she is like him ; they are like two peas in a pod! It's funny, because she has so many of his mannerisms, she even talks like him, yet they spend very little time together. Katie wishes she could see him ever day, and she was actually quite sad when she saw him off at the train station. Ahhhh.

House Move in May

Spring has finally sprung here in Stagsden. It's been such a long winter and I really hate being cold (probably my age) We are finally getting out and about and enjoying the great outdoors.
We took a trip to Lincs to see how our house-build is progressing.The new house is coming along nicely, with surprisingly few hiccoughs so far. We are due to move in the end of the month, so it's all very exciting!


The New House

Jaime and Tony are due to move into their new home next week and they can't wait. They came to stay with us last weekend and baby Charlie was just so cute! He has quite a vocabulary now but he's still not walking. However he can whizz about at quite a speed on his hands and knees! Poor Morkie Maisie was exhausted trying to keep out of his way!

Cheeky Charlie!

Katie and I have been busy.Dave is away working during the week so we have been getting ourselves out and about. Last week we went to see the author Christopher Lloyd at Moulsoe. He gave a fascinating and entertaining talk about History, spanning 5.3 billion years, with the help of his coat of many pockets! Katie bought his book, What on Earth and she was excited to have Christopher sign it.



The amazing Christopher Lloyd

 

Last week saw us with Piano and Brownies on Monday, swimming on Thursday with our HE group in Bedford and a lovely play-date with friends on Friday. Wednesday saw us "pond-dipping and meadow sweeping" at Priory Country Park in Bedford. The weather was perfect and we really had a lovely day! I think Katie liked the meadow sweeping best, especially when the children caught the most beautiful green-veined butterfly!

Pond dipping

What have we caught...Katie like the leech best!

 

Chasing butterflies

 

Green veined Butterfly

Green-Veined Butterfly

Katie is still enjoying her piano lessons with Beth. Unfortunately, we are going to have to find Katie a new piano teacher when we move to Lincs.
I have a feeling we will never find anyone
as nice as Beth ; Katie is so at ease with her,
and it's lovely that she is home-educated too!
We'll see.





On the down-side, the dreaded LA have finally caught up with us.Typical! Just when we are about to move house  some kindly neighbour thought they would report us to the CME (children missing education). I contacted CME who were very nice, once I'd told them that Katie certainly was not "missing education" as she was electively home educated! The nice lady said she was happy, and would "close the case". Of course, I knew she would pass our details onto the EHE dept at Bedford.

Sure enough, a few days later, another lovely letter arrived from the EHE officer. The first paragraph was so enthusiastic and positive about HE, I was pleasantly surprised,but then it rapidly went down-hill. Just like every other LA in this country, they over-stepped the mark, gave themselves powers they are not entitled to, and asked of us things we are not obliged to supply!  There was the usual rubbish about meeting with us and Katie in our home (because most parents are happy with that!) Or, we could send photographs of Katie engaging in educational activities and send samples of her work!! Needless to say, we will be doing none of that.

Dave and I updated our Educational Philosophy, wrote a nice long letter, and attached a list of resources we use and places of interest we have visited with Katie. Hopefully, that will keep the LA bod busy until we move house!

Of course, Katie is oblivious to all this, and she's far too busy having fun to worry about some office bod checking up to see if she's receiving an education!



Digging for treasure...because treasures are everywhere!

 

My Mam. Ten years on

It's ten years since my beautiful Mam left us. So much has happened since then. Yet, it seems like just yesterday that she was fooling around in the hospice, making us laugh and caring for the other patients, in spite of her being so very poorly herself.

Our family has grown since then ; we have moved house, county and country since then. But no matter where we are, or who we are with, there is always my Mam, never more than a whisper away from me.


I think about you every day Mam and I miss you dearly. The  searing pain of losing you has faded, and the tears are less frequent, but it doesn't take much to take me back to the last time we spoke. I kneeled by your chair and I was your little girl again. I cried at the thought of losing you and you comforted me in my sadness. You stroked my head and told me it would all be ok.That was so typical of you Mam. You are the most caring and selfless person I have ever met.  Your last words to me were "I love you bairn". I love you too Mam. Until we meet again

New Hoose!

There's an air of excitement in the "Shovlin Hoose" right now. We have put a deposit down on a brand new house in Lincs! It's not so long ago that we were adamant we would never buy again, as renting gave us the freedom to move around the country, or even abroad again if we wanted to. But here we are, setting down roots, getting a foot on the property ladder, and hopefully, investing in the future. It's a risk, but us Shovlins have never been a family that shies away from risk!

The house isn't ready until May, so we have plenty of time to prepare for the move, and figure out how we are going to furnish the five bedrooms....Yes, I said FIVE bedrooms! We began this house search with the words "down-sizing" in mind but somehow we just couldn't squeeze ourselves into a smaller house.

But, the house is beautiful and I can't wait to get moved.

On the down-side, I took a quick look at Lincs Elective Home Education Policy and it STINKS! Literally! So far we have managed to stay under the radar where the LA is concerned ; let's hope it continues because these guys are taking the biscuit, or maybe they need someone to set them straight! They will have met their match if they think they can get away with their ultra vires activity with Dave!lol

Getting in touch with nature....moi?

Now, as anybody who knows me will tell you, I am not an outdoorsy time of girl. So, it was somewhat of a surprise that I booked Katie and myself on a "den building, fire-making and investigating animal homes" event at Priory Park in Bedford.

I had seen it come up on the list a while back but had never quite got around to booking it. No surprises there! The thought of spending hours outside in the freezing cold, raking about in the mud and getting in touch with nature, really did not appeal. And anyway, I don't have suitable footwear!The last time I donned a pair or wellies, I was in primary school wearing bottle green knickers and my hair was in plaits!
Then, I found that our best friends were booked up, and I knew deep down Katie would enjoy herself doing the "outdoorsy" stuff. I was feeling just a tad guilty and sometimes I just need to step out of my comfort-zone so that Katie can experience lots of different activities (not just the ones that appeal to me!)
So, I bit the bullet and with just a little trepidation, I put our names down.
I am so glad we did!

I surprised myself, and that doesn't happen very often ; it really was a fun day and who knew my Den-Building was so good! Ray Mears eat your heart out!  There was quite a turn out of families and we split into smaller groups to each make our own den. Us mums took the task very seriously and we worked diligently and meticulously to build the "best" den. We scoured the ground for the best branches and twigs and willow, while slyly eyeing up the competition. Of course the kids helped out, collecting the branches and twigs and willow, but it was us mums who took the task very seriously.
Long after the kids had lost interest in making our den "the best" (by now they were digging in the soil for treasures and collecting foliage for food ), us mums continued furiously tying the willow and weaving the twigs. Well, you don't want the den to let in rain, do you?

Note to self; must buy wellies and lose the false nails before our next outdoorsy expedition!

Snow!

When we moved into our new house in Bedford last year, our lovely land-lords informed us that
                                                                  "it never snows in Stagsden"

OK, so Katie was disappointed, me too if I'm honest. Who doesn't love the snow?
I am pleased to say our neighbours were wrong!
Of course, this has meant the country has come to a standstill....but doesn't it look so pretty?

Happy Birthday Mam

Mam loved her Fancy-Dress costumes....all hand-mad of course!

Happy Birthday Mam.
My mam would have been 68 years old yesterday. She has been gone almost 10 years, so she was only just 59 when she died. So young.

I thought of you on your Birthday Mam. I have thought of you every single day since you left us.
I thought of you with fondness yesterday. on your Birthday. I remembered how you loved a party_any excuse to get dressed up in some hilarious fancy-dress outfit ; usually one you had made yourself from recycled clothes on your trusty old Singer sewing machine! You loved that old machine, and my childhood memories often play along to the sound-track of that Singer whirring away in the background. I would watch you in fascination as your foot pedalled away on the wrought iron pedal, the needle pounding precariously close to your fingers as the material whizzed with lightening speed through your fingers!

I wonder how we would have celebrated this birthday? I wonder how you would be with the grand-children you never met. I bet you would have them in fits of laughter with your antics! I feel so sad that you have missed so much of our children's lives and I am even sadder that I have missed having my mam around all these years,
I dearly want to believe I will see you again one day Mam. The thought that I might not, is heart-breaking. I can't get my head around it. So, just for now, I choose to believe in Heaven.

Happy New Year!

2013!
Dave, Katie and I saw the New Year in, just the three of us (four if you count Morkie Maisie!!)
We treated ourselves to delicious nibbles, copious wine, and Dave even had a Bacardi or two!
We counted down together as Big-Ben saw out the old year and hailed in the New and we watched the fabulous firework display in London, from the comfort of our sofa.

We are already a week into the New Year and it reminds me how quickly time moves on.

Things are still quiet on the HE front: our regular classes don't start up 'til later in January. That's not to say we haven't been busy though!
Piano lessons have resumed and I am really impressed at how Katie has thrown herself into her music_ next Christmas she will be playing us Carols!
Beth, Katie's piano teacher is lovely, and I am sure it's down to her being so encouraging that Katie is putting in so much effort and hard work. She practices two or three times a day and I must admit to loving the sound of the piano!

We plan to carry on HEing this year in the same fashion_ have fun, talk lots, read lots, visit some interesting places and.... we may just fit in the odd lesson here and there!