Grandpa and Exhaustion

How tired can a tired mum get? Well, a lot of us know the answer to that and it's to infinity and beyond. I am at the point whereby my head occasionally falls on to the keyboard and vomits letters at you all. I suffer from insomnia from time to time but I've realised there is a fate equal to this: not suffering from insomnia and yet still getting little or no sleep.

The last few days have involved bad dreams, singing, crying, suffocation and wandering...times that by four (including me) and it lends itself to tired, strange nights. I was so determined to sleep last night but Lucy having had a bad dream crawled in and clung to me like a limpet, cutting off my air supply and barring my exit from the bed. I'm sure I've complained before that I suffer from some kind of weird claustrophobia at being stuck in the middle of a bed; it's enough to make me come out in cold sweats and start to hyperventilate. Sometimes the tiredness wins and what a horrible sleep that turns out to be...the nightmares stay with me for some days afterwards so I always try and make sure to drag my weary body to an edge...any edge, however small.

As I began to drop off again, I was aware of a face an inch away from mine stage whispering "MUMMMYY!!"all to ask if he could go on the computer. Then cries of "hungry...hungggrrryyy". Aargh.

So, after a few days of this, exhaustion has taken over the asylum and I'm in a different zone. I think it may be akin to taking an illegal substance (because I have no idea what that is really like.......) and living for the moment because you know that when you crash, baby, you are going to BURN.

I look back on my days as a mum of three children under two, in particular the week that Brian went to a conference when the twins were 2 weeks old. I told him to go, I'd be fine. I compare everything back to that awful, sad, heartbreaking but manageable-after-all week and if it doesn't compare, it's not worth moaning about. So, despite my moaning, it does not compare.

Grandpa is here to stay for the weekend so it's on with the pinny and out with the pastry bowl, the rolling pin and the marinaded beef to make a good old fashioned steak pie with mashed potatoes and buttered boiled carrots, peas and broccoli. We'll no doubt follow it with a bread and butter pudding or a piece of fruit cake with lashings of butter.Steak Pie Dinner
2 lbs min stewing beef, dipped in seasoned flour-marinade in red wine if you prefer beforehand
1 onion, chopped
Tablespoon Oil
Beef stock, around 1 pint plus cupful beer or red wine
Optional: diced carrot, mushrooms, mini sausages, kidney...the kids prefer it simple!

Heat the oil over medium to high heat and when sizzling, brown the beef. Don't crowd the pan and remove browned meat to be replaced with raw meat, if necessary. Once browned, add the onion and fry for a few minutes. If using any other ingredient, add at this stage. If some beef was taken out of the pan then add it back in along with any juices that have gathered.

Pour over red wine or beer and let it sizzle and boil quite vigorously for a minute or three. Add stock, enough to cover and let it boil. Turn way down to a low simmer and put a lid on. Leave for a minimum of 1.5 hours, longer if possible. I like my beef really tender.

I sometimes make shortcrust pastry, sometimes puff; shortcrust, I'd make myself but puff I would always buy. You can line the pie tin with both pastry types if you wish or simply top off the pie with a pastry lid.

I drain the remaining stock from the beef as you don't want a 'wet' pie....! Keep this stock to serve at the table as extra gravy. Put the beef into pie dish and top with pastry lid, cooking as per instructions for pastry recipe or until pastry rises (if puff) and goes brown. Always brush with a little milk...I hate to waste an egg....and make a small hole in the pastry to let the steam out.

I won't insult you with how to make mashed potatoes but my tips would be to always salt the water, make sure the potato is really soft before draining and once drained, dry the potatoes over a minimum heat for a minute before adding butter, sea salt and a little drop of milk...always add the milk, or cream if you're feeling like you just don't care...as this will affect the consistency. Mash with a potato masher and then go back over it with a fork. Taste and add some more salt or pepper if you like. I always add a little drop more butter as it looks wonderful melting across the peaked mass of white, fluffy tattieness. Maris Piper potatoes are my favourite; cheap potatoes just don't work.

Steam, boil or juggle your vegetables as you see fit and serve with a dod of butter and a sprinkling of the eponymous sea salt.

Imaginatively Titled AAAAAaaaargh!

It was going to be called A&E but things have moved on since then...

I had an accident yesterday. I wasn't participating in extreme sports or parachuting, I wasn't even hillwalking or cycling. No, instead, I was walking into the park with my children and I fell into a little crevice in the road...literally fell right into it. As I disappeared into this tiny little hole, all 8 of the bags I was carrying...yes, 8.....dropped to the ground with me and fell on top of my ankle which was looking at me from a position you should never really see an ankle look at you from.

I lay there for a moment, wanting to shout, swear and cry at the top of my voice but being surrounded by not only my own children but half the kids from school, I held it all in. That's what we do isn't it? I held it in, not wanting to frighten them with the string of expletives going off in my head like fireworks and when one kindly lady asked if I was ok, I said "...fine, thanks".

There was a queue forming behind me as I of course fell over at the entrance where there is a big daft bollard that stops anyone from getting past. So people queued behind me and if there is one thing British people don't like to do, it's queue. The grumblings began and one 'lady' attempted to cartwheel her pram past me. LADY, your pram wasn't going anywhere, except over my withered leg!

So, I got up and gathered the bags, one lovely little girl helping me (thank you Amy)and walked off to sit under the tree and lick my wounds. I pretended to be on the phone so that I could sniffle to myself without anyone asking me if I was ok and to give me time to survey the damage: an enormous lump appeared on my knee and I was bleeding....I was wearing new linen cream trousers....oh yes my friend, this was physical damage, as painful as the gouge with bits of grit in it...another on my ankle, grazing all over and a torn toenail. Better cancel that pedicure.

I'd also banged my head a bit...don't know how that happened....and was feeling pretty sorry for myself which only lasted a moment and I was soon back to chatting to parents, handing out water and shouting "get out of there!". Fast forward to dinner time; we have a little friend over and everyone wants differing things to eat so in my painful, hobbled and woozy state, I complied. By the time they were all happily fed, I was feeling pretty bad.

My ankle continued to swell at a rate of noughts and my headache was getting worse. So, should I have went to A&E? Of course I should have, if only because of the incredibly swelling ankle but I'm always loathe to visit the doctors and waste their time so I thought I'd wait. So I waited until the swelling was the size of my head and thought maybe, maybe I should think about going but Lucy started to feel ill.

And then the story is a haze of cleaning up sick, hugging a crying child, bathing her at 4am, realising she'd been sick all the way from her room into her sisters room and into the bathroom...husband was not impressed at all....and we both began that ritual that all mums and dads know of filling up a bucket with soapy water and disinfectant, the early birds chirping outside, the odd fox cry reaching our ears whilst eyes peer out from heavy lids and grumble at the insanity of it all.

Today was supposed to be a lovely new recipe day as I got a beautiful new cake book....but food and baking and all that jazz will have to wait; Lucy is off school, I can't walk properly, I'm supposed to be packing today, cleaning, have a meeting, buy end of term gifts for the teachers (we finish tomorrow), bake for the lunch tomorrow and generally run around as usual but a visit to the doctor is necessary and everything will be done at slow speed.

Thank you for reading my rant, now that I've written it down I really feel I should delete it as it is hardly in the spirit of positive posting but well, this is real life, isn't it? I leave you with the following poem which tomorrow I will disagree with heartily, but for today, it suits my mood perfectly....

Never cross your bridges till the bridge comes into view
Never go to meet your problems...wait a day or two.
Circumstances arise that rearrange the sorted pack;
Never take a load until it's placed upon your back.
Half lives many miseries upon ourselves we bring
But how often comes along the unexpected thing?
Trust not in yourself clever tricks and common sense
But trust in the ways and the wiles of Providence.

Tired today...and yesterday.

I usually work through the tiredness; I think "If I wasn't doing this, I'd be sitting doing nothing" and that can't happen as there is always so much to do. Well, yesterday I kind of took the day off. I still cleaned and hoovered and ironed. I still made dinner. But I stayed in my tartan trousers, I applied no make-up...I didn't even pull a comb through my hair.

There was no frantic running. There was not a sign of urgency. Instead, I shuffled.

I walked slowly from room to room, half completing tasks and kicking the occasional teddy bear. Most of my time was spent blogging. Having never blogged as much before, I have to say it was great fun although my head started to hurt after staring at the computer for so long and my body went into a mild shock at not having done any walking. But that aside, it was fun.

A holiday.

I'm still tired today. I still have my tartan trousers on. You should see my hair; I went to bed with it wet and now I'm a fully signed up member of the Hair Bear Bunch (anyone younger than 35 won't have a clue what I'm on about!). I haven't yet placed a mascara wand near my eyes.

So, I'm at a crossroads: do I get dressed, do the housework, cook, do some paid work, go for my usual walk and generally run around like the proverbial blue-arsed fly or do I have another chillin' day? I think I already know the answer....*sigh*. Better go put on another pot of coffee....

I'm tired, so tired...

I'm tired, so dinner has been limited today to freezer stock. It's all good freezer stock but freezer stock nonetheless.

Supper was the same; it was toast with whatever topping the children desired (banana, jam and nutella...not all together, I should point out), made by dad as mummy collapsed in a heap before starting another round of chores. Such is the life of a mum.

Tomorrow, it shall be mince and tatties, like it or lump it. Of course, there are no lumps in my mince and tatties so we all love it fine!