We went on a holiday!

We went on a holiday! And it was fun!

I promised I would not become a daily blogger... and I did not.  We went away to Portugal last week and I suddenly felt weird about live blogging a holiday so sorry for the bloggy silence.

But also, the holiday was super busy.  There really wasn't much down time, and the down time was way better used catching up with our friends who joined us from America for the trip.  (FYI, they called it a "trip" and not at "holiday"... which was apt)

Anyways, it was great.  We flew to Lisbon and stayed at an AirBnB in Colares which was about 45 minutes from the airport.  I need to figure out how to both blog it and what to do with my 1,000 photos of it.

Our friends have a 2 and 5 year old so the kid game was strong.  My friend learned to say "I would like a table for 10, 6 children and 4 adults" in Portuguese, which helped to get tables and also to realize what a crazy number of kids we (I) have.

We booked flights on Easyjet, and paid for 1 checked bag between the 6 of us.  

Packing cubes are great.  We had to shuffle a bit to get it to the right weight (23kg/50lbs) but we just managed it.

We each got one small carryon item (under the seat - no rolly bags or overhead bags).  We mostly used this allowance for bags of sandwiches and food.  Big kids and grown ups had backpacks.

We also get 2 "child items" per kid.  This has to be a pram or baby backpack or travel cot etc.  We did make use of this allowance:

I'm not being lazy - I had Aubrey in a pram.

• The IKEA bags had our carseats (4)
• There are also 2 travel bedrails
• And the backpack Andy is wearing
• And the pram I am pushing.

We looked like a circus, but we made it to our rental car (7 seater, and we barely fit)

We spent 8 days in Portugal with 2 days of travel either side.  I will have to do a bigger post on that later, but it was definitely one of the best trips we've ever done.

We somehow managed to explore the famous Quinta De Regaleria in Sintra

My friend and I took our "big kids" (5, 5, 7) to Pena Palace

Mostly I made traveling with two year old twins look casual and easy:

Just kidding.  The trip was great, but two year old twins are not the easiest travel companions.  However, they loved it.  

And I am not too tired to function. I am just normal tired, and have had an awesome trip.  Traveling with friends is the best.  Especially ones who put up with 20 hours of flights (Portland to Lisbon is not Direct) to hang out with twin two year olds.  

Also, less importantly, I managed to get a new jacket on the day before we flew.  Marks and Spencer came through!

Weekend Family Fun, Marty Parenting, Grumpy Saturdays, and more Coat Conundrums.

I promise, I'm not becoming a daily blogger.  I have been getting up earlier (5:30am) and blogging appears to be the easiest thing that is both nice for me and OK to get fully interrupted by the chaos of potential kid mornings.

During our weekend planning Andy and I intentionally made this weekend a "family fun" weekend.  We have had a lot of family arguing and not-fun recently and we decided it was time for some fun.  On Saturday morning Ezra had his last tennis lesson and I was planning to take the girls to the library and park to ride bikes, then we could all meet up for coffee.

One of our children threw a massive wobbler about this. There was probably over an hour of crying by 8:30am.  One of our children was late for tennis, and instead of meeting at the park I dragged the twins out of the house at 10:30 (this is late to leave for stuff) and we went to a local museum to look at animals.

I was catastrophically annoyed about the morning.  I am not a martyr mum but we are basically becoming martyr parents.  Nowhere on our weekend plan was there anything resembling intentional grown up fun for Andy or me. No gym, no bike, no personal time.  Yes, kids at parks is "fun" but my exercise is basically 0 these days and it seems like it should be possible to fit 90 minutes of individual sport into a weekend.

Something to look into.

The afternoon play date went well, Lily's friend came for crafting and girl play and then her mum invited Lily over for Friday of school half term which happens to be the day I have all 4 children myself so now I have only 3 for some of the day and it should be so much easier!

Kids doing crafting is very cute, I forgot to take a photo.  There are easter stickers on everything now.

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 My non-progress on Jacket Audit is not ideal.  The only casual and put-together jacket I own is my denim jacket.  Which is great, except most of my trousers are denim and I start to look like a cowgirl.

I am going to be classically British today and go to Sainsburys to buy some clothes.

Maybe this one

Or maybe this

But also, maybe I need a fleece vest?

I probably just need to spend some time on Jacket project and wardrobe project.  It is a 2026 goal (to dress better and wear my clothes better).

What a playdate with me actually looks like // Maybe "stay at home" is made for people like me.

I feel like on this blog I do a fair amount of cute photos and then some "oh this is hard" chat and then more "we went to france!" chat. 

I don't really see many families with 4 kids in our age range that I can compare(?) myself to, so maybe I'm just doing it badly, or maybe I'm doing it well, or maybe it's like a tough mudder race and there is no bad or good because who would even want to do that? (lots of people... but it's morning and I can't think of a better analogy)

There is a mom at school with 3 kids, girl (8), girl (5), boy (1.5) and she always seems so calm with her kids walking next to her and not being chaos.  Other than that... I don't know many 4 kids families or even 3 kid families.

Anyways, let me invite you to join my play date yesterday!

A friendly aquantence had asked to meet up in the park after school.   I like her and haven't seen for a long time.  It was Friday, it was sunny.  Why not?

3:00 Twins were not happy to be up from nap, Aubrey was very sad.  I threw snack and drinks in the pram, got the twins in the pram, picked up the kids from school. Walked to the park. 

3:45  Got to the park. There were lots of kids there. Aubrey was still sad. Clara was curious.  Ezra and Lily ran off and I couldn't see them.  Friend showed up!  Friends mum helped push Clara on the swing.  Aubrey was sad.  

3:50 Lily said she needed a wee.  Friend and Lily went off for a wee in the woods.

3:55 Aubrey started yelling "wee wee potty" and I realized she had pooped AND I had forgotten the nappy bag.

I asked a stranger for a nappy and he said he didn't have any.  

I saw another friend with a 1 year old and managed to squeeze Aubrey into a size 4 nappy and clean up her teeny tiny poo while she stood on a bench at the park.

I caught up with friend's mum for 2 minutes.  

4:00 Lily and friend came back and Lily said she needed a poo RIGHT NOW.

I asked friend if she wanted to come back to my house so that Lily could do a poo.  She agreed (probably because this play date had literally lasted 15 minutes so far)

4:15 We got back to my house and Lily did do a poo, and then Aubrey was sad and vomited on the floor.  I tried to clean it up quickly while friend's mom was outside

Lily went to find friend to show her the giant poo.  Because... kids.  I didn't catch this because of aforementioned vomit.

I told Lily and Friend to go outside and play.  They did.  Friend's mum watched everyone outside while I cleaned up Aubrey and got her new clothes.

4:20 I noticed our neighbour I've never met had a girl who was looking through our garden and wanted to come play.  I invited her in.  She played with the kids in the garden while I tried to talk with friend's mum.

4:25 Clara fell down and broke her plastic bike in two and started crying.

4:30 All the big kids ran in to neighbours garden.

4:40 Friend said she had to go (which was the right time) so we yelled into neighbours garden to get kids back.

4:45 I couldn't get over to say goodbye because Clara had gone to the back of the garden and was trying to climb in neighbours garden and I was carrying Audrey

I managed to carry both Clara and Aubrey to the gate to let friend out and say goodbye.

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So that's probably the end of that acquaintanceship right?

I do really value being social and so have tried to keep different friendships and acquaintanceships going throughout these young kids years, but I'm thinking maybe it's just not a good idea.  Maybe my family in its current state is just not world ready, and the best thing to do is just not try.  Maybe 4 kids is just not something that people should have to engage with so closely.

Chat GPT drafted me this nice text I can send to the remaining few people who have invited me/us to do things:

When we had twins we said we weren't going to travel untill they turned 2.  Maybe we need to commit not to have a social life until they are... 4?

The Sun has come out... today! some randoms on a Friday

I have felt good this week.  The sun came out.  It might literally be that all my mental ennui is due to cloudy weather.  Would I be happy all the time in a more temperate climate?  Maybe I need to move to the South of France?

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Today I have 2 extra hours of childcare.  I decided not to make plans for the time, but to just do whatever stuff I wanted to do.  I spent some time working on photo albums - Aubrey and Clara both had 7 photos in Feb so their updates were easy.  I am saving Ezra and Lily and Family album for later since it includes the France trip and there are A LOT of photos.

While in snapfish I decided to order the 2025 Album I've never finished/printed.  I added some missing text and then bought it! And I got the best discount I've ever seen - 60%.  I thought 50% was the best, but now I'll know to hang on for 60% in the future

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Photo albums are a good reflection of how much things change between summer and winter.  Winter just... sucks.  I am not sure what can be done about it... Hygge is all well and good but it's not enough to carry from October to March.  I realize Fall is in there too... but I feel like fall is about a month long and then winter is 5 months.   I think bears have it right and next year I should plan to hibernate for all of January and Feb and come out on the first sunny day of March

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I can tell other people are also coming out of hibernation now, I've had texts off people I haven't seen for ages inviting us to play dates, which is nice.  This afternoon we are meeting up with a friend of Lilah's who I haven't seen since October.  It sometimes feels that our October Pumpkin Party is the closing ceremony of our social life.  Maybe we need an Easter themed Opening Ceremony?

Whats your weather? Is spring here? are your winters awful?

Things that are working // things that are not

Getting up early is Working.  I've started setting my alarm for 5:30am.  Kids sleep until at least 6am (usually 6:30) and my mornings have started to feel longer.  Yesterday I went to the office, which meant I left at 7:25am, but I had already had 2 hours at home.  I didn't feel rushed and chaos, although I did forget my phone charger and bring headphones instead, and I forgot my water bottle, so it wasn't an ideal get out.

I did wear my new blazer and thrifted dress! But my selfie skills are super sub par.  I have a whole head, I promise.

Not getting enough sleep is Not Working I know this is the other side of an early morning and I should be going to bed at 9 but kids finish bedtime at 8:00 and then dishes and house and stuff means I don't feel like going to bed at 9.  I've been falling asleep around 10:30, which is 7 hours of sleep, and slightly under the 7.5 I sort of need to function.

Sorting the house is Working I carved out a few hours of time to sort the house earlier this week and it makes me feel better that things are (or were) more in their place, even if it's not visually obvious I've accomplished anything at all.

The dishwasher is Not Working.  On Tuesday night the dishwasher died.  Andy thinks it's the element, and a new element is £150.  We have a 10 year parts warranty, but apparently the call out to use this warranty is £150, and varying levels of responsiveness and timescale.  We got this dishwasher in August 2023 (it was a warranty replacement for one that broke 6 weeks after purchase!) and 2.5 years seems really short for a dishwasher lifespan.  According to the internet, dishwashers are meant to last 8-10 years based on 4-5 cycles a week.  We run our dishwasher twice a day (at least) so... maybe 2.5 years is like 8-10 years in normal dishwasher life?  It still seems early for it to give up.

Replacing the dishwasher is Working I am immensely thankful that I am in a position where dropping £450 suddenly on a new dishwasher isn't a catastrophic situation.  Is it how I wanted to spend £450? No.  Is it crippling? No.  We have a new dishwasher arriving Monday (with a full 5 year warranty this time)

Budgeting for our house stuff is Not Working. Every year in January we make a list of house things we want to buy and then every year by March we seem to have bought totally different house stuff.  Here was our planned costs for the year:

And here are our actuals so far

Realistically our lighting upgrade probably won't cost that or we won't do it.  It was a "to do" from 2022.  We upgraded our kitchen lighting with a side-of-the-road freebie fixture, but it's not amazing.

You may notice the Cleaner line item.  Having a cleaner is distinctively Not Working.  Maybe my standards are too high.  Maybe good cleaners are totally full so when someone can fit me in it means they are not a good cleaner.   The last cleaner combined bleach and chlorine to get the toilets clean.  Apparently that is a "cleaning hack" that also produces chlorine gas and is super dangerous.  The cleaner before was expensive and the house wasn't clean.  I'm thinking about trying a service (not an individual), for a spring "deep clean" or also about just having a messy house for longer and/or realizing that I can hoover and dust in 2 years when the twins are in school.

There are a bunch of little things that I would say are Not Working (sport, ability to focus in work, fun nice family time on the weekends) but also overall some subset of these things are Working (I do get gym buddy once or twice a week, I can sometimes focus on things and intend to, we are trying to build more family fun into the weekend and it will be easier when the sun comes out) so overall, it's all fine.

And, to sign off in a very british way... after a long awful dark crappy cold wet winter... this weather is definitely WORKING

What is working and not working for you right now?

Spring Cleaning, Spring Mess, Trashbag Energy

My house is too full.

I know I'm supposed to lean into minimalism to help clear the clutter in mind and space or whatever but I very much don't want to minimize the number of people in this house and people seem to come with stuff and there is stuff everywhere.

Did you know British houses generally don't have closets? The house we live in is 1950s and it has no closets.  We built one "built in" into the twins room but otherwise... everything is in the room.  No doors to hide anything.

I dream of a closet.

When we went to France both Ezra and Lily fell out of their beds almost every night.  I asked why and Ezra noted that his bed has sides.  I sort of forgot, but he has been sleeping on one of these toddler beds (although it is fully extended)

So we went on Gumtree and bought a twin bed for his room with no sides because it is a normal bed.  It's also 10cm wider and now we are moving around the rest of his room.  So it looks like this at present

(Well, the bed is now made, and the hoover gone, but still... it's chaos)

And then outside his room looks like this

On, and there is now a disassembled toddler bed in my office.

As he went through his toys on which to keep and which to maybe put in the one closet or give to the twins he decided the keep pile was EVERYTHING. 

"but what about this puzzle for ages 3+? I think Aubrey might like it" I suggested.

"No" he said "Aubrey is only 2 and I like it"

So... stuff.  There is so much stuff.

Yesterday I put away (I almost wrote "folded" but I don't fold laundry until it goes in a drawer) 5 loads of laundry.  I know this is because I have slowly accumulated enough clothes for everyone that we can actually get to 5 loads... but it was so much laundry.

I know this is natural within the spring clean cycle and whatnot, but I have the urge to get rid of everything and start over.  I am also a classic over-declutterer.  I still have young kids and still need things. I have gotten rid of too much before.

I was listening to some cleaning based podcasts and they often start with "remove trash from your space" and I always think "I don't have trash in my space and the podcast person (Dana K White) said "Everyone has trash" and I realized I do.  I live in a trash space but I could literally spend every minute of every day sorting every room and by the end whatever room. started on would be chaos again.

That's my house complaint.   I feel like the Sisyphus of Stuff while everything else (ie personal sports, hobbies, people, interests) get neglected in favour of stuff management. 

I also realize that "stuff management" doesn't preclude "personal hobbies" but weirdly the time it would take to keep stuff managed is the exact same time it would take to enjoy my own hopies (I am guessing an hour a day?) and so it does feel like I can only pick one.  

It doesn't help that two year olds are not tidy.  Neither are 7 year olds.  The 5 year old is a star.  One of the twins actually loves going through the literal trash and we sometimes call her a trash panda because of this proclivity. 

Thanks for listening to my stuff rant.

March - Looking forward (let's pretend it's not the 12th)

Can I do a "looking forward' post when we are 40% of the way through the month already? Why not - I make the rules!

In March I am excited about...

Date night Okay, this one already happened.  We had our nanny come babysit on a Saturday and she did twin bedtime AND one big kid bedtime and another big kid stayed with my mom and it was amazing to not do bedtime.  Andy and I had Wine and Pizza and stayed out until 10:30.  It was fun.

Book Club A friend of mine started a book club and I love it.  We read The Women for this month's book club (which also already happened because I am so late posting this).  I enjoyed the book and the discussion.  Is it really about friendship? I'm not too sure.

Massage I have a massage person I adore.  She lives around the corner and she is always booked up and I started booking myself a massage ever 6 weeks or so.  I know this is super 1%er but also, it's the same price as drinks or dinner out and I enjoy it so much and rarely ever go out for drinks or dinner.  

Dinner with ex-colleagues I still meet up with some of my colleagues from the job I left in 2022 and we are going out to dinner this month and I'm looking forward to catching up with them

Theatre For Mothers Day (which is this Sunday in the UK) I am going to London to see The Lion King with my mom and Ezra and Lily! It is going to be a BIG day - London is 2.5 hours by train from me - but I think it will be memorable and fun.  The kids are going to ride on a double decker bus! And see London things! They have only ever been to the train stations before in transit so it will be awesome to walk around London with them for a few minutes.

Going to the Office I haven't been to the Bath office since January and I have two Office days this month and I'm looking forward to seeing people (and wearing my new blazer!)

Holiday adventure It's Easter Half Term soon and I'm off to Portugal! That's really the highlight of course.  More details soon - exciting times!

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There are a lot of exciting things happening in March.  I am feeling very out of routine, even though part of what put me out of routine is awesome fun things that I want to do.  Like going on date night, or out to dinner, or to London. I know these are far more memorable than whether I ate decent food and did decent sport.  And I also know that going to london for a day does not preclude me from doing sport for two weeks.  But... I get out of routine easy, and then I am out of routine.

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Also, there's some media stuff I'm excited about.  For instance, I really enjoyed Writers and Lovers 

Now I'm reading The Witches Guide to Magical Inkeeping. I have read one other book by Sangu Mandanna and I think her writing style is supposed to be magical and cute but I find it cute and boring.  I'm still reading it though

I am totally stalled reading both Rest and Best Laid Plans.  I think with Rest it's because I don't really see myself as a creative person right now.  I basically feel like a number cruncher in work.  I'm not sure a nap or a walk will improve my ability to write a good =sumifs equation in excel.

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I started watching the Scrubs reboot.  It's so cute.  I miss watching TV.

Is March getting away from you? Is it chaos or is it just me?