Motherhood = fewer shoes, but more goodie bags and glitter.

We survived !

Twelve toddlers, a gazebo that kept threatening to overturn in the wind and so much noise that the cat hid upstairs on his beanbag all afternoon. He only emerged after everyone had left to ask for his dinner. The main thing, though, is that we all made it out alive. No toddlers were harmed, the food was eaten and the drinks consumed. Every child found some treasure in the 'woods' at the end of the garden and they all got a goodie bag to take home as all the contents arrived in time. Then today our boy's birthday card was shown on Cbeebies after three years of trying. I'm expecting a damehood at the very least for awesome Mumming !

Seriously though I was so proud of my boy on Sunday. As each of his friends arrived he spotted them, came over and greeted them with a cheery, "Hello, thank you for my present, come and play" and took them over to the garden area where we'd set out games and playground toys for them all. At points Hubbie spotted the boy having intense conversations with his nursery pals in a mini version of the adult scenario at the other end of the garden. As all his pals left he handed them a goody bag, thanked them for coming and as his head started to droop on Hubbie's shoulder we could see he was as worn out as we were. My little party animal.

On how far we have come.

My boy is three today. At one point we weren't sure we'd ever have a child of our own. Then we weren't sure we'd ever get to adopt a family of our own. Then this miracle happened and we found out we were having a baby. Then we had a scan and found out we were having a boy. Then we were so close to meeting him and then worried that after all of it we weren't going to. Finally at 2.20pm on the 30th of September 2010 (a full two weeks late) our boy finally arrived and my heart skipped a beat.

There is a saying that when a baby is born a mother is also born (and a father of course). When I watch my boy putting his own pyjamas on, taking off his trainers by himself and giving all the family double kisses 'continental style' I see how far he has come since he was born. I'm also now - as we emerge from the fog of early parenting - starting to see how far I have come too.

• I have learned more about biology and medicine than I ever knew. Yes, Mum and Dad I'm almost as qualified as a doctor (probably not quite as qualified as Dr Ranj though). 

• My shoe cupboard hasn't been opened in three years - well four actually as I stopped wearing heels while pregnant. I used to get called Imelda due to my love of shoes, I now wear Fit Flops or trainers pretty much all the time. 

• Hubbie and I consider going out for dinner or to a gig a big deal due to the effort required to actually leave the house. It's made us truly appreciate our time together. 

• We've also impressed our boy (and a few of the other nursery parents) with our radio show - that makes us pretty cool parents doesn't it ?

Happy Birthday to my darling boy. 

No shoes compare with the joy of being your Mum. Well, maybe...

Mission Impossible 3: the quest for a birthday greeting

My son loves Cbeebies.

From Tikkabilla (which is weird and like Playschool on mogadon) when he wakes up to In the Night Garden (which is like doing psychotropic drugs so I'm told) at bedtime he loves loads of shows on the schedule. I give full credit to Justin Fletcher for my son appreciating a good knock knock joke and I'm pretty sure he's learned to count and his alphabet from watching educational shows on the channel. Yes I am happy to admit that I've left the telly to teach my son numeracy and literacy. 

I'm sure he's not the only child who knows all the theme songs and sings them enthusiastically. Today he sang Bob the builder when sitting on a tractor in the shopping centre. It was quite funny actually. Again I'm pretty sure that other children also call all postal staff Postman Pat and recognise the Royal Mail logo on the side of red vans.

So our credentials as Cbeebies fans are clear for all to see. I've befriended Dr Ranj on twitter and posted pics of my boy pretending to be a Dr using the stethascope from the front of his Cbeebies magazine that prompted a sideways smiley from the good Dr. Before you jump to any conclusions no I'm not one of those who pants when he's on screen because of a crush - that would just be wrong as he looks a lot like my brother !

My issue is that my boy is going to be 3 in a month and this is the third year of trying to get his birthday card read out on Cbeebies. I even asked for advice from my friend Lou who has managed to get her son's card read out twice - yes that's right TWICE !! Two years of trying to get a card shown on Cbeebies has almost broken me. The first year I was in such a panic to get the card there in time that I forgot to put his date of birth on the back and had to pull strings with my friend Vicky (who works at the BBC) and she put in a call to the Cbeebies office to make sure they added it to the back. We spent all day watching the birthday slots becoming increasingly depressed as it became clear his card wasn't going to appear. Last year I sent a card again and double and triple checked that I'd got it all right and again no sign of it. We even resorted to doing an online greeting on baby TV just to be sure he got something on telly.

This year I'm taking no chances. I've taken top tips from Lou in her capacity as 'the Mum who can' and am even going to write a super smarmy message on the back of the card just to be sure. I'm including as many characters as will fit onto the card and it's being posted in plenty of time.

If we don't do it this time I'm actually going to cry.

You don't want to make a grown woman cry now do you Cbeebies ? 

April Fooled out of my holiday

So remember how I had all those lovely plans for today ?

How I was going to do lots of things just for me ?

Well it went slightly differently from how I'd planned.

My boy woke up with gummy eyes, a puffy face and his rash hasn't gone away. So instead of the boys going to football we all went to the walk-in centre and from there onto children's A&E. It almost became the highlight of mine and the boy's day when Hubbie told us that Dr Ranj works there, but the nurse said he was off today. He was kind enough to tweet back a sad face when I said my son had missed seeing him and Nurse Suzanne and Dr Tim looked after us brilliantly. Thankfully the boy is ok, if a little whiney, and we have eye drops, banana medicine and he's off nursery tomorrow. I can't teach yoga in the morning, but I do get to spend some extra time with my boy. Of course wrestling the drops into his eyes 4 times a day won't be so easy with Hubbie back at work, but it's good exercise for me.

If my attitude towards this enforced family time sounds less than charitable bear this in mind. I plan my entire week around their activities. I do my radio show and teach yoga on days when the boy is at nursery. Every day I go to pick up Hubbie from the station so he can be home to "do bedtime" with his son. On a Saturday I no longer go to Zumba, but am "Mum Cabs" so that Hubbie can do his radio show between kiddie football and grown up football. When they are watching football in the afternoon I finally have a few hours to myself. Either I do my house chores in peace or I meet a friend for a late lunch. This week the boys did not go to football so I didn't get my few hours of peace. It doesn't sound much, but I look forward to that bit of time and it's my little oasis in the week.

I plan enough nice things for all of us to do together. We did our first family Easter egg hunt on Sunday morning and my son was delighted with his haul of goodies. Last week mother-in-law came to see us and we spent a lovely afternoon entertaining her. We took the boy to see my family and he kept them all amused too. The whole week was devoted to keeping everyone else happy.

Then at the end of it all his poor little body could take no more and he got ill. So this week is all about making him well. It's about rest and relaxation and play and fun.

Or as Dr Ranj sings, "Be Happy, Be Healthy, Get Well Soon."