Ok, so I do have a tendency to make him use his panic voice.  Usually because I’m doing something idiotic.

“I know you’re scared of the bus, but if you steer into the curb at speed you could topple the car.  Upside down car is more scary than bus, no?”

Today was my fifth lesson and it was going pretty well.  He hadn’t had cause to use panic voice, I was driving pretty confidently, I felt good, I was enjoying myself.  Epic Win.

So.  Seeing as I’d progressed, he decided to move onto working on some manouvres.  Up first, reversing round a corner.  Great!  He explained what I needed to do, talked me through it, and then I had a go.  And did it PRETTY DAMNED WELL.  He was impressed.  I was pleased beyond all sense that he was impressed; it was like being back at school and being teachers pet that all the other kids hated.  Happy memories.

So.  There I am, feeling all happy with myself, just straightening up, getting ready to stop, when there was a loud pop followed by a hissing, then a cloud of steam rose from under the bonnet.  Shit.

I broke the damned car.

To be fair, he has reassured me that a burst radiator pipe is in no way my responsibility, but still; I doubt I will ever live this down.

Forty minutes of my lesson were spent waiting on the side of the road for the AA.  Bless the poor guy; he felt so guilty he got all overprotective, to the extent of disturbing me no end when he went rummaging in the boot of the car and then started stripping off.  Had I finally done it?  Had I finally caused my instructor to lose the plot?  Nope, the friendly guy was simply removing his fleecy top and donning something more scruffy, so that I could wear the nicer one he had previously been sporting, in order to keep warm.  Nice guy.  Stole some body heat there, too.  WIN #2.  He wears nice aftershave.  WIN #3.

The AA managed to do a temporary repair on the roadside.  I was able to drive home.  WIN #4.

All in all, a day of win.  Apart from breaking the car, of course.

Heather: “Ok Mommy, I promise.  But if you hear a crunchy sound, it is a monkey.  Ok?”

He had an awesome day, though was a little overwhelmed by the presents and developed a tendency towards freaking out every time one was offered to him, preferring to crawl at speed to me, climb into my lap, fasten himself to me like a spider monkey and cackle wildly with his face buried into my neck.  Spoilt he is not.  “More presents?  Oh God no, this is too much to handle!”

Le cak.  Jungle themed (seeing as the smallest midget is obsessed with animules), made by my own fair hand.  I’ve never tried to make one like this before…for a first attempt I’m actually pretty pleased with myself.

New toy guitar.  Much of teh cute. 

Nom.

Opening another present (after he’d finished freaking the hell out about it).  Best.  Wrapping.  Paper.  Ever.  This is one of the many reasons I love having a little boy.

He’s bloody awesome.  Heather’s hyperactivity was somewhat aggravated by cake, sugar, excitement, visitors and all the other happy break-from-the-norm malarkey that comes along with a family birthday.  I swear to God we spent most of the day saying “calm down calm down CALM DOWN HEATHER CALM DOWN FOR THE LOVE OF GOD CALM DOWN.”  S’good fun, so it is.

You’ll need:

• A tin of stewed steak
• Couple of handfuls of macaroni
• 1/2 a pint of beef stock
• Worcestershire sauce
• Frozen peas – couple of handfuls again
• 1 medium onion

1. Dice the onion and fry in oil until clear
2. Meanwhile, stick the macaroni in a pan and cook until al dente.  To save time, pop the beef stock cube in the water so you can just tip the whole caboodle in with no draining.
3. Tip the stewing steak in with the onion, add a good sized splash of worcestershire sauce and give it a good stir.
4. Chuck the peas in this pan.
5. Tip in the macaroni and beefy water.
6. Simmer over a low heat for about 15 minutes until the sauce has thickened.
7. Nom it.

Sorted!  My little’uns quite enjoy some crusty bread with this, to mop up any remaining sauce.  If you modge the meat up so it totally disintegrates this makes it a little more suitable for younger midgets too.

Entirely unrelated to geeky internet humour, we have relationship developments.

A few days ago I decided I couldn’t handle the ‘on the fence’ stuff any more; I was going mental, I didn’t know how I was meant to be behaving, I couldn’t relax NOT AT ALL EVER…it was getting on top of me.  Just a little bit.

I told Alex that, one way or another, I needed him to commit to a course of action; either he needed to commit to trying to make the relationship work, or he needed to walk away.  I then proceeded to panic and hyperventilate for a few days.

Yesterday, we had le chat.  We’re back together.  Not living together again yet, but we’re on the same page, we’re both working to make the relationship work.  We can haz kisses and things like that. 

I’m ridiculously happy, I feel like a huge weight has been lifted…but strangely I’m also more terrified than I was before.  I can haz fears that he’ll freak out and bugger off again.  This will pass.  It’s gonna take a few days for me to get my head round it and stop bursting into grateful tears every five minutes.*

Yays, though.

Breaking news: Heather quote of the past 30 seconds

“When it’s winter time, hedgehogs come out”.  A light covering of snow provides the perfect backdrop for homosexual hedgehogs to reveal their sexuality to friends and family, did you know?

* Not helped by the fact that I am an idiot.  I thought I had another two weeks of crazy pills left, but on Sunday night realised that I had run out entirely.  Buggerit.  I’m on a high dose of anti-crazy; a few days without turns me into some kind of pseudo-menopausal monster with hot flushes and tears and wotnot.  Gah! 

It was Charlie’s first birthday on Monday, btw.  I will update on this separately.  Later.  With a photographic assault on your eyeballs, no less.

“Try me!  Turn on underneath!” – Sign on box of one of Charlie’s new toys

Who needs holy communion when you could make your very own Jesus pancake?  For the love of God (literally), someone needs to buy me a JesusPan for Christmas.  I want Saviour pancakes.  Start your day the Jesus way!

“Daddy, why are you putting that sparkler…in my…in my…IN MY PANTS!?”

Oh yes.  Daddy put a sparkler in Heather’s pants.  It sounds bad, yes?  Neighbours calling social services, children removed and placed into care, all because of my very literal, gobby three year old.

What actually happened: I was going to have a sparkler for Charlie to look at, while I held him.  I didn’t have gloves on.  Alex went on a search for something to wrap the sparkler in for safety, and came up with an old pair of Heather’s (clean) pants she’d grown out of.  Simple.  Not even a hint of child abuse.

Still, I’m willing to bet the neighbours will be looking at us sideways for the next few days at least.

Bugger.

Last night he made it perfectly clear to me that he has no idea what he wants…he’s just waiting to see what happens.  So.  I’m potentially opening myself up to being hurt; putting my trust in him, making myself vulnerable, knowing full well that he could suddenly bugger off and leave for good tomorrow/next week/six months down the line. 

Am I stupid to do this?  I don’t want to shoot myself in the foot; I don’t want to lose my husband who I love, but this situation is hurting me a hell of a lot. 

We had a lovely day out last week, taking the kids to the safari park.  We’ve had a few really good evenings together.  Last week’s counselling session was really productive and I came away feeling really buoyant, happy, uplifted etc etc and all other kinds of descriptive nonsense.  He’s been calling me more, talking to me for longer, communicating better.  He’s planning to get some fireworks to let off in the garden for the midgets.  But on the other hand, he’s still backed off from me; he doesn’t want to make any moves towards sorting the situation out.  Hell, he doesn’t even want to verbalise the possibility that we could end up back together. 

It’s Charlie’s first birthday on Monday, and that’s a huge logistical nightmare.  Alex has got the kids this weekend, but the party is on Sunday so he’ll have to bring them back for that.  Then he’ll be going back to his parent’s on Sunday night, so Charlie’s first birthday will start with him, me and his sister – no daddy in sight.  I can’t prevent Heather from handing over cards and presents, so by the time Alex gets here that’ll have already been done.  He did suggest that he could stay on the sofa that night, but seriously…I think that’d just fuck me up royally, and probably screw with Heather’s brain too.  Especially as she told him a few days ago “you sleep on your bit of bed, next to Mommy”.

This is like an emotional precursor to Christmas.  If Mr L is still cultivating a fence-shaped impression on his buttocks, he’ll miss them opening their stockings and their big presents from Santa…and all the excitement of Christmas morning, in general. 

Fuckit.

I’m especially fond of the little half-assed dance he does with his legs and the fact that he looks almost exactly like my Dad.