As I said in my last proper post, August was a very busy month. The girls had wonderful fun with all their birthday celebrations. The main event of course was the Jungle Junction party which went very well indeed. I managed to get there in plenty of time without getting stressed which as anyone who knows me will agree is a pretty major achievement. The food I prepared all went down well and there was enough for everyone without too much left over. The only nearly catastrophe was that I made the mistake of thinking that Jungle Junction supplied the squash...they don't, if you are doing your own food you have to bring your own squash and they supply the jugs for you to make it up in. Thankfully I was saved by the early arrival of my friend Mandy who nipped down the road to Sainsbury's for supplies. The girls had a wonderful time, but sadly due to organising the food and drinks for the children I didn't get chance to take more than a handful of photos. On their actual birthdays we had family round for a cuppa and birthday cake - so in total they had three cakes between them! Lucky girls (and lucky me, I managed to get my fair share...)
Hannah's endoscopy went very well indeed. I won't go into too much detail as I know it's all on her blog, but the main thing was she has no varices (still having trouble getting that to sink in) and she was a star for the whole day.
It was lovely to meet with Danielle, Liz, Maribel, Sam and their families for the Hugs and Hope day on the 19th of August. Sadly it bucketed it down for the whole day and as we had picked an outside activity it really spoiled our plans. The kids didn't mind splashing in the puddles though and we got to have a good natter together.
Here is the montage of photos I made from the day:
September started with Caitlin going back to school on the 5th. She was very excited to go back; it is great that she enjoys school so much. Being not terribly bright I had booked Hannah's home visit for nursery at 11 am that day. This did not exactly give me much 'one child instead of two children who mostly want to kill each other time' to make the house look presentable. Amazingly I managed to make the living room look like part of a respectable person's home, although the hidden bits of the house were very scary and I prayed that they wouldn't need the loo! It was a good job too...because the headmistress arrived with Hannah's teacher!
The following week we enjoyed a visit from Elly, Arthur, and Sylvan. Hannah has finally managed to work out that Sylvan is not called Shiny, which is progress. Arthur was perfectly happy as long as he could watch Thomas the Tank Engine (note to Elly: We now have a new video player so there is the potential for Arthur to watch more than one episode of Thomas next time he comes!)
The next highlight was Hannah starting nursery on the 26th of September...here she is....
...having a great time, and thankfully that has continued. In fact I have to chase her into the classroom for a goodbye kiss!
The 6th of October was the CLDF conference. This is the third time we have been and as usual it was an excellent day, being extremely interesting and informative. It was also the day of my big moment...the talk I had been asked to do. I worked really hard on it and also had some invaluable help from Andy. It was all worth it; not only did I manage not to cock it up but I have had some wonderful positive feedback about it.
So....*breathes*....I think that is our major events of the last three months caught up with....
