A trip to the photographers......

As a mother you have this kinda duty to ensure you have heaps of photos of your little darlings growing up and doing loads of fun filled things.  It's nice to look back on and think "Fuck me, I'm surprised I've not had a breakdown"

Then you get the "professional" photos done.  Blaine had his done at school - which went well, no picking of the nose, no sullen face, which is huge progress from last years disaster where he just looked miserable and told the photographer to "Go away" as he hates getting his photo taken. Nice child.

The Mum and Baby group that I go to had a Professional Photographer come along to take photos of the little cherubs - siblings were more than welcome.  I thought it would be a wonderful idea to have a charming picture of Blaine and Imogen together.  My mum had requested that they wore outfits that complemented each other and matched.... a hard task when Blaine won't wear a dress...... In my head my 2 delightful children would sit and happily smile and laugh at each other - dressed to perfection and behaving like angles.

The reality is, as always, something slightly different.  Prior to getting the photos taken I inform Blaine of what is about to happen, he has a tantrum.  "I HATE getting my picture taken.  I'm NOT going it.  I HATE it.  I HATE YOUUUUUUU!!" Great - wonderful. This starts Imogen off on one of her mini rants towards her brother. So, 2 crying children and I need to get Blaine in his outfit.  Of course he refuses point blank to wear anything remotely smart, but eventually he's dressed in jeans and a shirt and we walk up to the centre to get the pictures taken.

We are ushered into the room where a family are currently having their photos done - they are lovely, perfect smiling children, sitting nicely, smiling away and following instructions.  Blaine is standing beside me sulking as I attempt to tidy his hair "Don't touch me" he hisses. 

Then it's our shot.  Blaine flings off his coat, socks and shoes and plonks himself down on the white paper thing.  Imogen is placed beside him and then I move away.  At this point Imogen freaks out as I have moved one millimetre away from her and starts greeting.  Blaine starts moaning "Imogen, stop it"  the woman is attempting to restore some sort of normality by using children's TV characters to capture Imogen's attention. Blaine gets all huffy as it's all "BABYISH - I HATE IGGLE PIGGLE HE'S A BABY!!" and Imogen cries even more and is frantically attempting to get away from the camera lens and back to the security of me. Blaine then resorts to rolling his eyes and picking his nose.

After a few attempts the photographer gives up. Luckily it was free. Blaine gets himself ready then has a strop about nothing. 

The week later we got the photos - not bad, I think she captured one when Imogen was paused between screams, so she just looks grumpy and not actually screaming. I refrain from purchasing any.

The following week I receive a letter home from Imogen's nursery.  A Photographer is coming to the nursery and we have a place booked at 16:45 so Blaine can come along too.  Groan.  This time I'm much more prepared....

In the morning I tell Blaine that after school he is coming home to get changed into nice clothes and he is getting his photos taken.  "NO, I HATE IT" is the response.  "Oh dear, that's a wee shame" I reply "I was going to get you something nice if you were good" .......  Blaine processes this information, he's good at haggling so I know he'll try for anything.  "What's that then mummy?" he asks all innocently, "I dunno, depends how good you are" "Oh I'll be super good if I get a new DS game"  Hmmmm the stakes are high for this one.  I need to wangle him down from a DS game to something more realistic and affordable.  Pay day is tomorrow. I'm skint. "OK Blaine.  If you want a DS game you have to be very good and collect 20 things in your reward jar.  That's the rule for DS games.  For today, IF you are VERY good, you can get a mouse for the laptop"  Blaine is rather excited about this and the promise of a new mouse goes down well.

To explain Blaines reward jar - every time he does one of his "Star Jobs" without a tantrum he gets a wee thing in his jar (paperclip normally) - once he gets 20 he gets a reward.  He has NEVER achieved 20 yet.  This is how good his behaviour is.  Sigh. His Star Jobs aren't anything dramatic like "clean all the windows in the house"; "climb Mount Everest" no, no - it's things like "Get washed every day nicely with no tantrum"; "Get dressed every day nicely with no tantrum" "Eat meals NICELY with no distractions and NO tantrums" You can see the focus on tantrums here......  It's all a bit like SuperNanny.

After school he came home and got changed - even wore a tie!  Imogen is in her nice outfit, with matching hair band, and off we pop to nursery.  This time it is slightly more successful.  We last about 5/10 mins before Imogen starts going mental, she wasn't the most enthusiastic person in the world but she tolerated it.  The photographer used feathers for her to play with and I think she may have caught her slightly smiling once.  Or maybe she farted.  Who knows.

Blaine got his computer mouse. Imogen got a biscuit.  It all ended well and not one tantrum.  Until it was time for homework.....

Homework. AKA Blaine's teacher is a maniac!

Blaine entered the world of P2 in August.  Hurrah!  He was flung back to school at great speed as soon as the bloody holidays were over and he soon settled back into his old routine.  That routine being something like this:  Up at 7am, tantrum over breakfast as he's not allowed cake/biscuits/crisps, finally get him to eat a bowl of Rice Krispies.  7:45am tantrum over getting washed and dressed as he hates his school uniform.  8:15am tantrum over what to have for play piece and lunch.  8:40am tantrum over getting shoes and coat on.  8:45am leave house and walk to school. While he's having all these hissy fits I'm also trying to get Imogen ready for nursery, do her bottles, and get myself organised for work.  It's a bit mental. At 8:50 I leave him at school gates, head into work make strong coffee and relax.....

So he's been back for a good few weeks now, and he has a new teacher!  She's a probationer.  Groan.  They all have to start somewhere I suppose and, for some mental reason, the headteacher of Blaine's school have decided that she'll get flung straight in at the deep end and have a class of hyper active 6 year olds who would rather wrestle than read. She's a young lady, at the moment she doesn't look like she's turned into an alcoholic or had a mental breakdown. I'm sure this will come.  She's also far too enthusiastic and obviously has far too much time on her hands to do marking as she's suddenly turned into a homework slave.

This is what Blaine has to do in a week.  Mon-Thurs.

1. Reading book.  His reading is coming on great so he actually loves this.  Sometimes 2 books a week.
2. Education City - online homework stuff, again he loves it as it's on the computer and easy.
3. Spelling - 10 words that he has to learn to spell by Friday as they get tested on it every Friday.
4. Sentences - he has to write 3 sentences which incorporate the spelling words
5. Maths sheet - this week is subtraction, moving onto fractions soon?!
6. Jolly Grammar - trust me, it's far from Jolly.  This week he is learning the -ar sound and focusing on Common Nouns.  He has a worksheet to complete.
7. Research Homework (to be fair this is a 2 week project) researching jobs that people do at sea. Make a poster to show the class and present it to them next week.

According to his Homework Contract (yes, they have a signed contract and everything now!) He has to do 20 mins every night.

So tonight it went like this.  Bearing in mind I get home at 5:30pm due to bastard work. 

5:30 - Blaine needs a drink.  This is the start of the distraction techniques.  He has millions of these.  He then needs a pee.  Then he wants tea.
6pm - tantrum over teatime due to the food being hot or something.  Eventually calms down to eat it.
6:30pm - tantrum over getting the TV turned off as he needs to do homework.
6:45pm - I put Imogen to bed, Tom in shower.  Blaine takes this opportunity to fuck off outside to play with his friends. Grrrrr..... homework still not started.
7pm - Blaine brought back in and told he has to do homework
7:20pm - tantrum over.  Bargaining begins - "If you do your homework you can get 5 mins on the DS" Blaine - "I want 10 mins on DS"; me "No, 5 or nothing"  Blaine "FINE! I HATE YOU!"  Good, good.  Sigh.  I contemplate cracking open the vodka, however I'm on call for work so can't even do this......
7:25pm - Blaine decides he'll do Education City.  Which he completes with ease, but I get distracted by a phone call and while doing so he's managed to access the Lego website and is playing some shooting game when I return from the call.
7:30 - time to turn off PC and go to bed.  No tanturm, but instead he plays deaf.  I end up turning the computer off for him and he goes to bed.

So, this week we have managed to complete the maths sheet and Education City.  The project is due in next Friday, so that can wait.  The Common Nouns need done by tomorrow.  So I can see exactly what's going to happen tomorrow morning. Luckily my on-call ends at 7am, so I can quite happily have a splash of vodka over my Special K.

Oh - and it's parent's night tomorrow night.  I'm sure that will be enlightening. Best stock up on the voddy.