After semi-boasting to a friend recently that my battered, mud streaked, clap track of a buggy was the same one I brought 4 1/2 years ago when pregnant with my oldest, Girl Lacer, and that I hoped it’d last me until Boy Lacer no longer needed it, well of course the brake would have to literally snap off with plastic fatigue. And so after hearing a particularly alarming story involving a pushchair, a baby, the river, a slope and gravity, I concluded that of all things on a pushchair the brake is the most important, so we ordered a new one and it arrived yesterday (Urban Detour Vesta if anyone is interested). And compared to our old crusty 4 wheeler, the new pushchair is rather swish, as you can see from the photo, it’s black and bright yellow and more importantly is a 3 wheeler, I’d always said that if we’d known we were going to literally move next door to a National Park nine months after Girl Lacer was born we’d have brought a 3 wheeler in the first place. It’s also considerably lighter, so I keep on over-compensating at curbs and I can almost keep up with Girl Lacer on her scooter now. It’s also thinner when folded, which is very useful with our limited pushchair storage space, regular readers (if I have any) may remember my post about another pushchair calamity of mine, here (this post proved surprisingly popular for a long time, I suspect because it made me look so darn stupid). The only downside is that although the basket underneath is a reasonable size (compared to some) it isn’t as big as my old pushchair, so that’s going to cramp my shopping style a bit.
Now onto the new shoes. A quick recap, Boy Lacer amongst other things has hyperextension in his legs, which meant that he only started walking 2 months ago (he’s 2 1/2 next month). He had physio for almost a year and was prescribed Pedro boots, which helped keep his ankles steady, however now he can walk he no longer has physio but the physio said that she thought he still needed the Pedro boots and that I could just ring and leave a message when he needed a new pair. I actually left a message in person about a month ago when Boy Lacer’s boots started getting too small but I never heard a thing back and when it got to the stage this week of Boy Lacer not even being able to get his right foot into the boot properly I knew we had to get him some shoes, Pedro boots or no Pedro boots and that any good Pedro boots supposedly could do would be minuscule compared to the damage done by wearing ill fitting shoes. So we went shoe shopping, I still wanted him to wear boots though, so specifically should I say boot shopping. I went to Clarks first, were Girl Lacer gets all her shoes, heck even I get my shoes from there, we’re a brand loyal family but they didn’t have any boots (we discovered after getting his feet measured which he hates). So remembering that I’d seen that the child shoe department in the uber-expensive local department store did boots we went there instead, Boy Lacer had his feet measured again, hated it but was virtually flirting with the pretty blonde assistant by the end of it and we were presented with a wide variety of choice. We went for a pair of Ecco boots, you can just about see them in the photo and they seem to be almost as supportive as the Pedro’s and more importantly fit, when I held his old shoes up against his new ones the size difference was how shall a put it, guilt inducing. Only down side, well the shoes cost almost half as much as the new buggy cost, it was one of those places were you just don’t ask how much, so when the pretty blonde shop assistant got to the till and told me the price as I handed over my debit card there was certainly a faint tremor in the card as I did so.
It wasn’t the only shopping we did today though. Girl Lacer is turning into quite the party animal and has another party invite, this time for a princess party, I had suspected that this moment would come, the time where we would have to bite the bullet and improve Girl Lacer’s rather shabby dress up wardrobe (previous contents: doctor’s coat, fairy wings that don’t fit, bat girl outfit) specially as it seems de rigour in her ‘social circle’ to be decked out in as many Disney Princess outfits as possible. Now I am quite proud that I am probably one of the few parents in town who’s children arn’t desperate to get into the local very prominently placed Disney store the moment they walk past, we just have Freeview and we just watch CBeebies and they’re not into films (unless it’s Star Wars, they have their daddy’s blood) so Disney so far has pretty much passed them by, sorry Mickey. However in my brief bit of market research, they do do the best princess outfits, if the most jaw droppingly, come in their own suit protector, expensive. However as I browsed (and Boy Lacer having got into the shopping bug and was rather worringly keenly checking out the glittery shoes and the girls underwear) I spotted a Cinderella dress for £20 (as compared to the other £35 – 45 dresses) so not caring which of the panoply of Disney princesses it was I brought it (there were only two £20 dresses), got it home and of course Girl Lacer loves it.
So kids home, fed, in bed and fast forward to feeding me time (the final thing I’m rambling on about today), I’m still on this diet (lost 1lb in 2 weeks wey hay! (not)) and I’m still hating the ‘fake’ food (Learningwoman who commented on one of my other diet tagged posts about Slimming World – that sounds interesting). Thursday night is of course Jamie night and of course the stuff he normally serves up always looks nice anyway but as I sat there with my pasta bianca (a Jamie recipe actually) made with low fat spread instead of butter making it virtually inedible and my flourless / sugarless crumble which was inedible, I almost felt like eating that cr*p I shouldn’t even me allowed to watch Jamie at the same time. When he made that chilli preserve I could almost picture myself dancing around the kitchen with a spoonful of that on my tongue, even his cannelloni looked nice and I can’t stand cauliflower and broccoli!
Oh and sorry, one last thing, I have been thinking about my book selling, prompted by the thought of book selling (don’t make me laugh) at the children’s cafe next week which I don’t want to do and by a catalogue from another book selling company sent through the school (which don’t by the way want to know my book selection). The catalogue through the school had much cheaper product, far more well known titles and probably far more popular titles, unlike the ones I sell which are expensive and in some cases the sort of books parents think their kids ‘should’ like. I can never compete against selections like that. As for the children’s cafe, well considering I only sell one or two books at a time if I’m lucky, if I don’t want to sell there I shouldn’t. I’m not completely giving up though, I made money last Christmas and I suspect I could make more next Christmas, my stock is also a good source of very cheap (for me) birthday presents for all the parties Girl Lacer goes to and I’ll be able to use the books as ‘payment’ for the last two terms of Boy Lacer’s playgroup place. I just think for now, it needs a rest.
