Forrest Gump, eat your heart out...

It may not look like it, but that was my Mother's Day present to Lisa - the kids on a bench, a long way away from her. I held them hostage at the park while she had an afternoon nap. And that's not E.T. in the background, it's Amelie's scooter. Although she often says "Ouch!" when she rides it.

Anyhoo, to be honest, this past week and a half has been a bit like one long Mother's Day, as we've spent a good ten or eleven days doing little things for Lisa's Mum. Mostly telling her to sit down, and shoving frozen peas in her face. But as of this weekend, our work as professional carers has come to an end, and the mother-in-law has gone home.

She returned to the Eye Hospital on Friday for her post-op check-up, and by the time she left, she was no longer in stitches. Although she was laughing a lot more. The doctor told her that further nose bleeds are unlikely, which is the kind of statement I wouldn't want to make without clamping both hands to the nearest bit of wood, and she left with a clean bill of health.

So on Saturday I did a bit of dawn-breaking overtime, then returned home and took Amelie down to Asda for some groceries to fill her Nanny's vastly depleted fridge. After lunch, I drove my mother-in-law home with some shopping and a new electric blanket, which I then fitted (with great difficulty, as it transpired) before driving Amelie over to Hove for her Musical Theatre Class. Or Colouring-In Session, as I like to call it. This week they made kites. Last time it was masks. If they spent as much time singing and dancing as they do on craft projects, she'd be in the West End by Christmas.

Anyhoo, I returned home for a bit of housework, then collected Amelie, stopped off at McDonalds, came back for more hoovering, and finally made it into bed, before realising that if I'd gone into work at midnight, I could have claimed for an extra hour's overtime when the clocks went forward.

Sadly I didn't think of that, so I got up early on Sunday with the kids, and spent a couple of hours preparing Lisa's Mother's Day gifts, which included framed photos of them both, a heart-shaped crumpet and some Belgian Marc de Champagne Truffles. I'm not sure who Marc is, and why he's getting his Champagne from Belgium, but Lisa seemed to like them. Although Amelie tried one, and said it was so horrible it made her ear hurt.

No, me neither.

With Mother's Day well and truly celebrated, I headed back into work for some more overtime (these kids are going to have a holiday if it kills me) (and if it does, the flights will be cheaper), before returning after lunch and taking the children out to the park, where Amelie followed up on her purple dinosaur incident by acting like a headless chicken on a fowl-looking see-saw...


It's a fine line between role model and bad influence, and it's hard for Toby to look up to her if she's always flat on her face. But judging by the dancing at the end, that Musical Theatre Class isn't entirely in vain.