So it has been a few days since I’ve written.

Read that first line in the voice of Brian Blessed please, while holding on to the ‘so’ for a long time . It gives it more drama . Although, then (as long as you’ve got the voice spot on in your head) it maybe should read ‘since my last confession’ instead .

Oh dear, I got carried away imagining Brian Blessed reading my blog out loud and then got off track before I’ve even got onto it !

I had a dark moment on Saturday night and not just because it was night time which tends to be traditionally dark …

We had made it to my mother’s house in the afternoon , I still feel quite proud of myself each and every time I leave the house, like you do with a newborn . I also like to think he is young enough that descending on her at any time without prior warning constitutes an outing and therefore I am being an entertaining mother myself ….

‘Are we doing anything today?’ They ask ….. yikes …. panic …. quick plan what can we do that involves minimal effort because I thought just getting dressed was really pretty excellent in itself ….

‘Yes !’ I reply enthusiastically. Today we are going to Grandmas to play in the garden!’ We do have a garden ourselves of course …. but hers is bigger and ours most definitely cannot be counted as an outing. Then there are all sorts of complicated questions , such as what time are we going ? And other things I can’t possibly answer other than a vague aim at a time . Plus , I’m sure it’s much more exciting for my mum not to know that we are about to appear demanding water fights, biscuits, getting the wii fit working and so on and so forth. I’m almost certain that she loves the surprise and the challenge instead .

Anyway, I am waffling on and it’s still light …. we need to transcend into the darkness …..

Upon leaving my mother’s a good two hours after we said we would go (felt a bit bad there as she was getting ready for an evening out , but for some reason it takes about four hours to get three children into the car ) we decided that on such a beautiful evening it seemed a shame to leave the sunshine and go back to the dark forest covered house . Instead, to shrieks of delight (the girls that is …. not me ) I suggested we go to a country pub with a view and share some chips and have lemonades .

Wild …. I know …

We reached the pub , glorious evening sunshine , get out of the car , little man debated having a good wail, but stopped himself . All was going rather swimmingly well . Enter said pub …. rock up to the bar and order a bowl of their finest chips and three lemonades . Only to be told they don’t do chips . I queried the fact it clearly said chips on the menu, but alas you could only order said chips if also ordering a billion pound main also . So we left feeling confused and with that disappointed feeling you get when you’re just about to eat something …… and then you are not !

Saving the day, I had a glorious thought …. let’s grab chips and go to the park ! Woooop more delight . I felt like I’d really got this one …. minimal fuss and yet we were out enjoying the evening sun all three happy and then ……. THEN the darkness descends …… in the form of a woman entering the field with her dog, right next to the park . I think it was a lab, but let’s imagine it was a Corgi as it feels more fitting and I’m sure it joined in anyway with ………..

The look .

The woman gave me ‘the look’

I was confused at first …. I thought I saw a little head shake too as she went past . What could it be ???

Then it hit me . As I am sat on the swing , babe in one arm, polystyrene chip box in other . Babe unfortunately due to nappy explosion is now in a grey vest and heat of the day has stuck his hair into a delightful mohawk. Girls are full of summer hype and running round park , polystyrene chip boxes clutched in hands. Youngest daughter also has cola but thinks a wasp may have gone into the top , goes into panic and has also projectile spat cola (and no wasp it turned out) out of her mouth as eldest had said she thought she must have drunk it, just as the woman had walked past . I’m sat on swing, single mum of three children , two wild and one who looks like a mini punk rocker and I realise to my horror I’ve accidentally turned into a chav . I’d got the look, because to be quite frank , I must have looked like I’d just walked off the set of Shameless. Had to stop myself from calling out ‘no no…… there has been a terrible mistake , I play the violin and like opera and we eat vegetables every day’ but ‘twas too late . Ah well …. I took mini punk and the wild girls home .

Now, back to the point of this journey …. to work out how to survive as a single mother of newborn whilst affording generally anything . Bank holidays it turns out are not the best time to earn much while entertaining three children , but I thought I could combine fun and almost certain money making with this ….

Not sheep farming no .

A bit of good old fashioned gambling . Not that I’m an advocate of gambling of course …… but I think a good bit of comedy betting can’t do any harm ….. so off we went on what may have been the hottest day of the year to bet on some sheep racing ! A tough sport at the best of times and only he who dares is brave enough to risk losing a 50 pence instead of doubling it ….

So here we were at a glorious countryside summer fete in the South Downs and having bustled along in the heat, were about to place our bets when realising …… you don’t get to see your sheep first !!Maybe people weren’t taking this as seriously as we were but our competitive streak (yes… our ! Seems to run in the family) had led us to hoping we would at least be able to pick the sheep with the longest legs !!! Alas no …. it was all done on names ! I nearly chose Mint Sauce but changed when I saw the name Burning Sky, thought that sounds like a winner , eldest nearly went with Mint Sauce too but then chose Blueberry and middlest also debated Mint Sauce but went for Lucky Liz instead .

We then wandered across the field to the starting pens and found said sheep . Burning Sky looked straight at me and I’m pretty convinced winked too …. a knowing ‘I’m going to win’ kind of look . Look at the face …

The race began

Yes …..that’s right . Thats Burning Sky , burning away in last place …… trying to catch up with Blueberry and Lucky Liz who were also firmly staying towards the back .

Mint Sauce won.

Little man had a bet on Flip Flop for the second race , but Flip Flop got spooked by a dog and started jumping up and down instead of running forwards .

A very funny fun day out all in all, but my advice is that if you are after earning an income whilst single parenting teenies , sheep race bets probably aren’t your way forward.

I’ve decided sheep are fickle !

I wonder how long it will take me to remember ?…..

While sat on the sofa early this morning, coffee in hand, tiny man on knee, I suddenly noticed his entire shoulder and top of back were soaking wet . A leaky nappy?? No, can’t be , wrong place on him unless he has secretly learnt to wee out of his ear? (At this point and after nine weeks of no sleep nothing would surprise me !) then I notice I’m soaked too ! My top , my left leg !

Feeling utterly indignant I spun my head towards the window to catch sight of whichever rascal had clearly aimed at us through the window with a giant super soaker . The window was shut. My eldest was still drinking from a mug and even in zombie mode I’m sure I’d have known if it was scalding hot coffee that had got me . I stood up, still confused which only made the situation worse as the pool that had now accumulated somewhere around my middle, now also very cold, cascaded down my leg .

Milk . Idiot I am and somehow equally shocked and affronted every single time. When will I remember that breastfeeding equals milk disasters !

Onward and upward . Well, I say upward . There hasn’t been a vast amount of upwarding yet . The fridge contents aren’t very exciting unless one loaf and a cucumber does it for you (!…….) and I’ve not moved particularly forwards yet but at least have mastered a thousand ideas for holiday activities on no funds .

Yesterday – the middlest (middlest? Middle one? Middle child ??? Is there a shorter better way to describe your middle child? Argh and isn’t middle one of those words that if you say it several times over doesn’t sound like a real word anymore !??) I digress , far too much since she’s not even part of the story …. anyway , yesterday with the inbetweener at grandmas for the night and me and the eldest keen to do something out, ventured out with teeny man to Firle . We drove up Firle Beacon …… movedz just enough away from the car that we could pretend to other hikers that we had walked up there too , baby in sling and all … and stared at the view a bit . It’s beautiful . If you haven’t been , go .

It feels like you’re on top of the world . Then we drove down into the village and went to the church . Also totally beautiful and well worth a visit . Some sun and some wandering which did us some good .

Some much needed good too, as cannot deny there has been a little bit of wallowing again . A little bit of , maybe if I was a bit more like this or a bit more like that this would be different and so on and so forth and nothing that does any good at all at the end of the day .

Today I have set up a separate email account as advised on money saving expert and started looking through the millions of earn from home ideas there . Apparently if I just complete about four thousand surveys a day I could make up to five pounds a month ……

Or they suggest if you are a lucky person (hah …. hahahahahah ….. har har and so on especially for those who have perhaps known me for several years) I could start entering lots of online competitions …..

I’m going to have a good read through all the suggestions and see if anything actually seems viable … I might try a few out and see and I shall update you later !!!

Tootle pip!

So after beginning my blog yesterday feeling underdressed but nonetheless rather proactive about sorting everything out and becoming some sort of superhero-high earning-wonder mum , two things have occurred to me … firstly I have no time whatsoever with such a young baby and secondly I don’t have a lycra superhero costume to help me on my way . That said I’m not entirely sure lycra would be a great choice for a mum in the early days anyway . I can’t really picture Gal Gadot having had the same effect in Wonder Woman had she been leaping about sporting two gigantic milk patches leaking through her costume …..

So, time is an issue because little man while totally gorgeous , is also extremely crafty and desires being held 24/7 or screaming when being put down . I’m sure he fakes deep sleep to be funny. I can spend a good hour getting him to sleep on me and be convinced nothing will wake him until I gently start lowering him into his Moses basket at which point it’s like a thousand alarms going off at once as his ‘don’t leave me’ radar goes off.

He does however sleep very well in the bathroom when I’m having a shower as long as I shower with one leg hanging glamorously out of the bath tub and rock his moses basket at the same time . So as long as I can find a way of earning that I can do whilst showering or with one arm only I should be just fine !!

Back to the title of this mornings post though …. first I should share with you what is outside my window ….

I basically live in the woods ! Well not entirely but my house is very nicely nestled into a 28 acre wood and most of the inhabitants of the woods have decided they would like to live inside the house having got rather bored of woodland life …. so added to the insanity of the three munchkins and a mad dog, I also have to add spider warden to my list of tasks …

They are EVERYWHERE. We haven’t been in this house long at all and already I’ve seen more giant spiders here than I have in the rest of my life altogether . If only I could open a spider exhibit and charge the public to wander around the house viewing the many varieties I would make a fortune ! Or perhaps it could be used for a Halloween film or maybe Harry Potter fans would like to see a real life Aragog !

Hilarity struck at 4am when opened my eyes as little man had woken for feed number forty seven of the night to see a giant one transcending down from the ceiling aiming for my head and only a foot away . I blew at it in my sleep haze and it started going back up (thank god) then changed his mind and started fast down the wall towards little mans head. I helpfully leapt out of bed with a bit of a shriek which little man found hilarious and started running round the house, naked hunting for a jam jar . By the time said jar had been found tarantula (well nearly) was heading for little mans head on the bed ! Got jar over spider and little man started crying loudly enough to wake the girls so scooped him up with the free arm thus leaving no arm free to put card under said jar !! So a joyous 20 minutes of holding the jar over the beast while feeding little man was enjoyed before finally getting to put the spider out and then to my horror ….. discovering a leg left on the bed . Little man was happily drifting off again but guilt consumed after sending a now seven-legger out of the window saw to me staying awake a while .

Now off to entertain the three while finding a suitable income on no sleep and juggling baby haha I shall get there ! Some possible ideas I shall share tomorrow …. but for now I’ll leave you with these …..

Well …… truth be told it has already begun !

Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton

I think in truth this journey has had several beginnings but perhaps the biggest one in this journey I am taking you on was becoming single at 35 weeks pregnant (not my choice ) and moving house at 36 weeks pregnant …. also not my choice !

So here we are, myself, a very (for want of better words ) exuberant teenager, a rather lively seven year old and a nine week old baby . To say my world has been turned upside down would be the understatement of the century .

I’ve done a good bit of wallowing, a fair old bit of sobbing, a good few weeks of ignoring it all and just staring in wonder and joy when this little bundle of unexpected joy flew into our lives and now I have decided it is time to attempt to reassemble some sort of brain function and own up to the fact that after looking at all the ins and outs of my bank account we are currently left with a whopping £2.75 a week to live off for food and petrol and any other wild luxuries like …. for example , anything at all that isn’t a bill or my rent .

Laugh ?

Anyway , short of descending into wild sorrows I have decided the next best thing to do is work out how to survive, single parent three children, breastfeed exclusively, and sort out finances . This is the journey I am taking you on with me , because to be quite frank , it’s currently a rather lonely journey which is ironic in itself since I can’t remember the last time I was even able to have a wee without anyone joining me in the bathroom to sort out fighting, or pull apart some pieces of lego or answer one of a million non urgent questions , or more recently to jiggle a tiny baby on my knee !

Did I mention my line of work is as a classical musician ? That should certainly makes things easier ….. said nobody ever !

So here we go , day one of attempting to get back onto some sort of track . It has definitely started interestingly , having fallen asleep with teeny man in bed with me this morning we woke together on a huge puddle of wee , always a sign that it’s time to go up a nappy size …. thank god I bought a new pack of the size that’s too small yesterday . Perhaps I can add it to the mountain of first size nappies I stocked up on while pregnant forgetting that he’d be out of them after only two weeks … so into the shower for both of us nice and early and a bit of washing and wrestling a slippery bambino …… out of shower ….. little one dry, dressed and clean , put him down for ten seconds to attempt to find myself clothes then realise he has brought up so much milk it looks like he has had a milk hair wash ….. back into bathroom for second wash and baby shampoo and it’s only 8am. Back out , some more feeding, drying , re-dressing in clothes not covered in milk sick and I’m ready to start the day ! Here we go …. I’ll start with some internet research on how to earn anything while having a newborn baby .

Big prospects here I can feel it ..(did I mention I’m still currently in just knickers with a towel on my head ?…..)