We feel a bit in limbo waiting for littlest Mead to appear, but no sign yet. Meanwhile we’re trying to help Melanie as much as possible, which is providing some cute moments. She had been given a massage as a Christmas present, so we all went with her to Bristol last week. I sat in the waiting room with the children while Melanie was gone for the hour. I’d asked them to read books because I really needed to be reading too. They did really well (the receptionist was the most disruptive saying how good they were being!) After a while Mariah and Joel were snuggled up next to each other looking at a book together. Joel turned slightly, stroked her cheek tenderly and whispered “you know that I love you?” Cute. And a nice change from the fighting that has been a marked feature of home life in the last month or so.
I have taken them to the sports hall at church a couple of times to burn of some energy. They are really getting into that. We play five football matches starting with me against them, then me with each of them against the rest. It’s fun to see them improving. Hannah is getting into it, Aliyah continues to be a tireless worker, Mariah has improved significantly and likes to score goals running from deep. Joel runs enough to rival Aliyah, and the delight when he scores is worth all the effort of going!
Actually Joel is football mad at the moment. He loves to play in the living room too, with a soft ball. He has to score against one sofa, and he defends a smaller goal at the other end. This is quite fun and he keeps saying “give me a chance!” Truth is that while I don’t exactly play intensely, I don’t give away soft goals, but he always scores plenty. Last night Aliyah and Mariah joined in, with Melanie resting on another sofa…that did feel crowded – four people on a twelve foot long pitch!
After finishing the game I sat down to read Mariah and Joel their bedtime story, while the older two finished off the kitchen and putting the rabbits away for the night. We’re reading through a little book called Winter Pony, about a girl who gets her dream, a pony of her own. Appropriately the pony was about to give birth, so Melanie listened along as we read of the anxious waiting, then finally the successful birth story. We all wondered if that might be a catalyst for action. Not so far.
