February.
Eurgh.
Not a very inspiring month is it? It’s cold, the evenings are still dark, and you know that at some point you’re going to be forced to make pancakes that no one really wants to eat. Hardly surprising that my mind has been wandering forward to summer, imagining being able to sit outside with my lunch, feeling the warmth of the sun on my shoulders.
I’m having a bit of dilemma though when it comes to planning holidays. For a start, you know when you’re taking children with you that it’s never really a ‘break’, so you’re reluctant to spend too much money or travel too far for what will essentially be like being at home but without your own bed and favourite tea bags for comfort.
Then you’ve got the problem of trying to find somewhere to go and something to do that everyone will enjoy. Not a simple task when the ‘everyone’ includes a teenager who doesn’t like ‘abroad’ and gets anxious if she’s a few hundred metres from a wi-fi network, and a sulky nine year old whose ideal morning involves sitting in a dark room under a blanket, watching Tracy Beaker and eating dry cereal.
You can appreciate can’t you why I’m not getting over excited about the prospect of us all going away together?
The cherry on the cake then is money, or rather a lack of it. Do you blow it all on one fabulous fortnight, or try to spread the ‘fun’ throughout the year with a series of short breaks? Hotels? Self catering? Camping?? (Be reasonable…). It all feels like too much choice.
Given that we’ll all be fed up with each other and wanting to come home after about eight hours anyway, perhaps we should just forget the whole idea and spend the money instead on something we’d actually enjoy. I’ll buy Bee some sort of internet device, Belle has BT Vision already, so would just need a few boxes of Weetos. And me? I think I’ll just put the tent up in the garden, buy myself a pile of magazines and a crate of lager and leave them to it. Happy holidays!
I’ve always felt protective of February because it’s an eccentric little month, because it usually brings snow and because it’s got my birthday at the end of it. Lent’s a right bugger though, because I’ll have to get through the rest of the month without beer. And holidays, you’re so right! The stress of booking them, affording them and then blinking well enjoying them, far outweighs the benefits.
Cor blimey, no beer for forty days!? You should be more like Belle and give up something like ‘wearing your watch in bed’!
Pancakes no-one wants???? What?!?! I’ll have them!!!
My thouhts exactly – I can’t wait for my leek, bacon and blue cheese pancakes followed by maple pancakes for pudding :D
I did have a rather tasty soft cheese and ham pancake for breakfast today. It wasn’t very filling though – I had to have toast and marmite afterwards!
I’ll pop them in the post :-)
I have been thinking EXACTLY the same thing. My children really just want to spend their days lying in bed watching Hannah Montana and eating cornflakes from the packet. The cost of a crappy caravan by the seaide is terrifying. A friend offered me her tent, saying: “Jake was sick in it last year, but we cleaned it all up!”
WHAT TO DO????
A tent someone has thrown up in??? That doesn’t sound like much of a holiday. I think staying in bed sounds like the best option.
I keep saying to myself, it’s only a month till Spring and imagining holidays in the sun. Of course, the reality of a holiday with a 3 year old, is that it is not a holiday!
It’s really NOT a holiday is it?? I’ve often thought there is money to be made in week long childcare – like a nursery, but full time, so you can go off on your own for a proper holiday.
Well, I have to report that BabyMibs and I will be holidaying in our back garden this year in a tent!
Mind you, he is only 5 still and it will be a big adventure for him!
He is also already being recruited for child slave labour in the garden, now we actually HAVE a decent field-sized one to grow things in.
I intend to take us out for a couple of long day-trips to the seaside also in the summer, and along with making rocket ships out of toilet roll inners, that’ll be our summer sorted!
That actually sounds lovely – I know when I was little camping in the back garden was just as exciting. In a way it’s MORE exciting, as it makes you see your home and ordinary day to day life in a totally different way doesn’t it?