Hoping the fishwife threats worked.

Lola in the front carrier, behind the scenes with daddy, me, Monty and Oliver. 'Back in the day' dog walks.

With catlike dexterity, I negotiate the various poo-traps in the garage, reaching my destination with the self satisfaction of Tom Cruize after he completed his 'mission impossible'. I feel as though I am living a s*** nightmare, quite literally. Between the cats and the chickens, an on occasion the dog too, the garage is officially the poo-room. It is utterly rank, but I have nothing I can do about it, short of putting the cats in cages, and the chickens too. Well, caging the chickens is debatable, as I would rather, and quite happily wring all their bloody ostrich necks as we speak. I have never ever in my whole legged life, EVER come across such ENORMOUS birds, I am sure I have somehow managed to mutate them, and they are now evolving into fully fledged chicken-ostriches a new mutant breed. They will be a giant, nasty breed of chicken-ostrich that devour bacon butties and small children alike.

This is so much so the case, that at meal times, I arm my kids with plastic swords, I keep the cricket bat for myself (sounds dark, but in fact it is simply made-in-china rubber, so although brandishing this may raise some RSPCA eyebrows, they would probably understand my plight, and turn a blind eye). They flap with such almighty power at any rate, that the weapons designated to me and kids alike serve only the purpose of preventative aids from being eaten alive, rather than posing any serious threat to the gargantuan birds. The other day, I ran in the house to grab something (scoop up some sanity I stashed behind the eggs in the fridge earlier on), the kids are happily and contentedly sitting at the table in the garden, I stroll back up, when I suddenly find my self in a race,  against a chicken, screaming in slow motion ‘NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!’ as Margo, now fully recovered from dog-devouring episode, flies up on the table and snatches Esmie’s sandwich out of her hand. Monty is too late with his sword, and I left the cricket bat up at the table, once I get back up off my knees, I sunk down on them with my head in my hands after crying ‘NOOOOOOOOO’. I get back up, full of livid murdering chicken thoughts, and CHARGE! Triumphantly picking up my weapon, I’m on a roll, like Boadicea I whack around violently in the general direction of chickens (although she predominantly dealt with Romans, not birds, and she had a proper sword, lucky b*tch). Missing every time, which is just all the more frustrating, and I nearly die on the spot with stress and over exertion, and from the sheer frustration of the whacking-chicken-missing-EVERTIME-they-are-just-too-fast-and-flappy episode.

dog walks when there were 3...

Tonight, after a looong ol’ dog walk, whereupon we hit upon the ‘we’re sporting cramp-ons and proud of it’ group of walkers. They are lovely and chatty, but it does not aid me in my quest-Esmie on my shoulders, poking every orifice known to man in my face, and thoroughly enjoying herself even if she was gutted that the horses in the field we’d brought carrots and apples for, were not there. Lola the ‘I am only cycling downhill, Mummy’ was a sulky uphill, dragging biker. Monty and Lola, as they both had wheeled vehicles, were wearing cycling hats 4 times the size of their heads. Not a good look, but very funny, if they will strain their neck muscles. Mitzi is happy, drifting about, sometimes on the push-along bike I am pushing with toddler on shoulders, she’s chilling, hanging out, taking it all in, picking the beautiful wild flowers, and every so often the tranquility is interrupted by Monty up front yelling ‘CAR!’ like it’s a bunch o’ badgers with guns that have just stopped us in our tracks, taking us hostage. They’d be no matches for me and my hefty forearms though. I was saying that tonight, I have just left them (now at 8.45 pm) ‘camping’ in Monty's room. All their mattresses are on the floor, the travel cot is up (oh yes, still not ready quite yet to unleash my munchkin of a terrible-two-there’s-never-been-worse-year-old), and I am hoping the fishwife threats worked. Well, in reality, I told them ‘if you go to sleep like good kids now, there will be a special surprise on the table for you tomorrow morning’, I prefer bribing the good behaviour out of them-life is short!

Tomorrow will be my 7 year wedding anniversary, I am putting up my real-life true-story up for all to read, as I for one, am very proud of my man, of us, but not the chickens decision, that was a bad decision, definitely not a ‘proud’ moment…I’m sure they were his idea…!