Changing Rooms

I have no idea at all if anyone is out there in cyberspace reading the witterings of an insane mother, but if you are, many apologies for the long delay since my last blog. Blame a rather too large dose of real life, namely a book I have been editing which has kept me busy since Christmas (about which more later) combined with a more then average busy spell in our house at the weekends, and an office move...

...So, while some weeks ago I was going to blog about the travails of my recalcritant car breaking down on my friend's driveway on the way to school, I have now decided the moment is past, but there is still time enough to tell you about our recent changing rooms experience.

Being as we have four children we need rather a lot more room then most. Our current house had four bedrooms when we moved into it when no 1 was on the way. Over the course of time, and with the arrival of the subsequent offspring we have acquired an extra bedroom, but due to the nature of the house it came in the shape of two railway carriage rooms next to each other. When we first had these rooms the two little ones shared one room with a small bed and a cot, while the big ones were in a bunk bed in the other, and we had two spare bedrooms. Eventually, no 1 moved into the box room at the front, no3 into the bottom bunk and no4 had the other bedroom all to herself.

Such is the shifting nature of children's needs, no4 has of late taken to being rather fed up with this arrangement, and a) either gets scared or b) annoys everyone else and keeps them awake. Nos 1&2 seem incapable of sleeping alone so nine times out of ten no 2 creeps out of her bed and into no 1's. This used to work when no3 went to sleep and didn't realise, but of late she has twigged that her big sis deserts her after dark and has been making rather a fuss about it.

So the time had come, I felt to shift things around. However, we had decided that no 1 needed a high sleeper and therefore have spent some fruitless months looking for one (fruitless as the height of most of them is still too low for our requirements, though I am indebted to the person who posted a message on this blog directing me to various websites.), and have therefore remained in a state of limbo for some time. However, one night recently after some meaningless debacle in which nos 3&4 were kicking up stink about some supposed extra benefit the big ones were having, whilst no 1 was weeping in her room that life was so unfair, and no2 as usual was accusing me of ruining her life (god knows what she'll have to complain about when she's a teenager...), in a fit of desperation I promised them a change of scenery. What was I thinking...?

I tell Spouse of this foolish plan, which is enough for him to go haring off to Ikea on Saturday morning while I do the ballet run - he is nothing if not impetuous.

Meanwhile I end up taking four children first to no 2's Holy Joe classes, before braving the horror that is the Fame School. However, no 2 preferring not unnaturally to watch Dick and Dom in Da Bloody Bungalow is pretty pissed off with this arrangement and promptly turns into Devil Child. This is quite appropriate as she is shortly to make her First Confession (or Reconciliation as they call it in these PC days) - at least she now has something to confess. So she screams and sobs and wails at the unfairness of it all. By the time we arrive (late) she is sulking in the moodiest manner imaginable. I actually have to physically carry her to the Church door (and at seven she isn't desperately light), where the very kind but rather misguided people who run the classes offer her such delights as going to sit in the church and light a candle, or praying quietly to Jesus in a corner. Oh dear. Oh dear. Oh dear. I don't think so....

By this time it is about ten to ten - no 4 should have been in ballet ten minutes ago. So I foolishly promise no 2 that I will come back and check she is ok - I can't believe I'm doing it, it's the sort of deal I make with the three year old, but needs must and all that. Sweating profusely I make it back to ballet at ten to discover that thanks to no 2's appalling behaviour, I was so distracted, we have left the ballet bag behind. Luckily no 4 is wearing her dress under clothes, so she can pass that on to no 3 at the end of the lesson, but no one has any socks or shoes. I debate going home but realise that I have run out of time, to do either that or get back to church to check on no 2's progress. When my superorganised lifesaving friend arrives to take her daughter to ballet she nobly agrees to look after all my offspring while I check on the Devil Child. I get back to church and of course she is fine, but they let her go home with me early. And all I can say is they must have been drumming in the saying sorry bit good and hard today, as she is suitably repentant...

...Then it's back home to have a spot of lunch before heading back again with nos 1&2 for their ballet/gym classes. I get back to discover Spouse in the process of putting the bed together. It's high - very high. I try not to have too many palpitations about the thought of no1 breaking her neck, but given my propensity for imagining the worst, this is a nigh on impossibility. Worrying is what I do best, so I'd better live with it...

The good news is the bed liberates oodles of space in the bedroom, and we can put my old desk in there. The bad news is I now have to rearrange three bedrooms. So while Spouse tries to put the bed together with a friend whose children have come round to play, I move clothes around the house in rotation. This being Ikea furniture, nothing is straightforward as the boys suddenly discover when they realise they have put the bed together the wrong way. Much cursing ensues, but in the end the bed goes up, the boys hive off down the road to indulge in a spot of hovercraft building, while I hoover everywhere. In a moment of madness when Spouse is out, I decide I will have a go at moving the desk, which proves easier said then done. I manage (just) not to push it down the stairs, but when I get it into the bedroom, I discover the side has collapsed. I have now created further dust and dirt, so have to hoover the room all over again...

Meanwhile the children are rampaging about the house, and as is their wont, every toy from every room gets removed played with, discarded and left somewhere it shouldn't be. As usual I have the screaming abdabs about this, for all the good it does me. As no one ever takes a blind bit of notice...

By the time Spouse is back, I have decided that the desk actually fits better under the bed, and rearrange things accordingly. I then go into tackle the little ones' bedroom. In the process of the move, I have accquired an extra set of shelves, which is probably just as well as no4 is still at that stage in childhood where she seems to have amassed an obscenely large numbers of toys, most of which she never plays with, but if you tried to lose them she would scream blue murder.

In order to put things on the shelves, I have to sort out what is already there, as of course nothing is where it should be. Most of no 2's possessions have fallen down the side of the bed, and no 3 obligingly hoiks things out for me, but soon the floor is covered in bits of paper (too, too important apparently to bin), books, doll's clothes, bits of puzzles, Bratz dolls' feet - you name it there' s enough to start a toy shop here, if only I could put the right bits and pieces together...

By now it is gone eight o'clock, and I am seriously doubting that any of the children will get to bed tonight. I consider putting them in the spare room, but as this is where Spouse has been dumping the rubbish from the new bed, this is a bit of an impossibility. So instead I clean up as manically as possible, while Spouse sorts no 1's mattress and duvet out (getting a mattress on a high sleeper, requires the ingenuity of an Einstein, but between us we managed it). Meanwhile he starts dumping everything from no1's old room into the new room. And by dumping I mean dumping... trouble is he's seen the floor in the other room, so is taking heed, what he's not worked out is that I am actually putting things back on shelves...

By nine, the rooms are just about liveable in, though you still can't see the floor of no 1's room. "Time for bed," we say firmly, and are met with a chorus of protests. "But I don't likeitwantitimscaredinmynewroomthebedstoohigh..."

Whose idea was this again?