Soph's School of the Mad: Week Ten

Ten weeks, for fuck's sake. Monday was bleak. After two hours of sleep (THANKS ALEX!), I was  not ready for Monday. I was particularly not ready for Tom to go back to work full time, and yet he has and I am somehow still here. As per usual on Monday, no work was forthcoming from the schools so Jack worked on his story which is now on it's fifth chapter and nothing much has happened. Jim did some Harry Potter and then made chocolate fridge cake:

 Isn't it PRETTY?

Me and Alex made a father's day card which is TOP SECRET. Then the boys played on the PS while I worked, because I am a diligent mother.

I had a bit of a meltdown last week, mainly about Alex. I GRIEVE what he is losing out on, not being at school. All those new experiences and opportunities that I cannot replicate at home. If he wasn't autistic, it wouldn't matter, but he will try new things at school that he will not entertain at home. So I spoke to the SENCo and the head of EYFS and they were reassuring and gave me some advice. My cheap Chinese paints turned up two months after being ordered this week, so we did some car painting:

Jim was doing a random sheet of comprehension and came out with this gem:

Autism is DEFINITELY not mundane.

This week was quite stressful. My little niece had her third lot of brain surgery within six months, to replace her shunt. It went well, she's doing great. My kids have no idea what's wrong with Eliza, and thanks to Corona, we haven't had to tell them. It's not that we don't want them to know, or that we're unrealistic about it, it's that they will FREAK THE FUCK OUT and we'll never talk Jim down. But it does meant that me and Tom are trying not to let on how sad or stressed we are MORE than we would if we were merely homeschooling in a pandemic.

Also, I had to speak to a consultant dentist at UCL about What To Do With Jack's Teeth. Jack has a genetic disorder called amelogenesis imperfecta that means his teeth crumble in his mouth. He's had countless patch-up jobs and teeth out in his short life, and although it's very minor in the grand scheme of things, teeth hurt and teeth are cosmetically important. So, because of corona, I had to take pictures of his teeth, email them to the consultant and then talk about The Plan, while Jack whimpered in the background, terrified the dentist was going to dive down the phone and wrench his teeth from his head. He had his xray this morning (Friday) and had to go in all by himself, again because of corona. But he was very brave.

HOWEVER, in between the stress, Jim produced this:

YOU FOOL

And to FOX Alex, I froze one of his beloved cars and challenged him to get it out.

He poked it about a bit, and then abandoned it to melt in the sun. THE PATH OF LEAST RESISTANCE. Then he smashed the last bit of ice remaining and screamed "I SMASHED IT" joyfully.

For the first time, we also got him to try dressing up, and he was so utterly delighted by the results:

Did you ever see such a happy child?

Jim had to retell a story. He had a go...

I couldn't get his laptop to transmit sound on teams during our weekly lesson with his teacher, so he spent half an hour miming at her and showing her his foot. SO NORMAL HUN.

Friday is topic day, at least for Jim, and this week we were doing the Bronze Age. Ladies and gentlemen, I present, Bronze Age Fred:


And so to the weekend, which will hopefully be less fraught. Jim had a meltdown of such ground-shaking proportions yesterday that I'm surprised nobody called the police. And why? Because he had to put some things away. Truly, he is the most oppressed.

Finally, my children, but old:

Particularly enjoy that I've given birth to the next Bill Oddie...