In The Sun

"Dad! Dad!"

"What, Boy?"

"The Girl's throwing food at me!"

"Girl, stop throwing food at the Boy."

"He's in a zoo! I feeding him."

"I'M NOT A MONKEY!"

I don't know why, but my Kids either want to kill each other, or get married. And it changes in the blink of an eye. Over dinner yesterday the pair of them squabbled non stop. Either they were throwing food, tipping drinks on each other or - at one point - knife throwing. It truly was, to steal from Douglas Adams, the Long Dark Tea Time of the Soul.

After dinner the Kids went upstairs and whilst I was fart-arsing around I heard a thud and then the Boy said

"Are you all right, Girl?"

"Fell over."

"Did you fall over the Hoover?"

"Yes." *Starts crying*

"Don't cry! I'll cheer you up, I'll fall over the Hoover too!" *THUD* "Ow!" *Starts crying*

Still, it worked. When I got upstairs the Girl was laughing like a drain. 

The sweetest thing was that the Boy was tired and grumpy, and kept having meltdowns. So much so I had to give him a pep talk.

"Why do you think you're so tired?"

"Can't remember."

"Because you got up at five in the morning for a wee and instead of going back to bed you sat on the landing trying to feed Boris a toy car."

"Oh yeah. I got him to lick it once!"

The next day Nanna and Grandad came over prompting the Boy to mumble "Hello" and the Girl to yell "NO!" whenever anyone spoke to her. Or looked at her. Or weren't dead. Fortunately this passed and she resolved to lie face down on the ground for ten minutes. Along came new niece, and then Cousin. As ever there was a short stand off between the Girl and the Cousin who stared at each other like two gunfighters. The Boy broke the ice, in his own particular style, by punching himself in the face and falling over. We sat in the sunshine, laughing and joking. The Boy made the Girls laugh by trying to feed his bum to the chickens. The Girl complimented Nanna on her nails

"They're pink. I don't like pink."

And then all three Kids jumped on our slide and tried to push each other to their deaths. I cooked dinner for them - for which the Cousin was so grateful shepicked the broccoli off her plate and contemptuously flung it across the table.

After this afternoon I'm the happiest I have been for two weeks. It was an afternoon spent in the warmth of the family and the sun, surrounded by birdsong and laughter. Goodbye Winter. Hello Spring.