I think I’ve forgotten how to do the school run!
To say we’ve had a brilliant summer might be a teeny, tiny bit of an understatement.
There were trips to France and Spain – and then back to France again. Flea spent her eighth birthday in New York making a custom Muppet, then we spent an amazing week in Cape Cod. Even being at home was an adventure this summer – the week we were at home together, we visited the Warner Bros Harry Potter Studio Tour and Warwick Castle.
One day, I’m going to show Flea photos of the holidays we spent camping with my Dad in the 1980s. My Dad was a cub leader and most of our holidays happened in fields. Many featured flasks of mushy peas and leaky tents.
I’m just saying. Flea’s pretty much the luckiest kid ever.
Although, just to prove that the universe must always have balance, today we crashed back to earth with a bump.
We got home from our latest trip to France at 2am the day before Flea started back at school.
Shell-shock doesn’t even come close to how we both felt when the alarm went off at 8am this morning. I was definitely not prepared for the ideal school run routine.
Now, I should say I’m full of good intentions at the start of term. You know the sort of thing: I’m going to get up on time, I’ll have time to put Flea’s hair in plaits, her bag will be perfectly packed, we’ll set off early, listen to Radio 4 in the car, and I will probably drop Flea off at school and then go to the gym for a swim on the way back home.
After all these years, you’d think I’d have come to terms with the fact that I’m always going to be the mother who sleeps in and rushes out of the front door 10 mintues late, stopping only to find a hat to cover my unbrushed hair.
This morning was a sterling example during which I think I might actually have hit the School Run Triple Gold – unwashed hair, incomplete kit AND we burst into the classroom at school to find every other child in Flea’s class sitting nicely at their desks while Flea trailed behind me, saying, “Well, I don’t know which class I’m in, exactly…”
Maybe I’ll do the gym tomorrow.
