I have bonded with the children today. After stressing them out, and my wife.
The kids have been a bit distant from me in the last week, and in they felt that I was not being nice enough. A little bit of attitude too much and I lost my temper. Sadly this upset my wife as well as both of them, but it did get them to bond as they tend to stick together when one of us has lost our temper. My wife explained how she felt I was feeling which was important later in the day. After this discussion, which took place while we were getting some fruit, we dropped hem off and went to a bakery for some bread. It is a local enterprise and while there was a long queue (they since have apologised for it) it was nice to get out of the house and relax. My wife joined me after a while in the socially distancing queue (the lady in front of me was particularly observant about social distancing) so we got our hot date. Another family that we know cycled past. I suspect they came for food, but turned around on arrival. It was nice to have a socially distant chat with them and I have to say I was envious that they were all out together. They were quite kind thanking me for my work in the NHS, but while I was grateful, and am at risk at times, the real heroes are those working in hospitals and working in care homes. In addition to which, I am very grateful that those running the shop are putting themselves at risk, along with so many others who are still working. At my work, we screen those before we see the, if they need to be seen face to face. Those in the shop see more people than me and have no screening.
Once at home, my family let me listen to Any Questions and Any Answers afterwards, bringing food and drink to me upstairs so that I could rant on Twitter about the topics raised. After this, I took the kids out on a bike ride. My daughter has been active going out for a walk most days, but this was her first bike ride of the year. For my son, who was cycling back and forth to school, he has been out of the front door to exercise, literally less than a handful of times. I was hopeful that I could take them out together as my daughter in innately fitter than he is, but he has had so much more practice on his bike than her. But they have not done well in the past, and the same happened this time. This meant that I had to take my daughter back before taking my son out for longer.
I did get to watch The Mandalorian with my son and enjoyed the series finale. I still say that the little green alien is evil, but my son still insists otherwise, despite the way it murdered a storm trooper. There were a few plot issues, an example being how the robot got to the baby so quickly, but overall, a great series. In addition to this, I spent an hour or two watching comedy with my daughter.
After dinner, thanks to a take away, it was a board game all together. We each favour different games, but we settled on Labyrinth. The first game was enjoyed by all, but sadly this was not the case on the last one. Saying that, it was nice that we all played together.
We are lucky to have each other as well as our garden and house. Especially when I do not know how my mother would have coped with me and my siblings when we lived in our first floor council flat in the past.
