Out twice in a week

Sharon and I managed to get out twice this week! On Tuesday, we went to see Derren Brown at the Playhouse, Sharon having bought the tickets for me as a Christmas present. It was a good show, plenty of pseudo mind-reading and sleight of hand and a good finale involved numeracy and memory skills. I suspect there was a bit of hidden camera work and collusion but it was entertaining. Afterwards we picked up Marie and Michael from Milne's Bar. They came over as cover this week while Sharon went down to Birmingham for a couple of days of meetings. Normally they would be over in May to look after all four boys as we jaunt off on the Pampered Chef incentive trip, but this year only Sharon will be heading to the Med, leaving me to do the childminding.

On Sharon's return from Birmingham on Friday, I met her in Whigham's after work. We shared a bottle of wine then headed through to Queensferry St Lane, to Sygn, one of the newer bars in the area that also does decent food. Sharon was very impressed with her burger. The fried halloumi starter disappeared quickly too. I realised we hadn't paid for the wine at Whigham's so we dropped back in there to settle up before there was a police report out on us! It was good to be out after work on a Friday with just my wife. It must be years since we did that!

Festive run-up

The final week at school is generally a write-off. Not that work is much different: productivity takes a dip. There was a review of our function of late but fortunately there appears to be no redundancies amongst my peers. There are a few IT roles going though, almost entirely through voluntary redundancy. As ever it is unsettling, especially as more and more well-kent faces with Standard Life experience leave the building.

The schools broke up on Thursday lunchtime. A few mums and a good few kids went to the cinema to see the Rise of the Guardians. It was Angus's first trip to the cinema. Unlike his brothers who did not distinguish themselves on their cinematic debuts, Angus sat happily in the dark and the noise and munched on his sweeties. That made up for him missing out on his concert and nursery parties as his cough and cold kept him at home all week.

Stuart and Lesley came over for tea and an exchange of gifts on the Friday evening then I went out to them on the Sunday afternoon as Angus had fallen asleep in the car and we decided to give him a decent nap.

Earlier on the Sunday we had headed into the city centre for a brunch at the Edinburgh Larder deli in Blackfriars St (Black Bo's in days gone by). I enjoyed my GF bacon sandwich and celeriac soup and the boys ate up too. We walked from there to the Festival Theatre to see The Snowman, the boys' present courtesy of their Irish aunties and Nana and Papa. There is so much stuff in the house these days that these sorts of presents are appreciated by us, if not necessarily by the boys. They were attentive enough, although seemed to enjoy running around the upper cirle during the interval more, Angus flipping seats up and down everywhere he went, running into boxes and generally giving Sharon heart failure every time he went near the edge of the balcony. It was his theatre debut, following on from the cinematic experience two days' previously. Finn preferred the talking of the panto to the mime and music of The Snowman but Sean had keen eyes for the dancing, of which there was plenty. Rowan and Sean liked trying to spot the set changes whenever it went dark. Overall it was very well done, with the snow cascading from the roof at the end a fitting finale to set us up for Christmas.

Snow, singing and a sore foot

The snow finally arrived last Saturday, to the boys' delight (and their parents' irritation) so Sean and Finn were obviously distracted at their golf lesson, preferring to build a snowman and have snowball fights instead. The temperature rose throughout the day and the thaw arrived, much to Sean's chagrin as he wanted to go sledging.

Michael arrived to bolster the child-minding as Sharon starts the recovery from her foot op. It's been a painful first few days, with a crate in the bed helping to keep her foot free from quilt interference but the rigid positioning of her foot causing a strain on the rest of her leg and back.

Finn has been on the singing trail with the rest of the P3s, singing at an old folks home in Oxgangs ("some of them were as old as you Nana") and also at Tesco, raising a decent sum of money. Sean too has been hitting the high notes. He tried out with Kyle for a duet but Kyle was reluctant to do it so Sean merged in with the rest of his class in singing at Morrisons. Sharon managed down with Nana and Papa to hear him.

The snow may have thawed quickly but the temperature stayed near freezing and the night of the school disco was a horrible mix of sleety gales and rain. I took Rowan up for the early P1-P3 disco (Finn declined). He was a bit reluctant to join in, despite seeing plenty of his classmates but after loading up with sweets at the tuck shop he eventually let me go. When I returned later with Sean he was having a ball although I'm not sure he had done much in the way of dancing, preferring to muck about in the corridors. Sean had a great time. It brought back the novelty of being in school at night, seeing familiar places at an unsual time of day, in unusual lighting, with dark corridors leading off from the main action.

There was a pantomime in the school on Wednesday, which Rowan especially seems to have enjoyed, then Sean and Finn joined their Cub and Beaver packs at the Kings Theatre tonight to see Cinderella. It was a late return home for the boys who have been having a great run-up to Christmas.

Fringe finale

I finally got out for another round of golf yesterday after two previous attempts had been thwarted by the ongoing rainy summer. I returned to Craigielaw to play a fourball with two recently retired Lifers, Kenny Hunter and Keith Young, and Derek. Perhaps surprisingly, to me, Kenny and I won quite comfortably, 5&4. It was a decent afternoon, a bit breezy, and I scored as well as I have this year, without hitting my irons that well. I did hole a monster putt on the 8th for a par and hit 4 or 5 pars all told, probably shooting about 20 over par with three double bogeys at the finish. My bunker play was reasonably good and my putting was sound. At least I've got a few more rounds in this year than the last couple of years.

Sunday was very cold and autumnal. I took the boys out to Blackness Castle to use the last of our Historic Scotland ticket before it expired. The leaves were blowing off the trees and the wind was fairly whistling through the nooks and crannies of the castle by the firth. The lads were in good form though, running about and generally expending energy, which is the whole point of getting them out the house. Sharon was expending energy too, on another 13.1 mile run, this time round Arthur's Seat. She felt a lot better doing it this week than last and was pleased with her efforts. In the afternoon, the rain tipped down once more.

On Saturday we had taken the boys into town, parking near the Pleasance and having a wander around the main Fringe venues. Sharon and I went to see Rich Hall the night before and he was very good, as lugubrious and disparaging as ever with a good sense of the ridiculous thrown in ("Cork man drowns!"). The rest of the Fringe was in its death throes after three weeks of stamina-sapping shows. We had ice-cream in the Pleasance, let the boys run about then made our way up to Bristo Square for burgers by the Underbelly, a great big upside down inflated cow of a venue. I sometimes forget the boys are hardly in the city itself and wonder if they really know they live in one of the premier cities of the UK.

Before our show, Sharon and I were at Iglu which is one of our favourite Edinburgh restaurants these days, helped by the fact that it has a good understanding of what is required for gluten-free cooking. Mussels and then venison for me while Sharon had duck. All very tasty. August has been a busy month, with Sharon in pursuit of points for the Pampered Chef trip next year, so it was good to have a night out, just her and me.

Skiing Finn

Finn's run of doing new things in his holiday continued as he had a week of skiing lessons at Hillend, going each afternoon. He went off quite happily despite not knowing anyone, which was good to see. Sharon reported that he progressed well over the week and he seems to have enjoyed it too, fairly working up a sweat. Reminds me of the morning he and Sean spent in ski school in France. Finn was a damp blob after that one! Sean went up for a ski on Thursday afternoon while Finn was having his lesson and was fairly flying about the place. Here's hoping he keeps it up.

Finn had to cut short his last lesson as I collected him and Sean on Friday afternoon and drove into town for their first ever Fringe show. We went to see "Potted Potter" in the Pleasance Grand as I thought that would be appropriate given their current interest in all things Potter. It was good fun, a parody on all seven books done in seventy minutes with imaginative use of props. (Sean says, "It was funny. I liked the part where they acted out the Prisoner of Azkaban using a slide show.") There was even a game of Quidditch in which we, the audience, had to try and get a beach ball through a hoop. Remarkably, our team (Slytherin House) won! According to Dan, one of the actors, it was the first time in five years of putting on the show that anyone had scored!

After the show, we had to dash up to Fairmile nursery to collect the wee two. It was an especially notable day for Rowan as it was his last day there after four years. We draw every closer to him starting P1. He didn't appear unduly upset at leaving Fairmile: like Finn before him he has probably outgrown that stage and is ready for his next big move - school!

Angus has been a bit of a tyke recently, a regular cuckoo in the nest. He just won't stay in bed in the morning and has been bed-hopping, much to the irritation of those he has been waking up. If he isn't in at me and Sharon at 0600, I often hear him padding through to Sean and Finn's room to climb in beside them. Needless to say we're all a bit tired and cranky, moods which haven't been helped by the continuing poor weather.

The Bad Shepherd

Sean has continued his theatre trail this week, adding two more to his list. First he went to see Peter Pan with the rest of the school, Finn included, at the Lyceum on Monday and then Sharon took him on a big night out to the Playhouse last night to see We Will Rock You, the Queen musical. He seems to have enjoyed the music but been a bit vague on the storyline. At least he didn't start howling at the noise and darkness like he did the first time I took him to the Festival Theatre to see the Singing Kettle in May 2005. We ended up sitting up the back with him on the stairs! Of his three trips in the last week, Sean said Peter Pan was the best. I think he most enjoyed being the big boy who got to stay up late two night while his brothers went to bed!

Sharon attended a nativity double-header today. Finn's was rearranged for the school hall due to bad weather which meant it was rather a tight squeeze for all the school-children and the P1 parents. Finn was a "party person" which involved sitting at the side in his party clothes with a toy and singing "Away in a Manger" on cue. He has been practising that almost nightly, reading the words from his sheet. Sharon had to retreat to the doorway with Angus but could still see Finn doing his bit, although Finn threw a tantrum because he saw Sharon leave and wasn't aware that she could still seem through the door.

In the afternoon, Sharon went to Rowan's nativity at Fairmilehead Church hall. Given that he misses out on singing practice at Fairmile, his role as a shepherd was nominal, but he injected life into the piece by battering baby Jesus with his crook. He then turned on Sandy and gave him a few wallops too. Rowan is a boisterous child, very much used to rough and tumble with two older brothers.

We had hoped to get into the Winter Wonderland today but the bad weather dissuaded us of that notion, it being rather slippy in town. Angus is getting up on all fours now and is keen to crawl. For now he makes do by spinning on his tummy and covering ground by spiralling outwards from wherever you leave him. His sleeping is still no better and with Finn continuing his early evening night terrors, Sean leaping about in a dozy stupor and Rowan occasionally joining in with night-time crying it is a tiring time for Sharon and me.