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How much

I had high hopes. Such a simple baking task. Even I couldn’t mess up flapjacks. Well I kinda didn’t. Maybe…..

Enough flapjack to fill a big plate. Well it should have been.

If you like flapjack that instantly crumbles, falls apart, disintegrates, then this would be perfect for you. After several attempts of pressing and moulding, I managed to get just TWO pieces to stick together, just don’t get too close – their stability is severely compromised.

Whisper it. Just seconds later these perfect flapjacks had started to fall apart.

The rest well, I just let Hawklad spoon the crumbs into heaps of Maple Syrup, to form an Edible Mess. That’s our version of an Eton Mess.

Why don’t you have a crack at a bit of baking. Its the Great Bloggers Bake-off real soon. You know it makes sense.

To check on the latest, drop in on Mel’s awesome blog.

https://crushedcaramel.wordpress.com/2022/10/01/two-weeks-to-go/

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 33 Comments

Fungi

If you like Fungi, then this is the time to come to Yorkshire.

There has been MUSHROOM today to admire these regular autumnal visitors. A bit of a pattern is forming with Hawklad’s final school year before the main exams next May. A couple of subjects upload reasonable class notes onto the online school system, enough to follow a lesson but there is no interaction with the teacher. A couple of subjects will randomly load up shed load of questions, no explanations, no teaching materials, just questions. Hawklad then needs to figure out what he is supposed to be learning. Sadly his answers to the shed load of questions mostly remain unmarked, not even reviewed, an answer sheet makes it his responsibility to assess his own work. And the rest of the subjects, well let’s be polite, the bare minimum is sometimes being provided ….. possibly.

School has been back one month now and he hasn’t had any direct contact with a teacher. The occasional brief email, the occasional one or two word scribbled note on a document. That’s it. No teaching interaction.

So with a return to the classroom seemingly as remote a possibility as ever, we have mostly falling into homeschooling. It definitely doesn’t feel like a ‘school at home’ project anymore.

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 40 Comments

Crumble

It’s Autumn here in Yorkshire and Autumn means lots of really sour apples from our creaky old tree. What to do with them….

A few years back I would descend on my mum’s with bags laden with apples. She knew exactly what to do with them…. Make the most perfect apple crumbles.

So why not.

Not as good as mums but not bad at all. It’s amazing what difference shed loads of sugar and honey can make.

If I can do it…..

It’s the Great Bloggers Bake-off real soon.

Why don’t you have a go…..

You can find more details at Mel’s wonderful blog.

https://crushedcaramel.wordpress.com/2022/10/01/two-weeks-to-go/

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 24 Comments

Conkers

It’s CONKER season……

A rather depressingly familiar school at home week. Hardly any contact with teaching staff for Hawklad. We managed to randomly find some stuff that the classes have been covering on the online system, but not much. Even those few finds were a little dispiriting. Too many references to the class using textbooks, class learning materials that Hawklad has never seen, covering topics that haven’t even been mentioned to him. It really feels like he has only covered a fraction of the areas that his fellow classmates have. The scale of the missing teaching is now becoming all too apparent.

So we have 8 months until his final exams, 8 months to try and catch up. 8 months to try and get Hawklad ready for exams that he has had no practice at sitting. Relying on his muppet Dad to try and be an expert teacher in Maths, in English, History, Geography, Sciences, Religious Studies. School ain’t stepping up to the plate to help much. All while Hawklad is trying to re-engage with the outside world again. Absolutely no certainties that he will be in any kind of frame of mind to sit them. His well-being comes first.

Deep sigh.

It’s the weekend, time to try to relax.

Time to play with my conkers….

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 51 Comments

It’s…..

“Well Dad its ….”

All I had to do was bake 12 fairy cakes. Even I can do that surely. All was going so well. The cake mix passed the Hawklad eating it from the bowl test.

I just had to put it into the oven for 12 minutes and remember to take it out. No need for a timer, I just have to focus for 12 minutes. I can do that. I can avoid being distracted.

TWENTY EIGHT minutes later….Pants…..out the abominations came from the oven. A tad CRISPY.

Attempt two, this time with TIMER.

And the results. The great taste test from Hawklad.

“Well it’s not terrible”

I will settle for that. Eat your heart out Gordon Ramsey, that’s a review.

Just a few weeks to raise my game for the 2022 Great Bloggers Bake-off. Mel has all the details and all the proper, delicious baking results.

https://crushedcaramel.wordpress.com/2022/09/24/so-many-questions/

If I can have a go, surely you can. You know it makes sense.

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 59 Comments

It’s back

It’s been too long.

Time to don your aprons, time to get passionately whisking, time to tend your cobblers. The Great Bloggers Bake-off is coming back on the 15th and 16th of October. You know it makes sense.

More details can be found at Mel’s blog.

https://crushedcaramel.wordpress.com/2022/09/20/more-details-to-follow/

So in the buildup to the big weekend I will be donning the full HazMat protective gear and baking an item a week. This weekend Frankenstein’s Monster will be a Sponge Cake, sounds simple. However let’s remember some of the high end cuisine this kitchen has yielded in the past.

What could possibly go wrong.

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 51 Comments

Fog

The first proper autumnal fog, the first of many….

I was looking at an online social media chat about Bereavement ….. well it beats watching my team try to play football. The chat was all about the recent UK State Funeral and how it had triggered emotions in many about their own personal losses. It is hard to watch a funeral and not be reminded of matters much closer to hand. I must admit as I watched the Funeral, one thought really struck me. How on earth do you grieve in front of millions, I couldn’t do it in front 40 people.

Two funerals in 6 weeks and I didn’t grieve at either of them. Focused on an 8 year old and trying to process far too many thoughts. I’m not that sure I took any of the funerals in. I can’t remember anything that was said. Can’t remember the music. Can’t remember that much at all. I can remember my brother whispering something in my ear that brought a half smile. I can remember standing with Hawklad looking at a fishpond after his mums funeral. That’s about it. Just felt like it was about waiting for them to be over.

It does feel so strange that I took far more in for a woman I had never met than I ever did for either of my mum or partner. I sometimes wish I had a video of both Funerals so I could experience them, hear what was said. Feel a part of them after 6 years.

Back to the online chat, the consensus was very similar. Mostly funerals are an ordeal, to organise, to sit through. Often the grieving can only really start when you have the funeral behind you. That definitely was my experience, it felt like it was months and months later before I started. This may sound crazy but until that point I was hurting but I wasn’t grieving. I wasn’t really accepting the reality, wasn’t ready to let go. Maybe if I had let the Funerals in more, maybe I would have been more receptive to grieving.

The fog of life might have started to clear much sooner.

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 51 Comments

Pesky minus

Autumn is here. The Swallows and Swifts have left for warmer climes. Today felt cold even under a thick hoody.

Hawklad is making great strides on the dyslexia front. His reading is really good, now able to read History Textbooks. It’s hard to believe that back in 2020 he struggled to read books aimed at 6 and 7 year olds and school had decided that he would never read, so there was no point trying anymore. Sadly I realise they never really started trying in the first place. I had even gone out and bought a reading pen. He can now accurately read maybe 80% of the words then he can make educated guesses on most of the other ones. It works for him and that’s all that matters.

What is still very much a work in progress is his number dyslexia. He has finally conquered his difficultly with 4 and 7’s. Getting the two mixed up and often writing the two numbers back to front. But he just can’t break the roadblocks that are decimal points, fractions and minuses. Today he was easily expanding out complex equations, yet he would immediately grind to a halt when faced with something like +5-7. He just can’t visualise that. The problem is at home I can gently help with that, but in an exam there is no help.

This week has also highlighted another school stumbling block with reading. SHAKESPEARE. Hawklad’s way of reading just can’t cope with Shakespearean language and spellings.

And I will take thy word: yet if thou swear’st,

An open et caetera, thou a poperin pear!

I did try to read the sonnets to him but I struggle with Shakespeare as well. Plus according to Hawklad when I read, my character voice sounds like I’m reading parts from a SpongeBob cartoon. My Romeo apparently is a dead ringer for Patrick. But at least we have a solution to this one. Just watch the play on thou swear’st Netflix.

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 44 Comments

Wrestling with the logistics

He misses out on so much, so much of the teenage life. You can only experience so much when you spend so much time isolated. What highlights the isolation is that since March 2020 he has spent some time with only ONE friend in that time – his only contact with someone his own age. Yes a really good friend but that’s a shed load of teenage socialising missed out on. It’s not the same but when a chance to do something special for him presents itself then you grab it, regardless of the difficulties.

The alarm went off before 5am.

300 miles of driving later, two traffic jams and we park up in Cardiff.

Trying frustratingly to find facilities that weren’t too busy and that could be used without causing too much stress.

Trying to take in a bit of the history of the Capital of Wales while avoiding the crowds.

Watching the anxiety levels rise as we join the long queues to get into a huge stadium.

But then the goal. The whole point of this. Getting the wrestling mad Hawklad into the UK’s first major Wrestling Televised Live Event in 30 years, along with 62000 other crazy fans. Was I so underdressed in a grey T-shirt and Jeans…. With much trying I had obtained 2 tickets at the back but crucially in an area with some space around us. Then for 4 hours Hawklad could be part of something, experiencing something different, something exciting. A brief breakout from the isolation

Then it was over, 300 mile night driving and almost 24 hours later we arrived back home. Wow I was tired. Yes it was difficult. Yes the trip highlighted many issues that create roadblocks to eventually easing the isolation and maybe returning him to a classroom. But Hawklad did some of that exciting living and that is all that mattered.

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 16 Comments

Back

Autumn is here, school is here.

In the great tradition of Yorkshire Awkwardness, the moment the local water company declared a DROUGHT and brought in a hosepipe ban, ITS NOT REALLY STOPPED RAINING.

So SCHOOL is BACK. Is there an anti Alice Cooper ‘Schools Out’ song. Maybe Another Brick in the Wall…

When I say school is back, I kinda say that figuratively. So far only one subject has set up Hawklad with this year’s class codes, so only one subject is available on the online system. Apart from receiving one code the only other message from school was an email to all parents and pupils reminding (maybe threatening them) them of the attendance rules and the penalties. That’s it.

And so just like the autumn rain, so starts the chasing up school rigmarole, all over again. At least we have the hosepipe ban weather to sunbathe in.

Update… now add one more school email stressing the importance of pupils continuing to work as hard during the nations official mourning period while ensuring their behaviour is appropriately reflective. As Hawklad points out, the UK Parliament has closed for 10 days to mourn but that option is not applicable to schools – again one rule for some, another for the rest of us. WOW he is starting to sound like me, that’s not good.