Oh, was that the weekend?.....

At the risk of repeating myself, the weekends just vanish like snow off a dyke these days. I'm sure in the days BC (before children) weekends were long and lazy and langorous. I'm sure I used to read the newspapers. All of them. And we used to have lengthy breakfast-come-brunches involving fresh bread, still warm from the oven.

Actually, that is one of the things I miss about living where we do now. We used to live in Marchmont, which is the heart of middle-class bohemia mixed with student-land. On a weekend morning, we could stroll to our nearest corner shop for brunch supplies, but in Marchmont corner shops, there were a dozen different kinds of bread, many baked right there on the premises, and croissants and pains au chocolat. There were scores of different kinds of cheeses and olives and what have you. We moved up here to the suburbs (two kids = can't afford to live in Marchmont any more!) and discovered that the bread in our local shop is steadfastly plastic wrapped and your choice of cheese is either shrink wrapped orange cheddar or Dairylea. Takes the spontaneity out of weekend brunches if you have to pack the kids into the car and to go Sainsbury's.

Anyway, where was I? Oh the weekend. Early shopping on Saturday so that husband could have a jam session with his friend (very loud. We have a drumkit. And friend has just acquired a big amp which they wanted to "blow the dust out of"). I spent the day finishing off my sister-in-law's birthday cake. She has a phobia about eyeballs so of course I made her a cake with a big icing eyeball on it, complete with wee red veins. I would show you a photo, but we didn't take one. It tasted good though and my children enjoyed shouting "You're eating EYEBALL!" at her.

Sunday I took First Born to karate and went in the gym while he karate-d. I ran on the treadmill, which was lovely because the gym has a window and you can see sky and trees and stuff, and I stretched and did sit-ups and a wee stint on the exercise bike. Then I went home, showered and drove Second Born to a birthday party in Bonnyrigg. Went fruitlessly looking for some Christmas presents and then picked him up again and took him home.

Made pizza for dinner for everyone and that was pretty much it. Watched Strictly Come Dancing of course. I am a bit sorry to see Letitia go. She is the same age as me and I liked to fantasise that with a bit of BBC makeup and wardrobe magic, I too could look like that (the fact my legs are about 9 inches shorter than hers and my hair is mousy brown and short is of course irrelevant). I liked the fact that she was real-life-woman-shaped and proud of it.

You know you're getting old when the highlight of your weekend involves Bruce Forsyth.