I've enjoyed them being home but over the last few days, the children have become more restless, argumentative and generally giddy. I think that's a sign they are rested and are itching to get back to school. Both of them are as excited as anything about school. They miss their friends as only one or two other children from school live close to us. The friends they play with here are getting a bit boring and quite a few have been on holiday towards the end of the holidays. Missy Woo always struggles because there are many more boys than girls to play with - and then, two of the girls she played with regularly have moved house and beyond her reach, which has reduced the field considerably.
They started getting a bit more tetchy and argumentative over the weekend and then yesterday, I took them shopping, going for a treat breakfast first. I thought that would settle them first - it usually does, and they are usually quite good around a supermarket these days - but faced with a quiet supermarket with extra wide aisles, all they did was run everywhere and screech repeatedly. I lost count of the number of times I had to say their names and tell them to stop. My stress levels were through the roof by the checkout and I heard myself saying to the checkout operator, when she asked when they went back to school, "I can't wait for them to go back." I realised it was the first time I'd said it all holiday.
See that right there? That was my tether and I was at the end of it. Thankfully, after the riot act was read to them in the car on the way home, they helped to put away the shopping without a single word of complaint, then asked to go out to play and helpfully stayed out of my way for the next hour.
Yes, the novelty has truly worn off for them and school seems an exciting prospect. Both are looking forward to having new teachers - and Monkey moves into Juniors and his first male teacher, who is new to the school as well as him. Both have new school bags, which are apparently "amazing" as they have internal pockets. My children are easily pleased.
And me? Much as I love them and the summer we have had, I would like the house to stay tidy for longer than five minutes. And it's time for them to go - I think in an ideal world, going back yesterday would have been the ideal scenario.
That first cup of tea on Wednesday morning is going to taste as sweet as anything. Although the house is going to be eerily quiet for a few hours.