Last week we received the results of an assessment to gauge our son's understanding of the world around him. It transpires that his level of understanding is on the first percentile, in other words around the 3 ½ year mark, 2 years behind his chronological age. This means that he is likely to have problems with reading, writing and understanding sequences. Even though we knew that he was behind, it is always quite upsetting to see it written down in black and white. I suppose if he stays at two years behind then that is not too bad, as a 30 year old acting like a 28 year old is fine. However, if the gap increases any further then things will get a lot more tricky. It is so difficult not knowing what will happen and, even though we do try to live day by day and not look to the future, it is inevitable that you do worry about what will happen. If only we had a crystal ball, but I suppose at the same time it is sometimes better not to know!

Now in the midst of Christmas fete season, we attended our son’s this Saturday and was thrilled (!) that he won the biggest teddy in the tombola. This three foot high panda has been christened Cookie - Pickle and our son insists on taking it to bed with him every night which is really sweet but there is not much space for the both of them so one or the other ends up hanging out of the bed! Our daughter won a little car - far more practical!

I am really pleased with our new car which we got through the Motability scheme. What I didn’t know when we first started this process was that the vehicle is tax exempt so that was an added bonus. We'd looked into getting our old car tax exempt but as we did not use the car solely for our two children this wasn't possible. I just need to work out now which car parks are free! Oh yes - I can also report that the Christmas CD sounds fab on the new stereo!