AFTER ENDURING near Arctic conditions this winter, we decided there'd be no summer holiday we'd put in PVC windows.

But May and early June is a real bonanza for cheap holidays and I get a particular kick in taking the children out of school early to whizz off to Spain and the Canaries for half the price of holidays in peak time.

"They'll get material for essays," I enthuse, as the teacher gives me all the reasons why they should finish off the term. She is green with envy as I tell that we are getting the deal for half what she'll pay in July.

Hee hee, I think, they can't have everything long holidays and cheapies to the sun!

But this year was the best. Just £99 for flight and accommodation to a resort of your choice, beamed the ad in the newspaper. I was into the travel agent pronto, decided to go to Turkey, paid for four and started to think out my strategy for the teacher this year.

The 11 year old daughter got into a fever of excitement. The case was got down, outfits put together for the hotel, the beach, the disco. She wondered if she, like the 13 year old in England, might fall in love with a waiter and be married.

She would be the pure envy of the entire class. "I'll have a tan before anybody else," she crowed.

Darragh was more laid back. Making a case for him to have a week off, when his three month holiday would start when we came back, would require a fair degree of ingenuity. His excitement seemed to mount when he read in the brochure about the Duty Free and dormant entrepreneurial talents started to be aroused.

"Two hundred cigarettes for £7 could sell them singly to the lads," he mused.

Things were going along nicely. I still had to get up to the teacher but I found myself putting it off And then the bombshell.

Aoife, age 11, is an avid GAA fan and has been involved in a special football competition. I had been listening abstractedly for the last month about quarter finals and semi finals and then the final oh, no right in the middle of the holiday.

For an II year old, in GAA terms, this is big stuff. A competition is organised for primary schools and a team is made up of seven children from each school. They compete with schools in the county. The winners then represent their county at an All Ireland competition.

But the real icing on the cake, if they win, is the chance to appear with their heroes on All Ireland day they come on at half time and demonstrate their skills playing a match of five minutes each way. She could share the same pitch as Jason Sherlock.

And from swanning around the bedroom in bikinis she is now out in the garden kicking balls at every angle and quite convinced that a trial means she will be definitely selected. Tears mine and hers flowed. "You have to come on the holiday," I bleat.

"Can't. This year is my only chance. Next year there is a really good player coming up and I know she will get it. And she won't come.

Why didn't I stick with the windows?