Portrait of a scary-looking grandmother

Yesterday, BallFiend had his final ever appointment with the Maternal & Child Health Nurse for his three-and-a-half year old assessment. Gran came along to help with the kid-wrangling.

The nurse measured and weighed him to check he has been growing (turns out he has, surprise surprise). Then did a vision screening test (he failed the test when checking his right eye, so now he needs to be assessed by an optometrist). Then a couple of other tests to check his development, including the draw-a-person test. Suffice to say, he blitzed it!

The nurse showed him what to do by doing her own drawing of a face (circle for a head, two eyes, mouth and nose):

The nurse's original picture for BallFiend to copy (orange crayon).
The green ears, arms, hands, legs, and feet were
added by BallFiend after he finished his own picture (below).

Then she asked him to draw a face too (actually, she asked him to 'draw Gran'). Well, not only did he draw the head, eyes, mouth, nose, arms and legs (which is what most 3.5 year olds will do), he went on to add ears, hair, teeth, eyebrows, feet, hands (which is something that kids don't usually do until 5 or 6 years of age).

A portrait of a rather scary-looking Gran with very pointy teeth!

After the test, he kept drawing, which is when he
coloured in the left eye and added the 'cheek' mark.

I was so surprised! He rarely shows interest in drawing, painting or other such arty things at home and when he does draw it is usually lots of scribbles; he sometimes draws when at childcare, but again it is always lots of scribbles. So watching him draw a face was amazing. Apparently because he added so much extra detail, it means he is very intelligent. But of course, I already knew that! Afterall, what parent doesn't know their child is a genius from the moment they are born!!

BallFiend then went with Gran to spend the day at his grandparents house. This is our new childcare arrangement: instead of him going to the childcare centre two days a week, he will now just go for one day a week there, and one day with his grandparents. They get a kid to play with, we get to save $80 a day on childcare fees.

A post-script: this afternoon, BallFiend did a few more drawings of people (said he was drawing Gran again) and this time he included a neck, fingers and toes. Actually one of the Gran pictures had two necks! Then he did a picture of himself, spewing. Presumably this is because, we had dinner with Gran and GrandPaul yesterday and on the drive home, BallFiend did a massive boke all over the backseat of our (new!) car. Poor him, poor us. Lucky for me DeepSpice did the clean up. Lucky for DeepSpice, this little former Girl Guide lived up to the 'be prepared' motto, by having plenty of wash cloths and a bottle of water on-hand in the car.

Still not sure what caused the vomiting. Dinner was Salmon Risotto, followed by a cheese course (Brie), and then homemade vanilla ice-cream! BallFiend loved the Brie and GrandPaul kept giving him more and more, despite DeepSpice and my protestations. So I reckon it was either a mild allergic reaction to something he ate (because there was also a rash on his skin), or (more likely) too much fat from the Brie.

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No shortcuts

At BallFiend's kindergarten, one of the fathers, who brings his son in each week, literally dumps his son and rushes off. He spends no more than 30 seconds inside the kindergarten, which is as long as it takes him to prise his clinging child out of his arms, and then he races out the door. If the child's back is turned or his face buried in his hands crying (which is usually the case), the father doesn't even say goodbye but sees this as an opportunity to sneak out. The poor boy sobs for the first half of the session and is withdrawn, and sometimes even destructive, for the rest of it. It breaks my heart to see this twice a week. DeepSpice took BallFiend to kinder this morning and after seeing this poor, distressed boy, felt the same way as me.

Before having my own children I was very judgmental of parents, but since having my own, I have come to realise that there are many reasons why parents do what they do. It is all to easy to judge someone on their behaviour at a point in time, without knowing the history that has led up to that point.

For example, I see plenty of parents yelling at their kids and telling them 'no'. (Rather than being the model parent that is described in all the parenting books: the parent who never raises their voice and instead of telling the child 'no', instructs the child on what they should do.) I have learned not to judge these parents (especially since I am one of them!). Usually I can see that they are tired and frazzled, and it is obvious that they do not always speak to their children in this way. Almost all parents of young children are tired (extremely tired!) all the time and tiredness can break the most noble person.

However, in this instance at the kindergarten, the behaviour never changes. I don't know why this father is in such a rush to get away from his son. But whatever it is, I can't understand how it can be so important that he cannot spend a few minutes spent helping his son settle in, followed by a tender cuddle goodbye.

There are no shortcuts in parenting. Children need to feel loved and cared for so that they grow up to be confident, caring adults. It is especially important for children aged up to three years to feel safe and loved - and from what I have read, this is especially so for boys. Children who grow up feeling unloved, unwanted and unsafe are the ones most likely to become thugs and bullies. A few minutes spent helping a three-year-old to feel confident now will prevent months and years spent disciplining a difficult teenager in the future.

The question for me now is whether it is appropriate to intervene - to speak to this father or perhaps the kindergarten teachers?

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More BallFiend words of wisdom

Round the batteries, all about

Does he flick his medicine out the door?

Noooooooo!

- BallFiend, chatting away to no one in particular.

We have no idea what he was on about either... perhaps it's a haiku gone awry?

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The war on widdles

About 6 weeks ago, I started 'active' toilet training with BallFiend. I had hoped that by waiting until he was older, he would get the hang of it straight away and so would magically just switch from nappies to undies in a few days (coz that's what all the experienced mums-of-three-or-more-children told me would happen if I waited until he was older).

Overall, I would say that this has been mostly true. The first two weeks of toilet training went very smoothly. BallFiend was highly motivated and rarely had any misses. However the shine wore off and by week three there were frequent wees on the floor and poos in the pants. This is not my idea of fun. Any parenting books that encourage you to "embrace this new stage in your child's journey to independence' are full of shit. There is nothing fun about toilet training, the only thing that makes it worthwhile is knowing (hoping) that eventually your child will stop using their underpants as pseudo-cloth nappies!

Still there's no going back, so we pushed on and six weeks down the track, things are gradually improving. We still have one or two accidents every two days - mostly when BallFiend is tired at the end of the day, or if he is deeply involved in play and doesn't notice that he needs to go. However, it is now obvious that BallFiend considers himself to be permanently in undies and has no desire to wear nappies again (for a few weeks he frequently asked to wear nappies again).

So, thought this would be a good time to record some of my tactics - so I remember them for use with Thumper when her time comes.

Toilet Training Tactics

In addition to the usual stuff that most people seem to do (frequent reminders to go to the toilet; always go to the toilet after a meal; allowing lots of time for running about naked; potty near where the kid is playing, etc.), I have developed a few toilet training tactics of my own:

1. Cleaning-up after a miss

A flat cloth nappy (preferrably terry toweling rather than flannelette) is the perfect tool for cleaning up a 'miss'. Spread the nappy on the floor and have your darling stand on it whilst you pull down their pants. Any poo that falls out lands on the nappy, not the floor. Any wee that has trickled down onto your darling's feet is mopped up. And simultaneously, the nappy mops up the wee puddle on the floor. Dump the wet/soiled clothing in the middle of the nappy, bundle the whole lot up and take it to the laundry (or stick it in a plastic bag until you get home if you are out).

2. Reward charts

Sticker charts work, but only for a week or so. Then they get boring (and not just for the kid - for the parents as well). So I invented a game:

My version is beach-themed, due to BallFiend's current obsessions with beach balls and swim rings. The beach ball has to start at the house and travel, stop-by-stop, down the road to the beach. Each time BallFiend successfully uses the toilet, the beach ball (or swim ring) moves down the road to the next stop. I laminated the game board and several beach ball and swim rings as game tokens. When the beach ball reaches the beach, a prize is awarded (although not every time, just when additional motivation is required).

3. The going-out kit

When going out I carry "the Kit" which consists of:

• 2 or 3 pairs of underpants;
• 2 or 3 pairs of socks;
• three old wash cloths;
• a terry toweling square nappy;
• several plastic bags;
• 2 or 3 pairs of pants;
• BallFiend's drink bottle which doubles as a water supply for wetting the wash cloths;
• a bottle of hand-sanitizing gel in case I am not near soap and water (I used to carry around in his nappy bag, pre-toilet training too).

So far I have never used more than one change of clothes when out, but I always carry plenty, just in case.

4. Undies or a cloth nappy - let the child choose

When BallFiend was going through the 'want to wear nappies again' stage, I offered him the choice of undies or a fitted terry cloth nappy. As is unsurprising for a child who always wore disposable nappies, he didn't like it and so always opted for undies. I think that having a sibling who is also wearing cloth nappies helped too, since BallFiend wanted to be a big kid and so didn't want to wear nappies like his baby sister's.

That's about it for now... will add more ideas if I come up with anything else that seems to work well.

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Valentine's Day weekend

I don't usually care about (or for) Valentine's Day. Just more marketing hype really. But since DeepSpice dudded me out of $150 when negotiating the sale of the Camry, I strongly hinted to him that Valentine's Day might be a good time to make things up to me... and he did try. Starting with a hazelnut chocolate cupcake brought home from the market last Friday.

Then Saturday night was an enjoyable dinner party at Gran and GrandPaul's house, topped off with BallFiend staying the night so that (in theory) we could sleep in on Sunday. (Of course, Thumper had other ideas, waking at 5 am for an early feed.)

On Sunday morning, we raced off at 10.00 am to see the 11.45 am screening of Avatar 3D at Victoria Gardens (I chose this cinema because they have a 'crying' room - a soundproof room where parents with screaming kids can still watch the movie without annoying everyone else). We only just got to the cinema before the scheduled start time because DeepSpice decided to make us a cooked breakfast 45 minutes before we needed to leave. (I should have stopped him, but who can turn down bacon and eggs!) And also because, even on a Sunday morning, there was no bloody parking at the shopping centre.

Anyway, after the rush to get there, they didn't start the movie until 30 minutes after it's advertised time anyway. Humph! Thumper was an absolute angel throughout. She sat quietly in my arms watching the movie for some of the time, breastfeed and slept the rest through the rest of it. Although I had to keep my hands over her little ears a lot of the time because the sound was deafening!

The day was not-so-romantically concluded by a stop-off at Ikea for some shelving that we desperately need for the kids' bedroom. We arrived home exhausted but no rest for the wicked... Gran and GrandPaul arrived about half an hour later to drop BallFiend back and to deliver some extra goldfish for our pond (as they are about to landscape their garden and are getting rid of the fishpond.)

PS. Happy Chinese New Year - the Year of the Tiger. Takes one to know one...

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Bye bye bomb

Just sold my old car...

it's been replaced with something newer and more shiny:

Despite my feelings for the old car, the leak into the cabin when it rained was getting ridiculous. I found seedlings germinating in the carpet! And driving in Melbourne 40+ degree heat waves was scary when it came down to a choice between running the air conditioning or having no acceleration. Not a good choice when there are two little kids in the car. To spend money getting it fixed seemed silly when they would cost so much more than the car was worth. (I rang a few car wreckers who offered between $100 and $250 for it.) So we splashed out and got a new (and by that I mean 8 years old) car.

Of course I had delegated the job of 'eventually' replacing our car to DeepSpice... about a year ago! He was supposed to research options, test drive a few and come back to me with a short list. From there we would finalise which make and model, then he was to shop around until finding the right car at the right price. Although there was no rush to do so, I did want a new car before the old one died. However, it became apparent that if I was to wait for DeepSpice to organise it, I would be waiting another 20 years and walking everywhere in the meantime. So I did some intensive research and within a couple of weeks had found the right car. We did one test drive then bought it the next day.

My next task was to sell the old Camry. An ad on Gumtree did the trick - I had three enquiries within hours and someone making an offer the next day (although he was then given a car by a friend so didn't end up buying my car). I received another enquiry the following day and after a test drive, the interested buyer paid a deposit. The sale was completed today, only five days after first advertising it.

Unfortunately I didn't get as much money for it as I could have... Although there was 2 months registration remaining, I advertised the car as for sale unregistered because I wasn't sure if anyone would buy it, so didn't think it was worth paying for a roadworthy certificate (RWC) which is required if you want to sell a car with registration. Of course, the buyer wanted to buy it with registration and we came to an agreement that they would organise the RWC and they agreed to sign a contract absolving me of any liability if any damages happened in the 14 day period until the transfer of registration was being finalised.

At the crucial moment when the buyer was haggling over the price, I was busy breastfeeding Thumper so DeepSpice was left to do the negotiations. I gave DeepSpice instructions not to negotiate on price if they wanted to buy the car with registration but that he could accept a lower offer if they wanted to buy it unregistered. However, somewhere along the way DeepSpice got stressed and confused and ended up agreeing to sell the car with registration but at the price I was only wanting to accept if it was unregistered. Bah!! Goodbye $150.

At least the buyer should be happy, and it is good that the car is going to get some further use, rather than being turned into scrap metal. But it's going to take me a while to forgive DeepSpice for this one.

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Mystery of lost socks solved!

BallFiend arrived home from creche today wearing only one sock. Apparently, when DeepSpice collected him, BallFiend led DeepSpice into the toilet/washroom area and pointed to one of the toilets.

"MasterW flushed my one white sock down there!"

So, now you know were all those lost socks go.

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Blog-iversary!

I've been posting regularly to this blog for one whole year! Originally inspired by a need to record some details about my second pregnancy, it has turned out to be a useful tool for capturing all those funny moments in life that don't really have anywhere else to go. Admittedly, BallFiend has dominated, presumably because, being a little kid, he says the funniest things which make good blogging fodder.

Unfortunately Thumper has been quite under-represented. She does a lot of amazing things, as she grows before my eyes. But I just don't get the time I need to write everything down. I hereby resolve to do better. Starting now.

Thumper had her first experience with food (of the non-breast milk variety) today... we let her play with a stick of steamed carrot while everyone else ate their dinner. She licked it, chewed a tiny chunk off it, dropped it and caught it on her foot. What a clever bub! And don't fret, she didn't choke. I am attempting the baby-led weaning method with her. Tried it with BallFiend too, but he insisted on being spoon-fed mush, much to my annoyance. (Actually he still likes being spoonfed now, at three and a half!)

She is also an increasingly messy eater, even though the only thing she eats is breast milk. When she feeds, milk pours out of her nose (actually same thing used to happen with BallFiend, but not such a big volume), very conveniently clearing her sinuses at the same time. Convenient yes, tasteful no. And she hates it when I wipe her nose, screams the house down!

This is Thumper immediately after a breast-feed.
It's a little hard to see in this picture,
but she has a layer of milky snot,
extending from her nose to her chin.

She also suffers from reflux, has done since birth (we had diagnosed it by the time she was 3 weeks old). She 'possets' (ie. spews up) milk all day long. So I am never seen without that must-have fashion item, the 'spitty nappy' draped over my shoulder. She is still taking her daily dose of Losec to help with the pain caused by the stomach acid when she refluxes. Apparently she will grow out of it sooner or later. Some babies do so by 6 months and a few still have severe reflux at 12 months. I hope she grows an oesophogeal sphincter soon, as her medicine is not cheap - $40.00 a bottle, which lasts about 3 - 4 weeks. But I'm not holding my breath. BallFiend was a spewy baby too, but he was a 'happy chucker' - never screamed with pain like Thumper does - and I can remember him still occasionally spewing up milk when he was 12 months old.

Thumper had been enjoying some 'tummy time',

then she spewed, then she laid her face in it.

Ah well, good preparation for all those

teenage binge drinking session we have to look forward to.

Apart from the milk spewing and spraying, Thumper is a wonderful baby - very placid, easy going. Put her in her cot, she goes to sleep. Pick her up, she smiles. When she's hungry, she fusses about to let me know, but she will wait for ages before cries for a feed (not that I make a habit of making her wait, but sometimes BallFiend's demands take precedence over Thumper getting her feed).

Thumper is five months old in a few days, and she is growing up way too quickly. I am doing my best to make the most of having a baby, my last baby, while I have the chance. At the same time, I am really looking forward to watching her develop new skills and seeing her personality develop.

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