Bulky beetle

Every night, Thumper gets put into a gi-normous fat night-time nappy, consisting of a fitted cloth nappy, boosted with a pre-fold, and then a cover on top. She always looks so cute, waddling along with a John Wayne-like gait because the bulk of the nappy keeps her legs apart.

Last night, she wandered up to the bathroom door, curious about the commotion coming from within (BallFiend having his teeth brushed). Suddenly, she over-balanced and plopped down on her bum. No harm done... not with all that padding! But then, she couldn't get up again. The bulky nappy had her stuck, just like a beetle on it's back, with legs flailing helplessly in the air. The look on her face was priceless - puzzled with just a hint of terror.

Needless to say, DeepSpice and I were laughing so hard it took a few moments before we came to her aid.
--

As promised...

Here is the more news I referred to earlier...

This story starts ten years ago, when DesignerSis was just sweet-sixteen and she met a young lad whom we now know as Wigward. Now, most normal teens enjoy a romance for a few months, then break-up in order to be able to write better teenage-angst poetry and have an excuse to go through an obligatory goth phase. But not DesignerSis and Wigward. They set out to prove that your first love can be your true love.

Fast forward ten years and announce they're off to Noosa for a holiday. Nothing really unusual about this, they've done so a few times before. They usually disappear for a week or so and reappear back home with little fanfare (other than the occasional gripe about the crappy service that they got from a cut-price airline).

But not this time.

It was Saturday afternoon, and DeepSpice and I were out gallivanting around the inner-suburbs, pretending to be child-less yuppies, whilst Gran and GrandPaul babysat BallFiend and Thumper. Yep that's right - we were on a date! It was quite a novelty for us to be able to wander into shops and cafes at our leisure. We ended up passing a furniture shop that I have heard about but had never actually been to, so I dragged DeepSpice in for a look.

Then my phone rang. It was DesignerSis calling whilst still away on holiday. She had news: that Wigward had just proposed to her and they are now engaged! (She had to tell me quickly as they were about to tell Wigward's mother and once she got the news, it would be instantly broadcast far and wide.) I was too stunned to say much (or perhaps it was just that I was too focused on imagining how nice it would be to get a new sofa)... I managed to stammer out a "congratulations", before collapsing in shock on my dream sofa. (Just kiddin' - I am genuinely happy for them!)

Later when chatting to CutLuce about the news, I found out that she had had a much better come-back than my corny old 'congratulations'. She immediately asked: "So, when are you having babies?" I can just picture DesignerSis squirming a little on the other end of the phone.

Anyway, I am very happy for DesignerSis and Wigward and I hope they do get on with making some more cousins for BallFiend and Thumper (and Cuz1) soon... though perhaps not too soon, as I'm still on my 'auntie' L-plates.
--

Auntie Stompy

It's been a mad couple of weeks... a lot has going on in my life and as a result, I've had little time to post on The Swamp. And as a result, I have some long overdue news to brag...

On 9th June 2011, I became an auntie for the first time after CutLuce and DesignerMonkey's first progeny finally made her appearance, about a week overdue) at 4.39 am.

This of course means that DeepSpice is now an uncle for the first time and BallFiend and Thumper have their very first First Cousin (they already have a few cousins of the third or fourth or once-or-twice-removed variety, or something like that anyway).

It's all very exciting and I am very much enjoying getting to experience a newborn without all the horrible sleep-deprivation. No such luck for the long-suffering CutLuce and DesignerMonkey.

Now this little bubba just needs a Swamp-handle... I will be naming her soon, once her personality shines through, but for now, she can be Cuz1, in the hope that Cuz2, and even Cuz3 and Cuz4 will be along in the next few years... because, oh yes! there's more news...
--

Take that T-Rex!

Me: What did you do at Kinder today?

BallFiend: We played dinosaurs.

Me: Oh, tell me more about it...

BallFiend: I was the rock that fell to Earth and killed all the dinosaurs.

--

Alpha-Bet

I wasn't planning to post again, for the third day in a row, but had to note down this one...

Thumper just pointed to the letter M on the keyboard of my computer and said "W for [her name]".

She's only 20 months old - well 21 months in a few more days, but still... it's pretty impressive. 

--

Second day of Winter

There's a theme started here for June, but it's really just because I am not feeling very creative with my blog-post titles. Please don't expect that you will be getting two posts a day for the rest of the month!

Anyway, today is another glorious Winter day in Melbourne. Started off cold and frosty, but then the Sun came out and it seems like Spring. After taking BallFiend to kinder, Thumper and I headed off to a local cafe to meet The Librarian and LittleMissF for a coffee and catch-up. It's school-selection season, and all us mums of 4-and-a-bit-year olds are busy touring local schools and trying to decide which one to go to. So The Librarian and I had lots of notes to compare.

My morning had been a real rush, because I slept in, because of Thumper's night antics, and I had rushed out of the house with no breakfast. So it was nice to indulge in a yummy cooked breakfast, even if I did have to share it with Thumper. After a while, LittleMissF and Thumper tired of playing at the cafe, so we decided to go across the road to the park. As we were preparing to leave the cafe, I heard my name being called and turned around to see a mum from my former "Mothers' group" - I hadn't seen her for about 3 years, since our Mothers group sort of petered out. She was there with her second and third children. Her eldest daughter who is the same age as BallFiend was at kinder too. After a bit of a catch up (and more school-choice talk), The Librarian and I wandered over to the park and let the girls have a run about.

With Kinder pick-up time approaching, it was time to say goodbye to the sunshine and go on our way. I stopped in at Creche to retrieve blankie and popped in to say hello to SingingCheese who had just finished up a RhymeTime session. Thumper enjoyed playing chasey with SingingCheese's daughter MiniBabybel but it all ended in tears when Thumper decided to live up to her name and gave MiniBabyBel a shove.

So we said goodbye and I hurried off, to collect my pants from the tailor and get home in time for Thumper to squeeze in a nap before we go out again to collect BallFiend from Kinder. Then it will be off to visit CutLuce and so we have some stern words to baby cousin about coming out soon!

--

First (long) night of Winter

Oh calamity! It wasn't until 7.00 pm that I discovered that Thumper's green blankie hadn't come home from Creche. Blankie is the essential ingredient to a good night's sleep... it's how she self-settles: she holds the corner just under her nose and brushes it back and forwards whilst sucking her thumb.

Fearing the worst, I put on a brave face and took her off to bed, offering her a choice of "blue blankie" or one of BallFiend's blankies instead. She wasn't happy, but seemed to accept things as they were. But once in her cot, there was a plaintive cry: "corner gone, corner gone!".

So I hunted around in a box of toys which had been packed up ready for baby cousin (we're expecting CutLuce to produce the goods on that one any day now!) and found a toy which was made from similar fabric and had a corner of sorts. This seemed to help enough for Thumper to fall asleep. But sadly, it wasn't quite right for a whole night's worth and we paid the penalty with three separate wake-up call through the night.

This morning, I dropped in to Creche and collected blankie. I now have a happy Thumper who is tucked up in her cot having a nap, blankie firmly planted under nose.

I think the time has come to get out the scissors and do some blankie-mitosis.
--

First day of Winter

Busy morning for me today. I took Thumper to the Kookaburra room at Creche, then BallFiend and I joined the kids from the Kinder room on their first ever excursion to a local youth centre (they were allowed in, despite the fact that kinder kids are not yet actually youth). The walk to the youth centre would normally take me about 7 mins. With 25 kinder-aged kids, plus some siblings in prams, it took 30 minutes. Not just due to the dawdling, but also all the stops along the way to spot things such as:

1. shoes thrown over power lines,
2. house numbers,
3. a pet bunny in a front garden,
4. taxis, and
5. a police car.

We also had to "Stop. Look. Listen. Think." at each cross-street before crossing it.

At the youth centre, the kids had a great time, jumping on trampolines, playing table-air-hockey, table-soccer, basketball, football, cricket and jumping on a gym mat. Then we returned back to Creche, singing classic kids marching anthems as we walked.

Back at creche, BallFiend and I joined the other kids for some lunch (chicken curry and mashed potatoes - yum!) then I stopped by a local cafe to join a few other mums for a coffee and chat before carting BallFiend off to his "other kinder" (a sessional kinder which he attends Tuesday and Wednesday afternoons, and Thursday mornings).

Back at home, I decided that while there was beautiful sunshine outside, I would make the most of it and do some gardening. One large bin-full of weeds later and I am now officially exhausted, so I am going to relax and enjoy the half-hour of child-free time, before I go and collect BallFiend from kinder.
--

Copy cat

Conversation during dinner tonight:

BallFiend: Why is Thumper copying me?
Me: I don't know, why don't you ask her.
BallFiend: Thumper, why are you copying me?
Thumper: Not sure.
--

Pair of fruits

"Two Fruits" chorused BallFiend and Thumper, exactly one second after finishing eating their main course at dinner tonight. So DeepSpice served up a bowl of Two Fruits each. For the uninitiated, Two Fruits is a canned fruit product consisting of cubes of peaches and pears in syrup-y goodness.

BallFiend happily scoffed his down, then dragged DeepSpice off to the hallway for a round of indoor hallway soccer. Meanwhile Thumper meticulously picked out each piece of peach with her long, delicate fingers and ate them one at a time. Left with a bowl of pears in juice, she proceeded to meticulously pick out each piece of pear with her long, delicate fingers and carefully place them on the tray, saying "Don't like it." for each one.

She looked at me with a big grin on her face and said "On the tray." -- "Yes." I conceded, "Thank you for keeping them on the tray and not throwing them on the floor." -- and then she drank the juice from the bowl.

I asked Thumper to put the pear pieces back in the bowl so I could clear it all away. She happily complied. Then ate the pear anyway.

Miss Contrary!

--

Vermin!

Been a bit silent on the blog recently, and here's why... we had mice! Ewwwwwwww!!!!!
In fact, the mice are just the last in a long line of vermin that have invaded our home (or in one instance our holiday accommodation)...

First, there were rats in our roof, about 7 or 8 years ago, not long after we moved into our house. Ratsak sorted them out. Then about two years ago, we had cockroaches in kitchen. We had 'em sprayed and eventually located the nest in the base of the kettle!!!!

We have a minor silverfish problem - they keep appearing in bath tub! No idea how they get there, but I am guessing they fall through the ceiling fan out of the roof space.

We have seen numerous red-back spiders in the garden, one ventured under the door and into our laundry which was a bit scary. But even more worrying was the one we found recently on our stove! It had made a web on the trivets!!  

About a year ago, I saw a single, solitary mouse in our study/library. [Though I now know that there is no such thing as a single, solitary mouse... read on.] We set some traps but caught nothing and saw no further signs of it.

Then there was the time that a sparrow fell down the kitchen flue and ended up stuck in the rangehood. We got that one out and put some mesh over the top, but a few weeks later another sparrow got through the mesh and ended up in the same predicament. Both birds were extracted and survived the ordeal.

Another bird incident on April 7th this year when a Myna bird came down chimney in our study and pooed all over everything. After finishing this massive clean up, we were well and truly ready for a nice, relaxing holiday in Bendigo over the Easter long weekend, but it was not to be... on our second-last night, a Butcherbird came down the chimney in the bedroom of our holiday house. Curiously bringing someone's packet of the Pill with it - probably collected for it's shiny-ness.

May 2nd: back at home and all had been relatively normal for most of a week until we spotted a mouse, this time hanging around in our dining/living room. Eventually caught it in a trap, but only by the back leg, so then DeepSpice had to euthanase it (cervical dislocation, not fun). With that one gone, it soon became apparent that there was at least one more, as the baits kept disappearing out of other traps. I even saw a mouse carefully extract bait from one of the traps and then sit on top of the trap to eat it! And so began the War on Mice. A strategies included:

• Sealing up all the holes in our house with acrylic fillers and expanding foam. 
• Making patches to go over holes in the back of our kitchen cabinets leftover from when the lazy cabinet-maker was installing them and drilled huge holes for the electrical cables and pipes and then didn't patch them. DeepSpice made patches from plates of stainless steel that he had hoarded for years. (So now on top of having mice, I have no grounds for telling him to throw out all the clutter in the garage. Sigh.)  
• Laying more traps around the house overnight (and packing them up each morning so that Thumper didn't stick her fingers in them).
• Laying baits up in the roof space and monitoring these every day or two. 
• Lots and lots of cleaning with bleach where the mice had been, then sprinkling bicarbonate soda powder around so we'd be able to see if they came back. The bicarb also helped a bit with the disgusting smell.  
• Being super-vigilant in cleaning up every speck of food in the house, so there is nothing around for the mice to eat. No easy task with messy, small children about. 

We are now at the end of week 3 in the War, and we seem to be winning. No sign of mice inside our house anymore, so it seems like we have successfully found and sealed up all the holes. And DeepSpice reported this morning that there is no sign of the baits in the roof still being eaten. Unfortunately this probably means there are dead mice in our roof, but at least they're now down here with us.

So hopefully we can now relax a little, especially since today was meant to be The Rapture. I am very pleased to have been left behind so I can enjoy living in our mouse-free house again. I just hope that we don't get a post-Rapture apocalypse now, because I don't quite feel up to dealing with a zombie plague.
--

Twinkle stars

I want to see the twinkle stars.-- Thumper, asking to go outside last night. 

She has been using up to three words at a time since about 18 months, but this was a first - a seven word sentence! And she's only 20 months old.

A Royal Pain in the Throat

July 29th, 1981.

I was 7 years old. I watched, at first with interest and then with increasing concern, as StompyDad bustled back and forth between the TV in the lounge room and the hi-fi in the 'family' room, trying to set up the ABC radio simulcast before the big event began: Prince Charles & Lady Di, the Royal wedding.


Meanwhile, my long-suffering mother was busy preparing dinner -- fish -- whilst trying to calm StompyDad before he got into a complete tizz. CutLuce, then my cute little sister, was somewhere about too... probably hiding from me -- her nasty big sister who hadn't gotten over being dethroned 5 years previously (a grudge I continued to hold for about another 20 years, really sorry about that sis) -- in case I pinched her again. No DesignerSis yet... still another 3 years to wait for her arrival.

I think I was quite excited about the wedding - after all, what little girl doesn't love the idea of seeing a real, live princess? Or maybe it was just that we were going to be allowed to eat whilst sitting in front of the TV and I would get to stay up late.

Eventually, Mum, CutLuce & I sat down to eat, while StompyDad continued to fuss about trying to get the radio tuned just-so and the aerial adjusted on the TV just-right, all the while getting more stressed.

Finally, after much stomping about, accompanied by much ranting, StompyDad joined us and sat down to eat. He began wolfing down great mouthfuls of his dinner whilst still complaining about the failings of the household technology to deliver perfect Royal wedding sound and vision.

Lady Di was still in her carriage on the way to the church, waving demurely. She hadn't even had the chance to show off her 25ft train yet, when StompyDad was on his feet again. This time not yelling but coughing, gagging and spitting a mouthful of fish and vegies back out onto his plate.

Eventually, mum worked out what had happened - he had got a fish bone stuck in his throat.


"Bread! Bread!" a panicked StompyDad demanded. 

"I need it to help swallow down the bone." 

He raced to the kitchen and proceeded to wolf down great hunks of bread. 

But the fish bone was tenacious. 

I don't remember very clearly what happened next with the fish bone, but I do remember getting to watch the rest of the wedding, so I think that StompyDad went over the road to see DoctorH our neighbour and friend, who was also, conveniently, a GP. When he returned some time later, having missed the Royal wedding ceremony (and there was no catching up later on iView; in those days we didn't even have a VCR!), the fish bone was still firmly in place. DoctorH needed special equipment to get that bony morsel out and had told StompyDad to come to the clinic the next morning. 

Anyway, here I am, thirty years later, bitterly disappointed that I cannot watch The Chaser's commentary of today's Royal wedding (and as a result not-watching the Will & Kate Royal wedding at all). But guess what? We had fish for dinner: smoked salmon with pasta, and pulled it off without a single fish-bone mishap. Phew.

--

PAM

An exchange whilst in the car, driving around Bendigo:
BallFiend: we're going down a fast PAM.
DeepSpice: what's a PAM?
BallFiend: It's a fast bit of ham, but sloped uphill. (giggles a lot).
--

Kiss and tell

Conversation tonight whilst getting dinner ready...

Me: Hey Thumper, did you play with Shaunie [another child at creche] today?
Thumper: Shaunie!
Me: So you did play with Shaunie?
Thumper (nodding): Iss! Iss!
Me: Did you have fun?
Thumper: "Kiss."
Me: Did you kiss Shaunie!

Thumper (nodding again): Iss. 

Then she gave me a big cheesy grin. 

All I could think is "Uh-oh. She's going to be one hell of a teenager!" 

--

Potty 3, Floor 3

Thumper's potty antics are continuing at a steady pace. Most days for the past week have entailed a nappy-free time of 1 -3 hours. Most days, she successfully sits on the potty and on many occasions she even successfully deposits something into the potty. It is not often the traditional ones-and-twos. Sometimes it's a toy, sometimes it's a hand or foot as she attempts to clamber on. (Don't worry, the potty gets thoroughly cleaned after each 'successful' use!)

Here's a sample of life with a 19-month old toddler who wants to use the potty but clearly has neither the gross motor skills or much of an idea of exactly how to go about it... 

On Thursday I sat down to breakfast at about 9 am; Thumper was already in the high chair eating finishing her breakfast.
Suddenly she started squirming and trying to get out and saying 'poo, poo!'. So I get her down, whip off the nappy and help her sit on the potty. Ten seconds later she is up and playing. Then she asks to get back in the high chair to finish her breakfast. So I sit her on a terry-towelling flat nappy and she continues eating, as do I. Thirrty seconds later she starts squirming and trying to get out and saying 'poo, poo!'. There's already a spot on the nappy under her bum. So back to the potty for round two. Nothing. She gets up and starts playing. Then a minute later says 'wee!'. I look over to see most of a poo on the floor and the remainder still emerging. So I quickly try to help her back on the potty to finish the job... just as the last of it hits the floor. I clean up the floor, Thumper, the potty and the nappy on the high chair. Thumper continues to run around nappy-free (surely she must be good for at least half an hour now?) and I make another attempt to sit down and eat my breakfast. A few minutes later, Thumper starts saying 'poo, poo!' and looking distressed. This time, she has done a wee on the floor. She goes to the potty again while I clean up the floor, then her feet. Then I re-nappy her leaky ass! Finally, one hour and fifteen minutes later, I get to finish my soggy cereal. 

Oh well, it's pleasing to know she is motivated even if she still can't distinguish between 'wee' and 'poo'. And at least we have floorboards, not carpet. 

The scoreboard, if I had been keeping track, would look something like this:

• potty: 5
• floor: 6
• nappies... umm still too many to count! 

--

Ode to Food

Food! Food! Everywhere!

There's food on your face and food in your hair!

There's food from your head right down to your feet!

Did you actually get any food to eat?

This is the poem I improvised whilst cleaning Thumper up after her breakfast today. Sadly no photographic evidence of today's food-as-art effort. So here's a look at her previous efforts instead...

Thumper at 6 months, enjoying avocado on rice biscuit.

Thumper at 10 months, weapon of choice: pasta with bolognese sauce. 

Thumper at 16 months. "Right, rinished smearing porridge everywhere, now to eat the bowl."

--

Seriously going potty!

She did it again!

Thumper was running around nappy-free after dinner. She was half-way up the hallway when she suddenly turned around and headed for the bathroom. She pointed at the potty and said 'sit down, sit down'. Then she sat down and did her first ever wee on the potty. A great sequel to yesterday's poo.

If she makes it three in a row tomorrow night, I might just start to believe this is not just a fluke.
--

Fashion Statement

"Thumb Hat!"
- says Thumper upon placing the lid from a texta onto her thumb.

Who knows, hats for thumbs could be the next big thing.
--

Feed me!

Dinner tonight: roast beef with roast potato, sweet potato and carrot, and steamed broccoli and beans.
Yum!

End of the meal... I'm full, DeepSpice is full.
But the kids want more, more, more.
So they eat 2 bowls of yogurt each.

They still want more, more, more. 

So they eat a huge slice of watermelon each.

They still want more, more, more. 

What to offer? 

All that is left in the fridge is some pumpkin soup.

"Yippee!" yells BallFiend.

"Sooop!" yells Thumper.

And so the kids ended up having a soup course at the end of tonight's meal. 

Weirdos.  

--

Going potty

Thumper just used the potty for the first time, aged 19 months! Seems like our decision to use cloth nappies as a means to earlier toileting might be paying off.
DeepSpice's sensitive nose detected the signs that something big was a-brewin' so he asked Thumper if she would like to sit on the potty. And she was keen to do so. A few minutes later there's a poo! But surprisingly no wee.

Don't kids usually do this sort of thing the other way around - start at number ones and work their way up to number twos?

--

Where's Mindy?

Thumper just came over to me with a carton of UHT milk in her hand saying "Mork, Mork".
--

Conflict resolution 101

Another new word from Thumper today. It happened when I was visiting a local primary school, the one that BallFiend will most likely attend.

The school tour was organised by The Librarian and when she told me about it, I asked if I could tag along. She was there with LittleMissF and The Bibliophile and LittleMissIz also joined the tour. Both MasterF and MasterW were at kinder. BallFiend was also meant to be at kinder, but was home sick, with Gran minding him.

So the six of us were in the Principal's office, listening to him talk about the school, or at least trying to with three active toddlers mucking about. I had taken along a magnetic drawing toy to keep Thumper entertained and when she left it unattended on the table, LittleMissF started to play with it. Moments later Thumper noticed and started to throw a tantrum... and then I heard it: "Mine!".

It seems we have arrived at the terrible twos, about 5 months early.
--

Budding accountant?

This morning, Thumper amazed me again: she counted to three. I was preparing her nappies to go to creche and had two piled up already. She pointed to each one, saying 'one, two'. This wasn't surprising - she has been counting two items fairly often recently, blocks, fingers, etc.

But then I added a third nappy and she said 'one, two... (thinking for a moment), three'.
--

Fully sick

The name of today is Monday. BallFiend has been learning the days of the week at kinder. He came home one day and said to me, "Mum, did you know there are seven days of the week?" and proceeded to recite them to me: "Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Sunday, Friday". A few days later, he had it down pat: "Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday".

Anyway, Monday is swimming lesson day, and an exercise in logistics requiring military precision:

• 7.00 am: Get up out of bed (harder than it sounds when Thumper has woken us up at 3 am and kept us up till after 4 am). Get myself showered and dressed, leaving DeepSpice to tend the young'uns... that is, start on getting them dressed and fed.
• 7.30 am: Discover that DeepSpice has got as far as getting breakfast cereals into bowls on the bench and milk out of the fridge and on to the bench, but not actually poured onto cereal yet. Spot kids playing, and still in PJs. 
• 7.35 am: Find clothes and dress the slippery eels kids. Dressing Thumper is relatively straight-forward, except for those times when she does her over-cooked spaghetti impersonation and goes all 'boneless'. Thankfully, she's decided to be al-dente today. BallFiend takes a lot longer because: (a) he dresses himself; (b) he has to hold a ball whilst dressing himself; (c) he has to run about the house playing with said ball in between putting on each item of clothing. 
• 7.45 am: Sit Thumper in the highchair with a bowl of Vitabrits. Place BallFiend's breakfast on the table. Sit down and attempt to eat my breakfast.
• 7.46 am: Get up to replenish Thumper's bowl of Vitabrits. 
• 7.50 am: Encourage, cajole, nag, suggest, nag, remind, nag and shout at BallFiend to: (a) come to the table; (b) eat his Vitabrits; (c) 'turn around and eat facing the table and stop dropping food on the floor!'; (d) 'keep eating and stop playing with your spoon/placemat/ball/other distraction'; until a sufficient quantity of breakfast has finally been eaten... 
• 7.59 am: Hand damp face-washer to BallFiend and use another to wipe up Thumper, the mess on and under the highchair. Extract Thumper from highchair. Quickly wipe up mess on floor before Thumper walks through it. 
• 8.00 am: Start packing kids bags, making snacks to take to pool. No sandwiches for lunch today because there's no bread, again. 
• 9.30 am: Encourage, cajole, nag, suggest, nag, remind, nag and shout at BallFiend to put shoes on, go to toilet, get ready to go, etc., etc. Change Thumper's nappy.
• 10.00 am: Departure, Take 1. Strap Thumper into car seat, ask BallFiend to get into car. BallFiend announces "I have a poo!". Unstrap Thumper and return to the house. Assist BallFiend with wiping up after the event. Encourage, cajole, nag, suggest, nag, remind, nag and shout at BallFiend to put his pants back on, flush toilet, wash hands, dry hands. All things that he would be able to do much more quickly if he would only put down that ball for a moment! 
• 10.15 am: Departure, Take 2. Strap Thumper into car seat, ask BallFiend to get into car. BallFiend rants that he wanted to be strapped in first. Briefly consider unstrapping Thumper then decide to weather BallFiend's tantrum instead, in the vain hope that he will learn an important life lesson (which he probably will, but that won't come back to benefit me for another 25 years). Strap BallFiend in. Strap myself in, start engine. Drive down driveway. Realise I have forgotten Thumper's blankie. Turn off car and return to house (leaving kids strapped in). If someone is fool enough to kidnap them, then so be it.
• 10.30 am: Departure, Take 3. Return to car with blankie. Drive off to Gran and GrandPaul's house. Deposit a protesting Thumper. On our way again.
• 10.45 am: Arrive at swimming pool. Quickly help BallFiend change into bathers (amazing how cooperative he becomes when it is all about getting into a swimming pool). Time for 10 mins of playtime until the lesson with Nuccio. 
• 11.00 am: Lesson starts. Quick chat with The Bibliophile, MasterW and LittleMissIz before nicking out to cafe to start reading the next book for my bookgroup. 

After the swimming lesson, I dragged a protesting BallFiend to the change rooms. He wants to play in the pool longer. But I know he needs to go and get fed, ASAP, before a hunger-induced meltdown occurs. We join The Bibliophile, MasterW and LittleMissIz at a local eatery, as we often do. Today it is Al-Alamy for some Lebanese pizzas. Part way through his cheese calzoni, BallFiend announces that he won't eat anymore because he feels sick. Not like him at all, as he loves cheese and simple carbs, which is all that the cheese calzoni is, and he is usually starving after swimming. But then he and MasterW start running around the store, so I dismiss the idea that he is really sick. They go up and down the aisles with all the loose nuts in tubs. I chase after him and tell him not to go near the nuts (BallFiend has a serious nut allergy).

Then BallFiend and MasterW settle in front of the drinks fridges and start rolling BallFiend's "soccerball beach ball with a bell in it" back and forwards, continuously getting in the way of passing customers. ThePupperMaker arrives with her son MasterD (whom we know from 3 year old kinder) and the ball rolling game gets taken up a notch, then it is back to running around the aisles next to the nuts.

We decide to make a hasty exit and The Bibliophile suggests that I drop BallFiend off at her place so that he and MasterW can have a play while I do my shopping. We wander back to our cars, with our cute little boys holding hands and chattering away to each other. Then head back to The Bibliophile's house. Once there I stop for a cup of tea and shortly after, BallFiend resumes his complaint about feeling sick and wanting to go home.

I dismiss this at first, as he often gets into a sullen mood these days with no obvious reason and/or claims to be sick as a means of getting his way. But as I watch him over my cup of tea, I can see him looking more and more pale. His posture looks awkward and uncomfortable. He says he is cold, yet it is a beautiful 24 degrees. I touch his torso and feel heat radiating from his skin. OK, so he has a temperature and he really is a bit sick. So I ask him to lie on the couch and wait while I finish my cup of tea and get ready to go. He refuses at first, insisting that he needs his dummy and blankie to rest. Five minutes later, he is sound asleep.

I carry him to the car and drive home. Then carry him to his bed. Seconds later he starts vomiting... I catch it in the only thing to hand: his precious blankie. I clean him up, take his temperature (just under 40 degrees) and give him some Panadol. Then he vomits again. But he feels marginally better now and lies down, falling straight back to sleep. By now it is about 3.30 pm and I ring Gran and GrandPaul to ask them to drive Thumper home.

At 7 pm, I wake BallFiend and check his temperature again. It's come down to 37.8 degrees and he is much chirpier, but still feels sick. So I get him ready for bed and convince him to drink a little bit of water (he refuses a Hydralyte iceblock or apple juice) . He's asleep again by 8 pm, and Thumper not long after.

Thankfully, has DeepSpice put on the washing, so I don't have to deal with cleaning up all the vomited on things (including my pants!). Here's hoping that he is all better tomorrow and more importantly, that Thumper doesn't catch it.
--

Articulate tot

Today Thumper said

• towie (for tower) when building a tower of blocks
• "read this story", and then
• "put it in the zink" (sink) when she wanted to throw her toy in the sink

Since when does an 18 month old kid make a 5 word sentence!
--

Tantrums 101

In the past week or so, Thumper has just started doing really cute tantrums... the sort where she lies on her back on the floor and kicks both her legs up and down simultaneously whilst crying in that put-on sort of way.
And it gets better, as of today, she no longer just drops to the floor, banging her head on the timber floor boards, instead she has learned to carefully get down on hands and knees, then carefully lie on her tummy, then carefully roll over on to her back and only then to proceed with the tantrum.

I remember SingingCheese telling me about toddlers who did this sort of thing when she was BallFiend's carer at creche, and that her strategy for dealing with tantrums (whatever the style of tantrum) is to simply laugh. Well, Thumper is certainly making it easy for me to laugh at her tanties!
--

What was that Igglepiggle?

Act 1, Scene 1: 
The lounge room on a gloomy, grey afternoon. DeepSpice is reading "In the Night Garden... Igglepiggle: The bouncy jumping game!" to Thumper.

DeepSpice: Once upon a time in the night garden... Igglepiggle was out for a walk when he heard a funny noise. What noise did he hear, Thumper?

Thumper's rear end goes pop-pop-pop-pop-pop-pop-pop, right on cue!


DeepSpice and I laugh hysterically for a good few minutes. DeepSpice abandons the book-reading.
--

Date Night

Way back in July last year, Tim Minchin announced his next tour: Tim Minchin Vs the MSO, playing in Melbourne on February 25 and 26, 2011.

At that time, Thumper was 10 months old and I figured that 7 months should be enough notice to organise a babysitter. So DeepSpice and I decided to go, and happily VolubleK decided to come too. (Unfortunately in December/ January, the timetable for VolableK's relocation to France was brought forward and so she ended up missing the concert. But at least she gets to be in France eating lots of CHEESE!) I reactivated my membership of the fan club so I could get the fan club code that would allow me to buy pre-sale tickets. (Unfortunately, the code wasn't sent to me, so I spent a few days of emailing the promoter before I eventually got the code 'violin' but still was about to secure reasonably good seats... row Y.)

Then I booked up Gran and GrandPaul for babysitting and went about distracting myself with other things so I wouldn't get too impatient waiting for the big night. 

At the time of booking the tickets, Thumper was happily breastfeeding morning, noon and night, and often having a few sups (snacks) in between, and neither of us had plans for her to stop. So I assumed I would still be feeding her in February and that we would go to the concert and come home straight after. 

However, on 13 January, Thumper suddenly stopped breastfeeding. Just like that. Up until the day before, she had been having 3 - 5 feeds a day. Coincidentally 13 January was also the ten-year anniversary of my mother's death. And on 14 January, it was my first day back at paid work after 18 months maternity and long service leave. A perfect storm and I felt miserable: grieving for my mum, greiving for the end of my breastfeeding relationship with Thumper and having to deal with all this on my first day at work. 

Thumper's weaning from the breast at 16 months was slightly less of a shock to the system than when BallFiend did the same thing at 13.5 months of age. At least I had some experience of the sort of emotions I was going to feel. And I had done some preparation for that day that I knew would eventually come... I had made a mental list of things I was going to do once Thumper weaned... all things I couldn't do whilst still breastfeeding. And top of my list was a night away with DeepSpice, sans kids!

The last time we had been 'child free' for a night (actually two) was back when BallFiend had a practice run staying with Gran and GrandPaul in preparation for Thumper's arrival, about 20 months ago. Back then, I was too uncomfortably pregnant to make the most it. 

So, as the date for the Tim Minchin concert approached it occurred to me that this could be the right time to start my post-breastfeeding life with an entire 'night off'. DeepSpice raised the idea with Gran and GrandPaul. Gran was happy to have both kids overnight, but GrandPaul was rather hesitant. But after a few days of some gentle persuasion and it was all agreed: we would drop the kids over after lunch on Saturday, then pick them up on Sunday afternoon. 

I was getting more and more excited as the date drew closer, as evidenced by my frequent Facebook status updates informing anyone who cared to read them. Whilst web-searching for suitable accommodation in St Kilda, it occurred to me that FunkyOrganMan and ThingMaker may well be going to, so I tracked them down on Facebook, with very pleasing results: yes, they were both on Facebook and yes, they were both going to the Tim Minchin concert and yes, they were both going on the same night as us and yes, they were also planning to stay overnight in St Kilda! Jackpot! We arranged to meet for dinner before the show. 

Then calamity struck... Gran and GrandPaul had made last minute plans to attend a birthday lunch on Sunday and wanted us back bright and early (11 am) to collect the kids. My plans for a lazy Sunday morning sleep-in, followed by lunch in St Kilda were thrown into disarray. After coming to the conclusion that stomping around the house expressing my disappointment didn't seem to be doing much good, I did some quick thinking and phoned CutLuce... "would she and DesignerMonkey be able to mind the kids from 11 am on Sunday?" I asked wishfully, not expecting that my sister, with her busy social life, would be available. But as luck would have it, she said yes! I was overjoyed. I rushed to the internet and completed my booking for a B&B. 

Our night away went off almost perfectly... we were a lot late dropping the kids off to Gran and GrandPaul, so instead of checking into our B&B at 2 pm as planned, we didn't get there till nearly 4 pm. Having slept badly the previous night, I decided to have a quick afternoon nap, then we dressed for dinner and headed out to Cicciolina's for dinner with FunkyOrganMan and ThingMaker. Much wine was consumed in two short hours (with ThingMaker picking up my slack) and then we ambled down to The Palais for what turned out to be a fantastic concert... exceeding my expectations. At interval I raced out to the mechandise stand and handed over my credit card: one CD for me, one for VolubleK, a DVD of Tim's previous tour (which we didn't get to go to due to Thumper's then extreme infancy) and a "Rock 'n' Roll Nerd" t-shirt for DeepSpice.

After the concert, we chatted for quite a while with FunkyOrganMan and ThingMaker, then wandered back to our B&B. In the morning, we were served a yummy cooked breakfast and then spent some time wandering around Acland Street. Mother guilt had me seeking out little gifts for our little ones - a hypercolour foam ball for BallFiend (which he subsequently lost at the swimming pool the following Monday) and a box of tiny Dr Seuss books for Thumper (which she has progressively been trashing), and a thank you gift for CutLuce and DeepSpice (iPhone app fridge magnets). We had lunch at Gypsies Bar & Cafe, then strolled along to the St Kilda market, where DeepSpice bought himself a new belt and we found a nice handmade soap to give to Gran as a thank you gift. Unfortunately, we didn't find a suitable thank you gift for GrandPaul, but at least he can be happy in the knowledge that we didn't buy him an ugly, touristy trinket that he has to pretend to appreciate.

Then it was time to come back to reality and start our (long and tedious, thanks to Punt Road) journey home. 

On arriving home, we found BallFiend curled up on the couch with dummy and blankie, watching TV and Thumper, who had just woken up from her nap, nestled into DesignerMonkey's arms. Neither child was the least bit interested or excited to see us. It appears that we should have stayed away longer. Much, much longer... 

-- 

Toddling delight

She's 18 months, already!  A walking, 'talking' tot. Where did the last year and a half go?  

Thumper, wearing a lovely summer dress,
brought back from Bali by CutLuce and DesignerMonkey.

Thumper frequently mimics us and works hard to fit in to the family. She has developed a good appreciation of balls under her big brother's tuition. She likes to join BallFiend in playing with playdough, drawing with crayon and painting. Her skills with a fork and spoon are exemplary - she uses them with greater dexterity than some four-and-a-half year olds I know. She even mimics me when I am rubbing moisturiser on my hands. Very strange! She loves to carry her potty around the house and practices sitting on it, but mostly it is used to hold toys or her cup of water. 

She runs about with a cute waddle, arms held out from her body for balance, shrieking with delight if BallFiend is chasing her. She always busy, carrying small books and toys from one end of the house to the other. It takes less than 15 minutes for a tidy house to be transformed by Whirlwind Thumper, with debris scattered everywhere. And it is worst on days when BallFiend is at kindergarten... though I haven't worked out why yet.

She sleeps well, going to bed about 7.30 pm and lying in bed awake until BallFiend is brought to bed 15 minutes later so she doesn't miss out on hearing DeepSpice's 'talking story'. Dressed in her warm pyjamas on cold evenings, she looks just like Teletubbie! Mostly, she goes straight to sleep and doesn't wake until 8.00 am the following morning (unless BallFiend wakes her earlier when he is in need of an audience). Although sometimes our nights are interrupted by her screaming in her sleep... no idea what sort of thing a toddler would be having nightmares about. 

Her language is amazing, with an ever-growing vocabulary of spoken and signed words. Most recently she started saying "cheese", after we played the Cheese song from Tim Minchin's Heritage Orchestra album (which I got at his recent Melbourne concert). She loves to read books - she is always coming up to DeepSpice or me with a book in hand saying "read, read". I am continually impressed with her ability to follow directions of two steps (eg. pick up that book and take it to your bedroom). Singing is another favourite activity - currently her favourite song is Baa Baa Black Sheep, which she wanders about singing: 'baa baa baa baa...' 

Sadly however, she cannot possibly by my own child as she loves shoes and hats, playing with dolls (her 'baay-bees') and doing feminine things like playing with toy kitchens, dolls and pretending to mop the floor! I'm not too worried though, as she spends more time playing with toy cars and trucks than BallFiend ever has.

-- 

Neighbours

We have been living in our house for nine years now. It's on a main road and lacks that sense of community spirit that one tends to find in the quieter back streets. Across the road from us are several blocks of flats and units, many of them rental properties so there is a high turn-over of residents. Immediately to our East is a single story, ugly, brown brick, nouveau-wog house. The shutters are almost always down. And on the Western side is a large, two-story, brown brick, ugly nouveau-wog establishment; so large that our guests to mistake it for a block of flats.

to our East

to our West

When I say large, I mean enormous - the monstrosity fills most of the block. It's windows overlook our driveway and have a view straight into our bedrooms. At the front, the house has 'classy' white balustrading around the balcony and a driveway paved with large orange tiles. Not pretty but fortunately we usually can't see too many tiles as they are covered by the fleet of cars that belong to the household. A household of 3 people! There's the dad 'G', his wife 'C' and their adult son 'M' who really ought to have flown the family nest while he was still in his early thirties. They are frequently visited by their adult daughter who has married and spawned and now lives around the corner.

I first met G soon after we had moved in. A friendly-enough chat over the fence. This happened a few more times, and sometimes just a quick wave hello as we passed in the street. But things started to go a little bit wrong. One day I came outside to find G up a ladder painting the balcony of his house, on a ladder which had it's base in our driveway. He was positioned right over our car. Luckily no paint had dripped on it yet. I told him that he had no right to come onto our property, especially without asking first and told him to leave. Another time, I came home to find him in our driveway, digging around in the garden bed along the fence line - apparently the dirt from our garden bed was coming under a gap in the fence and he was trying to plug the gap or something. Again I told him not to take the liberty of coming onto our property. After this incident, we put a padlock on our gate.

Then we started renovating our place. First step was the garage which we extended to create room for DeepSpice's planned woodworking workshop. The original garage had an annoying 30cm gap between the fence line and the side of the existing garage. On his side of the fence, G had years of hoarded crap piled up - old timbers and sheets of corrogated iron, etc., high enough to be covering the gutters of our garage, which were now rusted out as a result. He seemed annoyed at having to move it when we started building.

We were told by Council that our new garage wall extension would either have to be right on the fence line or we would have to leave a 1 metre gap between the wall and the fence. We chose to build on the fence line (our yard is not big enough to allow the luxury of a one metre gap). This seemed to annoy G and his son, and from this point, he started making our lives difficult. Our building works were held up while we attempted to discuss the issue with G. Then G would not allow the builder to remove the fence so he could access our garage from the other side of the fence during the building works. So our builder had to do everything over the garage roof. Once the building was finished, there was just a small gap between the fence and the garage wall of about 10 cm. A week later we discovered that G had pulled down the fence and claimed this 10cm gap for himself. He also took the liberty of painting our Colourbond downpipe and guttering in a horrible shade of brown to match his house.

Several more annoyances have occurred since. For example:

• Visitors to G's house frequently park in the driveway blocking the footpath, which apart from being illegal, is simply annoying. When I am out with Thumper in the pram, I am forced to walk on the busy main road, around the offending car. Despite asking the drivers of these vehicles not to block the footpath, they keep doing, because they are too lazy to park in front of a neighbouring house and walk 20 metres along the footpath. 
• G places his rubbish bins in the middle of our shared driveway crossover, so that once the truck empties them, they end up in the middle of our driveway, blocking the way if we need to drive our car out. 
• Cigarette butts end up in our driveway, a long way back from the road. So I have my suspicions that they throw them over our fence. 

The way things are now... we don't like 'em but mostly we just ignore them and can speak civilly if the need arises. So DeepSpice and I were very puzzled a few days ago when a letter arrived from the Department of Justice (DoJ) inviting us to a mediation session at the Dispute Settlement Centre regarding 'an issue of concern' with a 'Mr D'. There was no mention of what the issue of concern was and we had no idea who this 'Mr D.' was. I looked the name up in the telephone directory and discovered that it was in fact G, our neighbour. And finally after two days of telephoning the DoJ, DeepSpice finally got hold of a real, live human being who could tell us what was going on. Apparently G has a problem with the pittosporum trees we have planted in the garden bed along the fenceline! He wants us to cut them back, or more likely he probably wants us to cut them down and concrete over the entire area. We could not believe he would go to the DoJ rather than just talk to us! DeepSpice does recall G having asked on two previous occasions for us to cut back the trees branches that extended over his fence line. We told G that if he wants to prune the trees he can (legally he has the right to do so as long as he does not damage or kill the trees). 

So that is the f-wit who lives to our West. 

Turns out, we have one on our East as well. An Italian family of nona, mother, father and their two kids have lived there for about 4 years now. I have often spoken to C, the nona, as she has seen me outside with my babies (when Thumper and BallFiend were still babies), and everyone knows that old Italian women love babies! However, I have barely laid eyes on the rest of the family. The household is a bit strange too, they seem to own a taxi business and there are always taxis arriving, getting cleaned and then leaving again. 

The man also has an expensive hobby of restoring vintage cars, and he likes to take them for a drive now and then. That is fine, except that he warms up the engine in his driveway, in a spot that is about 2 metres from our lounge room window. Our house is an old weatherboard, not particularly well-sealed. So all the smelly exhaust fumes find their way in through the gaps, and the noise of the engine resonates throughout the house. Very unpleasant and not helpful when trying to settle a screaming baby. So a few years ago, when BallFiend was a baby, DeepSpice went around and politely asked if he could please warm up the engine out in the street. The man begrudgingly complied and has mostly done so ever since. 

Over the past year or so I haven't seen the kids or their mother around, so I suspect they might have separated and the mother and kids have moved out. After recent issues we have had with father, I would not be surprised. A few weeks ago, at about 10 pm, a noisy power tool started up, a sander or something, in the garage at the back of their property. By 11.30 pm when we were definitely ready for bed, it was still going. DeepSpice attempted to go around and ask the neighbour to be quiet, but couldn't gain access - ringing the doorbell was unlikely to be heard by the man all the way down in his shed and the driveway gate was locked. So we put up with it and DeepSpice went around to speak to him the next day.

This guy had a serious chip on his shoulder! He carried on about 'you and your perfect life' and that if he was doing something illegal (which he in fact was) we should call the cops. We would never consider bothering the cops with something like this, especially if we had not first tried to speak with the neighbour. After all, for all we knew, he may not have been aware that he was bothering us. Anyway, DeepSpice convinced him to stop the noise by 10.30 pm (which is 2.5 hours later than EPA noise rules allow for).

A week or so later, we received a scrawled note in our letterbox:

  

So now it turns out we also have a f-wit who lives to our East. 

I have been talking to DeepSpice about moving house on and off for the past year or two. This really makes me want to move sooner rather than later!

PS. Sorry for the very long post (rant), but I feel marginally better now.

--

Is this thing on?

A while ago, I dropped my Palm Tunsten T3... actually, it was about a week or two before Thumper was born.

So, anyways, I finally got around to replacing it. I am now the proud owner of an HTC Desire smartphone. So far, I'm loving it!

I have just downloaded Google's Blogger app, and the whole point of this post is to try it out!

Postscript: I had to delete the post that was sent from my phone and re-post it using the web browser, because for some reason the Blogger app on the phone requires my GPS position and then automatically adds this to the bottom of the post. I don't particularly want my address published on the internet... even though Google got the address wrong. Screw you Google. 

--

Thumper's report card - 17 months

Despite my best intentions to ensure that Thumper gets an equal billing on this blog, the fact is she doesn't. At present, she has a mere 74 posts compared to BallFiend's 152. While this can in part be explained by the fact that BallFiend was born first and therefore has the advantage of having had more time to accumulate posts about his antics, it is also simply that she has the mis-fortune of being the second child. Sorry Thumper, that's your lot and you will have to live with it! And I will do my best to ensure you are not forgotten in this important historical record. 

So Thumper on this, the occasion of your 17-month-a-versary, here is your report card. 

According to the Raising Children web site, by the end of this month, your toddler:

… should be able to:

• use two words - certainly can, a whole lot more than two in fact, and there are a whole lot of sign language words as well;
• drink from a cup - yes, both with a lid and without (though the latter is only done under close supervision);

… will probably be able to:

• build a tower of two cubes - indeed, you did so yesterday using small cubes of watermelon as blocks and built a tower 3 cubes high (that was all the watermelon you had left so I don't know if you could have gone higher); 

… may possibly be able to:

• walk up steps - you do this when holding an adult's hand, but we don't have a lot of steps around, so I haven't noticed you do this on your own as yet; [Update, 8 February 2011: you can definitely walk up steps - you did so today when we took BallFiend to his first day at kinder.] 
• remove an article of clothing - oh, yes! You remove your bib, getting food in your hair in the process, you take off your top if you don't like it and every now and then you slide out of your pants with such ease that I wonder if they have satin lining. Your most recent skill in undressing is undoing the velco tabs on your nappy covers. This is bad news! I do not want you taking your nappies of yet! 
• ‘feed’ a doll - another yes. On Saturday (5 February) you placed two dolls (your 'baay-bees') in your high chair and feed them using a bowl and spoon. I was amazed! Having never seen BallFiend exhibit this behaviour we can be assured that this is something you have come up with on your own. Unfortunately you have just reinforced the idea that there are innate behaviours relating to one's sex and that gender is not entirely learned behaviour. 

… may even be able to:

• build a tower of four cubes - maybe, see 'build a tower of two cubes' above. 
• identify two items in a picture by pointing - yes, at least two
• combine words - yes, for example you have signed 'more food' and you have used the phrase 'I want...'
• throw a ball overhand - sure can, in fact just this morning, you were throwing BallFiend's blue football into the tub of ball over and over again. I love the way toddlers are entertained by such simple things.
• speak and be understood half the time - well, you certainly speak a lot and are really good at making yourself understood using a mix of words spoken and signed, combined with lots of pointing. You frequently launch into long monologues that sound like you are speaking in a foregin language with your own consistent vocabulary and grammar. Unfortunately DeepSpice and I do not understand a lot of it... but it's very entertaining and cute! Overall, I'd say 'yes' to this point, but I doubt anyone apart DeepSpice and I can really understand you. 

--

Melon BallFiend

BallFiend made morning tea for Thumper and himself today. He had seen a Play School presenter using a melon-baller on a watermelon and decided to have a go.

The end result was impressive: a bowl with about 3 ball-shaped pieces of watermelon and a whole lot of little, decidedly-not-ball-shaped slivers of watermelon. Plus watermelon juice everywhere! But he had a great time and also enjoyed serving the fruit into a little bowl and taking it over to Thumper in her high chair. Thumper, being the little piggy that she is, ended up eating about 90% of the watermelon - she had the unfair advantage of being able to sit and eat whilst BallFiend did the preparation.
--

Happy New Year to me

Tuesday was my new year, the anniversary of my emergence into the world, thirty-something years ago.
It is also not long after the ten-year anniversary of my mother's death from breast cancer (on 14 January 2001).

I find that being motherless has a whole new dimension now that I am a mother myself. There are so many times when I ache for my mum and wish she was here to help me, to understand what it means to be a mother and to ask about her about her experiences of raising me. But this cannot be. All I can do is accept the way things are and do my best to remember my mum.

So I decided to mark the occasion of my birth and of the day that my mother became a mother with a small gathering at my place, with family (DeepSpice, CutLuce and DesignerMonkey, DesignerSis and Wigward) and a few friends (VolubleK and AussieG with PetitAmi, The Bibliophile with MasterW and LittleMissIs, The Librarian and The SchoolMaster with MasterF and LittleMissF).

In addition, I haven't had a birthday party since my 30th, and given that my 40th is only a few years away, I thought it would be a good idea to sneak in at least one more party before the big 4-0. (Which is going to involve a trip to France where VoluableK and I will celebrate out birthdays together in style... but that's another story for another post).

The evening was good fun, somewhat over-catered(!) and a just little chaotic, with 7 kids running amok. I am grateful for everyone's help with cleaning up (AussieG did the dishes - what a star! And a magic fairy tidied the toys up in the kids bedroom. Thank you!). I am yet to wash the watermelon juice off the deck and clean up the watermelon pieces slowly dessicating on the garden path. Though the snails seem to be helping with that! And we still haven't found the icy-pole that LittleMissIz lost somewhere - hopefully outside the house! But this is all just proof that a good time was had by all... especially me.

Thank you everyone for an enjoyable evening!
--

More questions

BallFiend: Where did space come from? Where did the cow come from? Why did the dinosaurs live if they just died? How do trees grow?
Me: Oh! How many questions can you ask?
BallFiend [in a cheery, upbeat voice]: I'm full of them!
--

Pick-up Sticks

Thumper: 3.  Toothpicks: 0

It has taken me three times today to learn my lessons: 

1. Do not assume that just because the first baby was not into exploring through kitchen cupboards and drawers that the second baby will follow suit.
2. 16-month-old babies do not (or choose not to) understand when you tell them not to empty the contents out of a drawer in the kitchen. 
3. Never leave 16-month old babies alone in the kitchen, even with a very-responsible-for-a-four-year-old big brother supervising... even for a second!

For the third time today, w are picking up toothpicks off the floor after Thumper has emptied them out from the fourth-drawer-down. 

The toothpicks are now moving house to a higher-up drawer. 

-- 

Dex +10

Thumper has extraordinary fine motor skills for her age - a few weeks ago, she learned how to do up the buckles on her high chair and the outside swing. She would stand in front of the chair or swing and fiddle around for a minute or so until the buckle was clasped. Then she would throw a tantrum about not being able to undo it.

Now, as soon as I place her in the high chair, she finds the two ends of the strap and buckles herself in. Handy, but I hope she doesn't learn how to undo them too soon!

PS. Just discovered that Thumper had also got to the buckles on her pram. There is 4 separate buckles on the seat harness - Thumper's perfect toy! And it would appear that Thumper has saved us some cash by finding her own BucklePuzzle toy.
--

Beware STOP Leeches in the village STOP

Received this message from StompyDad who is spending a few weeks adventuring in a far off land (Sri Lanka) for a lark. 

------ SMS ------
From: +44********68
Received: 7 Jan 2011 3:40 AM
Subject: Hi.
Hi. Stompy was eaten by 2 leaches 2ay. Saw a 500 year old village. Xx stompydad

I never felt a thing, honest!

Just goes to show that all those Baby Boomers who complain about Gen Y and their use of txtspk causing the standards of grammar and punctuation to slip should perhaps refocus their attention on their elders, the so-called Builders. StompyDad precedes the Baby Boomer generation by just a couple of years, but I reckon this message gives Gen Y a real run for their money. 

--

Toddling tot

The toddler has started toddling. Just a few days ago, Thumper went from taking just one or two steps at a time, from coffee table to couch,  to taking many steps in a row... covering a good few metres in a stretch. She and BallFiend spent the day with Gran and GrandPaul today, and when we picked the kids up, Gran and GrandPaul enthusiastically told us about how Thumper has been "walking everywhere!" today.

Thumper is still perfecting the technique for her cute little toddler-waddle, so she lifts her feet unnecessarily high up for each step and a walk across the room frequently ends with her plonking down on her chubby bottom as she loses her balance.
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Nonsense

"Stop the nonsense!!!" 

- BallFiend's latest catch cry. We hear it at least 20 times a day. No idea where he picked up this one from.

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Mega-onion!

BallFiend was very excited when he discovered this onion in amongst the regular-sized onions at the shop. He said we had to buy it, and proceeded to show it to several other customers standing nearby.

When we got it home, BallFiend showed DeepSpice, who in turn got excited enough to want to weigh it and take photos. Enjoy.

For comparison, regular onions are about 175 - 250g.

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And this time forwards

Thumper just took her first steps in the traditional forwards manner. DeepSpice was opening up one of those infernal hard plastic packages containing some little people (a chrissie pressie from the aunties and uncles), and Thumper looked up from her playdough creation on the coffee table, then stepped across for a closer look.

I was in the room, but wasn't watching her at the time, so didn't actually see it. And DeepSpice only looked up from his plastic packaging wrestling in time to see the end of her walk.

The funny thing is she didn't even seem to realise what she had done; and she certainly wasn't going to repeat her new party trick for a quick video recording. So it could be a while before we can offer concrete evidence.
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The universal question

"Mum, does space ever end?"
- BallFiend

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Side-stepping the matter

Another first in baby-land today for Thumper, although she has left it so long that it's actually ended up being in toddler-land (she is now 15.5 months old). Anyway, she took her first steps.

She has been standing on her own for up to about 20 seconds at a time quite a lot recently. The strange thing is she doesn't do this the way most toddlers to (ie. by holding onto a piece of furniture until they have their balance then letting go). Thumper's method is to balance herself into a squat then with great control, slowly stand up, look around the room grinning proudly, then slowly lower herself back down into a squat. I've never seen any other toddlers learn to stand in this way - it's quite strange.

Anyway, her first steps today happened while we were visiting VolubleK, PetitAmi and her two older siblings for lunch. I was sitting next to a recently-vacated dining chair which Thumper was happily cruising around when she decided to make the move across the gap to hang onto my legs. It was just a large enough gap that she couldn't cruise from the chair to my legs. But without even seeming to think about it, she made it across the gap by side-stepping about 3 steps. I guess making her first steps sideways (rather than the traditional forwards) is in keeping with her unique way of learning to stand.

So, sadly the sight of her little crawling bottom racing away from me will soon be a distant memory. Especially since she is starting at creche in about 4 weeks. She will definitely want to walk once she gets there - too many other kids to keep up with.
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Changing dogs mid-stream

A long time ago, when BallFiend was about as mobile as a rock, but much more cute, he was showered in gifts, most of the soft toys - teddies, cows, dogs, dolls, elephants, orang-utans, lions, etc. Dunno what it is about babies makes people want to bestow stuffed toys on them. Anyway, one of specimens from this plush menagerie, which arrived after following CutLuce home from an op-shop, was a little tan dog. According to the tag on its rear-end, its name was 'Dolly'.

For a long time, Dolly sat on the shelf with all the other soft toys and generally stayed out of trouble. Then there was a phase when BallFiend was somewhere around 2 years old when he nominated several of the smaller soft toys to be his 'friends'. The 'friends' consisted of Moo-Moo (the cow), Ava-lant (the elephant), blue teddy (a blue teddy) and white teddy (a white teddy). Dolly was not one of this in-crowd. They got to sleep in his bed overnight but were usually ignored during the day time when balls are the companion of choice.

Then came a night when we had a grown-ups party to attend - specifically Gran's 60th birthday. And because Gran had most inconsiderately decided to invite all our usual babysitters (ie. CutLuce/DesignerMonkey and DesignerSis/Wigward), we had to look for other options. Luckily for us Wigward's parents love little kids and were more than happy to have our nearly-two-year-old BallFiend stay the night with them and their other family member Delphi the dog.

Whilst BallFiend liked the idea of a dog, he didn't like the actuality - Delphi unlike her owners was not  particularly enamoured with little kids. And in truth I don't even think BallFiend really liked the idea of a dog... he was just using the dog for her toys - namely various balls of interesting shape, texture and degree of chewed-ness. So to help him get used to the idea of spending around 36 hours in the presence of a dog, I dragged Dolly off the shelf and re-branded her 'Delphi' (OK, the real Delphi is black and Dolly is tan, but this didn't seem matter to BallFiend). Immediately after his stay with Wigward's parents, BallFiend showed little more than a mild interest in the toy dog, but it has continued to be known as Delphi ever since.

Jump forward 2 years and suddenly Delphi (formerly Dolly) is now the hottest soft toy on the scene. The toy has undergone a sex change (even though the original Delphi dog is female) and his namesake is completely forgotten. But BallFiend does not go anywhere with out him. Delphi has attained a status equal to BallFiend's balls (ie. he always walks around with a ball in hand or under his arm and now Delphi occupies the other hand or arm!) As a result, the toy dog that was once tan-coloured has quickly become a colour much closer to that of the real Delphi.

Before now, BallFiend displayed none of the traditional trappings of childhood: no imaginary friends, no special teddy. He was just content with balls, balls, balls as his companion. Easy to wash, easy to replace. In bed he does have two comfort items: a dummy (recently re-titled 'dumby') and a blankie (of which there are three cut from the same fabric so there is always a spare when one is in the wash).

But now that Delphi is on the scene, I have to do those things that I thought only 'other parents' have to do:

• talk to the toy dog, 
• offer the toy dog food,
• find the toy dog when it is missing,
• train the toy dog not to climb up on the table ("BallFiend, for the thousandth time, dogs eat on the floor!"), and most arduous of all,
• wash the one and only beloved toy dog and deal with the pining pre-schooler while they wait for said toy dog to dry. 

So when DeepSpice and BallFiend returned from a walk to the local supermarket, having been caught in a sudden downpour of rain, I was very surprised to hear of BallFiend's comment:

"I think I will have to change dogs - this one is all wet!"

And now, if you will excuse me, I have to go and wring out a wet dog and peg him out on the line.

BallFiend and Delphi, 18 December 2010,
at the train station on our way to the Zoo.

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