West of the Pennines

On hold

2011-08-13T17:55:00.000+01:00

I know, I know! Where have I been all this time?

Well don't get all excited now, because I'm only popping in here to officially inform you that the blog is on hold for the time being. You can imagine some annoying tune is playing while you read this if you like. What about Greensleeves? (Because that's really going to make you act more like a reasonable human being when you finally get through to the poor call-centre worker you're about to shout at, isn't it? A clue... No! Classical music mostly makes me want to hit something.)

I've just been too busy to keep up with this. Trying to juggle work, being a mummy and, on occasion, just being me. So, um, bye for now and be happy!

Being three

2011-07-08T15:05:00.000+01:00

Being three means you really want to ask 'why?' all the time even when the question itself makes no sense in relation to the conversation that has gone before. It means that every time you feel a bit fed up or don't get your own way you declare that you don't feel very well and that your tummy hurts. Being three means asking mummy why she doesn't have a willy every time she sits down to wee. It means pretending to open each of the four bottles of beer on the kitchen worktop and handing them to mummy one by one with a 'there you go'. Then demanding that mummy opens them and hands them to you. Then repeating the whole thing a dozen times. Being three means suddenly deciding there's a monster under your bed and that is why you have to stay in mummy's bed even though it's only 5.45am. It means developing an irrational dislike of certain items of clothing, such as your new Gucio shoes or your rainsuit. It means that you ask loudly in public places why someone is fat, or spotty, or wrinkly. It means having entire conversations with yourself out loud without self-consciousness, usually arguing about something. It means that you go to nursery and learn about children being called naughty all the time even though no one has ever previously called you a naughty boy. It means wanting to know what everything is made of and what's inside things, like pebbles and twigs. Being three means that on the days you go to a cafe and mummy doesn't order you something special because she thinks you'll share hers, you turn out to be ravenously hungry, but on the days that she orders you something separate you don't touch it. It means that you've starting acting 'shy' in front of strangers because so many of them have said 'Aww, have you gone shy?' to you that you are finally convinced this is the right way to act. Being three means making a fuss every single morning over the brushing of teeth, washing of faces (and branchial sinuses that need washing so they don't get infected) and getting dressed. Being three means becoming aware of your own littleness, so that you declare that when you are bigger/older you will be able to... drive the car, drink beer, go to school, go to the shop on your own, reach high things, use mummy's camping knife etc.

Sun, sea, sand

2011-07-03T10:19:00.001+01:00

We've been on our hols, camping in Devon, the boy recovering from chicken pox. He enjoyed digging holes on the beach, lining up rocks and examining seaweed. But he didn't like the big waves, especially when mummy disappeared into them with nought but her cossie on. I expected him to wake with the dawn at 4am, but he actually slept til near seven every night, which I was so glad of. I've only camped with him for two nights at a time before, whereas this was six nights albeit with a friend to help out with the toddler-chasing activities. I'm feeling all refreshed in mind and spirit from the fresh air and sunsets, the rolling green hills and sea views. My body could still do with a month of early nights though.

Right now...

2011-06-17T19:19:00.000+01:00

I am getting used to the keyboard on my new laptop. I am mightily pleased with the machine itself, purely because it is a beautiful shade of cherry red and the casing has an industrial tread-effect texture.
Little man is munching multigrain hoops and drinking warm milk whilst watching some telly, only this time it is bedtime and not breakfast time. I have steered him towards watching Deadly 60 so I can admire Steve Backshall.
I am slurping a glass of pinot grigio and looking forward to a takeaway when a friend comes round later.
I am trying to get used to the extra light flooding into the back of my house but am, on balance, not that happy with the loss of the mature silver birch tree in my neighbours' garden and the way they have hacked the leylandii hedge so that my view will now always be of dead brown bits.
I am, somewhere at the back of my mind, trying to decide whether I really want a man cluttering up my life.
I am looking forward to getting on with my subversive cross-stitch design and have decided the world is probably divided into those of us who giggle childlishly at seeing the word 'fuck' in embroidery and those who would sneer at such puerile nonsense.

Cosy

2011-06-16T07:54:00.000+01:00

I love the utter pointlessness of these. Egg cosies. The only real use I can think of is if you live in a very large mansion where there's a long trek from kitchen to breakfast room and your butler really does need to keep your boiled eggs warm. But your soldiers would go cold. These two pairs were pressies, now I'm going to make myself some in a denser type of felt. They're from Scandinavian needlecraft by Clare Youngs. Sorry for the lack of posts, I've ventured back into the strange world of internet dating. No, you won't hear about it.

Meet Ginger

2011-05-28T15:59:00.001+01:00

Here's Ginger, an impromptu gingerbread man. He came about because I ordered some felt from Blooming Felt. Now, this felt was for some birthday gifts, the nature of which cannot be revealed until next week. However, it was not the sort of felt I was expecting. I'm no expert but I knew I wanted proper wool felt. None of your cheapo polyester stuff. But what I got was a woven wool fabric with a slight tendency to fray, which isn't ideal for a project that requires felt and therefore has raw edges left unsewn. I made the gifts with it and am hoping they don't disintegrate on first use.

I then ordered some more felt from Myriad (which also has a large stock of lovely-looking but expensive wooden toys - daddy is going to be given the catalogue and told to get his saw out as he is quite handy with wood). Since I had already made the gifts, the purpose of this felt was unclear, but I wanted it all the same. I had to choose colours based on the tiniest of squares on their website. Hence this rather orangey shade of brown, which could really only become a gingerbread man.

Now, can anyone tell me the correct way to start off blanket stitch so you don't get a diagonal bit of thread at the back?!

Little man's nursery report

2011-05-24T09:07:00.000+01:00

Little man here, taking over as mummy has been somewhat remiss of late in updating her blog. Anyway, I can report that I like going to nursery and it meets many of my requirements. They have lots of toys to play with and lots of space to run around in outside. I'm even getting used to the windy conditions since the nursery is situated on a heath which is probably the most exposed spot in town. I get to do more painting than I do at home, although mummy did show me how to make purple at home last week, so I decided to do purple handprints with paint that isn't meant for finger painting while mummy was icing some cakes we'd made. That was after I'd decided the tablecloth needed a trim with my scissors.

I have lots of friends at nursery, but I'm not sure what all their names are. Mummy thinks I must have seen one of them throw a punch at some point, because I tried it on mummy when I was angry. She walked off to another room. I like some of the snacks we get, especially the naan bread and dips, but I'm not impressed with tinned spaghetti on toast. (Note from mummy: Tinned spaghetti? WTF?) Yesterday, we had a teddy bear's picnic and I wore blue teddy bear ears.

Mummy here. Just thought I'd share with you the contents of little man's rucksack which I discovered this morning, all essential items in a survival situation. Along with spare underpants and trousers there were: a set of mummy's bangles, a beanbag, half a plastic egg, a wine bottle cork, a set of JCB tyres, a packet of tissues and a new torch.

Fantasy facebook

2011-05-12T17:27:00.000+01:00

My laptop broke, ok?! And now that I've borrowed a laptop, my modem is playing up. I had to borrow a laptop because, having decided which new one I'd like to buy, I then got my car insurance renewal for pretty much the same amount of money. Anyway, I've been mentally writing this post. Which means I've forgotten it all and will have to make it up again.

Not to be confused with fantasy football, in which I have absolutely no interest, this is fantasy facebook where you daydream about the preposterous status updates you could have. This may sound like a lamentable pastime, and certainly doesn't encourage 'living in the moment', but I feel that long bouts of motorway driving legitimate it as an acceptable means of amusement. Here goes:

has doubled her income by selling subversive cross-stitch samplers online.
has met a lovely man who has his own allotment and camper van and is hopelessly infatuated with her.
has spent the entire day staring at clouds.
was going to eBay her ice axe but decided to go and climb Mont Blanc instead.
just bumped into Ray Mears and Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall and was invited to join their gourmet campfire dinner.
has just published an award-winning anthology of erotic short stories.
has knitted a bright pink tea cosy with lime green polka dots and is going to throw a massive tea party to show it off.
cancelled all commitments this morning and drove to Durness to swim in the sea instead.

Meet Mr Frog

2011-04-22T08:20:00.001+01:00

He took less than an hour to make, which is a nice contrast to the fiendishly complicated cable pattern jumper I'm knitting for the little man and has been on the needles for months. Now that I'm looking at these photos on screen, they are also reminding me that I want to replace the covering on this kitchen stool. But first, I'm gearing up for front door painting. Today is sanding. Tomorrow, after daddy has picked up the boy, is painting time. I'm also feeling a strong urge to declutter my cupboards. Must be something in the air this spring. Other than pollen.

Bad parenting at the forest

2011-04-16T18:51:00.001+01:00

I'm a bad mother. We went to The Forest today. That's Delamere Forest, although anyone who lives in Cheshire just calls it The Forest. It was about 7am when I decided we'd go. I thought we'd go early while it was still quiet. Just after 10am, we actually left the house, packed lunch in tow. But it seems I do not observe proper parenting practice whilst in the great outdoors. I did not, for example, expect him to stay clean. I did not tell him off for sliding down sandy embankments on his backside. I did not tell him off for getting green, mossy stains on the knees of his trousers. I did not tell him off for using his fingers to gouge interesting stones out of the earth. I did not tell him off for straying off the path to inspect every unfurling fern frond, every potentially climbable tree, every perfectly seat-like tree trunk, every half-nibbled pine cone, every mysterious rabbit hole. I did not warn him every five seconds about the nettles. Somehow, he managed not to get nettled. Somehow, we managed to have fun. Somehow, we managed to walk a couple of miles. Or so. I wasn't measuring. Another parenting fail. I had no buggy (it's been relegated to the loft). I couldn't pick him up due to the hernia op recovery, hence had no sling either. And I had only a vague idea of where we were going and how far away from the car park we were. Although I do have a tried-and-tested good sense of direction.

So now I'm raising a glass to my parenting failures, and to fresh air, and to dirt, and to exploring. Must do it more often.

Discoveries whilst on the sick

2011-04-11T12:39:00.001+01:00

I'm back to work on Wednesday after almost three weeks off with the hernia horror. Fortunately, the infection seems to be finally clearing up, halfway through my second week's worth of strong antibiotics. So what have been the big revelations of the past three weeks?

I like work. Conversation with a three-year-old is a little limited, although my language has probably been a hell of a lot cleaner for three weeks. Also, getting paid is quite nice, whilst statutory sick pay is not.
Work would have been a lot easier than looking after a three-year-old when one is supposed to be resting. At least at work I get to sit down for more than two minutes without being asked to get up and get someone a drink, snack, toy, teddy, book, clean underpants, tissue or spiky fish. Usually.
On the other hand, I find sitting down for more than two minutes difficult anyway unless I have embroidery, a book or knitting to do.
Plus, spending four or five days in a row together with a three-year-old can be good fun when you're not in a rush to be anywhere and have nothing in particular to get done.
Sunny Sunday afternoons were made for drinking real ale in beer gardens. So I guess I can also sit down for more than two minutes if I have a pint.
There's always something more important to do than put away the mountain of clean clothes piled up on my bedroom drawers.
Aftercare for day case surgery is virtually non-existent. There is no such thing as a district nurse in this area who you will ever be able to actually get an appointment to see when you need to because the primary care trust has reorganised services so that everyone has to go to the walk-in centre, which isn't even in this town.
Not being able to lift anything heavier than a kettle is a metaphorical ball-ache. No, I can't just shift that bag of compost in the back yard. No, I can't dig or rake at the allotment. No, I can't walk to the shop because I won't be able to carry everything home.

Edited to add: Felted bowls! Okay so my first effort is pretty small because I ignored all instructions as to needle size and wool gauge. But it's a bowl. And I hand-felted it in the kitchen sink in hot soapy water. And it's in gorgeous undyed eco wool. This may be the start of a new addiction.

The off switch

2011-04-06T14:56:00.001+01:00

A ten-minute car journey has now become an opportunity for little man to make all manner of preposterous requests and to question the very fabric of reality until my brain goes 'pop'.

On the way to and back from Speke Hall near Liverpool it was 'Where are we going mum?', 'It's on that bridge?', 'What are those cones doing?', 'Where have the cones gone?', 'Why?'. And 'You sing, mummy,' when I put the radio on. I don't know the words. 'You sing mummy.' I'm just a teenage dirtbag baby. That's the only bit I know. 'Why?' And 'A toadstool, mum, you eat the toadstool,' proffering an imaginary toadstool.

Then his plastic box, now emptied of strawberries but speckled with strawberry juice, became his little friend, who had to be hugged because he was covered in spots and obviously wasn't well. 'Mummy, you hug him.' I can't while I'm driving, little man.

Both journeys ended with his neurons overheating and initiating emergency shutdown. In other words, asleep.

Incidentally, the gardens at Speke Hall were pleasant enough, he actually admired the house (from the outside, I didn't fancy chasing him around the antique-furnished interior), the odd stone or hedge archway was fun, but the playground was by far the biggest hit.

Stitches

2011-04-03T13:20:00.000+01:00

This is the sort of thing I got up to last week whilst recovering from my hernia op. I started this sampler months ago and finally finished it off. And yes, I really did miss out a 'Y' and have to add it in at the end. And yes, I should have done it in the centre of the fabric so I had enough to wrap around a mount, but I'm too stingy so I'm going to botch it and have fabric left for some other designs.

Noah's ark is also coming along nicely. This is one for little man's room. I still have snakes, penguins and zebras to do, along with a bright, zig-zag border.

The op itself seemed to go fine. Unfortunately, the wound then got infected a few days later and I've been on strong antibiotics which seem to finally be doing the trick. The surgeon's sewing skills seem a little hit and miss. It's all very neat at one end, but a bit raggedy looking at the other.

Things and more things

2011-03-18T07:46:00.000Z

If you haven't already got sick of my moaning, you might gather that Things have been getting on top of me a bit. I'm not keen on Things. I try to keep them to a minimum. Things like financial matters and dealings with bureaucracy and call centres and waiting lists and officialdom and important post and the sort of emails you have to agonise over the wording of. But sometimes they all come flooding in on you. All at once.

At first, I get a bit stressed. Then I get a bit more stressed and start to sigh and swear a lot. Then I resort to list making, cake eating and beer drinking. Then little thoughts start to pop into my mind. Mischievous little daydreams of the things I'd actually like to be doing. Sometimes, the other blogs I read help with the inspiration. It's not that I wish my life was like these people's. But that the blogs I like to read tend to focus on the simple things that provide an enduring source of calm and contentment. I like things. With a small 't'; things like fresh new hawthorn leaves and daffodils, open windows, evening birdsong as the days grow longer, a three-year-old's rendition of Baa Baa Black Sheep (had some ice cream), an old book with beautiful woodcut pictures of rural life, a children's book with beautiful seaside illustrations, an afternoon's digging and raking of allotment soil until it is that elusive, gardening-book phenomenon known as a fine tilth (a great name for a blog if ever I heard one).

I am forming some half-baked plans for things I'd like to be doing this spring. Like going camping in south Wales for a couple of nights so the boy and I can go to the Museum of Welsh Life and explore all the replica Celtic roundhouses and 17th century farmhouses. Like planting primulas in the baskets on the wall opposite my kitchen windows. Like knitting a tea cosy. Like reading some Jane Austen and sitting in the yard doing some Jane Austen-esque needlework. Like eating buttery crumpets. Like taking picnics to the park. Like making a beanbag frog for the little man.

It doesn't matter if I don't do actually do these things. Or if it takes weeks and weeks to get round to them. The potential is enough to cheer me up so I can say a heartfelt 'fuck that' to all the crap.

NIBs*

2011-03-15T22:21:00.000Z

badly written online divorce service questionnaire... more blood tests required by anaesthetist (does this mean there was something unusual found in the first lot?)... no answer on my query over entitlement to sick pay... rearranging nursery familiarisation visits because of rearrangement of work because of expected op recovery time... boy waking up earlier and earlier as spring gets going... boy has been referred to Alder Hey to see specialist over infected branchial sinus, for which he is no longer taking any antibiotics but it is still gunky... yet another cold, making me cough and sneeze, which is what I think gave me a femoral hernia in the first place... two out of my three new bras are so badly designed that sharp corners at the back fastening are digging into me... comfort eating of such things as fresh white bread and brie...

* News In Brief. And of course, newspapers only print bad news. The good news is: daffodils everywhere... real ale in my glass... it's bedtime... I get to put my feet up after I've had surgery (should I be looking forward to this so much?)

Normal service, including the proper use of sentences and paragraphs, will be resumed soon.

A few 'whys' of my own

2011-03-09T09:24:00.000Z

Why do I have yet another cold? Because I am surrounded by a magical aura that acts as a beacon to every common cold virus within a fifty-mile radius.
Why is my bank account three-hundred-and-odd quid down? Because I haven't been paid this week. Why? This one's still a mystery.
Why can't I get hold of someone at my union to discuss my (non-)entitlement to sick pay after my operation? Because if I'm not at work I'm with a three-year-old who won't let me have a conversation on the phone without demanding the phone off me and making so much noise I can't hear the other person.
Why did I have to have a rather pathetic one-egg omelette, without cheese, for breakfast? Because I haven't had time to go to the shop to buy bread for toast, or enough milk for porridge, or cheese, or more eggs.
Why have I been stuffing myself full of chocolate? Because I'm a wee bit stressed, and tired, and run down.
Why can't I move in my dining room? Because there's a play tent in the middle of it.
Why did little man get up at 4am? Another mystery.
Why am I typing with one hand? Because the other one is in a cardboard box boat.
Why has the hole in the road outside my house still not been Tarmac-ed over after nine days? Who knows?
Why am I failing to see the funny side? Er...

Miscellaneous news, featuring the word 'why'

2011-03-05T18:08:00.000Z

It has begun. Asking why. About everything. I should be glad that he is such a curious and intelligent child. He wants to know about the world around him. Yes, erm, of course I'm glad. Here's one conversation we had in the car on the M56:

Boy: 'I want a tiny pink cake.'
Me: 'I don't have any tiny pink cakes.'
Boy: 'Why?'
Me: Because I don't carry tiny pink cakes around with me.'
Boy: 'Why?'
And so on...

He's been extra whingy of late. Probably because his branchial sinuses are infected (holes in his neck, evolutionary remnant of gills that should have closed over in the womb but didn't). He had one week of antibiotic ointment, one week of ointment and amoxycillin and now we've ditched the ointment but have a course of clarithromycin. He has two of these holes in his neck. One is very red and oozing lots of green gunk. We saw a specialist when he was a baby (it took a couple of weeks to notice the holes, babies' necks being what they are) who said nothing could be done while he's little but surgery is a possibility when he's older if infection becomes a problem.

It has, consequently, been a long day and I am hitting the bottle. A crisp Soave. I am preparing dinner, which I suspect I am cooking for one. Little man has just eaten two bananas and three ryvitas and has now moved on to an apple. He helped me to grind some spices and has just tucked into some coriander seeds, which he loves. He learnt to say 'coriander'. He also learnt how to finely chop herbs with a rocking motion of the knife. Another word he's trying to say at the moment is 'cushions' and it's unfortunate that it's sounding more like 'cunts'.

I finally told him this morning that the chickens had died. I wanted to wait until we went to the allotment, otherwise I don't think he'd have quite grasped the abstract concept of death. But now he knows they are not there. I told him they had got old and died, rather than that they were torn apart by some sharp-toothed beastie. He took it all in his stride, as toddlers do, and demanded a little fork to do some digging.

We then visited great grandma's house. Little man pressed the big red button. Well, it is very big and very red and just screams 'press me'. The Lifeline people called to check grandma was ok. I had to explain it was a false alarm. I asked little man not to press the button again. 'Why?' he asked. 'Because I bloody well said so,' I wanted to reply.

How to make healthy pancakes

2011-03-03T18:47:00.000Z

Disclaimer: This blog post contains absolutely no recipes for, or information about, healthy pancakes.

Step 1: Go shopping in your usual manner. Actually, we would normally walk to the Co-op, which is healthy, but today we drove, which is not, because we needed more shopping than I thought I could carry. When we get there, little man generally takes charge of one of those basket-on-wheels thingies while I get a normal basket too. He has a tendency to ram into old ladies. Who mostly coo in proper old lady fashion, but not always. Once you get to the queue, you have to get the small one to help unload the baskets onto the conveyor belt. This is a purely diversionary tactic to stop them running round and round the booze aisle with arms flailing dangerously close to the bottles. Near the checkout will be some of those plastic lemon-shaped lemon juice squeezy thingies. You will be required to purchase one.

Step 2: Make pancake batter in the usual manner. My recipe is in imperial: 4oz flour, one egg, half a pint of milk. Make a well in the flour, drop in the egg, start to draw in flour whilst slowly pouring in half the milk. Then bung in the rest of the milk and beat til bubbly. (Did I just tell you how to make pancake batter? I do apologise.) Important: You must be getting a bolognese sauce under way at the same time as you make the pancake batter. This allows the small one to spend plenty of time beating the batter while you juggle burning-hot pans full of scalding-hot fat from the mince. While you are pouring off the fat, the small one will knock over the bowl of batter. Approximately half of it will spill over the worktop and onto his jumper. Clear this up in a cheery, it's ok, it was an accident, manner. You have just saved approximately half the calories of a standard batch of pancakes.

Step 3: I forgot to mention the healthy carrots that made their way into the batter before it was spilt. The carrot circles you thought the small one might have liked to eat. But he/she will demand cucumber instead. Now is the time to fish out and bin (or rinse and compost) the carrot.

Step 4: Having resisted the urge to swig wine straight from the bottle at midday and transferred the bolognese to the slow cooker, fire up your frying pan. Make the first pancake and present it to the child. Sprinkle on a little sugar and allow the small one to squirt on some lemon juice. They will put on an excessive amount. Present the small one with knife and fork. They will declare at this point that they don't like pancakes.

Step 5: Eat the rest of the pancakes yourself while the child squirts lemon juice onto their plate and laps it up like a cat. They will eventually move on to squirting it directly into their mouth. When there is about one nano-gram left in the lemon juice container, they will declare they do not like it and pull a funny face. Oh good, you will reply, because it's all gone.

Step 6: Congratulate yourself on your child's vitamin C intake, give them something else for lunch and clear up the mess.

Annual life assessment

2011-03-01T07:56:00.000Z

Health: Hernia repair op due on March 25th. Weight creeping up again due to Christmas, the gloominess of January and the prolonged birthday season. Otherwise not so bad apart from the fact that I'm being eaten all up by a dragon right now.
Wealth: Middling to poor. But at least I still don't earn enough to have to pay back my student loan. And I saved some money on electricity yesterday when we had a power cut. New car is saving lots on fuel (to get to work, to earn money to buy more fuel to get to work...)
Career: I don't understand the concept.
Friends and family: Fab. Don't know what I'd do without them. The boy is generally a very happy chappy.
Romance: Non existent. Have ordered duplicate marriage certificate so I can start divorce process. Maybe once that's under way I'll try internet dating again. And maybe it'll be better than cardigan guy, the one I met at a coffee shop who didn't bring enough money for a coffee and the one who was so quietly spoken I couldn't carry on a conversation with him.
Creativity and general airy fairiness: I knit. I hug trees. I smile at daffodils. I found a tai chi class that fits in with my strange work and childcare arrangements. Occasionally I write stuff that mostly never sees the light of day. I daydream about the sea. I'm trying to decide whether to put pagan, taoist or Jedi on my census form.
Overall outlook: Life is good.

If you hadn't guessed, it's my birthday. I'm 34. Little man got me a ready-to-plant strawberry hanging basket and nasturtium bucket, via daddy.

Birthdays and giggles

2011-02-24T09:34:00.000Z

This is how the third birthday of a boy who has separated, working parents goes:

Phase 1: The Saturday before. Trip to the safari park with mummy and daddy. This is the once-a-year opportunity for him to have both the people he cares most about there at the same time. I've suggested to daddy we should do it slightly more often. Anyway, little man's favourite animals were the lions. Later, we all had pizza for tea.
Phase 2: The day itself. First use of the scooter. More presents to open and play with. A new book to read. Chocolate and milk in a cafe with grandma. An afternoon of more scooting at grandma and grandad's house while mummy goes to work.
Phase 3: Birthday tea day. This is where we're up to now. Food shopping to do. Cake to bake. Lunch with friends to fit in in between. Tea with mummy, grandma, grandad, auntie, uncle and cousin later.
Phase 4: The Saturday after. Start of a weekend with daddy and birthday tea with the other grandma and grandad. A new bike to be ridden.

And the giggles? Little man telling me to go away and trying to lift me up the stairs by the leg so he can use his scooter in the house without me seeing. And the discovery of a lump in his jeans pocket, which turned out to be an acorn which must have been there for months.

TV guilt

2011-02-22T08:54:00.000Z

Now that the boy can clearly express his wishes, they often tend towards the watching of television. At the moment he's having a Waybuloo phase. Chuggington is also a favourite, but silly mummy didn't record any episodes and now it's no longer on the iPlayer. At least he seems to have temporarily forgotten about Cars.

The zombie-like state he enters while staring at the box is useful sometimes. I know he won't be getting up to mischief while I have a shower. He isn't jumping on the laptop keyboard while I type this. And at least Waybuloo is teaching him some yoga.

Of course, yet another study has recently told us that watching TV is bad for children's health. A Canadian study of 1,300 children linked longer TV viewing at the age of two to lower levels of classroom engagement, poor achievement in maths, reduced physical activity and increased body mass index.

I suspect that the sort of parents who read about studies like that are the ones who have the least to worry about. We are actually thinking about what the hell we're doing to our kids by the way we bring them up.

During one episode of Waybuloo, he has actually sat still and eaten some breakfast instead of taking two hours over it. Then he announced that he wants to be on the television. I said I didn't know how you get on it, thinking of the group of children on Waybuloo. He said: 'There's a hole?' So now I know I'm going to have to try to explain how TV works sometime soon. Having had his cereal, he wandered about, making himself a bed on the footstool and practising his 'me' and 'I' as in 'I not want to go to sleep.' We played hide and seek when he closed his eyes and told me to count to ten. Now he's hiding the screen behind a blanket because a dinosaur wants to eat the piplings.

And I've just realised that he has started on 'why?' As in why will the TV give him a shock if he rubs the synthetic fleece blanket over the screen. I really don't know. It just will.

So there we go, I'm not banning television although we do avoid adverts. Eventually he gets the urge to get up and do something else anyway. We talk about what's on. His imagination hasn't stopped working. He still runs around plenty. Personally I don't like the thing blaring away at me, but the only way to stop him wanting to watch it would be to get rid of it altogether. Then how would I watch such educational programmes as The Vampire Diaries and My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding?

Potty training by stealth

2011-02-14T10:49:00.000Z

I think I can safely say we're more potty/toilet trained than not here. I keep thinking of the boy and me as this entity known as 'we', although I have, in fact, been toilet trained for many years now. Anyway, we've gone from wearing underpants as a bit of a playing around, 'oh look, here's a red pair with Thomas on', experience to wearing them as a matter of course in the daytime. Nappies still rule at night and I'm in no rush to change that and be dragged out of bed in the morning to help with weeing.

We've done this without me reading a single book on the subject. The shock of it. I don't think books on parenting are always very helpful. There are those that you generally agree with and you think 'oh yes' and 'of course' as you read. But then you realise you aren't living up to everything they say and you feel like a failure. Then there are those you disagree with. No names required here, I think, for anyone aware of the range of parenting literature out there. But even though you read them with a 'don't be ridiculous' and an 'I can't believe people really do that' attitude, their advice has been implanted at the back of your mind. Your methods suddenly seem a bit hippy instead of normal, your way of muddling along has been shoved to the 'alternative' end of the spectrum.

But back to the potty. It has pride of place in the living room. I once thought this was a bizarre thing to do. But, guess what? I can't be bothered going up and down the stairs every time he thinks he needs to go. My stairs are steep; it's like climbing the north face of the Eiger. With a full bladder. Once I'd convinced the boy that underpants were not the root of all evil, we started putting them on in the morning for an hour or two before we went out and again for a couple of hours before bedtime. Of course he weed in them. And did the other. But gradually he used the potty more. Then we ventured out in underpants. In the car, with no form of protection on the car seat. We like to live dangerously. It all went fine.

His answer to 'Do you need a wee wee?' is still always 'no'. And I do get fed up of constantly reminding him to tell me if he does. He still needs quite a bit of persuading to get him on the potty before we go out or to take the opportunity of using a loo when one is available while we're out. I'm still taking a change of pants everywhere; although I make him carry it himself in his little rucksack. But the whole process has been relatively hassle-free. And achieved without gold stars or chocolate. (I read Unconditional Parenting; now I can't do 'rewards' without questioning their effects.) He actually seems delighted to be able to do it. And to show me the results. I did tell him that baby boys wear nappies and big boys use the toilet. I don't see this as bribery or a value judgement; it's just a fact.

Sunny pottering... in numbers

2011-02-11T21:16:00.000Z

Visits to cafes: Two, one at the park in the morning; one at the arts centre near home with grandma and grandad in the afternoon.
Falls into mud whilst kicking football at park: About 47.
Very small trees scaled: 3, sort of, including the odd slip and cry of 'help me, mummy.'
Strangers befriended: 5, including the two volunteers in the park cafe, a three-year-old girl and the three-year-old's grandma.
Strangers who tutted at us: 1 old woman, as the boy ran round and got a bit noisy in the art gallery. Because obviously children shouldn't be taken anywere remotely cultural.
Inches of boy's scarf knitted: About 36. In 100% polyester snowflake yarn. Classy. But little man found it in the craft shop and started rubbing his cheek on it to sighs of 'ahh'.
Playings of 'This is Our House' DVD in succession: 7. A book by Michael Rosen and Bob Graham that he has suddenly taken a liking to. Involving a little boy playing in a cardboard box house who won't let anyone else in.
Accidents in underpants: 0
Changes of underpants: 1, due to falling over in mud and playing on wet park.
Wees in toy watering can whilst in the bath with mummy who was too lazy to get out to put him on the loo: 1

Pee tests and being prodded

2011-02-09T22:01:00.001Z

I've been getting an intermittent pain in my lower abdomen since last September. It felt like cystitis but didn't respond to over-the-counter remedies and kept coming back. I have done no less than five pee tests at the doctor's. No infection. I have been prodded and poked. I got sent for an ultrasound because of my polycystic ovaries to check they were behaving. They were. I have taken a course of antibiotics 'just in case'. They didn't help. The next step was going to be referral to a urologist.

Early on Sunday morning I had to get up to pee when I would normally have ignored it and gone back to sleep to avoid the risk of waking little man. He didn't wake up, but I did discover a big lump in my groin. (I know you really want to know all this.) It was somewhat alarming. It felt, to me, like quite a big swelling to be going on down there. I eventually convinced myself it was probably just a swollen gland and something to do with the cold I had (still have). I handed the boy to daddy over a cuppa and went to work.

On Monday morning I spent twenty minutes pressing redial to get through to the doc's and got an appointment for that morning. I was prodded and poked. By two doctors. They agreed. I have a hernia. I have an appointment with the surgeons next week. The doctor (he was quite young and had obviously had a course on being nice to patients) wondered how I felt about the fact I had gone in thinking I had a swollen gland and was going out needing surgery and with the knowledge that my innards aren't as inwards as they should be. Er....um. Afterwards, the thing that upset me most was the fact that I had no-one special to tell for a bit of instant sympathy.

I ate a bar of chocolate in work that afternoon and consumed a bottle of Soave spread over Monday and Tuesday nights. I feel just fine now, doctor.

Quick bodges: Making a rainbow

2011-02-05T17:01:00.000Z

As crafting achievements go, this one's pretty basic. I stole the idea from Jo Jingles. The handle is an embroidery hoop/frame thingie. The man at the market rooted out all the appropriate colours of ribbon for me while the boy ran off towards the fish stall to see the crabs. I snipped them (the ribbons, not the crabs) with pinking shears in the hope that the ends won't fray too much too soon. Then I wrapped them round the hoop, put a few little stitches in to secure and, hey presto, a rainbow shaker. Twenty minutes tops, not counting the trip to the market. It helps if you know someone with a drawer full of reels of cotton in all the required colours, someone, in this case, being my mum.

Now I just need to learn the song that starts: 'Take a little bit of red...' But not right now because I need to get spuds in the oven to roast alongside the chicken, a rare treat when there's only one big person and one small person in the house. Also, I need to help the boy brush up on his carrot chopping skills before he amputates a finger.

Bye bye Matilda

2011-02-01T22:01:00.000Z

Bye bye Matilda the Hun, the bantam hen who thought she was a cockerel, and her feathered friends Flossie and Gertie. Killed by a mystery savage beastie. They were crap at laying eggs, but they were pretty, friendly little things. Not sure what to tell little man.

A toddler's eye view

2011-01-28T18:29:00.000Z

Little man here. I got my hands on mummy's camera and took a few snapshots at home this morning. Here are some of the results.

Cars (the movie) colouring pad.

Self portrait. If you look closely you can see my branchial cleft sinuses, aka two holes in my neck that sometimes go red and gooey.)

Here's mummy in the kitchen, pulling a funny face and with scary red eyes. The post-it notes are her to-do list. I think she should add 'wash up' and 'get hair cut'.

My insey winsey spider game.

Me standing in a stream on my play mat.

Mummy's hair looking shiny.

My potty. Empty.

Selection of toys.

My big house.

Our fish, and the pottery snail I painted at a stall in the park last summer and which is miraculously still in one piece.

Favourite things

2011-01-27T21:08:00.002Z

Little man has just been laughing hysterically at The Enormous Turnip story. Specifically the bit where the turnip finally pops out of the ground and the old man falls on the wife and the wife falls on the boy and the boy falls on the little sister and the little sister falls on the dog and the dog falls on the cat and the cat falls on the mouse, who says 'Eeek!' He's finding the 'Eeek!' part hilarious and has also picked up the hot tip that you need to talk to seedlings to make them grow big. I think we'll be planting turnips at grandad's allotment this year. No idea what I'll do with them in the kitchen; ideas welcome.

Anyway, here are his other favourites:
Film: Cars. He loves it. I think Lightning McQueen is currently his biggest hero. I hate it. Mostly because of the noise. Which is ironic given the noisy sort of music I like to listen to whilst driving.

Song: Jack and Jill. When I ask what songs he wants at bedtime (he first instigated this ritual, possibly a crossover from what happens with daddy), he says: 'Broke his crown.' Although Baa Baa Black Sheep remains the only one he sings himself.

Food: Ice cream. Preferably Neapolitan. With bumps (chocolate vermicelli). At grandma and grandad's house. He never gets ice cream at home (my freezer's too full of last year's cabbage, which I never seem to find a use for).

Toy: His dumper truck. All kinds of things can be piled inside it, pushed around and then dumped in strategic places, such as the doorway between the dining room and kitchen.

Mummy-copying activity: Sewing. With a big blunt darning needle, a small square of linen and his choice of embroidery thread colour. He hasn't got the hang of pushing it back and forth through the fabric instead of wrapping it round yet so his masterpiece turns into a little screwed-up ball. The picture shows it after I have snipped it open again for further use.

I should be...

2011-01-24T10:09:00.000Z

tidying up before my mum comes to clean this afternoon.
phoning BT to check their incorrect demand for money has really been sorted out.
phoning B's prospective nursery to find out why I have still had no information in the post, supposedly the third time they have sent it.
on my way to check the chickens so I can then get to my tai chi class on time.
checking little man's pyjamas are out and bed is ready for him to get into when daddy brings him home while I'm at work later.
putting the recycling in the blue bin.
pumping my car tyres up.
making salad to take to work.

In the moment? Not really.

Social education

2011-01-21T20:55:00.000Z

It's funny how what comes naturally to a toddler is not always the done thing, or something they can continue doing as they get older.

While we are doing the (very slow) process of toilet training/familiarisation he spends a fair amount of time without any trousers or pants on. Of course, this means he fiddles with his willy a lot. And when, during dinner with his grandparents, he farted noisily (bare bum on wooden seat), he decided to investigate where the noise came from. Then went back to his pizza. (Chicken Pizza Mexicana, the tastiest bizarre, non-authentic pizza recipe ever.) Nice (the pizza, not the investigation).

Then there's the whole thing about engaging complete strangers in conversation. It's probably acceptable when it's the checkout assistant. He told her that mummy's car was parked outside, that mummy's dark blue car is old, that mummy is getting a new red car and, of course, that daddy broke his old car in the ice and had to get a new one (this one never gets old, apparently). But when it comes to the stranger who happens to pass us as we amble along the canal towpath, who gets told about the nests in the trees and the planes overhead... Well, it's sad to think that this might not be ok in the future. When he's with mummy, it's a positive sign of the boy's sociable nature and conversational skills. But when he's old enough to be out and about on his own you have to make him suspicious of innocent passers-by.

On the other hand, there are things he does now that he really needs to improve on. Like his hide-and-seek skills. Grandma, grandad and I have all taken at least three turns each at finding him this evening. He hid in the same place every time.

Topics of conversation

2011-01-18T09:03:00.000Z

It's 8.30am. So far today the boy and I have discussed:

The fact that the bumpy bits on his hands are called knuckles, which are a type of joint, and that we need them so we can move our fingers.
The relative states of happiness of baby fly and daddy fly, whose sadness can be assuaged only by being stuffed in my dressing gown pocket for a while then removed and fed multigrain hoops.
The crescent-moon like shape of broken multigrain hoops (own-brand, people, don't tell me off). Who'd have thought he knew the word 'crescent' even if he does pronounce it like it begins with a 'p'?
The technical specifications of the cast of Chuggington, including wipers, horns, lights, colours, shininess and top speeds.
What colour we should paint our front door. The boy chose blue, which is good because that's what I already decided and I've bought the paint.
The difference between a 2D picture of a circle and a 3D wooden sphere.
Many other topics, including snails, buses, Baa Baa Black Sheep, missing mummy and daddy when they go to work, what we might sing at Jo Jingles, mummy's need for tea, daffodils, wallpaper, fish, sewing machines, the Insey Winsey Spider game and the fluffiness of dressing gowns.

Growing vocabulary

2011-01-15T17:31:00.000Z

Little man (no, mummy, B a big boy) is becoming quite a chatterbox, having made us wait months and months for his first proper words. He now accosts strangers in the street: 'Man! Man! There's a nest / duck / stick / boat / balloon etc.' A couple of his latest achievements are the ability to say 'Mary Whitehouse' (don't ask) and 'pepperoni'. He is even starting to have a stab at singing nursery rhymes, particularly Baa Baa Black Sheep and Twinkle Twinkle. This goes along with him demanding songs at bedtime now, after stories but before final night-night hugs. Sometimes he can't get his words out as fast as his brain is working and stammers while you wait with an expectant, encouraging look on your face. It's probably not the done thing to laugh at him at this point. Sometimes he says the wrong word with comic effect and it's tempting not to tell him otherwise, particularly when he's pointing out that mummy has 'big burps' and he has 'baby burps'. Or when he wants to be carried down the stairs and says: 'You carrot me.' Snigger.

In other news, I have today paid a deposit on a new car. Well, new to me, if you know what I mean. A Micra that I will be able to park outside my house with much greater ease and which will hopefully guzzle a lot less fuel. The dealership are giving me £400 for my old car. For an eleven-year-old Mondeo with 116,000 miles on the clock and a hole in the bumper. Result. I have also filed my tax return. And they say they owe me money. I have no idea why, but I'm not going to quibble.

Winter sun

2011-01-09T21:31:00.000Z

A bit of winter sunshine and I suddenly feel all mellow and daydreamy. I'm affected to a ridiculous level by the things and people around me, including weather. I tell myself that winter gloom is okay. (I hate it when people complain about the weather all the time, except when it's me going on about snow...) I tell myself that winter means opportunities for wearing silly hats, coming home in the dark to the warm (electric) glow of home, getting cosy with a mug of cocoa. But after Christmas it starts to drag. And it has been pretty gloomy here most days.

This weekend, however, the sky cleared and the sun came out. And immediately I started to think of summer camping trips (something's whispering 'Devon' in my ear), lazy picnics, barbecues, growing things, wearing sandals. There's a lot of winter left, but it's nice to have sunshine. I listened to Paolo Nutini in the car instead of Biffy. I drove more slowly (although I still muttered 'twat' at several other drivers). I did some yoga after the gym this morning. Mellow all round. It's what I think of as 'acoustic' me.

It's not so nice to see British daffodils in the supermarket. I do usually buy daffs as early as possible. But surely to have them on the second weekend in January means there's a corner of southern England covered in acres of heated greenhouses?

My big house

2011-01-08T20:42:00.000Z

Hello, it's little man here, although I need to point out that I am a big boy now. Not a baby. Got that? Anyway, I got a big house for Christmas along with other such delights as a cash register, more cars and a big truck. The house was right in the middle of the living room covered in lovely 'trains' wrapping paper on Christmas morning.

I particularly like rearranging the bedding on the children's bunks and putting the tiny cakes on the tiny plates. Then I do a bit of DIY with my Bob the Builder toolbox; you know the sort of thing, hammering, sawing, screwing. After that it's ready for me to park Roary's big truck upstairs and a dumper truck and school bus downstairs. The stairs themselves have to be removed so that the truck can dangle precariously over the gap and I can shout 'whoooaaaa'.

Next up, I pile all the furniture and the four dolls into the attic. Tonight, mummy made me some miniature pictures of flowers and a boat to stick on the walls. I thought one would look good on the roof. Mummy told me it might get wet if it rained, but, as I had to point out to her, it won't get rained on because my house is inside our real house.

Downs and ups

2011-01-07T15:41:00.002Z

The downs: I've waited in all day for United Utilities to come and fit a new gas meter. I even rang up this morning and was told they'd be with me by 1pm. Rang again at about 3pm only to be told I was never booked on their system anyway. Right. Also, it snowed again. And I'm getting another cold. And I can barely afford to get to work. And I need to get divorced and it's going to cost me at least a few hundred pounds. And the boy keeps waking up at six-something. And I feel flabby and haven't had any proper exercise for weeks. And I'm fed up of having to go and feed chickens which haven't laid a single egg between them for at least three months. And I need to do my tax return.

On the other hand, there are the ups. I have my new picture back from the framing shop and my dad has put it up for me. (I do actually have a drill that was the ex's old one but have never actually got it out of the box to investigate its state, but I don't have a garage full of little tubs of variously sized rawl plugs, screws, nails etc that many men seem to have.) It's only a print, but it's a lovely scene of a little whitewashed Welsh cottage amid stone walls and rolling fields. In fact, if this works, it's this one by Pembrokeshire artist Chris Neale. The website comes with a financial health warning if your tastes are in any way similar to mine.

Also, I'm going to start car sharing from halfway to work if I ever get chance to clear my old banger out enough to be able to give everyone else a lift without feeling utterly ashamed of its pig-sty state. And I've found the two bits of paper I need to do my tax return. And it's stopped snowing and most of it has cleared now. And B rubbed my arm when I was having a sneezing fit earlier and said: 'Me feel you better, mummy.' And I'm going to the gym on Sunday, cold or not. And tai chi starts again on Monday. And my chickens are still pretty, which will probably save them from being stewed.

Little man has developed a way of avoiding saying 'no' to me all the time. He has cunningly started to say 'not yet' or 'soon'. I have tried to explain that this means whatever it is we're talking about has to happen at some point, but we haven't quite got that yet.

Right now...

2010-12-30T09:22:00.000Z

Little man is looking extraordinarily cute in his fluffy new dressing gown. Thank you grandma and grandad.
He is playing his new incey wincey spider game by himself, by which I mean he's shaking the dice and counting the spiders (four).
We're having breakfast after a bit of a lie-in. I gave B the usual 'it's too early to hide from dinosaurs' spiel when he first arrived in my room then realised it was twenty to eight so sang the 'Mummy loves B/what shall we do today?' mash-up instead.
I want to take the Christmas tree down but suppose I should wait until Saturday.
I'm wondering with amusement what little man will make of YO! Sushi, which is where we're going for lunch.
At the moment he's eating some peppered salami, but eating all the peppery bit at once and telling me it's too spiky. Oh, now he's telling me to eat the pepper 'snake'.
The new toy house is taking up a lot of room in the dining room, which is required for a family dinner tonight.
I'm trying to decide which sling to take on the train to Liverpool, which is a tough one because B usually walks everywhere these days (everywhere usually being ten minutes into our local town). In fact, it must be weeks and weeks since I carried him.
I'm going to make my second cup of tea and still lamenting the absence of a nice man to do it for me, although I can't stand the thought of actually having to share my house with someone else at the moment.

A funny sort of day

2010-12-26T21:22:00.000Z

It's the second anniversary of discovering the husband's infidelity. I wish now that I hadn't chosen Boxing Day to snoop on his 'spare' mobile phone, but that was when the opportunity presented itself and my intuition had been telling me for some time that there was something going on. If it hadn't been Boxing Day I would have long since forgotten the precise date, but now I get to remember it every year. Woopee. New year's resolution number one: get divorced.

I had a strange journey home from work today too. Oh yes, I have to work Boxing Day and bank holidays. Anyway, my windscreen wiper jets worked on the way home for the first time in about a week after I topped them up with super-duper concentrated stuff. When I say 'I', I mean the STBE-husband did it when he came over to collect little man. Strange again. Anyway, there I was experiencing a feeling of pure joy at being able to clean the windscreen (I mean it; commuting in this snow and ice is really getting to me), when I saw brake lights ahead. It looked very much like someone had jumped from a bridge over the M6 about five cars in front of me. For me, it was the first time I've ever done a three-point turn in the middle of the motorway.

I'll be glad when the thaw comes. Yes, the snow is very beautiful and yes it's nice to go out and throw snowballs. But when you have to drive in it, it's stressful. I haven't been able to go the shortest route from my house to the main road because the slope is too steep and my heavy tank of a car's wheels spin too much (New year's resolution number two: keep saving for a smaller car). So I have to drive the long way round in thick snow and slush to get to a junction which is slightly less steep but is on a blind bend. And I still can't pull out quickly because my wheels still spin a bit even when I do it in second gear. Then there's been the non-working windscreen wash jets, which means I've had to pull over on the hard shoulder or go into services a couple of times on the way to and from work just to be able to see where I'm going. All in all, not nice.

Back to Christmas Day. Daddy came over while there were still a few pressies left to unwrap. We all went to see the chickens together to give them a festive treat of boiled peelings. Yum. I cooked dinner, he washed up, which is, in my opinion, a perfect division of labour. We had a very nice bottle of Orvieto. Little man ate lots of turkey and very little else. The little fella hugged his new dolls' house and parked his new Cars (the film) racing cars in the attic and made us green cakes in his new toy food processor. Then daddy left and B and I went up to grandma and grandad's, where he made more green cakes, this time with a little brown in them (chocolate!). Now I just need to quietly remove some of his old toys and take them to the charity shop.

The latest thing

2010-12-23T20:24:00.000Z

Little man's current obsessions:

Snip, snip, snipping away with a little pair of scissors. I think they're actually scissors from my own childhood. He started on last year's Christmas cards, which I saved thinking he would make pretty Christmas pictures with them. They've now been reduced to confetti and he's started cutting anything that moves. Or doesn't move.
Using my hair clips as if they were JCB-style grabby things. (If anyone knows what that part of a digger is called, do let me know.) Two broken so far. A wide range of items have been transported around the house.
Asking for a big truck for Christmas every time anyone inquires as to what he would like. He's not getting a big truck. He's getting a dolls' house. He will love it, but more about that some other time.
The film Cars, which he had been watching on daddy's mobile phone and I have now had to acquire. It is the first thing he requests when we get downstairs in the morning at the moment. It's probably my least favourite of all the children's animation films I've been forced to watch.
Hiding from monsters, dragons, dinosaurs and tigers.
Pleading to come to work with me. 'B a come a work with you. Pleeeease mummy, Pleeeease mummy.' Also saying many times a day: 'Daddy come now?' and: 'I want mine daddy back.'
Trying to dig the frozen ground at the allotment every time we go to check the chickens (and defrost their water).

Please mummy

2010-12-17T17:16:00.000Z

The small boy has become ludicrously polite of late. I've always tried to do the 'please' and 'thank you' thing by example rather than demanding he say them all the time. I really don't think he should have to say them every time he wants something that an adult can easily get for themselves, like a snack or a drink or a book to read. But recently he has been saying please a lot. An awful lot. I think he's cottoned on to the fact that it's harder to say no to him if he's being ever so polite about it. He even says please when he's making crazy requests like: 'Please mummy can I cut your leg with my scissors. Pleeeease mummy.' Er, no little man, you can't.

That kind of parent

2010-12-14T21:17:00.000Z

I've never wanted to be the kind of parent that snaps at my child, always telling him to stop doing things, constantly grinding him down with negativity. The kind who says such things as: 'Stop that, don't be silly, it's not funny, blah, blah, blah.'

Of course, these things sometimes pop out because I'm far from being the ideal parent. Little man has the perfect answer. When I let out a desperate scream of: 'It's not funny!', he replies: 'It's a bit funny, mummy,' with a look of such utter cuteness that all I can do is agree.

Yes poppet, it is a bit funny. Let's have a giggle instead of all that grr-iness.

What else have we been up to? Well, after managing not to watch a second of a certain talent contest on the telly (although having to deal with stories about this show every day at work), the programme thrust itself on my notice by taking a Biffy Clyro song and turning it into garden centre-style croonery. Oh well, at least it might lead some people to see the light and listen to the real thing.

Rhubarb wine has also happened. A delicate, rose-style bouquet with a light effervescence. Given the quantity imbibed, I don't think it can have been any stronger than beer. And I'm counting it as one of my five a day.

Lack of exercise has also been on the menu due to the cold from hell. It's really the third cold I've had in quick succession and which will probably rumble on until spring if previous years are anything to go by. I haven't been swimming or to the gym, but I did make it to a new tai chi class I started going to a few weeks ago.

I've also been working on a little literary sideline, of which I really can't reveal any more without having to wipe all your memories with a Jedi mind trick.

Conversations

2010-12-07T08:47:00.000Z

Little man had a lot to tell me at half past six this morning after a long weekend with daddy.

'B a big boy. Mummy a lady. Daddy a big man. B grow da big man [B will grow up into a big man.] B is your friend. Hide, mummy, a big drag[on] come. A big green drag[on]. Mummy's feet in. Daddy got cars film on his phone. Daddy bumped his car in the ice. Daddy broke his old car. Daddy got a new car. B get da bogey in mine nose. B squash dat [my boob, that is]. My wood hammer is downdestairs. My wood hammer. Go downdestairs get mine wood hammer. Warm milk, mummy. WARM MILK, MUMMY!'

I tried to tell him that mummy could also be referred to as a woman, since I am not a member of the nobility. But he wasn't having it. He is also adamant that he is not a little boy any more. And daddy did in fact write his car off in the ice last week and have to buy a new one.

Progress

2010-12-06T09:30:00.000Z

I've made a big dent in the to-do list. Enough to stop it bothering me any more. Take that, list. I've also rearranged The List into a series of post-it notes stuck to the side of a cabinet in the kitchen. It means I can bin tasks as soon as they're done instead of having an actual list with lots of crossings out and those things that never get done and have to keep being transferred onto a new page. And I found a stack of post-it notes whilst sorting out a drawer full of old stationery supplies. Even some pink ones.

The boy spent most of last week feeling seriously grumpy. He bit the inside of his cheek, which of course made it swell up and easy to bite again. And again. He got very frustrated at trying to eat and kept telling me his tummy hurt, which was probably because he was hungry. He had lots of jelly, hot chocolate and pink milk. Even the hot chocolate was a problem though, because he knows you shouldn't eat or drink things that are too hot. So I had to call it warm chocolate, otherwise he would leave it until it was stone cold. Yuck. Anyway, his mouth was getting to be much better when he slipped off his little step in the bathroom, banged his chin on the wash basin and bit his tongue. By then it was daddy's turn to take over the cuddles and sympathy.

Daddy took over early so I could go to see Biffy Clyro in Manc. And blimey, they really are rather good. It was a fab night, except for the part where I fainted. Erm, not sure where that one came from. I'm putting it down to a lack of air flow in a crowd due to my small stature. Anyway, I was out cold like a teenybopper at a Justin Bieber gig. Ironically, I then got a better view from the edge of the hall where there was also more air. And the gentleman pictured is, in fact, my current teenage crush material. I think I need to get out more. Oh wait, I was out. My iPod is one step ahead of me though and has moved on to the somewhat mind-bending Marmaduke Duke, a funky and addictive Biffy Clyro-related ensemble.

Monster to-do list

2010-11-30T21:22:00.004Z

I've been feeling a little hassled of late. Too much to do, not enough time. Not enough time to spend pottering about at toddler pace. My bank account likes the fact that I'm working four days a week, but the rest of my life doesn't. I'm tired and stressed and I keep getting colds. Here's this week's to-do list, much of which probably won't get done and not much of which is much fun:

Get some adhesive stuck in my tyres to stop them going down all the time.
Stick my rear view mirror back on.
Top up my screen wash.
Find the right payslip to complete my holiday pay form.
Find the bits of paper I need to do my tax return.
Order some pix from when the photographer came to Jo Jingles.
Change my bedsheets. And little man's.
Check how I'm getting to Manchester for a Biffy Clyro concert on Friday.
Return my library books.
Make a Christmas card list.
Find the slip of paper that tells me when in December my dental check-up is.
Get little man's hair trimmed.
Put some more of little man's old baby sleeping bags and a couple of under-used slings on eBay.
Buy some kind of packaging for the ones I've already put on.
Rearrange a missed delivery of a component of little man's Christmas present.
Persuade the ex to come round with a long ladder and investigate why there are damp patches on my ceilings and walls.
Get the picture I bought on holiday framed.
Get a quote for the removal of my gas fire monstrosity.

Edited to add: Chase up the nursery that was supposed to send me an inquiry form.
Collect another missed delivery from the sorting office.

Edited again to add: Find a new telly as mine is refusing to stay switched on.
Work out how to empty the vacuum cleaner as I accidentally vacuumed up a pair of knickers! (I must add that I have done it before, I can just never remember how.)
Swap plants round in my pots.
Buy an external hard-drive before my overloading laptop seizes up and also back up all my photos.

And again to add: Remember to re-read the book Timeless Simplicity by John Lane (highly recommended), go outside, hug a tree and stop letting all this shit get on top of me.

Learning stuff

2010-11-26T17:47:00.000Z

Whenever I head into the kitchen to do any cooking, little man immediately drags in a dining chair, places it right in my way against the only useable bit of worktop space I have in my tiny kitchen and demands to take part.

So in the space of about an hour today he has peeled and chomped raw carrots as well unadulterated coriander and cumin seeds and we have talked about where the seeds might come from. We have confirmed that little man is right handed when he tried to stir a pan using his left hand and quickly realised it didn't feel right. We have learnt about how cogs work by mucking around with the tin opener, reinforced with a demonstration by mummy's fingers. We have discovered that fridge magnets don't stick to the plastic part of vegetable peelers, but do stick to the metal parts.

The fridge magnet in question was brought back from Cuba by a friend and has a picture of an old car on it. I shied away from explaining why this would be. Oh, and in case you're interested we were cooking roast salmon and squash with lentil thing.

Little man's holiday report

2010-11-23T21:15:00.000Z

Mummy and I spent a week at a hol-da-day home in Betws-y-Coed. I was a big strong boy when we had to unpack the car and helped by carrying in one book. Well, I carried it halfway up the steps to the front door anyway. For the rest of the week I had to point out that I was a 'big strong boy' every time we went up and down the steps. Mummy was a big strong girl when she carried a sack of logs back from the shop whilst also holding my hand next to the busy road. I liked watching mummy light the fire, but she kept telling me not to lean on her while she did it.

At first I had a little friend there with her mummy and daddy. Then, grandma and grandad came for the second part of the week. It was fun playing games with my friend and, for once, I didn't mind sharing my toys with her. Then it was fun going and climbing into grandma and grandad's beds in the morning to wake them up with a tickle. Although one morning I decided to go downstairs and hide under a blanket on the settee instead. It took them ages to find me.

We visited lots of tea shops, which always sounds like a good idea and I do like saying 'tea shop' and 'tup of tea' but it tends to get boring after a few minutes. I particularly liked the tea shop that came with a view of a working loom at the woollen mill. In most of the other tea shops I decided to go exploring, particularly under the tables.

I threw stones into the river in Betws. And the river in Beddgelert. And the sea in Llandudno. I thoroughly tested out how waterproof my winter boots are with the conclusion that they would be ok in a rainshower but can't stand up to ten inches of Afon Glaslyn swirling around them. Speaking of winter clothes, I happily wore my hat without tearing it off and mummy bought herself a slightly ridiculous Nepalese bobble hat.

Chips, with or without fish, also turned out to be a recurring theme, with impromptu picnics by the river in Llanrwst and by the sea in Conwy and Llandudno. I like chips. Yummy, just like my mummy, who has taught me to say the phrase 'yummy mummy'.

There was an initial hitch in our steam train plans, when gales blew branches onto the line of the miniature railway in Betws. But it was rectified with a trip down the lakeside in Llanberis pulled by a little engine called Thomas Bach. The driver let me and mummy stand in his cab and he showed us his firebox. Then we went to the slate museum and I was fascinated by the big water wheel that turned dozens of different machines.

It was all very exciting but I kept waking up at night and having to climb into mummy's little bed for a cuddle. I also missed my daddy and sometimes I just wanted to go home.

Holiday scenes

2010-11-19T19:05:00.000Z

With apologies for the point-and-shootness of my camera and photographic skills, some pix from our hols in North Wales:

'Mummy, it's bumpy, mummy.' The tide had just gone out at Llandudno's West Shore. And little man likes to make sure you know he's talking to you by putting your name at the beginning and end of every sentence.

View to the mountains from the RSPB reserve at Conwy. I'm sure there were lots of rare and interesting birds there, but this is the one that came close enough to snap:

Flowers in November. Gotta love gorse, even if it does smell of coconut.

A typical bit of damp autumn riverbank, just over the road from our holiday cottage in Betws-y-Coed.

Bean bags and other gubbins

2010-11-06T14:30:00.000Z

In a sudden flurry activity I got these beanbags finished. I started them ages ago and floundered at the stage where I decided to do a little running stitch round all the numbers. The tutorial is at Chez Beeper Bebe.

I have also finally made the dining room curtains to match the living room ones. (It's all one room but it makes it sound bigger to give them separate names...) So I have made it just in time to beat the first anniversary of moving in. And there was only one major cock-up, where I managed to cut one curtain about 20cm too short. This is the sort of thing that always happens when I get my sewing machine out. Anyway, better get on to my bedroom curtains soon, and something to replace the hideousness of the grubby nets in the meter cupboard.

I also have a cabled tank top half knitted and a cross-stitch alphabet sampler about two-thirds done. On my crafty would-like-to-do-list are: a cabled jumper for the boy, hat and gloves for the boy, tea cosy, pretty fabric bunting, wrist warmers for me, possibly a scarf and hat for me, a crocheted granny square blanket (this will probably take me until I am granny age), a mini quilt for the Ikea dolls'/teddy bed I've bought little man for Christmas (sorry to mention the C-word but everything I buy for him now is getting put away until then. By 'put away' I mean left in the boot of my car, which might be a problem when we go away next week), a wall hangy thing I started about two years ago which is a hotch potch of sewing and knitted bits and buttons and beads and stuff, some freezer paper stencilling (although by next summer little man will have grown out of the t-shirts I was going to try this out on), a mini ring sling for the boy to carry things in (probably cars) and a cross-stitch picture of Noah's ark for the boy (I'm hoping it will not yet lead to any deep theological questions; he likes boats and animals).

This list may be slightly over-ambitious. I'm off to do some knitting even though it's the sort of day where you have to put lights on to knit at 2pm. If only I had a cosy wood-burner to sit in front of. Unfortunately, any money I save at the moment is going into the replacement car fund.

It's that sort of day

2010-10-30T15:28:00.000+01:00

It's a back-door-open sort of day. There don't seem to have been many of these in the last few weeks. It's a shame the yard faces north. No sun 'til next May. But little man's new waterproof, furry-lined winter boots are lined up on the mat waiting to be worn again. We ate lunch al fresco. We had olives and feta in a vain attempt to feel Mediterranean.

It's a brewing-up-in-the-teapot sort of day. I'm using one of my earthy brown Wedgwood cups and saucers, discovered in a charity shop in Oban, which seems to fit in with season rather well. If only I had some leaf tea, the cosy homeliness would be complete.

It's a wandering-around-in-Babylegs-with-a-bare-bottom sort of day. For the boy, obviously. Babylegs wouldn't really cover much of my legs. But he is quite delighted at the rediscovery of his black and yellow stripey ones. (As an aside, I can tell you that yesterday I managed to epilate one thigh. Just one. And that a bit patchily. I thought buying an epilator would be a sound investment as I've been using tonnes of Veet since I started swimming and shaving leaves me with loads of ingrown hairs. I just didn't believe that any commercial product would be that painful and still be on the market.)

It's a tidying-up-in-forgotten corners sort of day. You know, the piles of stuff that have lain around so long you've stopped noticing them. All toys have been sorted and categorised and put away. I know, of course, that they won't stay that way but I have this need to sort everything out every once in a while. The dining table has been relocated to create more playing space. It's easy to pull out again when we want to eat.

It's a staying-awake-all-day sort of day. For the boy. Most unusual. But he doesn't seem to be showing any of the usual signs of sleepiness, despite being up at six thirty. Normally he would be getting 'naughty' by now, ie overtired, but he is merrily lining up all his trucks and cars. I just hope he lasts for pumpkin carving and Halloween mask-making later.

It's a sewing-the-dining-room-curtains-at-last sort of day. I have actually cut the pieces and sewn the side seams. Just got to add the header tape and attempt to sew the bottom hem in a vaguely straight fashion. I might get them done before the first anniversary of moving in.

Underpants: The return (Contains multiple references to bodily functions)

2010-10-29T19:14:00.001+01:00

I managed to semi-trick the boy into a pair a few days ago. Light blue Thomas the Tank Engine ones. I put a pair of trousers on him too. I said: 'Tell mummy when you want a wee and you can sit on the potty.' Not long afterwards he weed in them. Fair enough. New underpants. Dark blue Thomas ones. New trousers. Not long afterwards he weed in them. Ho hum. I chose a pair of white Thomas ones that he seemed to particularly like and let him wander around trouser-less. It was, of necessity, a staying-at-home sort of day. Not long after, he pooed in them. I cleaned him up and put the underpants in the bin.

Now very taken with the idea of underpants he decided to wear a red Thomas pair and a yellow Mr Men pair at the same time. No trousers again. Not long after, he weed in them. Have you spotted a pattern here? I put a nappy on him for naptime but persevered for the rest of the day. The only outing we had was a quick trip to the shop and a diversion into the park on the way home. He weed in his trousers at the park. Just before bedtime, he went bare-bottomed. He weed on the floor about two foot away from the potty.

The next day he wandered around the house bare-bummed for the morning. He used the potty or the toilet (when we were upstairs) every time he needed a wee. He'd already pooed in his night-time nappy first thing. I put a nappy on him when grandma came to collect him for the afternoon before I went to work. Again today, at home with a bare bum he has weed on the potty or loo every time.

I'm seeing this as the first stage in a process of gentle encouragement. I don't think we'll be taking the 'Potty Training in 24 Hours' approach.

Edited to note that the following ad popped up on blogger.com when I hit Publish Post: Potty Training Made Easy: Potty Training In Only 3 Days Fast & Easy - Guaranteed Results.

Right now...

2010-10-26T10:58:00.000+01:00

Little man is riding a hobby horse, found in a charity shop last week. Unfortunately the horse is upside down so its head is getting dragged around the floor.
He has just started to count 'eight, nine, ten'. I think he has decided that is what I'm typing.
He is leaning on my knee and pushing my arm and generally getting in the way of me typing.
My nose is all snotty and sneezy with the perpetual cold I get every winter and which comes and goes according to how tired I am.
I am wondering what to do about the new neighbours slamming their door repeatedly all evening, until about midnight, every time they step into the street to smoke.
I am considering having a cup of the hot chocolate filched from the B&B I stayed at in York when I had a girlie trip away at the weekend.
I am concerned that the mere mention to little man's daddy that we should all do something together sometime soon resulted in a furrowed brow and the 'I can't talk about difficult [important] issues' look.
Little man is pulling out the aerial on the old CD player/radio in the corner of the room, which I really should get round to freecycling.
I am sneezing some more.
It is raining.
The house is a tip and I am about to get up and do some tidying up...

Here be dragons

2010-10-21T08:34:00.000+01:00

'Good morning little man,' I say, as the boy climbs into my bed for a snuggle.
'A crab, mummy,' he declares. 'Crab pic [nip] mummy's finger.'
'Oh, a crab? Ouch, nip, nip.' The crab then has to nip little man's finger, of course, and his nose.
Next up is a visit from the dragon. It might be red, green or blue. The green one always reminds me of the Green Dragon at Bywater. (Short cuts make for long delays, but inns make longer ones...LotR, yes I'm a nerd.) Anyway, it's beware any exposed toes.
'Tent. Hide de tent. [Let's hide in a tent made out of the duvet.]' Mummy has to hold up the duvet over us, while little man declares that it is raining.
'Pitter, patter,' I say, over and over again. Little man puts on his imaginary boots and puts up his imaginary umbrella so he can go out in the rain.
Then the sun comes out: 'Pop.' The sun always comes out with a pop, because in The Very Hungry Caterpillar the caterpillar emerges from the egg with a pop when the sun comes out.
'Bite mummy's finger.'
'No, don't bite mummy's finger please. Be nice to mummy.' Cue a little sigh and a big hug. 'Hug mummy. Mummy hug me.' He still tries to bite my finger.
Next up: 'Mummy sing.' Mummy begins a rendition of Twinkle, Twinkle. 'Stop.' Mummy stops mid-sentence. 'Go.' 'Stop.' And so on until the song is finished. 'Again.'
I start to sing Rock-a-Bye Baby.
'[C]ome on, mummy, [s]tand up. Me de baby.' This wasn't part of my plan for remaining horizontal as long as possible. I have to stand up and rock little man, who does his baby impression - half-closed eyes, scrunched up arms and lots of little sighs - before I drop him at the appropriate point. Well not really drop him, obviously. Not quite.
'[C]ome on, mummy. Down de stairs. Play de cars.'
Snuggle time is over.

It's a pig!

2010-10-20T08:00:00.000+01:00

Underpants

2010-10-18T09:17:00.001+01:00

Little man has taken a dislike to the whole concept. Even when the underpants come with Thomas the Tank Engine or Mr Men pictures. He wees on the toilet in the morning and at bedtime and on a potty downstairs if he needs to go during nappy-off time after tea. So he knows what it's all about. But he got pretty upset when I just tried a pair of red Thomas pants on him to see if they actually fitted. (Size 18 months to two years, - he's two years and seven months.They fitted.)

I'm just going to leave them lying around so he gets used to the idea. I'm sure one day he'll surprise me and put them on. Or he'll refuse a nappy and want to go commando.

We've now visited three nurseries and there are two more on my list. I've had to drag little man away from each one because he likes their toys and their climbing frames. But I can't make my mind up. I thought I'd get a gut feeling but I've just got utter bewilderment. In two of them the pre-schoolers weren't in their room at the time we visited; they were either playing outside or sitting with the toddler children for a snack. So I didn't get to see how crowded the room looked or how the staff interacted with them. The one that appeared to be particularly well-organised and very focused on individual children's interests also happened to have the least welcoming pre-school room. The one that seemed a little smaller and quieter had lots of new staff and was in the process of recruiting a new pre-school nursery nurse so could be completely different by next April.

The need for nursery

2010-10-13T08:39:00.000+01:00

Once upon a time, the daydream was to have two children, move to a pretty cottage somewhere picturesque, and find the husband a job he enjoyed while I home-educated the children, baked cakes and grew vegetables. And possibly did a bit of writing or proofreading if I felt like it. Now you have to imagine that horrible, scraping sound you get when you drag the needle across a record. For it was not to be.

Instead, I have one precious little man who is currently whinging because he is finally getting his last molar and is very snotty. I have moved down the housing ladder and gone back to work almost full time. So we need to find a nursery for a couple of afternoons a week to give the grandparents some respite once he turns three.

I have two visits lined up later this week. Now I need to work out what I'm looking for and what questions I need to ask. Beyond the logistics of session times and how I'm actually going to get to work on time if they all start their afternoon sessions at 1pm. I want to know what sort of outdoor space they have and how much time they spend in it. I want to know what sort of food they provide for snacks. I want to find out whether the emphasis is more on learning or play. I want to know all sorts of things about rewards and behaviour and general ethos that I can't work out how to ask without being on a completely different wavelength to the nursery staff. And in the end, I'll probably ignore the facts and form an opinion based on how the place feels.

Bed and breakfast

2010-10-06T22:18:00.000+01:00

So my blog is seriously losing momentum. This is what happens when you start working four days a week at a job that gives you mornings with your little one (or mornings to go to the gym when your little one is with daddy) but eradicates your evenings spent with the laptop. I don't get in til nine-ish, Sunday to Wednesday.

Take a little time to fully digest the meaning of this, if you will. I don't tire of bedtime stories because I only get to read them on Thursdays, Fridays and every other Saturday. I still love Room on the Broom and am still amused by the fact that my bog monster (where the mud-covered dog and cat and frog tell the dragon to eff off) has a Brummie accent. Likewise with sharing our evening meal. Watching In the Night Garden. Tucking him in and giving him his night-night kiss. Two and a half nights a week, on average.

But I get woken up by him diving under my duvet five and half mornings (or middles of the night) a week, on average. Ditto trying to encourage him to eat some breakfast. Wrestling him into some clothes. Updating my facebook status to the cries of 'Bird, bird' (which means 'Mummy, get off that social networking site and find 3rd and Bird on the BBC iPlayer for me now, please). Washing up while he tries to drag me off by one leg to fix his truck.

I realise I've posted about the search for a nursery for little man, without talking about why nursery is necessary or desirable and what would constitute a good one, in my opinion. I now have one appointment to go and view one and will probably sort out some more tomorrow. Already I have had to smile and nod during a brief call at the one nursery when I was told it would really 'bring him on' to 'socialise' with other children. So many assumptions behind such simple statements. Repeat after me: I must conform. I must conform. I must conform.

Going into hiding

2010-09-30T15:53:00.000+01:00

I've been feeling a bit snowed under this week with a to-do list full of annoying little tasks, like phoning the tax credits people to say I'd increased my hours at work, renewing my house insurance, having first checked that I'm not being ripped off, collecting phone numbers of nurseries, filling in holiday pay claim forms. On top of that I've had a couple of days of PMT-induced sitting on the sofa going bleurgh and fighting the growing desire to eat the entire contents of my kitchen cupboards. Not that there's any particularly exciting food in them. Not even a biscuit. Also, it's my fifth week of working four days and I'm starting to feel like I actually have a job, although technically I haven't.

Anyway, yesterday I spontaneously picked up the phone, filled in the forms and got on t'internet for all those nursery details. I also tried to work out exactly what free 'education' three-year-olds are entitled to. Of course, this has been made as complicated as possible. The simple answer is that he can have up to fifteen hours a week at nursery from next April. The complications seem to be that he has to have at least three sessions a week (I only want two), some nurseries only offer the free places in two-and-a-half-hour slots and they are only available for 38 weeks of the year. From looking at nursery websites, I also get the feeling my requirement to drop him off at 12.30pm in order to get to work is going to cause problems with their session times and lunchtime arrangements.

So the next task is to phone round and explain that and see what response I get before going visiting. But I seem to have some urgent knitting to do instead. And some beanbags to make. And that cross-stitch embroidery to finish. Possibly even curtains to get on with. Or I could just hide in the laundry basket like my little man until all the hassle goes away:

Small joys

2010-09-22T09:02:00.000+01:00

A nice cup of tea, drunk at just the right temperature.
A small boy who has learnt how to say 'a big hug'.
An unexpected second flush of sweet peas.
A sunny morning in late September.
A small boy tucked up in bed fast asleep.

Any more?

A few questions

2010-09-16T18:48:00.000+01:00

Why did I think that having a boy would get me out of having My Little Pony figures in the house when the boy has a cousin whose girlie toys he can raid?
Is it better to have a cold on your days off, or while you're stuck at a desk?
What is the source of the leaky water marks on the upstairs ceilings and can it be easily remedied without replacing the entire, asbestos-containing, roof?
Why does little man think that the Tombliboos want to steal his milk?
If I leave today's dirty dishes lying around the kitchen, will they all be magically washed up and put away by morning?
Should I knit or embroider this evening?
When is little man's final tooth going to finally put in an appearance (yes, he is over two and a half now).
When should I swap the nappies for underpants?
Should I paint my front door bright, shiny red or bright, shiny blue?
How soon do I need to find a nursery for little man to go to next April?
Have I worn sandals for the last time this year?
How can little man go from being adorable to a wailing terror within seconds?
Am I inflicting lasting damage by calling him 'little poppet pie' or 'scampi chicken'?

Explaining the unexplainable

2010-09-14T21:06:00.000+01:00

I got my first tattoo about three weeks ago. I had been thinking about it for a couple of years. I sketched the design myself (can't you tell!?) and the tattoo parlour's artist worked it up into something doable. Several people have asked what it means and I have ummed and ahhed and dodged the question, but here's a very short and simplistic attempt to explain things when, basically, it just felt right. I realise the picture doesn't give much sense of scale or position, but it's in the middle of my back and, while not massive, it's quite big for a first tattoo!

The spiral: well, it's the cycle of life/nature, how things repeat but never in exactly the same way twice. The solar-type rays: the sun is a symbol of a strong positive energy, which I figure is always a good thing. Also, the rays are roughly the points of the compass, with all their modern pagan connotations and usefulness when trying not to fall off the top of cloud-covered mountains. The blue: woad, ie Celtic war paint.

And the other question people have asked: did it hurt? Yes, it bloody well did. Would I have another one? Probably.

Doing (housework) or being

2010-09-11T08:35:00.000+01:00

On Thursday, I intended to get some housework done. I was definitely going to tidy away some of the toys littering the living and dining room floors. Perhaps even sweep said floors. Then there was that big pile of clean washing waiting to be put away. The junk that has accumulated at one end of the dining room to be sorted out. And the loo in desperate need of a scrub.

So what did we actually do? We nipped off to the garden centre to buy some more plants for the fish tank. On the way, incidentally, I had some confirmation that it does sink in when I tell little man where we're going and what we're doing. As we parked up, he said: 'More plants, fish.' Of course, we had to look at all the fish, and the turtles, and anenomes, and guinea pigs, and rabbits, and finches. Then we were joined by grandma and grandad for tea and scones in the cafe. Then we found a playhouse to try out and we all ended up sitting inside it being ordered around by the two-year-old. Then mummy decided she needed an evergreen plant, what with winter approaching and all (a Pieris japonica 'Little Heath' in case you were wondering.)

Then it was home for a nice long nap, before throwing together some pizza dough and heading off to play in grandma and grandad's garden so grandad could pot up my new plant as I'd run out of compost. After going to the shop to buy the pizza toppings and calling in on a friend for instructions on checking her chooks while they're away, we'd run out of time.

Oh well. Most of the housework tasks actually got done on Friday instead. In between going swimming and popping to the park in between rain showers and playing trains and reading books and pretending to be aeroplanes and making duvets into tents and climbing into the washing basket (him, not me!). Just don't look too closely if you ever visit my house.

My life in music

2010-09-06T21:55:00.000+01:00

Today, I decided I have been listening to Biffy Clyro too much, if such a thing is possible. I have a friend who will soon be able to confirm whether this is possible. That's because she brought her iPod shuffle round to fill from my laptop and we didn't know how much memory it had. Turns out it was 1GB and all she got on there was some AC/DC, some Aerosmith, and everything Biffy Clyro have every released. But she does need to get in training for when she comes to see them with me in Manchester in December...

Anyway, just for fun I decided to go with the 'All Songs' option on my iPod. With mind-boggling results. On the way home from work, driving down the M6 in atrocious weather, I got to listen to songs by, in this order: Nirvana, Norah Jones, Queens of the Stone Age, Enrique Iglesias, New Model Army, Katie Melua, Simon Webbe, Mumford & Sons, Lenny Kravitz, Newton Faulkner, Aerosmith, Guns n' Roses.

So I'm now going to bore you with the story behind some of these. Nirvana were always guaranteed to be played at the so-called club where the mid-teenaged me used to hang out at the Alternative Night every Friday and I'm sure I've snogged many a lovely long-haired boy to their dulcet tones. Norah Jones and Katie Melua belong to the smug married phase of my life. We even went to see Katie in Blackpool. They're not on my regular playlist now. Queens of the Stone Age reminded me that it's probably not a good idea to download a band's entire discography before you've actually worked out whether you like them.

Enrique Iglesias I blame on the ex; there are things on my laptop put there by him several years ago. I had to skip it. I just had to. New Model Army reminded me of going to see bands at the Royal Court in Liverpool as a wee youngster. I sacked off my Duke of Edinburgh Silver Award practice hike to go and see them. Simon Webbe. What can I say? I think there was one song I liked. I am ashamed of myself. Mumford & Sons are a new discovery and they're fantastic. Folk rock. Who'd have thought there was such a thing? Lenny Kravitz, he has his moments.

Newton Faulker is another one I blame on the ex. And I actually think some of these CDs that got copied onto my computer originated with the woman he had an affair with. Nice. Perhaps I should delete them all. Perhaps I should decide if I like the music first. Aerosmith. I believe they're actually cool again. I was never that much into them in my first heavy metal phase but now I think they're quite good fun. Guns n' Roses were the first proper band I went to see, with the first proper long-term boyfriend I had. Slash stuffed up the intro to Sweet Child O' Mine. Now you can buy Guns n' Roses t-shirts in trendy high street stores. Weird.

And for my journey to work tomorrow: Scouting for Girls (who are these people?), Antonio Forcione (ace jazz guitarist), Fanfare Ciocarlia (Romanian gypsy music), Pearl Jam, Bon Jovi, Free, and, finally, Biffy.

Endurance test

2010-09-04T21:06:00.001+01:00

That's what taking a two-and-a-half-year-old camping on your own amounts to. There are probably mothers out there who take it all in their stride. And there are probably two-and-a-half-year-olds out there who are unnaturally compliant, for two-and-a-half-year-olds.

So why do I do it? Just because. Because I like going camping and knowing that everything I need to survive fits into the car. (Ok, once upon a time it fitted into a rucksack but I can't carry a supply of nappies, breadsticks and full-fat milk as well as a two-and-a-half-year-old, especially with a new tattoo on my back which makes carrying the toddler in my customary fashion impossible for the moment anyway.) Because I saw the forecast for unexpectedly warm and sunny weather in September. Because I'd been wondering what we would do for those couple of gloriously free days. Because I like fresh air. And sea air. And the sea.

So why is it an endurance test? Because the two-and-a-half-year-old won't go to sleep until later than I'd have liked to have gone to sleep myself and still wakes up at 6.30am. At least now it goes dark at half-eight and not half-ten like the first time this summer I took him camping. Because he insists on climbing the steep, probably about 4ft high bank into another field. Because he tries to climb up the guy ropes. Repeatedly. Because he fills his pockets with shells, then empties them into the tent. Because he asks for milk, doesn't drink it, then wails for it the minute I've poured it away. Because he decided it would be a good idea to run his hands down the outside of the car, low down where it's really dirty, then ask for food. Repeatedly. Because he wouldn't sit and eat a meal but would decide half an hour later that he was hungry. Because he could never find the energy to get to the toilet block without being carried but was always sure he had enough energy to go to the play area. Because on the way to the toilet block he had to examine every patch of sand, every rabbit poo and every scrap of rubbish. Because every time we went to the toilet block he tried to flush the toilet while I was sitting on it, then tried to pull out all the toilet roll sheets while I was pulling my trousers up. Because he couldn't see the necessity of staying still to have a new nappy put on. Or to have his pyjamas replaced with clothes. Or his clothes replaced with pyjamas. Because if mummy's trying to have a few more minutes' rest in the morning, it seems like a good idea to kick her in the stomach. Or throw The Very Hungry Caterpillar in her face. Because he climbed onto my camping chair with wellies covered in mud from the molehill. Because I couldn't even put a beer down without him grabbing it. Because he refused to nap, despite his lack of night-time sleep, and therefore denied me my chance to nap.

Wow, it all sounds quite trivial. Of course, when it's coming at you relentlessly all day and some of the night too it's a bit much. And there are many, many little things I've missed out. But then, I suspect our camping trips are over for this year. And next year he'll be a different child throwing different challenges at me. Don't you just love the word challenge? In the way that it's replaced the word 'problem' as an acceptable way of describing children...

Doing or being

2010-09-01T21:49:00.000+01:00

I sometimes worry I don't do enough 'activities' with the boy. You know, like painting and sticking and gluing and glittering and engineering grand pavilions out of wooden blocks and making mud palaces in the back yard sandpit and weaving sailing ships out of willow twigs. This is usually because I'm trying to get the house straight and cook the occasional meal and hang out the washing and fit in a little light knitting and pop up to the shop to replace a loaf of bread that's gone mouldy.

Of course, I don't worry for long. There are plenty of things we do together and these days there is also plenty of time when little man is happy in his own little world in which various objects - kangaroos, teacups, elastic bands or Tigger - tend to get transported around the place in various vehicles. Together, we read stories and chop vegetables and water plants and feed chickens and go out for walks and dance around the kitchen and marvel at creepy crawlies.

Perhaps I could spend a bit more time on the 'activities'. I can feel a play-dough making session coming on soon. I need to empty all the yucky old sand out of the sandpit and might splash out on some coloured sand for us to muck about with. But a lot of things happen in the course of our days (or mornings when I'm working) together anyway, even if they're just for a few moments. I'll break off what I'm doing to read him a book or draw a picture for him to colour in (scribble on) or rescue a squashed Tigger or reassemble a tractor's trailer or throw him a bouncy ball or push him round the yard on his trike or build a tower for him to knock down.

These little moments can't be quantified as 'we spent an hour painting' or 'we made three glittery pictures' or 'we worked out by how many millimetres each block in a tower can deviate from the vertical alignment before the tower falls down'. But I think they all add up to something just as valuable for the little guy as long as I'm being attentive enough to realise when he wants to do something with me and when he's ok just to be with me, doing his own thing.

Bed hopping

2010-08-24T18:53:00.000+01:00

Before I get on to the subject of sleep, and the lack thereof, I just have to tell you that today in the park, little man rubbed two sticks together and declared that he had made fire. No idea where that has come from. I think he's been secretly watching Ray Mears.

Anyway, sleep. I like it. A lot of it. Pre-child I would happily go to bed at 9pm and get up around 7am. Then there was all the usual baby shenanigans. At ten months, he 'slept through' for the first time and gradually started to do so quite reliably. For months - maybe seven or eight. I allowed myself to be lulled into a false sense of security, congratulate myself for never having considered any sleep training methods when he was a baby and came to believe that he would continue to sleep twelve hours straight for ever.

Yeah, right. He's a toddler. He still has one tooth to come. He's learning to talk. He's trying to work out what it's all about. It being the meaning of life and other momentous issues such as why mummy's bracelets always fall off his arm. Sometimes he wakes up thirsty. Usually he just wants a cuddle, and who can blame him? That's why I'm all for co-sleeping, in theory.

Unfortunately, he's fidgety and I'm a light sleeper, which is not a good combination. And I find that a tired mummy is one less able to remain patient in the face of toddler upsets and pestering. So after a few months of putting up with his arrival in my bed in the middle of the night, I've started returning him to his own bed. A couple of times he has bounced straight back up again, but he hasn't yet persisted enough to turn it into an issue. In general, I try to avoid anything becoming an 'issue' because you only start worrying about it and questioning what you're doing wrong. So we'll see how the current approach goes. And I'll try to go to bed early too, just in case.

First amendment

2010-08-22T21:50:00.000+01:00

I have just checked, and in a post about a year ago I did promise not to leave you for more than three days without a post. A promise I have repeatedly broken recently. And because I am me, I actually remembered the original pledge and feel bad for not sticking to my word.

So I'm having to make an amendment: I will not leave you for more than three days without a post unless: a) my brain is functioning at less than twenty per cent capacity because of the small person's night-time fidgetings; b) there is something worth watching on the telly; or, c) I am too busy ogling the video for Biffy Clyro's The Captain.

(a) is probably my most likely excuse and will no doubt result in a post some time soon.
(b) is unlikely to occur now that Spartacus, the only thing I was bothering to tune in for, has finished.
(c) may happen on occasion when hormones demand it.

As for my other pledges, I'm glad to have confirmed to myself that I am keeping most of them. Particularly in terms of not sparing you the expletives or any unsavoury details concerning such things as menstruation, puke or toddler poo and in being utterly contradictory at all times.

A woman's work...

2010-08-16T21:34:00.000+01:00

I've volunteered to work an extra day from September. Obviously this goes against all my principles of simple (cheap) living, anti-corporatism and general idleness. It means I'll be working Sunday to Wednesday afternoons and evenings. The work was there; I thought I might as well make a bit of extra money while I can. I need to boost my car replacement fund. I should probably set up a private pension. I'd like a woodburning stove. And an electric guitar. I don't have any job security since I don't have a contract so it makes sense to take the cash now in case it's not there in a few months' time.

Little man is with his daddy on Sundays and Mondays anyway. Daddy has only worked four days a week since he was off with various psychological issues. I knew he had been looking out for a new job, so I had to check he wasn't about to start working Mondays and have been reassured that Mondays are a Ben day for him. This doesn't really explain how he's going to get out of a job that is contributing to making him miserable but he doesn't do discussions of important subjects as they are too upsetting. So that leaves an afternoon with each set of grandparents until next Easter when he will get some free time at nursery, provided it hasn't been axed by the government before then and that I can find a nursery I like the look of. Even then, someone else will have to pick him up, give him his tea and put him to bed because I don't get home until about nine.

Maternal possessiveness notwithstanding, I think it's actually good for little man to be looked after by a small group of close family members who really care about him. It's more of a whole tribe effort, a la the Continuum Concept. Even if it means mummy is only there at bedtime two or three days a week. And it means I get to sit down at a desk without being pestered. I was going to mention the importance of adult conversation, but the banter in work could not be classed as mature. So I'll settle for the fact that I can get all my swearing done without worrying about the boy picking any of it up. We have a profanity guide on the wall at work, the words we have to put asterisks in: fuck, shit, cunt, wank and twat. The conversation may not be mature but it is highly amusing.

Running commentary

2010-08-12T18:57:00.000+01:00

Little man's constant questioning has shifted recently, from 'whassat?' to 'whadooween?', which translates as 'what are you doing?' I even sometimes get an accurate answer from him if I ask him the same question back. But sometimes he asks the question on repeat so that what I'm doing is exactly the same as it was the last time he asked. And the time before that.

He is talking so much more. I'm currently getting a commentary on In the Night Garden. 'In there', 'a house', 'nin nonk', 'gone', 'a blue'...which translates as the Pontypines and Wottingers are getting in the carriage of the Ninky Nonk that looks like a house. The Ninky Nonk goes off screen and the blue Ha Hoo appears. Sometimes the constant commentary and questioning becomes a little wearing. Just a little. I, of course, have the infinite patience to deal with it without ever adopting a tone of exasperation or snapping at him. Of course.

He does indeed have full-scale, finger pointing, 'No' shouting arguments between his left hand and his right hand. There's obviously a lot going on in his imagination. He sometimes plays by himself for what feels like quite some time, it's probably about twenty minutes, and he's constantly chattering to himself or to his toys.

His obsession with all motorised transportation continues. Today he got quite upset because he couldn't make the baby sign for plane, despite the fact that he can say 'plane' quite clearly. And does so several dozen times a day as we live on a flight path. Every time he eats an oatcake or ricecake he nibbles it until, to him, it resembles a boat, which he then waves around proudly proclaiming that fact. He also has other amusing obsessions, such as collecting the seeds of any kind of tree he finds. I now have to remember to check his trouser pockets before they go in the wash.

I have to make sure his father and I confer about what he's up to. Sometimes little man will say something that is a mystery to me until I ask his dad and it turns out it's to do with a film they've watched or somewhere they've been. I think the pair of them watch a lot of Disney Pixar. I suppose it saves me having to.

The other day I also had to check with his father (who's a civil engineer) that the metal inside reinforced concrete is steel. Little man had asked what it was as there's a picture in his Big Dig book. I think I'm going to have to read up properly about the workings of steam engines. Internal combustion is bound to be on the cards at some point. A trip to the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester is probably in order. All I can say is, it's a good job I'm an all-round genius.

Answers

2010-08-09T22:10:00.000+01:00

I've been tagged by Skippedydoodah. I've also been tagged a couple of times before but as those posts require photos I'm putting them off... As for tagging other folks, I don't like to put anyone under pressure! So straight on to the answers:

1) When were you most relaxed – and I mean so chilled you couldn’t move?

I remember a particularly sunny afternoon on Ynys Llandwyn, a kind of semi-island off Anglesey in North Wales. Lying on the grass above the beach, hearing the waves fizzing over the sand and bees buzzing in the sea thrift. Probably the odd seagull's cry up above. The water so bright and sparkly you could barely look at it. Clear views across to the mountains of Snowdonia. Warm sunshine on your face. An equally chilled husband next to me at that time.

2) Who in your life has changed you the most? (for good or bad)

I was going to say the aforementioned husband, as we met when I was 16 and split when I was 31 - that's a lot of time at such a changeable period of one's life. But... I think it's actually my son. There's nothing like having a child to make you think about what's important in life. And that it's generally the small, simple things. Also, when you have a newborn baby to look after you put your own needs on the backburner. I think that as that baby turns into a toddler and you maybe, just maybe, get to think a bit about yourself you re-evaluate what you think are your needs and wants.

3) What gets you up on your soap box – finger waving, rhetoric spouting, red-faced, passionately standing up for what you believe in?

I'm not a soap boxy sort of person. Confrontation scares me. I'm more of a quietly simmer but never say anything type. One of the big things that bugs me is when people think that everything in life comes down to money.

4) Which book/s have you read the most number of times (and are likely to read 100 times more)?

Lord of the Rings. Now I feel very cliched, but it's the book I turn to when I don't fancy anything else. A few times I've got to the end and started right back at the beginning. I guess it has that epic quality about it. I also love the idea of just heading off to tramp through the wilds. And I'm very short and fond of good food and ale.

5) Where is ‘Home’? The house you grew up in, the house you’re in now, or the house in your dreams?

The house I'm in now. I'm not one for nostalgia (and I don't like my parents' net curtains) and although I may daydream of a stone cottage by the sea somewhere on Britain's west coast my future is currently a bit of an unknown. I never thought I would move back to my home town, which is not really a place anyone would aspire to move to although I don't mind it. And I never thought I would have to buy a house on my own (or indeed that any mortgage company would lend me the money since I don't have a real job). But here I am, in my own house with my son and I've made it nice and cosy. If only I could afford a woodburning stove...

6) What attribute of yours would you most like to pass on to your children?

Erm, I'm thinking of things like self-reliance, determination, that horrible phrase: a can-do attitude. Not that I'm always like that.

7) How do you organise your life? Are you a list-maker, a scheduler or a “we’ll see when we get there” kinda person?

I used to be a list maker. Then I realised that whenever I weighed up decisions rationally, I still always ended up choosing the option that felt right. So that's what I do now. I do what feels right. I do a certain amount of forward planning, like trying to have fun things scheduled for days when I don't have the little man and I'm not working. Sometimes, if I start to feel overwhelmed by having lots of things to do, I'll write a to-do list and then try to make myself get through lots of the easier items on it so I feel like I've really dented it. But usually I ignore the to-do list and go out for cake instead. Or lose the book with the list in. I don't have a grand plan in life because I'm still dealing with the loss of the future I thought I had ahead of me.

8 ) And finally, because this one’s been bugging me for a while now: How much wood would a woodchuck chuck, if a woodchuck could chuck wood?

I reckon about three trees' worth a day. Depending on the type and size of tree. Maybe only one fully mature oak. Half a dozen ten-year-old silver birches. Unless we're talking pre-cut logs. And I'd like the woodchuck to chuck it in my direction; I'll store it all up for when I get my woodburner.

Up, down, up, down, up, down...

2010-08-07T22:10:00.000+01:00

Did you notice how I sneaked in with a post as if I'd never gone away? What do you mean, you never noticed I'd gone! I was suffering from a prolonged inability to post. I have been too busy with my obsession with listening to Biffy Clyro and generally sitting on my arse going bleurgh. At first it was the usual pre-menstrual madness. Then it turned into the during-menstrual madness. Then I thought I was fine. And wham, I got hit with an out-of-the-blue, absolutely unexplained wave of depression. You know, the whole 'Go away; I want to hide under the duvet all day and not talk to anyone' thing. I've got used to these things coming and going predictably (as predictably as polycystic ovary cycles lasting anywhere between 28 and 48 days can be) but this was all out of sync. However, it only lasted a few days and now I'm fine again. Which begs the question: What the fuck's going on?

I'm used to the ups and downs, the lethargic can't-be-arsed-ness and the over-hyped let-me-at-em ness. But this latest was completely unexpected. But also very short-lived. Now, I'm used to my emotions being up and down, that's fine - when you're feeling down you know it will pass and when you're a bit hyper you know you'll relax eventually. I tend to think everyone is like this to some extent (one in four and all that). What I'm not used to is unexpected depression with no apparent trigger that comes from nowhere and fuzzes your brain up so that picking up even just one pair of toddler socks from the living room floor becomes an impossible task. So that, in a nutshell that can't ever fully explain this stuff, is what was going on.

I have other things to say, things about little man's fairly comical development (seeing his left hand and his right hand arguing with each other is quite funny), things about simple living, and working (which I have volunteered to do more of), things about sleeping, co-sleeping and lying awake not sleeping when you should be sleeping, things about getting in touch with your inner teenager. But for now, I've supped some homemade elderflower champagne and have had a day tidying up a rather overgrown allotment, so it's off to bed for an early night.

Right now....

2010-08-05T08:02:00.000+01:00

I am absolutely bloody knackered from not being able to sleep properly then getting woken by the boy's arrival in the middle of the night.
I need a recipe for cornflake cakes that just uses cocoa powder instead of actual melted chocolate, because who could actually keep chocolate in stock in their cupboards?
I do not know where the baby fish is.
I cannot make the car fit inside the egg shell.
I am being cuddled up to by a boy who has a plastic slice of watermelon that he insists is a boat.
Tea, tea and more tea is required.
I have just remembered that the roadworks from hell on the M6 at Haydock are OVER at last and that I promised myself a bottle of something fizzy when this happened. And I don't mean diet Coke.
I am hoping the boy has forgotten the toy guitar I bought him yesterday and which has already been left behind at the other grandparents' house.
I am being given a slice of plastic bacon for breakfast. Yum.
I am looking out of my north-facing window and trying to decide if a picnic with friends in Lancashire is going to become an indoor picnic.
I am considering burning the grubby net curtains that hide the electric and gas meters inside a cupboard and which I intended to replace months ago with something prettier but have still not got around to.
I am also considering whether to ask the boy's father to have him on Saturday night even though it's not his weekend for that because I am just so effing tired I am struggling to function.

In hiding

2010-07-28T21:15:00.000+01:00

Normal service will be resumed soon... for now I have pre-menstrual mood swings, preoccupations, decisions, ditherings, sleeplessness, obsessive musical listenings, cross-stitching and courgette chutney making.

Little blue book

2010-07-22T08:04:00.001+01:00

I've lost it, my little blue book with cutesy white spots. I've lost my to-do list. The one I often ignore for weeks on end but usually glance at just in time to avert major financial disaster. I've lost my shopping wishlist. This is the one that tells me the Stuff I think little man or I could do with so that when I get the urge to spend money I spend it on something that might actually be useful and not a pile of pointless junk. And not more tunes from a well-known digital music store where it is far too easy to splash the cash without really noticing. I've lost my list of crafty projects I'd like to do, or should do - like the curtains that I haven't made for seven months now.

Other things in our lives right now:

The boy has purple nail varnish on his toes.
I can't stop listening to Biffy Clyro.
We've had so much torrential rain it has been impossible to even think about doing any work at the allotment.
My courgettes are turning into marrows.
I once again have library fines to pay, exacerbated by the fact that my nearest library doesn't open on a Wednesday, a fact I discovered after walking there with all the books and boy in tow.
I am becoming increasingly bothered by the hideousness of my gas fire.
This is a three cups of tea morning.
I am not that keen on runner beans.
I am being politely requested (read: bashed over the head with the magnetic drawing board thingy to wails of pig, pig, pig) to draw a picture of Peppa Pig so had better go and get on with it.

Holidaying with a two-year-old

2010-07-18T22:01:00.000+01:00

So here are my top tips for taking a two-year-old on holiday alone, albeit to a friend's house:

Borrow a portable DVD player then don't actually use it because you never got round to working out how and you manage to entertain the child with a Peppa Pig magnetic doodle board thingy, books and a colouring book.
Prepare to stop at unexpected times or places on the journey, such as the most depressing service station on the planet (Happenden, just south of Glasgow) or the shores of Loch Lomond.
Don't bother to plan where the child will sleep or take any kind of blow-up toddler bed because the child will be sleeping in your bed.
Remember to have a stock of oatcakes, rice cakes, bananas, satsumas, sultanas, breadsticks and those expensive but handy organic oaty fruity bars about your person at all times.
If you think you should take the buggy on an outing, take the sling, and if you think you should take the sling, take the buggy.
Expect to spend a long time doing things that may become tedious to you, such as walking into the edge of the sea and out again. And in, and out again. And in, and out again.
Do not take a toddler into a pottery shop regardless of how much you like pottery.
Do not leave your wallet on top of the car at a petrol station and drive off 30 miles to a campsite before realising and returning to find that all your cards have been run over and strewn across the carriageway of a busy A road.
Try to avoid having to erect a tent in a thunderstorm and torrential rain.
Remember that the child will be more interested in muddy puddles and toadstools than sitting in the pub, even if people are playing music in the pub and he briefly wants to join in.
Try to bypass all ice cream signs and work out how to explain that you don't carry ice cream in your pockets and one does not generally have ice cream for breakfast.
Do have a nice time and do some of the things you want to do regardless of how much harder they are going to be with the company of the small person.

Little man's holiday report

2010-07-15T18:17:00.000+01:00

I forgot to mention our holiday for the benefit of non-facebookers. The boy and mummy have been to Oban in Scotland to stay with a friend for five nights, followed by a night's camping at Moffat on the way back down. So here's some of little man's holiday experiences, once more in the style of the facebook status update. Little man:

stirred Loch Lomond with a stick.
held a starfish and stroked a hermit crab's shell at the Sea Life Centre.
sounded quite tuneful on mummy's friend's piano and quite liked playing the dulcimer and the tin whistles too.
joined in playing folk music at the pub on the tambourine.
got drenched splashing in muddy puddles outside the pub.
paddled in the sea and collected pretty shells.
got very excited on the boat trip to the island of Kerrera.
but was frightened by the langoustines at the restaurant on Kerrera, even after they had been cooked.
liked scaring mummy by insisting on walking up and down the floating jetties past all the posh boats.
became very attached to the 'truck' at the park.
climbed a mountain the easy way, by cable car, and was underwhelmed by the views but impressed with stepping stones over a stream.
wouldn't move off the top step of the baby pool at the leisure centre.
kept noticing poisonous-looking toadstools.
thought thunder sounded like wind in the trees.
stayed awake til after half past ten on the night of camping.
kept telling mummy to go into cafes for cups of tea, but didn't really want to stay put while she drank them.
likes the word 'boots', especially when referring to wellie boots and big puddles after torrential rain.
enjoyed the adventure play area at Westmoreland Services but was fed up of being in the car by the time he got home.

A little spot of paradise... and the pit of doom

2010-07-08T21:50:00.000+01:00

Sorry about the gloominess of this shot. I'm sure if I had Photowotsit or some such I could lighten it. But hey, let's keep it real - I took it at dusk, therefore it's gloomy. But still it shows off the newly cleaned-up and stained decking, the lilac painted back wall, my cheery flowers and herbs and my newly retrieved table and chairs. I did have to drive around with the table in the back of my car for three days because it wouldn't fit through my front door or down the side alley. Then I mentioned it to the ex by text. I thought his reply was calling me a spanner. Actually, he was telling me I needed a spanner to take the top off. Oh, right.

There is more to the yard round to the left, down the side of the kitchen, although it's still considerably smaller than the garden I had pre-marital breakdown.

Ah yes, the pit of doom. And this is just the easily visible bit. Underneath the decking there is more junk, including what looks like an old toilet bowl. Nice. Sorting all this out is somewhere further down my to-do list. Anyone want two tatty white plastic garden chairs?

Gym'll fix it

2010-07-05T10:49:00.000+01:00

I joined a gym a couple of months ago. I've been most weeks. (That was my aim since I have just two mornings a week when I can actually go to a gym as well as getting a million and one toddler-incompatible things done.) It goes against a lot of what I value and enjoy. Such as being outdoors amidst greenery and fresh air. Shunning daft machinery designed to do something you could do outdoors amidst the greenery and fresh air, like run, climb hills, cycle or row. Avoiding dance music at all costs. Not spending money on special clobber just to look good whilst prancing about on said machinery.

However. It's hard to get such an intensive hit of exercise out in the fresh air. Especially when running is out of the question. I am simply not built for it. I always feel better for spending an hour in the gym. I have energy despite the teething toddler sleep deprivation. I can even tolerate the music; it helps alleviate the boredom associated with repetitive movements. I even think I look quite good in black Lycra. I now weigh 11 stone despite eating the odd cake and slurping the odd glass (bottle) of wine. That's about 24 lbs less than I weighed at the beginning of the year.

There are a few factors that make going to the gym work and if they weren't in place I probably wouldn't even consider it. It's the council gym, so it's cheap, basic and friendly. I'm usually the youngest person in there by about thirty years. It's three minutes' walk away from my house. My membership also covers my weekly swim and my yoga class at two other leisure centres in the borough. I have a certain discount designer store in my vicinity so I can get decent clobber at bargain prices.

And I've been out climbing hills too, so I've had a big dose of fresh air, rocks, scenery and the odd bit of adrenaline provoked by steep drops:

Right now...

2010-07-02T07:43:00.000+01:00

...I'm in need of a second cuppa to wake me up. And probably a third.
...I've realised my jam set too hard despite my efforts with cold saucers.
...The boy is whining because he's tired and teething, although he's quite happy that he found a pile of loose change and I've given him a little knitted bag to put it in.
...I'm glad it rained overnight as it means I don't have to water my pots today.
...I'm trying to remember if I fed the fish when we first came downstairs a mere half an hour ago.
...I'm looking forward to trying on my new walking trousers.
...I'm wondering whether to do my usual Friday swim, boy in creche, or to go to the woods instead.
...I'm devising a plan that will let me have a lunchtime nap with the boy.
...I'm looking at my guitar and realising I haven't picked it up to play since I replaced the broken string (the one I broke about a week after changing all the strings).
...I'm wondering if there are enough out-of-date dried beans in my cupboards to make a set of beanbags, and if there is suitable fabric in my stash.
...I'm wondering where the handles of the cupboards where the fabric stash is stored have gone since they were all unscrewed by the boy.
...The boy is whining because he's trying to slot pennies between his toes and they keep falling out.
...I'm remembering there are onions lying on a bench at the allotment supposedly drying out that have in fact just been rained on.
...The boy is whining because a pound coin rolled away.
...I'm looking at all the toys and crumbs on the floor in despair.
...The boy is whining because his coins won't stack.
...I'm going to put the kettle on.

Transformation

2010-07-01T18:54:00.000+01:00

Another hour or so of picking and feeling like I was playing twister whilst getting scratched by raspberry canes and nettled... and I had another 1.4kg of strawberries. There was only one thing for it. I think I've made jam before although I don't have a distinct memory of it so I wasn't entirely sure what I was doing. The result is very dark, but the strawberries were very ripe and they took a while to reach setting point so they were very well boiled.

In an ideal world...

2010-06-29T19:18:00.000+01:00

Babies would come complete with teeth.
The arrival of little man's final two molars would not have coincided with mummy having PMT.
Mummy would have had her Mooncup boiled and ready before her period started.
Little boys would instinctively know how to use a hankie.
Rain would come at regular intervals rather than vast quantities in a short period of time after weeks of drought.
Mummies would not be distracted by their children in the back of the car whilst passing a mobile speed camera positioned about a hundred yards before the change from a 40 to 60mph zone.
The tastiest food would also be the healthiest.
Therefore, cakes would be calorie-free.
Clothes would make it into drawers and wardrobes between being washed and being worn again.
Internet connections would not inexplicably stop working.
Children would not be automatically drawn to the one thing they shouldn't mess around with.
Everything would be where it belongs, including, for example, the tin of pins being actually in the sewing box and the kitchen scissors being in the kitchen utensils pot.
Toddlers would be compatible with mummy's desire to do crafty things.
I would have remembered I need to put the washing out on the line instead of writing this before it's time for little man's bath.
Life would be dull and predictable.

Getting away from it all

2010-06-26T20:54:00.000+01:00

The little man and I have survived two nights' camping in Silverdale in north Lancashire. The rose-tinted, blogsville, let's look on the bright side version goes something like this:

The weather was stunningly warm and sunny, which meant we got a fantastic view over the Lake District from the top of Arnside Knott.
We did lots of little ambles, pottering through the woods, sauntering along the beach, finding empty snail shells, checking holly leaves for prickliness, tripping over tree roots and marvelling at butterflies.
Little man particularly enjoyed the muddy beach at Arnside. Not only did he get to scoop up handfuls of mud and throw it into the incoming tide, but he also got to watch trains go over the long bridge over the Kent estuary. Boy bliss. I drew him pictures in the mud with a rock.
We ate yummy proper ice cream, prompting his first ever demand to go to a 'shop'. I eventually realised he meant the cafe where we bought ice cream and played with their ride-on car.
We had a hideously nutritionally deficient picnic mostly consisting of sausage rolls (from a craft bakery, of course!), crisps (the organic sort aimed at babies and toddlers for no reason I can actually fathom) and a satsuma. We sat on the picnic blanket in the dappled shade of some oak trees and watched squirrels scampering about. Little man is charmingly fond of going for a 'picpic'.
There was plenty of space on the campsite for little man to run around, mostly without the usual worries about traffic or vicious dogs. He was very excited about the tent and kept going in it to play, despite the fact it must have been about 40C in there in the daytime.
I feel like I've had a break just from being somewhere so beautiful and peaceful. I saw a little stone place called Woodwell Cottage where I could happily retire, right now, and spend my time knitting bobble hats and making wonky pottery jugs.

Obviously, there were some fairly significant negative aspects, mostly concerning sleep, or the extreme lack thereof. Also tantrums, the first proper kicking and screaming type ones (something tells me this is not unrelated to the previous point). And running away, not due to the innate desire to explore but due to the desire to disrupt whatever boring but essential task mummy's trying to get done, such as cooking dinner, washing up or packing the car. And cooking on little gas burners with a toddler about wasn't much fun either. I don't think I can adequately describe just how much harder and more exhausting it is being alone with a two-year-old in such circumstances.

But hey, I'd do it again. In fact my memory of the bad things is already fading, as it helpfully tends to. I quite fancy Rhosneigr on Anglesey and Eskdale in Cumbria. I just wouldn't recommend it to anyone else unless you, like me, have a ridiculous need to 'get away from it all' into the middle of nowhere every now and again, and you have the ability to sink into ever lower depths of knackeredness and frazzledness and somehow manage to carry on regardless.

Three nice things

2010-06-19T08:05:00.000+01:00

1. Cross stitched hearts on linen. They may become an embellishment on some kind of little bag or picture made from my fabric stash, which is mostly old clothes.
2. Flowers in a salad, namely pansies and chive heads. Salad is good at the moment. Lettuce, radishes, beetroot, mangetout and courgettes are all provided from my dad's allotment. Herbs and flowers from the pots in my back yard.
3. The lighthouse on Ynys Llandwyn. The picture is not great as it was pissing down with rain and I got drenched. I wanted to take pictures of the pretty snails all over the island, but the camera was getting too wet. On the other hand, if it hadn't been raining, the snails wouldn't have all been out.

I love those blogs I read that often come with beautiful photography. The sort that inspires you to get off your backside and do something creative. My pictures are very much point and shoot I'm afraid.

I'm being dragged off to see the snails in the fish tank now. They're not supposed to be there, but I don't suppose they're doing any harm. So bye for now.

Whassat?

2010-06-17T09:35:00.000+01:00

Whassat? Goose poo.
Whassat? A feather.
Whassat? A police car.
Whassat? Rubbish.
Whassat? A dog barking.
Whassat? A cement mixer.
Whassat? A flag.
Whassat? A shopping trolley in the canal.
Whassat? A sycamore seed.

That was in a ten-minute walk back from the garage (where I have spent a small fortune on servicing and a new timing belt). We haven't even got on to the why, why, why yet.

Here's my big why for the day: Why do I have to sit and be jolly with the little man while we make a card for daddy for this Sunday?

A little light poetry

2010-06-13T21:56:00.000+01:00

We've all been there, haven't we? Deciding to write poetry whilst drunk at some point in our angst-ridden teens? No? Oh, just me then. Anyway, here's a little something from the eighteenth-century Japanese Zen poet Ryokan that is reminiscent of such incidents, with less of the angst:

Stone steps, a mound of lustrous green moss;
The wind carries the scent of cedar and pine.
The rain has stopped and it is beginning to clear.
I call to the children as I walk to get some village sake.
After drinking too much, I happily write these verses.

As translated by John Stevens in One Robe, One Bowl: The Zen Poetry of Ryokan (2006, Weatherhill).

Just one of my new books that arrived last week. How ironic that I have to buy books to remind me that I'm trying to live a simple, low-cost, less consumerist kind of life. Oh well, cheers!

Doing Stuff

2010-06-10T21:32:00.000+01:00

I haven't been feeling very inspired to blog of late. And in the past few days I've had sudden urges to Do Stuff instead. Like cross-stitch pretty red hearts on undyed linen. Sort through the kitchen cupboards. Vacuum the bedrooms. Book my car in for a service. Draw round mine and little man's hands and string the results across the dining room. Grate freshly pulled-up beetroot into salads. Deadhead pansies. Drink green tea with mint. Phone the tax credits people.

I'm not sure when this flurry of activity will end. I'm just going with the flow in a slightly bemused taoist manner. Of course, the activity has been interspersed with plenty of shared naps, sitting down for a nice cuppa, gazing at trees blowing in the wind and sitting on my backside watching telly. I wouldn't want to overdo it.

I've been musing on a post about simple living, one about cookbooks, another about my perfect playlist for driving, one about the driving itself. Maybe one about toddler learning. By which I probably mean un-learning or something. Possibly even a post about measures of success in life. But I'm going to stick to my general life philosophy: I'll do them when I feel like it. So much easier to wait until then, I find.

Letter to Australia

2010-06-06T20:05:00.002+01:00

To: Mum and dad, somewhere in the Australian outback.

Thanks for the postcards, it sounds like you are having a fantastic time. Little man especially likes the thorny devil picture. He still thinks you are on every plane that goes overhead. And he wants to go on a plane too. I've told him he can when he's a bit older.

S and I have found the perfect solution to your gooseberry glut. They're fermenting nicely. The rhubarb brew is coming along well too. The allotment is relatively weed free. The raspberries have some sort of orange fungus on them. Little man is steadily eating his way through all the onion leaves for some reason.

Sat out in your garden with some friends a couple of weeks ago to keep the frogs company. We're having a barbecue there soon. I see you've been running your wine rack down though. I might even have to buy some. Shocking.

The car's running ok. I'm going to take it to work tomorrow. I've strewn a bit of rubbish around the passenger footwell to make it feel more familiar. I've also retuned the radio to get rid of whatever easy listening station you had it on. It's now tuned to Rock Radio and my iPod frequency.

No major news to report. I now have a blue bin. Little man and I may go to Oban for a few days next month.

J x

Questions

2010-06-01T19:55:00.000+01:00

How can my son shun chocolate sponge pudding then ask for a Ryvita?
Why does he always eat the leaves of the onions at the allotment?
Why is there always sand in his shoes even when we've been nowhere near any sand?
Why did he tell me to shush when we went for a walk in the woods today?
Why is my quiet next-door neighbour moving house and not the one whose telly I can often hear loud and clear at midnight?
Where can I buy mini egg cups to fit my bantam eggs?
Why, nearly eighteen months after splitting up, am I still not sure whether my marriage is actually over or not?
Why do I have an insane desire to take my son camping when it gets light at around 4am?
Why isn't The Vampire Diaries on tonight?
What day is it anyway?
Are my goldfish happy?
What does 'aween' mean in my son's world?
Was he listening to my language today when I a) gouged my finger on the clothes airer and b) stubbed my toe?
Why do I want to listen to Paolo Nutini whilst doing housework and AC/DC whilst driving?
When will I get time to go and climb Tryfan?
What time will little man wake up tomorrow?

One of the shittier weeks in the history of shitness

2010-05-29T20:47:00.001+01:00

What with little man puking up all over me and the ex's bizarre text mistake and my pre-period fuzziness it's been a weird week.

The puking started in the early hours of Monday at daddy's house. He was sick twice in the night there. I put it down to him being pumped too full of fruit. Or being given juice to drink, which he never gets at home. He seemed fine back home with me. Until Wednesday morning. When he gesticulated for a banana, scoffed it, then brought it back up down the front of my pyjamas. Nice. He was his usual crazy self straight afterwards. But then when I got home from work at eight thirty that evening I found him still awake and saving up his puke for me. Thursday and Friday he was just a little more clingy and subdued than normal. Then as I went to bed on Friday I went in to check on him and discovered he'd been sick again, apparently without waking up. So now I don't know if it will happen again or what is causing it. I would have thought a bug would make him sick more frequently but for less time overall...

Then, on Friday morning, I got The Text. This is a really odd one. It was from little man's daddy and contained the words 'I love you'. I've never really known what happened to his relationship with the woman I found out he'd been shagging about eighteen months ago. But I assumed this text was meant for her. I texted back so he knew it had gone astray. And in a bizarre twist, the ex actually said it was some kind of sarcastic discussion with a family member about a problem at work. Right, ok. It seems such an unlikely explanation I guess it might actually be true, although he's actually quite free to say those words to whoever he likes. It was just very upsetting for me when I'm trying to get over him and it was not my choice to end our marriage in the first place.

On top of all that, my period started on the Friday morning too and I've been feeling really exhausted all week heading up to that. So the house is a mess, many things that should have been done haven't been done and many things that shouldn't have been consumed have been consumed. I also missed my lunchtime nap today because the boy woke up as I got him out of the car to carry him upstairs to bed. And his hair still smells of sick after last night, when I just wiped him up as best I could at half ten rather than wake him up fully to get him properly clean. I gave him a bath this morning but his hair is still stinky in that really special-smelling vomity kind of way.

Still, we made gingerbread biscuits this afternoon. And I made him a paper boat and aeroplane. And we spent ages watching a snail at the park.

Toddlerwearing

2010-05-25T20:23:00.000+01:00

I thought my sling hoard was complete. I'm even thinking of selling some on. But now I'm wondering if, in fact, I need a new one. Little man only ever wants to go in the Yamo. He protests mightily if I suggest the Storchenwiege instead. Unfortunately, he has finally grown big enough that the Yamo is a) not supportive enough of him if he falls asleep and b) not that comfy for my back for more than half an hour or so.

So I'm wondering if I need something designed with toddlers in mind as I still have an instinctive dislike of the pushchair. Sure, there are days when it comes in handy and days when I can't be bothered carrying him. But generally it makes me feel encumbered. I don't like sticking to a certain quality of path if I go out for a walk and I don't like struggling in and out of shops or trying to find somewhere to park it in cafes. I do like that the little man is up at my level and I can talk to him over my shoulder.

So this is a warning really, that babywearing is addictive and very bad for the bank balance. Now, what do I go for...

Climb every mountain...

2010-05-23T22:25:00.001+01:00

Imagine the conversation between me and someone who's part of a group I'm climbing Snowdon with; most of this group have never climbed a mountain.

Her: 'So have you done this before?'
Me: 'Yeah, quite a few times... but not for years.' ('Quite a few times' is a big understatement.)

Then there are the general conversations about walking where I can talk knowledgeably about most of the hills in Snowdonia and a fair few elsewhere but always include the line: 'I used to do a lot of walking/scrambling.'

Well, I've got fed up of the 'used to' and realised how important walking up hills is to me. Don't ask me to explain why; I find there's no need for a reason. Ironically, the ex and I first got to know each other by going out in the hills together. I remember him holding my hand because I was slipping in the snow coming down between Carnedd Llewelyn and Daffyd.

But as you get caught up in, first, the nine to five of sitting in an office and commuting and being knackered by the weekend, then, secondly, the demands of being a parent, it's easy to let things that are important to you slip away. Well, I think there's a compromise in there somewhere. I think that parents, and probably mothers most of all, need to have some time to do things that are important to them as individuals and not just as parents. Things that are fundamentally part of their identity.

Of course, I wish I could have had nice family weekends where little man gets to do fun things with mummy and daddy - at the same time. But I'm also glad I have the opportunity to do 'me' things. And being a single mum when there's a dad around who's still very much committed to his son actually makes this potentially easier than it is for happily marrieds.

Yesterday, I had asked daddy to pick little man up at half eight so I could go and climb a lovely little hill called Cnicht, pictured above. It was a bit humid but still a fine day out.

Another 'used to' I'm working on is playing the guitar. I restrung my acoustic last week. All by myself. Now I just need to keep strumming those chords until the fingertips of my left hand stop going numb.

The ultimate spag bol

2010-05-21T16:36:00.001+01:00

Yeah, I know everyone can make spag bol, but I find this combination of ingredients particularly scrummy so I thought I'd share.

You need:
Decent minced beef (you know, preferably without chewy bits)
Pancetta
Onion
Carrot
Celery
Garlic
Tinned toms
Tom puree
Beef stock cube (I know, highly inauthentic and a big cheat)
Red wine
Oregano, bay leaves, nutmeg

What you do:
Finely chop the onion, celery, carrot and garlic.

Brown the mince in some olive oil, drain off the excess fat and stick it in a bowl to vacate the pan. I tend to use about a kg of beef and make a reasonably big batch for freezing.

Brown the pancetta and stick it in the bowl with the mince.

Bung the veg in the pan and soften over a low heat, stirring every now and again. Then return the meat to the pan.

Now pour in a generous slurp of wine. I'd go for at least half a bottle, preferably two thirds. Also add the toms, a whole tube of tom puree or tinned equivalent, beef stock cube and herbs. I go for a couple of bay leaves, a desert spoon or so of dried oregano and a generous grating of nutmeg.

Now comes the crucial bit. Get it up to the boil, give it all a good stir together, then turn it down to the lowest heat you can and ignore it for a couple of hours. Maybe three. Or so. You can stir it every now and again but it's not that important. I'd recommend going out for a walk in the sunshine.

If it's boiled dry and stuck by the time you get back, you obviously didn't put enough wine in. Perhaps you were saving it to drink? Well don't be stingy, open another bottle!

Serve with the pasta shape of your toddler's choice and a sprinkling of grated Parmesan. We like spaghetti (big comedy factor) or penne (opportunity for sticking your fingers inside the tubes). If you're cunning like me, you'll grate a big block of Parmesan at a time and bung it in a tub in the freezer.

Some people talk of such things as chicken livers. Some may use half pork mince. Feel free to tell me if your ultimate spag bol differs from mine in some delicious way.

It's all good fun really

2010-05-18T22:23:00.001+01:00

So he whinges and whines a lot, and doesn't listen to a word I say, and causes chaos everywhere he goes, and won't ever be discouraged when he's set his heart on doing something he shouldn't be doing, and always tries to pull away from me and run off when we're next to busy roads/car parks, but...

he gives big wet kisses and the only way he knows is smack bang on the lips.
he brings me imaginary tea and cakes.
he gets very upset if I go near other toddlers or babies and shouts 'me mummy'.
he pretends that oatcakes and onion rings are steering wheels.
he gives the puppy at the end of the Dear Zoo book a big cuddle.
he nibbles his toast into the shape of boats.
when he sees a picture of a hedgehog, or the spiky fish in the Hoorary for Fish book, he touches it and yells 'ow'.
he also has to test any holly hedges we go near to check they're spiky.
when you ask him to smell a flower, he snorts out on it instead.
if he can't say what he wants, he grabs my hand and drags me off to show me.
olives are his favourite food.

Being single means...

2010-05-16T22:14:00.000+01:00

no-one messes up the margarine tub (what is with the gouging?).
feeling sad when you take your son out on a Saturday knowing he will never have the proper family days out that you see other kids having all around you.
being able to watch what you want on the telly... and switch it off whenever you want to instead of having it on in the background all the bloody time.
having a very big bed all to yourself... and the resulting lack of the obvious.
no-one leaving the switches down on electrical sockets that aren't actually in use.
eating pasta and pesto for dinner when you can't be bothered to cook.
not having anyone to bring you a cup of tea in bed in the morning.
having to put up your tent by yourself whilst keeping an eye on the child.
no complaints about the number of books you have.
feeling like you're asking a big favour when you want a full day to yourself.
missing the child because he had an extra night with daddy because you wanted a full day to yourself.
no random cupboard doors and drawers left open for no apparent reason.
no-one to talk to or give you a hug if you're feeling down.
no double check on whether you locked the back door at night.
a big nothing when you think about the future because you don't know if you'll ever meet anyone or not or quite how that would work while you have a young child anyway.
not being asked to proofread any dull technical reports at 10pm just as you were thinking about going to bed.
knowing what you own, and the rough whereabouts of it all, instead of having a garage/loft full of miscellaneous junk.

Snoozing

2010-05-14T12:57:00.000+01:00

Well, it's taken a couple of weeks in the big boy's bed but he has finally realised he can get up by himself in the morning. And come and find mummy, which is fine. And run her over with the Fat Controller's car or a tractor or whatever other mode of motorised transport he took to bed the previous night, which is not so good. With this realisation have come some earlier mornings. Previously, he was sleeping past seven most mornings. This week it's been mostly half six, culminating in a cheery 'Mummy!' at 5am this morning. Followed by much fidgeting and digging of tiny toes into my ribs.

I realise I'm very lucky compared with some folks that my little man does now usually sleep a good twelve hours solid. And, just to rub it in, this morning I got so fed up of his constant fidgeting I carried him back to his own bed at half five, tucked him in, said night night and he actually stayed there and went back to sleep until quarter past seven. I was rather surprised.

Daytime naps still usually require a trip in the car though. Yesterday, I took him out for an hour's walk to get some fresh air and sunshine, thinking he would doze off in the buggy. (I couldn't be bothered carrying him, ok; I'm not supermum!) Anyway, he whinged and whined and was still wide awake when we got home. I stuck him in the car and two minutes down the Daresbury Expressway he was fast asleep.

That was the day I had the funny dream about barbecuing. Apologies to facebook people who read it on my status. I carried the little man inside and thought, bugger the housework I'm having a snooze too. I duly dozed off only to be startled awake when I dreamed I was having a barbecue and that I burned my hand on the tongs. Yes, I'm that clumsy. Clumsy enough to burn myself in my sleep with an imaginary kitchen utensil.

Some facts... according to a two-year-old

2010-05-11T19:14:00.000+01:00

Thomas the Tank Engine is a god.
Window ledges are railways, runways or racetracks.
Boxes are to be emptied and climbed in.
Shells are for scooping sand.
Water is to be splashed in, spare clothes or no spare clothes and no matter how many times mummy tries to redirect me.
Milk is for small people to drink, not for putting in mummy's tea.
Lemon slices are there to be consumed in their entirety, not just to look pretty in the jug.
Artistically placed old tractors are to be climbed on.
Paper is boring to draw on; hands, clothes and furniture are better.
Ice cream is the perfect foodstuff.
Mummies spend too much time in cafes.
I am allowed to cause chaos because people still love me when I smile and wave bye-bye in a cute manner.
My toys are my toys and not for sharing.
Noodles are snakes, or worms.
Dancing along with Upsy Daisy is a compulsory activity for everyone present.
I know what I mean, so everyone else should too.

Five things...

2010-05-09T21:47:00.000+01:00

...I'd like to be able to do:

Play the guitar (like I could when I was eighteen).
Roll a kayak.
Chop wood (and have a stove to burn it in).
The whole of the 24-step Yang-style tai chi form.
Walk the Offa's Dyke Path.

Strange days

2010-05-06T21:24:00.000+01:00

This has been one of them. Little man slept until 9am. Yes, you read that right. 9am. Of course, he had a little cry at around half five to make sure I got woken up, then he went back to sleep. I got up at 8am and had a cup of tea. I took in the veg delivery. I thought, bugger it, I'm going to risk him waking up in the middle of my shower. He didn't. I got dressed. I went and made another cuppa. He finally woke up.

I would normally think, oh well, he obviously had some catching up to do. But I'm supposed to be looking out for symptoms of Lyme disease after finding a tick chomping on his leg on Tuesday. Flu-like symptoms and 'bull's eye' shaped rashes. I decided not to panic when he seemed like his usual crazy self. I asked him who I should vote for at the polling station, but he didn't seem to have an opinion on the matter. He was too busy showing everyone his daisies, which he then tried to put in my hair.

At lunchtime, I made myself a big salad with a carefully measured portion of posh feta containing precisely 14 grammes of fat. Little man decided he liked feta. For the first time ever. So I ate some of the ham I'd bought for him as a change from cheddar cheese or houmous. Still, I'm steadily losing weight. The goal now is to be 10 stone something. I don't care if it's 10 stone 13 and a half pounds as long as it's 10 stone something. Unfortunately I'd have to lose over another stone for my BMI to be supposedly normal. My conversation with the doctor about this is another story. No doc, losing weight has not changed my bra size.

After his lie-in, little man wasn't sleepy at his usual time, but not long after lunch he was flagging so we had a drive up the expressway and back. Then I carried him inside and we both went to bed. For another of those two-hour afternoon naps. It sounds blissful, but actually it just made me feel grotty afterwards. I had to go into the backyard for some fresh air in an attempt to wake up again. I swapped bulbs for French marigolds and pelargoniums in some of my containers and potted up some herb seedlings. Little man, meanwhile, threw sand off the decking onto the concrete area below. I've asked him not to, it seems such a waste and makes a mess. I've tried taking him back inside when he does it but he still goes back to it again next time. I figure it's not important enough to make an issue of.

At tea-time, he ate cabbage, having shunned anything remotely resembling a leaf ever since weaning. A strange day indeed. At least tonight he's only taken a small toy car to bed. Not like the tambourine I had to remove last night.

Assessments and allotments

2010-05-03T21:49:00.001+01:00

A health visitor finally arrived last week to see little man. It seems no-one at the doc's had told them we'd moved to the area. Anyway, it turned out to be a health visitor at the more common sense end of the spectrum. As she filled in forms, little man was playing and showing us things and saying the odd intelligible word and grabbing her pen off her. So the health visitor announced that she certainly had no concerns about his development and we talked about poultry keeping and allotments instead.

I wrote to the council last week too, expressing my concern about the length of the allotment waiting list. I discovered that my highest placing on the list for any of the four sites in the town is 80-something. For the other three it's over 100. They say the wait is now three to four years. I suspect it's going to be considerably longer. It seems a bit unfair that some people got their hands on more than one allotment back when there was no waiting list and they can't be turfed off now because they have a tenancy agreement. There's an empty field round the corner; I might have to get on with some guerilla gardening.

Pitter patter on the window

2010-04-30T22:26:00.000+01:00

Just a quickie here to express my delight at hearing rain on the window. Yes, you heard. April in my neck of the woods has been abnormally dry and now, just as the buds burst on the lime trees opposite my house, we're getting a decent bit of rain. You know, the rain we're supposed to get in April to help this green and pleasant land stay green and pleasant. And yes, you know, the lime trees that are going to drip sticky nectar over my car if I have to park on the grass verge. Then again, I don't think it could make it look much worse... must get round to renewing that tape on the bumper.

Where I used to live was in a very exposed spot. There was nothing to break the wind and rain between our bit of Wigan and the Irish Sea. Now, although I am a stone's throw from the Mersey, it's a lot more sheltered. I used to hate the windy weather. I never could get in touch with that part of nature's ferocity. All I thought about was the unexplained leak above the kitchen window and the vulnerability of the trees I had planted. Now I don't have trees to worry about because I don't have a garden any more. And all my window frames look like they were made for a different house where they might have fitted.

Anyway, happy soggy Beltane. If you want fecundity, I guess you have to live with the rain.

Busy little bee

2010-04-29T21:22:00.001+01:00

Hello, it's Sir Whingealot here for a change to tell you about my day. I had a nice ride on Thomas the Tank Engine at the supermarket but I don't know why mummy always says I can't go on it until after we've done the shopping. And why can't I have one of the bananas as soon as they go in the trolley? I'd also quite like to press the buttons on that little machine she puts her debit card in. And why she insists on trying to get me to sit in the actual toddler seat in the trolley is beyond me.

After that we went to the library and I wanted mummy to carry me there but she keeps saying I'm getting too heavy. I pointed out some buses, and aeroplanes, and street lights for her, just in case she hadn't noticed them. I saw lots of balloons in the shops on the way there but mummy wouldn't get me one. At the library we were supposed to be singing some songs but it wasn't very lively so I decided to run around instead. Even the fact that a real fireman was joining in the singing couldn't persuade me to take part. So mummy said she wasn't going to just chase me round the library and we went back to the car. Pretty soon after that I felt like having a doze. I have a feeling mummy did something interesting while I was asleep because we have gained a pot of paint. But I didn't wake up until we were back home. And then I was very grumpy for a while, but I felt better after cuddles.

It rained all afternoon so we pottered about the house. I nibbled oatcakes into the shape of boats but refused to touch any cheese today. I played with some toys I hadn't seen for a while, which mummy was trying to sneak away for the charity shop. I played night night-good morning in my lovely new bed. I took my toolbox for a walk in the buggy. I got very frustrated with jigsaws that wouldn't jig and magnets that wouldn't stick and the fact that we couldn't find all my squeaky eggs.

Grandma and grandad, and even great grandma, came to visit and brought me a cookie. I think mummy might have swiped the other half of it though. We all had lots of fun with a plastic orange. Then it was tea and bath and bedtime. Yawn. I gave mummy a big wet hug from in the bath before she went to do yogo with the Piplings, then grandma and grandad put me to bed and I plan to dream about being Timmy the tiger.

Tired and wild

2010-04-27T21:12:00.000+01:00

The boy was tired. That explains it all. He should have been napping and instead I dragged him off to Jo Jingles and expected him to wait for his sleep. That's why he decided to repeatedly go and rattle the door handle even though I asked him not to in case someone opened the door into him. That's why he ran around at full speed and fell flat on his face. That's why he was the one child peering under the table cloth for goodies, such as the balloon intended for a birthday girl, and reaching on top of the table for anything he could get hold of. The one child doing his own thing instead of joining in, although he often does anyway.

That's why I picked him up to try to calm him down and have a little chat with him, particularly about the door. And that's why he was shaking his head about in a crazy fashion. And that's why he headbutted me in the nose. Really hard. Ouch.

My self critic briefly kicked in, telling me that other people might be disapproving of the fact that my child was running around like a loon while all the others were sitting still and listening and joining in. Maybe I should have been attempting to deal with this delinquent behaviour. Maybe I shouldn't be allowed to go to toddler groups where my child can be a bad influence on other little people. Maybe I've created this monstrous child by failing to be authoritarian enough.

But I say briefly because this, of course, is nonsense. He just needed a sleep, having been up early and also having had less sleep than usual at daddy's over the weekend due to the excitement of those grandparents returning from a long trip away. And the critic was purely internal. And the boy is charming and adorable even when he is ignoring my every word.