Like Water For Chocolate

Oh, now I get it.

I'm not the world's best cook. It may even be stretching the point to use the word 'cook'. However, this is my last week of maternity leave, and dammit, I've been attempting to 'parent'.

I had a half-remembered childhood memory of edible Easter nests made with shredded wheat and chocolate. It seemed like a good idea at the time. After all, how hard can it be to;

a) crumble shredded wheat in bowl,

b) melt chocolate,

c) mix shredded wheat and chocolate to form nests.


What a great mother-daughter project! Instant happy childhood memories!

I even sort of remembered that you should melt the chocolate in a double boiler. Not having one to hand though, I decided to wing it. While Anna steadily ate her way through square after square of Cadbury's chocolate I set about boiling some water. I floated a dish in a pan (so far so good!) and put the chocolate inside. Genius! Except when I tried to stir the chocolate the dish tipped ever so slightly and the smallest amount of water mixed with the chocolate where it turned in to instant crap. Of course, I didn't realise what had happened and thought, hmm, it's taking an awfully long time for this chocolate to melt. Maybe I'll just turn the heat up a bit. After five more minutes of chocolate death I did what all self-respecting chefs do, which is swear profusely (sorry Anna) and dash upstairs to google 'my chocolate won't melt *sob* and all I'm trying to do is create memories for my child and the only thing she's taking away from this is a sugar high and the words jesus fucking christ how the fuck can chocolate not melt when it's 110 fucking degrees'. That search amazingly turns up all manner of articles.

Apparently even the slightest hint of water will make your chocolate wither and die. Like water for chocolate. *Oh*. Who knew chocolate was so temperamental? I did find a few 'post chocolate-death rescue ideas' on google but they mostly involved controlled temperatures, vegetable shortening (WTF?) and cookery skills, and as I was making these nests for a class of 3 year olds I decided a fresh attempt with new chocolate rather than possibly killing them all with random cupboard items was best. "Well Mrs B. I'm sorry the chocolate nests turned out a little strange, but I tried to rescue my buggered chocolate with vegetable shortening, but as I didn't have any of that I just used miniature carrots instead...."

Alarmed by the nuclear mushroom cloud above my head, LK fled to the shops for more chocolate. I had a cup of tea and prepared for round two. Which worked.

More effortless perfection from the kitchen of AliBlahBlah.....

A Rolling Stone Gathers No Lyrics

At the beginning of the year we moved Anna to a new preschool. We (well, I) agonized over the decision, wondering if switching schools coinciding with adding a sibling would blow Anna's conscious world to smithereens.

Her old school used to be brilliant, we were absolutely thrilled to get her in there. No mean feat in this town. Then they expanded and suddenly her cute, artsy little school became a heaving morass of screaming toddlerdom.

Anna has never been particularly rambunctious, and she's definitely a follower not a leader. The sudden transition last year to a larger more impersonal school really shook her. We know that now. Suddenly six months after being potty trained she started having 'accidents' and crying at drop-off. Being pregnant, overworked and quite frankly oblivious to some pretty glaring signs of unhappiness I was clueless for a long time. I work long days and was dropping her off early when there were only a few other kids at the school, and picking her up late when she was one of the few remaining kids. It kills me that for so long I had no idea what a zoo the place had become.

Finally a friend of mine looking for preschools for her own daughter, visited Anna's school upon my recommendation and gently explained that Lord of the Flies wasn't exactly what she was hoping for at a billion dollars a month tuition. LK visited in the middle of the day after that and was pretty shocked. Anna was not an attention seeker, not a trouble maker, and consequently was being left to her own devices. She had been having accidents because as she explained later, she couldn't find a teacher to help her with her clothes.

Ouch.

Being a parent means assuming all sorts of guilt, and I feel terrible about what Anna had been going through. It took my friend and then another parent of one of Anna's friends to wake me up to what was going on. My drop-off and pick-up had taken all of 5 minutes each day, I was on a 'hello only' basis with all but one of the parents. I had written most of them off as unapproachable SB Bugaboo Moms. A little extra time, and a little extra effort to get to know the other parents might have clued me in faster. It was a stark lesson that I needed to get that insecure 'I'm not worthy' chip off my shoulder in front of terrifyingly wealthy and confident SB parents, for Anna's sake.

So, in January, just a few days before the tectonic shift of her sister's arrival, Anna started at her new school. It's a brand new place run by a favourite teacher from her former school. It's small, funky, laid back and friendly and we both love it. Her best friends from her old school also made the transition and Anna has blossomed in to a chatty (oh Lord!), confident girl who gives barely a backward glance at drop off. When she first started she would say every day in the car ride over there 'they will be so pleased to see me!' with the unconscious self-assurance of a happy child.

*Sigh*

I try and remind myself of that fact now that the commute to her preschool is 20 minutes not 5. Oh well.

I agonize over even the simplest of decisions, particularly those relating to my daughters, but this I think was a good one. Underscored by this little gem from a couple of days ago.

Anna (from the backseat whilst driving back from school): "We sang a new song today!"
Me: "Brilliant! Let's hear it!"
Anna: "Oh you can't always get what you wa-ant. Oh you can't always get what you wa-ant. Oh you can't alway get what you wa-ant."
*pause*.
"Oh you can't always get what you wa-ant. Oh you can't always get what you wa-ant. Oh you can't alway get what you wa-ant."
*pause*
Me: "but if you try sometimes, you get what you need?"
Anna: "No Momma! I'm singing..."
Anna (starting again): Oh you can't always get what you wa-ant. Oh you can't always get what you wa-ant. Oh you can't alway get what you wa-ant.

This continues for another 3 freeway exits, I'm practically crying with laughter wondering how you unstick a record if the record is your child when we finally fit the off-ramp, jolting my little Rolling Stone to say:

Anna: "Oh you can't always get what you wa-ant. But if you try sometimes you might get what you, oh Momma look! Purple and white flowers can I have some?"

That's an education worth paying for.

On Parenting Two Children....

Act One: Harried mother tries to get two children under the age of 4 in to the car whilst remembering snacks, diapers, water, swimsuits, swim diapers (I forgot them), a book (ha!) and sundry parenting crap.....

Lucy: Waah, waah, waah, waah!!!!
Anna: Mom! Mom!
Me: What?!@!
Anna: Momma, why are you so mad?
Me (slapping on my air hostess everything's fine smile): I'm not mad love!
Anna: Well your face sure looks mad

I thought this was funny. I think I even snapped out of my defcom delta parenting mood and smiled. What's not so hilarious is me relaying Anna's words of wisdom to a fellow Santa Barbara parent when we finally arrived at the pool and receiving this in return "I know, kids are so receptive to your moods aren't they, you know, sometimes if you just take a deep breath and think it won't always be like this it helps".

Or you could laugh with me, not at me lady.

Sibling Rivalry

I had wondered how Anna was going to react to her baby sister.

I hadn't been thorough enough to read any books on the topic, well, except for 'Angelina Ballerina Gets a Baby Sister' but I bought that at a yard sale before I was even pregnant so that hardly counts. People were more than generous with their advice though, and knowing that Anna had been on the pedestal of single child-hood for long enough I knew I should listen and listen hard.

The advice mainly fell in to two camps, what to do when first introducing your little dictator to her new sibling, and then what to do when real life begins and you get home. In the first case we were told by numerous wellwishers that it was imperative to have Lucy brought in to meet the three of us (LK, me and Anna) whilst in the hospital rather than have Anna walk in to my room and be confronted by the nuclear family unit of me, LK and Lucy. It was a feat of logistics let me tell you. LK called from the hospital lobby to say he and Anna were minutes away, I scrambled the nurse to whisk Lucy off my boob and into the nursery etc etc. but amazingly it all went like clockwork.

So what was Anna's first response to her new sibling?

She sneezed on her.

Best laid plans etc etc.

Lucy then developed a cold and spent the first few days at home sleeping upright in her car seat struggling with a noseful of baby boogers, while her evil sister, I mean doting sibling tried to hug the living daylights out of her. Lucy is clearly a survivor.

That has been the extent, so far, of the sibling rivalry. Anna is very attentive to her sister, constantly wanting to kiss her (we're on cold #2 and counting....), and squeeze the crap out of her. Her hugs may speak louder than her words as they do border on the 'aggressive' if I've been spending a little too much time nursing Lucy. As far as you could tell, she appears thrilled with the new addition, telling anyone within earshot that she has a baby sister who is very slow to learn to talk.

The backlash, it turns out, has all been directed my way.

This is a typical conversation between Anna and I these days:

Me: "Hey love, will you be a big helper and get Mummy a blanket for Lucy"
Anna: "No, I'm afraid I can do only small helps right now"
Me: "Please love"
Anna: "No, NO, NO!"



















It's a joy. To my every question, request, breath, her answer is 'no', and sadly the same is pretty much true of my responses to her. Because, her questions (if permission is ever asked) are usually along the lines of "can I draw with my crayons on the curtains", or "can I mix milk, water and playdough and form a paste to plaster on the couch". Yesterday I came downstairs after putting Lucy down to find Anna painting her toenails on the carpet.

Dear God she's behaving like a three year old!

That's what I have to remind myself. She's only three. Maybe this behaviour was always going to develop. I have heard that 'three is the new two' after all. LK swears she was getting pushier before Lucy arrived, but I think it coincided with late pregnancy when I was unable to do anything more interactive than lie on the couch with a tube of antacids. Clearly she's begun acting out in a desperate bid for attention.

I know the answer is to give LK a bottle of breastmilk (not for him, for the baby for God's sake.....) and spend a couple of hours alone with Anna doing something fun, just the two of us. She is after all, struggling to find her place in our new family.



















But quite frankly I think I'd rather poke my eyes out with a sharp stick.

Got Milk?

I got my boobs from my Dad.

I know that because I could fit one of my Mum's bras inside the cup of one of mine. Hell, right now I could probably fit my Mum in one cup.

Apparently my Dad's Mum famously said she could have nursed an entire ward full of babies. I appear to have inherited that trait. Without labouring too much on the size of my nursing rack for fear of attracting the wrong kind of traffic, I'll just leave you with the fact that Lucy put on a pound in eight days after birth. The poor thing opened her tiny infant mouth and was met with a torrent.

She inflated like a water balloon.

I have been very lucky to find breastfeeding pretty easy. The act itself that is, not the constant refrain from anyone holding Lucy which is 'err, I think she needs feeding'. Even Anna will give me an accusing look when Lucy so much as squeaks and yell 'Mom, Lucy needs a boob!'. The buck stops here when it comes to sating my child, which is both lovely and thoroughly time-consuming. It could be worse though. Boobing my infant comes naturally. Apparently, I was genetically programmed for it. My boobs were just itching for the opportunity to engorge, nurse, then shrivel and hang limply by my knee-caps for the rest of my life.

I know - how lucky am I?

I feel for people who try to breastfeed and, for whatever reason, are unable. Except that they probably still have perfect perky breasts. But, jaunty mammaries can be little consolation when faced with the parent-police. I should imagine that confessing to formula-feeding an infant at your local Mums' Group is tantamount to admitting you allow co-sleeping. Not for the faint of heart, but I'm entirely sympathetic to both (as an aside, LK gives Lucy straight formula for her midnight feed allowing me a blissful 6+ hours of sleep a night - more on that later).

What I don't understand is the idea of purchasing breast milk. Can the benefits of breast milk really outweigh the risks? How and why is this deemed necessary? Is it for cosmetic boob-preservation, or are there really babies who refuse all brands of formula (snobs). I thought the days of wet nurses were long gone, but apparently not. I even know of someone locally who buys breast milk for her child, although I'm not sure of the reason - but I will be checking her boobs for perkiness.

According to my research, the going rate is $3 an oz, and it may even be covered by your insurance?! I'm sure the donor/seller must have to undergo rigorous health checks first, because after all this is somebody else's bodily fluid that you're willingly feeding your child. Yet even with the proven health benefits of breast milk to an infant, the risks of using someone else's milk, screened or not, seem absurdly high.

And for the record, no, I'm not seriously considering selling my breast milk, even with the present economic climate and boobs like Krakatoa. After all, I tried donating blood over here a few years ago and was denied because of an FDA ruling against Brits and potential mad cow disease (how ironic, I can't sell my breast milk because I might be a mad cow). However, every time Lucy spits up I do glare at her and let her know exactly how many dollars of my hard-earned milk she has just wasted.

America: Brought To You By Erectile Dysfunction

I've shied away recently from the typical us vs. them comparisons of the UK vs. US - for many reasons, not least of which was the whole all-consuming gestation/birthing/newborn thing. 

Oh that. 

Mainly though, it's because I'm growing increasingly aware that I haven't lived in the UK for nearly fifteen years now, and the England I rhapsodise about may or may not exist anymore, so it would be a little dangerous to say 'we Brits don't have plastic surgery before going out for breakfast', when for the last 14 years people in Rotherham may have been doing just that. Although, Jesus Christ, tell that to any American who - to a man - still expects us to have tea at 4pm, wear bowler hats, shirk at showers and flee from physical intimacy. Not me! I love intimacy, particularly in showers! wearing bowler hats! at 4pm! - which is probably how I ended up with the whole gestation/birthing/newborn thing.

I digress.

Legitimate comparisons can be drawn though when you have real-live Brits visiting (seriously depleting my stocks of tea bags and marmalade let me tell you.....). It's only then that you realise things oh, for example, like there are no commercials for erectile dysfunction on at three in the afternoon in North Yorkshire. 

Not judging by the stunned look on my Dad's face anyway. 

Visitors to the US come prepared for endless commercials, for adverts running between the opening credits and the show starting (WTF?!), for 'this show brought to you by the makers of ' -  but then I'd noticed Coronation Street was 'brought to you by Cadbury's' last time I was home. Clearly the UK is making up some ground with gratuitous advertising. What I hadn't considered, was the difference in content, the appropriateness of material that is shoved down your throat (pun intended) each time you turn on the TV. Erectile dysfunction (ED), male enhancement, that itch you can't scratch, embarrassing odour, frequent urination, may not protect against sexually transmitted diseases - thanks to DVR and a heavy work schedule I've been blithely unaware of how many really inappropriate messages are being launched at us during daytime TV. Perhaps not so inappropriate if you're watching Oprah whilst experiencing embarrassing odour - probably quite common - but, not so good if you've got a houseful of relatives sipping tea, having some ginger lemon cremes and playing go fish with your 3 y ear old.

 "Please see your doctor if you experience an erection lasting longer than 4 hours" counsels the TV, - "Well, yes, I would hope so" answers my Dad. Obviously I've been tuning these adverts out, but to Mum and Dad they are new, so they're picking up on it, and asking why there isn't a watershed for this kind of advertising - after 9pm perhaps? - which makes me more aware of my 3 year old sponge sitting there, soaking it all up. She's already asked me 'if I want to get more for my money', and whether we 'use Chlorox', I suppose it's only a matter of time before she starts asking her paediatrician about that 4-hour erection she's been experiencing.

A Rose By Any Other Name

Generally I don't give much thought to any of LK's old girlfriends - if anything most of them did me a huge favour by treating him so badly that any half decent wifely behaviour on my part leaves him shocked and grateful. At least I'll tell myself that until he asks for a divorce.

However, many years ago one of his ex-girlfriends did a complete number on him, and has left me paying the price.

Apparently, early in their relationship she told him she'd one day like them to have two golden retrievers and their names would be blah and blah. Now as any pre-pubescent scholar of Cosmo will tell you, never ever breathe of future domesticity until you're walking the other way down the aisle. And even then let him think it was his idea. This offhand comment on her part (and she's probably still wondering why he ran screaming - maybe she concluded he had a pet dander allergy), left him completely unable to commit to naming something. Fine if you're talking about hypothetical dogs - not so great if you're 8 months pregnant with his child.

We named Anna in the delivery room. I do not intend for that to happen again.

If necessary I will be going in to labour with a fully executed Advance Directive - not in case of emergencies, just in case in the throes of animal pain he manages to persuade me that Waltrout is a great name. For days after naming Anna I was left wondering if 'we'd' made the right decision. We had three top picks if it was to be a girl (we left the gender unknown last time), Anna, Lucy and Elsa/Elsie. The only thing we had agreed on was a middle name - Rose - for English Rose. While in labour 'we' picked Anna because it best matched her middle name. Not such a bad choice as it happens, and it did honour both sides of the family and soften his incredibly Teutonic last name. Still, the point is, I don't want to be naming another child while hopped up on drugs, yet he resolutely refuses to discuss the issue leaving me hopelessly frustrated. Instead he says he wants to 'name her when he sees her' (in which case she'll probably be called 'whopper' or 'tore Mummy a new one').

So, I'm reaching out to you dear internet - let's discuss baby names! Humour me - any favourites, suggestions, names to avoid? I generally go for traditional names, but all suggestions will be met with complete respect - unless you're called Waltrout of course.

My Mom Is Having A Baby Sister

My pregnancy is inescapable these days. I've even started to do 'the waddle', the weight of my belly coupled with loosening pelvic ligaments means it's easier for me to move forward by lurching from side to side while swinging my legs forward than it is to walk normally. I let out an involuntarily 'oof' noise whenever I bend. The other day I dropped my car keys, and sighed, looking around as if to say 'anybody, help? please don't make me pick these up by myself'.

I look like a bad actor portraying a pregnant woman.

Obviously all this has not gone unnoticed by Anna. So the question is, how is she coping with the idea of being bumped along the food chain?

For months, apart from sporting her own phantom pregnancy, she really couldn't have cared less. In fact she could hardly be engaged on the subject. The first I heard of it was when one of her little school friends went crying to her Mum saying that Anna's Mom was going to have a baby sister and that she wanted one too. I was completely gobsmacked that Anna was even thinking about creature #2 let alone bragging. Things have changed though, and her baby sister is literally in her face. Nose to distended navel. We like to talk about how much work baby #2 is going to be, and how Anna will be my 'big helper'. She is assisting me in 'decorating' the baby's room which is beginning to take shape (although as you can tell by the photos below - we still need to paint). We bought a lovely changing table/dresser on Craigslist last weekend which Anna covered liberally in sea glass. How baby friendly! We have also unearthed all of Anna's old baby toys.



































Now, several people have told me that when a new baby arrives your older child will regress in some way. Some will revert to toddler-style temper tantrums, others will lose ground with potty training (please God, no). Anna is embracing her babyhood. The arrival of all her old baby toys means that's all she wants to play with. She's even started to demand we watch her old 'Baby Einstein' DVDs again. We draw the line when she starts 'pretending' to be a baby. Lying on her back waving her limbs in the air talking gibberish. It's laughably transparent. "Look! We don't need to introduce a new baby - I can be all the baby you'll ever need!".

We're trying to let her know that we loved her when she was an infant, but we love her even more now - now that she's a big girl and so accomplished. We try to emphasize all the things she's capable of that 'Fahan' won't be able to do, like helping to bake cookies, running through puddles, and drawing monsters - all the important stuff. It doesn't seem to be working though.

Anyone have any advice or suggestions in this area? So far we're humouring her, I assume it's a phase that she'll just work her way through, but right now I'm wondering just how far this regression is going to go.

Flushed Away

Thanks for all your suggestions on how to dispose of Lester. In the end we decided to be very matter-of-fact with Anna. We told her that Lester had had good life, but that unfortunately he'd died overnight and that we were going to flush him down the loo to the ocean (thankyou finding Nemo!).

We made a solemn grouping around the toilet, Lester hanging limply in a fishing net. LK spoke about how pretty he was, how he was always eager to zoom up and grab a pellet. Meanwhile I'm thinking, *damn* the only two things I could say about the bloody fish and you've already mentioned them. I gave a suitably sombre pause and waxed lyrical about how he'd always been a good friend to Anna and that we'd been lucky to have him as a member of our family. Anna was last. More than anything she wanted to flush him down, but we suggested she say something nice by way of a goodbye. She said 'I want you to come back from the ocean alive so that I can play with you'.

*Ouch*

Then it way bye-bye Lester, two of his mourners praying vehemently that he wasn't going to break up in the watery vortex.

In relaying the story to my Mum and Dad later that day, my Dad said 'she'll be looking for him whenever you go to the beach you know'. If only that were true! He was right in that she is looking for him, newly reincarnated from his trip to the ocean, but at his point of departure. She is fully expecting him to reappear in the toilet, ready to play. Honestly, best laid plans etc etc. We are going to have one seriously constipated 3 year old on our hands at this rate.

Double Stroller Advice Needed

Sorry, this is an automatic switch-off for anyone without any kids (or quite frankly anyone with anything better to do). I'm trying to decide whether to invest in a double stroller. Any suggestions? Anna will be 3 1/2 when creature #2 makes her debut. We had considered not getting a double stroller and just using a sling for the newbie and our trusted Bob for Anna if necessary. Is a stroller even necessary once a child reaches 4-ish? I'd thought not, but on reflection it certainly makes shopping easier to have her confined and not whining or walking at..........the.........slowest........pace...........of........all..........time (and pointing out every leaf/dandelion/'treasure' in our path).

We chuffing love our Bob, it's even flown with us to the UK more than once, but a double Bob just fills me with fear. There's no popping in and out of shops with this thing:















Someone suggested this from Phil and Teds:






























and despite the fact that we'd have to take out a mortgage to acquire it (LK's flat-screen fund is not looking good), it is seeming to make more and more sense. The key for me is that it's a jogger, so I could still go out and run off this lard I'm accumulating. We spend a lot of time walking around town or running down by the beach. Yet (unlike me) it's not the size of a small aircraft carrier. Plus the terrible twosome won't be sitting next to each other and poking each other into a frenzy of crying. Also, the re-sale on these things is better than a chuffing Honda Pilot (I'm not kidding, we could still get $$$$ for our 2 year old Bob dubious stains notwithstanding).

Also - more importantly, does it come with cupholders? and if Anna farts (and bear in mind she is related to my brother) will she kill her sibling instantly????

Any thoughts? Recommendations?

She's Not Going To Thank Me For This....

This may be one of the posts I consider deleting when Anna is old enough to read more than her name.....

Recently Anna came down with a urinary tract infection. The truly wonderful thing about having a child over three is that they are much more able to communicate what is wrong. She'd started to have 'accidents' which is very unusual for her, but we were able to work out pretty easily that she'd been avoiding going to the bathroom as she confessed it was hurting her. Something that only 1 or 2 years ago would have been almost impossible to diagnose was blindingly obvious. LK sighed a big manly sigh, canceled his first golf game in months, and dutifully trotted his daughter off to the doctors. Diagnosis confirmed, I am a genius, Anna starts on some antibiotics, everyone's fine.

--- Incidentally we were told no more bubble baths for Anna - who knew? Well, perhaps we should have, but bubble baths are the prime culprit in causing UTIs in young girls. Bath time is a little less fun, but overall we have a much happier child. We knew she was getting better when she informed us that it didn't hurt when she used the toilet at S. and J's house. Obviously in her mind it was the toilet inflicting the pain, not the infection. Preschooler logic reigns supreme.

Now, here's the kicker. 3 year olds love learning new tricks. That's their raison d'etre, they thrive on figuring things out and mastering new arts. This has backfired more than a little in the K household.

What could Anna have learned at the doctors that is now causing us to watch her every move? Surely nothing that bad right? Well, apparently our little girl had to pee in a cup in order for the doctor to make his diagnosis (and kudos here for LK for not only missing his golf, but for actually being the one to collect the sample - what a hero). Anna was pretty taken with the idea of collecting a specimen. Very taken in fact. Now it's all we can do to stop her peeing in to a vessel every day. If we walk in to the bathroom there is usually a glistening beaker of toddler urine sitting by the taps, and one very chuffed 3 year old.

All I'm saying is, when you come over to our house, keep your wineglass with you at all times, and preferably drink red.

Daddy's Girl

As a parent you're not supposed to play favourites. On the whole I'm finding that easy, considering one's still in utero, kicking me in the bladder and causing me to pee when I laugh, sneeze, and move too quickly.

No-one tells a 3 year old they can't play favourites though, and I'm rapidly being demoted to parent #2.

This morning while HRH was sitting in the bath I told her that I would be watching her while Dad was in the shower, but that once he was done, I was off to work and he was going to be looking after her. I usually drop her off at school, but for once he had a late start and was on Anna-duty.

'Oh great' she said, more to her turtles than to me 'I knew a Dadda day would come up soon'.

To save on childcare, we have arranged our schedules so that I have Friday thru Sunday off and LK has Sundays and Mondays off, so Anna only has to go to school 3 days a week. I don't get to see LK that much, but after almost 15 years of being together, *shoulder shrug*.

Monday is LK's favourite day of the week, he takes Anna to the beach, to the swimming pool, to the Sea Center, the carousel, all over. On Fridays I take Anna to the supermarket, to my gym, and we do laundry. Hmm, I wonder why LK is winning parent of the year.

I realize my issue is not so much with Anna (although Jesus Christ beotch, I nursed you for chuffing months, throw me a frickin' bone here), it's with LK. It's getting the balance right. I am more interested in her having a presentable ponytail and outfit when she leaves the house. LK never adheres to a schedule and doesn't care when she turns up somewhere or how she looks. He's also far more creative than me. If I take Anna to the beach, we will look for shells, or more often these days, I will park my giant bulk on a towel and she will hunt for sea-life herself. When LK takes her, they pretend to fish for marlin and barracuda, they design elaborate assault courses and then race til exhaustion. Exhaustion seems to hit me a little earlier these days.

I know this is only going to get worse when the new little one arrives and I'll have to spend half my life nursing. I've decided to up the ante while I can. This weekend, I'm playing dirty. Anna and I are making cupcakes, going bug-hunting, watching Dora ad nauseum and going swimming. I will save the errands for LK for Monday. Then we'll see who's parent of the month.

Bwa-ha-ha.

Bloody Utah

It was a great trip. No pun intended. We didn't win the jackpot, but when Anna went face-first into the gravel at Cedar Breaks National Park (moments after the photo below was taken) and ended up not needing stitches, I felt like we'd won the lottery.


















I'm sure if we had a 3 year old boy visits to the ER would be second nature, but Anna has never done anything worse than scrape up her knees or poop a barrette, so this was a new experience.

I kept telling myself that head wounds bleed a lot, but that still doesn't prepare you for the moment when your hands are dripping with your child's blood. Plus, we had nothing in the car to take care of it, no antiseptic, no band-aids, only beef jerky and M&Ms.

Excellent parenting!

We patched her up as best we could, and within about 3 minutes she'd stopped crying and was starting to specify what colour M&Ms she wanted. While the bleeding had all but stopped though, the wound looked like the petulant mouth of a Hollywood movie star and we knew it would need putting back together. We headed out of the wilderness and well over an hour later ended up at the fantastic hospital in St George Utah. Brand spanking new, and we were the only people there. Not so implausible when you consider that driving through St. George there are no signs to the hospital?! WTF St. George. You were inviting us to any number of fast food restaurants, places to fill up with gas and get a comfy bed for the night, but emergency services? Nada. After driving through the entire town we had to pull off and ask for directions at a gas station. A little less alarming if your 3 year old is happily asleep in the back of the car, head wound gently weeping , but not so great in a true emergency. Come on St. George Hospital, splash out on a sign!

Anna was a star. She was happily oblivious to the weeping gash above her right eye, probably because she couldn't see it, and we were careful to keep our blood-stained clothing away from her. Of the 5 medical professionals we saw (welcome to a hospital in the United States) the only one who didn't question her footwear was the registration nurse, and then probably because she was also wearing crocs. We must have been asked at least four times if 'those were the shoes she had been hiking in'. A little unfair considering we were actually on a road trip and had only popped out of the car at a 'look-out point' to take a photo. *Whatever*. Apparently, crocs aren't considered suitable hiking attire. Imagine that.





















Throughout the entire procedure I sat there with a grin as frozen as a 50 year old air hostess and LK kept shooting me covert glances that read 'if you freak out or freak her out you're leaving you know that don't you'. I managed to keep my maternal and pregnant hormones in check through giant force of will but the entire time I felt like excusing myself to go and have a massive cry. Nerves of steel, me. Meanwhile Anna is having a whale of time saying 'this bed has paper on it, that's silly' and 'can we go back outside and get those Skittles from that machine. I looovvee Skittles'. The docs kept asking if she'd lost consciousness but Ms. K. performed like her usual precocious self and when asked her name said 'Anna Rose, A-N-N-A'. Many points on the Glasgow coma scale I think you'll find.

The end result was her forehead glued back together and stern warnings not to get the wound wet for 5 days, which was a little sad as one of the highlights of the trip, the pool and lazy river at the MGM Grand in Vegas was yet to come. So in true Vegas style we kitted our daughter out like a chuffing freak in two waterproof band-aids, shower cap (oh yes), a sun hat, armbands and ladybird water ring. She looked like a moron:














.....but a good time was had by all.

Glacial Progress

It's slow-going with the battle to have Anna say please. Much like WWI, progress is measured in inches of muddy terrain, and there have been many casualties. Take for example, this gem from last night:

Anna, sidling up to me, placing her fluffy blonde head on my lap, training her sad blue eyes on mine to say:

"I really need some candy, I really do........puhlease"

"Thankyou for asking so nicely. Of course you can have some candy"

"Thankyou Momma."

"Get it for me!"

"Right now!"

Co-Sleeping For Dummies

Since we came back from England Anna has been sleeping in her own bed.



















Some of you are probably reading that thinking, yay Anna, the big girl bed! You rock little snoozer.

I’m sure others of you are going I’m sorry what? She’s almost 3 for crying out loud, when were you going to kick her out of that nest? Maybe at 16 when hosting a sleep-over and she was forced to admit to friends that they'd have to share with her parents?

Then there are probably some people thinking, ‘wait, I googled homemade surfboard, what the hell kind of website is this? A Mommy Blog? Aaah, my eyes! they burn!















So yes, co-sleeping a brief family history:

Not long after we brought our deliciously fresh pink baby back from the hospital we realized that we could either:

A: Not sleep at all by putting the creature in the torture-chamber of hell known in baby circles as a ‘bassinet’.

or

B: Get quite a lot of sleep by sharing the bed with the tiny but all-powerful scream-machine and simply rolling over to boob her whenever she dared utter a squeak. This worked so well that I would frequently wake up in the morning with only the vaguest memories of having fed her, but with one boob the size of a watermelon and the other flapping in the wind. Not an easy look to pass off at work a few hours later let me tell you, but so completely worth it.















Things were going fairly well for a while. We were new parents, we were definitely getting more than our fair share of sleep, and then I started going to a parent support class. A group that seemed (in my insecure mind at least) to be solely designed to tell you YOU'RE DOING THE WRONG THING! Of course they don't say it like that do they, they say 'wow, and that's working for you is it?', or 'well, that's brave!' Then of course there was the couple we nanny-shared with for 2 years who said 'oh my God you POOR THINGS!' To which I mumbled 'actually, it seems to be working pretty nicely for everyone'.

"Oh you POOR PEOPLE, I really CAN'T IMAGINE, I would just DIE'.















So parenting guilt led me to try having Anna sleep in her cot/crib and many hours of crying and mid-night waking later she was more or less used to it. She'd still wake up at about 3-4am and scream to be put in our bed, but that's par for the course right? Parenting Nazis. Anyway, we were practically normal, with a child who to all intents and purposes slept in a separate room. Until a few months later when we got the mother of all stomach flus, every ounce of internal fluid making a simultaneous bid for freedom. We were all so sick we literally couldn't get down the stairs to the kitchen. For 2 days. For that 48 hours of hell, we all fought death in the same bed watching the same Hannah Montana marathon on the Disney channel because we were too sick to find the remote. After that we were back to square one with the creature sleeping in our bed.

Co-sleeping is almost the parenting dirty little word. Conjuring up images of slovenly parents lacking in discipline. Which of course is true(!) What strikes me as strange is the number of people who are doing it, but mostly on the quiet. Of the friends I have with young children, well over 50% have or have had their children sleeping with them. They all graduated to their own beds without fuss well before the age of 5, why is everyone staying in the closet?















The main concern is that children become dependent on you to sleep, that they lack the ability to 'self-soothe', and while I'll admit that 'I need Mummy's hair' has been an oft-repeated sleepy refrain she has made the transition to sleeping in her own bed with very little fuss at all. She barely even questioned the move, seeming to accept it as the natural order of things. Quite honestly we had to face the alarming truth that we were just as dependent on her presence as she was ours. The overwhelming comfort of being able to reach out and touch her in the middle of the night, to know she was safe - particularly in an earthquake zone - the soft sweet smell of her downy head. We were rapidly becoming the ones that needed weaning.

Overall I would say co-sleeping has worked very well for us. At first we were worried we'd roll over and crush her, but as with most parents, we were so alert to her presence, to any half-uttered cry or fart that forgetting she was there was never an issue. It was also easy to keep her away from duvets and pillows that might suffocate her, as she was born mid-summer in California. It was a life-saver on our three trips to the UK, as jet-lag and sleeping in a foreign bed was made much easier with her being comforted by us being right there. Plus, when Anna sleeps, she sleeps like the dead. If she thrashed around a lot, I'm sure co-sleeping would never have taken off.

We decided to wean her when the logistics of having two tall adults and an increasingly gangly toddler in a Queen size bed became overwhelming. Too many knees and elbows, and quite frankly, butts, in a bed. One of us had to go. Then came the time when LK and I were doing some dozy half-awake spooning only to have her march into our room, sandwich herself between us and declare 'no, I go in the middle!'















Admittedly, we still wake up in our bed at 7am with her often sleeping soundly between us, both of us oblivious to her having snuck in in the wee hours.

That's fine with us, as long as she stops before she goes to college of course.

Please Please Me

I feel like I need to preface this with:

YES I KNOW SHE'S ONLY TWO.

But.

Anna will not, no never, never ever say please. Unless coerced or prodded with a red-hot poker and then she will spit out a 'plissss' like a basketball leaking air.

It was killing me and I couldn't for the life of me understand it, because she will say thankyou at the drop of a hat (mostly 'aww fanks').'You're welcome' is practically a visceral reflex. You should have seen her puzzlement when in England she would say 'fanks' to my Mum and wait patiently for her to say 'you're welcome', which obviously is never going to happen in the North of England. You've just thanked me? Well so be it, but I OWE YOU NOTHING!

I couldn't work it out, because the easiest ways to learn something as a toddler are by repetition, copying or reward, right? Thankyou gets you nothing, (except a knee-jerk 'you're welcome sweetie'). If you say 'can I have some candy?'. Not bloody likely. 'Can I have some candy please', absolutely, go crazy, since you asked so nicely. You would think please would be a no-brainer because the bottom line is, it gets you stuff.

Besides, Anna is generally a really well-mannered little girl. Staggeringly so sometimes. The other week I was hunkered down on a toddler-sized picnic bench having a 'Mothers Day Brunch' at Anna's preschool. Suddenly Anna trotted off and returned with a tissue. I was just in the middle of saying 'oh I have a napkin for you love', when she turned to the smaller girl sitting next to her, gently cradled the back of her head and wiped a giant trail of snot from under her nose whilst saying 'there you go sweetie'. Obviously she put me to shame - I hadn't even noticed the little girl's snot-slug. Anna's a genuinely good kid, and a fast learner. Why wasn't she saying please?

Then my friend R. enlightened me. People don't say please anymore (and I'm not prepared to make the cultural leap here and say it's just California - I honestly had not been paying attention to this phenomenon when in England, so I don't know if it's been abandoned there either). R's point was, please gets you nothing, because not saying please very often gets you the same stuff anyway. Furthermore, kids, and since I've started paying attention, adults too, don't 'ask' for things. They command.

"I want Anna tunes"
"Sure, do you want Old MacDonald or Twinkle Twinkle"

"Dada, I need a drink"
"Sure, do you want water or juice?"

"I'll take a ham on wheat, mayo no mustard"

See what I mean?

It's amazing that since we've issued the 'must say please' rule for getting stuff that what we're actually realizing is the number of times we give her things when she doesn't say please, and the number of times we don't say it either. No wonder she wasn't picking it up, we were effectively making it redundant - R. was spot on!

I know there are bigger pre-schooler battles so fight. Not peeing on somebody else's carpet for example (sorry Jen!), but I always wanted my kid to be the polite one. It would seem I might need to lead by example?

I blame the parents.

The Anna Button!!

When I first got my new car it came complete with XM radio. LK pre-programmed some channels for me and it was goodbye NPR, hello non-stop 80s at the press of a button. I can't tell you what a hit that 80s button was on our girls-only wine tasting trip in February, while Anna cooperated by sleeping through Men at Work and some cracking Cindy Lauper.

I wasn't the only one who got used to the XM radio, as soon as Anna got in the car she would demand I press the 'Anna button' switching us from 80s gold to the mind-numbing nursery-rhymes that are her current vogue. Sadly I had to ditch the XM a few months ago. I have a four minute commute to work and I couldn't justify the luxury, so it's back to eight minutes of NPR a day, which leaves me tantalisingly half-educated about Ghandian basket-weaving.

Unless Anna is in the car and then she still demands 'the Anna button' .

I would actually welcome any suggestions from parents out there who have some good kids CDs to listen to that won't leave me wanting to claw my own ears off at every 'hey diddle diddle'.

In the meantime, I bring you this, courtesy of my friend Jen. Kids songs that won't have you resorting to driving on valium. Damn this is funny:

Necessity Is The Mother

The potty training is going very well, thanks for asking.

We did have that one 'wanna get away' moment in Longs Drugs last week, and a couple of accidents at school, but other than that she's being a little star.

As with all developmental milestones though, new accomplishments lead to new challenges. Now that we've chucked all her nappies we're now having to deal with the horror of our potty-training fledging and public toilets.

As most of you know, one of the tricks to keeping your day and your toddler urine-free is to ask them every hour on the hour whether they need to go to the loo. Then when they scream and say no, their tiny little arses heading for the hills, you ignore them and make them go anyway. This is all very well at home, but proves much trickier out in the real world. Fortunately, any mother of a toddler will have developed an excellent working knowledge of all public toilets in her home town during her last month of pregnancy when it was necessary to be no more than five minutes from that Nordstrom bathroom at all times. The problem is, even with the nicest public loos, they tend to have that little hygienic cut-out at the front of the toilet seat, which happens to be the perfect size of a toddler's pelvis. It puts a whole new meaning to 'mind the gap'. I could never do that to her.

Unfortunately, neither will I hold her over the loo until she performs. She's still getting the hang of the controls as it were, and despite several months of 'Body Pump' at my gym I would defy anyone to be capable of holding a 28lb toddler at arms length for more than five minutes while she tries to remember how to do a wee-wee.

She's pretty adept at straddling a 'grown-up potty' but that always leaves her clutching the underside of the toilet seat to hang on, and urrghh, no thanks. Another option was to go everywhere with her bulky toilet-seat insert, but there are some parenting lines I will draw. I mean, who wants to be the 'I've given my life and my dignity over to my child' parent toting a miniature loo seat with them everywhere?



















OK, that is me at a winery this weekend with a glass of Pinot Gris and a toilet seat.

How times have changed.

I can't be too drunk to care about embarrassment all the time though, so I thought, there has to be a better way. Necessity is the mother of invention, and lo and behold I came up with my million dollar, guaranteed to lift us out of financial penury idea:

A blow-up toddler toilet seat (acronym BUTTS). Genius!

Until LK reminded me I'd be putting my lips near something that went in a public toilet (said the actress to the vicar).

Hmm. On second thoughts.

Actually, I did come up with a solution, and I know that all you seasoned parents out there will no doubt beat me to it with your time-tested tricks, but here's my offering; I worked out that if you use the disabled toilet, cover the seat with bum-protectors (thanks America, I love you), and have your toddler turn sideways she can hold on to the disabled bar and support herself while her bum overhangs the porcelain precipice. Bingo!

You're welcome.

Dear World: Please Be My Valentine

I've just stuffed twenty valentines into twenty envelopes complete with twenty chocolates nicked from our office candy bin. Good grief America! Once again you've stymied me with your cultural holiday-a-palooza. I was really hoping to avoid this valentine-a-thon being as how Anna is only two and a half and the only thing she could possibly do with a Valentine is eat it, but then I found a 'Starfish class list' in Anna's pigeonhole at school yesterday and knew I was sunk. Yes my daughter is a 'Starfish', something I found out literally months into her preschool life which finally explained why she kept asking me if I was a 'Starfish friend'. I had been thinking we had a budding marine biologist on our hands, but no.

LK and I did have a lot of fun the other night drafting Anna's Valentine messages; 'Dear Shanti, I know you think you're cool with your organic individually crafted packed lunches, but you can share my PB&J if you fancy slumming it'. My fave was 'Dear Jack, have enjoyed checking out your delicious diaper-less arse from afar. How about a drink sometime?'. That sounds like Anna. In the end I went with the safe, vanilla option (moi?) and in each card I stuck to 'Dear Blah, Happy Valentines Day, Anna', even though some of these kids clearly do not go to school on a day that Anna does and have I ever met Jaia or Riley, and are they even male or female?

Nothing illustrates the difference between the UK and the US better than Valentines Day. In the UK, it's about sending that one person you fancy a secret card, poem or if you're really hard-up for a shag, maybe a small present. It's about romantic love and trying to get laid. Over here it's Love Inc ™. Everyone sends everyone else a valentine, because to miss someone out would be discrimination and we'd hate that wouldn't we? Our local parents.org (or similar) had an article about a woman with three children who started to rethink her plan to handcraft each valentine after completing only five of the seventy-five that she was required to make for her kids classes. WTF lady? Who would even embark on such a sisyphean task? I wouldn't get as far as Michaels to shop for supplies. Maybe things have changed since I was at school (sound of chalks on slates), do British children now have to bring a Valentine for every other child in attendance?

When I first moved here I was completely freaked out when Lance's Mum sent me a valentine. There was me thinking 'gosh thanks, but it's actually your son I'm after'. Just as well she didn't get him this years gift at the time, otherwise I would have probably run for the hills:











Nothing says 'I love you son' like Valentines pants.

I suppose the easy thing would be to claim cultural ignorance and avoid the issue entirely, but as I've learned with this whole parenting caper, it's not about me is it? I don't want Anna to be left out. I want her to have fun. I made the chuffing valentines. Given my history though I'm sure we'll be walking through the school gates this morning with our bag full of valentines only to be pulled aside by a teacher saying 'the class list was for informational purposes only Mrs K, we're not doing valentines today and certainly not chocolates, for Pete's sake they're only two'.

Anyway, happy Valentines day bloggy readers. I want to shag you all.

A Little Pivacy Pease!

In the true spirit of revolution, reminiscent of women burning their bras, Anna has decided to potty train herself. She is saying no more! to nappies, and don't let the door hit you on the derriere to diapers. Her plastic Elmo potty lies dusty and discarded, untouched for months. No, Anna suddenly decided she wanted to use the 'Big Potty' and with very little else in the way of coercion, maybe a few chocolate-covered pretzels, she is now using the 'Big Potty' several times a day.

I've bought a couple of those plastic child-seat inserts because the sight of her tiny white peaches teetering on the edge of that massive precipice made me a little nervous. Not for her you understand, just the possible humiliation of being that parent whose child drowned in the toilet. So, safe in the knowledge that she's protected from diving head first down the Big Potty I left her to her 'privacy'. And yes, two year-olds in this day and age do ask for privacy, I even heard one of her preschool friends the other day saying he needed 'to hydrate'. Precisely.

So, Anna asked for privacy, and I knew I'd childproofed the bathroom.

I will freely admit that I was the one who installed the plastic childproof latches on the bathroom drawers, and I will also confess that I'm more Spongebob than Handy Manny, but I was not expecting this after her requisite five minutes of 'pivacy':











































...and a poop! Everyone's a winner!!


Is it just me or does she look like Courtney Love?