Anyone For Tennis?

Parents can be unwittingly cruel to their children. My Dad's insistence on wearing flares well in to the 1980s being a great example.

Anna had a week off preschool, and LK was able to get her in to a week's tennis camp for free. Perfect. Except there was slightly more consideration given to our finances than to Anna's aptitudes. She's not exactly gifted when it comes to sports. If you throw a ball at her she can just about muster a blink before it hits her in the face. Nevertheless, there was also pool time involved, and summer has finally arrived in Southern California. She would have fun.

LK dropped her off on Monday morning wearing a lilac unicorn t-shirt and a flowery skirt, so she blended in perfectly with the Wimbledon whites worn by everyone else. Plus she was a full year younger than all the other kids, 90% of whom were boys. LK texted me a photo where she looked like the token black kid in a Tommy Hilfiger advert. Then he sent a photo of her kneeling on the tennis court looking despondent while kids played around her. My heart sank. We had put her in 'tennis for tots' on Monday mornings for the month prior hoping that would give her a bit of a head start. I was beginning to wonder if she'd ever set foot on a tennis court again.

Amazingly that evening she was excited about the prospect of more tennis the next day. Despite not having hit a single ball over the net. Apparently when it comes to sheer 'stick-to-it-iveness' she is streets ahead of her mother. I am in awe. The day after, success! She hit two balls over the net!

In four hours.

She was excited that they had been doing a 'tennis hit' that she'd heard of; the forehand. Here's Anna's forehand in all its glory:



















These would make perfect 'spot-the-ball' photos....







































This one looks like it's going to hurt.....














and finally, very much like her mother, the pro is feeding a ball to her and she is turning to have a natter with the kid behind her....


























By Thursday 'pizza prize day' she had accrued a massive 10 points (for successfully eating an orange - I kid you not). She was undeterred and still managed to come home with an alligator squirt gun as a prize. She even wants to do it again next year, which is good, because it's free so I can foresee a lot of tennis in her future.

Funky Town

Through the process of selective reporting I am choosing to remember this period of my life as 'the summer that Lucy learned to talk' rather than the bleakest days of my life. I am in a funk that would beat anything produced in the 70s. Fortunately the girls couldn't care less how miserable we are. They are happily carrying on with their lives. Here is Anna's pre-school graduation photo:


























Yes, she rocked it. She stood up in front of the entire audience and gave her speech (why I will miss my school; because we play outside and have sleepovers and have fun with no shoes). They processed down to the garden stage to 'Land of Hope and Glory' and halfway down the music switched to The Beatles 'Revolution' and they all donned sunglasses and carried on walking, but with attitude. This already beats my all-latin graduation solemnity, hands-down.

We made a big deal of graduation, so instead of her usual 'watermelon kidz' shampoo I let her use mine, with conditioner. I then blew dry her hair and she looked so surprisingly groomed , so unlike her usual 'Grapes of Wrath' self that one of the other parents said 'Anna, your hair looks beautiful today' - to which she replied, ­ hand on hip - ­ 'Thanks, I used Dove'.

Did I tell you that Anna can read? No of course I didn't, I've preferred to shower you with news of financial devastation instead. Well, she's been reading for about a year which just proves that delinquent parenting can sometimes come up trumps. We didn't believe her teachers when they told us she was reading at 3. We knew she could sound out some words and certainly knew all her letters, but no, they assured us she was reading quietly to herself in the 'reading nook'. If only everything was this easy. She has been shy about reading in front of us but now just in time for Kindergarten she is going a mile a minute, ploughing through 'easy read' books and warning us that my friend's garden contains snakes (she had a 'cobra' security sign posted in her driveway).

Not to be out-done, Lucy is conquering 'the talkies' as LK calls it. She names everything, with about a 5% success rate. I think she just likes the novelty of making syllable sounds. Yesterday she came up to me, looked me full in the eye and shouted "NARTCH!" What do you say to that? Especially when it is then repeated as a question, complete with baleful look - "Nartch?"

She is at the wonderful stage where she has a lot of words but they all sound a little like 'oon' or 'arl' or 'grnk' and it is a little like trying to take care of a tiny Croat. She also says 'mo' for 'no' which is very funny when you hear her (approx. 100 times a day) yell "Anna Mo!" A la Def Leppard.

I tell you, it is a barrel of laughs over at our place. We can't afford to go outside or to splurge on anything but Top Ramen instead of Ramen, but we certainly know how to make our own fun!

Nartch.

Get Your Safety On

Summer is not a happy time round our way. LK is working every hour possible rendering him sore, grumpy and vocal about it as only a man can be, and I am juggling childcare like a well-trained seal. Still, at least we’re not tourists who have spent thousands of dollars on a Californian summer vacation only to be met with the foggiest summer in decades. I had to use windscreen wipers this morning!! Heavy marine layer my arse – I grew up in the North of England and I know a persistent drizzle when I see one.

We are very fortunate that Anna’s school does not take the summer off, but even so, they do have a short break, and a week of half-days due to ‘parent teacher conferences’ so I’ve been stitching together a patchwork of camps and playdates to cover the gaps. Incidentally, I asked LK this morning what we were doing about coverage for Lucy tomorrow and he made a volcano gesture with his hands to imitate his head exploding and I thought, dude, you have no. fucking. idea.

I need a wife.

Through my network of fellow ‘Moms’ I was guided towards putting Anna in Safety Town for a week this summer. It’s a brilliant program just for pre-Kindergarteners that teaches them how to be safe in their ever-expanding worlds; stranger danger, road safety, inappropriate touching (really), earthquake safety, and wildfire safety (oh no wait, we’ve covered that many times, thanks Santa Barbara). Anna now knows how to yell and punch hard in the stomach if grabbed by someone – so perhaps I should warn her long distance relations when they go in for a hug at their next meeting - that would be a shocker.

She also knows what to do in the event of an earthquake. Thank God someone in the family does. I have visions of an earthquake hitting and me running around in my knickers looking for a safe place like a bug scattering when you remove the log it was hiding under.

Anna loved Safety Town. She was a fountain of knowledge. Don’t touch matches! Always find another Mom with kids if you get lost! Don’t disturb the driver (then stop talking to her….) It was just what every officious small girl dreams of. Five year olds are all about rules (and ratting out people who break them). After her first day I asked how things had gone;

"Well, Mom, today we were fortunate enough to have two very special guests".

She can be a little scary with that photographic memory of hers. Apparently she'd been hanging on their every word.

"We had two ambliance drivers and Smokey the Bear. I'm not entirely sure about Smokey the Bear."

This was interesting. I asked what was so suspicious about Smokey.

"Well, what kind of bear wears a hat and pants - but no shirt?"

This was possibly a little uncharitable considering it was 90º in the shade and some poor Forestry Service intern was no doubt staggering inside the sweltering costume wondering where his career was going. However, I've just learned that the new slogan for fire prevention is ‘get your smokey on!’ and suddenly Anna’s mistrust of the guy in the bear costume seemed very well-placed.

‘Get your Smokey on’?!




























What sixties renegade wannabe gangsta came up with that one? I think her 5 year old counterparts may be the only age group in California that wouldn’t connect that with pot smoking. What were they thinking?

Still, she definitely learned a lot, and when I asked her what the best bit was she said:

“Well, I am really very good at sitting nicely, legs criss-crossed. Probably the best”.

So that’s money well spent.

I'm Preparing Myself To Forgive You

"I'm preparing myself to forgive you" is a great line from one of my all-time favourite movies, Withnail and I. Right now it rather sums up how I feel about Santa Barbara. If anyone within the last 3 months had uttered the phrase "aren't we lucky to live here" I would have punched them full in the mouth, stuffed my property tax bill up their nose and set fire to it.

Still, in the spirit of lying in the bed that I have well and truly made for myself, I've decided to try and go for a full-on starfish, fluff the pillows, reach for a cup of coffee and a good book and try to make the best of things.

One of the good things about SB (fingers cramping with the pain of writing that) is that you can literally be on vacation within 2 minutes of leaving your front door. Which is useful, because this weekend two minutes was all we had. All Sunday LK beavered away at the apartment next door - poor choice of words considering the three young female students who reside there - and finally by 5pm we were ready for "family time!".

We decided to take a quick boat trip across the harbour.


















The girls had such a marvelous time.

































































That we decided to really complete the day and take them to the beachside playground too.









Good Times!

How To Knit - Fast

"Mom, you know what you haven't done in ages?" asks Anna.

I think, hmm......let's see; laugh, smile, be frivolous, sexy, hopeful.....

"MOM!"
"Sorry!"
"You know what you haven't done in ages that you should teach me? Knitting!"
"Right! That's certainly true. Would you like to learn how to knit?"
"Yes!! I've already found your stuff!"

Anna comes back moments later, clutching my knitting bag as I watch stitches from Lucy's half-finished poncho leaping like lemmings off the needles.

*sigh*

I grab a separate pair of fat needles, a spare ball of wool and cast on 10 perfect little stitches. The knitter in me begins to reawaken.

After approximately two minutes of 'in through the back, and pull the stitch over' Anna's starts to look cross. She wants a turn. We hold the needles together and hash out one row. This could be the start of something big. This is why having daughters is going to be brilliant. Anna demands to try it herself. 30 seconds later she huffs "I did not order up that knot! I'm not sure I like your way of knitting Momma, mine is much easier. Do you want me to show you?"

Well aware that expecting a five year old to learn how to knit is stretching things a tad, I take a leaf out of LK's book and allow the student to keep enjoying the idea of the sport, if not the specifics.

"Here's actually how you do it Mom. My way. It's much quicker. It's how kids do it. You just loop it around like this, and make as many stitches as you want. I am going to make you a rainbow scarf. I'm thinking about it right now, hanging up in your wardrobe. It is going to be beautiful!"

I have to admit, I'm getting a little misty at this point, thinking of my little knitter, working hard on my first five-stitches-wide rainbow scarf. I would wear it every day. Especially in July - heatwave be damned.

Anna by this point has produced a silk-worm-like cocoon of wool on the needle. She hands it back to me.

"There you go Mom! I'm just gonna need you to do the long part, you know the stretching it out so that's it a scarf part. I'm gonna have a snack".

I may have to wait a while for that rainbow scarf.

Don't Try This At Home

AliBlahBlah - making your life seem like a chuffing picnic.

Running an apartment building can be a full time job - a round the clock job when you're transitioning between tenants.

The trouble is, we already have full time jobs, plus two small and very demanding children. The last two weeks have been pretty harrowing. It would have put a huge strain on our marriage, except we've not been awake and in the same location as one another for more than two minutes at a time so we've only been able to bicker by text - and predictive text doesn't let you swear in British, so I've had to be restrained.

We gutted and renovated a three bedroom two bath apartment in four days with a budget made from fairy wings and pixie dust. LK worked til 2:30am every morning and was up to start his day job at 7am. I single-parented it for a week and definitely got the better end of the deal. I was sorely tempted to use the baby monitor and help him remove 10 years of rotten grout from the filthiest bathrooms of all time but somehow even though we were just next door to the sleeping kids, it didn't seem right. The two apartments combined (ours shares a wall with the one we were renovating) are probably equal to the square footage of your average American home, but even though we were only feet away from the kids, the fact that we were at a different physical postal address made us both freak out about using the baby monitor.

It was awful. At the time, the issues seemed insurmountable. Still, we did it, and we pulled it off by ourselves. It took the existing hoarders four days to move out - that's four days longer than we had anticipated them being there. Every day we would text 'are you guys going to be out today' and they would reply 'no', and we would try not to panic about the carpet that was being delivered in a matter of hours.

Meanwhile, next door chez K, our slab leak was gushing water and we still had yet to locate it. Our plumber called a specialty plumber, who detected it via sonar, and left detailed instructions for the plumber to fix it. The whole process took an absurdly long time, especially when you consider we could hear a continuous 'pshhhhhh' as water poured out of the building. Yes, it would have been prudent to turn off the water, except there is only one water shut off for the entire building....Nice.

Still, I'm always trying to scratch around for the positive or the humorous side to things, (believe it or not). Did you know that you can get a one-time 'extraordinary water charge' adjustment on your water bill? We do now. Plus, on a very positive note, in a tough rental market we had prospective tenants volunteering themselves for the place - we didn't even have to advertise, and we got to increase the rent. They rented it sight unseen (and a bloody good job too.....).We also had people notice the UHaul in our drive and knock on our door wanting to know if there was a place to rent. Form an orderly queue people.

The new tenants are three college girls. I know. LK laughably thinks their presence will persuade me to 'get my game on'. All I can think about is on-site babysitting. Besides, I'm sure to them he must seem about 120 years old.

Or perhaps I'd better just go out for a quick jog......

Melodrama

Firstly, in a rare act of continuity, I bring you Lucy's first day at preschool:





































She had a wonderful time. She napped, she explored, she got absolutely chuffing filthy. It was a perfect honeymoon start. She didn't cling to her sister, she didn't demand to be held, apparently she just walked and walked and walked. Amazed that there was half an acre of kid-size trails, and new plants, and sand pits to explore. A 'flower vine tunnel', a 'wooden chateau with play furniture'. When I arrived she was toddling around the tangerine tree, and she shouted 'Mamma' as soon as she saw me, but after a brief hug she wanted to be down and free to wander again. When I'd eventually rounded up her older sister and we were walking out of the school, Lucy finally rested her head on my shoulder and gave a huge sigh, glad to give in to the known. Or maybe she was just sad to be leaving the place.

......................

Back to Anna. I think she's picking up on the general stress levels chez K. Our tenants are moving out as we speak (ominous bangs and crashes through the wall in front of me). They were slamming UHaul doors and clanging equipment at 2am this morning. Last night they asked if they really needed to thoroughly clean their stove 'as you'll probably be replacing it right?'. I can't even think about it. We have only rarely been in that apartment since we bought this building 5 years ago, they pre-dated us, once invited a homeless family of 8 to live with them, blamed a broken toilet on low-flying aircraft, and, no small thing, they are hoarders. My anxiety levels are through the roof.

Anna had been hidden away in her room for most of this morning, only emerging for a stealthy sandwich or for some princess wardrobe fix (broken tiara, stuck zip). She was not happy to be told that we'd have to head out to LK's work for a 4th of July party. She was not happy to learn that she'd have to wear a non-princess dress. She moaned in the car, her dress was hurting. 'I am in pain, real pain. It hurts unless I I lean forward like this' (looking back in the rearview mirror revealed a crazy yoga/seatbelt contortion). 'Mom' she whined 'I feel like you're not listening to me! I am EXCRUCIATING!"

My thoughts exactly.

I pulled in to the nearest driveway which happened to be McDonalds. I performed emergency surgery on the dress, pulling out a tiny piece of plastic left over from the tag. Bingo, instant cure.

She started to look around. 'I'm thinking Mom, that I'm going to need some Old McDonalds french fries after that'.
'But you're cured', I said.
'Yes, but I'm still feeling a little sad about it all'.

*Sigh*

Moving On Up

Milestones happen no matter what you're going through.

Lucy is starting at Anna's preschool tomorrow. Her usual babysitter is taking a break for July and we had to find another option. For once, the universe aligned and helped us out. How often has that happened over the past 5 years? Not chuffing much. The teacher at Anna's preschool has a daughter who was looking for a summer job for a few days a week, we were looking for a sitter. Bingo. It means Lucy still gets one on one attention, whilst being able to transition in to the preschool. It also means that Anna and Lucy get to be at the same school at the same time, however briefly, which will be a huge help to Lucy's state of mind, and no small thing, makes my morning routine easier by a factor of about a million.

I can't wait to see how it goes. Lucy already loves the place and flings herself face down in the grass when it's time to leave Anna there. She loves the huge garden, the fruit trees, the kid-friendly natural play-structures, the paints and craft supplies, the child-sized chairs and easels. Here's a couple of photos of the two of them 'rocking out' at the school's Summer Celebration last weekend:








































































What kid doesn't love a child-centric environment, one that teaches them to rock out to 'Three Little Birds' by Bob Marley? I hope it goes well. I don't think it's a permanent transition, 18 months is still very young after all. Anna was just shy of two when she made her 'big leap forward':



















Still, some people are practically born at preschool, others finally achieve preschool, and it seems Lucy is going to have preschool thrust upon her.

Go get 'em tiger! I'll take pictures I promise.

Fish and Chips

Moving swiftly on from that last post about football.

The big expat news for me right now is an 'authentic' British fish and chips shop that's opened downtown. We've been watching for the grand opening, and I was more than a little excited when I snuck a peak through the papered up windows a couple of weeks ago and saw a packet of Jaffa Cakes sitting on the counter. Clearly the outfit was being run by people in the know.

Practically every restaurant in Santa Barbara offers fish and chips. When you order it, you'll get fish and fries, and the fish will be delicious and people will challenge you that it's the best fish and chips you've ever eaten, but it's not real fish and chips from a chippy. That wonderful fish and chip smell that carries through the drizzle and lures you in to the steamy, greasy shop with it's piles of pies, chips, fresh fish and pickled eggs (even I will draw the line on that one).

I'm sure every English person thinks their local chippy is the best. Maybe so, but I think if you grow up in Yorkshire you have a pretty good claim to the best fish and chips in the world. Even if your husband does order the 'toona' on his first visit to York's Petergate fisheries.

I was so excited to get a little bit of home right on my doorstep. Not that we go out anymore, but I had visions of us celebrating our new tenants moving in by splashing out on a fish supper.

*Sigh*, it was not to be. They have fantastic mushy peas, and a pretty good battered sausage - even special sausage mix from Whitefoot Meat market - Julia Child's favourite butchers when she was living in SB. They even have haggis, deep fried 'candy bars' and shandy. Talk about promising.

The chips though. That's where it matters. They were the right shape, and even came in faux newspaper, but they'd been cooked in canola oil. Gutted. They just didn't taste the same. Fake chips. I'm sure the magic ingredient is some horrifying amount of rendered beef fat, combined with the blood sweat and tears of a Yorkshire chippy, something the FDA would never, ever approve, but without that magic lard, that mixture of steam and grease from a real chippy, you might as well be eating fries. LK didn't care, and he quite rightly said that 99% of the people visiting the shop would be none the wiser. Still, real chips right on my doorstep, a girl can dream.

Didn't stop me eating the whole portion though, just to make sure.

Watching The World Cup From America

I thought I'd better get this post in quick before England play Germany tomorrow morning. Not that I'm a doubter you understand, it's just that if it goes to penalties, I may choose the cyanide pill option.





























You can take the girl out of the country.....

Neither of them look too happy do they? Lucy looks like she's facing a firing squad and Anna said 'but I'm American'. Cultural indoctrination is not easy. It reminds me of Gavin and Stacey which I am addicted to right now. (DVR it, or failing that, put it on your Netflix, it is well worth the effort)......when Smithy turns to his infant son and says 'lets get one thing straight, when it comes to football, you support England. None of this Ryan Giggs nonsense'.

Exactly.

Watching the World Cup in America is a vastly different experience now than when I moved here 15 years ago. Back then I had to watch England's World Cup matches on the Mexican channels as it wasn't even covered on any of the English speaking networks. I was the lone sad act at work asking if anyone had seen that corking Ivory Coast game last night.

Things have definitely changed. For the last couple of World Cups I've organized a pool at work, where teams are drawn at random for a $5 buy-in. Now that there is $160 to be won it's amazing how ardent my coworkers are, following their teams and checking the results. Americans may be generally clueless as to the location of Slovakia/Slovenia or the merits of the Spanish back four, but they do welcome a bit of gambling. Of course, nothing sours an office atmosphere more than the organizer drawing Brazil and my boss getting North Korea. (Come on Brazil!! We need the money!!).

On that note, it is refreshing living somewhere so multinational. The big teams here are the US and Mexico - with Mexico having a much fiercer fan base - especially in the barrio I call home. You can hear the roars when they score - definitely more so than the US games. Even though it would be nice to be at home during the World Cup it is nice to be surrounded by so many people with different affiliations; the Danish lady who works across the building from me, the Swiss/Italian EEG tech, the Mexican groundskeeper, our Australian friends etc. It's also nice when you can condemn that England v Algeria game to history here, without it being completely dissected and rehashed like it was in the English press.

I'm sad that the US are out. Apart from their first match I was cheering for them all the way. I wish they'd gone further. A decent run at the cup would have quieted all those who think soccer is for 8 year old girls. A bluster that fails to hide how pissed off they are at losing to Ghana. Again.

So yes, I'll be up at 7am tomorrow, coffee in hand, no doubt groaning with the rest of my countrymen. I know it's just a game, that there's far too much hype, and in our case, far too much hope, but knowing that every member of my family will be doing just what I am, (except with better, more partisan commentating), even when separated by over 5,500 miles, is brilliant.

Come on you England!

Riddle

I think a little light relief is in order.

When LK and I were on vacation in Maine we stopped at a seafood restaurant in Bar Harbor and had a cocktail while we waited for our table to be ready. The barman poured us both a hefty gin martini and asked:

"What is more powerful than God
More evil than the devil
Rich people want it
Poor people have it
and if you eat it you will die"

I'm proud to say that, such is the power of a gin martini, I got it. And to give you a hint - the answer is not 'cheese' or a 'whale shark' which were my coworkers guesses.

No googling!

The Fear

I've discovered the cure for public speaking.

Yesterday I had to give a presentation in front of all the bigwigs in my field, topic: Health Care Reform. I'll bet you wish you were there. The date has been a looming presence for what seems like my entire life.

The night before, LK and I discovered a leak in our building. Water streaming out of the slab outside our kitchen window, source unknown. After spending hours listening through the walls with a stethoscope (I kid you not) and cutting countless patches in the dry wall we have yet to find the leak. It is likely to be underneath the concrete foundation. I went to sleep that night counting gallons of water as they gurgled out of my house. $1, $2, $3, you get the picture.

We also heard yesterday morning that a tenant of ours who had locked himself out and attempting to climb in to his second story room, slipped, fell, broke his pelvis - this much we were aware of - now wants to know the 'name of our liability insurer'.

As I stood in front of all those people, chattering away and gesticulating to make an Italian football player proud, I felt very little fear. About speaking. It reminds me of the time in College I had three projects due at the same time and I powered through all of them in the space of a couple of days. At the time I felt unbeatable, all-powerful, I could take on the world. Then I handed the reports in, and came down with a two week long cold.

One of my favourite quotes of all time has to be from Eleanor Roosevelt:

"A woman is like a tea bag- you never know how strong she is until she gets in hot water."

I feel like a weak Darjeeling.

As I say, I've found the cure for public speaking, it's to have much worse things to worry about. It's not something I would wholeheartedly recommend, but it certainly works.

Annapalooza

Apologies for my absence. It's becoming clear that a nervous breakdown is a luxury I can't afford right now.

We've been dealing with some heart-stopping financial problems, coupled with tenants handing in their notice. Good times. We've slapped a bandaid on one of the issues and now it just feels like I'm no longer going through a heart-attack, but one further shock may just kill me.

People have been very kind, offering such time-worn adages as 'it's always darkest before the dawn' (what dawn?), 'what doesn't kill you makes you stronger', 'worse things can happen', or 'wow, you guys are fucked'.

I hadn't intended to write about this, mostly because we're still very much in the middle of things and quite frankly I spend 95% of my time worrying and writing is supposed to be a hobby, so I'd prefer to write about the girls instead. The reason I'm alluding to it is, one of the hardest things about having your world come crashing down around your ears is the people who don't know what's happening. Those who still expect a reply to their child's playdate offer, or want you to consider 'nature camp' or to chair a meeting or commit to the fall drop-off schedule. People who assume you know where you're going to be this time next month, hell, this time next week. All the time you feel like you're walking around with 'my world is ending' tattoed on your forehead, but everyone is completely oblivious and you still have to function because a nervous breakdown is far too self-serving.

Which is exactly what it felt like on Anna's 5th birthday party when I had to slap on my 'happy face', all the time wishing I could smack that pinata within an inch of it's life just so I could beat the crap out of something. As it happens we had to, because that unicorn pinata was built out of papier mache and 100lbs of tape and would not die. In the end 10 under 5s watched my husband brutally murder a defenceless white unicorn and then eviscerate it to release the candy (which had all come out of their wrappers due to the prior abuse).

Pinatas: an odd tradition I feel.



















Anna was happily oblivious. She had been looking forward to this birthday for approximately 364 days. The event had morphed from a horses party to a unicorn party to a pegasus/unicorn/pool party. She wanted everyone to dress as a pegasus (vetoed), and requested we feast on cooked rabbit (I need to check her nighttime reading, because she is coming up with some weird stuff). By the way, you know you have a 5 year old daughter when you have to ask yourself what the plural of pegasus is? Pegasuses? Pegasi?

We've been writing thankyou cards and I asked her to say what her favourite bits of the party were, 'the pinata' (death by beating) and our cake (requested: unicorn cake with a white body, red horn, rainbow tail, golden hooves, rainbow background with castle):



















As you can see, I cunningly slapped a unicorn on top of a homemade pink cake and allowed Anna to go crazy with the candy flowers and silver balls. What a confection I think you'll agree.

It tasted wonderful, even after the unicorn had sunk into the second layer.

So there you have it. She and her friends had a wonderful time, I felt like I was going to crack at any second (and did), but life goes on, and after a gentle prodding from a few of you, I've also decided to keep blogging because in the midst of all this financial heartache, the girls are having a childhood that I want to try and remember.

Oh, and by the way, the phrase any parent on a budget dreads to hear 'Mom, now that I'm 5 I want to learn to ride horses!!'

Crap.

Little White Lies

Anna's birthday is coming up so I'm teaching her how to lie.

I suppose you could say I'm teaching her how to be 'diplomatic' considering she apparently already knows how to lie.

She has a strappy sundress that is now strapless - found lying on our bedroom floor this morning, four straps snipped cleanly off.

I asked Anna if she'd done it. 'Nope' she answered, eyes unblinking, 'Lucy must have done it.' As much as I would like to believe my 17 month old possesses the fine motor skills necessary for using scissors, I was sceptical. Besides, Anna has already tried to pin some graffiti on her sister - the word 'LUCY' written on every wall in our house. Nice try sunshine.

I bent down, looked Anna in the eye and asked her again.

"It's a mystery!", she cried, and then, "We should investigate! I wore it yesterday and took it off for bedtime, so we know it happened at night.......... so we know that whoever did it is...................nocturnal!"

Really, I'm at a loss for words.

You'll have to agree then that she's a pretty adept fibber, and I'm obviously working on cracking her story.....yet at the same time I'm trying to teach her about thanking people appropriately for their gifts. While we were in England she was given two presents that she a) had already got, or b) just didn't want. Which is unfortunately exactly what she said. "But I already have this".

I tried saying, no this book is about the same character, but it's a different story, "err, no it's not Mom, it's exactly the same. It's the same book. I already have this one".

Then there have been many times when she gets something and she just doesn't want it. "No thanks! I don't like it." She beams. "Maybe Lucy will want it?" Helpful, but not exactly polite.

Prepping her for her upcoming party I've been telling her about not hurting people's feelings. I can just see her receiving a 3rd copy of the same barbie movie and saying "Thankyou that's lovely".

"Right Mom? Isn't that what I'm supposed to say if I don't like it?"

Thar She Blows

Lucy is proving to be an education in what toddlers are really like.

Granted she has reason to be upset in the above photo as LK has styled her hair a la David Beckham. There is a lot of use of hair gel by male Englishmen. A lot. I draw the line at the 70 year old I saw at Manchester airport with a fauxhawk - please, you're trying too hard. I realize, given his age, that he probably saw the heyday of Britain in the 60s and he's still far cooler than I will ever be, but David Beckham you are not sir.

Back to Lucy. I had never witnessed a 'fit of pique' or even a 'conniption fit' until Lucy arrived. Apparently it's nature, because no-one I know in her limited social sphere flings themselves down on the floor in a rage when thwarted. Anna's preschool teacher described Lucy as a very 'willful' child, which I believe means 'devil spawn who will not be attending my school'. Actually she said that a child with a 'strong sense of self' (again with the double speak) is good, because from an early age they are able to communicate their needs. Violently.

When frustrated Lucy will either:

a) fling herself face down in a pool of tears and snot
b) arch her spine violently backwards so it feels like you're wrangling an Atlantic salmon.
c) or, lock her arms behind her head and go completely limp so keeping a grip on her is like holding a sock full of sand.

I don't know where she's getting it from. We are not passionate people. I am phlegmatic on my most energetic days. She is bred from English, Swiss and Danish stock, not a Mediterranean spark amongst us. Bizarre.

So yes, not the easiest child to entertain/pacify on six flights, or when you land either. My worst moment must have been when my parents and I took the girls to the pool (inside! weird!). Two children, 3 adults - I really thought we had enough hands. After 5 minutes in the pool Lucy wanted to get out and run along the edge of the pool. I tried sticking her in the jacuzzi until a staff member accused me of trying to cook my child - tempting, but no. So I gave up, sighed goodbye to the sauna and steam room, and took Lucy back to the showers, where she immediately squeezed herself under the cubicle door in a bid for freedom and proceeded to race around on the slippy wet floor.

Nursing a cup of coffee in the lobby approximately 3 minutes later, I was really cursing my child and her golf-playing father, wondering what I'd done in a previous life to deserve such a hellion. At that precise moment a woman sprinted out of the changing rooms in front of me. Wrapped in only a towel, shampoo dripping from her hair, she was screaming at a small boy who was dashing out of the front door and in to the street.

I think someone was trying to tell me something. I watched Lucy dump her entire bag of rice puffs all over the carpet and thanked God that I wasn't chasing her naked in to the street.

That'll be next year.

Come On You England

The World Cup begins in less than a month. You cannot escape this fact if you're in England. Every shop has a dedicated 'England' section, home to English flags, union jack mugs and t-shirts, bras and cushions. It's the cushions that grabbed my attention, they are everywhere. Including my suitcase. I couldn't resist. If I am unable to be in England during the World Cup then I will at least transform our house in to a shrine to St. George.

I first saw the Jan Constantine pillows at the V&A Museum in London a couple of years ago, but a diabolical exchange rate and a hefty price tag meant I had to look but not touch. *sigh*

A couple of years later brought 17 billion high street knock-offs, and a plummeting pound (thanks coalition government!) and this meant I could indulge:

I bought this one at Castle Howard:


























LK affectionately calls it my 'crappy gay pillow' and threatens to throw it in the understairs cupboard whenever my back is turned. Poor Falkland Islands cushion marooned on the Argentina of our couch.

This one is my fave:



























Bought for a song at Next and now giving Lucy's room a good dose of colour, jingoism, jam roly-poly and Jerusalem.

I have a feeling these cushions will reach their zenith of usefulness when being thrown at the telly during England's inevitable World Cup defeat, but for now I love them.

I Believe I Can Fly

Both girls spent a huge proportion of our vacation playing in my parent's back garden. Never mind that it was a full 20º (that's centigrade, people) cooler than California. They were impervious to the cold. Granted Lucy was a little puzzled to be straight-jacketed in layer after layer of clothing and topped with an absurdly overlarge hat:




























I wasn't about to be buying any winter clothing for a 10 day sojourn in the UK, particularly as we are hurtling towards our 9 month summer in California, so I just made them wear all their clothes. At once. I was hoping for boho chic, but it turned out more like 'I'm wearing my carry-on'. Of course, now I review my photos, all the English children in the background are wearing nothing but t-shirts, jeans and rosy cheeks and my children look like miniature bag ladies.

Back to flying. Anna was devoted to launching herself off the back patio in an absurd parody of flight:























"Look at me fly Lucy!". She also performed something called 'gliding', not unlike flying, except with an odd contortion towards landing. I nicknamed it the 'spiral fracture'. She was obsessed with 'flying'.

Me, not so much.

As I sit here typing away at 5am (I heart jetlag), I'm still trying to find the words for flying halfway across the world with two under 5s. I've basically concluded that it's not unlike a marriage. We started off well, LK launched a charm offensive on the Continental staff at Manchester Airport, who no doubt snow-blinded by his massive American teeth, let us dodge the hoi-poloi queue and check in interfrastically at the 'First Class' ticket counter. The girls did their best to win over every Mancunian within earshot; "Hi! My name is Anna! I am 4 and 3/4. My Mom is Alison, she is 36! I have 8 My Little Ponies, their names are....." OK, so maybe Manchester was glad to see the back of us, but it started well. I'm sure LK was impressed by my efficient production of paperwork and filing of passports by age and nationality. He probably just didn't want to get caught demonstrating his overwhelming love for me.

But how quickly things degenerate when four family members are stuck in an area the size of a laundry cupboard for 28 hours. I'm not sure we'd even entered International Waters by the time we were both considering divorce. Lucy slept on me and only on me, I still have the armrest pressure sores. Do you know what it's like trying to stop a toddler kicking the seat in front when that seat is practically resting on your knees? I had to admit, the urge to let her keep kicking to gently 'persuade' the passenger in front to push his seat back in to the upright position was strong. I didn't though. I am meek, and do not expect to inherit the earth.

LK on the other hand had the aisle seat, so he was responsible for walking Lucy up and down the plane while she tried to snag headsets and toupees from every passenger. By the time we reached New Jersey we were both pretending we couldn't smell that dirty diaper even though it was mere inches from our noses.

It was hard work. Brutal, really. The jet lag has also been a joy. The girls waking at 3am yesterday morning to demand breakfast and inquire 'why isn't is morning? Is it morning now? What about now?'

It was completely worth every minute though - or maybe I'm suffering a form of childbirth amnesia and I'm already forgetting the true horror. I also know that it has to get easier. Next time Lucy will have her own seat (if she gets a job in the meantime and pays for it.....). She will be easier to reason with, hopefully more inclined to sit still for five seconds and watch a movie. Her sister watched the same episode of Bunnytown for 11,000 miles which means she is either:

a)autistic
b)has the memory of a goldfish
or,
c) awesome!

I am this close to saying why can't you be more like your sister. Except obviously I'm glad they're so different. Now that we're back on the ground.

Busman's Holiday

Is it possible to have a relaxing vacation with small children? Don't get me wrong, I'm very happy we've taken a break and flown to the UK. My accent has already sunk back into it's northern vowels, and my waistline is fighting a losing battle against fish and chips and curry.



We're a week in though, and I still feel like I need a holiday.



Let's just say that Lucy is not quite the seasoned traveller her sister is. On the third flight it took us to get to the UK I had already dismissed the idea of having a third child and ever going anywhere with my youngest daughter again. Lucy was a nightmare. It didn't help that we were re-routed to the south of Ireland to avoid volcanic ash, making the third flight (did I say third flight? I think it bears repeating...) even longer than anticipated.


Anna worked her way through a sticker book, watched endless kids movies thanks to the touch-screen TVs of Continental Airlines, then she announced the need for a nap and fell asleep. Lucy on the other hand wriggled, and screamed, and pulled hair, and kicked her sleeping sister. She spat out the Benadryl we tried to dose her with. She threw countless dummies into inpenetrable corners of the aircraft and then cried for the want of a pacifier. She slept. Fitfully. Gaining an impossible 30lbs every time she dozed, instantly cutting off circulation to my lower limbs. Of course they both chose to gravitate towards me whilst sleeping. I was covered in an impenetrable pile of leaden limbs. LK pretended to be absorbed in his ipad while I tried to spirit my book out of my handbag with my one free hand. Instead I watched the sun rise over the Atlantic and gazed at the cloud of volcanic dust hovering over Ireland, trails of yellow smoke snaking underneath the plane. I tried not to think about ash turning to glass in the engines and killing us all. I tried not to think about murdering Lucy.


When we landed at Manchester, to cold grey skies and rain, we were told that one of our two trains was delayed due to vandalism on the tracks and that we'd have to be bussed between Huddersfield and Leeds. I was so dizzy with tiredness that I managed to lose our train tickets somewhere on the platform. Our ticket collector said the upcoming week was predicted to be 'unseasonably cold'. That is never a good thing in the North of England. I started wondering whether LK and I should have just taken a week off and stayed in bed at home, only venturing out to drop the girls off at school.

Jet lag and small children make a difficult combination and the first three days of holiday were a blur. The girls were not as badly affected as we were. They sleep when it's dark, seemingly oblivious to time zones, but their nap and eating schedules have been thrown off leaving two very irritable girls and much whining. My family have been doing sterling work trying to entertain them, but it's exhausting work. My Mum fell asleep on the couch yesterday afternoon and you can tell my Dad is wishing he could go back to work for a bit of a rest and relaxation. My old bedroom smells like a hospital after an unfortunate projectile vomiting episode last night with Lucy. Who knows what triggered it; tiredness, over-excitement, British soy milk? She exploded in a torrent of liquid. LK dragging her off to the bathroom as she liberally doused everything in sight. What fun.



It sounds horrendous, except with the benefit of a week behind me I am thankful. Grateful that we didn't get stuck in New Jersey due to volcanic ash. Happy that some kind soul at Manchester handed in our tickets and they were returned to us. Thankful for every kind English coffee shop that doesn't sell milk but will happily fill up your baby's bottle for free. Anna turned to Lucy at the train station and said 'Lucy, now you need to know that we are in a country called Manchester and that we're going to England. I get to play with the horses first. It rains here and it's green and they call candy 'sweets.' When she wrote a postcard to her friends at school the first thing she said was 'I know you all miss me but I am in England where the farms come from'.

It's hard work, not relaxing, but it is rewarding. I love showing the girls where I grew up, playgrounds I used to play on, flowers I used to pick, sweets I used to eat. I love seeing the roses they are getting in their cheeks from the cold air. Lucy is going bonkers signing 'bird' as there seem to be so many more of them here than in California. I know we're not going to get a vacation, there will be no lying back with a good book, no unwinding, no rest - but I already have a photo album of memories to make up for it. Who has time for sleep?

The Tao of Anna

Short but achingly sweet:

Anna: There's no such things as monsters really Momma is there?
Me: No, definitely no monsters love.
Anna: Then I guess we have absolutely nothing to worry about!

I wish I could take this from my heart and transplant it to my brain as I lie awake, once again, in the small hours of the morning worrying. Does anyone have any sleep tips? That don't involve medication? I am awake from 2-3am til 4-5am every night. I should hire myself out to look after newborns. After two children have I lost the ability to sleep through the night?

We need a holiday. I may be sleepless, but LK is also stressed. He slept in last Monday (he has Mondays off to look after the girls). For some bizarre reason he woke up thinking it was Tuesday and that I had gone to work leaving him with both girls to get up, dressed, fed and dropped off at their various day-cares before he went to work. Never mind the fact that this NEVER happens. He never has to drop the girls off against the clock, only on Wednesdays when he doesn't have to be at work til the afternoon. Anyway, he went in to LK hyperdrive, running around like a headless chicken cursing me for letting him sleep in, hurling Lucy in to her clothes, telling a sleep-fogged Anna that 'there's no time for crying'! as he buckled them in to the car and gave them cups of dry cereal for breakfast. It was only as he was calling to apologize for Lucy's lateness that my friend Jen said 'it's Monday'. I'm sure she was at that very instant thinking 'wait, it is Monday isn't it?'. Suddenly he was left with an entire day to fill and two tear-streaked daughters in the backseat with nowhere to go. As I say, we need a holiday.

Fortunately for us we have blown caution to the wind and we're going! Home! Volcanoes permitting...... Now I just need to worry about how I'm going to pack.

Careful What You Wish For

I know that years ago, a 17 year old you probably wished for a house full of loose women just waiting for you to come home and scoop them up.

















It feels like someone's playing a huge cosmic joke on you doesn't it?

Happy birthday love.

Career Week

When I picked Anna up at school yesterday they told me she'd had a splinter about a third of an inch long stuck in her hand. It took her teacher over 20 minutes to dig it out using tweezers and then a needle. He said he was pale and clammy by the end of the procedure. Anna on the other hand was fascinated by the whole thing. Apparently she would guide him by saying 'that hurts Jason' but she was so engrossed by the anatomy of the surgery that she was detached from the pain. Or so they said. 'She's remarkable' they added, 'we've never had a kid who's more likely to become a doctor'.

Yeah, or a psychopath. I thought.

In all seriousness though, I still remember the terror of my Mum and Dad digging out a splinter, the smell of 'surgical spirit' and fear mixing in the air. Anna has inherited her lack of squeamishness from my Mum. Maybe from LK's side too, I don't know, the only thing I've seen them tested with is a 10lb diaper change. Anna is a born scientist. Who likes to wear pink. A chic geek.

I retold the story to LK when he got home, including the part about medical school. 'Sounds like she's going to college in England!' was his reply. 'Or we need to start saving', 'yeah, with our ante-money'. Anna chimed in 'I don't want to be a doctor, I want to be a dentist or a veterinarian'. Thanks Anna, much cheaper.

As an aside, a brief what the fuck (WTF) America? Abbreviations are to Americans as queues as to the British. They can't get enough of them. Why then do they insist on saying 'veterinarian'. I mean honestly, I'm exhausted from just typing it. They say 'pk' for penalty kick, 'c-section' for cesarian section and 'ra' for rheumatoid arthritis, yet they can't say vet? Do you really think a vet-er-i-nar-i-an and a veteran will somehow be confused? Bizarre. The same holds true for re-frig-e-ra-tor. I lose my appetite by the time I've said it. For a country that loves it's acronyms both of these words seem unfeasibly long.

Back to Anna. 'I want to be a dentist. But only on Mondays'.

Apparently this is to be her schedule:

Monday: Dentist/Vet

Tuesday: Detective

Wednesday: A hunter with my Dad. He can do the running. ?????

Thursday: Bug detective & scientist

Friday: Flower shop owner

Saturday: The world's top person knowing things about birds.

Sunday: Family day! With horses. And an archaeologist like Dora. Do I have enough days?


No wonder we're having a hard time finding the right school! I know nobody grows up wanting to be a systems analyst or an insurance claims adjuster, but I have to admit I'm pretty impressed and proud of this list.

You go girl, we'll do the best we can.

Love Mum x

Does Size Matter?

I know I’ve been on a bit of an education bent recently and I apologize. I’m sure a lot of you couldn’t care less (well, except for Rebecca and Nimble, many thanks for your kind words). Besides, all that kids do in Kindergarten is eat playdough and play doctor anyway, so what’s the big deal?

Well, not to flog a dead horse or anything, but, I’m more than a little concerned with the education level of our employees who all grew up in California. Recently. Either that, or I need to seriously re-evaluate my hiring policies.

Like, OMG! Today I was asked how to take a third off a bill of $300. I have the hardest time getting people to calculate 120% of the Medicare rate, with a calculator. Don’t get me started on spelling (she writes while scrutinizing her spellcheck for hypocritical errors). Today I corrected the spelling of: should I wright this off, patient has payn in his leggs, and I applyed this to his deductable. These are not typos.

I sound like I’m a hundred years old.

If you grow up with spellcheck are you pre-disposed to not concentrate on spelling? I tend to ignore it (as you may have noticed) as spellcheck takes my Britishisms as a personal affront. If you spend your life using predictive text are you oblivious to correct spelling? Should anyone really care anymore – is it going to be redundant in a matter of years anyway? I have a feeling that we're transitioning to a world of doers, rather than editors, where the details are overlooked. That irritates me, but only because I'm so anal that I would have been a sensation before computers, personal organizers and the like. Now I'm resigned to being a reactionary manager seething at the fact I asked an employee to consolidate our files - stored by year - and she started in the middle....

A lot of people will say the problem is the lack of funding in education. Increasing class sizes and the like. To which my Mum and Dad had a good response. It's their class photo at the top of this post. I say 'their' class, because they are both in this picture, they were in the same classes together until age 11. I won't say which ones they are because if you know me, or them, I'll leave you to guess. They are classic boomers and they had 46 in their kindergarten class.

As my Mum said 'we had a huge primary school class and we turned out alright'.

Or should that be 'allwrite'?

Vitriol

I am in an abusive relationship.

We attempted to transfer Anna out of the truly shitty school district we pay nearly $20,000 a year in property taxes for, and have failed. Everyone told us we should fake it, lie about where we lived like everyone else did - but we decided not to. We took the high road. I feel like the good girl at the prom who wouldn't put out and then watched her boyfriend go off with someone else.

That's what it feels like, as if Santa Barbara is the cute boy in school that everyone thinks the world of, 'oh you're so lucky to live there', 'it's gorgeous', yet behind closed doors Santa Barbara is mean and vindictive, telling you that you don't have enough money, you don't belong, you'll never be good enough.

That's right, I'm having a little pity party over here. Sorry, I sound like a petulant schoolgirl, and I will get over it, I'm just cross and disappointed, and very, very jaded.

We had been told that as our area school is so very poor (it's listed as a 'failing school' and in this State, you can only imagine how bad that is), that we are granted an automatic transfer and are bumped up the transfer list to boot. We were then told that the school we wanted her to go to is full for next year, and that they would hold a lottery for any spots that become available. Anna was in the third batch of kids to be pulled out of the lottery, behind kids with parents teaching at the school (1), kids with siblings at the school (10) and kids transferring from a failing school (17). With the luck of the English Anna came 28th out of 28. It's almost laughable really. Unless they open up an entirely new kindergarten class, or there is a mass defection, then she will not get in.

That was Friday, and I'm already feeling better. I have moved on. There is another option, a smaller school, further away with kids that she knows, a huge garden, a K-1 class for those kids who are (like Anna) already reading quite strongly. It's across the freeway from where Lucy will go to preschool next year (for ease of drop-off, and quite frankly, to make me less nervous about MORE natural disasters separating me from my children). Anna likes the rainbow gate and the rooms full of books.

I feel like the decision has been made for me. Maybe Santa Barbara is showing me some tough love.

Baby Talk

Lucy just turned 15 months old and she is starting to talk. Lush, jammy consonants spoken with heartaching deliberation. She's been saying 'dat!' for months, Dada, and Anne, uttered with the flattest Cockney 'a' of all time. My little Eliza Doolittle. That is the basic baby repertoire, one-consonant descriptors for the people in her life. As is customary, Dada was uttered months before Mama. It's easier to say. That's my story and I'm sticking to it. Now she asks for Mama! and it is rewarding on a cellular level.

Recently she has started branching out. Her first distinct word was 'boon' for balloon, repeated over and over at the supermarket as they danced above her head at the checkout. Then she added 'fssssshhhhhh', a sound like a slow puncture, to describe the fish tank at the dentists. And so it begins. So begins that period of time when you swear they have a repertoire of 30 words but to the untrained ear they all sound like 'duck'. With Anna we wrote them all down on the calendar on the day each new word arrived. I remember November being the 'explosion' month, at least a couple of new words a day. That would have made her a couple of months older than Lucy is now so Lucy is right on track.

Even before she could talk we had taught her to communicate. Sign language worked brilliantly with Anna so at about 4 months we started with Lucy. Just a few basic commands to make life easier. Every time we gave her a bottle we opened and closed our fists to indicate 'milk', before we gave her additional spoonfuls of yogurt we did the sign for 'more', then there is a sign for 'tired' and of course the ever-helpful 'all done' sign. I tried taking a picture of these, but it's hard to get Lucy to sign 'milk' when she's not hungry, and woe betide anyone who attempts to take her picture when she is signing a genuine need for milk because you will end up with this:




















Poor thing, I'm trying to point and click and she's pumping her fist as if to say 'FUCK! MILK!' why are you torturing me?!

And that's the funny thing about sign language, signs can evolve and take on new meanings, or inadvertently be attached to the wrong thing. Lucy's sign for milk is done when she wants a bottle, or when she wants anything. In her mind she's not saying 'milk' she's looking at the proffered bottle and saying 'hell yes!', which is how she reacts when you're holding some chocolate and she signs 'milk' as if to say 'dude! hand it over - I want that' and when you laugh (cruel parent that you are) at her desperate attempts to communicate need she will start squeezing both fists at the same time as if to say 'are you not listening? what's wrong with you people. Fuck, I'm surrounded by morons.'

Sign language has been brilliant and will continue to be a big help in the transition to real words. The other day Lucy switched from saying 'Anne' to the delightfully juicy Anne Na. Two fat, luscious syllables, she was so pleased with herself. Anna came racing in, 'Mom! Loop said Anna! Me! Listen!'

"Anne-Na" (grin)
"See! Good girl Lucy!"
"Anne-Na!"
"Lucy say Anna!"
"Anne-Na!"
"See? She's saying my name"
"Anne-Na"
"Mom she won't stop"
"Anne-Na!" (proud smile)
"Mom make her stop"
"ANNE-NA!" (huge smile)
"Mom make her go away"

Oh it's going to be so much fun. Anna already talks as it she's on a one-woman mission to use up all the oxygen in a room, and to be fair I'm no slouch. Lance is muttering about needing a man-cave.

In At The Deep End

How did you learn to swim? Swimming classes? Individual swimming coach? Thrown into a disused quarry? I can't remember how and when I learned. I remember Saturday mornings at the 'baths' and doing my 100m swimming badge, my silver lifesaver in pyjamas. I remember armbands but not them being taken away. I'm sure it was a traumatic experience for both me and my parents.

I am not a fish in the water, more like a tin of tuna. It took me three triathlons before I would even consider doing anything but the breaststroke. Unfortunately Anna has taken after me in this respect.


























We have free access to a gorgeous, mostly empty outdoor pool (Anna thinks England is hil-arious because they have swimming pools in houses....). We go there almost every week and Anna is finally learning to swim. I know there are plenty of 4 year-olds out there who don't know their butterfly from their dolphin crawl but with so much exposure to the water you would have thought....

Except it was the exposure to the water that was always the problem. She hates water in her face. If she gets splashed in the bath she will scream 'I need the big towel!!'. Apparently some people have a more sensitive 'drowning reflex' than others, and Anna seems to have inherited mine. Lucy on the other hand is part eel and at a lowly 6 weeks old LK was whispering 'are you going to be my surfer?' as she sat in the sink - reveling in the water and not caring in the slightest if her face was wet.

Interestingly, Anna loves being in the pool - on the proviso that her arm bands are heavily inflated and she is 60% out of the water at all times. If you've ever seen my Mum execute the 'ladies dry-hair butterfly' at the local swimming baths you will know that this is a genetic trait. We had a pool party for her 4th birthday, and some of the kids could swim and some still had floaties. It's not an issue of her being 'behind', I just long for the days when I can lie by the pool with a beer and a good book while the girls splash happily and independently in front of me. For that elusive goal of some 'me time' (I'm writing this at 3am) we had to take action.

We had heard that it's hard for parents to teach their kids to swim and that was certainly the case for us. We tried treats and rewards, slow deflation of her arm bands (this left her partially submerged and worried, like an anxious hippo), good old encouragement, and threats that her sister would learn before she would. Nothing worked. After over 4 years we had managed a couple of seconds with her face in the water in exchange for a barbie. At that rate she would have us bankrupt before she learned the crawl.

She is cautious by nature and it is very hard to get her to do something she's scared of. She hates; crowds, loud noises, water in her face, waves, large men, performing in public, new situations....you get the picture. We hired a pro. Before the lesson we outlined our hopes and concerns. "Well, how is she in the bath?" asked the teacher "I need the big towel!" we replied. "The shower?", "bottom water only - no shower head Mumma".

"I see" said Sarah.

Anna had her second lesson yesterday and she is already swimming several strokes of the doggy paddle underwater. Completely submerged except for her flower-clad bottom. You could have knocked me over with a feather - except I was too busy trying to stop Lucy from hurtling fully-clothed in to the deep end - that child is fearless. How can they be so different?

Anna even begged for more time. Goggles have certainly helped (thanks Lorna!!) but the key has been her instant bond with her teacher and the fact that the excitement over learning to swim and her desire to please are greater than her fear. She can do breaststroke kicks (frog kicks), the crawl (scooping ice cream) and mini-dives (humpty-dumpty).

Someone order me a pool-side cocktail, I think this is going to be a good summer.

Alien

One of the strangest things about being an expat is going back and forth between feeling like you have two homes, or feeling like you belong nowhere. Two sides of the same coin.

I spend my life in the States 'being English', it's my defining characteristic over here - well that and the mother-of-two-under-five pallor. When I go 'home' though, everyone talks to me as if I'm an expat, an outsider. This happens to everyone who leaves their home, whether it be a home town, country, or continent.

Two things have happened recently that have made me feel like I'm not quite as English as I pretend to be. Firstly, we're going back to England in a month (yay!) and this coincides with a general election. I immediately thought about having the opportunity to vote for the first time in 15 years (I am not an American citizen). I take the right to vote very seriously. Then it hit me - what right do I really have to vote in a country where I haven't been resident in almost 15 years? I have more to say about the politics of the US these days. Healthcare reform, education cuts, these things will directly impact my day to day existence. I could vote by party lines in the UK, but even those have probably changed dramatically since I've been gone. At what point do I admit that I've lost touch?

Then there's my need for contraception. We want to have more kids. We can't afford to have more kids. We can't afford the two we have quite frankly. I need a long term contraceptive solution that is not permanent (not the snip) just in case we win the lottery, but I can no longer tolerate hormonal solutions - that is an entirely different blog post. The copper IUD seems the only obvious solution, except that my genius American health insurance doesn't cover it. It's over $800 out of pocket here thanks to private healthcare gauging, and it's free on the NHS. I called my doctor in England this morning hoping to get it sorted out while I'm over there so I could save the equivalent of a plane ticket. I was surprised at how American I sounded on the phone. I had to make a concerted effort to speak English. I got the feeling they thought I was milking the system asking for healthcare when I no longer live there and no longer pay taxes. They were right. I'm still entitled to free healthcare but do I feel like I can justify it? Am I still owed it by birthright? After all I've 'chosen' to live in a country that withholds long term contraception because it won't afford my insurance company a monthly copay. More fool me.

I'm conflicted. I've decided to pay for my IUD over here, or at least investigate payment options or a different health plan. Damn you Blue Shield! I don't think I'll vote in the UK unless I can spend some time researching the issues, and reading the BBC magazine online in the mornings doesn't count. I'm still not ready to call America my permanent home but it seems that I'm starting to realize that I'm not a full British citizen any more either.

At what point do you let go?

Happy Easter

I woke up this Easter morning to a screaming 1 year old and the kind of hangover that only a girls night in a bar full of sugary cocktails can produce. Lucy wailed her sympathies in to my right ear. She has four teeth coming in at the same time. As someone who experiences fast labours I can sympathize - her pain is brutal, yet efficient. I never get to go out these days. LK took one look at my pale green complexion and raccoon eyes and said 'poor you, you finally got off your leash and you ran right in to traffic'.

Our kitchen counter was celebrating the Lord's day with a perfect coffee stain crucifixion. Someone was obviously trying to tell me something; it was either, go to church and celebrate that Jesus is risen, or, have a strong cup of coffee and sort yourself out. I chose the latter.

Lucy's pitiful screams had woken up her sister so I didn't get to race upstairs and place her chocolate bunny by the side of her bed. Instead I propped it up outside her door and did a little 'I think I just saw a bunny racing down the stairs' routine when she emerged from her room.

She wanted to know what the bunny looked like. My dessicated brain described something akin to Peter Rabbit; small, brown, furry etc. Anna furrowed her brow. 'Dada said when he saw him last year he was large and white, with white fur'. She didn't seem suspicious, just confused. It was too much for my poor hungover grey cells. I muttered something about him wearing a brown jacket and moving too fast to be sure. LK later gave me a verbal beatdown about not knowing what the Easter Bunny looked like. To which I replied - nobody knows what he looks like, he's a figment of the collective imagination. 'Like Santa Claus?' he replied? Touché.

Still, Anna refused to be thrown by the brown rabbit/white bunny controversy and a good time was had by all foraging for eggs in a friend's garden. We nursed Irish coffees like good parents and laughed at Lucy trying to hold an Easter basket whilst tripping on gopher holes.

Good times. Happy Easter all.