Splash Therapy

All things considered, it's been a bit a of a crappy week.

This is nothing new, just the usual February blues - Christmas is long gone, Spring is still too far away and the evenings and mornings are still dark and miserable. All that, and the whole Valentine's Day lunacy too - February is not my favourite time of year.

So, in the hope that a bit of weak, late-winter sun and some cold, fresh air would blow away some of the lingering malcontentment that makes me a rancid, horrible February ratbag, I packed the boy into the car this morning, and set off to our local butterflies, birds & wildlife place.

The boy, perhaps sensing my mood, sat in his buggy with politeness and good grace all the way around the tropical butterfly house, smiling and pointing obligingly in all the right places. He wasn't keen on the very loud squawking parrots - a shame, because Charlie the chattering Lory bird is a scream when he gets going - so we had to push on and out of the aviary.

(I wonder if the staff know that Charlie often says 'What's this? What's this? That's shit...' to the gathered pre-schoolers?)

Next up was Pet's Corner, where it seemed like a good enough opportunity to get him out of the buggy and let him have a walk. He chased the chickens, poked at the guinea pigs, and finally, we wandered off into Wallaby Paddock.

And that was when he saw it.

The huge, filthy puddle, lying straight ahead, right in the middle of the path.

'It's OK', I said. 'You've got your wellies on, that's what they're for - off you go'. He didn't need telling twice.

Today, I learned that there is no pleasure on earth to match that experienced by a one-year-old splashing in a puddle for the very first time. I nearly cried with laughter, as he danced, stamped, stomped, splashed, giggled and squealed and the filthy water sloshed all over the pair of us.

As an inexperienced, first-time parent of a toddler, I tend to find that these new experiences often teach me something new on a practical level - so here are today's lessons:

1. All the exciting, hoppity-hop action of an entire, free-roaming mob of tame wallabies is as nothing compared to the unadulterated joy to be had from one good, muddy puddle.

2. Any expedition that involves wellies will also necessitate a change of clothes. This is crucial, because...

3. ...you must choose trousers that will stay tucked in the wellies. The mid-splash-wardrobe-malfunction/no-spare-clothes combination is disastrous!

Bring on the April showers - I'm off out to get myself some new wellies, and get in on the Splash Therapy!

Photo courtesy of Flickr/sierraromeo

Let Them Eat Dirt

So says this week's New Scientist magazine, in an article to warm the hearts of lazy mummies everywhere.

I was once asked, in one of those mummy conversations, how often I disinfected our toys. 'Never', I said. 'Unless I found it down the toilet, or in the dog's mouth, and even then I'd probably just bung it in the dishwasher. A bit of dirt does them no harm.'

Whilst the hygiene debate amongst your average set of mothers-at-a-playgroup probably extends no further than allergies and asthma, it seems that the outlook for the child of a slightly slummy mummy could possibly be even brighter.

Here are the edited highlights:

'As strange as it sounds, epidemiologists are starting to uncover some unexpected links between our exposure to dirt and germs and our risk of cancer later in life...Such findings point towards a curious possibility: one way to avoid dying of cancer may be a hefty dose of germs.

The notion that living dirty has benefits may ring a bell. Researchers have been debating the 'hygiene hypothesis' for years, but it is typically discussed as an explanation for the rising incidence of allergies and asthma in developed countries, not cancer.

Now some researchers are starting to wonder whether the higher incidence of certain cancers in affluent populations - including breast cancer, lymphoma and melanoma - might also have something to do with sanitised, infection-free living. If they're right, the implications are huge.

There are of course huge problems. Assessing ways of preventing cancer, rather than treating it, can take decades. And no-one is suggesting deliberately exposing people to risky infections...when it comes to vaccines with a proven safety record, however, there are far fewer issues.'

Still, if your own mother was a hygiene queen, there are benefits to be had in other ways. Apparently, working in a cotton factory, or doing a job that involves breathing in lots of aerosolised manure (e.g. on a dairy farm) will also make you far less likely to develop lung cancer, even if you are a smoker.

Fantastic news all round. I'm looking forward to getting my good friend MadCow's take on the subject. She's called MadCow because she has substantial academic and professional expertise in the field of virology - and she always knows the juicy bits that the newspapers and magazines won't tell you.

In the meantime, I'm off to make the most of that season ticket to our local Open Farm - looks like there might be some new added value in it for us all!

Coping with a Toddler: 10 Easy Steps to Keeping Your Sanity

A few weeks ago, I posted some introspection revealing my huge insecurites about dealing with my little boy as he took his first steps and officially entered his toddlerhood.

I've never been one for going all gooey in the presence of small children. Babies are cute enough when they're not screaming or pooing, but there's always been something about toddlers and their demanding, interrupting, juice-spilling, house-demolishing ways that had previously made me want to scrub my toilet bowl with their irritating little heads. So it didn't come as any surprise that I found this stage hard. Really, horribly, insanely hard.

However, today, I think I have just about cracked it. I haven't so much tamed the toddler as been tamed by the toddler, and despite the occasional bad day, I am now loving this amazing time.

Here's how I do it.

1. You know those expectations of normality and the ability to get stuff done that you were delighted to re-discover once the horrendous, sleep-deprived exhaustion that is the newborn phase was finally over?
2. Forget about them.
3. Ask everyone around you to do the same.
4. You know how you had just about got used to feeling in control of your days again, and able to get around at something resembling the speed of a normal functioning adult?
5. Forget about it.
6. Ask everyone around you to do the same.
7. Remember how your house used to look?
8. Forget about it.
9. Ask everyone around you to do the same.
10. Develop a sound risk assessment strategy, and stick to it in the face of all reasoned debate.*

What it all seemed to boil down to was as simple as finding the ability to remove the cork, say 'bollocks' to what everyone else appears to be doing, and just give in to the mayhem.

It's so very easy to feel insecure about what you're doing, or intimidated by what other mothers seem to be doing, but my observation of and conversations with other mothers tell me that on balance, we're all just working to our own priorites.

The mother who religiously cooks wholesome fresh organic meals for her little darling almost invariably sticks him in front of the TV while she does it each day, and the relaxed, happy mum with the well-adjusted siblings almost certainly lives in a toy and washing-strewn pig sty. We all have our ways of getting through, and I'm certainly casting no aspersions nor making any value judgments here. I'm far too far from perfect myself...not to mention that it would be rude and unpleasant and make me a Very Bad Person Indeed.

*When I say 'Risk Assessment Strategy', what I mean is a foolproof way for picking one's battles when the little buggers get testy. These days, if my boy is unlikely to hurt himself badly, to hurt anyone else (or the dog) or to break something, I tend to let stuff go.

If challenged, I find that an effective strategy is to say 'Well I'm at my battleground limit just now so which of the following [dangerous and destructive] behaviours would you like me to be letting slide instead?'. Provided your list is long enough, your critics soon get the message and back off.

This will probably be my last post before the madness that is our family Christmas gets underway, so I'd like to wish everyone who finds themselves here a Happy Whatever It Is You Celebrate In Late December, and a Fabulous 2008!

A Mother's Morning Rollercoaster Ride

As always, the little blighter wakes you up far too early, and you just know you're in for a rough morning. You get out of bed feeling every inch the malevolent hag-beast that you know you are today, and the fact that he's demanding his milk right now isn't helping.

It's only 7:00 and you're already counting the minutes until his lunchtime nap.

This morning, he discovers that if he just presses the end of the sippy cup, the milk flows out of the end in a continuous stream, soaking your bedclothes.

Your mind starts formulating the letter you're going to write to the incompetent idiots who missed that particular design flaw, but you don't reach a conclusion because you know that once you get a minute to yourself, there'll be another 15 jobs demaning your attention that are far more important than wallowing in narkiness. You sigh, and resign yourself to buying yet another new cup, wishing you'd just given in and bought the expensive one in the first place.

There's no improvement over breaskfast, as he hones his aiming and throwing skills with some soggy Weetabix and your pyjamas. That stuff sets like cement within seconds, and you write a mental note to yourself - 'Must remember to scrape PJ bottoms before washing...'.

It's only 9:00 and you're still counting the minutes until his lunchtime nap.

You take him upstairs to clean his teeth and wash his face and hands, where he wriggles and squirms like a bag of angry cats. That job done, it's your turn, and as you sink into your shallow and by now lukewarm bath, you're hit on the back of the head by one of the balls you have thoughtfully provided to keep him occupied for the two minutes that you get each day to make sure that you are basically clean, and don't smell too horrible.

It's only 10:00 and you're still counting the minutes until his lunchtime nap.

It's Friday today, and there are no activities, so it's up to you to keep him entertained until lunchtime. You switch on CBeebies in the hope of some peace, but it's no use. You read every book he has, and although it's lovely that he likes his books, today he wants that really irritating one that was all the library had to offer, 20 times over. He's then seized by some evil demons of mischievousness, and proceeds to twang every nerve you possess, including your very last one, like the strings of a double bass. He runs from plug socket, to oven, to bin, to stairs, back to plug socket, just testing, testing, testing whether the behaviours that elicited a 'No' yesterday will get the same response today. He's quite clearly a budding scientist, because he seems to have an innate grasp of the fact that a quality experiment must be repeatable many, many times.

2 hours later, it's lunchtime, and your living room looks like an accident at a jumble sale. Still, it's 12:00, and there's only 60 mintues to go. You remember that The Husband insisted on cooking him chilli last night, and you sigh and wish you had put your foot down and insisted on Bolognese instead. There's no chance he's in the mood for something new. Especially rice.

In fairness, he gives it a good try, but spits most of it down his front. By this point, he's getting bored and ratty, and as the arm goes up for the kidney bean long fling, you whip the bowl away, take cover and woof the chilli down yourself, because by this stage, you really can't be arsed to cook your own lunch. One banana, many raisins, a grape choking incident, and a few Pom Bears later, you give up and decide to take him upstairs.

You try to change his nappy, and as usual, he's fighting you every step of the way. You put him on his back again, and lauch into a desperate, yet somehow hilariously ironic rendition of 'If You're Happy and You Know It, Clap Your Hands' knowing full well, that he's tired and not in the least bit happy, and he doesn't even clap his hands on command yet, never mind in time to music.

Except this time, he does. You're amazed. You sing the second line. He does it again. As you reach the end of the verse, you're both laughing hysterically at this wonderful musical interaction, and he laughs and claps harder and says '' 'gen 'gen" Six verses and one clean nappy later, you pop him into his sleeping bag, draw the curtains, find his toy and settle down for a cuddle. He's shattered but relaxed and happy, and falls asleep in your arms within two minutes.

Just as his soggy little thumb drops slowly from his sleepy mouth and you lay him gently into his cot, you start counting again.

It's only 1:00, and you just can't wait until he wakes up, and you can give him an enormous hug and tell him how much you love him.

No, NO, NO!!

OK, that's pretty much all I seem to say these days, as a result of trial by toddler, and I really must get a grip and try some POSITIVE parenting.

Apparently, you are just supposed to ignore bad behaviour, but here's a quick list of behaviours that I simply can't ignore. Please, someone, tell me I'm not misjudging this?

1. Bashing toy bricks on my wooden table tops
2. Bashing toy bricks on the windows
3. Throwing toy bricks at the dog
4. Playing with plug sockets
5. Throwing toys down the stairs
6. Surfing on upturned activity tables
7. Playing with dirty nappies
8. Tipping food into Mummy's lap (the icy cereal milk actually made me scream...)
9. Flushing clothes down the toilet.

Repeat the above sequence of events about 75 times, and that's pretty much my day at the moment. Add to that the apparent dropping of the 2 hour lunchtime nap, and what you get is a woman on the edge of her sanity.

I'm handling it at the moment by taking him out lots. I've got a great story about a sweary parrot and some menacing wallabies at one of the local kiddie attractions, but it will have to wait till another time. The Husband and I are having a rare Night Out, and I must go and make myself look presentable. Finding something without snot trails on the shoulders and tomato sauce up the legs would be a good start. I won't recognise myself without them!

Slummy Mummy

So, what with the insomnia and the teething toddler (intermittent crying from 3am - 5am this morning), I am not exactly at my best today. Thankfully, this allows me to forgive myself for what I did this evening.

The boy has discovered an insatiable enthusiasm for books this week. It's coincided with the walking - he can now get one from his box and bring it over to me to read with him. 20 times in succession. Then another one, 20 times in succession.

Anyway, by 6:30 this evening, I was pretty much down to my very last nerve, especially with 'Where's Spot?' - 'Is he in the cupboard? - NO; Is he inside the clock? - NO'*and I found myself uttering the unimaginable:

'Oh pleeeeaase, just put the book down and watch the TV'

We will be visiting the library for some new books tomorrow, to keep Mummy from losing her last remaining shreds of sanity.

*He's in the basket. These things can be a worry, I know.