I will miss Wembley. Where else, with the possible exception of One Direction's house (do they all live in the same house? I sort of imagine they do, except the one who left, obvs.) can you walk out of your flat, take the baby for a walk and find yourself in the middle of a crowd of excitable teenage girls all waiting around hoping to catch a fleeting glimpse of someone famous?
At least, I presume that was what they were all doing outside Wembley Arena today watching the X Factor being filmed. Unless there was just a really, really long queue to get in.
Piglet was asleep, so I waited for a few minutes, noting that something must be about to happen as not only was there an expectant waiting crowd, but a paparazzi photographer was stationed on the roof like a sniper.
Of course she may actually have been a sniper. Watching X Factor sometimes has that effect on me, too, especially when Cheryl rocks up wearing two dustbin lids and shaming a teenage girl on national television for being "a bit of a bully" and everyone swoons and says she's the nation's sweetheart. Or when they cue the Sad Music and start talking about a contestant's "journey," and how every minute of their existence up until now has been utterly meaningless because all they have ever done with their life is have a normal job like everyone else that doesn't involve singing terrible dated covers to the nation on a glittery plinth every week, and also their gran died last year at the age of a hundred and three and it was all terribly tragic and unexpected, and now she must be watching over their moment of televisual glory from that great big living room in the sky, probably wearing a T-shirt with a picture of them on it. Anyway, I digress. Piglet let out a squawk of displeasure at the pushchair being stationary, and I moved on, noting with interest that the real action was not in front of the Arena, but along the side street on the way back to my flat, where Olly Murs was being filmed getting out of a car. Yes, OLLY MURS. GETTING OUT OF A CAR. Take that, waiting public, you missed it.
After all this excitement, (please note I also saw Caroline Flack. CAROLINE FLACK! She was only, like, FIFTY METRES AWAY! And also some other presenter who I didn't recognise, who was interviewing some people whom I can only assume were PROBABLY X FACTOR CONTESTANTS!) I had to calm myself down with smelling salts, and very nearly missed the yearly extravaganza that is the Forum House Residents' Party.
This was, in fact, a welcome break from trying to get Piglet to eat his dinner, an ordeal that basically consists of me repeatedly putting him in his Bumbo seat and him repeatedly climbing out and crawling away, although not before giving his sippy cup a nice big shake so that all the water comes out, soaking at least one book in the process.
Piglet seemed to enjoy the party, and it did have the desired effect of tiring him out before bed, as he spent a glorious hour exploring the courtyard of the building, being trailed by yours truly. I was trying to strike the right balance between being a relaxed parent who lets my child explore his surroundings, thus meeting his development potential as encouraged by the likes of Penelope Leach, et al, and being suitably firm about boundaries at crucial points such as when Piglet decided to pick up some stones from the ground and attempt to eat them.
The main difficulty in gauging where exactly the appropriate limits might be, is that there is no one else to tell you. Well, maybe Gina Ford, but like, facepalm. Or my mother, but is it really necessary to avoid all grass just in case a dog might have once relieved itself on that patch at some point in history? There is no rehearsal and no going back and putting it right if you get it wrong. Let's just say that this evening, in the courtyard, no one else's baby seemed to be crawling around. They were all either old enough to walk, or too young to do much more than sit contentedly in their parents' arms. And not one of the assorted children of my neighbours were in any way covered in mud and grass, as Piglet very quickly was. Eventually I gave up and took him back inside. He crawled most of the way back to the flat, which is probably regarded in some quarters as unacceptable, but hey, we don't have a block party every week.
Showing posts with label fun times in Wembers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label fun times in Wembers. Show all posts
Tuesday, 21 July 2015
Monday, 20 July 2015
Piglet Vs. Literature: Part 2
Piglet seems to have developed a rather disturbing new habit. Several times this week I have caught him banging his head-apparently deliberately-on his cot or my bed. Upon consulting Dr Google about this distressing new hobby I have learned the following:
Piglet has above average intelligence
Head banging is totally normal
Piglet must be autistic
Piglet is a Romanian orphan
Obviously some of these possibilities are more appealing than others.
Anyway, in an attempt to stimulate the first of these options, today I took Piglet to the library. Now I must admit that Piglet does not seem to be overly keen on books at this present time. In fact, whenever I try to read to him he either a) tries to grab the book and throw it around or b) crawls as quickly as possible in the opposite direction, usually right off the side of the bed (I basically have to cling on to him at all times whilst on the bed. The other night I was woken up by an almighty crash and the sound of hysterical crying, only to find that he had rolled right off in his sleep. This did not go down well in light conversation at work, where I suddenly felt the eyebrows of all present company rise slightly as I regaled this witty oh-aren't-children-funny anecdote, as though I had just casually admitted to waterboarding my son during his evening bath). Today, however, there was a Netmums meet-up at the library, during which they were going to be talking about some stuff that doesn't apply to me, such as flexible working (ha ha ha) and starting your own business (I once sold some stuff on Ebay and made an actual loss).
Now one friend of mine, a devotee of Mumsnet, once told me that she preferred Mumsnet to Netmums because the latter was "a bit working class," so I was expectingto feel right at home the place to be populated by people with Croydon facelifts and children called Chardonnay, but it turned out that in fact the Netmums posse consisted of nice well-spoken ladies with well-behaved children who sat still and looked on magnanimously as Piglet crawled around crazily trying to steal their scooters, pushchairs and any shoes they happened to have removed from their feet. This meant that I ended up somewhat disengaged from the conversation as I was continuously having to run across the library and stop Piglet from emptying entire bookshelves and throwing the contents across the floor, in much the same manner to how he rolls at home with my own book collection, now sadly mostly ripped to shreds or soaked with water on a daily basis. To be honest though, I pretty much switched off and decided to leave at the point when the speaker, who was talking about setting up a business when her children were small, decisively proclaimed that if you were always working when your child was young, by the time they turned ten you would have lost them forever, and due to your failure as a mother by not putting the effort in during the early years and being there to wipe away their every tear and change their every nappy, you were setting yourself up for a lifetime of emotional distance, bad behaviour, and basically having you and your child physically enact all the lyrics from Cats in the Cradle by Harry Chapin.
That song always made my dad cry. Not sure why, as it seems that in real life it's generally only mothers who come in for the sort of criticism that blames every one of an individual's personal failings/murderous tendencies/despotic dictatorships on the failure of their female parent to be a cookie-baking, treasure hunt-organising, dedicated to home and hearth Perfect Mother. The dads can work all they want and no one ever implies that they are neglecting their true vocation and ruining the next generation for all of humanity.
Anyway, my lack of motherly skills evident, I skulked off, only returning when I saw that the queue in Starbucks was a bit long, and I stealthily snuck back into the library to use the coffee shop, hoping not to be seen by any of the Net Mums. Sometimes I think when Piglet is older he will turn on me and accuse me of loving coffee more than him. The boy is basically being raised in the highchairs of Cafe Nero, Costa and Starbucks. The Starbucks staff don't even have to ask me my name anymore. Some of them can even spell it.
And I made him play on his own while I watched an episode of Mad Men this evening. I'm going to Hell in a Handcart.
Piglet has above average intelligence
Head banging is totally normal
Piglet must be autistic
Piglet is a Romanian orphan
Obviously some of these possibilities are more appealing than others.
Anyway, in an attempt to stimulate the first of these options, today I took Piglet to the library. Now I must admit that Piglet does not seem to be overly keen on books at this present time. In fact, whenever I try to read to him he either a) tries to grab the book and throw it around or b) crawls as quickly as possible in the opposite direction, usually right off the side of the bed (I basically have to cling on to him at all times whilst on the bed. The other night I was woken up by an almighty crash and the sound of hysterical crying, only to find that he had rolled right off in his sleep. This did not go down well in light conversation at work, where I suddenly felt the eyebrows of all present company rise slightly as I regaled this witty oh-aren't-children-funny anecdote, as though I had just casually admitted to waterboarding my son during his evening bath). Today, however, there was a Netmums meet-up at the library, during which they were going to be talking about some stuff that doesn't apply to me, such as flexible working (ha ha ha) and starting your own business (I once sold some stuff on Ebay and made an actual loss).
Now one friend of mine, a devotee of Mumsnet, once told me that she preferred Mumsnet to Netmums because the latter was "a bit working class," so I was expecting
That song always made my dad cry. Not sure why, as it seems that in real life it's generally only mothers who come in for the sort of criticism that blames every one of an individual's personal failings/murderous tendencies/despotic dictatorships on the failure of their female parent to be a cookie-baking, treasure hunt-organising, dedicated to home and hearth Perfect Mother. The dads can work all they want and no one ever implies that they are neglecting their true vocation and ruining the next generation for all of humanity.
Anyway, my lack of motherly skills evident, I skulked off, only returning when I saw that the queue in Starbucks was a bit long, and I stealthily snuck back into the library to use the coffee shop, hoping not to be seen by any of the Net Mums. Sometimes I think when Piglet is older he will turn on me and accuse me of loving coffee more than him. The boy is basically being raised in the highchairs of Cafe Nero, Costa and Starbucks. The Starbucks staff don't even have to ask me my name anymore. Some of them can even spell it.
And I made him play on his own while I watched an episode of Mad Men this evening. I'm going to Hell in a Handcart.
Wednesday, 25 March 2015
More Unsolicited Advice from the Good People of Wembley
So I regale you with yet another tale of how when you have a baby, everyone considers it their God-given right to tell you how to parent.
I had, as usual, carefully considered how Piglet and I were presenting ourselves to the world, in order to deflect any unwanted comments. Piglet was wearing his snowsuit, and despite the fact that it wasn't even that cold, I had also brought a blanket to cover him with, lest any well-intentioned individuals decide that I was a neglectful mother for not swaddling Piglet to within an inch of his life. As we were travelling by bus, I considered taking him out in the sling, so that we wouldn't be taking up space that may be required by a wheelchair user, or a person with more children than me, whilst also winning bonus points by carrying my baby, which according to the doctrines of attachment parenting is better for the child than being pushed in a pram, because they can like, hear your heartbeat and stuff. And also it's what people did in the olden times back on the savannah, innit. Then I decided against it, as surely if babywearing is indeed better for the child, it wouldn't result in said child yelling all the way to Ealing because the way Mummy is sitting on the bus is uncomfortable for him, and then being knackered and unable to sleep the whole time we are out as there is nowhere for him to lie down. So, like the selfish mother that I am, I took the pram.
This was all fine until the way home, when I was sitting contentedly on the bus with Piglet blissfully asleep, until a particularly loud party of schoolchildren walked past, and Piglet woke up. Like he always does when there is any hint of noise. After all, in the olden times back in the cave, he had to stay alert all the time just in case a sabre toothed tiger was hanging around, hoping for a bit of a nosh up. For a while, he was content to sit quietly, looking around (there were surprisingly no sabre toothed tigers on the 83 bus, just a mad bloke who kept caressing the pole with the bell on it) but as time went on, the traffic got worse and he started to get bored, the whingeing started.
"Don't worry," I told him reassuringly, "we'll soon be home."
Judging by the state of the traffic, this was at best an optimistic estimate, and at worst an outright lie, but Piglet had not yet descended into actual shouting, so surely the other passengers on the bus could put up with the occasional whimper.
And then the elderly man next to me turned to me and explained everything.
"He wants milk."
Well, at least he had got Piglet's gender right. This was an improvement from earlier in the day, when I had been in Boots buying mascara and the woman at the counter leaned over and said knowingly to Piglet, "you'll be wearing that before too long!" Not wanting to conform to gender stereotypes by protesting that he was actually a boy, I had nodded enthusiastically in agreement.
I explained to the man on the bus that Piglet was going to be fed when he got home, but I didn't really want to breastfeed him on the bus, and anyway, hunger was not the cause of his discontent on this occasion. Why I felt I had to justify myself to the entire cohort of the 83 bus I do not know, but I immediately assumed that the man thought that I must be starving my child.
Which he obviously did, as his next comment was, "he needs nipple. Somebody give him nipple."
SOMEBODY?
Emergency! Emergency! Piglet is showing a small amount of displeasure on public transport! The logical conclusion to this is that I am officially such a terrible specimen of mother and general human being that I need someone else to feed my starving baby as I am incapable of doing it myself by means of breast, bottle or solid food.
I had, as usual, carefully considered how Piglet and I were presenting ourselves to the world, in order to deflect any unwanted comments. Piglet was wearing his snowsuit, and despite the fact that it wasn't even that cold, I had also brought a blanket to cover him with, lest any well-intentioned individuals decide that I was a neglectful mother for not swaddling Piglet to within an inch of his life. As we were travelling by bus, I considered taking him out in the sling, so that we wouldn't be taking up space that may be required by a wheelchair user, or a person with more children than me, whilst also winning bonus points by carrying my baby, which according to the doctrines of attachment parenting is better for the child than being pushed in a pram, because they can like, hear your heartbeat and stuff. And also it's what people did in the olden times back on the savannah, innit. Then I decided against it, as surely if babywearing is indeed better for the child, it wouldn't result in said child yelling all the way to Ealing because the way Mummy is sitting on the bus is uncomfortable for him, and then being knackered and unable to sleep the whole time we are out as there is nowhere for him to lie down. So, like the selfish mother that I am, I took the pram.
This was all fine until the way home, when I was sitting contentedly on the bus with Piglet blissfully asleep, until a particularly loud party of schoolchildren walked past, and Piglet woke up. Like he always does when there is any hint of noise. After all, in the olden times back in the cave, he had to stay alert all the time just in case a sabre toothed tiger was hanging around, hoping for a bit of a nosh up. For a while, he was content to sit quietly, looking around (there were surprisingly no sabre toothed tigers on the 83 bus, just a mad bloke who kept caressing the pole with the bell on it) but as time went on, the traffic got worse and he started to get bored, the whingeing started.
"Don't worry," I told him reassuringly, "we'll soon be home."
Judging by the state of the traffic, this was at best an optimistic estimate, and at worst an outright lie, but Piglet had not yet descended into actual shouting, so surely the other passengers on the bus could put up with the occasional whimper.
And then the elderly man next to me turned to me and explained everything.
"He wants milk."
Well, at least he had got Piglet's gender right. This was an improvement from earlier in the day, when I had been in Boots buying mascara and the woman at the counter leaned over and said knowingly to Piglet, "you'll be wearing that before too long!" Not wanting to conform to gender stereotypes by protesting that he was actually a boy, I had nodded enthusiastically in agreement.
I explained to the man on the bus that Piglet was going to be fed when he got home, but I didn't really want to breastfeed him on the bus, and anyway, hunger was not the cause of his discontent on this occasion. Why I felt I had to justify myself to the entire cohort of the 83 bus I do not know, but I immediately assumed that the man thought that I must be starving my child.
Which he obviously did, as his next comment was, "he needs nipple. Somebody give him nipple."
SOMEBODY?
Emergency! Emergency! Piglet is showing a small amount of displeasure on public transport! The logical conclusion to this is that I am officially such a terrible specimen of mother and general human being that I need someone else to feed my starving baby as I am incapable of doing it myself by means of breast, bottle or solid food.
Monday, 23 March 2015
Drowsy but Awake
Piglet is having a nap *KLAXON*
The flip side of this is that I am now scared to move. I am backed into a corner of my own bed, based on the advice that "babies should nap in the place where they usually go to sleep" which, for Piglet, would be my bed. This also means that I cannot leave the bed, since babies should "never be placed alone in an adult bed to sleep." ARGH.
Still, the very fact that he is napping at all is a cause for celebration. I had decided that instead of muddling along in a haphazard fashion, perhaps if I got him into a bit of a routine things might be easier, and so today I have been Gina Fording it up with the naps. The results were as follows.
6.30am
Piglet starts crying. Argh. This is not how it was supposed to happen. The routine doesn't start until 7. Must go back to sleep immediately. Fortunately, after a quick feed, Piglet returns to his slumbers.
8.00am
Crying again. Nooooo, go back to sleep. I open one eye and implore Piglet to let Mummy sleep a bit longer. He ignores me, and continues crying. I feed him again, but he stays awake. How do other people get their babies up and fed by 7am? This is just unacceptable. At 8.30am I finally drag myself out of bed, and start making breakfast. As for breakfast itself, I understand that most babies have porridge. Not Piglet. Piglet does not know how to eat porridge; nor does he allow you to feed him with a spoon, instead preferring to block your arm as the spoon hovers ever closer to his face, and turn away in disgust. In lieu of porridge, I make a mushroom omelette and give some to Piglet. He waves it around a bit and drops it on the floor, before pouring water all over it and himself when I offer him a cup to drink. I am reminded of my mother's reaction to baby led weaning; "I still think it's a bit strange." She had previously reserved this opinion for when I showed her pictures of Piglet's dozen or so half siblings on Facebook, and it basically means "O new-fangled folly. Things were better in my day when everyone ate rusks."
9.30am
Ah, Heir Hunters is on. Love a bit of Heir Hunters. I always feel a bit sorry for the people in it; the dead ones. Not because they are dead, but because they usually lived on their own and never married and their neighbours are on there talking about how they were a bit weird. Then I start to think that I might be a bit weird because I'm not married either. Then Piglet starts yelling and rubbing his eyes and I realise it's time for his nap.
I put Piglet in his sleeping bag and feed him again. Miraculously, he falls asleep on the boob. This routine thing is like MAGIC. By 10.25, he's in his cot, sleeping peacefully.
10.35am
ARGH NO THE PHONE'S RINGING. It better not be one of those electronic voices going on about mis-sold PPI. Ah, it's my auntie asking if I'd like her to knit Piglet a jumper. As soon as I start speaking, Piglet opens his eyes and blinks at me, wide awake, from the cot. I feed him again, but to no avail. He's not going back to sleep.
11am
Right, let's go out and hope he sleeps in the pram. Oh hang on, just need to do the washing first. And clear up from breakfast. And get dressed.
11.45am
Finally leave house. Catch glimpse of self in the mirror and realise I look haggard.
We walk to Wembley High Road and go to Wilkinson's, then to Primark. This is exciting, as despite having lived in Wembley for three years, I have never set foot in the Primark before, but merely viewed it from afar with disdain. However, I have now realised that I need some pyjamas, and the only thing I can find online is a set of Topshop loungewear for £47, which I'm not sure that I can justify. I hold my head high, enter Primark, and purchase two sets of pyjamas for about 20p. Piglet starts yelling while we are in the checkout queue (note to self, why are the queues in Primark always so massive? It was a Monday morning, for Christ's sake!) and I implore him to sleep. On the way home, he finally falls asleep. It's now 12.45 and I pop into Wenzel's for a congratulatory Danish pastry.
1.15pm
Pour myself a cup of tea and sit down to enjoy the Danish pastry. Maybe Gina was right about this routine thing after all. It really is easy. I have, like, totes got my life back.
1.17pm
Piglet is screaming. But he's only been asleep for half an hour! HOW CAN THIS BE? I run to the pram, pick him up and feed him again while he kicks the Danish pastry off the side of the sofa. He does not return to sleep. Instead, I decide to start cooking lunch, and put him in the baby gym while I spend what turns out to be hours cooking lentils. I can't even give Piglet any lentils, as the recipe contains vegetable stock, which is too salty. Instead, he has pieces of cheese, avocado and red pepper, all of which end up on the floor.
3.45pm
Finally lunch is over and Piglet has also had a breastfeed and has fallen asleep on me, just in time for Escape to the Country, which I cannot watch as I can't move from the bed because Piglet is asleep in it. He sleeps for 50 minutes, which is a marked improvement on yesterday, when I walked him round Wembley for an hour and his eyes remained resolutely open the whole time.
So, total amount of time spent napping today=one hour. Not quite the three hours recommended for Piglet's age group, but I'll take what I can get.
The flip side of this is that I am now scared to move. I am backed into a corner of my own bed, based on the advice that "babies should nap in the place where they usually go to sleep" which, for Piglet, would be my bed. This also means that I cannot leave the bed, since babies should "never be placed alone in an adult bed to sleep." ARGH.
Still, the very fact that he is napping at all is a cause for celebration. I had decided that instead of muddling along in a haphazard fashion, perhaps if I got him into a bit of a routine things might be easier, and so today I have been Gina Fording it up with the naps. The results were as follows.
6.30am
Piglet starts crying. Argh. This is not how it was supposed to happen. The routine doesn't start until 7. Must go back to sleep immediately. Fortunately, after a quick feed, Piglet returns to his slumbers.
8.00am
Crying again. Nooooo, go back to sleep. I open one eye and implore Piglet to let Mummy sleep a bit longer. He ignores me, and continues crying. I feed him again, but he stays awake. How do other people get their babies up and fed by 7am? This is just unacceptable. At 8.30am I finally drag myself out of bed, and start making breakfast. As for breakfast itself, I understand that most babies have porridge. Not Piglet. Piglet does not know how to eat porridge; nor does he allow you to feed him with a spoon, instead preferring to block your arm as the spoon hovers ever closer to his face, and turn away in disgust. In lieu of porridge, I make a mushroom omelette and give some to Piglet. He waves it around a bit and drops it on the floor, before pouring water all over it and himself when I offer him a cup to drink. I am reminded of my mother's reaction to baby led weaning; "I still think it's a bit strange." She had previously reserved this opinion for when I showed her pictures of Piglet's dozen or so half siblings on Facebook, and it basically means "O new-fangled folly. Things were better in my day when everyone ate rusks."
9.30am
Ah, Heir Hunters is on. Love a bit of Heir Hunters. I always feel a bit sorry for the people in it; the dead ones. Not because they are dead, but because they usually lived on their own and never married and their neighbours are on there talking about how they were a bit weird. Then I start to think that I might be a bit weird because I'm not married either. Then Piglet starts yelling and rubbing his eyes and I realise it's time for his nap.
I put Piglet in his sleeping bag and feed him again. Miraculously, he falls asleep on the boob. This routine thing is like MAGIC. By 10.25, he's in his cot, sleeping peacefully.
10.35am
ARGH NO THE PHONE'S RINGING. It better not be one of those electronic voices going on about mis-sold PPI. Ah, it's my auntie asking if I'd like her to knit Piglet a jumper. As soon as I start speaking, Piglet opens his eyes and blinks at me, wide awake, from the cot. I feed him again, but to no avail. He's not going back to sleep.
11am
Right, let's go out and hope he sleeps in the pram. Oh hang on, just need to do the washing first. And clear up from breakfast. And get dressed.
11.45am
Finally leave house. Catch glimpse of self in the mirror and realise I look haggard.
We walk to Wembley High Road and go to Wilkinson's, then to Primark. This is exciting, as despite having lived in Wembley for three years, I have never set foot in the Primark before, but merely viewed it from afar with disdain. However, I have now realised that I need some pyjamas, and the only thing I can find online is a set of Topshop loungewear for £47, which I'm not sure that I can justify. I hold my head high, enter Primark, and purchase two sets of pyjamas for about 20p. Piglet starts yelling while we are in the checkout queue (note to self, why are the queues in Primark always so massive? It was a Monday morning, for Christ's sake!) and I implore him to sleep. On the way home, he finally falls asleep. It's now 12.45 and I pop into Wenzel's for a congratulatory Danish pastry.
1.15pm
Pour myself a cup of tea and sit down to enjoy the Danish pastry. Maybe Gina was right about this routine thing after all. It really is easy. I have, like, totes got my life back.
1.17pm
Piglet is screaming. But he's only been asleep for half an hour! HOW CAN THIS BE? I run to the pram, pick him up and feed him again while he kicks the Danish pastry off the side of the sofa. He does not return to sleep. Instead, I decide to start cooking lunch, and put him in the baby gym while I spend what turns out to be hours cooking lentils. I can't even give Piglet any lentils, as the recipe contains vegetable stock, which is too salty. Instead, he has pieces of cheese, avocado and red pepper, all of which end up on the floor.
3.45pm
Finally lunch is over and Piglet has also had a breastfeed and has fallen asleep on me, just in time for Escape to the Country, which I cannot watch as I can't move from the bed because Piglet is asleep in it. He sleeps for 50 minutes, which is a marked improvement on yesterday, when I walked him round Wembley for an hour and his eyes remained resolutely open the whole time.
So, total amount of time spent napping today=one hour. Not quite the three hours recommended for Piglet's age group, but I'll take what I can get.
Saturday, 21 March 2015
Haters Gonna Hate
Ladies and gentlemen, I have been well and truly JUDGED.
And I say to thee, Ye Olde Judgey McJudgeys of Wembley, if you are thinking that someone has made a terrible parenting faux pas, unless it is quite clear that the parenting in question constitutes actual child abuse, please keep your thoughts to yourself.
Yesterday Piglet had his latest settling in session with the childminder, and we had to get up at the ungodly hour of 7.30am to ensure that we had two hours to get out of bed and present ourselves in some sort of reasonable condition at the station in time for the 9.34 train. Gone are the days when I could roll out of bed and spend twenty minutes slowly waking myself up with a cup of tea in front of BBC Breakfast. Nowadays, those precious twenty minutes are spent watching Piglet fling a spoon around, sending gloopy porridge spurting over the cowhide rug, and furiously pumping milk like a frustrated dairy cow after realising that I failed to defrost today's expressed milk from the freezer the previous night and it is still rock solid. The knock-on effect of having to spend breakfast pumping milk is that unnecessary activities like having a shower and putting on make up go out of the window, meaning I basically had to go out looking like this.
It was a good look.
Piglet, for his part, was in the sling following the Stair Based Pram Disaster which led to my beloved Bugaboo being bent to one side after being lugged up some steps in a tube station which shall not be named (thank you, South Ruislip).
It should probably also be mentioned that there was an eclipse happening at the time, although it was impossible to see as the sky was completely overcast. It did, however, mean that it was slightly chillier than I had assumed, it not having occurred to me that with 80-odd per cent of the sun being blocked out, it might get a bit cold. As I had been expecting a balmy spring day, I had dressed Piglet in his (very warm) jacket, instead of his snowsuit. He also had a felted cardigan underneath, and a woolly hat on, and he was snuggled close to me in his sling, so he would have been perfectly warm. I was a bit worried about his feet as he just had trousers and socks on his bottom half, so I was rubbing them periodically to make sure he was warm. He was perfectly content however, so I assumed-not unreasonably-that he was fine.
And then some random woman approached me and asked if Piglet was "OK in there, or do you need to pull your coat round him a bit?"
Like I was actually Jimmy Savile or something. This woman, in her infinite wisdom, thought I was some sort of monstrous neglectful child abuser. In years to come, Piglet will probably end up writing a harrowing book called A Child Called Piglet, where he describes how his neglectful mother used to parade him around the train station during eclipses in just his socks. Well, and his nappy. And his trousers. And garters to keep his socks on. And a vest. And a felted cardigan. And a frigging COAT. And a very cosy sling.
Wembley Stadium Station: the scene of the crime
Of course, with some people you just can't win. I spent the rest of the day in abject fear of what people might be thinking about my parenting skills, especially when I picked Piglet up from the childminder and he CRIED. Like he was thinking, "please don't let me go back to that horrible, mean Mummy who took me out this morning without a snowsuit like I was Tiny Tim from A Christmas Carol."
And then the weather changed. The weather changed so dramatically that on the way home, as we basked in the spring sunshine on the sun-baked train platform where we waited for AN HOUR for the train, I actually thought Piglet was going to get sunburnt. The poor mite had to wear his woolly hat and coat to protect against the sun's blistering rays. I debated taking him into the shelter of the concrete steps leading up to the train platform, but WHAT IF HE FELL DOWN THE STEPS? The same steps, I might add, which had the audacity to bend a pram out of shape. Goodness knows what horrors they could inflict on a baby. And am I allowed to put the baby on the seat next to me, even if I hold him there? He might bang his head, for God's sake, and the seat is made of metal!
Parenting. A minefield, eh?
No, not an actual minefield. I didn't take Piglet to Cambodia to look at landmines! Put your phones down, people!
And I say to thee, Ye Olde Judgey McJudgeys of Wembley, if you are thinking that someone has made a terrible parenting faux pas, unless it is quite clear that the parenting in question constitutes actual child abuse, please keep your thoughts to yourself.
Yesterday Piglet had his latest settling in session with the childminder, and we had to get up at the ungodly hour of 7.30am to ensure that we had two hours to get out of bed and present ourselves in some sort of reasonable condition at the station in time for the 9.34 train. Gone are the days when I could roll out of bed and spend twenty minutes slowly waking myself up with a cup of tea in front of BBC Breakfast. Nowadays, those precious twenty minutes are spent watching Piglet fling a spoon around, sending gloopy porridge spurting over the cowhide rug, and furiously pumping milk like a frustrated dairy cow after realising that I failed to defrost today's expressed milk from the freezer the previous night and it is still rock solid. The knock-on effect of having to spend breakfast pumping milk is that unnecessary activities like having a shower and putting on make up go out of the window, meaning I basically had to go out looking like this.
It was a good look.
Piglet, for his part, was in the sling following the Stair Based Pram Disaster which led to my beloved Bugaboo being bent to one side after being lugged up some steps in a tube station which shall not be named (thank you, South Ruislip).
It should probably also be mentioned that there was an eclipse happening at the time, although it was impossible to see as the sky was completely overcast. It did, however, mean that it was slightly chillier than I had assumed, it not having occurred to me that with 80-odd per cent of the sun being blocked out, it might get a bit cold. As I had been expecting a balmy spring day, I had dressed Piglet in his (very warm) jacket, instead of his snowsuit. He also had a felted cardigan underneath, and a woolly hat on, and he was snuggled close to me in his sling, so he would have been perfectly warm. I was a bit worried about his feet as he just had trousers and socks on his bottom half, so I was rubbing them periodically to make sure he was warm. He was perfectly content however, so I assumed-not unreasonably-that he was fine.
And then some random woman approached me and asked if Piglet was "OK in there, or do you need to pull your coat round him a bit?"
Like I was actually Jimmy Savile or something. This woman, in her infinite wisdom, thought I was some sort of monstrous neglectful child abuser. In years to come, Piglet will probably end up writing a harrowing book called A Child Called Piglet, where he describes how his neglectful mother used to parade him around the train station during eclipses in just his socks. Well, and his nappy. And his trousers. And garters to keep his socks on. And a vest. And a felted cardigan. And a frigging COAT. And a very cosy sling.
Wembley Stadium Station: the scene of the crime
Of course, with some people you just can't win. I spent the rest of the day in abject fear of what people might be thinking about my parenting skills, especially when I picked Piglet up from the childminder and he CRIED. Like he was thinking, "please don't let me go back to that horrible, mean Mummy who took me out this morning without a snowsuit like I was Tiny Tim from A Christmas Carol."
And then the weather changed. The weather changed so dramatically that on the way home, as we basked in the spring sunshine on the sun-baked train platform where we waited for AN HOUR for the train, I actually thought Piglet was going to get sunburnt. The poor mite had to wear his woolly hat and coat to protect against the sun's blistering rays. I debated taking him into the shelter of the concrete steps leading up to the train platform, but WHAT IF HE FELL DOWN THE STEPS? The same steps, I might add, which had the audacity to bend a pram out of shape. Goodness knows what horrors they could inflict on a baby. And am I allowed to put the baby on the seat next to me, even if I hold him there? He might bang his head, for God's sake, and the seat is made of metal!
Parenting. A minefield, eh?
No, not an actual minefield. I didn't take Piglet to Cambodia to look at landmines! Put your phones down, people!
Friday, 13 March 2015
Piglet Commences Destruction of Entire House
Piglet had his second settling in session with the childminder today. This went well, right up until the point where we were on the way home and Piglet, who has never been one for eating and drinking anything other than breast milk, decided that he was now hungry. Hungry enough to start licking the zip of my leather jacket whilst he sat in the sling. I fervently prayed that there would be a train due when we got to the station. Luckily there was.
It was due in 46 minutes, to be precise.
Now apparently, it is possible to breastfeed in my sling, at least according to the instructions. Once, whilst carrying Piglet in it, I came across a heavily pregnant woman in the sling section at John Lewis. She was thinking about which sling to buy, and wanted one she could use for feeding, as clearly we all do with the best intentions and plans that for most of us start to go awry right around the time of the first contraction when it starts to become clear that there is not going to be any whalesong involved in the whole birth thing, nor is it likely to take place in a bathtub strewn with rose petals and surrounded by fragrant Jo Malone candles while you practise your deep meditation techniques and allow yourself to open like a lotus flower to expel the baby gracefully and gently from the depths of your womanhood. Like the wizened old sage that I am, I said that in theory yes you could breastfeed in this sling, but I personally had not quite managed it.
This is because it is IMPOSSIBLE. Without even going into the nightmare that is breastfeeding in the early weeks, when you can't even wear a bra because your nipples are too sore and you end up walking around Tesco with big wet patches on your dress from the leaking milk, and where the baby regularly remains attached to the breast for up to an hour and a half (each side), leaving you with basically no time to do anything else; even now, as a relatively advanced breastfeeder, breastfeeding in a sling involves skills I simply do not have.
The trouble was, I was now at a station, waiting 46 minutes for a train and with a baby who was so hungry he was licking my jacket. Remarkably, I managed to hoist up my top and discreetly proffer a nipple from within the sling without too much difficulty. And would Piglet take said nipple? No he would not. He did not even appear to be able to see it. After all, why would he be eating in an upright position, whilst being carried around, when on every other occasion he is reclining and being cradled in Mummy's arms? This then led to twenty minutes of standing around trying to wave a nipple in Piglet's face while he, able to smell the milk, got excited and rooted around, completely unable to find the breast, before I gave up, took him out of the sling and sat on the seat and fed him normally, which is what I would have done from the outset had I not been worried about the location of the station being near to my school, and the possibility of truanting teenagers popping up and filming the whole thing and posting it on Youtube.
Anyway, things are now OK again, as I have just produced this. Yes folks, this is what it actually looks like when not in the breast. Like milk, to be precise.
O the wonders of new-fangled breast pumps. I feel like a dairy cow. I'm sure they have a similar sense of achievement when they see the vats of milk going off to Tesco and Asda. Finally the mystery of how Piglet keeps getting bigger and bigger is solved. It certainly isn't through solids, as most of them end up on the floor. Piglet takes great delight in pulling the tray off the Bumbo seat and waving it around in a way that makes me wonder if he is going to grow up to be some sort of delinquent n'er do well.
Speaking of which, on Tuesday I was reminded during a particularly uncomfortable ride on the number 83 bus of a scene I once witnessed on a National Express coach, where a woman was trying to get her toddler to sit down on the seat, and said toddler refused and continued to stand up on the chair, even when the coach started moving. I remember thinking that if it was my toddler I would have marched stridently off the coach, with the little urchin in my arms, saying they could kick and scream all they wanted but they would not be spending a two and a half hour coach journey refusing to sit nicely in their seat and we were not going anywhere until they did as they were told thank you very much.
That was until Piglet decided to re-enact this entire scene on a packed bus during rush hour. I basically had to hold him aloft like the baby Simba in the Lion King for the entire gridlocked journey so that he had a panoramic view out of the window, lord and master of all he surveyed on Wembley High Road.
He is now exploring the living room and looming dangerously close to the DVD player, which he is examining thoroughly as though he is about to start taking it apart and destroying it slowly, piece by piece.
Oh, he has now moved on to trying to smash up the television with one of my bangles. Time for an intervention, methinks.
Right, I've given him a ball. That should keep him happy for a couple of seconds until it rolls away. Already there is a lamp in the living room which no longer works after Piglet decided to pull on the wires attached to it for a few seconds before I rushed over, shouting "don't touch anything ELECTRICAL! NOT THE PLUG SOCKETS!"
And he isn't even crawling yet.
It was due in 46 minutes, to be precise.
Now apparently, it is possible to breastfeed in my sling, at least according to the instructions. Once, whilst carrying Piglet in it, I came across a heavily pregnant woman in the sling section at John Lewis. She was thinking about which sling to buy, and wanted one she could use for feeding, as clearly we all do with the best intentions and plans that for most of us start to go awry right around the time of the first contraction when it starts to become clear that there is not going to be any whalesong involved in the whole birth thing, nor is it likely to take place in a bathtub strewn with rose petals and surrounded by fragrant Jo Malone candles while you practise your deep meditation techniques and allow yourself to open like a lotus flower to expel the baby gracefully and gently from the depths of your womanhood. Like the wizened old sage that I am, I said that in theory yes you could breastfeed in this sling, but I personally had not quite managed it.
This is because it is IMPOSSIBLE. Without even going into the nightmare that is breastfeeding in the early weeks, when you can't even wear a bra because your nipples are too sore and you end up walking around Tesco with big wet patches on your dress from the leaking milk, and where the baby regularly remains attached to the breast for up to an hour and a half (each side), leaving you with basically no time to do anything else; even now, as a relatively advanced breastfeeder, breastfeeding in a sling involves skills I simply do not have.
The trouble was, I was now at a station, waiting 46 minutes for a train and with a baby who was so hungry he was licking my jacket. Remarkably, I managed to hoist up my top and discreetly proffer a nipple from within the sling without too much difficulty. And would Piglet take said nipple? No he would not. He did not even appear to be able to see it. After all, why would he be eating in an upright position, whilst being carried around, when on every other occasion he is reclining and being cradled in Mummy's arms? This then led to twenty minutes of standing around trying to wave a nipple in Piglet's face while he, able to smell the milk, got excited and rooted around, completely unable to find the breast, before I gave up, took him out of the sling and sat on the seat and fed him normally, which is what I would have done from the outset had I not been worried about the location of the station being near to my school, and the possibility of truanting teenagers popping up and filming the whole thing and posting it on Youtube.
Anyway, things are now OK again, as I have just produced this. Yes folks, this is what it actually looks like when not in the breast. Like milk, to be precise.
O the wonders of new-fangled breast pumps. I feel like a dairy cow. I'm sure they have a similar sense of achievement when they see the vats of milk going off to Tesco and Asda. Finally the mystery of how Piglet keeps getting bigger and bigger is solved. It certainly isn't through solids, as most of them end up on the floor. Piglet takes great delight in pulling the tray off the Bumbo seat and waving it around in a way that makes me wonder if he is going to grow up to be some sort of delinquent n'er do well.
Speaking of which, on Tuesday I was reminded during a particularly uncomfortable ride on the number 83 bus of a scene I once witnessed on a National Express coach, where a woman was trying to get her toddler to sit down on the seat, and said toddler refused and continued to stand up on the chair, even when the coach started moving. I remember thinking that if it was my toddler I would have marched stridently off the coach, with the little urchin in my arms, saying they could kick and scream all they wanted but they would not be spending a two and a half hour coach journey refusing to sit nicely in their seat and we were not going anywhere until they did as they were told thank you very much.
That was until Piglet decided to re-enact this entire scene on a packed bus during rush hour. I basically had to hold him aloft like the baby Simba in the Lion King for the entire gridlocked journey so that he had a panoramic view out of the window, lord and master of all he surveyed on Wembley High Road.
He is now exploring the living room and looming dangerously close to the DVD player, which he is examining thoroughly as though he is about to start taking it apart and destroying it slowly, piece by piece.
Oh, he has now moved on to trying to smash up the television with one of my bangles. Time for an intervention, methinks.
Right, I've given him a ball. That should keep him happy for a couple of seconds until it rolls away. Already there is a lamp in the living room which no longer works after Piglet decided to pull on the wires attached to it for a few seconds before I rushed over, shouting "don't touch anything ELECTRICAL! NOT THE PLUG SOCKETS!"
And he isn't even crawling yet.
Saturday, 7 March 2015
What is this nap time of which you speak?
I haven't written on here recently as I have been spending most of my life wandering around Wembley in a dead-eyed haze, pushing a pram containing a wide-eyed and alert Piglet, who sits staring at me blankly as I plead with him to take a nap.
He does actually need a nap. He has all the signs. All the signs that every baby book and website says are there to tell you that the baby has gone past his window of normal drowsiness, and has passed into the realm of the wired clubber at 6am getting second wind after fifteen vodka Red Bulls. The yawning, the eye-rubbing, the screeching; even the frantic crying when put into the pram and forced to wait for an inordinately long period of time for Mummy to rush around the flat taking such obscene liberties as grabbing the keys and putting shoes on before we can actually leave.
And every time I tell myself, through the persistent and ear-splitting screams, he will be asleep as soon as we leave this flat and start moving. Please God, don't let the neighbours think I'm some sort of heinous child abuser.
The thing is, back in Ye Olden Days (a few weeks ago), Piglet did fall asleep as soon as we started moving, but now he is far too excited at the prospect of having a little wander round Baby Gap, or watching Mummy drink a latte in Cafe Nero, that he simply Will. Not. Sleep.
Today we walked the entire perimeter of Wembley Stadium (which is a surprisingly long walk, let me tell you), being buffeted by gales (it's randomly very windy up there. Sort of like being in the middle of the sea), with Piglet wide awake and wired, eyeing me from his car seat with the slightly insane look of the sleep-deprived. We walked so far that we encountered a whole new Sainsbury's which I didn't know existed (forgive me my excitement. I live a simple life). We saw people dressed as actual real monks and nuns. One was in a full-on authentic Mother Teresa outfit. I thought it was her until I remembered that she was dead. I thought I might be hallucinating through lack of sleep but it turns out that there was a Catholic event at Wembley Arena. Actual monks and nuns in the genuine uniforms people! Who knew? It was a bit like that moment in my first term of university when two people in the E block kitchen started talking about their boarding schools and I started guffawing with laughter as those things died out in the 1950s and only lived on in the Mallory Towers books, right?
And through all this, Piglet continued to sit in his pram, wide awake, taking it all in. We went into Cafe Nero and he behaved impeccably, sitting bolt upright in his car seat like one of those black and white pictures of bonnet-clad 1930s babies in their humungous prams, fixing their gaze on the camera in a steely stare while children in rags play hopscotch around them. We then went home and all hell broke loose, with persistent shouting interspersed with a few brief periods of quiet where Piglet was pulling his Bumbo seat apart while I tried to get him to eat his dinner, followed by an hour and a half of constant breastfeeding.
He is now asleep, but for how long?
He does actually need a nap. He has all the signs. All the signs that every baby book and website says are there to tell you that the baby has gone past his window of normal drowsiness, and has passed into the realm of the wired clubber at 6am getting second wind after fifteen vodka Red Bulls. The yawning, the eye-rubbing, the screeching; even the frantic crying when put into the pram and forced to wait for an inordinately long period of time for Mummy to rush around the flat taking such obscene liberties as grabbing the keys and putting shoes on before we can actually leave.
And every time I tell myself, through the persistent and ear-splitting screams, he will be asleep as soon as we leave this flat and start moving. Please God, don't let the neighbours think I'm some sort of heinous child abuser.
The thing is, back in Ye Olden Days (a few weeks ago), Piglet did fall asleep as soon as we started moving, but now he is far too excited at the prospect of having a little wander round Baby Gap, or watching Mummy drink a latte in Cafe Nero, that he simply Will. Not. Sleep.
Today we walked the entire perimeter of Wembley Stadium (which is a surprisingly long walk, let me tell you), being buffeted by gales (it's randomly very windy up there. Sort of like being in the middle of the sea), with Piglet wide awake and wired, eyeing me from his car seat with the slightly insane look of the sleep-deprived. We walked so far that we encountered a whole new Sainsbury's which I didn't know existed (forgive me my excitement. I live a simple life). We saw people dressed as actual real monks and nuns. One was in a full-on authentic Mother Teresa outfit. I thought it was her until I remembered that she was dead. I thought I might be hallucinating through lack of sleep but it turns out that there was a Catholic event at Wembley Arena. Actual monks and nuns in the genuine uniforms people! Who knew? It was a bit like that moment in my first term of university when two people in the E block kitchen started talking about their boarding schools and I started guffawing with laughter as those things died out in the 1950s and only lived on in the Mallory Towers books, right?
And through all this, Piglet continued to sit in his pram, wide awake, taking it all in. We went into Cafe Nero and he behaved impeccably, sitting bolt upright in his car seat like one of those black and white pictures of bonnet-clad 1930s babies in their humungous prams, fixing their gaze on the camera in a steely stare while children in rags play hopscotch around them. We then went home and all hell broke loose, with persistent shouting interspersed with a few brief periods of quiet where Piglet was pulling his Bumbo seat apart while I tried to get him to eat his dinner, followed by an hour and a half of constant breastfeeding.
He is now asleep, but for how long?
Wednesday, 14 January 2015
Let's all just end this madness now
Just come back from a visit to the health visitor where, in typical fashion, Piglet did an enormous wee on the baby weighing scales and I was told off for not taking vitamin supplements, despite the fact that (as I protested to the health visitor) they have been repeatedly shown to be useless. Better just get used to the fact that whatever I do, there is always going to be someone judging my parenting decisions.
And speaking of judging, what is one to make of this?
Yes apparently, according to that bastion of the British high street, Poundland, these are the two vocations open to babies. Pink-clad jockey, if you are a girl, and superhero, if you are a boy. There are, of course, many problems with this. Firstly, I have seen many pink-clad jockeys during my less productive Saturday afternoons spent channel hopping through Channel 4 racing, and few, if any, were women. Secondly, superheroes clearly don't exist. However, these points are unimportant (although more female jockeys please. Given that women are generally smaller than men, is it not odd that horse-racing is mostly the domain of really tiny men?) Bearing in mind the fact that encouraging a girl to ride a horse is significantly less bad than encouraging her to be a princess, I now give you that other bastion of the British high street, Wilkinson's (I know, I know, but when I say "British high street" I more specifically mean Wembley High Road, where the most upmarket establishment is a shop called Bland's that sells a curious mixture of cheap-looking prams and cots that actually aren't that cheap, ladies' underwear and hideous meringue ballgowns. Because what everyone in Wembley needs is a hideous meringue ballgown to wear down the pub of a Friday night).
So this is a snapshot of the girls' toys section in Wilkinson's. Now it goes without saying that the idea that there needs to be separate sections for boys' and girls' toys is itself abhorrent, but let's ignore this for a moment so we can look in more detail at what Wilko deem to be acceptable toys for young impressionable girls. So let's see: we have a Barbie in a pink dress, a pink tutu outfit, a pink KITCHEN and a-yes, it really is-a PINK BABY CARRIER. The boys' section is not shown here as I was too boiling with rage to linger in the aisles, but suffice to say it included police officer and fire brigade hats.
Yes ladies, the message here is clear. Boys do the real jobs, like fighting fires and catching criminals, while the girls stay in the kitchen looking after the children.
The most ridiculous thing is that not only have things not moved on since I was a wee lass flicking through the toy pages of the Peter Craig catalogue lusting after a pink Barbie house and an A La Carte Kitchen, but they have got worse. At least the A La Carte Kitchen wasn't pink! And there were gender neutral toys available, such as the legendary Teddy Ruxpin. Now admittedly I wasn't allowed any of the three toys mentioned above as they were all too expensive, but I do have photographic proof that for my second birthday, some progressive soul gifted me with a toy carpet sweeper. Because, like, being a girl and all, all I could aspire to was a piece of already-obsolete equipment for cleaning a house, but AT LEAST IT WASN'T PINK! End this madness now please!
For my part, I purchased both the bibs in the first picture, as at least then Piglet will know it's OK to be a boy who likes pink, right?
And speaking of judging, what is one to make of this?
Yes apparently, according to that bastion of the British high street, Poundland, these are the two vocations open to babies. Pink-clad jockey, if you are a girl, and superhero, if you are a boy. There are, of course, many problems with this. Firstly, I have seen many pink-clad jockeys during my less productive Saturday afternoons spent channel hopping through Channel 4 racing, and few, if any, were women. Secondly, superheroes clearly don't exist. However, these points are unimportant (although more female jockeys please. Given that women are generally smaller than men, is it not odd that horse-racing is mostly the domain of really tiny men?) Bearing in mind the fact that encouraging a girl to ride a horse is significantly less bad than encouraging her to be a princess, I now give you that other bastion of the British high street, Wilkinson's (I know, I know, but when I say "British high street" I more specifically mean Wembley High Road, where the most upmarket establishment is a shop called Bland's that sells a curious mixture of cheap-looking prams and cots that actually aren't that cheap, ladies' underwear and hideous meringue ballgowns. Because what everyone in Wembley needs is a hideous meringue ballgown to wear down the pub of a Friday night).
So this is a snapshot of the girls' toys section in Wilkinson's. Now it goes without saying that the idea that there needs to be separate sections for boys' and girls' toys is itself abhorrent, but let's ignore this for a moment so we can look in more detail at what Wilko deem to be acceptable toys for young impressionable girls. So let's see: we have a Barbie in a pink dress, a pink tutu outfit, a pink KITCHEN and a-yes, it really is-a PINK BABY CARRIER. The boys' section is not shown here as I was too boiling with rage to linger in the aisles, but suffice to say it included police officer and fire brigade hats.
Yes ladies, the message here is clear. Boys do the real jobs, like fighting fires and catching criminals, while the girls stay in the kitchen looking after the children.
The most ridiculous thing is that not only have things not moved on since I was a wee lass flicking through the toy pages of the Peter Craig catalogue lusting after a pink Barbie house and an A La Carte Kitchen, but they have got worse. At least the A La Carte Kitchen wasn't pink! And there were gender neutral toys available, such as the legendary Teddy Ruxpin. Now admittedly I wasn't allowed any of the three toys mentioned above as they were all too expensive, but I do have photographic proof that for my second birthday, some progressive soul gifted me with a toy carpet sweeper. Because, like, being a girl and all, all I could aspire to was a piece of already-obsolete equipment for cleaning a house, but AT LEAST IT WASN'T PINK! End this madness now please!
For my part, I purchased both the bibs in the first picture, as at least then Piglet will know it's OK to be a boy who likes pink, right?
Monday, 8 December 2014
The Curse of the Mummy Clothes
Not a terribly productive day. Currently procrastinating cleaning the flat and using Piglet's current slumbers as an excuse. We cannot have him being woken up by the vacuum cleaner after all.
In fact, today's activities consisted of: going downstairs to check my mailbox, baking chocolate cookies and going to the bank. As I am currently desperately trying to reclaim my Public Badge of Good Motherhood and also as the first of these necessitated going outside briefly, Piglet was trussed up in a snowsuit for a walk of several metres across the courtyard, whilst I was wearing leggings and a T-shirt. Granted we were only actually outdoors for a matter of seconds, but what would people think if they saw a wee bairn like Piglet snowsuitless and wearing just a hat and indoor clothes in December? I also had to put him in the sling for the journey, as what would people think if they saw me carrying around a baby in my arms? I mean, it's just not safe.
Later on we went to the bank and Piglet finally managed to have a nap in the pram, and we went into a charity shop for a look around, only for Piglet to be woken up by a screaming child who wasn't him, and who in my opinion was a bit too old to be sitting in a pushchair, but then I'm no expert in toddlers and I can envision a day when someone thinks that about Piglet, so I will try not to judge.
Anyway, by far the most important thing about the visit to the charity shop was not Piglet's rude awakening, but the fact that I found a dress for one pound. Yes, ONE POUND. It wasn't exactly a masterpiece, but ONE POUND! I found myself explaining the style of the dress to my mother thus:
Mum: "So, what's it like then, this dress?"
Me: "Er, it's kind of like, a dress."
Mum: "What colour?"
Me (realising this makes it sound like a primary school summer uniform circa 1989) "Pink and white checked."
Mum: "What size?"
Me: Noting that the size had not even occurred to me when I bought it "Well, it fits. Sort of. It's long. It looks OK with a belt. It would have cost, like twenty pounds in a vintage shop."
I stopped just short of describing it for what it was; a tent-like object which which was probably previously worn as an overall for cleaning the house, but still, ONE POUND. And yet I still feel guilty for buying it, even more guilty, randomly, than I do when I spend £2.50 on a latte, even though that is more than twice what I paid for the dress. There's just something about clothes, sitting there in the wardrobe, that invites guilt. Perhaps it's the fact that the only things I wear these days are those in the list below.
My list of mummy clothes, a.k.a. the only things I am allowed to wear now that I am of the maternal persuasion.
Leggings-some of which are from Primark-ugh. A total waste of £3 as they don't even fit properly. Thanks Primark. Thanks for making your size eight leggings more like AGE EIGHT.
Orange T-shirt from American Apparel which slides off easily, therefore good for breastfeeding. Also good for accidentally revealing entirety of bra to Wembley High Road. Speaking of bras....
Two M&S nursing bras (all other bras currently in storage until they can be worn/fit again).
Multipack of M&S Giant Mummy Pants. I'm not sure that's the name they were advertised by on the website, but it is implicitly understood that this is what they are. And my Caesarean scar is still a bit too tender to wear anything that isn't a Giant Mummy Pant. The jury's out on whether I will ever wear acceptable underwear again. Once you've worn a Giant Mummy Pant, nothing else is ever comfortable enough.
Sensible shoes. I grant that what is sensible for me isn't necessarily sensible for everyone else, but put it this way, they are not Jeffrey Campbells.
Parka coat. No more spectacular furry creations. Everything has to be waterproof and have a hood.
Pyjamas. In fact, I basically just live in these.
So in other words, that pound might have been better put towards the cost of a latte. I probably would have got more wear out of it.
In fact, today's activities consisted of: going downstairs to check my mailbox, baking chocolate cookies and going to the bank. As I am currently desperately trying to reclaim my Public Badge of Good Motherhood and also as the first of these necessitated going outside briefly, Piglet was trussed up in a snowsuit for a walk of several metres across the courtyard, whilst I was wearing leggings and a T-shirt. Granted we were only actually outdoors for a matter of seconds, but what would people think if they saw a wee bairn like Piglet snowsuitless and wearing just a hat and indoor clothes in December? I also had to put him in the sling for the journey, as what would people think if they saw me carrying around a baby in my arms? I mean, it's just not safe.
Later on we went to the bank and Piglet finally managed to have a nap in the pram, and we went into a charity shop for a look around, only for Piglet to be woken up by a screaming child who wasn't him, and who in my opinion was a bit too old to be sitting in a pushchair, but then I'm no expert in toddlers and I can envision a day when someone thinks that about Piglet, so I will try not to judge.
Anyway, by far the most important thing about the visit to the charity shop was not Piglet's rude awakening, but the fact that I found a dress for one pound. Yes, ONE POUND. It wasn't exactly a masterpiece, but ONE POUND! I found myself explaining the style of the dress to my mother thus:
Mum: "So, what's it like then, this dress?"
Me: "Er, it's kind of like, a dress."
Mum: "What colour?"
Me (realising this makes it sound like a primary school summer uniform circa 1989) "Pink and white checked."
Mum: "What size?"
Me: Noting that the size had not even occurred to me when I bought it "Well, it fits. Sort of. It's long. It looks OK with a belt. It would have cost, like twenty pounds in a vintage shop."
I stopped just short of describing it for what it was; a tent-like object which which was probably previously worn as an overall for cleaning the house, but still, ONE POUND. And yet I still feel guilty for buying it, even more guilty, randomly, than I do when I spend £2.50 on a latte, even though that is more than twice what I paid for the dress. There's just something about clothes, sitting there in the wardrobe, that invites guilt. Perhaps it's the fact that the only things I wear these days are those in the list below.
My list of mummy clothes, a.k.a. the only things I am allowed to wear now that I am of the maternal persuasion.
Leggings-some of which are from Primark-ugh. A total waste of £3 as they don't even fit properly. Thanks Primark. Thanks for making your size eight leggings more like AGE EIGHT.
Orange T-shirt from American Apparel which slides off easily, therefore good for breastfeeding. Also good for accidentally revealing entirety of bra to Wembley High Road. Speaking of bras....
Two M&S nursing bras (all other bras currently in storage until they can be worn/fit again).
Multipack of M&S Giant Mummy Pants. I'm not sure that's the name they were advertised by on the website, but it is implicitly understood that this is what they are. And my Caesarean scar is still a bit too tender to wear anything that isn't a Giant Mummy Pant. The jury's out on whether I will ever wear acceptable underwear again. Once you've worn a Giant Mummy Pant, nothing else is ever comfortable enough.
Sensible shoes. I grant that what is sensible for me isn't necessarily sensible for everyone else, but put it this way, they are not Jeffrey Campbells.
Parka coat. No more spectacular furry creations. Everything has to be waterproof and have a hood.
Pyjamas. In fact, I basically just live in these.
So in other words, that pound might have been better put towards the cost of a latte. I probably would have got more wear out of it.
Sunday, 7 December 2014
New Sport of Ostentatious Breastfeeding Makes Wembley Debut
And so for a bit of ostentatious breastfeeding.
Well not at the moment. At the moment I am watching X Factor on mute so as not to wake Piglet from his slumbers. Michael Buble is either singing or talking to someone who may or may not be Nelly Furtado. Without the benefit of sound, they both look like they're hosting the Eurovision Song Contest and are having a faux-hilarious conversation about the merits of Azerbaijan whilst pretending to look excited about the prospect of someone from Bosnia-Herzigovina singing a heartfelt ballad in Serbo-Croat.
Anyway, today Piglet again behaved impeccably throughout swimming, and another comment was made about how relaxed he seemed to be in the water (another star on my Public Badge of Good Motherhood). One poor child was screaming so much his parents took him out of the water, which would not have even merited a comment here were it not for the fact that I caught Piglet watching him with interest as his parents tried to take him to the other side of the pool to test to see if he could go in again without crying, and I am pretty sure that he was taking notes.
Piglet's impeccable behaviour continued throughout the afternoon as I went to meet friends for coffee, but then sadly decided to deteriorate right at the point when Mummy and friends decided that they wanted a mulled wine at the Christmas market. The following farcical events then ensued.
1.) Piglet starts screaming. This is worrisome. Previous attempts to feed him in Costa Coffee have been unsuccessful; partly because my eyes are constantly scanning the room for any signs of Nigel Farage or Katie Hopkins come to chase me into the corner, where I will sit behind a taped-off police cordon marked with the sign "Danger! Breastfeeding woman ahead!" with a napkin draped over me; and partly because I am wearing an enormous fluffy jumper which gets in the way.
2.) Piglet is briefly distracted by some fairy lights. Thank the Lord for fairy lights! And for being born at Christmas, allowing us all to have fairy lights! This gives Mummy enough time to chug down the greater part of of a cup of mulled wine, keeping it well away from Piglet of course (remembering the health visitor's dire warning about a baby they saw recently who had been scarred for life by a hot drink).
3.) The fairy lights are forgotten, and the crying resumes. Mummy attempts a fair bit of ostentatious breastfeeding, standing on the table yelling "Look everybody! I'm breastfeeding!" squirting jets of milk at the two other people in the open air Christmas market bar, and the five bouncers they have inexplicably needed to employ to keep those two people under control.
4.) OK that last one was inaccurate. What actually happened was that Mummy had to take off Piglet's hat and unbutton his coat while the Public Badge of Good Motherhood fell from its privileged position on Mummy's lapel in the cold December air, and attempt to latch Piglet onto the breast while the fluffy jumper and Piglet's fluffy coat conspire to render such a feat impossible. Well, I couldn't take the coat off as IT'S DECEMBER GODDAMIT AND THE BABY MIGHT FREEZE, and I couldn't remove the fluffy jumper either in case Nigel Farage happened to be promenading past arm in arm with Katie Hopkins and THERE WAS NO CORNER IN THIS EDIFICE. I mean, it was like, in the open air! It was just a roof with some tables! And it was sort of a bar as well, which serves ALCOHOL, so what was I even doing in there with a baby? Off with my head!
5.) As things get even more fraught, I decide we may have to vacate the area, and knock back the remaining mulled wine. As I do so, some of the mulled wine spills onto Piglet's fluffy white coat. It looks like blood. AARGH! I am terrible mother! I have done something terrible to baby!*
6.) That's it. We're going home. I look around. The five bouncers are looking at me in a judgemental way which says, "you are a disgrace to motherhood. Get Nigel Farage on the phone IMMEDIATELY."
And that, my friend, is ostentatious breastfeeding.
* I must add here, before you all call social services, that the mulled wine was, by this point, cold. Piglet was never in any danger from the mulled wine spillage. Put down your phones, people.
Well not at the moment. At the moment I am watching X Factor on mute so as not to wake Piglet from his slumbers. Michael Buble is either singing or talking to someone who may or may not be Nelly Furtado. Without the benefit of sound, they both look like they're hosting the Eurovision Song Contest and are having a faux-hilarious conversation about the merits of Azerbaijan whilst pretending to look excited about the prospect of someone from Bosnia-Herzigovina singing a heartfelt ballad in Serbo-Croat.
Anyway, today Piglet again behaved impeccably throughout swimming, and another comment was made about how relaxed he seemed to be in the water (another star on my Public Badge of Good Motherhood). One poor child was screaming so much his parents took him out of the water, which would not have even merited a comment here were it not for the fact that I caught Piglet watching him with interest as his parents tried to take him to the other side of the pool to test to see if he could go in again without crying, and I am pretty sure that he was taking notes.
Piglet's impeccable behaviour continued throughout the afternoon as I went to meet friends for coffee, but then sadly decided to deteriorate right at the point when Mummy and friends decided that they wanted a mulled wine at the Christmas market. The following farcical events then ensued.
1.) Piglet starts screaming. This is worrisome. Previous attempts to feed him in Costa Coffee have been unsuccessful; partly because my eyes are constantly scanning the room for any signs of Nigel Farage or Katie Hopkins come to chase me into the corner, where I will sit behind a taped-off police cordon marked with the sign "Danger! Breastfeeding woman ahead!" with a napkin draped over me; and partly because I am wearing an enormous fluffy jumper which gets in the way.
2.) Piglet is briefly distracted by some fairy lights. Thank the Lord for fairy lights! And for being born at Christmas, allowing us all to have fairy lights! This gives Mummy enough time to chug down the greater part of of a cup of mulled wine, keeping it well away from Piglet of course (remembering the health visitor's dire warning about a baby they saw recently who had been scarred for life by a hot drink).
3.) The fairy lights are forgotten, and the crying resumes. Mummy attempts a fair bit of ostentatious breastfeeding, standing on the table yelling "Look everybody! I'm breastfeeding!" squirting jets of milk at the two other people in the open air Christmas market bar, and the five bouncers they have inexplicably needed to employ to keep those two people under control.
4.) OK that last one was inaccurate. What actually happened was that Mummy had to take off Piglet's hat and unbutton his coat while the Public Badge of Good Motherhood fell from its privileged position on Mummy's lapel in the cold December air, and attempt to latch Piglet onto the breast while the fluffy jumper and Piglet's fluffy coat conspire to render such a feat impossible. Well, I couldn't take the coat off as IT'S DECEMBER GODDAMIT AND THE BABY MIGHT FREEZE, and I couldn't remove the fluffy jumper either in case Nigel Farage happened to be promenading past arm in arm with Katie Hopkins and THERE WAS NO CORNER IN THIS EDIFICE. I mean, it was like, in the open air! It was just a roof with some tables! And it was sort of a bar as well, which serves ALCOHOL, so what was I even doing in there with a baby? Off with my head!
5.) As things get even more fraught, I decide we may have to vacate the area, and knock back the remaining mulled wine. As I do so, some of the mulled wine spills onto Piglet's fluffy white coat. It looks like blood. AARGH! I am terrible mother! I have done something terrible to baby!*
6.) That's it. We're going home. I look around. The five bouncers are looking at me in a judgemental way which says, "you are a disgrace to motherhood. Get Nigel Farage on the phone IMMEDIATELY."
And that, my friend, is ostentatious breastfeeding.
* I must add here, before you all call social services, that the mulled wine was, by this point, cold. Piglet was never in any danger from the mulled wine spillage. Put down your phones, people.
Friday, 5 December 2014
DOES THIS CHILD HAVE A PARENT?
It is 9pm and Piglet is asleep in his bouncy chair.
I am pretty sure that this is VERY BAD, as apparently babies are not supposed to sleep in their bouncy chairs. Especially without the little seat belt attached to strap them in; the little seatbelt that Piglet has recently discovered and now regularly tries to eat. However, for the last few nights, Piglet has (finally!) been going to sleep at the very reasonable time of 8.30pm (HALLELUJAH), with the result that Mummy is now in a quandary. Do I join him in the bedroom at 8.30pm so I can keep an eye on him, or do I put him in his bouncy chair in the living room for a bit, so that if he wakes up I can immediately rock him back to sleep? I have cautiously chosen the latter for now, on the assumption that should this happy routine continue, I will start putting him in his cot earlier. Trouble is, I cannot now move Piglet to the cot while he is asleep, as then when he wakes he will freak out and start screaming, as he will not know how he got there, so now I have to wait for him to wake naturally so that I can move him into the cot while he's awake. This is according to the oft-quoted Golden Rule of Baby Sleep: put them down in their cots drowsy but awake. Only then will they learn to go to sleep on their own in their cot, and only then will you be liberated from the potential future scenario of a child who wants to be rocked to sleep, preferably in your arms, and then sleep in your bed for ever and ever until they finally leave home at the age of forty five.
AHA! He has just woken up and I have placed him in his cot. I am no longer the cruel, neglectful mother making her child sleep in a bouncy chair instead of a proper bed like a properly cared for child.
Anyway, went to see the health visitor today. I was given the usual large-print leaflets about what the local children's centre is for (special groups for fathers and male carers; how to live a healthy lifestyle). I was disappointed, having settled Piglet to sleep and sat down with a nice cup of tea to read these rather hefty tomes, that they took mere seconds to read, as consisted of mostly pictures and a few massive words. I know the NHS means well and is to be commended for trying to help people out, but not sure why it is automatically assumed that all men are feckless, irresponsible and unable or unwilling to spend any time with any children who may be related to them, and that as I have had a baby, I must have never heard of fruit or vegetables and be buying my groceries at Chicken Cottage. Not to mention the fact that most of this literature seems to be written for someone with a reading age of five. Then the health visitor (who also meant well) remarked about how happy Piglet must be to see his father every day and I had to say he didn't have one, thus unintentionally perpetuating the unfortunate stereotype of feckless babyfathers. Also had to fill in a questionnaire which asked me how I felt about being a parent ('fantastic") and whether I was experiencing domestic violence ("no"). I'm not sure that many people with answers that varied greatly from those I gave would be willing to say so on a questionnaire, but as I said, they mean well. And after all I don't particularly want them coming round to my house to check for domestic violence because they might notice that I haven't cleaned the kitchen.
I also wonder why it is, when it is automatically assumed in the literature that your first language is not English and that you may even be an asylum seeker, that when it comes to getting anything done or having a conversation with an actual human, everything is so impossibly complicated that if you were an asylum seeker who didn't speak a word of English, you would probably end up sitting in the waiting room all day wondering what was going on; that is if you could even find the entrance to the clinic. When I got there the entrance was deserted and the door didn't appear to be working, so I had to wait for someone to come out so that I could actually get in, and when I managed to find the receptionist and ask where we needed to go for our appointment with the health visitor, she looked at me as though I was Oliver Twist proffering an empty bowl of gruel at the workhouse master, asking for some more, and gave me what turned out to be completely inaccurate directions. When I finally asked another receptionist where I needed to go (shortly after the same receptionist had shouted across the crowded waiting room "DOES THIS CHILD HAVE A PARENT?" at the top of her voice because a small boy-mercifully not Piglet, who was sleeping peacefully in his perambulator-was fiddling with the blood pressure machine) she too seemed to assume by her tone that I was incapable any kind of rational thought, rather than was just someone who happened not to have visited the health centre before and so could hardly be expected to be on familiar terms with the layout, and told me that I had to go to a completely different waiting area.
Once we managed to get inside and actually see the health visitor, fortunately Piglet was on his best behaviour and seemed to enjoy basking naked in the bowl of the baby weighing scales. In fact he is loving being naked in general at the moment, and it is getting to be quite a struggle to change his nappy, as he cannot stop kicking his legs around at a ridiculous pace every time they have a modicum of freedom. I do hope he's not going to start taking his clothes off and running around naked in public. I don't think I could stand the humiliation of the receptionist at the health centre hollering "DOES THIS CHILD HAVE A PARENT?' at me.
I'd have to blame the proverbial feckless and irresponsible babyfather.
I am pretty sure that this is VERY BAD, as apparently babies are not supposed to sleep in their bouncy chairs. Especially without the little seat belt attached to strap them in; the little seatbelt that Piglet has recently discovered and now regularly tries to eat. However, for the last few nights, Piglet has (finally!) been going to sleep at the very reasonable time of 8.30pm (HALLELUJAH), with the result that Mummy is now in a quandary. Do I join him in the bedroom at 8.30pm so I can keep an eye on him, or do I put him in his bouncy chair in the living room for a bit, so that if he wakes up I can immediately rock him back to sleep? I have cautiously chosen the latter for now, on the assumption that should this happy routine continue, I will start putting him in his cot earlier. Trouble is, I cannot now move Piglet to the cot while he is asleep, as then when he wakes he will freak out and start screaming, as he will not know how he got there, so now I have to wait for him to wake naturally so that I can move him into the cot while he's awake. This is according to the oft-quoted Golden Rule of Baby Sleep: put them down in their cots drowsy but awake. Only then will they learn to go to sleep on their own in their cot, and only then will you be liberated from the potential future scenario of a child who wants to be rocked to sleep, preferably in your arms, and then sleep in your bed for ever and ever until they finally leave home at the age of forty five.
AHA! He has just woken up and I have placed him in his cot. I am no longer the cruel, neglectful mother making her child sleep in a bouncy chair instead of a proper bed like a properly cared for child.
Anyway, went to see the health visitor today. I was given the usual large-print leaflets about what the local children's centre is for (special groups for fathers and male carers; how to live a healthy lifestyle). I was disappointed, having settled Piglet to sleep and sat down with a nice cup of tea to read these rather hefty tomes, that they took mere seconds to read, as consisted of mostly pictures and a few massive words. I know the NHS means well and is to be commended for trying to help people out, but not sure why it is automatically assumed that all men are feckless, irresponsible and unable or unwilling to spend any time with any children who may be related to them, and that as I have had a baby, I must have never heard of fruit or vegetables and be buying my groceries at Chicken Cottage. Not to mention the fact that most of this literature seems to be written for someone with a reading age of five. Then the health visitor (who also meant well) remarked about how happy Piglet must be to see his father every day and I had to say he didn't have one, thus unintentionally perpetuating the unfortunate stereotype of feckless babyfathers. Also had to fill in a questionnaire which asked me how I felt about being a parent ('fantastic") and whether I was experiencing domestic violence ("no"). I'm not sure that many people with answers that varied greatly from those I gave would be willing to say so on a questionnaire, but as I said, they mean well. And after all I don't particularly want them coming round to my house to check for domestic violence because they might notice that I haven't cleaned the kitchen.
I also wonder why it is, when it is automatically assumed in the literature that your first language is not English and that you may even be an asylum seeker, that when it comes to getting anything done or having a conversation with an actual human, everything is so impossibly complicated that if you were an asylum seeker who didn't speak a word of English, you would probably end up sitting in the waiting room all day wondering what was going on; that is if you could even find the entrance to the clinic. When I got there the entrance was deserted and the door didn't appear to be working, so I had to wait for someone to come out so that I could actually get in, and when I managed to find the receptionist and ask where we needed to go for our appointment with the health visitor, she looked at me as though I was Oliver Twist proffering an empty bowl of gruel at the workhouse master, asking for some more, and gave me what turned out to be completely inaccurate directions. When I finally asked another receptionist where I needed to go (shortly after the same receptionist had shouted across the crowded waiting room "DOES THIS CHILD HAVE A PARENT?" at the top of her voice because a small boy-mercifully not Piglet, who was sleeping peacefully in his perambulator-was fiddling with the blood pressure machine) she too seemed to assume by her tone that I was incapable any kind of rational thought, rather than was just someone who happened not to have visited the health centre before and so could hardly be expected to be on familiar terms with the layout, and told me that I had to go to a completely different waiting area.
Once we managed to get inside and actually see the health visitor, fortunately Piglet was on his best behaviour and seemed to enjoy basking naked in the bowl of the baby weighing scales. In fact he is loving being naked in general at the moment, and it is getting to be quite a struggle to change his nappy, as he cannot stop kicking his legs around at a ridiculous pace every time they have a modicum of freedom. I do hope he's not going to start taking his clothes off and running around naked in public. I don't think I could stand the humiliation of the receptionist at the health centre hollering "DOES THIS CHILD HAVE A PARENT?' at me.
I'd have to blame the proverbial feckless and irresponsible babyfather.
Sunday, 30 November 2014
Expressing Milk Attempt no. 1: Abject Failure
11pm and Piglet is lying in his co-sleeper, shouting. God knows what the neighbours must think. Frankly I'm amazed I haven't had a note through the door telling me to keep the noise down, and while we're at it, social services have been called. In fact, everybody in my building must see a good deal more of my parenting skills than they would like, given that my living room has no curtains and overlooks a whole bunch of other flats. Today, for example, the neighbours were treated to the sight of what must have looked like me abusing my breasts with a plastic bottle with a big suction pad attached.
Yes, I tried to express milk in the futile hope that at some point I will be able to leave Piglet with a relative for an hour or so to go out and enjoy some wild times. Maybe a glass of wine, maybe a day at work, maybe even-gasp!-a date. OK not the last one. I have officially retired from the dating scene.
Anyway, this was not a wildly successful enterprise, as the photograph below revealing the results of this experiment shows.
Just to reiterate, in case the photo didn't make things entirely clear, this bottle is EMPTY. I think most of the few droplets that can be seen are the remnants of a spin in the dishwasher that the breast pump had before I started using it. So I now have both a manual breast pump and a steam steriliser that are both completely useless. This was what I ended up with after a walk around the baby section of Boots with my mother while she pointed out the baffling array of items that are required for any sort of bottle feeding: bottles in a variety of shapes and sizes, teats which let the milk out at varying speeds, breast pumps, sterilisers. I'm still not sure what the latter even do. Mine is sitting in its box in my living room; a room which, I might add, I until recently described as "minimalist" and which now contains the following: bouncy chair, weaning chair (a small chair for Piglet which looks like a high chair, but on the ground. Essentially, it's a low chair), feeding pillow, car seat, toy arch, baby gym, play mat, selection of cuddly toys and now a breast pump and steriliser. And yet I found myself looking at this very room this evening-a room whose strict colour scheme and lack of plastic tat I had previously prided myself upon-and thinking to myself, "now, what this room really needs is a jumperoo."
No, what I really need is a bigger house. And some curtains. Definitely need those. Poor Piglet had to have his bath this evening in full view of most of Wembley. I'm surprised his naked bottom didn't accidentally end up being beamed to the nation on X Factor. In fact, what I really need is one of those houses on Escape to the Country, with a large kitchen diner, exposed beams, wood burner and range. I've already chosen which Aga I want. The blue one. And I'll have at least an acre of land with a few outbuildings, hot tub, sauna and holiday let. Or failing that, I'll just live somewhere that isn't Wembley, and will no longer be followed down the high street by a mentalist waving a can of deodorant in my face and explaining how he bought it, but he no longer wants it and wants to exchange it. I think he must have mistaken me for this.
We do look pretty similar.
Anyway, thankfully Piglet has now gone to sleep. It only took about two hours of feeding. Thank goodness I wasn't relying on that expressed milk.
Yes, I tried to express milk in the futile hope that at some point I will be able to leave Piglet with a relative for an hour or so to go out and enjoy some wild times. Maybe a glass of wine, maybe a day at work, maybe even-gasp!-a date. OK not the last one. I have officially retired from the dating scene.
Anyway, this was not a wildly successful enterprise, as the photograph below revealing the results of this experiment shows.
Just to reiterate, in case the photo didn't make things entirely clear, this bottle is EMPTY. I think most of the few droplets that can be seen are the remnants of a spin in the dishwasher that the breast pump had before I started using it. So I now have both a manual breast pump and a steam steriliser that are both completely useless. This was what I ended up with after a walk around the baby section of Boots with my mother while she pointed out the baffling array of items that are required for any sort of bottle feeding: bottles in a variety of shapes and sizes, teats which let the milk out at varying speeds, breast pumps, sterilisers. I'm still not sure what the latter even do. Mine is sitting in its box in my living room; a room which, I might add, I until recently described as "minimalist" and which now contains the following: bouncy chair, weaning chair (a small chair for Piglet which looks like a high chair, but on the ground. Essentially, it's a low chair), feeding pillow, car seat, toy arch, baby gym, play mat, selection of cuddly toys and now a breast pump and steriliser. And yet I found myself looking at this very room this evening-a room whose strict colour scheme and lack of plastic tat I had previously prided myself upon-and thinking to myself, "now, what this room really needs is a jumperoo."
No, what I really need is a bigger house. And some curtains. Definitely need those. Poor Piglet had to have his bath this evening in full view of most of Wembley. I'm surprised his naked bottom didn't accidentally end up being beamed to the nation on X Factor. In fact, what I really need is one of those houses on Escape to the Country, with a large kitchen diner, exposed beams, wood burner and range. I've already chosen which Aga I want. The blue one. And I'll have at least an acre of land with a few outbuildings, hot tub, sauna and holiday let. Or failing that, I'll just live somewhere that isn't Wembley, and will no longer be followed down the high street by a mentalist waving a can of deodorant in my face and explaining how he bought it, but he no longer wants it and wants to exchange it. I think he must have mistaken me for this.
We do look pretty similar.
Anyway, thankfully Piglet has now gone to sleep. It only took about two hours of feeding. Thank goodness I wasn't relying on that expressed milk.
Saturday, 8 November 2014
Positive Sleep Associations
This is my latest scintillating read.
The wrinkled sheet underneath (yes that is on my bed) is basically a metaphor for Piglet's current sleeping patterns. Well, who irons a sheet anyway? I mean, who even owns an iron?
As I write, Piglet is sleeping soundly at my feet in his bouncy chair. To look at his angelic face, anyone would assume that the last thing he has is a sleep problem, but appearances are deceiving. For reasons unknown, today he has been sleepy all day and whinging loudly whenever awake. I have therefore spent most of the day feeding, rocking or walking him to sleep; the latter around the industrial estate encircling Wembley Stadium in the wind and driving rain, with a nearby concrete-making works blowing bits of sand and gravel into my face at approximately the speed of a tornado whilst I clung desperately to the pram to avoid it being whipped up into the air and Piglet having an unintentional Mary Poppins moment.
To say this amount of sleep is unusual for Piglet is an understatement. Usually he barely sleeps during the day, then spends much of the night whinging and failing to go to sleep, before finally dropping off sometime after midnight. Dr Richard Ferber of book in picture above fame says that babies need to form positive sleep associations, so I have been bombarding Piglet with images of this lot:
None of these creatures are going to scare a young baby in any way. And all of their antics are very relaxing and do not in any way involve such hyperactivity-inducing pastimes as singing, dancing, saying their own name over and over again in squeaky baby-language or chasing each other around a garden armed with a sponge. My personal favourite character is this dude on the right:
The wrinkled sheet underneath (yes that is on my bed) is basically a metaphor for Piglet's current sleeping patterns. Well, who irons a sheet anyway? I mean, who even owns an iron?
As I write, Piglet is sleeping soundly at my feet in his bouncy chair. To look at his angelic face, anyone would assume that the last thing he has is a sleep problem, but appearances are deceiving. For reasons unknown, today he has been sleepy all day and whinging loudly whenever awake. I have therefore spent most of the day feeding, rocking or walking him to sleep; the latter around the industrial estate encircling Wembley Stadium in the wind and driving rain, with a nearby concrete-making works blowing bits of sand and gravel into my face at approximately the speed of a tornado whilst I clung desperately to the pram to avoid it being whipped up into the air and Piglet having an unintentional Mary Poppins moment.
To say this amount of sleep is unusual for Piglet is an understatement. Usually he barely sleeps during the day, then spends much of the night whinging and failing to go to sleep, before finally dropping off sometime after midnight. Dr Richard Ferber of book in picture above fame says that babies need to form positive sleep associations, so I have been bombarding Piglet with images of this lot:
None of these creatures are going to scare a young baby in any way. And all of their antics are very relaxing and do not in any way involve such hyperactivity-inducing pastimes as singing, dancing, saying their own name over and over again in squeaky baby-language or chasing each other around a garden armed with a sponge. My personal favourite character is this dude on the right:
What a ledge. Would not be at all alarming if you were walking through the woods and ran into this chap. IMAGINE IF IT STARTED CHASING YOU. I might add that despite appearances, this picture is not a grainy CCTV shot of two people the police want to speak to regarding a series of armed attacks on innocent dog-walkers.
In a further attempt to give Piglet some positive sleep associations-and of course to get him interested in all things literary-I have also been reading him a series of bedtime stories on the theme of bedtime and night time.
Hold on, no not that one.
This one!
I know, it looks like it may not be a whole lot better. I found this gem yesterday in the library. It was the first book I picked up, but I had to leave quickly because there was a two year old child trying to attack Piglet. I kid thee not. Piglet was-unusually and only because he was in the pram and we had been walking-asleep. As I wheeled the pram through the library to the children's section, I heard a small voice saying "baby! Sleepy baby!" This was followed by the owner of said voice following us-in full view of his mother who did absolutely nothing about the situation-poking Piglet with a soggy biscuit-covered hand, and then blocking the pram from the front whilst clinging onto the underside of it so that I very nearly had to actually ram the little blighter to get rid of him. Instead, I announced in my sternest teacher voice that the baby was sleeping, thank you very much, and much as we both appreciated the help manoeuvring the pram, he did not wish to be disturbed. I then made a very quick exit and hence Piglet is now stuck with Good Night Wisconsin as his bedtime story. Interestingly, the back cover says that there are other, similar books in the series, not just other states of America, but other countries, so I'm not sure why Wembley Library only seems to stock the one about Wisconsin, which is somewhere that I doubt many of the locals have been, not even me, although I did confess to Piglet familiarity with some of the places and items mentioned ("Lake Michigan! Mummy's been there Piglet! And look! They're harvesting cranberries in that picture. Mummy has a carton of cranberry juice in the fridge!" Clutching at straws). My personal highlight of the book, though, is the way that children are encouraged to greet everyone in Wisconsin in the same way that In the Night Garden encourages them to greet and say goodnight to a family of miniscule wooden pegs and a pretend airship.
GREETINGS, WISCONSIN CHEESE MAKERS!
Goodness knows what randomness awaits poor Piglet in his dreams. It really is no wonder he has such trouble sleeping.
Friday, 3 October 2014
Why Middle Aged Women Should Rule the World
For the last two days I have managed to get Piglet to bed at *around* the 9pm mark. This is an immeasurable improvement on midnight, which was his previous bedtime. It may in fact now be the case that Piglet will grow into a creature of reasonable nocturnal habits, and will not be staying up all night to play on his Playstation (are they still a thing?) all night by the age of two.
To celebrate this irrefutable evidence that I am now an uber-mother, and should definitely be crowned Mother of the Year by Mumsnet, the Pride of Britain Awards and OK! magazine (whichever of those venerable institutions has such an award), I decided to do two things.
1.) Take Piglet to Time for Rhymes at the local children's centre, and
2.) Stand up for mothers everywhere-and the disabled and mobility challenged-by taking both Chiltern Rail and London Underground to task for failing to provide a place to swipe one's oyster card at the step-free entrance at my local station, which for reasons of protecting the guilty, shall remain nameless (Wembley Stadium).
Neither of these were entirely successful.
Time for Rhymes was actually brilliant. I loved the songs and toys (tambourines! Drums! Every bit of the percussion section at the back of the hall that we weren't allowed to touch when I was at infants' school!) more than Piglet, who mostly just sat on my lap staring into space while other, bigger babies toddled up and tried to poke him and their parents cooed "ooh, look at that tiny baby! I'd forgotten how small they were!" I also liked the fact that the staff were so nice and informative. And then, upon lifting Piglet from my lap as I told a member of staff that I thought he needed changing and asked where the baby change facilities were, I discovered that not only did he need changing, but I did too, as the poo had seeped right through his nappy, covering the stylish dungarees (very Prince George) that I had lovingly dressed him in that morning, thinking that such an occasion merited proper big-boy clothes, rather than the usual daily babygro, and the stylish dress that I had lovingly clothed myself in, thinking that I was going to be a trendy yummy mummy and the envy of all the other mothers at Time for Rhymes, rather than my usual daytime uniform of milk-stained pyjamas.
"This doesn't usually happen!" I squealed at the member of staff, terrified that she was going to think I was an unfit mother and ignoramus who couldn't put a nappy on properly. I then spent ten minutes running back and forth to the pram, which had been left in the buggy park outside (thankfully hadn't been stolen. The amount of time I spend worrying that the pram will be stolen is ridiculous. I love that Bugaboo almost as much as the baby) fetching the spare babygro and nappy bags, and dealing with a screaming, poo-covered Piglet. Sadly, although I had the facilities to clean the baby, my organisation did not stretch to cleaning myself, and I spent the remainder of Time for Rhymes, and the not-inconsiderable journey home, with three huge poo stains on the front of my dress.
Could have been worse I suppose. At least it wasn't the back.
My second fail of the day came when I ventured into Central London (always a test of endurance) to meet a friend and fellow mother (look at me, drinking coffees in Regent's Park with my fellow mothers and talking about motherhood!). I had decided to take the train rather than the tube, as the nearest tube station to where I was going (Baker Street) was not step-free, and being a caring, sharing sort, I didn't want to lumber the great British public-who already largely despise me for procreating if the number of people who moved seats to get away from a squawking Piglet and I on the Jubilee Line yesterday is anything to go by-with the headache of feeling obliged to assist me on the stairs with a lumbering pushchair.
This would be fine if it were not for the fact that the train station in question (Wembley Stadium) has no oyster card reader at the step-free entrance which, I might add, is some distance away from the main entrance with the card readers. This led to a particularly fraught journey with a screaming Piglet last week when I had to walk all the way around from the step-free exit to the main exit just to swipe my oyster card to avoid being charged a million pounds. Thanks Transport for London. Thanks a bunch.
I'd just like to take a moment to point out to my fellow Londoners here that if Transport for London do cut the vast numbers of jobs they've been threatening, other stations will go the way of the wretched Wembley Stadium, as being an unmanned station there is a) never anybody there who can help you with anything and b) nobody at any other stations ever understands why you were unable to swipe your oyster card/purchase a ticket as they just assume it's a normal station, with a kiosk and turnstiles and everything, instead of just a random unmanned and un-gated platform which happens to have a few trains stop there occasionally, and have a go at you and imply you are a moron for being unable to see where to swipe oyster card/purchase ticket despite the fact the ticket machine is not working and there is nowhere to swipe oyster card. Angry point made. I shall continue.
Anyway, last time I used this station I had to leave Piglet with a random middle aged woman (risk assessed as being of the demographic least likely to kidnap Piglet or allow him to have some terrible accident in my absence) so that I could run up a huge flight of stairs to swipe my oyster card. Today, however, the only other people at the station were middle aged men, which I considered a less favourable demographic and so decided to press the little button on the platform for information. This led to a long conversation where it took ten minutes to explain what the exact issue was and then the man on the other end of the line had to go and speak to his supervisor to see if he could find out if anyone knew if there was somewhere to swipe the oyster card that did not involve walking up a flight of stairs. At that point, the train came.
I then had to explain to someone at Marylebone why I had not swiped said oyster card, which met with the inspired response "you need to swipe your oyster card. Now you're going to be charged loads when you swipe your card here", although he did at least let me through the barrier, saying I should speak to someone in the tube station about it as oyster card readers were Transport for London's business and not theirs. I then went to the tube station to explain the situation and to politely request that they install a card reader at the step-free entrance at Wembley Stadium, only to be told again that I should have swiped my oyster card, despite the fact that I'd already explained multiple times why I was unable to do this, and that this was Chiltern Rail's problem and not theirs (why was the rail service ever privatised? WHY? Not only this, but the logo was much better in the old days) When I explained that I had already spoken to Chiltern Rail and been told to speak to London Underground as they are the ones with the oyster card readers, I was accused of being, and I quote, "ignorant."
On the way home, I was still so angry that I couldn't face Marylebone or Wembley Stadium or the whole situation, and got on the tube at Baker Street instead-the station I had been trying to avoid due to its many steps. I was immediately asked by a middle aged woman who reminisced about when she used to have a double buggy and couldn't go anywhere if I needed assistance with the pram. Moral of the story: middle aged women rule. Men who work at stations do not.
To celebrate this irrefutable evidence that I am now an uber-mother, and should definitely be crowned Mother of the Year by Mumsnet, the Pride of Britain Awards and OK! magazine (whichever of those venerable institutions has such an award), I decided to do two things.
1.) Take Piglet to Time for Rhymes at the local children's centre, and
2.) Stand up for mothers everywhere-and the disabled and mobility challenged-by taking both Chiltern Rail and London Underground to task for failing to provide a place to swipe one's oyster card at the step-free entrance at my local station, which for reasons of protecting the guilty, shall remain nameless (Wembley Stadium).
Neither of these were entirely successful.
Time for Rhymes was actually brilliant. I loved the songs and toys (tambourines! Drums! Every bit of the percussion section at the back of the hall that we weren't allowed to touch when I was at infants' school!) more than Piglet, who mostly just sat on my lap staring into space while other, bigger babies toddled up and tried to poke him and their parents cooed "ooh, look at that tiny baby! I'd forgotten how small they were!" I also liked the fact that the staff were so nice and informative. And then, upon lifting Piglet from my lap as I told a member of staff that I thought he needed changing and asked where the baby change facilities were, I discovered that not only did he need changing, but I did too, as the poo had seeped right through his nappy, covering the stylish dungarees (very Prince George) that I had lovingly dressed him in that morning, thinking that such an occasion merited proper big-boy clothes, rather than the usual daily babygro, and the stylish dress that I had lovingly clothed myself in, thinking that I was going to be a trendy yummy mummy and the envy of all the other mothers at Time for Rhymes, rather than my usual daytime uniform of milk-stained pyjamas.
"This doesn't usually happen!" I squealed at the member of staff, terrified that she was going to think I was an unfit mother and ignoramus who couldn't put a nappy on properly. I then spent ten minutes running back and forth to the pram, which had been left in the buggy park outside (thankfully hadn't been stolen. The amount of time I spend worrying that the pram will be stolen is ridiculous. I love that Bugaboo almost as much as the baby) fetching the spare babygro and nappy bags, and dealing with a screaming, poo-covered Piglet. Sadly, although I had the facilities to clean the baby, my organisation did not stretch to cleaning myself, and I spent the remainder of Time for Rhymes, and the not-inconsiderable journey home, with three huge poo stains on the front of my dress.
Could have been worse I suppose. At least it wasn't the back.
My second fail of the day came when I ventured into Central London (always a test of endurance) to meet a friend and fellow mother (look at me, drinking coffees in Regent's Park with my fellow mothers and talking about motherhood!). I had decided to take the train rather than the tube, as the nearest tube station to where I was going (Baker Street) was not step-free, and being a caring, sharing sort, I didn't want to lumber the great British public-who already largely despise me for procreating if the number of people who moved seats to get away from a squawking Piglet and I on the Jubilee Line yesterday is anything to go by-with the headache of feeling obliged to assist me on the stairs with a lumbering pushchair.
This would be fine if it were not for the fact that the train station in question (Wembley Stadium) has no oyster card reader at the step-free entrance which, I might add, is some distance away from the main entrance with the card readers. This led to a particularly fraught journey with a screaming Piglet last week when I had to walk all the way around from the step-free exit to the main exit just to swipe my oyster card to avoid being charged a million pounds. Thanks Transport for London. Thanks a bunch.
I'd just like to take a moment to point out to my fellow Londoners here that if Transport for London do cut the vast numbers of jobs they've been threatening, other stations will go the way of the wretched Wembley Stadium, as being an unmanned station there is a) never anybody there who can help you with anything and b) nobody at any other stations ever understands why you were unable to swipe your oyster card/purchase a ticket as they just assume it's a normal station, with a kiosk and turnstiles and everything, instead of just a random unmanned and un-gated platform which happens to have a few trains stop there occasionally, and have a go at you and imply you are a moron for being unable to see where to swipe oyster card/purchase ticket despite the fact the ticket machine is not working and there is nowhere to swipe oyster card. Angry point made. I shall continue.
Anyway, last time I used this station I had to leave Piglet with a random middle aged woman (risk assessed as being of the demographic least likely to kidnap Piglet or allow him to have some terrible accident in my absence) so that I could run up a huge flight of stairs to swipe my oyster card. Today, however, the only other people at the station were middle aged men, which I considered a less favourable demographic and so decided to press the little button on the platform for information. This led to a long conversation where it took ten minutes to explain what the exact issue was and then the man on the other end of the line had to go and speak to his supervisor to see if he could find out if anyone knew if there was somewhere to swipe the oyster card that did not involve walking up a flight of stairs. At that point, the train came.
I then had to explain to someone at Marylebone why I had not swiped said oyster card, which met with the inspired response "you need to swipe your oyster card. Now you're going to be charged loads when you swipe your card here", although he did at least let me through the barrier, saying I should speak to someone in the tube station about it as oyster card readers were Transport for London's business and not theirs. I then went to the tube station to explain the situation and to politely request that they install a card reader at the step-free entrance at Wembley Stadium, only to be told again that I should have swiped my oyster card, despite the fact that I'd already explained multiple times why I was unable to do this, and that this was Chiltern Rail's problem and not theirs (why was the rail service ever privatised? WHY? Not only this, but the logo was much better in the old days) When I explained that I had already spoken to Chiltern Rail and been told to speak to London Underground as they are the ones with the oyster card readers, I was accused of being, and I quote, "ignorant."
On the way home, I was still so angry that I couldn't face Marylebone or Wembley Stadium or the whole situation, and got on the tube at Baker Street instead-the station I had been trying to avoid due to its many steps. I was immediately asked by a middle aged woman who reminisced about when she used to have a double buggy and couldn't go anywhere if I needed assistance with the pram. Moral of the story: middle aged women rule. Men who work at stations do not.
Wednesday, 1 October 2014
A Critique of Daytime Television: 1.) Real Housewives
I just shouted "Yes!" when the announcer on ITV2 announced a double bill of Real Housewives of Beverley Hills.
I am officially a very sad person.
The thing is, when you are on maternity leave, there isn't a lot to do. Or there is, but most of it involves spending money I do not have. Got a credit card bill in the post today and almost cried as I completely forgot I had a credit card that needs to be paid. I thought the credit card was for buying designer shoes and pretending they were free, as the impact on the bank account isn't felt immediately and therefore doesn't count. Real Housewives doesn't exactly help in this respect as the women on it appear to have all the money in the world despite appearing never to do a single day's work. After googling some of the Real Housewives, I am reliably informed that at least some of them do in fact work, but how they manage to fit this in amongst all the partying, wine drinking and bitching, and asking stupid questions that no one ever asks in real life, such as "So now we're alone...I wanted to ask you, why do you have such a problem with me?" and "Did you just give me the Evil Eye? You just gave me the Evil Eye!" (the latter, btw, led to a full-on six person argument that I thought was going to descend into actual fisticuffs). One of the cast of Big Rich Texas, which is even worse than Real Housewives, is actually a successful doctor and author, and yet seems to spend the entire series wafting around a clothes shop with elaborately styled hair, drinking and schmoozing. This raises two questions: 1.) when does she do the doctoring and authoring? and b) why am I not this person?
Argh an entire section of the cast of Real Housewives of Beverley Hills have just swanned off to France (which is a LONG way from Beverley Hills, so we're not talking driving down to Dover and hopping on Le Shuttle here) for no apparent reason, just because they can. I hate them all. That said, suspiciously all the scenes that were supposedly filmed in France seem to look exactly like Beverley Hills, so there is a strong possibility the whole trip has been faked (a bit like the Real Housewives' friendships and arguments, one suspects).
Oh I love it, the French scenes now involve a French flag flapping about and, bizarrely, something that looks like a tank driving down the Champs Elysee. Is France being invaded again? Or is this just how Americans imagine the rest of the world rolls? Maybe they just found some very old footage of Paris in 1945 and re-used it to save money on air fares.
Today, in a bid to get away from all this daytime television, I signed Piglet and I up for a parent and baby group at the local children's centre. This may be worse than staying in watching Real Housewives. I doubt it will involve champagne, but it may well involve bitching. Watch this space.
Saturday, 27 September 2014
The Kindness of Strangers.
Why is it that every time I go out, no matter how many times I have fed Piglet (and no matter how many times he has tried to escape from the Hide-the-Boob Tent), and even if I have fed him immediately before leaving wherever I am, by the time he gets on the train home he is hungry again and screaming blue murder as if to alert every passer by within a fifty mile radius that I am a useless and neglectful mother who doesn't feed her baby and who will doubtless end up with a child with a shrunken brain from all the cortisol released during the frantic screaming.
And why is it that as I run from station to home with the pram, reassuring Piglet repeatedly that we are almost home as he shrieks inconsolably, and pointing out every local landmark that he won't recognise to support my point, that EVERY ONE of those passers by feels the need to give me the Look of Death which communicates in no uncertain terms that not only do they-Mr and Mrs Judgey McJudge, the Great British Public-wholeheartedly agree with the sentiment outlined above, but they are also on the verge of calling social services.
And why is it that every time I pass another baby, they are sitting there serenely in their mother's arms, cooing and gurgling into their swaddling bands whilst looking up at their parents with a look of blissful adoration as if they have never shed a tear in their young life. WHY, WHY, WHY?
And lastly, why are all these people always full of useless suggestions to stop the crying, such as (I kid thee not) blowing on the baby's face?
BECAUSE THAT'S GOING TO WORK
Surely the one time in the history of the world that this worked was when the reason for the crying was a hair or bit of dust or fluff happened to have fallen on the baby's face and was really annoying it until a knowledgeable stranger walked by and blew the offending article away.
It has been mooted (on the Internets, obvs.) that one possible reason for a baby's crying is that a hair has become tightly wound around the baby's finger, toe or (eek!) penis, annoying said baby and potentially cutting off the circulation to the area. I now live in fear of this happening (particularly the penis situation, especially since today I found one of my own ludicrously long hairs lurking in Piglet's nappy). However, so far every time Piglet has started to cry on the train, the only thing that can satisfy him is the boob. And it's hardly practical to whip one out whilst walking down the street, however successful a multi-tasker I consider myself to be.
Yet why have I never seen anyone else in this predicament?
And why is it that as I run from station to home with the pram, reassuring Piglet repeatedly that we are almost home as he shrieks inconsolably, and pointing out every local landmark that he won't recognise to support my point, that EVERY ONE of those passers by feels the need to give me the Look of Death which communicates in no uncertain terms that not only do they-Mr and Mrs Judgey McJudge, the Great British Public-wholeheartedly agree with the sentiment outlined above, but they are also on the verge of calling social services.
And why is it that every time I pass another baby, they are sitting there serenely in their mother's arms, cooing and gurgling into their swaddling bands whilst looking up at their parents with a look of blissful adoration as if they have never shed a tear in their young life. WHY, WHY, WHY?
And lastly, why are all these people always full of useless suggestions to stop the crying, such as (I kid thee not) blowing on the baby's face?
BECAUSE THAT'S GOING TO WORK
Surely the one time in the history of the world that this worked was when the reason for the crying was a hair or bit of dust or fluff happened to have fallen on the baby's face and was really annoying it until a knowledgeable stranger walked by and blew the offending article away.
It has been mooted (on the Internets, obvs.) that one possible reason for a baby's crying is that a hair has become tightly wound around the baby's finger, toe or (eek!) penis, annoying said baby and potentially cutting off the circulation to the area. I now live in fear of this happening (particularly the penis situation, especially since today I found one of my own ludicrously long hairs lurking in Piglet's nappy). However, so far every time Piglet has started to cry on the train, the only thing that can satisfy him is the boob. And it's hardly practical to whip one out whilst walking down the street, however successful a multi-tasker I consider myself to be.
Yet why have I never seen anyone else in this predicament?
Friday, 26 September 2014
The Desperate State of Shopping with No Money
So today I was so desperate to get out of the house that I sat in Starbucks for an hour sipping a latte.
A LATTE. This is very bad on the money-saving front. That £2.25 would have bought three days worth of food in the halal shop. At least I didn't buy any cake. This was mainly because now that I am an Uber-Mother and Domestic Goddess, I have been trying my hand at baking, and yesterday made pineapple upside down cake, which I am now in the process of polishing off, on my own, before it goes off. Let's just say that three weeks after giving birth (or, as I prefer to think of it, having Piglet wrenched out of me, since I played a pathetically small role in the whole process) I had lost most of the baby weight, and since then it has been steadily creeping back on. I then spent the next half an hour wandering idly round the "London Designer Outlet" (compulsory inverted commas, like allegedly that's what it is. Most exciting brands therein are Kurt Geiger and er, North Face. We're not talking Roland Mouret here), glancing in shop windows and sighing dramatically at the sight of my not-very-thin midsection, wondering if taking up baking as a hobby was such a good idea.
I also had a little wander into Kurt Geiger. Because obviously shoe shopping is the sensible thing to do whilst berating yourself for having the extravagance to purchase a latte. To my delight, they had the perfect Mum shoes in there-flat heeled knee high brown riding boots, which I had been considering buying for some time, due to their practicality whilst pushing a pram, and country-chic, preppy look with a tweed jacket. And they were reduced. To £140. All I can say is, thank God the "London Designer Outlet" is not a real designer outlet. I then spotted a pair of cheaper black suede over-the-knee boots which I also wanted and still couldn't afford, despite their being less than half the price of the riding boots. If it's any consolation, I already have both a pair of brown knee high boots, and black over the knee ones, but the devil is in the details (the brown boots have a heel and laces, and were purchased in 2006, when knee high boots were already starting to look dated, and the over the knee boots have a pointed toe in the style last seen on Caprice circa 1999).
Before long I am going to look like Caprice in 1999. But fatter. Either that or I'm just going to have to wait for all these things to come back into fashion. Because, like the recent resurgence of the crop top, this is likely to happen just as I have got too old and fat to enjoy it.
A LATTE. This is very bad on the money-saving front. That £2.25 would have bought three days worth of food in the halal shop. At least I didn't buy any cake. This was mainly because now that I am an Uber-Mother and Domestic Goddess, I have been trying my hand at baking, and yesterday made pineapple upside down cake, which I am now in the process of polishing off, on my own, before it goes off. Let's just say that three weeks after giving birth (or, as I prefer to think of it, having Piglet wrenched out of me, since I played a pathetically small role in the whole process) I had lost most of the baby weight, and since then it has been steadily creeping back on. I then spent the next half an hour wandering idly round the "London Designer Outlet" (compulsory inverted commas, like allegedly that's what it is. Most exciting brands therein are Kurt Geiger and er, North Face. We're not talking Roland Mouret here), glancing in shop windows and sighing dramatically at the sight of my not-very-thin midsection, wondering if taking up baking as a hobby was such a good idea.
I also had a little wander into Kurt Geiger. Because obviously shoe shopping is the sensible thing to do whilst berating yourself for having the extravagance to purchase a latte. To my delight, they had the perfect Mum shoes in there-flat heeled knee high brown riding boots, which I had been considering buying for some time, due to their practicality whilst pushing a pram, and country-chic, preppy look with a tweed jacket. And they were reduced. To £140. All I can say is, thank God the "London Designer Outlet" is not a real designer outlet. I then spotted a pair of cheaper black suede over-the-knee boots which I also wanted and still couldn't afford, despite their being less than half the price of the riding boots. If it's any consolation, I already have both a pair of brown knee high boots, and black over the knee ones, but the devil is in the details (the brown boots have a heel and laces, and were purchased in 2006, when knee high boots were already starting to look dated, and the over the knee boots have a pointed toe in the style last seen on Caprice circa 1999).
Before long I am going to look like Caprice in 1999. But fatter. Either that or I'm just going to have to wait for all these things to come back into fashion. Because, like the recent resurgence of the crop top, this is likely to happen just as I have got too old and fat to enjoy it.
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