The Lowdown On Lockdown Birthdays

We've had three, so far: Hearthfather's, mine and Gertie's. That would be Gertie, who somehow while I wasn't looking, has just become a teenager.

So we are getting quite good at lockdown celebrations as we have had quite a bit of practice. There are a few rules:

• The birthday girl or boy gets to choose the structure of the day and everyone has to go along with it. 
• Lockdown birthdays really ought to last for two days rather than one
• There are more family presents than usual.

So, inevitably, we each went for something different in terms of the 'structure of the day'.

Hearthfather went for

• a lunchtime beer 
• a family Zoom quiz (he won on a bonus question, supplied at the last minute, to ensure that result)
• a takeaway curry.

His was quite early on in lockdown days, and the Indian restaurant (that we are relatively frequent patrons of ordinarily) actually let us have a beer while we waited to collect the curry. And brought some poppadoms to the table. It almost felt like going out. As in olden days. But not quite. Because it also felt quite naughty. But nice.

Mine involved

• no Zooms whatsoever, on pain of death
• a cycle ride 
• a disco. 

I realise that final bullet point requires some explanation. It was a disco for five people. At home. (With rather excellent disco lighting that we have now permanently installed in the sitting room.)

I have decided that this is by far and away the best format for a disco. I could dance like nobody was watching, because, really - they weren't. We went beyond 'air guitar' and mimed with actual guitars. And it was actually enormous fun - we partied until after 10pm. Yes, 10pm. Gilby took himself off to bed just before and Eddie had to be carried up, floppy and exhausted, like back when he was a toddler. Even Gertie got involved. (It was before she became a teenager though.)

Gertie chose

• a family Zoom quiz (which she won by a country mile, not needing the bonus question)
• separate social distanced doorstep deliveries from friends who had baked cookies and a cake
• a takeaway pizza

And what a cake!  We are still eating it. Apparently it feed 30-35. It's not really helping the lockdown diet terribly much.

Gilby is eleven in July and Eddie's is not until September, so there is a bit of a lull now. Eddie has his heart set on Harry Potter World. Fingers crossed.



Currently reading: The London Train by Tessa Hadley

The Cost of Reading

As it is the end of the first week back I am playing perfect mother and am on it with the reading and the homework. This will last for another week and a half, approximately, when we will return to hastily scribbled made-up entries in the reading log and Sunday night homework conversations conducted through gritted teeth, but right now I am in the zone.

Biff, Chip and Kipper have a lot to answer for. Eddie was reading the fairly innocuous-sounding Victorian Adventure. The magic key began to do its thing and the children found themselves at Buckingham Palace in the nineteenth century. Spoiler alert: After getting arrested they are mysteriously released. Gran appears near the end as she is also in the adventure and has made friends with Queen Victoria. (Obvs.) The problem page was this one:

Eddie stumbled over the word 'scones'; in part because he didn't know what they were.

"Well," said I, "that is a problem easily rectified!" And off we went to a lovely little tea shop on the banks of the Arun. "I'll just force down an afternoon tea for the sake of your reading homework..."

I know how to take one for the team...

Moody skies, though.


Currently reading: The Secret History by Donna Tartt

Sing, King!

It's the season to be jolly and all that.  And to rush around like a lunatic.  And to enjoy youngest son's star performance as a king in the nursery nativity.

I had high hopes.  He sang his king song loudly, confidently and relatively tunefully in the car on the way to the village hall. He was pleased with his costume.  Any resemblance between his royal cloak and our living room curtains is entirely coincidental. I asked him whether he was giving gold, frankincense or myrrh to the baby Jesus.  "Mine's red," he said.  "So that means it's the gold, it's just red." Right.

He had a wobbly moment earlier in the day when he decided that he wanted to abdicate...his kingship and all responsibility for doing the play, but I insisted that we go along anyway just to have a look.  After the sing-song in the car and his delight in his crown he got caught up in the buzz and virtually ran back stage.

I sat in the audience expectantly.  It was the standard nursery production.  Bright, bubbly and exhaustingly enthusiastic helpers narrated, cajoled and over-acted next to unpredictable toddlers, whilst removing screaming children from the stage from time to time.  There were fourteen angels, five donkeys, four stars (yes, I know, that was a new development for me too, but there were also four kings so they kind of had one each to follow), a whole flock of shepherds, one Mary, one Joseph and, thankfully, one baby Jesus.

"Sing, Eddie," I heard the helper next to him implore as they launched in to the first 'number'.  He smiled his cutest smile, waved at me in the audience to make sure that I was looking, and then shook his head like he'd just been asked to tidy his bedroom.  I knew that shake. So I wasn't surprised when he refused to sing any songs for the entire duration of the show, including his special king one.  He did, dutifully, walk over and sling his 'red' at the crib at more or less the allotted time, but then promptly sat himself down again at the front of the stage and proceeded to pick his nose for the rest of the show.

He then had the temerity to demand cake on his return from the stage. Celebrity mindset without the performance, it seems.

And he sang all the way home, too.



Currently reading: Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen

No Fight Left Club

So, tantrums, then.

They are a bit worse, it seems, when I am single-parenting.  Hearth-Father is away in Malta on a cricket tour.

Eddie's tantrum this afternoon was prolonged.  And LOUD.  Insistent.  High-pitched and piercing.  It made me send him to bed without any supper, which I thought only happened in Victorian novels.  This was a meltdown of epic proportions. He was utterly inconsolable.  His eyes, at one point, seemed to roll backwards in his head with the sheer effort of continuing to scream.  And when he could get words out at all, which wasn't often, they mostly involved declamations like, "I...CAN'T....STOP...SCREAMING!" with giant shuddering gulps in between.  Horrible.  It made Eddie Norton's character fighting with himself in Fight Club look rational. It's been a long while since we've had one like that.

So I'm trying to work out what caused it; because, frankly, what escalated it was that I sat his Toy Story Woody toy upright instead of laying him down on the ground flat. Yes, I know.  Call social services.

Since he turned three at the weekend, can I blame 'terrible twos'?  I'm wondering if feeding him rubbish yesterday (birthday cake, chips, ketchup, sweets) was a deciding factor.  Bad if it was, because I seem not to have fed him at all, this evening.  Daddy being away?  The fact that everyone bowed down to his will yesterday because he was the birthday boy - and then didn't today, when he wasn't?  Being exhausted after having a lovely day in glorious late September sunshine at the stoolball, at the park and playing football?E

Who knows?  All I know is that I'm as exhausted as he is.  How does a little body have so much noise and fight in it? The 'expert advice' on www.babycenter.com suggests that the number one coping mechanism during a toddler tantrum is 'not losing your own cool'.  Right.  This is followed by the advice to 'remember that you're the adult'.  Oh.

Come back, Daddy!



Currently Reading: The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver

Magic Number Seven

Seven is a magic number.

It is a lot of candles on a cake.

It is the difference between a cake that looks like a cake - something that grown-ups might like to eat too - and one that looks like this, from last year:

It is the difference between having a tea party with cup cakes and jelly and ice-cream, and going out to the cinema with a few mates from school, which was this year's 'party' choice.

It is a long time in years and it makes for one very grown up little girl.

Things have begun to happen very fast indeed.  She had a sleepover with two friends.  And they were entirely sensible, asking to brush their teeth after their 'midnight' feast, and all asleep by 10pm.

Her present from us was a tablet (much debate and agonising).  We haven't sorted out the internet controls yet, but she has, unfortunately already downloaded 'Candy Crush Saga'. On the upside, it means that presents are getting smaller.  More expensive, yes, but less plastic, bulky and ugly. She is more self contained.  She had a friend round to play earlier in the week and they sat quietly and made bangles for an hour and a half.

She doesn't volunteer for anything anymore.  She used to be the 'pick me, pick me' person, unable to stay in her seat with the effort of thrusting her hand upwards.  She was forever up on stage as the helper in the pantomime or magic show.  Now she would rather sit back and watch other people make fools of themselves, which is a little sad.

But we giggle together at something shared.  Often.  I do a lot of laughing with the boys, too, but it's usually at something they've said or done.

How do I feel?  Proud of my so clever and confident and beautiful girl.  Slightly wistful for the innocent bygone days of pleasures that don't involve a screen and downloading stuff.  A tiny bit frightened by how fast it is all changing...


Currently reading: Strange Music by Laura Fish.

Have the Bumps Gone Out of Fashion?

I only ask because it has never once occurred to me to give any of my children the bumps on their birthday.
In fact, I'd forgotten that they even existed until my memory was jolted by the sight of Arsene Wenger receiving them courtesy of his team following their FA Cup win.

Seeing this white-haired man in his mid-sixties being casually tossed aloft - and looking both delighted and slightly sheepish at the same time -  reminded me of that mixture of fear and exhilaration that came with getting the bumps on your birthday.  It was part of the whole deal...cake, candles, making a wish, presents, musical statues, the bumps.

So where did they go?  We've attended dozens of children's parties in over the last seven years.  Not even a sniff of them.  Wikipedia described them as one of a number of 'birthday torments' that might be inflicted.  I wondered if contemporary health and safety fears have banished them to the annals of history.

So, ignoring all that, we decided to reinstate them for Gertie's seventh birthday.

I think she enjoyed herself!

Currently reading: Death at Wentwater Court by Carola Dunn
Don't judge...it's half term!

Birthday Know-How

Six years ago our lives were transformed, utterly, by the birth of Gertie.

Ten months of expectation and wonder, followed by a twelve-hour-induced-labour and too many stitches to talk about.

Then two more children, who also have birthdays.  Now I mostly bake cakes.

Who knew that the human body was capable of so much? (The cake-baking is the particularly impressive bit.)

The Little Things

I went on a cake-decorating course for the first time yesterday.  Not really the type of thing I ususally do.  My husband is king of the kitchen, so I make only the occasional foray into the world of baking, usually just around the time of the little people's birthdays, and then I ususally make it up as I go along, often to the great amusement of my husband.   So the cake-decorating course was probably more about having a few hours to myself and doing something new. 

But thanks to a great teacher and lots of expensive cake-decorating toys, the results were astounding.  Look, I even made the roses!  By the time I was on my way home, (driving at 20 miles an hour to preserve my precious cupcake cargo) Gertie was due at a birthday party and Daddy had taken everyone with him, so I had a few more unexpected hours on my own.

Joy of joys - this meant that I could tidy the house whilst no-one was there to mess it up as I went along, (and admire the greatness of my cup-cakes in solitude).  Such peace.  I even read the paper.  It's the little things.

So for a little while I could pretend that I was one of those cupcake mums who has a tidy house and is in control of everything.  Calm down: I said, 'for a little while'.  By 4.30pm everyone was home, chaos ensued and the cupcakes were demolished in a hundredth of the time it had taken to create them. 

And we discovered that Gertie had head-lice...resulting in a mad dash to the chemist and the destruction of my smug, 'I-can-do-this-motherhood-lark' feeling.  See - it's the little things.

Birthdays Abroad and Overheating Kayaks

We were getting ready to head off on our now annual trip to the south of France. I used to think it was a terrible waste of the world to return to the same place year after year; now I find a reassuring comfort in the familiar. This is our third visit.

“Mummy, you look Hanson!” cried Gilby in the morning, and all I could think was “Mmmbop…” Did I have floppy blond hair and look about twelve, suddenly? No, it was merely Gilby’s rapidly expanding vocabulary getting the better of him as it often does. Well, he was going to be three whilst we were away, but we took the decision to ‘save’ the birthday celebrations until our return. I feel a need to justify this decision: his presents were big (like soccer goal nets) and I didn’t fancy spending time baking and icing a cake in the heat of the sun. All the adults agreed to the conspiracy; how would he ever know?

I finished the last day of school and Daddy was waiting in the car park, Alice Cooper blaring from the stereo: School’s out for summer…car packed up with cases and kids, and a grandmother and a niece. Tremendously exciting, and by early evening we were in Lille.

The long trek down through France took the whole of the next day, and was relatively peaceful, aside from the moment when Gilby complained that his crisps had 'gone quiet' but his bread was 'noisy', which are the best eupehmisms for 'stale' I have heard.  Later, Nano calmly asked whether we had a change of skirt for Gertie.
“Only in the roof box…”
“No problem, only she’s just sneezed Babybel all over herself,” Nano went on to explain cheerfully. We arrived mostly in one piece, if a little cheese-sneezed.

A glorious week consisted of fabulous weather, delicious food, too much rose wine, daily water volleyball tournaments and plenty of other pool antics.

Grumps was at his best, or worst, depending on how you view it. We’d finished our main course of ‘chicken au Cabrieres’, and had just got to cheese. Excitedly, we planned our trip to kayak under the Pont du Gard the following morning. “They tried puttingheaters in those, you know,” he began, conversationally. “But they all started to explode.” The rest of us looked at him, bemused. “Which just goes to show that you can’t have your kayak and heat it, really.”

Gilby’s ‘birthday’ passed without incident. Sadly, the terrible twos didn’t end, but I consoled myself with the thought that it was simply that he didn’t yet know he was three. And we’d have got away with the harmless deception, too, if only the passport control officer hadn’t wished on our way back through the tunnel with the parting words, “Where’s Gilbert? Ah, there you are. Happy birthday for yesterday, young man!”

Pass the rose...

Scars, Tantrums and Banishment

Oh.  We are recovering from a row. This is a BAD THING. And I am still nursing the scars from a bouncy-castle related drinking injury at Gertie's birthday party, so feeling doubly wounded.

Have I mentioned recently how 'difficult' Gilby is?  On a scale of one to ten he currently sits somewhere around 'hellish'.  Temper tantrums, an unhealthy preoccupation with the word, 'no', an inability to carry out a task without being distracted by a toy: Eating, dressing, teeth-brushing, putting on shoes...the list of potential clash-points before we have even left the house in the morning is quite...exhaustive.  Sorry: exhausting.

This morning's flashpoint occured in the bathroom.  I have a three strikes rule.  I say 'rule', I suppose it simply reflects the limited amount of patience I possess. Once I have politely requested a course of action twice, I really can't be doing with a third time. So - to cut a tedious story slightly shorter,  I ended up forcibly brushing his teeth for him and then banishing Gilby to his bedroom to calm down.

I went back in to see if he was ready for 'deep breaths and a cuddle' but, no, it was too soon for that.
So, I returned to getting myself ready.  I mostly remember to brush my hair these days, and occasionally find some lipstick to apply badly. It was at this point that Daddy knocked on Gilby's door.  Met with a gruff, "Go away!" he responded with, "Don't worry, Gilby, it's only Daddy."  Don't worry?  DON'T WORRY?  Oh, I see, it's not evil Mummy, it's only Daddy."  Well, I'm afraid I momenarily became 'evil Mummy' until Daddy retracted his statement.  Oh dear.  Was I over-reacting?

And then Gertie decided, inexplicably at that moment, to point out that she hadn't, in fact, had any of her own birthday cake at her party. The cake that I had lovingly laboured over just for her...  It didn't really do a great deal to lower the emotional intensity of the moment.

And all this by 8am, before my day's work has supposedly begun.

Things got better though, and finished this evening with a glass of wine in the garden in glorious evening sunshine. The healing power of sun and alcohol...now only the bouncy-castle scars remain.

Five Years, Five Cakes

Hard to believe that my little girl is five years old. I still haven't quite got used to seeing her in her school uniform, all grown up.  But here is the cake to prove it. Slightly trickier than the 'number one' I made for her first birthday and didn't go far between the 25 kids who came to her party on Sunday, but I was pleased with the finished result.

Let Them Not Eat Cake!

In preparation for Eddie's baptism, we had to go and collect the cake the day before and deliver it to the party venue. As the picture shows it was a thing of beauty, a cut above my past efforts at Mr Bump, Peppa Pig and a Fairy Toadstool. As soon as they saw it, Gertie and Gilbert were desperate to try it so I had to explain, quite forcibly, how special it was, and how we'd have to wait until it was time to cut the cake after the baptism. There would certainly not be any cake-eating before that moment I intoned sternly, pushing visions of a half-munched cake firmly from my mind.

When we arrived for the party holding a newly-Christened Eddie aloft, a lovely buffet was set with the cake as the deserved centre-piece. The children soon piled up their plates with party food. Gilby kept coming up and anxiously asking if it was 'cake-time' yet. Eventually I said that it was and he looked mightily relieved as he reached up to take the final fairy cake from a nearly empty plate.

What a lesson in noble restraint. It seems that my sermon had hit deeply. He had waited all that time, thinking that he couldn't have any cake, watching all the other children repeatedly helping themselves, desperately willing the final one not to disappear.