Pumpkin Head

Gertie is dressing up as a (slightly too sexy in my opinion) angel for Halloween. Gilby is trick or treating as a werewolf. But Eddie has rather struggled with an idea for a Halloween costume this year. 

We have got as far as this:

I'm currently losing the battle to persuade him to carve eye holes, so don't be alarmed if you see a pumpkin-head walking into lampposts in a small village in Sussex this evening.

Currently reading: The Man Who Died Twice by Richard Osman

It's All Greek To Me

It has been a busy old week with regards to the combined demands of primary school and social commitments. Monday was 'Superhero Day' for Year 2. Eddie hasn't worn a superhero costume for a couple of years, so some improvisation was needed. 

Yesterday was 'Forest Schools' followed by a party at a local farm park. This required the sorting out of a present for the birthday girl - on a school night - and, with an after work meeting and ferrying the kids to clubs until 9pm, I left Daddy in charge. He surpassed himself. I had expected a tenner stuffed in a card, but the present was thoughtfully chosen, wrapped and delivered on time.  

Today was 'Greek Day' for Year 5, so, following the success of mid-week birthday-gate, Hearth-Father was promoted to costume design for the first time. With hindsight, I don't know why I have found the last few years remotely stressful. I should have handed over responsibilities a long time ago. I may be about to announce my retirement. Somehow he managed this:

And is utterly forgiven for raiding the wardrobe for my sandals and destroying a pillow case. I have no idea about the authenticity, but am overwhelmed by the commitment. After nineteen years I have discovered my husband's secret dressmaking skill. The needle and cotton are his domain from now on.

Currently reading: The Mere Wife by Maria Dahvana Headley

Malfunctioning Jumpsuits

Eddie's latest obsession is with wearing a vampire bat costume that he got at Halloween last year.

For the last few days he has lived in it.  Including during yesterday's 26 degree heat. On the plus side, this meant that I didn't have to be overly concerned about sunscreen - since it covers more or less every inch of him.

Here he is, bottom left, wielding his devilish pitchfork. (He does that metaphorically, most days, but this is an actual one.  Or at least one made out of plastic.)

This morning, whilst getting ready for gymnastics (in obligatory bat costume - Grandfather was taking him, I didn't have to worry about explaining that one...) he noticed that the label said it was a 'jump suit'.

I was impressed. This reading lark is really taking effect.

Except that he had a major concern.  'So, it says it is a 'jump suit', but it doesn't actually jump.  Do we need to take it back?


Currently reading: A Brief History of Seven Killings by Marlon James

Feel the Force

I'm all nativitied out, now.

Gilby was a shepherd in his school production: A shepherd dressed in black with sunglasses and a walkie-talkie, but we love a cheeky anachronism or ten.

Eddie was a king (of course, again) in his nursery version.

Both delivered their lines beautifully, knew all the words and actions of their songs, made their mother cry and generally did what nursery and primary school nativity productions are supposed to do - including providing those moments of sublime but unintentional comedy through missed cues and prop-handling (poor baby Jesus slung mercilessly into his cradle is perennially amusing.)

Gertie's class do the Easter production (unless this is her way of letting me down gently with the news that she didn't get a part this year) but she watched her brothers in their different shows patiently and supportively.

And all three were on parade again this morning. It was the advent 'family mass' where the children took responsibility for all the key moments of the service.  Gertie led the opening prayer and lit the advent candle and Gilby wrote and shared his bidding prayer. They both had 'acting' roles in the gospel.

Eddie played with his lightsaber, mostly - and after some cajoling took part in the offertory procession.

But his main, unscripted contribution took place during the contemplative calm of the Eucharistic prayer. He took himself off to stand in front of the kneeling congregation and demanded, loudly, 'When are you all going to stop BEING LIKE STATUES?'

It had the desired effect, since some of the assembled worshippers were, indeed, unable to maintain their stillness; there was some definite shoulder-shaking.




Currently reading: Remember Me by Melvyn Bragg

On Dressing Up...And Underestimating Dad

October and November have been turbulent and travel-filled.

I returned last weekend from ten days in Uganda, where I was 'on duty' over half term with a group of Year 11 students.  The trip itself was amazing, but the logistical arrangements to enable it to happen - over a period of holiday for the kids with Hearth-father working - were quite spectacular.

Shaded into the shared google-spreadsheet(!) were the swimming lessons, football club, Irish dancing workshops and nursery sessions with clear instructions about who was picking up whom and when.  Secreted into last weekend with little discussion or preparation was a Halloween Party in fancy dress.

Above is what he pulled off! Most impressive was the make-up. Clearly my services were not required. Note to self: go away more often...

 What a fearsome trio they make!

Eddie insisted on coming to meet me in his full 'bat' gear - which look slightly less devilish at 9am on a bright November morning.

But it was rapid change into the Ugandan away kit, so that the 'Uganda Boys' can continue to train this season:

And later that afternoon, Nano returned from her even more far-flung travels - with some pyjamas from Hong Kong:

 So, my return had a rather theatrical feel to it all.  I wonder where they get it from?




Currently reading: The Paying Guests by Sarah Waters

In the Swim of Things

Eddie has a weekly swimming lesson, and has done since he was about six weeks old. The word 'lesson' here is used in its loosest possible sense, and it's fair to say that he hasn't taken to the water like the proverbial duck. Thursday mornings have the potential to be a very stressful affair.

So, when he announced last Thursday that he wanted to get himself ready for swimming in advance, the suggestion was greeted enthusiastically by Hearth-father. Perhaps this might be a 'good' swimming day.

All was quiet upstairs for a while before Eddie marched down proudly, fully dressed but pulling his shirt buttons apart in the manner of Superman (Eddie is obsessed with superheroes; Batman and Spiderman are his current favourites) so that it was plain to see that he was already sporting his all-in-one swimsuit beneath.

Behaviour was bordering on enthusiastic, and it meant that exit from the changing rooms to poolside was unusually speedy and hassle-free. The chickens were lining themselves up to be counted.  The lesson passed without a tantrum, and Eddie even did some of the things that his teacher told him to.

But there was a problem. Hearth-father realised that, following Eddie's self-selected sartorial arrangements, he had neglected to bring along a pair of pants for Eddie to change back into after his lesson.

"Don't worry, Daddy," Eddie piped up unperturbed, "I kept my pants on underneath my swimsuit..."

Perhaps it's a superhero thing.




Currently reading: The Book of You by Claire Kendal

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

More Shelves, Please, I'm Winning

I seem to be a little bit preoccupied by my eldest child at the moment.  I do have other children, I remember, but lots seems to be revolving around Gertie. This is the fifth post in a row in which she is the main event.

I will find other subject matter, but just one last little thing.  She does Irish dancing.  Mostly because this was a thing that I had to do when I was little.  She was at the CAID British Open Championships in Farnham in Surrey a couple of weekends ago where she won her light jig and came third in the championship overall, which generated a sizeable piece of silverware.

I did a reasonable job of hiding the remnants of Scissorgate:

Her comment? "Mummy, I know that you've only just decorated my room, but I think I'm going to need another shelf."

Currently reading: The Testament of Mary by Colm Toibin

On God and Merkins

Under what circumstances might a four-year-old boy run round his sitting room shouting "I'm a merkin, I'm a merkin, I'm a merkin!"?


I only ask because this is exactly what you might have heard had you been at our place last weekend.


Before you cast aspersions on the kind of household we have created, allow me to explain.


Last Sunday was 'Epiphany', and, as part of celebrating the journey of the magi, Gilby was asked to be a king at church. He was representing Caspar, and we had a jolly old time making his crown. Cereal box, bandage, and some of Gertie's sequins from her Christmas nail art set all came in very handy. Mister Maker wouldn't have been that impressed, but Gilby was, and that was the main thing.


And what did Caspar have to do? Well, as we discovered, he had to give the gift of myrrh to the baby Jesus in a procession at the end of the service. Which is simply what Gilby was explaining to anyone who might listen.


And therein lies the explanation.





Currently reading: And the Mountains Echoed by Khalid Hosseini. Wow.

Dressing Down

Gertie was keen to dress herself from before the age of two. She needed no encouragement, and certainly no help, thank you very much. This has continued through to the dizzy heights of being five. And dress herself she does, though these days she manages to get far fewer items back to front or inside out. My sister, based on the South coast, will often comment on 'how very Brighton' Gertie looks; a euphemism for..well, slightly eccentric, I suppose.

Gilby, soon to be three years old, has no such pretensions. The most he claims to be able to dress or undress is to remove his socks, with much huff and puff and fuss, just prior to his bath. Everything else must be done for him. Indeed, when I have forced him to dress himself just to make a point, he has made one back by making the process so painful and unproductive (usually involving two limbs down same leg-hole of his trousers, and I deliberately say 'limbs' because I don't necessarily mean legs) that I am forced to intervene.

Strange, then, how the arrival of the paddling pool in the garden today saw him whip his clothes off in a jiffy, no problem at all. He was also, curiously, able to don them again whilst I wasn't looking. I will remind him of this miraculous feat tomorrow morning, though I have a sneaking suspicion he will play helpless once more.

Slinky Malinki

Slinky Malinki, for anyone unacquainted with this shady character, is a cat belonging to series of books by New Zealand author Lynley Dodd, first published in the 1990s. They employ alliteration and assonance addictively, and my children love the rhythmic quality of the stories - of whom the most well-known is probably Hairy Maclary. As well as being chased by Hairy Maclary, Slinky Malinki is also a feline leading a dubious double-life, forced eventually to change his ways.



So, for World Book Day last month, Gertie chose to go to school dressed as this literary cat. I was delighted, as the costume was an awful lot simpler to create (ears on a hairband, fur-fabric tail, bit of eye-liner) than 'Mr Bump', which was her other suggestion. It also proved to be unique: she stood out from the dozen or so Cinderellas and Rapunzels in her class.

Smashing Pumpkins and a Raging Raisin

Here are Gertie and Gilby splendidly painted as pumpkins for Halloween.

Eddie, alas, is too new for face-painting, but it doesn't matter because when he screws his little face up for a good screaming cry he resembles a particularly scary halloween pumpkin anyway. His new nickname is the 'raging raisin' on account of his newborn wrinkliness combined with his ability to ratchet up the decibels. I wonder if this is typical third-child behaviour, borne of the need to be very loud to make his demands heard above the others...?

We are winning, finally, with Gilby and the potty training; though the timing of a severe bout of diarrhoea was not helpful to this process. Enough said.

Dancing Shoes

Gertie has just taken part in her second Irish-dancing class. She loves dancing, and aged four, has already been doing ballet for more than two years. As a child I loved Irish-dancing, and carried on taking part in competitions until I was thirty, (albeit with a long break through my late teens and early twenties!) I loved the excitement of the feis and all the dressing-up that went with it. But at twenty-eight weeks pregnant with baby number three, my dancing days are well and truly over. So the item that has inspired this blog-post in response to Jodie's writing prompts this week are my tired and worn-out shoes, next to Gertie's shiny new and very, very tiny ones.

It is a personality cat-walk as I revist old loves: nostalgic, but memories faded at the edges, a little tarnished on reflection. And watch history repeating itself!

DANCING SHOES

A restless night: my hair in lumpy rags.
For this six-year-old white-dreadlocked dreamer
The unroutine 5am start
Prevents sleep more than the tight wound curls.
In the morning the ritual unwinding,
A mess of ribboned ringlets scooped to top-knot.
Not really a look for London, circa 1980.
Then soft leather shoes lattice-laced
Like twisted liquorice around poodle socks
Thickening my ankles. A racing greyhound,
Hungry for the hare. But my chase was for a trophy
In the jig; a shiny medal in the reel;
Highly commended in the horn-pipe,
And my mother: glowing, proud and smiling.

Now I see the glitz under glare of bare Whitechapel bulb;
Fuss and pomp and empty Gaelic line.
McEvoy by name: a tired cultural link,
Forcing Irishness under lure of dress and gloss.
As I enrol my daughter in her Irish dancing class.

Tie for First Place

What is wrong with this picture of two beautiful princesses all dressed up?



Nothing at all, except that this is Gertie and Gilby. My son appears to be very much in touch with his feminine side: His other favourite costume is a mermaid one...

But we were at their lovely cousin's christening at the weekend, and Gilby dressed up smartly for the occasion.



I get the feeling that his father is much happier when the little man is wearing a shirt and tie!

The Porthole Affair

The year is 1935 and we are travelling across the Atlantic in RMS Olympic, sister ship to the Titanic. Yes, last weekend we hosted a murder mystery evening: The Porthole Affair.

Never done one before, and to be fair, we don't do a great deal of entertaining these days, so it became quite a big deal. I was playing the maid, 'Dawn Trodden' (oh, how appropriate) and my husband was playing the butler, 'Eamonn Etonion'. That gives a flavour of the calibre of the characterisation. Frilly apron and bowler hat at the ready, respectively, and three courses of food prepared the day before; we were ready to go. I had laid the table in the dining room early in the morning, and whilst we had perhaps not quite achieved the 'feel of Edwardian splendour' indicated in the murder mystery box of instructions, the scene was set.

But of course we hadn't factored in the little people. I picked Gilby and Gertie up from nursery on Friday afternoon as usual. Gertie had won a special prize for being a good helper and volunteering to buddy up with a new boy to help him settle in at pre-school, and the staff told me what a wonderful day Gilby had had, 'chatting' away to everyone with his baby-babble and general being very contented. Excellent. All going according to plan. I can work, have happy children and entertain. Go me.

On the way back we had to collect two of our guests from the train station: Auntie Bob (don't ask) and 1-year old cousin Milly. Uncle was arriving later on with Daddy, and all three were staying. Gertie had to give up her bedroom to allow this level of hospitality, but she did so with good grace and it was all turning into a happy adventure.

5pm. Now just to feed all three kids supper, get them into bed, and jump into ridiculous costume prior to the arrival of the other guests. Still going swimmingly.

It was at that point that Gilby decided to start vomiting, violently, in the fashion of a large hydrant gushing on free-flow. I got covered, and changed, three times. The kitchen floor took a battering. Auntie Bob was brilliant at entertaining the girls while I cleared up successive waves of sick. This, surely, was an unnecessarily realistic degree of preparation for the role of 'Dawn Trodden'?

Since I now had more than just carrot in my hair, a shower was required. I couldn't put Gilby down even for a second as he had gone all sort of floppy and pathetic as they do. He also wouldn't touch any food (understandably) but did want to suckle at the breast without taking very much milk. Brilliant. Torn between concern for my baby and the imminent arrival of five more guests, including the wealthy heiress 'Angeline Desguys', and the Russian-German-Jewish emigre, 'Esau Hytall', I didn't know what to do. Should we cancel? Call a doctor? Pour a large glass of wine? Laugh hysterically?

Well of course, then the door went. Toby O'Notoby and Ed Butte had arrived. Cancelling was now not an option. The phone rang almost simultaneously. Enid Ann Hallaby needed to know where to park her car as the driveway was full. The surgery was closing; no doctor until Monday morning. Large wine and laughter the only remaining options. We weren't a sinking ship yet. Threw some crisps in a bowl to keep the guests happy. Eventually got Gertie and Gilby to sleep. Rustled up a toffee sauce for the sticky toffee pudding. Hid wet hair behind frilly maid cap and got on with it. One moment scrubbing baby sick from the floor, the next dining amidst the great splendour of the Captain's quarters amidst one of the most fabulous ships ever built. Ish.

P.S. Gilby recovering well.