My Guilty Pleasure

There are too many good topics to choose from this week from Josie's writing workshop at Sleep is For the Weak...but this is just a quick one. And it's a little bit pathetic and I can't believe that I am about to reveal it publicly.


My guilty pleasure. I'm not a soap addict, cannot bear reality TV, am driven mad by most day-time telly and dislike the television being on just for the sake of it.


BUT ssshhh, don't tell my husband: For the last couple of weeks, at 2pm I have been tuned into ITV3 for The Darling Buds of May re-runs. I have tried to analyse this. What is the appeal of a television series that was first broadcast in 1991? Am I aspiring to be Ma Larkin, continually producing children and simultaneously baking? I very much doubt it. I don't know what it is other than perhaps wanting to grab hold of a piece of the warmth from that fictitious household. But it certainly adds a glow to a dreary afternoon and has become my guilty secret.


I do try and ensure it coincides with a long feed for Gilby so that I can justify sitting in front of the television for this length during the day, but really, I am starting to worry about myself!

What Spacial Awareness?

Oh the shame. To have to call my husband to the rescue like some pathetic damsel in distress, sobbing and snivelling in my own driveway.

Let me explain a little. My husband loves cars and works in the trade. I, on the other hand, don't really 'get' them. Beyond details like a decent stereo and being a nice colour, I couldn't really care less, as long as they get me where I want to go. They all look the same to me. I could probably tell a Mini from a Porsche, on a good day if pushed. So a car is just a car. But with the arrival of Gilby back in July, and now having to have two car seats as well as all the other accompanying 'stuff' (potty, pram, changing bag, etc.), things had got a little bit squashed in our old, er, 'silver' car.

So a few weeks ago, my husband brought home a seven-seater thing that looks a bit like a small bus and has these amazing slidy doors, so you can get children in and out however tight the parking space. I had a stronger positive reaction to it than I normally do to a vehicle, so Daddy took this as a good sign and promptly bought us this, er, 'green' one. It had one damaged panel from the previous owners and so he took it straight to the paint-shop and got it all straightened out.

Trouble is, it's a wee bit bigger than the last one. The same afternoon that he brought it back all perfectly repaired, I managed to scrape exactly the same panel on our gatepost. He was...a little bit cross. But we got over it with a little laugh and some jokes at my expense about poor spatial awareness.

On Friday morning our neighbours were parked in such a way that when I tried to turn the car round there was even less room than usual. I embarked upon something approximating a 57-point turn and somehow I got stuck, quite literally, on the gate post. I had cunningly managed to manoeuvre myself into a position whereby I couldn't move forwards or backwards without scraping the side and causing untold damage. I don't know how I managed to do this. Neither did my husband, when he arrived home from work in the middle of the day, at my blubbering behest to get me out of this predicament.

At least it was a different panel this time.

Things I'll Never Do Again

You know before it happens that parenting will involve sacrifices - financially, emotionally, physically. Things that I once took for granted like going to the pub, or spending one day of the weekend in my dressing grown watching entire box sets of television series: These I knew would be a thing of the past. But there are some other by-products of becoming a mum: strange things that I didn't anticipate being affected, but that I am now fairly convinced I will never try again.

Pre-motherhood I was happy to try most things: sky-diving, bungy-jumping, white-water-rafting, river-boarding; you named it, I would have given it a go.

Now with two very small people that I am responsible for, I have suddenly lost my derring-do. It no longer seems appealing to throw myself from a perfectly sound structure for the sake of bouncing up and down on the end of a large bungy cord. I was a keen recreational diver before Gertie and Gilby came along, and though we have been diving once since Gertie's arrival, I was a lot more cautious and risk aware than I ever was before.

So here, for the record, are some of the other lost activities:

1. Roller coaster rides (I know they're perfectly safe, just no longer have any desire to do it).


2. Taking my regulator out of my mouth for a photograph whilst scuba-diving (see photo).


3. Diving from the top board at a swimming pool (as if).


4. Rock-climbing (really used to enjoy this but ropes now look way too flimsy).


5. Running for a bus (just a practical impossibility this one, with prams, bags, small people, etc.)

Thing is, I don't miss them - just wonder if that courage is temporarily displaced or gone forever!

Blue Shoes

I am delighted to be responding to Josie's Writing Workshop prompts this week at Sleep is For the Weak, because here is someone inviting me to talk about shoes: A dangerous topic, since, like most women, I have a long and complex relationship with my footwear. The challenge is to identify shoes which somehow reflect your personality. I wonder how a pair of shoes that you choose to wear could not reveal something of you in someway...

These objets d'art are my current favourites.

Bright blue and always commented upon.

Saved for special occasions like Gilby's baptism and some summer weddings. But only with the dress that you can just about see in the picture that has the same electric blue tones.

So what exactly do they say about me? Poised, sophisticated, impossibly glamorous, a little bit showy but not afraid to make a statement, perhaps? I wish.

In fact what they say is 'bought really cheaply at TK Maxx, pretending to be something they're not, and the straps at the back need to be continually hoisted up when no one is looking.'

Just about sums it all up really.

I thank you.

What's in Santa's Sack?

This morning I asked my two and a half year old daughter what she would like Father Christmas to bring her. She thought for a moment and then (and this made my heart hurt) said that she would like him to come down the chimney with some nappies for Gilby (her four month old baby brother).

I know that times are hard in the current economic climate, but really!

Early Political Stance

It appears that, despite the government's recent controversial advertising campaign targeting children in the fight against global warming, I have failed to breed the next generation of eco-warrior!

The weekend saw us make our fortnightly trip to the local amenity tip to clear our accumulated recycling materials. The local council are good enough to collect cans and plastics one week and newspapers and magazines the following week, but in spite of my best efforts our household seems to produce much more than this, necessitating the extra trip. (Incidentally, they don't collect glass and we do seem to have the odd wine bottle to dispose of too.)

Anyway, what this means is that Gertie is familiar with the excursion and its associated boredom. She has to wait in the car since she can't reach to help while Mummy and Daddy feed the recycling bins. Her frustration is increased by the fact that we are usually on our way to somewhere far more interesting, so the tip becomes a symbol of her delayed pleasure. (I am building all this as an excuse to justify her reaction that I will share with you in a moment...)

This week's trip coincided with a sudden escalation in the frequency of the 'why' questions. The conversation went something like this:

"Why are we going to the tip?"
"Because we need to do the recycling."
"Why do we need to do the re-skykling?"
"So that some of the things we use can be turned into other things."
"Why do they need to be turned into ummer things?"
"Um, so that we can...save the environment."
Short pause.
"Mummy, I don't want to save the enviro-men!"

I am desperately hoping that what she actually meant was that she would rather be elsewhere at that particular moment...

Weighty Issues

Earlier this week I had to visit the health visitor and the vet within the space of an hour. Both appointments followed a remarkably similar pattern and included my baby and the cat (Iggy) being weighed. Both, it seems, are doing fine.

So Gilbert is a healthy baby boy, hovering around the '75th percentile' and staying nicely on his curve. This apparently means that although he is above average weight we don't need to worry about anything. He is 16 weeks old now, and the contrast between this and his sister could not be marked.

She was born nearly two and a half pounds lighter, nearly two and a half years ago. The pregnancies were very similar (though I was much sicker second time around) and I put on approximately the same amount of weight during each. I have breastfed both, introducing a single bottle of formula at around the 14 week mark.

But first time round the health professionals would not leave me alone. Gertie remained on the '4th percentile' and they insisted that she was weighed weekly. I was constantly made to feel inadequate for the slow rate at which she gained her weight, and felt incredible pressure to stop breast-feeding in order to ensure that she got all that she needed.

In fact I did not do this but carried on feeding her myself until she was nearly 16 months, although I worried about her continuously for the first six months until she was also taking on some solids.

She remains around average height, but slightly below average weight, so a slim build. She has been very healthy during her short life so far, and I know that by the time she is in her teens she will thank me for her slender frame, and that all the anxiety will have been needless.

I have done nothing differently for the new baby: my diet is the same as it always was, he feeds a similar amount. And yet I am praised for his 'bonny' development. I have done nothing, as far as I can see, to influence this. And so it makes me a little bit cross. I have come to the conclusion that babies are just the size they are, and a new mum should not be made to feel terrible (and certainly not consider giving up breast-feeding) because they don't conform to a silly chart.

And the irony of the whole story really lies with the cat, I think: the vet was delighted with her condition and her weight.

"You're obviously doing a wonderful job of looking after her. She's in a tip-top state for her age."

Hmm. Right. I didn't bother to explain that Iggy rarely puts in an appearance at home during the summer; Though her food and water bowls go down and get refilled with regularity, her ladyship is entirely elusive. We occasionally catch the odd glimpse and are lucky if we manage to find her to flea her. I have no idea where she sleeps between April and October. But as soon as the weather turns cold and wet she plants herself in front of the fire and doesn't move from our hearth until March.

So she has only been back being 'looked after' for about a fortnight. Lucky, really, that we're doing such a good job...