The F-Word

My very sweet, intelligent, beautiful (innocent) five year old seems to have turned into a stroppy teenager in the space of a few short days.

Monosyllabic responses to the simplest of requests and questions, a form of amnesia directly related to saying please and thank you, and a pout that makes Angelina Jolie look a bit tight-lipped.

But she came home from school the other day with a question:  "Mummy, what's the F-word?"  When I declined to explain, she complained that people had been talking about how naughty it is and how you shouldn't say it, but she felt silly because she didn't know what it was.

I said that I agreed with the people who said it was naughty and that you shouldn't say it (whilst metaphorically mouthing it to myself as I was undoing her plaits).

Then she asked if she could guess what it was.  I had no idea what was coming next, and took a big gulp.

"Is it....fire?" she asked.

Perhaps my sweet, innocent, beautiful little girl is still hiding in there, after all.

Talking Turkey

Now that summer's finally here, Gertie and Gilby went to Fishers Farm at the weekend.  Much fun was had by all until they were waiting in the queue for the pony rides.  A large and unexpectedly free range turkey approached them with a waddle that might be described as 'aggressive'.  When you are just three years old and of a similar height to a fair-sized and threateningly-approaching turkey, they can look pretty fearsome.  With round, wide eyes, Gilby grabbed hold of his sister's hand and asked in a tiny voice if turkeys ate people.

Big sister, with all the experience and authority of her nearly-six-years, considered his question carefully.  "No, Gilby," she said, after a moment.  "People eat turkeys."

Words of Wisdom

Sigh.  The things they say.

I was a little disconcerted earlier yesterday morning, when Naga Munchetty was presenting the news, to hear Gilby turn to his older sister and giggle, 'Look how brown she is!' 

Tempted to view this as a product of Gilby's provinical upbringing, which it undoubtedly is, I also hope that his is a healthy three-year-old curiosity about difference.

Less than an hour later, Gertie was lamenting the loss of limb on a broken doll.  'But it's ok,' she consoled herself, 'she could compete in the Paralympics!' 

So we are ok on disability, if not on race.

But when Gilby rushed to show me the model he had created from old toilet rolls, boxes and a bit of paint with an excited, 'Look Mummy, I've made a space rocket!' I made the mistake of answering with a question: 'That's wonderful; are you going to fly to the moon in it?'

He looked at me with a slightly concerned expression on his face and explained, quite patiently, that flying to the moon wouldn't be possible because, 'it's only made out of cardboard.'

Which taught me not to patronise my children. 

World According to Gilby: The Little People

Gilby has very definite ideas about the way the world works.  His logic is unquestionable, with that cock-sure confidence and arms-outstretched earnestness only a three-year-old can pull off.

This morning, he patiently explains to me how his toy microphone works.

'So you see, Mummy, you just sing in to it, like this...and the little people inside join in with you to make it louder.'

I can't really criticise, since I remember as a child knowing, with absolute certainty, that the television only operated when the little people inside were awake.

If only these little people weren't confined inside their little gadgets.  There are plenty of other things I could get them to do around the house...

Call it a Duck

Eddie's been...less keen...than either Gertie or Gilby to walk and talk.  The walking is down to his hyper-mobility and we'll get there in the end with the help of the physio and ingenious playing that involves having to get on his feet to reach stuff.  But with his speech there's mostly a lot of Bill and Ben going on:  Babbly conversations of nothing much in particular that have the intonation and variation of real dialogue.  But he does now have his first ten words, representative of the importance of things in his world:

Dog
Duck
Daddy
Banana
Car
Look
Mummy
That
Sock
Shark

Yes, I'm a bit bemused by that last one.  'Shark' is usually said in the bath, accompanied by a scary sort of a roar. What's going on in that little head, I'm not entirely sure.


But, though the list looks varied, most thing are 'ducks'.  In fact, 'if in doubt, call it a duck', seems to be his maxim. This applies to most animals (that aren't dogs or sharks) including our chickens in the garden abd the cat. And when we are out and about there are ducks that moo and ducks that say 'baa', apparently. It's one of the most common species in the animal kingdom, the duck.

But frankly, with two older and more communicative siblings, usually pointing and a cry of anguish gets what he wants.  Who needs words?  It was fine for Bill and Ben.  Though come to think of it, even those flower pots could walk...

Baggy Trousers

The world's 'most prolific' streaker, Mark Roberts, with 519 streaks under his...er, well not his belt, I suppose...retired last month, much to the reported relief of his children.

This is lucky in that it leaves a gap in the market for my son.  Still four months away from his fourth birthday, he is showing early signs of a vocation.  In truth, he finds any excuse to drop his trousers.  In public is best, preferably a restaurant, or somewhere equally embarassing (for his mother);  since he appears to feel no embarrassment whatsoever, but gains some kind of genuine pleasure from this exhibitionism.  And people laugh.  Which he loves. 

He usually claims that his trousers are too big.  I have resorted to adjusting every pair to the tightest setting, so that he has to breathe in to get them done up in the morning.  Nevertheless, at some point during the day, they will be round his ankles, and he'll have a mischievous look on his face, arms outstretched to absolve himself from blame. (Yes, a little bit like Mark Roberts in the picture...)

It's been going on for a couple of years.  Ever since his release from the imprisonment of nappies, I suppose, and the freedom of potty training with its inbuilt excuse to whip his pants off without prompting. His audiences are confined to Pizza Hut and the local pub at the moment, but when he makes a name for himself at Wimbledon, or Wembley, in a few years time, you heard it here first. 

It's A Shoe-On

We don't get out much. 

Even less, since the night time shenanigans began in earnest for Gilby in the run up to Christmas.  Nine weeks of interrupted sleep seems a lifetime, and I wouldn't want to inflict one of those tortured evenings on an unsuspecting baby-sitter.  But given that we have Lady Visa, our au pair, we thought we'd try it last night.  Just round to friends' for supper; a few streets away.  Easy to return if things kicked off back at home. We took the unusual precaution of pre-ordering a taxi, on the off-chance that one or two glasses of alcohol might be consumed.

We returned, relaxed(!) and refreshed at about quarter past eleven (phew - late night!) to find Gilby crying his eyes out, one shoe on, sitting by the back door trying desperately to pull the other shoe on.  Ouch.  That is the combined pain of my heart hurting, and the piercing stab of guilt. 

He was incoherent, but I'm assuming he must have wandered into our bedroom, realised that we weren't there, and, without checking Lady Visa, decided that he had been abandoned.His three year old mind had then hatched a wild plan to head out into the dark night to come and find us.  We live on a main road in the middle of nowhere.  Fast cars and no people!

Once we had calmed him down, he whispered in my ear that he was 'sorry for being naughty and for putting my shoes on, actually...'.  Ouch, ouch, ouch!

Sigh.  So there's guilt and there's...guilt.  It will be a while until we try to go out again, methinks.