Masterchef Monster

So, I am away for one Saturday afternoon. One single lunchtime. Hearth-father makes lunch, and what do you know? Everyone's eating vegetables.

Because he was on Masterchef once, briefly, five years ago, he thinks he can just waltz in and do this:

And he did a 'grand piano' for Gertie because she didn't want monster burgers like her brothers.

I officially throw in the apron.



Currently reading:

Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates

More Hair-Raising Adventures

Not to be outdone by the dramas of his big sister, the youngest member of the clan has also had a hair-raising start to the new year:

Those in the know suggest that this replicates his father's style choice aged 16...



Currently reading:

The Miniaturist by Jessie Burton

Dr Who In All's Well That Ends Well

It is day three of the new year and I am clinging to an Austrian mountainside, screaming into icy winds as a helicopter lands to airlift my daughter to hospital.

It was the final day of our holiday. We had been visiting friends in Austria and had decided to do a last ski-run together as a family (while Eddie waited at the bottom with his grandfather). We picked the easiest run on the mountain.  Taking the chairlift was an adventure for Gilby and he did bring it to a standstill trying to get on, but it was a glorious morning.

Gilby was slow, doing lots of snow-ploughing and crashing into his mother; and Gertie, scornful and seven-years' confident, went on ahead with her uncle.

A few minutes later we came across a crumpled heap on the mountain side. I thought she was winded until it transpired that she couldn't lift her head or straighten her back and complained that her feet were numb.  It was a fairly innocuous fall by all accounts but it looked as though it might have tragic consequences. The piste ambulance arrived, took one look, and refused to move her, radioing immediately for a helicopter.

They sedated her on the mountain. The last thing she said was 'Mummy, please don't let them take me to hospital'.

I have no doubt that the the view across the mountains by helicopter was dramatic and beautiful but I really didn't see any of it as I was so focused on Gertie who was unconscious.  There are no pictures because for once in my life I didn't think to take any. There were horrible scenes in the emergency room as she began to come to.  She kept asking if it was all 'real', and the memory loss meant that I had to explain over and over again what had happened to her.  She screamed each time she realised anew that she was in hospital.

The wonderful Dr Florian was patient and kind and had excellent English.  Gertie could never remember his name all the time we were there.  But his superb language skills lacked a tiny little something in bedside manner.

He would wave a giant needle around and say things like 'Vill you please tell your daughter that I must just now stab her qvickly for the bloods?' or flex his fingers before announcing, 'She vill feel extreme pain just now as I tvist her bone...'

I watched her for ten hours in intensive care before we knew that everything was really going to be ok. The point at which she leapt from the wheelchair and did a little jig was a bit of a giveaway, as was asking whether she was allowed to wear eye-shadow.

We were delayed leaving Austria by about 30 hours in the end and I had to miss a day of school. It's an extreme way to get additional time off work (as indeed my headteacher pointed out.)

I try not to court drama. I am thankful that my life generally goes along on an even keel. There are highs and lows and 2014 was a good year: healthy, happy children and a warm hearth.  There were some biggies, like my graduation ceremony - ten years in the making - no small cause for celebration;

Gertie's Irish Dancing Championship, a life-changing trip to teach in Uganda;

 my fulfilling of a twenty-year ambition to go to the Hay Festival, as well as finally getting Hearth-Father to the Isle of Wight Festival in June; and, of course, Arsenal won the FA Cup.

These highs were clouded by the sad and sudden loss of 'Pomp' in October.

But 2015 has begun with a bang. Gertie is absolutely fine, and will be back dancing in a couple of weeks' time. My mental scars will take a little longer to heal! Here's to a less dramatic start to the rest of the year.



Currently reading: Talking It Over by Julian Barnes

Beware Ticker Foot

As blog readers may know we had a few problems with Eddie's growth and development from birth, but were finally given the all clear just over a year ago - and were mightily relieved when he began to walk just shy of his second birthday.  So I was a little worried this week when he announced emphatically that he had 'Ticker Foot'.

I racked my brain. What was this strange affliction? I asked myself.  Might it be infectious?  (Gertie is prone to Athlete's Foot at times.)  Eddie was insistent, hopping about from one foot to the other, yelling.

"Let me have a look," I said, gravely.

At which point he ran to get it.  Apparently it comes with a badge when you go up a level in swimming.

He has also asked for 'Orkshire Puddings' this weekend.  I believe they are a particular delicacy in Middle Earth.

Currently Reading: Skios by Michael Frayn

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

Things That Go Bang In The Night

No blog post in over a month!  Must try harder.

Bonfire night means that fireworks are out in full force.  I'm a big fan of them: I wanted them at my 40th birthday party that never was.  Perhaps I'll get them for my 50th. They are stunning, frivolous and fully deserving of the oohs and aahs they provoke.  Dark history aside they are reminders of childhood and symbols of celebration.

So I found it quite distressing when child after child of mine didn't like them.  Successively they screamed and shouted and crumbled in fear.  We kept trying.  Each year we have attended a number of displays, and taken it in turns to leap for safety.  Hearth-father spent last year's display cuddling tear-streaked cowerers in the cricket changing room at the local sports ground. (My turn to enjoy the rockets and Catherine wheels and bangers.)

Ear defenders, bribery and bullying have all failed in the past, but we persevere nevertheless.

And this year we accidentally hit on the magic formula to make it all work.

We separated them.

Gertie was with a school friend, and accidentally Hearth-father and I got split up in the crowd so that we had one each.  They were transfixed!

Fear is contagious, so this separation, coupled with the peer group pressure that Gertie must have experienced, finally made for a tear-free Guy Fawkes' night.  Hooray!

Smiles all round. Or perhaps they just grew up while we weren't looking.



Currently reading: The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton

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