The Most Special Person

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Something that our 3yo (C) has been saying lately is that she wants to get married. Yes, I snorted with surprise the first time she said it. I think it’s coming from seeing my wedding dress in the wardrobe and having one of her day-care friends going to a wedding recently. But this is something I am not keen to have happen too soon. Obviously.

“You have to be a grown up to get married.”

– “But I AM a grown up girl.”

“You have to be 18 at least.”

– “I’m nearly 18!”

“Well, who do you think you’re going to marry, anyway?”

– “YOU!”

“But I’m already married to daddy. You and baby E are special, but daddy is the most special person in the whole world for me. You can only get married if you find the most special person in the whole world for YOU.”

I’ve been hearing me through her for a little while now, in her playtime and more recently how she talks to E. But because we’ve had this marriage conversation a few times, I wasn’t sure it had sunk in just yet.

Until a week ago. We had my brother over for a little visit, and something was mentioned about him getting engaged (VERY exciting). And in the middle of all the grown ups talking about weddings and how he proposed, C pipes up with “because she’s the most special person in the whole world for you?”

I teared up a little, knowing that yes, she has really heard this, and yes, my brother has found his most special person, and yes, I found my most special person. In the whole entire world. 

Glenn and I celebrate our 2nd wedding anniversary today. 2 years doesn’t sound like much. But 2 years also feels like an age, for all the right reasons. Mostly because I can’t imagine my life without him.

And we are building our most special life together.

What We Read This Week (We Love Mem Fox)

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There has been less of a precarious pile on the sofa this week. On Tuesday my sofa was turned into a fancy restaurant for Marcel (the frog) so there wasn’t really enough space… plus, Bedtime Stories has been the main pick.

E has continued to enjoy her books by chewing, but she has also (for a few weeks now) turned herself around to the books. No matter which way she is put down, or how close, she will turn herself around and reach for the books.

I love this.

Our favourites this week:

This & That (Mem Fox and Judy Horacek). I found this book a few months ago and recite it to E at least once every day. C loves (loves loves) the pictures.

Where is the Green Sheep (Mem Fox and Judy Horacek). C has taken to going through *every* sheep on the penultimate pages. 

Time For Bed (Mem Fox and Jane Dyer). An old favourite that I recited to C every night for nearly 2 years.

Oh Dear! (Rod Campbell). Lift the flap books are marginally less fraught now.

Bedtime Stories (Deb Gliori). Every. Single. One.

A Trip to the Hospital

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[Trigger Warning: baby trauma]

Last Thursday – RUOK Day – we were not ok for a large part of the day. We had to take our baby to the hospital, and not for the first time. [Spoiler alert: everything is fine.] There were many emotions.

I am so aware that, for some parents, a trip to the hospital is a regular thing. For some parents, a trip to the hospital doesn’t have a happy ending. And for some parents, they’ve never had to take a child to the hospital at all. 

What happened was nobody’s fault. It wasn’t from rough play, or neglect, or distraction. Bubs straightened her arm at the wrong time. We couldn’t tell what was wrong, just that something was wrong. Last time we were there, saying in our befuddled panic that we weren’t sure if we should have gone in, the triage nurse cut us off and said, always, ALWAYS when they are this little, just come in. So, not knowing quite what the problem was, we went in.

Thankfully, she was quiet on the way there. Thankfully, we were assured we had done the right thing by going in. Thankfully, we live where we live. The Children’s Hospital is not far away, and treatment is excellent and free. All it cost us was some time. Because she was calm (except when anyone looked at her), we had a bit of a wait. 

But in that time we became less and less worried. When we were eventually seen, the diagnosis was a pulled elbow. Very common in children under 5. Very easily fixed. A wiggle and a waggle and her arm was as good as new.

There was so much relief. What more could any parent want, really? She was fine. Her arm is fine. She will be able to grow up to play violin and dance and swim. We didn’t have to stay in the hospital, or even have an X-ray. And we were out of there in good time for the daycare pick up and treat night for dinner.

‘I picked a daisy on the way home for you, mummy, to make you feel all better’.

What We Read This Week (it’s never too early for Christmas stories)

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We love books. We have two story times during the day: before lunch nap; and after bath. The first is more baby-oriented, the second is for the 3-year-old. Baby story time happens in front of the bookshelf, so those choices always go straight back once they’ve been read. Older story time happens on the sofa and by the end of the week there will be a collection of books piling precariously on the sofa. 

Here are our favourites this week.

The Story of the Little Mole Who Knew It Was None of His Business (Werner Holzwarth and Wolf Erlbruch). Everyone loves a good poo story.

Santagram (Sophie Masson and Shiloh Gordon). Is it too early for Christmas stories? Too late? Who knows. Christmas stories are always an option here.

Where the Wild Things Are (Maurice Sendak). We love a good party.

There’s No Such Thing As Monsters (Steve Smallman and Caroline Pedler). This always elicits great squeals of laughter.

The Very Hungry Caterpillar (Eric Carle). We have a hard copy so yay for chewing, and the 3-year-old has started insisting on ‘reading’ it to us.

Bunny’s Egg Hunt (Shannon Hays). A board book, with pop-ups, and beautifully illustrated.

When We Baked Jamie’s Precious Pear Tart

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Glenn is very much the cook in our household. I enjoy it, and can cook stuff when required, but Glenn will find amazing recipes and flavour combinations and ingredients and cook us delicious food. It is one of the ways he shows his love for us. However, I am the sweets baker in the family. For Father’s Day, Glenn requested I make the Precious Pear Tart from Jamie Oliver’s new book, Together. Thankfully, I have more experience now at assessing how long a dish will actually take. Things like actual helpfulness of my helper, and baby nap successes, must be taken into account.

Friday. A large bag of Imperfect Pears were bought. My helper and I chose the best 12.

Saturday. I bought the extra ingredients in the morning… except for elderflower cordial, which was nowhere to be found in our local supermarket. Glenn assured me he would find it in the afternoon.

He did not. Due to Covid, there was no supply. Elderflower tonic water was bought instead.

Saturday night, after the girls were in bed, I managed to soak the pears in the syrup, reduce the syrup, and measure the dry ingredients into bowls, in between attending to baby wake-ups.

Sunday. During the lunch nap, my helper and I made the base. Later in the afternoon, we managed to make the filling, choose the best of the soaked pears, put them in the frangipane, sample another pear for, uh, quality control, and bake the pie.

By the time it was ready, it was far too late for a 3yo to have sugar. Glenn and I enjoyed some after dinner, and the 3yo was allowed to have some on Monday. Which really meant, she had her ice cream in a separate bowl and ate that first and had a meltdown when Glenn made her have a bite of tart with ice cream but recovered and licked the ice cream bowl and tried a bit of the tart, just a bit, and said she was really sharing it with me. I’m ok with that.

Good Thing She’s Adorable

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We are in THAT zone of baby sleep.

The ‘dropping a nap so is overtired so can’t sink into sleep so stays awake’ stage. The ‘practising new skills in the cot so stays awake’ stage. The ‘adjusting to solids and all that does to the insides so stays awake’ stage. The ‘new awareness of surroundings so needs to have someone there for any chance of going back to sleep’ stage.

We’ve had some shocking nights recently. ‘Good thing she’s adorable’ has been said more than once as we hear yowls and coos interspersed with frustrated acks at 4am when she’s been awake since 3am. And in those long hours of patting and ssshhhing and bobbing up and down I have been so aware of how much better I am handling it this time around. 

First Time Mum me – well. Tired and frustrated. Knowing all the reasons for the staying awake but in some ways that made it more frustrating. I KNOW you’re overtired because you refused to nap but if you would just nap when you’re meant to then we wouldn’t be in this position now, would we?! And then, more often than not, after hours of trying all sorts of ways to get her back to sleep, a burp or a fart would pop out and then, like magic, she would be asleep.

Second Time Mum me remembers these things. Why are you crying? Is it- oh. Nice burp! Theeere you go…. asleep. Second Time Mum me is far more understanding of the practising new skills stage. Maybe because I know it really is just a phase and, although it will feel like it is never-ending and I’ll never sleep again, there will be a morning that I wake up because I’m ready to wake up and not because I have to attend to a frustrated baby and she will be still asleep and on her tummy with a hand sticking through the cot rails. Second Time Mum me is better at staying calm knowing that nobody will fall asleep if there is a whiff of frustration in the air. And, to be really honest, Second Time Mum me tries to channel Chilli Heeler a whole lot more. In the ‘Sleepytime’ episode of Bluey (SUCH a gem) when Chilli says, Remember, I’ll always be here for you. 

And it makes this whole mothering thing so much easier. Yes, my back is suffering from leaning into a cot for hours. Yes, I am often so sleep-deprived I literally can’t stand or even sit straight. Yes, there is stuff I want to do (as well as sleep) while my girls sleep. But if I take care of the ‘being here for you’ side of things first, the other things are manageable. 

Where to Begin?

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Why now? 

Why, at all?

Well. There has been so much happen in the world and in our own little corner of the world recently. The Taliban has advanced through Afghanistan. Covid is raging in American schools and across the world and throughout parts of Australia (different scales, admittedly). Smaller tragedies that have hit home, hard.

Our baby can now sit, and started using the high chair, and flinging food across to our 3-year-old’s hair, and is teething furiously. Our 3-year-old is saying more and more expressions that we haven’t heard from her before, and painting the thunderstorms that kept her awake when she was 2, and getting better at matching sounds to letters, and building forts to sleep in at night.

And all of the stuff of our life will be lost, save for the photos we take, unless I make it more memorable with the actual writing of the words. Photos help, but don’t tell the full story. I can’t get a photo of the heaviness of a baby sleeping on my chest, or the feeling of soft skin and little fingers holding my hand, or the momentary flash of a smile as a face is upturned towards me. I can’t get a photo of the frustration when sleep is a battle, when food isn’t eaten, when no response is given, when their independence overtakes all reason. 

This is, therefore, partly to keep in my mind the wonderful things my children do, and how wondrous it is to be their parent, and just how fortunate we are to be where we are; to work through things for my own sake, to try to be a better parent; and to share the little things we do in our family that make up the stuff of our life.

So this is who we are. I’m Anna, wife of Glenn, mother of our two young girls. We love Star Wars and Minions and Bluey and Frozen and all things pink; baking and bubbles and food and creating.

Welcome.