Don't let me put you off

Not so long ago, a childless friend remarked to me "you know, if I didn't know better, your blog would really put me off having kids".  "Yeah, I know" I responded quickly.  "But there's nothing interesting or funny about blathering on about how moonily in love you are with your newborn, or his latest achievements.  And plus there's like a tonne of those blogs on the internet already."

So, just to even things up a bit, this blog post is me blathering on about how moonily in love I am with my toddler.  In small doses.  Like just evenings and weekends.  But whatever, that suits us both.

If you asked me to name the best thing about having a child, I would say it's the ability to experience your baby-days and childhood all over again, with the wisdom and knowledge that you've gained from having been there, done that.  Something as simple as the texture of the leather on the couch has a whole new fascination when you're a baby, nothing is more delightful than the feel of running your hand through a hedge as you walk past it, and water... now that's a whole other cup of tea.

At the moment we're all about language development.  We're working on two word sentences, the best one of which has been "yellow bus".  Milkbaby knows what a bus is, but the concept of 'yellow' is proving tricky. I had a the following conversation with him tonight:

"Okay, hold onto your car" (I'm changing his nappy)
"Car"
"That's right, car. What colour is your car?"
"Yellow bus"
"Well, it's more of a red car really"
"Yellow bus"
"Red car?"
"Yellow bus."
"Okay, sure, whatever."
[There's a pause]
"Car?"
"That's right, red car" (I'm like, wahoo, he's getting it!)
"Yellow bus."
"mm hmm" (I give up.)

Yellow bus? Red car? Who cares?

What's your favourite thing about parenthood?

I hate weekends

As I walk through the Creche gate on Friday afternoons, my mind turns to the 48 hours looming ahead of me. Usually I'm looking forward to some quality time with Milkbaby.  Though often that pleasant thought is accompanied by a small ironic voice that says "Ha, 48 hours straight with your kid... how will you cope?  Will you even remember what to do?".

I'm usually a bit of a planner.  I keep numerous To Do lists.  In the time Before Child (BC), I saw weekends as potential time for getting stuff done.  I mean real stuff.  Like entire house renovations.  And having a bit of a sleep in.  Only till 8.30am at the latest though - any later and that would interfere with getting stuff done.

Now, not only is it nigh-on impossible to get anything but a few small jobs done, but any kind of sleep-in is a far-distant memory.  And since it's been a week since I last tried to get my little monkey down for a nap, today I seemed to have lost the knack.  I gave up, leaving him yelling angrily in his cot, shut his door, and got back into bed, quickly pulling the covers over my head to drown out the screaming.

Luckily, the DH, wondering what all the noise was, came to investigate.  After getting Milkbaby off to la-la land, he came into our room.

"what's up?" he said
"I hate weekends" I mumbled from under the duvet
"really?  you'd prefer to be at work?"
"yes... I wish creche was open on the weekend...  I feel like I've forgotten what to do... And I've got so much to do I don't know where to start..."
"you're obviously a bit tired.  Just try and get some sleep while Milkbaby is sleeping."
"mmm nhmm... [snoring]

24 hours down, 24 hours to go.  Maybe I'll remember how to get him to sleep tomorrow.