Toothless

Why can’t we just be born with our teeth already in place? Sure, the breastfeeders might suffer but I’d have the backing of at least 50% of all parents and we’d all benefit somewhere down the line. I write this while perched outside J’s room, hoping that at some point he will stop howling and go to sleep. Downstairs T is rejecting her breakfast, having not eaten a decent meal for the best part of three days. It seems particularly cruel to have two children with an 18-month age gap who still contrive to be teething at exactly the same time – J’s first teeth arriving simultaneously with
T’s last. J’s problems seem to go a bit deeper than just teething, though

Back to work

Today is a must-blog day, marking as it does Rachel’s return to work after her second (and final, subject to accidents or unforeseen mind-changes) maternity leave. As the dust settles on this new world, we will see what it contains, but it certainly includes: an hour and a half of pre-work/play solo double childcare for me in the morning, three days a week; a rum old time for Rachel herself, who unlike me will never, or near enough, have a day without work or childcare, and a nanny called Marta who we can’t really afford – J needs to get a nursery place sharpish. We had a little shock this week when we discovered our current account had slipped (more a slump than a slip, if truth be told) into overdraft. We’ll have to spend more wisely and eat out less otherwise we’ll have to sell the kids and we wouldn’t want that.

(Kids, if it’s 2025 and you’re reading this, we never actually considered selling you)

Totally potty

A week and a half in, we’ve had our first accident-free day. There was a half-accident involving poo, but we’ll pass that by. We’ll pass that by because, in every other respect, T is amazing. She’s the coolest, greatest thing. She smiles a lot. She sometimes tells you off by putting on a stern face and wagging her finger in a way that can only be described as hilarious. She has started explaining everything she says, with a gloriously exaggerated “be-cause” (as in, “don’t tickle me, be-cause my tummy’s all full”, or “we’re going on a spaceship, be-cause we’re going on a spaceship”. Logic not required). And, when I put her to bed tonight, her last words to me were “Daddy I love you. Bye-bye. Goodnight.” And I couldn’t script a better sign-off myself.

J, meanwhile, is only happy when he’s standing up, which he can only do when an adult is there to assist him. He has also started talking. So far he says a-buh, boo and guh. And when he’s really happy he makes a really weird high-pitched squealing noise, the kind of sound that must make the neighbours think we’re torturing kestrels. I’m guessing what tortured kestrels sound like, by the way.

Wee rules

So after one week, we can look back at potty training, job done, and wonder what the big fuss was abou … oh hang on, we don’t live in GinaFordLand.

If you come to our house you might notice that the floorboards in the living room have an unusually bright shine to them at present. That is because they have spent the week being weed on, mopped, towelled and wiped. They’ve been buffed to a professional sheen. And they’ll probably be just as shiny a week from now.

For the last few days we’ve packed T off to nursery with five or six changes of clothes and she’s come back with all of them wet. On Thursday she even had to borrow another change of clothes from nursery.

She is terrified of wee and as for poo… She’s done one of those in the potty all week, the rest she’s saved up for when she’s wearing a nappy. When she needs a wee, she runs up and down and begs you for a cuddle. The trick is knowing when to stop cuddling and dump her on the potty smartish, otherwise you’re getting wet.

Today, we’re trying a new tactic. Bribery.

Update No1

Two hours, six wees, all on various bits of floor, and T is screaming and begging for a nappy.

Toilet time

For the last month or so there has been a dark and worrying cloud on the horizon. Potty training. It’s about time – J is seven months old now, so there’s no excu… Only kidding, it’s for T, who at 25 and a bit months is, we think, finally ready to step out of nappies.

… As I write, she’s just weed on her bedroom floor…

She has spent approximately 75% of the last three hours sitting on her potty, and 1% in a different room to me, and she weed during that 1%. Not a great start.

It’s all set up to be a horrific weekend. Well, it is Halloween.

It wasn’t just Mary who was quite contrary

So the other day, T and J had contrasting lunchtime naps – T had a long one, J had a short one, meaning that by the time T woke up J was on his way back to bed. T then had to knock about the house while J had his second nap. So when they were all up, we scooted off to Highate to give them dinner out – anything to get out of the house, at that point. We went to Strada, where their £4.50 children’s meal offers a drink, a main and a pud. We also got a tricolore salad to go with it. This was cordon bleu toddler dining.

So of course she got bored immediately, demanded to climb off her chair, ran around the restaurant for a while and then wanted to go outside. She had a little bit of pizza, quite a lot of tomato and basically nothing else, didn’t even hang around for pudding and then, after running around outside for a while, came home and said she was hungry. She ate toast for dinner.

Tonight, she didn’t want to have a bath. Eventually I wrestled her in and held her down, wailing, while I gave her a quick wash with a wet flannel. All the while she was sobbing and demanding to be allowed out, so at that point I give up and gather her up and into a towel. At which point, she asks to go into the bath.

Manipulative, wilful, contrary little fox. And I haven’t even told you about the psycho face…

Modern Art

At Tate Modern with Rachel and J. He is creating his own art installation in the cafe

Vertigo

At the weekend, we went to Willows Farm with Abi, Rob & Jacky, Matt & Emma and Gidon, together with all their respective sproglets. It was cold, which meant that all the outdoor fun stuff was basically empty. Cold is good. If a bit chilly.

At one point I went to change T’s nappy, using one of those wall-mounted changing tables. I strapped her in and got to work, but T suddenly started screaming. Not annoying brattish not-getting-my-own-way screaming, but genuinely terrified screaming. “Too high!” She wailed.

Ever since, she has refused to go down our stairs. I wonder if that nappy table and I have left her scarred for life.

A day to remember

So here’s a photo of J. Not a very good one, because I took it with my phone about two minutes ago in unhelpful light, but enough to mark the occasion of his fourth successive through-the-night sleep. God, is that a relief. It also shows him standing up, all by himself. He needs someone to get him up to standing of course, and then something to lean on, but then he’s fine for literally seconds at a time. You know when he’s had enough, because he bangs his head loudly on whatever he’s leaning on then collapses to the floor and starts crying.