Potty straining

'Wee! Wee!' Miss A shouted as she struggled to take her freshly fastened nappy off.

'Nooooooo!' I whined in hope my pitiful face might change her mind.

Miss A had decided it was time to toilet train. Which would be great if you weren't 'toilettrainingaphobic' after your last child went through it!!! Yes I did just coin the term toilettrainingaphobic, there's no other way to describe it. Thinking of taking another child out in public, nappy free, after miss M and the debarkles that came with her milestone, makes me want to spoon my eyeballs out onto a plate and eat them!! (Yeah sorry, a bit gross but you get my point!). So here we sit in a Mexican standoff where I put the nappies on and Miss A pulls them off again wanting to do 'wee'.

Miss M was about 19 months old when she showed her first signs of wanting to toilet train. It was exciting given that miss H had been a dream to toilet train and there had also been 8 and a half years between children so I couldn't claim to be sick of it by any means!! The only problem was that miss A was due to be born in less than a month and the idea of toilet training and having a new born did not sound like it would work out well! So I did what anyone clinging to her sanity would do and held her off. I kept putting nappies on her and resisted the urge to buy a potty. This would have to wait.

Once Miss M was a bit older it was time. Initially things went like a dream. We bought a potty and she took to it like a duck to water. Wee's initially and then poos soon to follow. She was that quick at picking it up that's she soon followed on to having dry nappies at night so in disbelief, I got rid of them too! So here I was with a 2 year old completely day AND  night trained and pretty damn proud of myself. Now those of you who know of Miss M and her antics you will know that she is the 'challenging' child so in hind sight I should have known that it was the calm before the storm. 

After about one month of smooth sailing the novelty wore off. Miss M was well and truly over toilet training. She started having 'accidents' more frequently and appeared quite triumphant when it happened. She would sneak off into a corner and wee and then come in smirking at me showing me the wet patch on her pants. 'Ok.' I thought 'I've heard of this happening, ill just have to take a step back' so I went back to reoffering the toilet. Unfortuntunately, the answer was ALWAYS 'no!'. It didn't matter if she was dancing the Irish jig in the corner if I said 'do you need to do wee?' She would always say no and then a few minutes later would pee in her pants! As frustrating as this was we persevered and instead of getting better, things got worse!! Miss M went back to night time wetting four out of five nights a week and me, while I became a sobbing mess in a pile of piddly washing. This went on for about a month and as much as people say 'stick with it', I chose my sanity and I put miss M back in night nappies so we could focus on the daytime again. 

It was then that the worst part happened, miss M became a sneaky pooer. She would sneak off into the corner and reappear with a smirk. When asked what she was doing he would then turn around facing away from me showing the obvious 'finger like' projection showing in the rear if her pants. It's was awful!!! It didn't matter how much I caught her 'popping' and then made her sit on the toilet, she would then manage to keep the lid on it until after she got off the loo and after I had let my guard down. With the accidents came the funny stories like miss M letting us know that she had 'shit eberywhere' in her pants. Or the time that it rolled out th cuff of her pants. But most of it was stress, anguish and frustration.

What did we do you ask? I read all the google search literature i could, i asked other people, i cried, a screamed but in the end we went with what instinct told us. Miss M was our child and if anyone was going to work her out, it was us, not google. We started from scratch. We pretended like miss M knew nothing about toilet training and started from scratch. I must admit to using food as a reward initially (which I don't really like to do) but desperate times call for desperate measures. And I was DESPERATE! I felt like I couldn't go anywhere. She was pooing herself on a daily basis and was proud as punch about it too! We started with some small jube lollies saying she could have one each time she did wee on the toilet. This then progressed to each time she pooed on the toilet. It then became an ink stamp on the hand each time. This then progressed to a stamp on the calendar for each accident free day and a surprise after the week was accident free, eventually phasing out the rewards and replacing it with 'good job! You're a big girl now!'. Looking back it was so stressful and exhausting and in hindsight it was partly attention seeking behaviour mixed in with a bit of miss M being miss M and not doing anything on command unless it suited her.

So now here we are with toilettrainophobia and an obviously 'keen to progress' almost two year old and a terrible case of déjà vu. I am being lead by miss A at this point but I am certainly not biting the bullet just yet. She is getting a potty time elmo for her 2nd birthday so that should keep her happy for a while but I'm not rushing her and I'm not being rushed. Over the need to jump to the next milestone, I choose life and mental stability!!!

Dodging the duster

I don't know about you, but I will do anything to avoid cleaning. Social media and increased accessibility to the net has only made me worse. Things like cleaning the oven and washing the windows are now in the 'pffffft' jobs category.... Meaning that is someone asks me how often I clean my oven I make that sound 'pppppffftttt!!!!'. I'm still trying to work out whether this is a good or a bad thing. Yes, I may not be in the running for housewife of the year amongst the Martha Stewart types, but I am spending more time doing things that I want to do! I have let go of the stress of having to make sure that the windows are washed to a squeaky clean shine each week. The bathroom gets done when I can be bothered and the toilet gets done when it needs to be (ie. when you look at it thought the eyes of a visitor and wonder what people might be saying about you!!)

The other day I had the perfect opportunity to finally catch up on some housework and I had to actually set myself a Facebook ban!! I turned my phone to 'do not disturb' to stop all my notifications popping up and got to it. I felt so much better when it was finished but it really made me reflect on why it takes me Sooooooo long to get the housework done on other days. 

I am a fairly distractable person. If a bird flies by while I'm doing the dishes I am likely to wash the clean stuff and dry the dirty stuff whilst thinking about where it might be flying to. When it comes to cleaning, I am worse!!! Firstly I will start at the bedroom end of the house which is more successful because I don't have as many distractions. This however kills me because I can't stand being away from everyone else so I always find a way of sneaking back up to the main living area whether it be to check the television, check my phone, or take some washing into the laundry. Once the bedroom end of the house is done the trouble starts. The television noises draw me into the lounge room and I find myself almost tip toeing past myself to get to it to see what is on the latest talk show. I find I will sit down, start watching and then before I know it I am making promises to myself to 'get back to it next ad'. Next ad I am off again only to find that the kids have found the three only clean rooms in the house and have become excited at the prospect of clear floors and have therefore covered the floor with toys again.

The next attempt I have will be a quick clean up of the rooms I have already done and then moving onto the next room. My phone normally lingers about here so I have a tendency at this point to sneak a peek at the screen. If there are any notifications on Facebook I MUST check them and then while I'm there wrote a status about the fact that I am avoiding housework/ hate housework or something of that calibre. The problem from here is that I have then committed to a status and every buzz of the phone , despite being elbow deep in dish water, warrants a response or at least a like.

The next thing that happens will be the children. By this time they will have either been playing quietly (which is never a good thing in my house) or they will be hanging off my legs whilst fighting over who gets to push the vacuum cleaner. If I had have avoided distraction the cleaning would be done and I would be playing with the girls by now, but alas, now not only do I still have half a house to clean I have two children under the age of four who are bored, ratty and fighting. I generally forge on briefly before succumbing to miss A who by this time is usually hanging from my leg screaming 'up peeeeeeeaaaasssss!!!'. I then end up again sitting on the couch with miss A on my knee watching pepper pig or something to that effect.

With phone in hand and TV on, I become entranced in the peace that suddenly surrounds me and I forget that miss M is still at large. After looking at the clock and terrifyingly realising that miss M has now been at large for over 15 minutes I put down a disgusted miss A to run up the other end of the house only to find miss M spraying leave in conditioner all over her bed. Back at square one again and now having a bed to strip and wash, I give up.....

Lesson learned. Distraction doesn't pay when balancing preschool children and housework. My Facebook ban on days off will exist on a permanent basis until the girls go down for their midday sleep. I'm going to make a concious effort to cut my distractions but cutting back my Facebook/ phone time. Lets see how this goes.... 

The bedtime boomerang

I sighed as I clicked post on my Facebook post boasting about the fact I was about to sit and drink a cup of tea in peace for the first time in go only knows how long. Its funny how a warm cup of tea and peace and quiet can give you that warm fuzzy feeling. I sighed and felt my body relax.
'muuuuum' Miss M whined as she quietly tiptoed up the hallway. That relaxed feeling that so nicely had invaded my body, left with a snap. I felt my body tense and resisted the urge to scream 'WHAT?!?'
Miss M is the one in the house that DOES NOT do bedtime. In fact her latest thing she loves to say at sleep time is 'I don't go to sleep anymore'. I think the child actually believes that she doesn't sleep! So as you can imagine, before this we have already been through the 'I'm not tired', 'I need another cuddle', 'I want to read a book', 'Im still hungry', 'I want to finish my tea', 'I need a drink', 'I want a different teddy', 'I want the passage light on'... and so on and so forth.
'I need to go to the toilet again' she said quietly, looking at me through her eyebrows, knowing that she had ben pushing her luck. She had already gone to the toilet once prior to bed however given that we have had a few wet beds of late it wasn't worth calling her on it!
'Quick, off you go then' I said and went about stirring my tea trying not to look her in the eye for fear of seeing her smug expression as she sauntered off to the toilet. She made an excursion of it of course, and examined the door frame, sang a bit of a ditty, played with the toilet paper and then eventually pulled down her pants to sit down. After about five minutes she wandered in again.
'I'm thirsty' she whined.
'no more to drink!' I said. knowing that she had not long had a drink, and that I was already drowning in washing from the previous weeks wet beds.
'but I waaaaaaannnnt onnnnnnneee!' she whined.
'Nope!, of you go now' I said and looked her dead in the eye.
'awwwwwwww' she groaned and turned to walk back up the hall way.
I grabbed my tea and laptop and wandered into the lounge room.
Nowadays real peace and quiet is so rare. You cant even go to the toilet without someone trying to burst into the room, someone screaming because you have shut the door and locked it to avoid the barge ins, or someone fighting on the outside of the door leaving you yelling that good old faithful
'look out when I get out of this toilet!!'
Sometimes I even just add in a little shower and just stand under the hot water doing absolutely nothing. Generally someone flushes the toilet or turns on the water in the kitchen or just Miss A plonks her little bottom in front of the bathroom door and screams, again because there is a door stopping her from accessing you.
I spy hubby to be wandering out with a drink bottle in hand.
'What are you doing with that?' I asked accusingly.
'She said she was thirsty' he said. Looking at me quizzically.
'I just told her that she wasn't allowed to have another drink!' I said in exasperation.
He smirked at me with that ' she got me again didn't she?' expression that I see so much of.
I sipped another sip of my tea and continued chewing away on a biscuit.
It was then that I heard the toilet door shut, and Miss M speaking under her breath to Miss H.
Miss H came wandering out.
'whats going on out there?' I asked, feeling my blood start to boil.
'[miss M] needed to go to toilet' Miss H said rolling her eyes.
I rolled mine in return. We sat waiting for about 5-10 minuted listening to the faint singing.
'[Miss H]? can you go check the toilet door?' Hubby to be asked. 'I think she has locked it' he said smirking. As much as Miss M's escapades are exhausting and drive us crazy, we are always impressed by her clever mind. A devious mind, but gosh it is clever!
We listened amused, as we heard a commotion and a squeal of disgust as Miss H dragged Miss M from the toilet after finding her standing in the room talking to herself, and sent her back to bed.
Another five minutes later Miss M comes skipping out of her room again,
'gonna do another wee mum!' she proudly sang. Obviously thinking that it had worked a few times so why not try again.
'righto Mum, you're up' Hubby to be directed.
I groaned, looked at my cup of tea sadly, and got up.
'RIGHT! THAT'S ENOUGH!' I yelled. stomping up the passage with an over exaggerated walk to make my point.
'In to bed NOW!'
'but I need to weeeeeeeeeee!' Miss M cried.
'[Miss M] you're mummy is a nurse and NO-ONE does wees that much! There is none left and you are just playing tricks! Now I want you in bed by the count of three!' I held up my thumb, signalling that the count had already started, as she scuttled off to bed, admitting defeat and wailing the whole way back to bed. I sighed with a smile, sensing victory.
I walked back in to the lounge room and looked sadly at my cuppa, turned around, and went back into the kitchen to turn the kettle on. I picked up my cup, tipped the cold tea down the sink, looked at the cup.
'Ok peace and quiet, lets try this again!'

Diary of a busy mum - Mondays

So a lot of you are busy mums and a lot of you who read this blog, read it to make yourselves feel 'normal'. We all want to tell like we are doing the right thing by our children. The women that work CONSTANTLY feel guilty about not being with their kids and the women that stay at home constantly feel guilty that they aren't bringing in some cash. We never seem to be happy with whatever job we are doing so we stretch ourselves to incredible lengths to try to cover all the bases.

Monday

Mondays are a work day. The alarm goes off at 5.30 to which I generally deliver a brisk thump to the snooze button. 'Another few minutes'. I think to myself, rolling over and pulling up the doona round my neck. It's winter at the moment and there is no incentive to get out of bed; it's dark, it's cold and frosty, and the kids are grumpy. Five minutes later the alarm goes off again and wakes me from my toasty slumber again ins Groundhog Day type scenario. I always think I will stay awake and just lie there but every time I fall back to sleep. This time I drag myself to the side of the bed and sigh then pull on my dressing gown before standing up and quietly making my way to the bathroom. The shower starts with a splutter and I'm in, trying to wash the sleep away. After lingering in the shower a little too long, I'm out and pulling my dressing gown back on already tasting the coffee that I am about to make. This is the time of the morning that I get a moment if peace, and I need this time to work up to the day, the exact reason why I get up at the time that I do. The coffee machine buzzes to life and i cringe at the noise, hoping that it doesn't wake anyone. I pop four slices of toast I the toaster planning to only eat two. Having been caught out a few times with prematurely woking children, I have learned to have backup toast readily available so I don't miss out on breakfast when the munchkins take mine. I sit and eat my breakfast, check my Facebook/emails/shopping apps, and work out what jobs I have to get done this week. After I have had my peaceful breakfast I'm up to get changed and get my makeup done before waking the girls to get them dressed and ready for daycare. I generally give myself all of fifteen minutes to get them ready. Luckily daycare give the children breakfast so if the morning goes to plan, I can get them dressed and their hair done and teeth brushed within this time. About seventy percent of the time things go to plan, the other thirty percent of the time we muddle through, generally with me not eating breakfast, the children with crazy hair and shoes on the wrong feet. How having the children out of bed for longer makes it harder to get them ready on time is beyond me. But thats just how it goes. If Miss A is up she is whining for me to carry her around everywhere, if Miss M is up she is into mischief, and Miss H...... well its pretty much impossible to get her up most days. On a good day; they are woken, dressed in their beds, teeth brushed an hair done and then promptly put in the car and taken to daycare for breakfast by 7.15AM.

I generally spend about nine to ten hours at work and am generally heading to daycare by about 5pm. As you can imagine pick up from daycare can be interesting when both mum and two and three year olds are tired. Miss A is in the first room and generally comes running, pretty much packing herself up from daycare by taking her bag off me, wanting to put her own jacket on and saying goodbye to the staff before I have even signed her out! We then head into collect Miss M. Miss M is generally found by hearing a 'mummy' bellowed as loud as possible as she runs as fast as she can directly towards my legs threatening to bowl me over. I brace for contact, watch with a smile as Miss M and Miss A hug (like hey haven't seen each other all day despite seeing each other at daycare). Then comes the hard work. As much as the girls are excited to see me they take FOREVER to leave the daycare center. I watch enviously as other parents stroll with ease to their cars with their young child in tow. No running, no screaming, no-one looking like they have even broken a sweat. Then there is me, wandering ahead as my children get distracted by every possible thing on the way out of the daycare center. They play with posters on the wall, the play stations that they have set up with colouring pencils and crayons, and then just when you think you have made it to the door they both giggle and yell 'RUN!' and head back in the opposite direction. I spend the next five minuted doing 'ready set go', and 'ok, bye, mums going now' and pretending to leave without them. By the time I get to the car I'm exhausted. And this is where the work starts. It is only when I get to the car that Miss A decides that she wants to get in the car all by herself. Now I drive a Holden Captiva (SUV) that sits relatively high off the ground. So Miss A stands her chubby short little frame right beside the car trying to jackknife her leg up to get into the car. If by some miracle she actually got up there she would only be on the floor of the vehicle and would still have to get up onto the car seat and then into her child restraint. So I take charge. I lift her up quickly, bracing myself for whats about to come. As I picked her up her little body began to tense. 'Noooooooo' she said quickly progressing from speaking to wailing. 'HELP!!!' she starts to scream (meaning that she doesn't want anyones help), And arches her back back making it almost impossible to put her in her seat. She lets out a scream until her little head is shaking as she runs out of air, gasps a bit breath in, and then cries loudly again, directly in my ear as I try to position her central to the seat. As she lets out the next cry she weakens her rigidity a bit and I manage to position my hand so that I can gently push her bottom down into the seat and then frantically get the clasp fastened before she gathers her strength for the next buck. It has always amazed me how strong toddlers can be! With the seatbelt secured I take a big breath in and wipe my brow having worked up a sweat, pause for a second, and then turn to Miss M who is balancing precariously on a ledge. I feel my pulse jump to that familiar rate yet again and then I am ushering Miss M back to the car with her protesting that she wants to do it herself. She attempts to go out on the road independently as I grab her little hand tightly and remind her of the dangers of running out on the to the road and then put her safely into the car. The drive home generally consists of miss M yelling form the back of the car that she wants the music turned up, Miss A yelling 'NOOOOO' at miss M in response to her yelling because she is still in a mood from her defeat at daycare, and me telling the girls to speak nicely.

On arriving home, miss M already has whipped her seatbelt off and is getting out of the car as I open the back door of the car to let her out. Miss A is much happier to be helped out of the car than being helped in and happily reaches for my arms as she is released from her seatbelt. Both girls run to the door to be greeted by their big sister. On a good day I walk into the smell of dinner cooking and Hubby to be in the kitchen, on bad day I find hubby to be on the couch looking like he has only just woken from a sleep. By this time it is almost six o'clock so you can imagine that the children are cranky and hungry, I am cranky and hungry, and if tea is not cooking, Miss H's first question to me as I walk in the door is ALWAYs 'mu-um, whats for tea?' which infuriates me even more. This is when crazy hour starts. Crazy hour, or hours, is that time of the night when the kids need bathing, dinner needs cooking, homework needs to be done, and no-one wants to do it. The younger children don't want to get in the bath, the preteen does NOT want to do her homework, and on a bad day, mum and dad barely want to look each other in the eye! It normally takes just one of the kids to do something funny which quickly thaws me out and everyone is back to being social again. We generally choose to divide and conquer, with one of us tackling the little ones bath and pyjamas and the other cooking dinner and arguing with Miss H about her homework or her contribution (or lack there of) the the work that is being done. After bath time, the house is normally chiming with Miss A's disgust at being made to get dressed and at least one of her parents are sweating yet again.

At the dinner table, Miss A is generally quiet and inhaling her dinner, Miss M is making conversation by asking around the table about everyones days. Miss H is normally chewing very loudly, and hubby to be and I sit back and giggle at the surroundings while food flies on to the floor. After dinner the fighting starts again as we wind up for bed time. Miss H is normally complaining about having to do the whatever job she is allocated while one parent is telling her to do her job faster as we painstakingly watch her work at a snails pace, while she is hoping that someone else will do it for her. She then choses this time to 'need to go to the toilet' to which her parents generally roll their eyes. She tells me today that not every time does she do a number two which tells me that most time she actually must just sit there staring at the wall because NO-ONE takes that long to go to the toilet when its just for number ones! Miss M and Miss A are normally running around the house burning off a bit of energy at this stage, giggling and squealing at the top of their lungs. Once the house is clean its time for teeth and bed for the girls, Miss H obviously a little later than the others, after which time their parents lunches and bags packed for the next day and then collapse on the couch exhausted and the day is done. I usually stay up to ridiculous times savouring the me time and then wonder why on earth I did it when the alarm goes off the next day.

Cheeky monkeys

So what is 'cheeky' nowadays? I remember as a child something simple like referring to an adult by their first name could be seen as 'cheeky'. By definition, a child being referred to as cheeky  has taken on a whole new meaning. I think if my mother were to be told that we were 'cheeky' she would have been quite disappointed,  yet I refer to my own children as cheeky little monkeys on a regular basis! Cheeky I suppose is tolerated at different levels and depends on the age of the child.

Miss A has started to get a bit cheeky. She has started to stick out her tongue at everyone to which I tell her I am going to pull her tongue off and give it to the dog. She generally laughs at me and then does it again five seconds! This seems to be a phase at the moment and I really am not sure about it. It is hilarious watching that chubby little face pointed directly at you with eyebrows raised and protruding tongue. This done to the wrong person however can result in a 'bad parent' type scenario where you are at the supermarket and they do it at an older lady who gasps and scuttles off in disgust. She will shout 'no' back at me when I ask her to do something, and will find all of this quite entertaining. I really cant help but laugh myself at her funny little face and therefore she gets away with it.

Miss M is at another level of cheeky. Miss M will talk back at you arguing the point. She will say intelligent things like 'poopey head' and 'bum bum' and run off giggling. She will wiggle her little backside at you when you tell her to go to bed and respond with a smug 'no its not' and is always very proud of herself with her responses. She makes everyone laugh though, and therefore she also gets away with it. At daycare today one of the daycare ladies who lets say goes by the name 'Liz' was saying goodbye to the girls. Miss M promptly turned around and said 'see-ya Lizard!'. I was mortified!! I almost felt myself instinctually duck my head from that smack around the ears that you would expect to get if you had have said something of that sort to an adult when you were a child. The daycare girls laughed it off and said not to worry about it because they had been saying it earlier. This morning, Miss M, on getting out of the car this morning said 'thank-you' for something. She then turned this into 'wank-you' which she obviously read the discomfort in my expression and repeated it a few times grinning before I told her it wasn't a very nice thing to say to get her to stop. Tonight at dinner, Miss M wanted me to get up and get her a drink and I told her we would all have a drink after dinner. She sat there all through dinner talking away, nibbling at her dinner but doing more talking than eating. Just as I finished and said I was full she looked at me and said 'oh good, you can get my drink now' which as cheeky as it was, it was hilarious so again by laughing at her 'more front that Myer' approach, we are fuelling this behaviour!

Miss H can be a whole new world of cheeky. Generally more so to her father because he likes to stir her up so she retaliates and generally ends up speaking the same way that he speaks to her. She gets involved in the arguments that her father and I are having speaking in that 'so ner' tone which drives me insane! The indignant tone in her responses makes me wild and I can feel the steam coming from my ears. She even argues with her aunties, which I find terrible! God, if we had have done that in our day!! And the comments they make are no longer funny but in fact can be hurtful. ie. 'mums undies are HUGE!'. So by eleven, cheeky is no longer funny, and I'm not sure at what age that changed.

Some parents let things go and its always interesting to be at the receiving end of it. I remember once speaking to a friend of mines brother when he was about ten years old. At this point I had a rather large 'coco pop' type mole on my face. I remember walking into the house and he looked at me and said 'you have some cake on your face', his parents were in the room with him and said nothing. I explained to him that it was not cake but a mole that I have had forever. He kept going, digging the hole deeper, and still his parents did nothing to stop him. I will never forget that awkward moment! I will also never understand why his parents didn't just save me the embarrassment by turning it round on him and saying that that wasn't a nice thing to say.

There are also the times when there is unintentional cheekiness. Everyone has had the dreaded moment in the supermarket when your child yells out 'mum, why is that lady so fat?', or 'mum, why is that mans skin like chocolate?', or 'mum, I want to have a turn on that wheelycar' pointing to a man in a wheelchair. When Miss H was littler we had friends who had a daughter in law with cerebral palsy. I remember when one day she asked Miss H a question and Miss H responded with a giggly 'stop talking funny!'. I have never felt so uncomfortable and shushed Miss H and then ushered her away to explain to her why this lady spoke differently to us.

I can always tell a whether parents are old fashioned or not when their primary school aged child stands up next to me. On some occasions the child will openly try to measure up against my 149cm tall self saying 'WOW! You're short!' or 'Im nearly taller than you!'. The children who have the old fashioned parents will at least discreetly sidle up to me, look at the top of my head, and then quietly disappear, whispering to their friends/siblings that they are taller than Miss H's mum!

The dog did it!

So my blog/facebook followers would know that presently half the household is unwell. Both the two little ones have had a virus and are on antibiotics for ear infections and chesty coughs, so I have a fridge full of penicillin. I myself, am full of snot, completely blocked up, with the dry crusty nose which is such a great look! Miss H is complaining of a scratchy throat (but you never know with her whether she just doesn't want to miss out on the attention that everyone else is getting!). And hubby-to-be, well he just looks nervous most days at the moment, waiting to be struck down.

This morning was all class. I was running round the house cleaning, my nose coated in thick white moisturiser, hoping to God that the postman wasn't going to knock with a package. The youngest was in our bed for most of the night, so I was so tired I woke up to the sound of my own snoring, closely followed by a kick in the shins from hubby to be. The morning progressed with a whiney, clingy toddler. Lots of crying and 'up pleeeeeeese' while I tried to make breakfast and clean the house with my free arm.

I was cleaning the house when miss A began her usual routine of stripping naked and refusing to get dressed. Miss M had also decided it was dress up time, and was sporting a very summery dress. The heaters had both been turned on high this morning to counter the single digit and negative temperatures that we have been having, and the house was a toasty warm. So to avoid the fight, and to stretch out the time that he wasn't clinging to me, I let them stay half nude and went on cleaning. Miss A is at that age when she thinks she is having a conversation with you, and some words make sense and the rest is just gibber. She stopped me in the hallway, as i bustled through with an armful of washing, and was pointing into the bedroom repeating the dogs name. 'Yes!' I congratulated her on getting the dogs name right 'why don't you go knock on the window!' I said, hoping to distract her a bit longer so I could at least get a load of washing on. She looked at me strangely. So I changed my attack. 'Why don't we come into mummy's room and you can see him through the window from in there?' I asked, in my best happy child convincing voice. Miss A is fascinated by our dog and loves knocking on the windows at him and has even started reminding miss H when its time to feed him. Our dog has followed my every move through the house ever since he was made an outside dog. If I was in one bedroom, he would sleep right outside that window. Then when we started renovating and moved into the other room, he came too, etching a nice new sleeping spot into the grass outside that window. Never mind the super sized kennel that hubby-to-be built him! He prefers to be near me. 

By this stage miss A had been into the dress ups and had put her pyjama top back on but was wearing a dress as a skirt with it and was getting frustrated as she tried to pull the dress off. I helped pull the dress down momentarily before miss A started screaming 'help!' and backed herself into a corner to avoid my helping hands. I sighed and moved on to making the bed. Miss M had come to investigate. Miss M is well known for her sense of smell and has thus scored the nickname 'beagle'. She will often get out of bed during mummy and daddy's 'sneaky snack time' walk into the lounge room and say 'I can smell chocolate!' leaving her parents, tight lipped, concealing the evidence, giggling like children who had just been caught out. Miss M can also pick a full nappy from the other end of the house and is often heard to be chiming 'mu-um, [miss A] has done a poo-oo!'.

Miss M strolled into the room and stood in the window, her blonde hair glowing in the sun. She looked at me, smiled, and then promptly changed her expression to disgusted. She screwed up her nose, sniffing and said 'what is that poo smell?'. My eyes widened as I swung around and looked for miss A who was waddling out of the room with a brown stain down her chubby legs. 'No no no no no!!' I started repeating to myself in panic as I chased her out of the room trying to stop her before she went and sat on something. You never know which direction to go in these scenarios. Do you find the poo before someone steps in it, or do you clean up the toddler before it spreads further??? I chose the latter and grabbed a pack of wipes and cornered miss A in the toilet to clean her up. Miss A happily sat still while I cleaned her up. All the while still gibbering about the dog. 'Yes! We will go say hello in a minute when you are all clean!' I said, concentrating on what I was doing. 

'Ok!' I said, once I was happy with my job. 'Now, where's this poo Miss A?' I asked. She turned on her heels and ran her little naked self out of the toilet. I followed, figuring she would proudly lead me to her work. I followed her into her bedroom, and there it was, a big yellow poo. Whilst thanking God that it was at least formed, and then considering perhaps it was too formed and mentally adding more vegetables to the tonights planned dinner, I noticed miss A was saying the dogs name again. I looked out the window wondering whether he was looking in, but no dog. It was then that it occurred to me. My eyes tracked to miss A who was accusingly pointing at the poo, with her little eyebrows raised in indignation, and BLAMING THE DOG!!! The dog never-the-less was securely outside!! I have heard of farting and blaming the dog but this is just ridiculous!! I cleaned up the mess giggling, and made a mental note to start listening better to my toddler, no matter how cryptic her sentences!!!

Hunting and gathering with Dad

So today Hubby-to-be was feeling a bit sorry for me with my present head cold, and decided that he would pitch in by doing the grocery shopping. I must have looked pretty crappy because to top that off he decided he would take Miss M (3 years old) with him. Now those of you ho have read my previous posts, would know that Miss M can be a bit of a challenge. She is a very busy child, quick thinking and moves a mile a minute, but never to our advantage. Until now, taking Miss M out in public was something that probably could only have been made easier with valium and a leash! Miss M lately seems to be growing up, which has put a new edge on her escapades. All her little tricks have gone from being exploratory and destructive, to more grown up and independent. Sounds great doesn't it? Not always! Unfortunately grown up and independent never coincides with us wanting her assistance. Miss M who is quite capable of dressing herself, wiping her own bottom, putting herself in her car seat, will only do these things sporadically with most times her insisting 'you do it' in a whiney I'm about to cry voice. And conversely, like her baby sister, the times you are in a hurry and need to do something for her, for speed and ease, she will refuse your help and insist on doing it the long way.

So anyway, hubby-to-be left the house this morning with a very enthusiastic Miss M in tow and I got some peace and quiet with Miss A, who is still unwell. On leaving the house Miss M said to her father 'daddy I want the windy ones' meaning that she wanted the back window of the car down. Her father obliged, given the weather was nice. On arriving at the supermarket, H2B got Miss M out of the car and was about to head into the supermarket when he realised the rear window was still open. Swearing under his breath he unlocked the car, put the keys in the ignition and wound the window back up. Calling to Miss M to follow, H2B opening his wallet and spied the bank card was not there. Again, swearing under his breath, he explained to Miss M that they would again have to get back into the car. On getting in the car Miss M made the request for 'the windy's' again, and her father again obliged. luckily we live very close to the supermarket and a quick minute later H2B had come home, explained the lack of cash situation to a confused me as he walked in the door, and left again with the wind in Miss M's hair as she wanted. Again arriving at the supermarket, in a different park, he got Miss M out of the car, locked it, and went to head inside seeing the rear window was again open. Another slightly louder curse word was said as he again, unlocked the car to wind the window up and the relocked it and went in. After about half an hour of peace and quiet for me, hubby-to-be walked back in to door at home with a smirk on his face, shaking his head. 'what?' I asked hesitantly, stretching out the word with a worried expression on my face. He giggled and started to tell the story.

Hubby-to-be had made it in the door of the supermarket unscathed and proceeded to collect the ingredients for our sunday bacon and eggs brunch. Miss M insisted on carrying the shopping basket as her little independent self kicked in. Being sick and whiney, I had put in a specific order for sourdough, rather than our usual $1 loaf of bread. H2B was busy scanning the shelves when he got a phone call. One of his mates had managed a power tool injury the night prior and was busily telling the story. This obviously is distracting to anyone, let alone an alpha male that wants to know every detail. It wasn't until a few minutes into the conversation that H2B had 'that feeling' you get when Miss M is up to something, that same feeling that every parent gets when the house is abnormally quiet. H2B looked around him expecting to find Miss M. Nothing. 'ah.. yeah mate I'd better go, I've lost me kid.' he explained in his usual calm tone. His mate, laughed and responded with a 'yeah you'd better deal with that' and promptly hung up the phone. So with his heart skipping a beat or two, H2B proceeded to put his brain in Miss M gear and made a quick trip up the end of the aisles. It wasn't far up the back aisle of the supermarket he spotted a flash of blonde hair and the back of a little girl wandering around with her basket that was almost half her size. H2B called out . '[Miss M]! What are you doing?'. Miss M didn't even pause, she just kept on her merry way, yelling back over her shoulder 'I'm trying to find the bacon!'. H2B caught up to his independent little miss and spied that she had been doing a little shopping of her own. 'what's this in here?' he asked pointing to the basket. Miss M had decided that it was a grand opportunity to get some snacks and had cleverly collected a pack of biscuits and two small containers of flavoured milk. Getting his heart rate back to normal, H2B ushered Miss M and her basket of goodies back to the fruit and veg department, all the while Miss M explaining where she had been collecting her items from. 'Right' he thought 'next on the list, tomatoes'. Miss M happily followed. H2B carefully checked a few tomatoes making sure that they were well ripened and then he heard a thump, and some items scattered along the floor. While H2B was checking his tomatoes, Miss M was doing her own checking. She had attempted to open a punnet of cherry tomatoes and had managed to drop the lot on the floor. H2B let out an exasperated sigh, looked around making sure no-one saw, and regathered the cherry tomatoes and put them back (here lies a timely reminder to always wash your fruit and veg!). Another big breath in and they moved to the deli to get the bacon. Miss M was interested, having initially been looking for the bacon, and followed while her father moved to speak to the deli attendant. While the order was being filled H2B was distracted by Miss M exclaiming 'ooohhh tickets!!' followed by the whir of the ticket dispenser as half the roll of tickets came rolling out. H2B yanked the roll end of the deli tickets out of her hand and Miss M wandered off happy with the three that she was allowed to keep. Thanking God that this was the last item to get, he ushered Miss M through the checkout with her items, made his purchases also, and headed home to tell the tale, automatically winding down the window for Miss M. He arrived at home, unpacked the couple of bags and went to head inside leaving the car window open.

So you would think that this was where the story ends. No. Miss M bowled in the door, quite smug with her win, and got stuck into her biscuits and milk while her Dad went out to the car, wound the window up and came in and started on the bacon and eggs. A bit later in the day it was shopping time. Time to do the weekly shop when no-one was hungry to avoid the spontaneous hungry purchases. Funnily enough, this mornings incidents were readily forgotten and Miss M and Miss H accompanied H2B to the supermarket. Again Miss M insisted on having her own basket and wandered round trying to collect more items. First was a punnet of strawberries which she was made to return to the shelf. She then made comment on the 'HUUUUUGEEE Watermellum' which I am sure she would have attempted to tackle into her basket if it wasn't for its size. The next was a bag of grapes, which Miss H snatched away and made her younger sister return to the shelf. Dad was on the verge of having had enough. He looked over from what he was doing to see Miss M with a cucumber in a freezer bag. '[Miss M]!' He Exclaimed 'put it back and stop touching everything!'. It was at this point that miss M let out a big wet sneeze, right into the bag in which the cucumber was in. Being in between school pick up and dinner time the supermarket was a busy place. So this time, when H2B glanced around to see who was watching, he saw at least three people had seen the germ explosion and were laughing. 'I think we had better keep that one now!' he said. They wandered another couple of aisles, while miss M kept her hands to herself. On one occasion she was seen to be wandering off to which her father issued a 'miss M come back here' order, to which she responded with 'I'm just looking at sump-ping'. Arriving at the toy aisle, H2B was feeling exhausted, and when Miss M spotted the bubbles and started claiming that she 'needed' them, he picked up Miss M and put her in the child seat of the trolley. 'this isn't my seat!' she said in a disgusted voice 'this is [miss A]'s seat!'. The remainder of the shopping was completed with Miss M secured within the trolley, occasionally commenting on items as they passed such as 'Dad! theres the pussy mouse food!!' (meaning a cat with long whiskers we are guessing!?!). They got the rest of the shopping done and even managed to secure a bag of lollies and then made the trip home. Arriving home H2B pulled into the driveway across the road attempting reverse in, to make the unpacking easier. Miss M chimed from the back seat 'We don't live here silly!!!' which was received with a giggle from both Dad and Miss H. As the car was put into reverse and they made their way into the driveway, Miss M was comforted by the more recognisable scenery and exclaimed 'THIS is where we live!'. Having had a very eventful day, H2B stopped the car smiling, glad to be home and even more glad that the rear window of the car was done up!