Eating Veg

No more chocolate! No more I say!

Oh, okay then....just a little more.......

I don't mean me by the way, I mean the daughter.  I swear that once this excess of chocolate eggs (and bunnies) is consumed then all chocolate, sweets and junk food will be relegated to a once-a-week treat.  Which somehow seems easier said than done as multiple grandparents and great grandparents like to 'treat' her (it can't be a treat if it's more than once a week surely?!) and at the moment I'm feeling too tired to argue.  But no more!  I shall by Super-Muumy The Strict, the foot shall go down, there will be spinach for breakfast and broccoli for dinner and sugar shall be banned! Oh yes!.......errmm.....

I need to do something though, I've become a tad lax in recent months with the family diet.  Not that I'd be able to persuade daughter to expand her taste for vegetables beyond the current bolognaise sauce (blended only, but I can get celery, mushrooms, lentils, peppers, carrots, onions ad carrots into that, most of which she wouldn't touch otherwise), raw carrots, tomatoes and cucumber (with the occasional small spoonful of peas....I say spoonful but it's usually 3 or 4, eaten under duress with a look of disgust on her face followed by dramatic gulping from her cup of water).  I'm relying on the theory that as she grows older she'll develop the taste for veg - husband wouldn't touch anything other than raw carrots and raw cauliflower as a child but eats pretty much anything now.  I wasn't quite so fussy but I definitely wasn't the lover of brussels sprouts that I am now (although you'd still be hard pushed to get me to eat broad beans....unless they're the roasted/fried kind you'd get in a little bowl as Tapas!).

Although I'm relying on my "she'll grow into it" theory I still sometimes wonder if there's a better way of getting her to eat veg - although definitely not the approach I remember my dad using on us as kids:

       My 4 year old brother: "I don't like sweetcorn!"

       My dad: "Yes you do!"

       Brother: "No I don't!"

       Dad: "You do and you're not leaving that table until you eat it!"

Cue three hour standoff which my brother eventually won, proving once and for all that small children are the most stubborn creatures on the planet.  

Actually, I may be exaggerating on the length of time he sat at the table staring at a plate of cold sweetcorn (I'm only three years older so the concept of time is different looking back) but knowing my dad, and knowing my brother, I suspect I'm not far off.

I think if I tried that approach with daughter the results would be similar - she also has a wonderful stubborn streak in her,  It doesn't always make for the easiest time but I hope it'll stand her in good stead as she grows to adulthood.

Funny, when I started writing this blog entry it was going to be about something else entirely.  Mostly revolving around meeting up with a friend who's about to head to Nepal for a couple of months trekking and mountain climbing.  I guess the eating-veg battle is far more exciting than discussions on tackling Anapurna and the risks of meeting a Yak Train on a mountain path............maybe.

Today is mostly about....

....the early morning bubble-wrap disco.

1. Forgetfully leave bubble wrap from previous days package delivery in an obvious and easily accessible place.
2. Allow four year old daughter to discover said bubble wrap and spread it across the kitchen floor.
3. Four year old daughter then proceeds to the dressing-gowned, barefooted bubble wrap disco-stomp while you attempt to carefully squeeze around preparing breakfast as "you're not allowed to pop the bubbles mummy!"
4. Post breakfast persuade, blackmail or otherwise move daughter onto bedroom and bathroom for getting dressed purposes.
5. Ten minutes later express confusion at daughter's sudden disappearance.
6. Follow popping sound back to kitchen where second bubble wrap disco stomp is in full swing.  
7. Fact: Wearing school shoes makes for a better bubble popping experience.

The things they say...

I can never keep up with all the little things that R says, and the odd little conversations we have - sometimes cute, sometimes profound, often vaguely insulting!  I regularly wish I could grab those seconds and record them for ever, sometimes I update them as my Facebook status because it's the quickest way to make a note.  So much happens and it's so easy to forget.

So far this morning we've had.....

R:  How did it go last night mummy?

Me: It was lovely, we had lots of yummy Chinese food.

R:  Did you use chopsticks?

(that was one of those moments where I wonder how she knows things - She's four and we've never used chopsticks at home or been to a Chinese restaurant as a family.  I know she must have learnt things from Cbeebies, or stories we've read or nursery but it's still one of those "Oh!" moments, that delight in learning something about R that I didn't know before).

We've also had the cute....

"Mummy!  I've got chicken wrinkles again!"

(she meant goose bumps!)

The slightly gross.....

"Mummy, my poo looks like a wolfs head"

 (I know we like to avoid shame associated with bodily functions but maybe that's going a bit far - although at least this time she didn't request I take a look!)

And finally, the typically insulting.....

"Mummy, your breath smells like dog food"

Thank you so much fruit of my womb!  Although, the comparison was probably fair as at that point I hadn't cleaned my teeth.  At least you can trust small children to be completely honest (blunt!) about things.

I hope I can capture those little moments through the years.  Not just the words, but the pictures and the stories that go with them.

The Selkie Mother

The night air is surprisingly warm, not what I'm expecting as I stand here on the shore line with bare shoulders and feet.  The shift in air currents, barely enough to be called a breeze, lifts the hairs on my arms as I bury my feet in the soft pale sand feeling each grain trickle between my toes.  I have my eyes closed for what only seems a minute, taking in the sensations around me and I breathe deeply, filling my lungs with the sweet tang of ocean drenched air.  Yet when I open them again the moon has risen, hanging huge and full on the horizon, it's luminescence nearly overwhelming the softer twinkle of the surrounding stars.

As the moon steadily rises higher above me, it's silver moon path stretches across the lapping waves, their gentle rush echoing my breathing and the twin heart beats in my body - my own and that of the child I carry.  Beyond the moon path occasional cresting waves, or maybe sea creatures I can't see, disturb the surface of the water and spread a soft green fluorescence that seems to flicker and die before I'm even fully aware it is there.  I look up to the moon again and for a moment, held within it's glow I see my child, curled as though in the womb, sleeping in the moons embrace - my embrace.

I am drawn to the sea and step forward, the sand behind me so soft it collapses into my footprints obliterating them as though I never stood there.  At the water's edge the tiniest of waves  curl around my feet, as warm as the night air, drawing me further in.  I wade deeper and the ocean waters support me, in much the same way as the waters of my being support the new life growing inside.  I sway with the movement of the tide, the ebb and flow of water, of blood and breath, heartbeat and life.  Suddenly all is one and I'm am lost in the water's velvet darkness   I am the seal mother, the selkie; the waters open for me, embrace me and welcome me in, swirling spirals within spirals.  I am both chasing the spirals of life and cocooned in a watery sleep where time has never been and holds no meaning.

And then, somewhere beyond now, the Moon's song calls me back and I hear her and respond, the salt waters releasing their hold and carrying me back.  Still I feel embraced, but I float on the waves now, carried gentle to the shore.  And now, I find myself lying under the night sky as the ocean recedes behind me.  My sealskin caul fades and I am here again, feeling the warm damp sand rough on my cheek.  The moon is gone for now but I still feel her, as I still feel the rhythm of the ocean.  All is connected.  I breathe deeply and close my eyes.  I am home.

The above is inspired by a meditation I carried out on Tuesday evening, as part of a group of pregnant ladies, under the direction of a lovely lady called Nikki.  The meditation itself lasted nearly an hour and the guided visualisation was only a small part of it - and even then, the imagery suggested was simple; standing on a beach under a night sky then entering the sea and floating for a while supported by the waves before returning to the shore.  But, as often is the case when I follow guided visualisations, I found my inner being creating a much greater picture.

Through my 20s I was what might be viewed as 'left-brain' orientated - or at least, that's what I aimed to be.  I was a scientist, my bachelors degree being in Biology/Ecology and my Masters being in Ecology.  I tried to be logical, think only practically, I questioned everything and facts were the priority.  I treated my pregnancy with my first daughter in much the same way -  wanted to understand the biology of pregnancy, researched how it all worked, how labour worked, what could go wrong and the likelihood but I never allowed myself to imerse myself in the emotional side of it and I never created a bond with my unborn child.  In part because my daughter was unplanned and part of me was in denial (perhaps until she was maybe 3 years old - the PND I suffered didn't help) and also because I didn't have 'time' to be pregnant.  I was commuting 60miles each way to work, I was studying for my Masters degree, I was busy. Work was a priority because I never wanted to be a mother, motherhood damaged children, I was safest with a career.....

As a child I was much more 'right-brained' - I was artistic, created fantasy worlds, allowed my imagination free reign.  Somewhere between childhood and my 20s I came to believe that part was wrong - and I denied it, even though it was always there, you can't remove what's innate.  I'm not sure whether the depression I suffered through the latter part of my teens and my 20s was in part, a result of that.  You can't be whole if you deny the aspects of yourself you believe to be 'wrong' and if you can't be whole then you can't be helathy....or happy.

So now, over the last 12-18months - from when I entered my 30s - I've begun to re-embrace what was once a massive part of who I was.  I'm rediscovering the joy in intuition, in imagination and I'm letting go of the shame I've always associated with being 'emotional'.  And because of this, my current pregnancy feels very different to my last.  I feel connected to it, and I'm looking for ways to strengthen that connection and the bond with the baby I'm carrying - which is where the pregnancy meditation comes in.  And a side effect of this is I feel like I'm forging a better shared space with my daughter, I'm learning patience (slowly) and I'm learning to accept the bad days with the good (very slowly!), without feeling like I've constantly failed at a task that I was never prepared for.

I am the Selkie Mother, chasing spirals within spirals since the dawn of time.  Singing the pull of the moon tide of emotions, drawing me to the life within.

Birthdays and families

I'm exhausted!

It was my daughter's (R) 4th Birthday at the weekend and I had Parents no.2 staying for a few days (my parents divorced when I was a child, both my mum and dad remarried, so I have two sets of parents besides my parents-in-law.  Parents no.1 live two doors down and are mum and stepdad. Parents no.2 (dad and stepmum) live a couple of hundred mile away and they visit, or we visit, as and when we can - depends when my dad's home from sea as he works in merchant shipping).  They headed back this morning so we've got the house back and I can take some time to recover from the last week.

R had been excitedly looking forward to her birthday for weeks and had been chopping and changing her mind about her birthday cake.  Originally she wanted an alien cake (last year she wanted a blue dinosaur), but after a short space of time she entered the girly-fairy-princess stage and decided a fairy toadstool cake was the only way to go.  I bake fairly regularly, and make a Christmas Cake every year which is fairly basic in terms of decoration, but I thought I'd give her birthday cake a shot.  It took a few days, handful of hours here and there in between 101 other things, and it would have been a lot cheaper to just pay someone else to make it I suspect, but not nearly as much fun!  Mind you, after hunching over the kitchen worktop, fiddling around with fondant icing, my lower back was killing me!

It seems it was worth it though - not bad for a first attempt....

Actually - who am I kidding? I thought it was damn near brilliant!  No false modesty here, I was so, so chuffed with how it turned out. So chuffed in fact that I could just about ignore the niggling voice of perfectionism in my head telling me that "that bit's wonky" or "the icing has been pulled too thin there so the cake is showing", or "I don't like the smudges/marks/lumps/bumps here - you do know this is nowhere near good enough don't you?".  I'm definitely better at ignoring the voice now, compared to when I was 13 and would throw a teenage strop if something I did wasn't exactly, spot-on, perfect.

And what matters most is R adored it, her excitement was catching! The most fearful part was transporting it on my lap in the car (husband drove) to her birthday party on Saturday.  The internal voice in my head was screaming "don't brake suddenly!" as I stared maniacally ahead on the watch out for unexpected oil spills, small animals running in front of the car or traffic lights ;)

Parents No.2 arrived on the Saturday morning. Birthday party was held Saturday afternoon (I opted for the vaguely sensible approach of  having one of those birthday-party packages at a soft-play centre where they also provided a birthday tea afterwards.  There were 14 children and the same number of parents so I doubt our house would have survived the influx otherwise!). R's birthday was actually on Sunday so we had the whole family over after lunch and I did another birthday tea; Parents no1, Parents no.2, In-laws, godfather, great grandmother no.2 (great grandmother no.1 had my handicapped aunt home for the weekend so couldn't come by sadly), uncle & uncles girlfriend, plus husband and myself.  Not the whole family but a good chunk of the immediate family. R has 3 godmothers and 2 godfathers, only one lives locally, the rest are scattered between Cardiff, Essex and Glasgow - we're not Christian's, the christening was just carrying on a family tradition in the village church; my mother was Christened their, as were my brother and I.  I was also married there (originally it was going to be a registry office wedding but a change of plan for my gran - long story!).  We're very lucky in that respect - family wise, that is.  I also suspect I'm quite unusual to have divorced parents who are remarried and everyone gets on well (when I walked down the aisle I had my dad on one arm and my stepdad on the other).

While Parents No.2 were staying we had a bed made up of the seat cushions from Lola (our excessively tatty VW monster-Bus - she's a 1986 LT31) in the living room as we don't have a spare bedroom and it always seems a bit mean to ask your guests to sleep on the floor/airbed/sofa; so Parents No.2 had our bed.  The makeshift cushion bed was comfy enough but I'm looking forward to our bed tonight.....

......And the calm after the storm........

......My family are wonderful, child-induced birthday chaos is great fun, and it's always a pleasure to to have people to stay but it's nice to breathe deeply in the silence afterwards. Light some incense, listen to some gentle music, and have an early night ;)

Memories

The hedgerows are rich in memories at this time of year; memories I can touch and memories I can taste.  I can watch my daughter run to me with a sycamore seed clutched in her hand.  I can show her how it spins in the golden autumn light, nature's helicopter, inducing the dizzy, giddy joy of watching them fall from the sycamore tree outside the crumbling Victorian school I attended as young child.  I can see her excitement too and I recreate the memory in the current time.

Purple stained lips, purple stained hands, we seek out blackberries together and I am her as she crams them into her mouth.  And I am me, scratched and battered, reaching for the biggest, ripest berry beyond the highest thorns in the thickets of brambles that filled the field at the end of the housing estate where I grew up. The field is gone, more houses stand in their place, but the memories live in the here and now, in my daughter and in hedgerows.