after

Daniel is of the opinion that Franklin D. Roosevelt is full of shit.

To clarify, I'm still a dirty hippy (hi Jane!) and we do still co-sleep. See?

Hollie is replete after sucking the air out of Daniel's lungs.

Daniel's cage is for his naps, which have been a vague memory since he was put behind bars anyway, and for when he goes to bed at night. He still wakes up when I go to bed, so I still change his strides and pop him into bed with me for the next, ideally eight but in reality not so much so, hours.

Now, if you're reading this and you're my mum, let's not be going over all judgemental about the damn cat. She never usually sleeps on the bed. Her usual preference is to view the boy from a distance, because he's the reason her life is now in the toilet. Literally. She used to be Queen, and now she eats her meals in the bathroom. You'd think that would be a good reason for her to want the little punk taken down a few pegs, but she actually seems to quite like the new order around here. On this one occasion though, she circled us supiciously before hopping on the bed, curling up in a ball and promptly falling asleep. Fucking aw, okay? Aw! If it was an everyday event, d'ya think I'd waste my time photographing it?! I rest my case. God.

Also, wow, defensive much? Criminy.

if you build it, they will come

I don't know who the they are, but I built it and so far, nothing.

So I went to Ikea on Monday and got Daniel a new cot. The Hensvik, which I think is Swedish for ha ha HA. Cot, by the way, is Australian for crib. We have cribs here too, but they're the style smaller cots that smaller babies tend to sleep in. Like bassinets, you know, but more...wooden.

Daniel's is a nice, simple cot that converts into a junior bed, so if his father's stature (or lack thereof) is anything to go by, it should suit him until he's at least seventeen.

The flat box was delivered on Wednesday afternoon, and taking into consideration naptimes et al, I got to building the cot sometime on Thursday. And build it I did. I built the living fuck out of that bitch. On my own with one borrowed hammer, two screw drivers and that weird little Ikea key.

before

The cot ends and railings were put together before Daniel needed his room back to take a nap, which as an aside, he took like a true champion. Once squawk and he was out like a light. Meanwhile I took the hammer and the rest of the cot parts into the next room and hammered the the crap out of everything so that the cot base ready for insertion by the time the deebs woke up two hours later. When he did, I gave him a kiss on the head and then totally ignored him so I could drag the cot base back into the room and bolt it together with the bits I'd completed earlier. Daniel, of course, protested to playing second fiddle to his new bed, so again with the squawking. So I picked him up and plonked him into my lap, and ignoring the dump he'd recently taken in his pants because by god, I was going to finish thisthing RIGHT NOW, returned to my construction work. Also, his change table was a mess of nuts and bolts and Ikea keys and all, and I didn't want to have to remove it all and break the vibe I had going on, and in order to change him on the floor or the bed or anywhere else other than his actual change table, I really need to hold him down with a foot to his chest and as I mentioned, vibe, so was totally not up to breaking it with any strongarm tactics.

Fast forward to the absolute fact that I can build a cot out of several thousand unidentifiable parts, using only a stick figure on a few folded bits of paper to guide me. I can do anything. I could build me a damn house if I wanted to, and I could do it on my own while holding a baby in my lap.

In realised yesterday that there are two kinds of people in this world. There are those who after experiencing the joy that is Ikea declare "Never again!!", and then there are those who after the cursing and the swearing and the wondering which end is in fact up, go over all "Bring. It. ON, motherfuckers!!", while shaking their closed fist at the sky, and yes, that would be me.

The batteries in my camera died, so in lieu of the finished cot...he's rather mismatched in his attire, but he's still as cute as fuck so, enjoy.

note the blue teddy bear on the left. It was given to me by his father on my birthday. I put it on the change table so Daniel could pee on it.

papillon

Usually by the time Daniel wakes up from a sleep, he's escaped his swaddling and is lying flat on his face which, apart from the flat on his face component, isn't really an issue. The value of the swaddle is its ability to bring about the onset of sleep. Once sleep is aquired, the swaddle value plummets until the next time nap time rolls around, when the swaddle is once again king.

Now, if you're anywhere close to being my mother, yes I still swaddle him because a) it's legal and b) without swaddling him, I've got a snowflake's chance in hell of getting him to sleep. There is a point c) and it's that we swaddle because that's what we do.

I'm glad we cleared that up.

So about that snowflake's chance business. Dude escaped right in front of my eyes this morning, and then rolled over and crawled (crawled!!) out of bed until he lay half in and half out, and then he flopped about like a fish on a pier. So I wrapped him up tighter and he did it again. He was wide awake by now, what with all the games (ha ha HA) we were playing at naptime, so I threw in the towel in favor of pondering this latest dilemma.

He wouldn't go down for his nap this morning because babies are little creatures of habit, and the most important component of The Nap is not Daniel's tiredness, it's how effectively you can hold the little shit down. Without being pinned on his back with his arms by his side, Daniel believes that the tiredness factor can go fuck itself until it's mate, delirious, shows up to pah-tay. Which it did. Woot. The escaping the swaddle though, isn't the issue. Dude will eventually pass out from exhaustion anyway. It's the escaping the bed that's the issue. I mean, the bedroom doesn't come equipped qith sharp knives and unattended power tools, but still, letting a baby loose in there unsupervised? Not sucha great idea. You'd be all, it's quiet in there, junior must be napping so well. Meanwhile junior has climbed out the window, hot wired your car and is downtown in some sleazy bar shooting craps.

The boy is crawling and he's only just gone seven months old. True, it's not a very elegant form of locomotion, it being the mode of trasport one would more expect to see coming from whatever it was that first crawled out of the primoridal slime than a little boy, but that's not the point. The point is he's crawling, and while he's been mobile since he first instigated the cute as fuck rolling phase that's kept me on my feet since the first time he disappeared under the sofa, this is the first time he's been able to escape his bed.

He eventually went to sleep, but now that he's realised his potential as a bed escaper, my mission this afternoon is to find a cot before the close of trade at 5pm. The pity is that we went to Ikea yesterday, and came home with nothing that even resembles an infant's bed.

Oh my god people. How fucking awesome is Ikea? Because we're a hick town, despite being one of the nation's capitals, Ikea only opened here in April. It's taken me this long to get there because I don't know why. I wish I was more decisive though because I looked at a damn cot yesterday, a sniglar, and instead of buying the fucking thing, I pursed my lips, cupped my chin between my thumb and forefinger, looked at its blonde wood hues, and decided what I really wanted was a white cot with drop down sides because, you know, I'm rich. So I bought a dish rack and a document tray instead, because raising a child is all about owning shit like that.

argh

We went swimming again today, and in much the same way that a dog goes a little crazy when you take out his leash and ask him if he wants to go walkies, so does Daniel at the prospect of a dunk in le pool.

Mum flew in afuckingain last Wednesday, and when I saw her last night, I thought she might like watching Daniel go that little bit crazy, so I asked her if she'd like to come along. She's back staying in a friends' house while they holiday in their penthouse apartment in Queensland, which is about a twenty minute drive from here, so as it comes complete with a late model BMW, I gave her directions to the pool, with an alternative option of meeting me at my place by 11.40am, at the very latest. Mum being mum, when asked whether she was coming to the pool or my place or not at all, with a dismissive wave of the hand, kept her decision to herself. I don't know, maybe she thinks being completely self absorbed adds a certain je ne c'est quoi but frankly, those dismissive waves leave me feeling like the dog poo she found on the heell of her shoes, which kinda irritates me, what with the resentement I feel when I'm questioning my relationship to dog poo. Yes I should say so, bla bla bla, but really, why? The issue is with me, and it's about not accepting her right to be the Queen.

Honestly, I've been in therapy for four years or more now, following almost twenty years of anorexia and after that, four years of panic attacks and anxiety which, oh yeah, I'm one well balanced individual, and the reason I'm there now is to help me grow past my paralysing mother issues. It's also so I don't screw Daniel up.

We tend to parent as we were parented, so I take an hour out each week because I don't want to turn into the Queen Of the Universe while I diminish my son to a mere extension of myself.

Now where was I? Oh yeah, 11.40 came and went and no ma, so I squeezed myself into some speedos, woke the boy (he'd refused to nap at the designated naptime, so was still asleep at the designated We Need To Leave time), tried shoving some carrots down his throat and when that didn't work, was stunned at his refusal to breastfeed instead, changed him into his Zoggs, grabbed everything we needed to survive the chilly and wet apres pool moments, and trekked out to the car. Then we trekked back inside after the boy started wailing and pawing at my boobs.Dude has no respect for the clock. By the time he was a quarter full, we were already running late so tough tittes (hehe) kiddo, off we went to the pool. Mum was already there and I was already resenting that she didn't think to say what she was doing, because I am small and need to grow the fuck up already.

Then when I was, as I do each week because taking your baby swimming is a solid argument against sole parenting, what with the undressing of self and baby required, and the packing away of clothes so that they don't get saturated by all the humidity and splashing, all while holding a baby who is going a little loco in anticipation of a dunking, struggling a little as I juggled fucking everything we needed to get aquatic, mum sat and watched. I don't know what I expected because realistically she never twigs to what she could possibly do to lighten the load - even when I was fresh out of hospital with a new baby, and stitched together so my innards wouldn't fall out, she didn't do anything even vaguely helpful. Which I resented because she was telling all her friends that she was here to support me - so why I thought she'd independently realise that I could do with a hand today, if one's on offer, is beside me.

So I asked if she'd mind helping me a bit here? And I swear she got all fucking antsy. Or maybe I expected her to so I thought she was, I dunno anymore. In any case she said something like '"doing what?" and I'm thinking just look. LOOK fercrisake, what do you think I need help with? Meanwhile Daniel is slipping from my grasp, the clothes we're shedding are falling into puddles of water, and the class is about to start.

She doesn't mean to be unhelpful, I thinnk she just totally doesn't exist outside of herself.

She finally grabbed some shit, but it was too late by then and her grabbing shit ended up making my task even more complicated. Argh.

Finally I tossed the boy into the pool and, giving my best Springer Spaniel impression, leapt in after him. Dude was having fun even before he landed (and in case you were wondering, no I didn't really toss him in. I carefully handed him to the instructor, if you must know, before daintily climbing in via the ladder), and I was glad because as I said, I thought mum would enjoy watching her grandson spaz out with pure, unadulterated joy.

As an aside, the swim teacher lurves Daniel too.. Or maybe I just look really incompetant because each week, Alice offers to take Daniel while I take the ladder, and she doesn't do that with any one else. Also, she laughs a lot with him, more so that she does with the other kidlets, which is really nice. Not the apparent favoratism, mind, because it probably only exists in my head, but that Daniel is so gregarious that others get joy from being with him too.

So splash splash, swim swim, and before you know it, the lesson was over. I got out the pool, wrapped Daniel in a blanket and handed him to mum, then got dressed (read: put my track pants on over my wet speedos, which could be the arguemnt toward the benefit of knowing if in fact, my mum, aka a potential spare pair of hands, was coming along because, hello! Change room, dry underwear!) before dressing the kid in some nice warm, dry clothes.

As she's (literally, apparently) had a panic attack at the prospect of taking the Beemer, mum had taken a cab, so I asked her if she wanted me to drive her home. Mum was all we could go for a coffee, which was nice, and despite all the shit I say about her, I like to do stuff with her like that because she's my mum, and even mre than the resentment that drips from my very pores, I feel sad about her. A deep aching sadness that we don't have anything more to share than small things like the occasional trip out for coffee together. The little swim star needed his nap though, so I explained this and declined. I offered to take her to my place instead, saying again that star needed his nap and that later on, I needed to get to target to buy a present for a one year old. I don't know what went wrong. I generally know when I've been short or terse of whatever it takes for mum to get snippy, but there's this whole range of unknown stuff I do that sets off this, I don;t even know what it is, but next thing you know, she's saying "Take me home". Just like that. Snip snip. Of course I noted that there was no "please" accompanying her request, which made it a command really, when you think about it, but decided to take my silent high road and assumed she'd say thanks or something once we got there.

I don't need slobbering appreciation, but manners are important to me, and just because I'm her daughter doesn't, in my opinion, mean that the social graces aren't appreciated.

But she's my mum so instead of saying a sing song "What do you say?" as one does to a two year old whose been handed a cookie, I felt I was being unreasonable and that I needed to again, grow the fuck up already. Then when I got to her place, she simply opened the door, got out of the car and walked away. She didn't even look back,much less wave goodbye.

I ask you? Is that right? I know it's not right that it miffs me so, this abandonment of social niceties, but is it right for a mother to get the fuck out of a daughter's car after she's driven you home?

Whatever. Argh.

So now the deebs is napping in the car (quote mum: but that's illegal!") and I'm here worrying about mum and what I can do to rectify the situation.

Argh.

But I said that already.

for I am awesome

It took talent and the space of only a few hours to prove myself as a paragon of motherhood.

Yesterday I stood by and supervised as my baby fell out of bed, then I held him as he gummed a glossy piece of paper into a sodden mess and then choked on it, and to top all this motherly goodness off, I dropped him on his head.

Score!

look ma,no visible bruises!

he's now ten pounds lighter

Now that Daniel is enjoying the high life that is solids, woo, there's been a change in the texture of his, uh, 'creative expressions'. Where once we mopped up the fruits of his digestive tract, now the tendency is more toward something that needs to be scraped off with a spatula.

Which isn't always a bad thing.

Case in point.

After his bath last night, I plonked the deebster, wearing little more than a towel, onto the playmat for his regular airing of thenether regions. The boy, of course, took off across the room like a bat out of hell, taking Miss Kitty and his towel along for the ride.

Poor Miss Kitty. She'd only just been washed since her last trip across the room with Daniel. Dude had learned all about finger painting last week in daycare - and you know how they say that yarpy babies yarp less once they begin solids? Well it's horseshit. It's right up there with that crap about breastfeeding making you lose the baby weight. Daniel pukes just as much as he ever did, if not more so, except now it has a vague orange hue (and I'm just as porky as I was when he was born, if not fucking more so. Geez). Combining those mad finger painting skilz with my son, aka The Chunder From Down Under, using Miss Kitty as his paint bomb and the floor as his canvas, meant a really bad day for the cat and an end product on the floor that was not unlike something one would expect from the late Pro Hart.

Last night though, with a freshly washed Kitty as his sidekick, Daniel was rolling around on the floor and I was standing by. I was distracted by something shiny and the next time I looked, he was merrily dragging Miss Kitty's head through a vaguely tinted, tangerine puddle with his left hand and splashing into it with his right, completely oblivious to the rapidly expanding puddle he was lying in, and to the Mr.Whippy action going on out back.

I squawked and lept into action, and Daniel responded to my squawk with a smile and a whole body jam. I kind of stalled then because the smile/jam combo is usually achingly adorable, but with the inclusion of an assortment of biological matter, no, not so much so. What it was was...mooshy. But! While it was disgusting and an experience I have no wish to repeat again, ever, it wasn't the uber-disgusting puddle of liquid gold it has been before and that I prayed it never would be again. It was a modest pile. Pick uppable too, yannow? With a rubber glove and a forest's worth of paper towels, but put it this way, I didn't need to don a rubber suit to survive a dip in the bubbling cauldron of ick.

So there's yer silver lining. Enjoy.

Wrapping up this riveting tale, fortunately I hadn't yet let the bathwater out because apparently I'm psychic. It was tepid and for the record, had fallen victim to The Yarp earlier in the evening, but desperate times called for desperate measures, and Daniel was unceremoniously dunked right back into it, disinfected, rinsed off, dried, duct taped into a bin liner and put to bed.

Miss Kitty was soaked in bleach, and I'm seriously reconsidering the ludicrous concept of combining fresh air and babies' bottoms.