Arya and Owl

Close encounters of the bird kind.

Good times: On Saturday we were passing a little display set up by the Raptor Foundation. Arya was immensely taken with the owls, and despite a little nervousness, she stroked an eagle owl about the same size as she is.

Parenting for the Sleep Deprived

"I'm going to put this washing up ball on my fist and chew
on it, Dad. Is that cool?"
"Can I take a selfie? Sure; that's cool then."

Some days I feel like the worst of all people, especially on weekends like the one just past, when the shouty parents upstairs and their kids are apparently away and not providing me with a comforting counter-example. There was a lot of "Arya, don't do that," this weekend, less because she was being extra-naughty than because Hannah and I were blitzed, and both too tired to keep up with Arya's energy (because she gets super bouncy when she's tired) or to tag each other out appropriately.

It was definitely not the weekend we had planned. A trip into town on Saturday kind of stretched out to... God help me, I have no idea what we actually did in town. Oh, that was it; Hobbycraft, food, home. It would have been much quicker if we'd realised there's a Frankie and Benny's on the Coldham's Lane trading estate now. I'm also increasingly unconvinced by the Weatherspoon's under the Arts Cinema, which seems to specialise in overcharging.

Sunday was supposed to be super relaxed, and in fairness to our plan of going back to the morning swimming class, I think if we'd had to go into Cambridge for the afternoon swim in the drizzling rain and pre-Christmas traffic, they would have found us all in the Grand Arcade at closing time, Hannah curled protectively in a ball around Arya and wibbling, while she waved brightly at passersby, assuring them in her best Roedean accent that 'they only drink to forget.'*

There were positives. Even if we didn't spend as much time together as we'd hoped (we're still way behind on Downton) time spent with Hannah is good time in my book, and Arya is adorable, even when she's being trouble. It's a struggle sometimes to be cross with her, even when we know we need to be (but we do need to do it, or she'll continue to think that rubbing food onto her face is adorable long past the point where it is.)

We also sat down and ate pancakes in front of the CBeebies Prom. In retrospect this would have worked better, I think, if I'd done a double batch and served them like blinis with crudites and savoury toppings as a proper lunch. As it was they were too late for her snack and threw the timing out.

Despite some fuss over the lamb tagine (she's not mad for cooked figs, apparently) she ate really well this week, although she may have had some tummy trouble afterwards.

A mixed weekend then (in no small part because the weather was so shockingly miserable.) I mean to do better in the future.

* I'm not sure why I assume my daughter will grow up to be ashamed of me. It's probably a sign of great insecurity.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

Arya's first mince pie

Advertising aside, you have to start planning for these things early with a family. Next year I intend to start putting present money aside... well, about now, actually. Christmas has sort of leaped up and smacked me in the face with stress and its only early November.

Still, if we get the stress out of the way early, hopefully we can enjoy Christmas itself. It's likely to be a whole new experience for Arya, as she as just a wee thing last year. Hannah wants to get a tree, so we're eyeing up a fine line between too expensive and tacky as hell. I thought I saw one at the absolute top line of my price in John Lewis, but that turned out to be the mat for catching needles.

It's been an odd weekend. The whole family descended late on Friday and went to bed. On Saturday they were up and out to a wedding, came back late and went to bed (I can't complain, I was invited, but largely as a courtesy and it would have felt odd.) Sunday was swimming followed by game.

On the plus side, apart from a few tears getting home on Sunday, Arya has been very cheerful all weekend. She woke up bright and breezy, and had loads of fun trotting up and down in mummy's shoes, enjoying the clop-clop-clop of the kitten heels flapping behind her. Swimming was a bit stressful for her, but we're back to the earlier class next week, which means that she won't be swimming when her body tells her that she ought to be napping.

She also ate pretty well, although she is developing a tendency to play with her food once she's finished eating.

We had a very good bath on Sunday, with only a little fussing as I rinsed her hair after washing it. Getting to sleep on Sunday was tougher than it ought to have been, but that was unfortunate chance. She needed a change and I found having put the light on that all the bits were elsewhere, which meant she was in the light for far too long and woke up merrily. Still, at least she was merry.

Fruit and Balloons

This has been a weekend of fruit and balloons.

This apple was 'appropriated' from the Co-op
by the tried and tested means of licking it until
Daddy had to pay for it.

Arya loves her fruit; she genuinely does. She's always liked satsumas and other small orangey citrus fruits (although actual oranges she seems to find a terrible disappointment,) has loved bananas since they stopped making her sick, and now is into her apples as well.

She's less into cinema. We went to see How to Train Your Dragon 2 on Saturday morning, and once she'd finished her popcorn and raisins and poured CapriSun on Daddy's crotch, she was pretty much done with it. We went downstairs and played a game where she ran around the arcade in the karaoke and bowling place and I tried to catch her and make her put her shoes on. It was hilarious; y'know, if you were her and except for the bits with the shoes because shoes are evil.

"Do you come here often?"

She's at an odd stage for interacting with things. She fixates on odd things; last week she clung to her toothbrush until the milk appeared at bedtime, and she will pick up a pair of tights or PJ trousers and hug then for hours, but kick up a storm if you try to put them on her. Shoes she is particularly against at the moment, apparently because she feels she should be putting them on for herself and only over her toes.

All in all she's very independent and very bold. It can be hard keeping hold of her, so on roads and in crowded places she has to go in the pushchair which, much of the time, she hates. It's heartbreaking to fight her into the chair, especially as 'No, Daddy! No!' is now an established part of her vocabulary, but the alternative is letting her run around in car parks, so it's a no brainer.

All your fruit are belong to us!

Arya was full of beans this weekend; literally as well as figuratively. We had some trouble with food, although that could come down to 'doesn't like pumpkin' as we had chicken and pumpkin risotto on Friday and an amazingly gloopy potato and pumpkin soup on Sunday.

Mind you, that doesn't explain the roast fish and veg that she's nommed before.

Anyway, beans are a good fallback to make sure that she eats something (fibre, protein, vitamins) and we also had a Frankie and Benny's breakfast after the half-movie and run around because she was taken with their balloons. She was of course then desperately aggrieved to be put back in the pushchair and howled all the way to the Co-op by the station, where we bought much needed fruit (we were down to two satsumas and one banana, which unbeknownst to me, Mummy had already eaten.)

Happiness is a warm orange.

She immediately wanted to be allowed to hold the fruit, and was upset when I took it away to pay for. I then offered to peel a banana for her, but no; she didn't want a peeled banana to eat, she just wanted to hold all of the bananas and all of the satsumas.

Still, it made her chipper as anything as we walked quickly to the station. There we had to get past the wankers who had decided that because the barriers were open it was totally okay to go the wrong way though the 'wide access for pushchairs and such' gate, in spite of the Dad and baby coming the other way. As a result of this, we missed our train by seconds and had to wait an hour for the next one. Fortunately, Arya soon went to sleep, although she woke up when we got home and I tried to extract her from her fruit pile.

Everyone loves balloons, right?

She was also given a balloon in McDonald's on Sunday. This one floated, and hilarity ensued as she swiftly realised that a) it floated and b) releasing the string would lead to Mummy and Daddy grabbing for it in an amusing way (at least until Mummy 'lost' her grip and let it float away out of sight.)

I do worry about her love of messing with the
oven controls (or any turny thing; I
accidentally boil-washed a bunch of clothes
after she left; hopefully no harm was done.)

After McDonald's and a very rich honey and almond hot chocolate in Starbucks (she had a baby hot chocolate and just ate the cream off the top) we bought her some new clothes and went swimming, where she had fun on the floating mat and then dancing with her reflection in a mirrored pedestal, which was like the most adorable thing ever.

She was also much better at being bathed this weekend, actually sitting to play with her whistling dolphins instead of standing and bending precariously to reach them. She even lay on her tummy and practiced swimming a little. Then she fought me like a demon when I tried to put her nappy on afterwards.

So, it's been swings and roundabouts again this weekend, but fortunately at any time I feel frustrated either with her or with my own ability as a parent I have the rampaging toddler and his screaming, shouting, swearing parents upstairs to reassure me that I am the bomb at parenting. Um... yay?

Everything is terrible!

The title exaggerates; popcorn is still
awesome.

It's been a tough weekend.

Hannah and Arya came over a day early, due to cancelled other plans. It was great to have them there, but sad that their plans had fallen through.

On Saturday I had a dentist's appointment and Hannah went out for tea in the afternoon, and the on Sunday I was going to take Arya into town to visit the botanical gardens. When the weather turned bad, I figured I could take her to the cinema instead (she still gets to run around a bit and we'e indoors,) but I messed up the timing (I'm sure that the Sunday trains used to be the same time as the weekday ones.) Hannah drove us in, but we ended up running late and it took out a lot of Hannah's working time.

In addition, it looks like Arya is going through a major growth spurt and (to judge by the drool) teething like a shark. This apparently means she is deeply uncomfortable in her own skin and not wanting to be touched except absolutely on her own terms, a fact that she alerted me to by struggling away from me at bedtime, screaming 'no, daddy' and calling for mummy.

This morning she hit me with a shoe for good measure. This parenthood lark* is a proper emotional rollercoaster.

* Of course, what days like these bring home is that parenthood is no lark; it's all and everything.