Water Baby

Station bench or magical gateway?

This weekend, I went away to play games, but on Thursday I got to spend the day with Arya.

Hanna and Arya picked me up at the park and ride and we made our way home for a quiet evening. On Thursday, Hanna headed off for work and I laid out my plan for the day to Arya: We would go to the library, then into Ely to go swimming. I checked the library opening times, and realised that it doesn't open at all on Thursday mornings.

So, we went to the station and missed a train, then waited an hour for the next one while Arya got bored.

"I want to go home now."
"All right. It's a shame, but we can go if you really..."
"I want to go swimming."
"Oo-kay..."

So, eventually we got to Ely and walked to the pool. It's quite a trek, and past her favourite playground, so she wanted to stop off there, but I pushed on through to the pool, promising we'd come to the park on the way back.

We'd not been to the Paradise Pool in Ely before, but it's actually pretty nice. The training pool has a sloped bottom going from 0-90cm, so Arya could walk in herself to about halfway. We did some jumping in and rudimentary swimming, but after however long it was mostly about getting her used to the pool again, and she was amazingly confident. I'd forgotten her new waterwings, ring and shampoo, so we rinsed hair - or as Arya would have it to judge by the cries, committed bloody murder - afterwards and went to get dry, only for Arya to take the towels, shove them back into a locker and announce that they were 'in the washing up' and couldn't be used.

Whee!

Eventually we got out and we did visit the park, even though that left us too late for the library. She had a lot of fun, but she was tired and a couple of falls took the wind out of her sails. We bought some plasters for her knee (with princesses on) and an ice cream because it was hot, then headed home for simple dinner and chilling with ponies.

On Friday we spent some time together, including an hour to get her dressed. There were some tears when I left, and she seemed pleased as punch to see me when I got home. I'm told she was quite the little beast on Saturday night, but went to sleep wonderfully for me on Sunday. I hope she was just playing up because she missed me, rather than playing favourites or trying to flannel me.

They left early Monday, Arya just about waking up enough to say goodbye.

Favourites

"I want cereal."
"But I'm making chicken curry."
"I don't like chickchick curry."
The enormity of this lie is hard to describe.

I'm starting to worry that Arya has a favourite Daddy, and it's me. You might think I'd be more worried by the opposite, and you'd be right, but I don't want either of us to be the favourite because it means someone being less favourite and it really isn't fair on Andrew some of the flack she gives him.

This thought is brought to you by the fact that we had another all-family weekend (due to Hanna's extreme tiredness after two night shifts) and Andrew got the short end of the stick, beginning with a phone call on Thursday night in which Arya insisted that she wanted to wake up at Daddy Luke's. It's not total, mind you. He is definitely Daddy of choice for ziplining, and she really isn't ever letting go of the fact that I let her stop too hard and she bumped her head. When we hit the park on Sunday she spent a good ten minutes on the zipline. Each time Andrew put her up she'd remind him over and over again 'Don't bump my head, okay?'

Children reflect things in you that you never noticed. The degree to which I use 'okay?' as a means to soften a fait accompli, for example. "Let's have lunch and maybe have a biscuit later, okay?" for example. This has been brought home by such statements as "You sit there, okay?" or "That's Mummy's. You don't drink it, okay?"

I realise this is coming across as very negative, so I ought to point out that among her many explorations of Daddy's stuff, as well as spending in-game currency on my mobile, she also managed to dial a number on my landline and greeted the voice at the other end as 'Mummy'.

"Hello, Mummy!"
"The number you have dialed has not been recognised. Please hang up and try again."
"Okay."

Arya made me 'tiger cupcake soup'. She also wanted to see the photos I was
taking, which got fiddly when I was filming her.

She's growing into a bright, determined little madame, which is both good and bad. She knows what she likes and what she wants and can be pushy, and shows delightful forthrightness and egregious levels of sass in equal parts. She can also be physically pushy to an excessive degree, and even occasionally hits. We're trying to clamp down on that before it becomes habitual. She can also be incredibly generous and very protective.

Being a parent is way, way more complicated than I ever knew, and I actually knew that it would be complicated, which is more than most people have going into the experience.

Andrew is also Daddy of choice for Duplo.

Maw Sawbries

Having walked in our shoes (one of mine
and one of Mummy's) Arya felt qualified to
judge us.

Arya loves strawberries, but I'll come back to that.

This weekend, Hanna and Arya turned up early evening, with Arya already asleep. She woke up at about eight and decided that as she had already slept, further sleep was a nonsense. I tried to settle her, then Hanna tried to settle her, then we tried to settle altogether on the sofa. Eventually Hanna's endurance gave out and I took Arya back to the bedroom, where she fussed for ten minutes then passed out gulping milk.

Saturday was... exciting, even before we drove to Ipswich after Tumble Tots. For breakfast we had pancakes and strawberries, or in Arya's case just strawberries. I would pass her one, she would eat it, then ask hopefully: "Maw sawbries?" She still doesn't like pancakes.

In Ipswich, Hanna crashed and I tried to stay awake while watching Arya try on my shoes. It got a bit surreal. Then Hanna and Andrew had a pary to go to, and Arya helped Hanna with her makeup before they left. After an hour of trying to put her to bed, she insisted on sharing my dinner, but didn't eat any of it, and then after two episodes of Pajanimals went out like a light.

Anna dress height check.

Sunday was the Water Babies sponsored splashathon (a misnomer, as it's a pajama swim rather than an endurance event; she raised £107 for Tommy's.) Swimming in pajamas is really hard work, so good for her for having a go. Then we had breakfast, then went shopping (all with her in her swimming costume, since Daddy was rubbish and didn't realise it was a pajama swim, so that was what she had to change into,) and the rest of the day was pretty chilled. We watched Despicable Me twice, but she rejected 2 and we watched Frozen once more instead.

I was ever so sad to see her go today. She refused to say goodbye, I think in the hope that I wouldn't leave without, but I had to. I'm not sure I even remembered to give Hanna the leftover strawberries to feed her.

Casting the Runes

Arya casts the runes.

Hanna and Arya came up on the Friday afternoon, and because Hanna needed to do emergency shopping they took me to lunch and then Arya came back to the office with me to do some coloring while I worked.

Yeah, stop laughing.

Of course, what happened was that she got bored after ten minutes, tried to get out onto the landing, and eventually we went up to the roof garden where she tried to cast the runes using the gravel. This is what comes of leaving her moral education in the hands of witches, I tells ya! First it's throwing pebbles, then before you know it she's doing whatever she will yet harming none (which has always struck me as a very genteel and fundamentally British kind of anarchy.)

She didn't eat much at lunch. She preferred to run around Wagamama's like a loon, and when she agreed to sit down in the common room, tried to feed me her food. She made a much better fist of her curry at dinner time, we having given up on cooking on a fundamental level due to extreme weariness.

Spoonstache!

On Friday night we split up for sleeps. I took the monitor into the man-nest (living room sofa) so that Hanna could stretch out and rest her joints. I popped YouTube on and was greeted with a small girl being menaced by supernatural evil. Thanks, Guillermo del Toro; you're a mensch.

When I finally managed to get to sleep I was woken by 'Mummy. Mummy'. I went into Arya's room, fearing the Woman in Black on 'roids, but Arya was just awake and slightly groggy.

"Mummy?" she asked.

"It's okay. It's Daddy."

"Mummy!"

Thankfully she did accept me as an alternative (this would not always be the case through a Mummy-centric weekend) and went back to sleep.

On Saturday we did something new. We took Arya to an introductory session at Tumble Tots baby gymnastic class, which is basically just a lot of guided play on mini-gym equipment to help develop coordination and the all-important ladder skills which will mark her out in later life as someone who can change a lightbulb*. She seemed to enjoy it, so we signed her up for the class.

We spent much of the rest of the afternoon in Ely, going slightly mad. Seriously, I think we were all slightly too tired and events are a bit of a blur. I think Hanna had a nap afterwards, Arya and I watched the new episodes of Sarah and Duck and... Okay, either Friday or Saturday I was introduced to Animal Mechanicals, a series on Netflix which her new bestie Marcus introduced Arya to. I think that was Friday, and on Saturday she watched a lot of Melody on CBeebies with Mummy while I made a paella.

"I call it 'Terror Mountain'."

Animal Mechanicals is a CGI series about a group of mechanical animals who are sent on missions using their oddly arbitrary mecha powers to solve problems. Melody is a mixed live-action and animated series about a partially-sighted girl who interacts imaginatively with the classical music that her mother plays for her. I like to look on this pairing as an argument for the licence fee in microcosm.

Apparently a boat.

On Sunday we were woken up by Arya calling for me (yay!) and we went swimming. Arya was clingy as anything; Hanna maintains that this is because I am anxious, but I don't think I am, and besides, I was bricking it when I took her to the playground in the afternoon (after breakfast) and she wanted to scramble over the big kid climbing frames, and that didn't stop her.

She also rode the horsie while singing 'Row Your Boat', which was adorable, if slightly confusing.

After the park, it was pretty much time to say goodbye, and Hanna took Arya off back to Martelsham for the week. Next weekend I have Arya all to myself, although we will actually be staying with my Mum and Dad.

* I may have some scars from being told I wasn't qualified to climb a ladder in the professional setting.

We're going to the zoo, zoo, zoo

The day begins as it means to go on: with owls. Arya is very
taken with the snowy owls.

On Thursday, our little girl turned two. In celebration, we decided to damn the costs; we were taking her to the zoo.

There are many arguments for and against zoos, but honestly, we took our little girl to the zoo; it was a good zoo, with a solid conservation programme, and if you have a problem with that then maybe we can discuss it another time; not here.

The zoo in question was Banham Zoo, a deceptively small establishment, given the size of many of the animal enclosures, in Norfolk. It took about an hour to drive there, we got Arya into her backpack/baby reins, gave her a helium balloon (which she adored) and set off for the entrance. For once I skimped on the gift aid, simply because Arya wanted to get on and go through the gate.

Golden lion tamarin, not tamarind. Tamarins
eat tamarinds for breakfast; or might do. I'm
not sure.

She was not to be disappointed, for on the far side there were owls. Arya has loved owls ever since she got to meet on in Cambridge (we gave serious thought to the Raptor Sanctuary, but Banham is close to my parents and looked like a more solid day out) and from the first was besotted with the ones she saw at Banham. The first pair were the snowy owls, and I've gone with the reaction shot rather than the slightly distant picture of the owls themselves. We did want to adopt an owl for Arya, but it's not cheap; I guess they eat a fair bit.

What immortal hand or eye...

The owls were a definite highlight, but there were also tamarins, a baby colobus monkey and a Siberian tiger strutting his or her* stuff right close to the glass. There were many lemurs, including a sun-bathing chap who seemed for all the world to be posing for the punters. I almost felt exploited by obliging him, but Hanna insisted that the collection would not be complete without, so here he is:

Basking.

We spent about four hours at the zoo in the end, which is a long time for a little girl. We saw the giraffes being fed and rode the road train - the driver of which pointed out that the elusive snow leopards were sitting on the roof of their house rather than any of the dramatic rocks in their enclosure - saw more owls, collected up stamps to exchange for a commemorative medal and finally went to the flying show. The European eagle in flight appeared to both delight and terrify Arya (as he* swooped a few inches overhead.)

Afterwards we went to tea with my parents, which was lovely, although by that point we were a little overloaded on sweet things and it was notable that the GF cocktail sausages went faster than any of the cakes.

The birthday girls.

We came home and had curry, because none of us had the energy left to cook, let alone wash up the cake-icing debris before hand. It had been a long day and an exciting one, and thankfully the former won out and Arya went down fast and only got a little restive in the night. Consequently, we were up and at 'em no Sunday for swimming.

Hanna remains convinced that I spook Arya at swimming. I am not conscious of doing so, but after a two week break she wasn't keen to be peeled off my neck in the pool. She did pour water over my head again, however.

The rest of the day was a Mother's Day chill out. Arya delivered Hanna's present neatly (although not as well as Hanna's birthday present, which I gave to her in the living room, saying: 'Could you give this to Mummy?' and was delighted to see her carry through to the kitchen and hand over,) although she did open my Mum's present, which I'd forgotten to take on Saturday. She napped beautifully, watched The Lion King with Hanna, rode her new hobby horse and demanded that her parents each take a turn.

I was sorry to see her go; more so even than usual. She refused to say goodbye to me, I think in the hope that if she didn't, I wouldn't let her leave. I didn't want to.

* It seemed rude to ask.

**In this case they told us.

Daddy, Ready, Go

Condiments: The new LEGO.

Hanna and Arya came over on Friday evening this week.

On Saturday, we went into Ely to do some shopping and have a bit of lunch. Arya ended up napping very late and then we ran even later because we rolled up the rug, laid out some papers and did some painting on the floor, which Arya absolutely loved. It meant that we ate much too late and she was kind of too tired to be doing with it, but we do have a lovely painting of handprints.

All in all, as a result it was a struggle to get her to sleep; so much so that once she went off I basically dropped off beside her and woke up around 11 o'clock. Then she was up again at about 3.30, kept Hanna awake until 5 (at which point Hanna slipped next door), fell asleep with her head on my crotch and finally slept on my lap, which meant that I was awake from 4.30-6.00.

And then swimming happened.

It had to, really, despite everyone being tired and Hanna being ill, as they will be in Leeds next weekend and we missed enough sessions last term. As least tired parent, however, I got to take Arya swimming again.

Hanna, watching from the side, observed that I was a real pushover. "She just turns to you with those big sad eyes and you give her a cuddle instead of doing what you're meant to be doing."

What Hanna can't see is that that 'turn' is a grapple, and that being in the water and crouching awkwardly, I have no way to do other than accept the cuddle without wrestling with Arya in the pool, and that doesn't feel safe. Also, how is it helpful to force her to do things? She'll just resent swimming if I do that.

I know this is just her playing with condiments
again, but she wouldn't let us get one of her in
the Chiquitos sombrero.

She was cheeky with the name, ready gos, mind you.

To get her used to getting her face wet, we do a thing where I hold her, say 'Arya, ready, go' and then pour water over her face. The first time we did this this week she grabbed my hand and spashed the water in my face.

The second time she preempted me. No sooner had we stopped and got organised than she scooped up a handful of water, said: "Daddy, eddy, go!" and poured water over my face.

After swimming we had brunch at Chiquitos (sitting in the booth where - pre-Arya - we were told we were a lovely couple and the barman made us not-from-the-menu milkshakes) and then went on to the cinema to watch The Boxtrolls, which marks the first time she has been more interested in the screen than the popcorn. On previous Movies for Kids runs we've actually left once she's finished her kids' popcorn and raisins, but this time she had some left by the end.

After that we went home, took a walk so she could nap, and rounded off the weekend with the faithful standby spaghetti carbonara.

I now face about a fortnight without seeing my little girl, given the above mentioned trip to Leeds. I shall miss her terribly.