An awfully big adventure o the non-terminal kind

Mike the Knight, a young crusader in the
world of criminals who operate above the
law...

This past weekend was our first holiday as a complete family: Hanna, Arya, Andrew and I went to Alton Towers, expressly to visit CBeebies Land. There was a plan that we would take turns with Arya or seeing other bits of the park, but that sort of fell through as plans are wont to do.

We drove up on Friday evening and thus arrived in the wilds of Staffordshire in the middle of the night and pretty much collapsed into our beds (apart from Hanna who was still wired on Monster.) At... I have no idea when, I woke from a dream in which someone was calling for Daddy Luke, stumbled over to Arya's bunk bed and curled up next to her until she woke up at about six with a cough asking for a drink of water, and that was it for sleep.

We had a big breakfast and headed into the park, then straight for CBeebies Land (after picking up food passes and a tag for Arya's wrist and other such technicalities.) We kicked off with Mike the Knight in the Big Fun Show Time arena, where Arya found an egg but had an attack of nerves and had to get another little girl to take it to Mike. We got a picture, but only with Mummy. Her shyness around CBeebies characters was a recurrent theme, matched only by her desire to be taken to see characters she would then hide from in the crook of our necks.

Before I got the camera out, she
actually gave Upsy-Daisy a huge
hug.

We went on the In the Night Garden boat ride as a family, and then I took her on the Numtums Number-Go-Round while Hanna and Andrew slipped off to do the big scary rollercoasters that wouldn't let Arya on and I don't like. It took them about an hour and a half - I think - to do Nemesis, Air, the Congo Rapids Ride and the Sonic Screwball. In the meantime, Arya and I took in the Zingzillas' show in the arena, the Postman Pat ride and Nina's Science Lab, had a bit of a picnic snack, and met Upsy-Daisy and Iggle-Piggle.

She straight begged me to take her
to meet Iggle-Piggle and then
buried her head in her arms. The
same happened with Tree Fu Tom
and MimMim

We then wandered over to look at the Tree-Top Adventure and the Octonauts Rollercoaster, but they were both very busy and before we got onto anything else Hanna and Andrew got back and we went for lunch, which was one of the few downsides. Food at Alton Towers was overwhelmingly soft carbs and protein, mostly with a BBQ sauce, with meager provision for non-fizzy drinks on the meal passes and naff all gluten free. After lunch, Hanna and I went to sate a craving for tiny fresh doughnuts, but then Arya took a tumble and split her lip, and by the time we were sure she was okay the doughnuts were cold (and the only reason I had paused long enough to collect them was that I didn't see the blood.)

I can see why she'd be wary of Jess, having seen the movie.

From the first aid centre we took the cable cars to Cloud Cuckoo Land, the other children's section, where the Charlie and the Chocolate Factory Ride proved a little too intense for Arya. By then she was tired, so we put her in the pushchair and she went spark out and stayed asleep while we went through the Hex ride in shifts.

Gangsta.

We took the Skyride back and walked to Mutiny Bay where we got Arya certified 90cm on the nose and rode the Congo River Ride as a family, which she seemed to hate; I don't think she likes being splashed unless she's also doing the splashing. It wasn't a major upset, however, and soon after she was just amused that we were all wet and she absolutely loved the Sea Life centre Sharkbait Reef exhibit, complete with actual sharks.

To finish, we went back to CBeebies Land, where we took Arya on the Octonauts ride. A family behind us were very doubtful of whether she was tall enough and, having paid for some manner of VIP pass themselves, appeared to think that her orange 'I'm 90cm' wristband meant that we'd shelled out for the super VIP 'ignore health and safety regulations in this park where they recently had some highly publicised accidents' pass. Arya was terrified, but once off the ride very firmly announced that she had enjoyed it. Then Hanna took Arya on the Tree Top ride - a little car that runs on a rail around CBeebies Land - we ate more BBQ and came home.

Born to drive.

On Saturday night Arya went off eventually, and we played some Ticket to Ride before bed.

On Sunday we failed utterly to go in early, but Hanna and Andrew still managed to get in another ride on Hex, the flume and a couple more rollercoasters while Arya and I did more CBeebies. Before they went off, they took her on the Postman Pat ride for a photograph; unfortunately it's limited to two adults per car, so I sat that one out, promising myself the next photo. Then we couldn't find anywhere else that took photos and I started to worry I'd be left with no picture of me and Arya at the park.

While Hanna and Andrew were off, we took in the Tree Fu Training ground - a decent adventure playground, but a bit too old for Arya - and then went through the sensory garden the Treetop Adventure again. The queue was long, Arya was scared by the two girls behind us - six and eight if I had to guess - constantly screaming for no reason and I was hacked off by the woman who carried her child out of line then nipped up in the wheelchair lift (presumably to join someone who was holding a place in line, which isn't supposed to be allowed,) but once we were on she absolutely adored the ride, waving at the CBeebies bugs and watching what was below us.

After that, we had a snack and got some juice from the CBeebies Land canteen, and we sat and shared a packet of biscuits in a most companionable fashion.

We met up with Hanna and Andrew for lunch, and walked up to the pseudo-West African zone where the pizza and pasta shack offered not only buffet lunch that wasn't BBQ meat, but also non-fizzy on tap, a salad bar (yay vitamins!) and gluten free pizza. They also made Arya a gluten free pizza and included it on our meal passes, despite the fact that technically we should have paid extra for them, so seriously, I like those guys.

I was clearly knackered, because
this is the only photo I took all day.

Arya took Andrew off for a walk (technically the other way around, but I like the way that reads) while Hanna and I spent some time together. We went on the spinning barrels ride and acted like total children, then the flume, then we had pancakes and headed to Cloud Cuckoo Land on the Skyline to meet up with the others and oh my gosh it was swinging all over the place. I'm sure I have a permanent crease in my linen trousers from where Hanna was clutching my leg.

Anyway, then we went on the carousel, and that was lovely, and something Hanna has kind of wanted to do with Arya for a while. We grabbed some ice cream from the Dark Forest and strolled back to CBeebies Land one last time. Andrew tried to win a fluffy unicorn for Arya, and got close, but ultimately I can't imagine it being very satisfying to win a fluffy unicorn without destroying something.

In the absence of a suitable ride, we popped into the CBeebies Photo Studio for a family pic and one of me and Arya in the greenscreen Night Garden. We bought sandwiches for the journey, rode the Nigth Garden boat one more time, then Hanna took Arya on the Numtums ride and then we were off home, with Arya clutching her new fluffy CBeebies bug.

Not a cheap weekend, nor an undemanding one, but a good one.

That way!

Arya has taken to asking to be picked up and then pointing where she wants to go and declaring 'that way' in a firm tone.

I have taken to responding with 'Hodor', a joke that she will not get for many, many years.

The Twelve Days of Christmas

On the first day of Christmas* my daughter gave to me, the joy of her presence.

On the second day of Christmas my daughter gave to me, the joy of her presents.

All right; the doll's pram was a hit.

Actually, the truth is that she sort of blanked on the whole gift thing. Of the ones she opened at my place - before becoming first bored of the whole opening presents thing and then aggrieved that we were tearing the pretty shiny paper she'd spent so many happy hours scribbling on whenever Mummy tried to address a gift - her favourite was an eerily lifelike baby doll (which she calls 'Babby') that she opened on Christmas Eve after mistaking its wrapped form for a shiny chair. We knew she'd like this because she was so taken with the one at nursery.

The extensive workbench has grown on her, so it's not all girly. In particular the vice that she can open and shut is great fun. She also got her own copy of That's Not My Santa, so the library's can go back. She did very well for books overall, from Rosie's Walk to My Cat Likes to Hide in Boxes.

The talking tea set, also a hit.

From my place, we went on to my parents, where there were more presents and more bafflement at the mass of gifts ('But I have stuff. If you give me more stuff, I have to put some of it down. What's that about?') The giant box of Duplo from Uncle Yoda was a highlight, for her daddies at least. I'm still a little grumpy that it ended up in Martlesham.

Duck was a disappointment, a very accurate stuffed toy of the co-star of Sarah & Duck, I think his failure to move and quack was a let down. (The Christmas episodes of Sarah & Duck on the other hand were delightful.)

Foodwise, she was very keen on the ham until she got some of the honey-mustard glaze, but iffy on Christmas dinner. Mind you, she was iffy on food all holiday, I think in part because some hard teething was setting in, and possible some tummy trouble, poor mite.

On the third day of Christmas my daughter gave to me, a largely peaceful journey.

My TARDIS cookie jar was another hit, but I
didn't get a decent shot to demonstrate this
for a week.

Boxing Day was a lot of travelling, and fortunately she slept through a great deal of it. We headed from Norfolk to Leeds to see Hanna's folks, where there were more presents. By this point, Arya was completely done with this unwrapping lark, although that's not to say that nothing caught her eye. Her IKEA mini-kitchen had buttons, and when Hanna recklessly put a damp blanket out of the way in the oven Arya thought this was a great game and shoved one of Babby's blankets into the microwave.

On the fourth day of Christmas my daughter gave to me, a typically exciting shopping experience. She has a complicated relationship with pushchairs at the moment, and gets antsy in busy shopping environments. It doesn't help that we got cut up by another couple with a pushchair who assumed Hanna was trying to block them out of the lift and exhibited all the classic signs of buggy rage. I'm glad I didn't hear what they were saying, as I wish for my daughter to witness neither her father punching a man for mouthing off to Mummy, nor Daddy getting his teeth kicked in for his impulsive efforts.

Come on; that's adorable, right?

On the fifth day of Christmas my daughter gave to me, a massive bout of squeeing. We were packing the car to leave for Martlesham (well, Littleport; we changed our plans halfway and went direct to Martlesham because Hanna was tired and it was getting dark and the wipers had stopped working) and apparently she decided that we were taking too long and that she would have to take charge of the driving.

Dancing with Babby!

That journey as a lot less fun for her, especially after we stopped for food at the Peterborough eerily interchangeable food court and failed to buy rain shield.

On the other hand, in the back of the car she danced.

On the sixth day of Christmas my daughter gave to me, the first of several near heart-attacks. It was while we waited for the man to fix the wipers that she decided that the perfect combination of play and being close to Mummy was to run around in the parking spaces. She also opted at one point to go into someone's garden and play with their gravel, while I tried to coax her back out ('Come out, sweetie; you don't want Daddy to get arrested for loitering, do you?')

Fun times, fun times.

His name is Iago.

On the seventh day of Christmas my daughter gave to me, another example of how I'm a sucker for her. we went into Waterstone's to return a duplicate present. We were in Ipswich and Arya was naturally distressed, so I wheeled her around the children's section while Hanna queued. 'Look,' I said, disingenuously, seeking to distract her. 'It's a dragon, as mean as can be.' 'Rah, rah!' she agreed, picking up the stuffed toy dragon from Room on the Broom and declining to release him.

He seems to be almost as loved a present as Babby, although the image of him flying on the tag seems to have inspired her to fling him about a lot.

The eighth day of Christmas was a struggle, as she was starting to get antsy napping in the afternoons, which made her grommity in the evenings. It was also New Year's Eve, which of course meant that the ninth day was rough. The ninth day also brought, however, another bout of squee.

The pre-travel visit to the play park.

I was giving her a bath and she was playing with a set of silicone cupcake cases, filling them with water and drinking it. Wanting to head off the drinking of bathwater I said lightly: 'Are you going to drink the whole bath?' Apparently assuming I was upset with her for being selfish, she immediately poured the contents of two cases into a third and handed that to me. She continued to do this for some time, and did the same for Hanna and Andrew when they came in, as if she were some sort of cocktail bartender.

On the tenth day we headed back to Littleport, where baths were apparently out of the question. Before that, however, Andrew and I took her to the play park, where she had great fun on the swings and the slide, before deciding that the best thing ever was to open and close the gate repeatedly, preferably with her daddies on the far side. On a couple of occasions she in fact opened the gate, offered me a hand, guided me through to the side she was on, and then nipped through to the other side and closed the gate behind her.

Fresh in from Ely, she opted to play with her
ducks. This was apt to the weather.

On the eleventh day of Christmas, she and I were left to our own devices, as Hanna and Andrew hit Empire Day (or rather, hit heavy traffic due to an accident on the M11, and then Empire Day.) Our trip to Ely was less than successful (she didn't nap and was so upset at being in the pushchair that I had to let her out on Ely station and wrangle her away from the platform edge when I really wanted to sit down for twenty minutes.) Exhausted as she was she went from carefree and delighted to screaming rage at the drop of a hat, and then as quickly settled back to kiss and boop my nose. The weather was also foul.

That evening she basically started to fall asleep in her food, which wasn't good at all.

This is the best one of her interacting with the
cookie jar; sadly the cause of the fascination
(the light) is out in this image.

On the twelfth day of Christmas, the day I turned thirty eight, we had a great morning, but again she fought against napping. This was more of an issue since she'd woken up at 2 o'clock and spent two hours crying for Mummy (waking to find me there, she expected to be carried through to Mummy, because that's what always happens,) so we were both pretty burned out. When we got in from our walk she was still awake and Mummy was there, so she got very clingy for a long time, and after two nights of going down within ten minutes of taking her to bed she kicked off a storm when, after a nappy change, I turned the lights back off (damn my eyes!)

On the upside, once she went down she stayed out until 5:30, her best sleep through in weeks, and it worked out all right as by six I had to load her into the car for Hanna to get Andrew to Martlesham in time for work.

All in all, it's been an exhausting Christmas, but as I told Hanna when she asked how it was being on my own with Arya, parenthood is a lot like school. It's tough getting through it sometimes, but looking back it is, on balance, amazing. This has been my first full year of parenthood (calendar or birthday to birthday) and it continues to be the most amazing experience of my life. Yes, it can be heartbreaking, and there are times when the struggle between knowing what is right for her and that little face squeaking 'cuddle, cuddle!' is more than flesh and soul can bear, but there are also moments when she smiles at you and everything seems okay, and long stretches in between that are neither transcendently awesome nor horrible, but are filled with a light at the thought that she is in the world.

* Herein defined as December 24th

The Curse of Ipswich Station

This weekend I again spent the Friday night in Ipswich and brought Arya back on the train. For added funsies, en route I missed a train and, having time to muse, called 111 and described some symptoms I had noticed. Two hours later I was in Ipswich hospital being diagnosed with hand, foot and mouth disease!

After consulting with Hannah and Andrew, I went on to spend the night at the bungalow, and the following afternoon took Arya home by train. We got to the station with her still asleep this time, but then the damned tannoy woke her up by yelling down right in front of the lift. Given that this is the one spot that parents with pushchairs have to pass, putting the speaker there feels like a pretty shit thing to do.

She wandered a lot, but fortunately was less
fixated on hitting the emergency alarm than
the last time.

Still, she was much happier this time, at least until I made her go back into the pushchair. She pottered about, and was only really troubled after she realised that the doors had buttons and stood right up to them trying to reach and press them. She was not happy to be taken away from them.

It was a mixed evening, as she was dead tired and therefore grumpy, but we had dinner, watched the usual Pajanimals and she went off pretty quickly.

On the food front, Arya still doesn't like porridge, whatever yummy things I put in it. Okay, she might go for maple syrup, but that's far too sweet and far too expensive. She can feed that habit from her GF cereal.

On Sunday we went into town before swimming, partly to let her nap and partly to buy a stuffed Toothless from Build-a-Bear Workshop. The one of these thwarted the other somewhat; having previously been in either very early on a Sunday or in the week, the noise in BaB took me aback, and woke Arya, who at least had fun pressing the buttons for the various sounds (girl loves buttons; ain't no doubt.)

She went down alright on Sunday, allowing Hannah and I to catch up on Downton Abbey, but then woke and became upset. When she wouldn't settle, I took her through to Hannah (I was sleeping on the sofa due to lurgy,) thinking it was by now quite late. It was actually about half-one, which I realised only after Arya was snuggled in next to mummy.

Travels with My Daughter

Arya prepares to draw on something. I don't
think she really cares what.

Arya is about seventeen months now, and quite well-traveled for her age. She's been to Scotland at least three times, to Leeds many and makes frequent visits to Norwich. For all that, she's not an especially comfortable or accomplished traveler, involving as travel does for her, the process of being strapped into a car seat for hours on end and probably visiting someone that her doting parents will want to talk to, possibly distracting for as much as several minutes from the absolute and dedicated adoration of her.

The horror!

Grandpa rocks out; Arya eats a satsuma.
Legs by Granny

It was with some trepidation, therefore, that we set out on this weekend's double journey to Norfolk, first to a birthday party for our friend Jess, where mutual friends quickly felt it wise to move Jess's ornaments to a higher shelf in order to be certain that Arya could not reach them.

Me: I would apologise for the havoc, but I don't as a matter of policy.
Jess: She's a baby.
Me: It's how she rolls. I figure people can suck it up or ask us to leave.
Jess: I can suck it up for that little face.

Arya watches cousin Sebby feed the
chickens

Jess is okay.

On Sunday, having been home for sleep (but not much, as we didn't get home, or certainly didn't get Arya down, until about 10), we went to see my parents. Arya and I spent the day with them, while Hannah saw friends in the city.

My parents live in the wilds of the county, where they keep chickens. For added fun, my brother and his family - including cousins Sebby and Teddy - were also visiting. We brought Arya's purple unicorn, her star bunny, her dolly and a couple of her historically questionable plastic ducks, and we still felt underprepared by comparison.

Arya watches the chickens be fed by
cousin Sebby

Arya was quite taken with cousin Sebby. She has a great affinity for children who look like they know where they're going, and followed him about quite a bit. In return, Teddy followed her, which would have been adorable if she weren't rolling about in a sit-in device the size and shape of a Dalek's travel skirt, which her parents called a walker but I think was more accurately defined as a tank.

Arya and an apple 

Of note was the fact that Arya was very taken with the pull-along helicopter. Being a V-Tech toy it made all kinds of noise, and complained bitterly if ignored, finishing with a snarky "Goodbye" if finally obliged to enter standby. We realised that Arya didn't have any pull-along toys of her own, although she's prepared to give it the old school try with anything, whether or not it's designed for the role.

She went out to the chicken run with Granny and Sebby, where they retrieved some eggs and fed the chickens some corn. Sebby was determined to give her a go, but she wasn't up for it. I'm rather glad really, as I was worried she might try to eat the corn. She'd already had a go at the LEGO. 

Checking the ingredients

We also picked apples from the orchard, and made some LEGO models by the time-honoured method of her bringing me pieces to put together and then pulling them apart if I got it 'wrong'. She's so judgey.

We got home earlier than on Saturday, but not early exactly.

Reading

Yesterday, I had work. Hannah met a friend in town for lunch and then came in to see me for tea. As it was by then four o'clock, I knocked off early to go home with them by car. We went via Boots for wipes (which was harder to do than it sounds), which Arya very much enjoyed reading the packet of (upside down, just so I wouldn't think she was even more precocious than I do already).

Arya & Duck

Hannah picked her up a new book, and her first pull-along toy, which she is so taken with that she tends to carry it everywhere, slightly defeating the purpose (the picture on the right shows a rare exception). we saw a lovely rainbow on the way home, but Arya was on the wrong side of the car to really notice.

This morning I had to put her in the car again. It was a bit of a struggle, and part of me didn't want to fight her since she was on her way back to Ipswich with Mummy. I will miss them both madly for the next few days.

For reference, I've been reviewing some of our shared viewing on my movie and TV blog, My Life as a Doge.