Paddling (hard)
June 18th, 2005 at 11:16 pm by jamesOh dear, where to begin …
The beeb upgraded their estimate to 30 degrees today and 29 tomorrow. The car said it was 37 today, the truth is probably somewhere in between.
Josie and I set out early to the market to get stuff from the fishmongers to barbeque. He had live crabs and lobster, which we had a good look at and picked up (but didn’t have the heart to take home and eat). We bought sea bass and prawns. This was probably my first mistake of the day.
Hot tip: if your wife is absolutely knackered and feeding and changing a baby every couple of hours, concentrate on simple meals with good nutritional value and lots of protein. Heinz does a great line of spaghetti in tomato sauce in the shape of Pooh bears that she could eat through a straw if she wanted to. Chargrilled sea bass and marinated prawns are not simple. Also, although eating fish just like Pingu sounds exciting and gets you running about demanding “fish, fish”, the act might not live up to the expectation. Michelle had cereal for dinner and Josie tried a little bit of everything and then ate a bread roll.
We spent most of the day outdoors, although I did manage to turn the living room into a bomb site by dismantling the table ready to take it away to make space for the sofa Michelle wants me to move in. Turns out she wanted both (and of course has neither). And just one day left before I return to work …
Jo had a great time in her paddling pool and Sophie enjoyed the dappled shade at the bottom of the garden. I let Josie run around in her costume until she piddled on Sophie’s blanket, at which point I put her back in her nappy. She started to pull the velcro; “Josie, don’t touch. Josie! Josie, look at me. [Sharp clap of the hands to generate eye contact]. Josie look at me [vigorous two-fingered ‘I’ve got my eyes on you’ motion a la Meet the Parents to keep attention]. Don’t touch your nappy darling, do you understand?”
“Yes.”
She brought it to me five minutes later carrying it carefully in both hands: “poo, daddy?” Yes, darling it is. Thanks.
I thought it’d do her bum good to run around naked outside in the evening sunshine so left her without a nappy. After a while she disappeared into the shed and I saw her moving things about so wandered down to make sure the pointy things and poisons were out of reach. She’d tipped a bag of charcoal out on the floor and was raking it around with a wire brush. She looked like a chimney sweep so I helped her rake for a bit then sent her to show Mum 😀
The next logical step was to put her on the potty, where she widdled and was rewarded then didn’t want to get off because she was sure she was going to do another one. I coaxed her off to have a special “wipe bath” – wipe down with baby wipes instead of a bath because I’d let her play far too late to have a bath but she was absolutely filthy. I turned to help her off the potty and she was holding a suspiciously damp-looking pencil. “AIOU, dad?” which is what she says when she wants to practice writing. “Just put the pencil down carefully on the table darling.”
My, what fun we’ve had.
Pics of Jo in the pool in the gallery.
We’re still decided about the conservatory.