Everyone here is quite tired as a result of such a frantic weekend, but it was well worth it.
My only regret? That there was so much great stuff going on and so many people to catch up with and chat to that I came away feeling as though I only saw/did about half of what I wanted to!
Oh, and the girls were flower girls along with another little girl called Anna, and all three of them did an excellent job.
I can’t help thinking this morning how lucky it is that children love their parents unconditionally and have such unpredictably short memories.
As mentioned before, Millie has been a bit of a nightmare lately, and I lost my temper with her this morning after yet another bout of screaming, shouting and hitting people – so much so that I grabbed her legs, carried her upside-down to her room, threw her on her bed and slammed the door, all the while shouting that we were not going to put up with this kind of behaviour, that she was not going to have any breakfast, that she was not coming out of her room until she calmed down and that we were sick and tired of having such a horrid little girl in our house.
Then, taking deep breaths, I went back to AmberG’s room, to finish getting her dressed and ready.
The morning hadn’t started well when I was disappointed to find Millie standing in the toilet surrounded by wee. The problem is that just lately she’s started to fly off the handle at the smallest thing – this morning she was having trouble pulling her trousers up and that sparked a tantrum. I calmly told her I would come and help once I’d finished dressing AmberG, but she started shouting and screaming and then hitting me – hence my own disappointing tantrum.
Eventually (and I mean eventually) the wailing and gnashing of teeth from Millie’s bedroom stopped and we were able to have a cuddle, both say sorry, finish getting dressed and go down for breakfast. Not without the occasional mild flare-up again, this time they were rather better handled by me and damped down without things getting out of hand.
These frequent bouts of rage are getting a bit wearing, frankly, and the sooner she grows out of them the better. I love Millie with every fibre of my being, but it’s hard to show it when she’s transmogrified into some kind of rabid kung fu banshee.
However, as I say, it’s fortunate that children love their parents unconditionally and have such unpredictably short memories because I always worry that Millie will start to hold a grudge when I lose my temper with her, the same way that adults can.
It might sound silly, but I do; and I can’t imagine anything much worse than your own children hating you. 😦
At least the worst thing AmberG does at the moment is to throw Makka-Pakka away and wail – when she does that you know she’s utterly deranged with fury. 😉
Good grief, talk about a day of ups and downs. The Lovely Melanie was away last night, out with friends in Putney, where she stayed the night as it’s remarkably difficult to get home from there of an evening.
I was woken up this morning by Millie, who had managed to precisely place a poo on the toilet seat.
Then AmberG (our new name for eBub) started screaming ten minutes later – really screaming, too, not just a bit of bog-standard grizzling. She was really hot in her cot, so Millie and I brought her into my bed to calm – and cool- down. She was very subdued and sleepy, but not unhappy.
I was quite unhappy when she sicked her breakfast up five minutes after pushing it away and saying “Nah“.
I was more unhappy when 15 minutes later she threw up while sat on my lap.
I was marginally less unhappy when she threw up again, but by the time after that I was getting pretty blasé about it (although, Millie’s lackadaisical manner upon being asked to quicklypass the kitchen roll upped my unhappiness quotient again). Fortunately I’d only put on my swimming trunks when I got up that morning (legacy of a lovely day before spent at Camber Sands in the blazing sunshine).
Next up, Millie has finally conceded that pedalling a bike by using both feet and pushing the pedals round and round instead of backwards and forwards with one foot is a superior method of locomotion, so eager as I was to see her ride a bike properly we went to the shops after breakfast and showers and scrubbing of floor. Millie was on her bike and a plainly not-right AmberG in the buggy.
Now, it’s fair enough that Millie was tired from stupidly refusing to go to sleep until a ridiculous 10pm the night before, but she was just an absolute @*$#ing nightmare all the way to the shops. Bearing in mind that I’d already cleaned her poo off the toilet and been vomited on three times it’s a miracle they haven’t found her little body buried under our patio.
It took us 35 minutes to reach the shops, a journey I normally walk in ten minutes, and all the way there was spent either grizzling, screaming, shouting at her bike, smacking her bike, shouting at me, howling with inchoate rage or all of the above simultaneously. We had to stop four times for me to try and calm her down as there seemed a real danger that she was going to completely and utterly lose it. We stopped twice more for me to ignore her until she calmed down, another three times to rub legs or arms where she’d gotten so furious that she’d hurt herself and once for me to simply yell “Shut up!” at her.
Upon finally reaching the shops we stopped to eat an ill-deserved but much-needed ice cream, whereupon I sat Millie down and told her in no uncertain terms what a nasty, horrible, shouty little madam she had been so far that day and that if she didn’t buck her damn ideas up there was no way we were going to the cinema this afternoon.
Ideas, thankfully, were significantly bucked and Millie went to the cinema for the first time this afternoon. It wasn’t an unqualified success, to be honest. The film, G-Force 3D, was a little bit too complex for her and the special glasses you had to wear to see the 3D effects were so big they wouldn’t even stay on Millie’s head (she gave up on them after ten minutes – although, not before one of the cutest things I’ve ever seen: when a particularly 3D effect shot towards us she looked over her shoulder to try and see where it went. :-D)
For the rest of the film she commented loudly upon any scene she thought would be improved by a loud comment and shouted questions – such as the marvellous “What on earth is going on?!” – every five minutes. But I think she enjoyed it – she certainly enjoyed the popcorn!
Oh, and “This place smells funny!” were her first words upon her first entrance to a cinema.
AmberG is still not well; she’s eating and drinking, thank goodness, but is very very hot and has been either cuddling or sleeping all day, the poor little thing. 😦
Because this website is as much a diary for me to look back on in the future as it is a conventional blog I thought that today I’d write an entry about what the Bexley Carters did this morning, which was a pretty average morning.
(apologies if you find the following a bit boring)
It’s a work day for me, but not for the Lovely Melanie, which also means no nursery for the girls, so no rush to get up and ready. I need to catch a train around 8.30-9, and since it’s a Friday the girls all go to the library for story and song time there, as well as to change their library books.
My alarm goes at off 7am, but we ignore that today. Millie gets up to use the loo at 7.15 and then comes in to cuddle with us. eBub can often be heard in chattering and sometimes even singing in her room – with the side of her cot up she can’t get out of there so she has to wait for us to come in and get her – but today she sleeps in.
Millie as a pussy cat, the day before
About 7.30 I go downstairs and get the breakfast things ready – Cheerios, beakers of milk, cups of juice and a tea for me. When I return upstairs Millie is in Amber’s room asking her to pass “Mr Bug” (a cuddly toy) to her. Amber ignores Millie’s request and raises her arms to me saying “Meh! Meh!” (Translation: get me out of here! Get me out of here!)
I change Amber’s nappy and put her slippers on – Amber has something of a shoe fetish at the moment (the Lovely Melanie called her the Imelda Marcos of the baby world), trying on every pair of shoes she can find and stumbling round the house in them.
The Lovely Melanie comes in and tells Millie to put her glasses on.
Somewhat unusually, Millie puts her glasses on. She also grabs her blanket, then follows Amber and I downstairs.
In the kitchen Amber goes into her baby chair, happily shouting “bibby” when I put her bib on and give her a beaker of milk. Millie no longer wears a bib when I do breakfast, but does with the Lovely Melanie. She still has a booster seat on one dining room chair, but doesn’t sit in this for breakfast any more.
The Lovely Melanie comes down and sits with the girls. I shave my head in the kitchen with a pair of shears (my, ahem, hair, has gotten a bit, cough, long, and I do this about once a week). We talk about how weird it will be when Millie starts school in two weeks and suddenly realise that this will be the last time the girls all go to song and story time together, since next Friday we’ll be going to Swindon ready for Trev and Conny’s wedding. I think about how it’s a shame we can’t make Millie aware of these milestones passing – life rushes by in a blur of new exciting things for her, with precious little time to stop and think about them.
Amber, taken by Millie
We’ve bought 100 glow sticks for Trev and Conny’s wedding and I show one to Millie, promising we can see it properly in her room with the curtains shut after she’s finished her breakfast. Amber is spooning delicious Cheerios into her mouth as fast as she can and doesn’t notice.
Millie finishes her Cheerios and we go upstairs, close the curtains in her room and for ten minutes play at being fairy godmothers with glow sticks for magic wands. Zap! Bing!
I go into the bathroom to shave my face. While Mel tidies up Amber can be heard roaming around downstairs shouting “Shoe-shoos!” or “Meh!” From the bottom of the stairs she spots me and rattles the stair gate shouting “Da-dah! Meh” I wave at her and finish shaving.
Amber and the Lovely Melanie come upstairs; Amber is dressed by the Lovely Melanie; I get into the shower. Amber climbs on the top of the loo and examines all the pretty things on the window sill. She’s not terribly safe on there to be honest and I’m watching her carefully from the shower. Fortunately she doesn’t fall off.
Where is Millie?
When I get out of the shower I show Amber the glow sticks in Millie’s room. She shrieks with delight!
She walks out of Millie’s darkened room and is less impressed.
She walks back into Millie’s room again and shrieks with delight.
Repeat four times.
Amber, hoping for dinner, the day before
I’m cleaning my teeth and she comes in to watch me, but is slightly upset at getting her socks wet on the bathroom floor. She points up at the sink and says “Teh!” until I pick her up and clean her teeth.
Toothbrush still in mouth she wanders off to find the Lovely Melanie.
No, really, where is Millie?
She’s in our room, dressed, sat at the computer, and asking for music – no, a film! – no, music! – no, a film! I give her the minimum of help to start Sleeping Beauty playing on the computer (in the last couple of weeks Millie has realised what the computer can do and has become surprisingly adept at using it). Sleeping Beauty is her favourite film ever.
Amber returns, gives me her toothbrush, climbs on the bed and grabs my iPod and phone. I grab my iPod back and let her run around the bed. The Lovely Melanie comes in and lies down on the bed with us.
I give everyone a kiss and head off to the station…
As mentioned 
