My boy’s school play took place last week.
I had it written in the calendar, which is hidden behind the mountain of important letters, which are pinned behind the funny postcards on the notice board in our kitchen. How could I possibly have missed it?
On Wednesday morning my youngest son asked me where his ox costume was, that the school play started in an hour and he would much prefer to just wear it in instead of his school uniform.
I know that I promised that child that I would fashion him an ox costume, I remember nodding as he described how it should look, however the manifestation and materialisation of promises department in my brain let me down badly.
I stood and nodded again as the boy told me how nervous he was about his big performance and tried not to let him see me hyperventilate as he impressed upon me the need for a really good costume, not one fashioned from something stupid like, I don’t know, plastic bags. The boy may well have psychic abilities.
Now, I know how important these things are for any kid’s school cred and I also know that this express costume challenge is payback for the predicament I left my own mother on many a December morning back in the day.
In fairness my own mother was slightly less flamboyant in her Christmas play costume design. There was no faux fur or silky material wasted on us. Regardless of what role I was playing she fashioned my outfit from those striped flannelette bed sheets that were all the rage with Northern Irish housewives in the 60s.
‘You’re a donkey eh? Well you’re a donkey of the faded bed sheet variety that is common in Peru.
‘You’re a little star? Where are those bed sheets? You can be a washed out bed sheet star and we’ll give you a belt make from tinsel, that’s Christmassy eh?’
I suppose she had to get it spot on once, the year I was a shepherd. Well, everyone knows that the standard issue shepherd’s uniform consists of faded stripy bed sheet and tasselled tieback from the living room curtains.
I vowed to spare my son from rushed and ill-thought out Christmas play costume humiliation.
So I sent the boy upstairs to get in the zone and spent the next 30 minutes running around the house picking things up and putting them down, throwing stuff overhead out of cupboards and muttering maniacally.
Despite being half country girl (mum from Donegal) my eyes have never once gazed upon an ox of any description. Do they even exist in Ireland? Where do the teachers get these wacky ideas?
Yes. Well, apparently the Bible.
A quick search on Google revealed that the ox was, in fact, the main man to keep Baby Jesus warm in the Manger. All thoughts of using that Scooby Doo Halloween costume went straight out of my head. A giant, talking dog just wouldn’t have fitted in among all those deeply religious men that bore witness to the birth of Christ. This was a serious role and demanded a serious costume.
I decided that Caolan’s interpretation of this blessed ox would look shockingly like the sandy coloured fluffy faux fur throws I bought last week in a well-known fabric and furniture store to cover my sofa.
I sewed those throws like my life, and the reputation of my boy as a serious actor, depended on it. While Caolan got himself into the role I fashioned the best dog-gone ox costume I, or anyone else whose eyes fell upon it, had ever seen. We’re talking BBC props department stuff here. In fact I’d say there were a few parents in the front row on the day of the play feeling more than a little nervous about the inclusion of an actual live ox in the proceedings. It was that good.
My older son played an inn-keeper. Everyone knows inn-keepers circa 1AD sported washed out stripy bed sheets, much like their sheep shepherding pals. Daniel added to the effect by drawing a big bushy beard and elaborate curly moustache, using a permanent black pen. And, surprisingly, it was a good look for the boy. Good job too because it’ll be weeks before it comes off.
Daniel might just be the man to bring drawn on facial hair back into fashion in primary school age kids. You mark my words 2011 will be the year of the fake beard.
Wednesday 22 December 2010
Tuesday 14 December 2010
Send help. And chocolate....
I don’t know how much more I can take. We have been stranded for more than a week now. The six of us together. In the same house. I’m hoping that the following information will go someway to allowing the proper authorities to piece together the circumstances running up to the assaults, criminal damage and various other crimes that happened in the week from hell.
If by some miracle this message reaches you, please send help. And chocolate.
Day one, Saturday
Mood – Christmassy
Housebound for the day due to failure of car that never starts to start.
Snowflakes falling gently outside, fire roaring in the hearth. Children’s laughter rings out throughout the house. The smell of sweet cinnamon cookies hangs in the air. The baby coos in her pram. The husband tinkers lightly under the bonnet of the family car, whistling a Christmas tune. All is right with the world.
Day Two, Sunday
Mood – concerned
Snow fall significant. Children laugh and fashion various snow-related characters in the garden before walloping their heads off with spades. Have to fashion an imaginative dinner from what supplies are left in the fridge. Children demand new, warm, clean clothes at 15-minute intervals due to snowy conditions. Car that never starts still wont start. Husband floats between broken car and Google, hoping that random people on the internet might send good vibes and advice on how to fix it.
Day Three, Monday
Mood – Increasingly worried
Children ready for school and packed into the car that never starts, which doesn’t start. Husband risks combustion by asking passing bin lorry for a jump-start. Trek to school in Arctic conditions, wearing boots that can unbelievably hold several inches of snow inside. Husband decides a week working from home is only option as five years worth of snow falls outside our windows. Mechanic doesn’t come. Husband tries beating his fist on the bonnet of car and waving other fist to the heavens as a method of starting car. Doesn’t work.
Day Four, Tuesday
Mood – Deranged
Children off school due to the 10-foot of snow and deadly daggers of ice hanging from every surface. Car that never starts sits on the driveway like a giant ice cube laughing at us as we huddle in the house, with dangerously depleted coffee supplies and bereft of proper sustenance. Husband walks to the shop three miles away, leaving us with the words ‘I’m going for a walk, I may be some time’. He arrives back some time later with news that the shop has sold out of most things except beans, of which he has purchased 14 tins. Struggle to plan bean-related breakfast, lunches and dinners for the next few days or weeks. Spot four horsemen of the Apocalypse outside our window, pointing and laughing at our frozen car.
Day Five, Wednesday
Mood – Beyond crazy
Mechanic promises, for the third day in a row, to visit and fix our stricken vehicle. Mechanic has weather related problems and doesn’t turn up again. Youngest boy falls ill with bokey, screaming, and insomniac bug. May be cabin fever, may be over-consumption of baked beans.
Day Six, Thursday
Mood – End of proverbial tether
Two more children fall victim to the horrible bokey bug. House now filled with whingey, screaming children and crazy-haired, deranged parents. Still snowing outside with some freezing fog thrown in for good measure. Am awaiting the arrival of locusts to top off the apocalyptic atmosphere.
Day Seven, Friday
Mood – Oh Dear God, NO!!!
TV broken.
Loose wire at the rear means TV flickers on, teasing us with a brief glimpse at our favourite programmes before going blank. Toddler beside himself with Thomas the Tank Engine withdrawal symptoms. We are forced to listen to the radio for news of the outside world. Older children punch each other and destroy furniture for entertainment. It’s still snowing. We are still consuming baked bean-based meals.
Day Eight, Saturday
Mood – Fair to middling
Mechanic made an appearance six days late and fixed the car. Husband used scientific method to fix TV (hit screen with propelled shoe in fit of frustration). Celebrated by skidding sideways in fabulously fixed car to Sainsbury’s to purchase essential supplies – chocolate and coffee.
If by some miracle this message reaches you, please send help. And chocolate.
Day one, Saturday
Mood – Christmassy
Housebound for the day due to failure of car that never starts to start.
Snowflakes falling gently outside, fire roaring in the hearth. Children’s laughter rings out throughout the house. The smell of sweet cinnamon cookies hangs in the air. The baby coos in her pram. The husband tinkers lightly under the bonnet of the family car, whistling a Christmas tune. All is right with the world.
Day Two, Sunday
Mood – concerned
Snow fall significant. Children laugh and fashion various snow-related characters in the garden before walloping their heads off with spades. Have to fashion an imaginative dinner from what supplies are left in the fridge. Children demand new, warm, clean clothes at 15-minute intervals due to snowy conditions. Car that never starts still wont start. Husband floats between broken car and Google, hoping that random people on the internet might send good vibes and advice on how to fix it.
Day Three, Monday
Mood – Increasingly worried
Children ready for school and packed into the car that never starts, which doesn’t start. Husband risks combustion by asking passing bin lorry for a jump-start. Trek to school in Arctic conditions, wearing boots that can unbelievably hold several inches of snow inside. Husband decides a week working from home is only option as five years worth of snow falls outside our windows. Mechanic doesn’t come. Husband tries beating his fist on the bonnet of car and waving other fist to the heavens as a method of starting car. Doesn’t work.
Day Four, Tuesday
Mood – Deranged
Children off school due to the 10-foot of snow and deadly daggers of ice hanging from every surface. Car that never starts sits on the driveway like a giant ice cube laughing at us as we huddle in the house, with dangerously depleted coffee supplies and bereft of proper sustenance. Husband walks to the shop three miles away, leaving us with the words ‘I’m going for a walk, I may be some time’. He arrives back some time later with news that the shop has sold out of most things except beans, of which he has purchased 14 tins. Struggle to plan bean-related breakfast, lunches and dinners for the next few days or weeks. Spot four horsemen of the Apocalypse outside our window, pointing and laughing at our frozen car.
Day Five, Wednesday
Mood – Beyond crazy
Mechanic promises, for the third day in a row, to visit and fix our stricken vehicle. Mechanic has weather related problems and doesn’t turn up again. Youngest boy falls ill with bokey, screaming, and insomniac bug. May be cabin fever, may be over-consumption of baked beans.
Day Six, Thursday
Mood – End of proverbial tether
Two more children fall victim to the horrible bokey bug. House now filled with whingey, screaming children and crazy-haired, deranged parents. Still snowing outside with some freezing fog thrown in for good measure. Am awaiting the arrival of locusts to top off the apocalyptic atmosphere.
Day Seven, Friday
Mood – Oh Dear God, NO!!!
TV broken.
Loose wire at the rear means TV flickers on, teasing us with a brief glimpse at our favourite programmes before going blank. Toddler beside himself with Thomas the Tank Engine withdrawal symptoms. We are forced to listen to the radio for news of the outside world. Older children punch each other and destroy furniture for entertainment. It’s still snowing. We are still consuming baked bean-based meals.
Day Eight, Saturday
Mood – Fair to middling
Mechanic made an appearance six days late and fixed the car. Husband used scientific method to fix TV (hit screen with propelled shoe in fit of frustration). Celebrated by skidding sideways in fabulously fixed car to Sainsbury’s to purchase essential supplies – chocolate and coffee.
Wednesday 8 December 2010
No level seven mummy's boys...
We have a cupboard under our stairs, which plays host to a vast array of broken, useless and long forgotten stuff. It houses ironing boards with bits missing, prams, odd wellies and doubles up as a vacuum cleaner graveyard.
I don’t know why I don’t throw these vacuum cleaners out, perhaps I hold onto the hope that the husband might one day be overwhelmed with the notion to fix them all, therefore providing me with a different vacuum for every room in the house.
I am also bewildered as to why I have such a high turnover of the things. Am I the black widow of vacuums as well as motor vehicles? Why does everything mechanical I touch turn to dust? These questions and more I pondered as I rummaged about in that dark, spidery closet under the stairs.
And then I saw it. The industrial vacuum cleaner that the husband purchased when I let him off the leash one day in B&Q. A big, angry brute of a thing that sounded much like a jet airplane and sucked up everything, including rugs and small pets. I believe he was sucked in, so to speak, by the pictures on the box – a boiler-suited gentleman vacuuming up leaves on a building site, a woman wearing goggles vacuuming a pond of all things, an astronaut using the machine to hold on to his friend in outer space. The thing was a monster and, for reasons known only to himself, my husband felt that it was right up our street with regards our household vacuuming needs.
The thing could not only handle household dust and dirt it could also suck up leaves from your driveway and there was a reverse button on it which allowed the operator (as in me) to shoot the contents of the drum out at 30mph. For the five years we owned the thing I never did figure out what that particular function was useful for, until now.
The husband has to constantly remind me not to ‘mother’ our boys too much. He’s from the ‘let them find their own way’ school of parenting. Whereas he would like them to make their mistakes, learn from them and not make them again, the mother in me tries to ceaselessly shelter them from the hurt and harm that life can bring.
He allows them to swing from trees, tussle in the garden, learn to box. I, on the other hand, make sure that not an inch of skin is exposed to the elements when we go out, I would honestly prefer they wear helmets and knee pads when they play football and that they do not reach speeds of more than 3mph while running around the playground. I also find it rather difficult not to want to throttle other people’s children when they hurt or insult mine.
Perhaps my way is detrimental to their development but the mothering instinct is inbuilt and at this stage I’m afraid I can’t be reprogrammed. Nevertheless the husband continues to try and train me to stop with the ‘mummying’ so as to prevent my lads growing up to be level seven mummy’s boys.
My training was put into practice this week when the middle boy returned home from playing in the street with an angry red slap mark on his face and his shirt filled with freezing snow. One of his pals had walloped him, close range, with an icy snowball, then helpfully filled his clothes with leftover snow. He was rather annoyed about the affair, and so was I.
My first thought was to go ‘psycho mum’ get that industrial vacuum cleaner from the deepest, darkest depths of the under stairs cupboard, suck up all the snow from the front garden and shoot it 30mph from the front porch in the general direction of the perpetrator while laughing maniacally. My second thought was to stop mummying the boy and allow him to stand on his own two feet.
I spent my later teenage years in a mixed sex school in Strabane. It was hell let loose at the best of times; when the snow fell, it was all out war. Being a teacher’s daughter meant I was a target for the snowball brigade. I had to learn to kill or be killed so to speak. That is where I learnt how to fashion proper flesh freezing, face stinging snowballs. There are people in that Co Tyrone town that whisper of those snowballs in hushed, worried tones. There are people there who will never smile again because of the trauma my snowballs inflicted.
So I bypassed the old aggravated assault with a vacuum route I had been planning and decided instead to teach the kid to make my world-famous, stuff of legends snowballs. As we stood there in the front garden making our snowy ammunition we had one of those universe aligning mother son moments. Here I was giving my son the tools (and the snowballs) to fight his own battles and he felt empowered enough to head right back onto the battlefield that was our street without fear (while I paced the living room floor while biting my nails).
Watch out kids, there’s a new mini-sheriff in town.
Monday 29 November 2010
Baby girl....
The baby girl is 4 months old now, sitting up, smiling, laughing and chatting. Not intelligent conversation you understand, we're not conversing on world issues or discussing the diabolic state of the economy just yet. I'll give her a few weeks...
Swotty parent night...
If you have a child of primary school age you’ll be well aware of the InCas tests and will probably know by now if you’re child is above, below or just about average in the old smarty pants stakes.
It has to be said I’m not a big fan of testing and labelling kids. Every single child is different, learns at different speeds, and excels in different things. Although these tests are great gauges for the education system I feel that the best judge of a child’s ability is their teacher, who works with them every day.
I went to a parent’s meeting last week where the teachers discussed the progress of our children and outlined the work the kids would be doing in the next year.
Our teacher introduced us to Inky, the friendly little cartoon computer dude who will help our children prepare and take part in these tests.
I know it’s a cartoon character, I know he’s not real but the voice was so irritating that I could have easily listened to and enjoyed fingernails being scraped down a blackboard or dentists drilling teeth instead of his, probably very important, instructions.
It’s an over exaggerated Belfast accent, like the ones the Hollywood stars do. The little person who owns the voice no doubt has a beautiful accent, but I imagine that he was asked to explain everything super slowly in order for the kids to understand. Speech that would normally have taken two seconds to produce was dragged over two minutes of slow and over exaggerated drawl.
I’d say had I sat the InCas test that night the computer would have had just enough time to register my name and average reading age as five years old before I deposited the thing through the window into the watery depths of a blue recycle bin below the window.
Children at my son’s school, and I imagine schools across the north, were talking in Inky’s annoying voice for days after the tests. I would also hazard a guess that the increased rate of head flushing and playground walloping skyrocketed in direct correlation to those mimicking incidents.
After that ordeal we were introduced to the ‘new way of doing stuff’ in education. Back in the olden days, when I was a lass, we multiplied and divided numbers in a normal fashion. But that way was wrong and now we have to learn new, more complicated ways to do the same things that we already knew how to do perfectly fine before. Are you with me?
Things were running along fabulously, that is I understood largely what they were talking about, until we got to the maths part. The teacher explained that the kids would be partaking in a bit of multiplication, division and the like. She did a sum on the board and took us through it, step-by-step so we could help our children with the homework.
Now I like to think that I’m an intelligent woman, I have been through the education system and run my own business. But as my son’s primary four teacher explained the division sum I was completely and utterly baffled.
Then she asked if anyone would like to come up to the board and work it out.
The swotty parents at the front all put up their hands, other ‘not so sure I want to make a fool of myself’ parents smiled and threw knowing looks at each other, some counted on their fingers, some nodded and some coughed so that they wouldn’t be asked the answer. A few up the back, myself included, slouched on our seats, folded our arms, stretched out our legs and chewed gum violently, rolling our eyes intermittedly. A few of the Mums went the whole hog, twirling their hair around their fingers and popping gum bubbles. I opted more for the ‘slack-jawed, slouchy, please don’t pick me’ look.
In those few moments that old feeling of school nerves came flooding back…. What if the teacher picked me to go to the board? What if I don’t know the answer in front of all these people and they think I stupido? What if I choke on the chalk fumes and collapse in a snivelling heap on the floor and they have to call an ambulance and they can’t get the vehicle in because the grumpy Dad who drives the 4x4 has blocked the school entrance gates again and I die right here on these boring beige coloured slip-proof floor tiles? Oh dear God, what if?
So I did what always worked for me back then. I made no eye contact and pretended to look for something really important in my bag until a swot parent was picked and I could breathe easy again.
School’s tough kids, I don’t envy you.
It has to be said I’m not a big fan of testing and labelling kids. Every single child is different, learns at different speeds, and excels in different things. Although these tests are great gauges for the education system I feel that the best judge of a child’s ability is their teacher, who works with them every day.
I went to a parent’s meeting last week where the teachers discussed the progress of our children and outlined the work the kids would be doing in the next year.
Our teacher introduced us to Inky, the friendly little cartoon computer dude who will help our children prepare and take part in these tests.
I know it’s a cartoon character, I know he’s not real but the voice was so irritating that I could have easily listened to and enjoyed fingernails being scraped down a blackboard or dentists drilling teeth instead of his, probably very important, instructions.
It’s an over exaggerated Belfast accent, like the ones the Hollywood stars do. The little person who owns the voice no doubt has a beautiful accent, but I imagine that he was asked to explain everything super slowly in order for the kids to understand. Speech that would normally have taken two seconds to produce was dragged over two minutes of slow and over exaggerated drawl.
I’d say had I sat the InCas test that night the computer would have had just enough time to register my name and average reading age as five years old before I deposited the thing through the window into the watery depths of a blue recycle bin below the window.
Children at my son’s school, and I imagine schools across the north, were talking in Inky’s annoying voice for days after the tests. I would also hazard a guess that the increased rate of head flushing and playground walloping skyrocketed in direct correlation to those mimicking incidents.
After that ordeal we were introduced to the ‘new way of doing stuff’ in education. Back in the olden days, when I was a lass, we multiplied and divided numbers in a normal fashion. But that way was wrong and now we have to learn new, more complicated ways to do the same things that we already knew how to do perfectly fine before. Are you with me?
Things were running along fabulously, that is I understood largely what they were talking about, until we got to the maths part. The teacher explained that the kids would be partaking in a bit of multiplication, division and the like. She did a sum on the board and took us through it, step-by-step so we could help our children with the homework.
Now I like to think that I’m an intelligent woman, I have been through the education system and run my own business. But as my son’s primary four teacher explained the division sum I was completely and utterly baffled.
Then she asked if anyone would like to come up to the board and work it out.
The swotty parents at the front all put up their hands, other ‘not so sure I want to make a fool of myself’ parents smiled and threw knowing looks at each other, some counted on their fingers, some nodded and some coughed so that they wouldn’t be asked the answer. A few up the back, myself included, slouched on our seats, folded our arms, stretched out our legs and chewed gum violently, rolling our eyes intermittedly. A few of the Mums went the whole hog, twirling their hair around their fingers and popping gum bubbles. I opted more for the ‘slack-jawed, slouchy, please don’t pick me’ look.
In those few moments that old feeling of school nerves came flooding back…. What if the teacher picked me to go to the board? What if I don’t know the answer in front of all these people and they think I stupido? What if I choke on the chalk fumes and collapse in a snivelling heap on the floor and they have to call an ambulance and they can’t get the vehicle in because the grumpy Dad who drives the 4x4 has blocked the school entrance gates again and I die right here on these boring beige coloured slip-proof floor tiles? Oh dear God, what if?
So I did what always worked for me back then. I made no eye contact and pretended to look for something really important in my bag until a swot parent was picked and I could breathe easy again.
School’s tough kids, I don’t envy you.
Monday 15 November 2010
Merry Christmas....
Happy Christmas one and all!
Yes I know that it’s early November, the aroma of pumpkins and toffee apples still hangs heavy in the air but the world has, once again, gone Christmas mad.
I heard the first tinkling of silver bells as I was shoving vampire capes and witches hats into the attic. The TV showed me pictures of perfect families, on perfect sofas, with perfect clothes and perfect lives.
This advert and the one following it told me that what I have isn’t quite good enough, my family aren’t quite well enough dressed, and if I really want to be happy, deep down happy, I need that white sofa and I need that gorgeous jacket and my kids need the very latest, most expensive gadgets. And I need them all NOW! I need them to properly celebrate Christmas. If I don't have them my Christmas will be, quite literally crap.
There are times when I find myself almost hypnotised by these adverts promising a beautiful family Christmas, complete with snowy scenes and laughing relatives all exchanging gifts in a exquisitely cosy living room with an open fire.
Then the guilt kicks in. Why can’t I give my children that kind of perfect Christmas? One where the house is packed to the rafters with expensive gifts, every one of us is kitted out in fancy designer gear, the house is decorated to perfection with brand new sofas and furnishings and there are gentle flakes of snow fluffing about our shiny new BMW X3.
For two seconds those advertising geniuses take over my brain and make me stressed, make me panic and have me think I need all this stuff to have an actual happy Christmas.
But let’s be honest folks, no one’s Christmas is that perfect, unless you’re Twiggy or Danni Minogue.
I’d say if one of the big shopping stores were to make a Christmas advert about our family – with me being the star of course – it would go something like this…
Camera pans into star’s bedroom. Clock says 4.02am. Parents have just climbed into bed after spending the night assembling Thomas the flipping Tank Engine tracks and ‘test driving’ and ultimately breaking remote control cars. Middle son bursts into room screaming that it is the morning and that Santa has been and gone. He screams that he can hear a remote control car singing 'Who Let the Dogs Out' and wakes rest of family. Baby screams, toddler demands to be let out of his cage, oldest child shouts obscenities from under duvet.
Camera breaks to star’s husband – wearing fetching Christmas jumper and big grumpy face – outside house with engine hood popped. Jump wires are dangling around neck in the hope that one of the neighbours – who are indoors having one of those perfect Christmases – will assist him in jump-starting the car.
Camera moves to star’s mother’s home. Smoke bellows from kitchen into beautifully festive hall. Smoke alarm rings out as various children run screaming up and down stairs, hitting each other with toy swords and sweeping brushes.
Star’s brother stirs ‘mulled wine’ concoction on the stove and talks loudly while ignoring smoking turkey quite clearly on fire in the oven. Star’s sister offers to be mulled wine taster and critic, while she consumes half a tin of Roses at the kitchen table. Star’s older brother tries to dismantle latest fancy gadget he got for Christmas with a screwdriver.
Camera breaks to dining room where star’s younger brother and older sister look drunkenly from squinted eyes at dinner and assure each other that if you keep one foot on ground the room will stop spinning. A gigantic jug half-filled with boiling wine and unpeeled oranges sits between them on the dinner table.
In the corner older brother reassembles his Christmas present which started off life as a DVD player, but is now a toaster.
Star’s husband presents his world-renowned sage and onion stuffing to a chorus of cheers. Star and sister hold a minute’s silence for the deceased turkey.
Gathered family eat, drink and are very merry indeed.
Near the window lights twinkle on a 35-year-old artificial Christmas tree which has branches missing and branches taped on but is still just about able to carry a vast array of sentimental decorations and skinny tinsel.
Children fight, babies scream, dogs bark. Star is surrounded by the people she loves dearly and they’re all laughing.
Camera pans out the window, where a real Christmas tree – bought in haste at a petrol station, positioned in the front garden and dangerously decorated with indoor lights – falls down, fusing the lights.
That’s my kind of Christmas. You can keep your perfect one.
Yes I know that it’s early November, the aroma of pumpkins and toffee apples still hangs heavy in the air but the world has, once again, gone Christmas mad.
I heard the first tinkling of silver bells as I was shoving vampire capes and witches hats into the attic. The TV showed me pictures of perfect families, on perfect sofas, with perfect clothes and perfect lives.
This advert and the one following it told me that what I have isn’t quite good enough, my family aren’t quite well enough dressed, and if I really want to be happy, deep down happy, I need that white sofa and I need that gorgeous jacket and my kids need the very latest, most expensive gadgets. And I need them all NOW! I need them to properly celebrate Christmas. If I don't have them my Christmas will be, quite literally crap.
There are times when I find myself almost hypnotised by these adverts promising a beautiful family Christmas, complete with snowy scenes and laughing relatives all exchanging gifts in a exquisitely cosy living room with an open fire.
Then the guilt kicks in. Why can’t I give my children that kind of perfect Christmas? One where the house is packed to the rafters with expensive gifts, every one of us is kitted out in fancy designer gear, the house is decorated to perfection with brand new sofas and furnishings and there are gentle flakes of snow fluffing about our shiny new BMW X3.
For two seconds those advertising geniuses take over my brain and make me stressed, make me panic and have me think I need all this stuff to have an actual happy Christmas.
But let’s be honest folks, no one’s Christmas is that perfect, unless you’re Twiggy or Danni Minogue.
I’d say if one of the big shopping stores were to make a Christmas advert about our family – with me being the star of course – it would go something like this…
Camera pans into star’s bedroom. Clock says 4.02am. Parents have just climbed into bed after spending the night assembling Thomas the flipping Tank Engine tracks and ‘test driving’ and ultimately breaking remote control cars. Middle son bursts into room screaming that it is the morning and that Santa has been and gone. He screams that he can hear a remote control car singing 'Who Let the Dogs Out' and wakes rest of family. Baby screams, toddler demands to be let out of his cage, oldest child shouts obscenities from under duvet.
Camera breaks to star’s husband – wearing fetching Christmas jumper and big grumpy face – outside house with engine hood popped. Jump wires are dangling around neck in the hope that one of the neighbours – who are indoors having one of those perfect Christmases – will assist him in jump-starting the car.
Camera moves to star’s mother’s home. Smoke bellows from kitchen into beautifully festive hall. Smoke alarm rings out as various children run screaming up and down stairs, hitting each other with toy swords and sweeping brushes.
Star’s brother stirs ‘mulled wine’ concoction on the stove and talks loudly while ignoring smoking turkey quite clearly on fire in the oven. Star’s sister offers to be mulled wine taster and critic, while she consumes half a tin of Roses at the kitchen table. Star’s older brother tries to dismantle latest fancy gadget he got for Christmas with a screwdriver.
Camera breaks to dining room where star’s younger brother and older sister look drunkenly from squinted eyes at dinner and assure each other that if you keep one foot on ground the room will stop spinning. A gigantic jug half-filled with boiling wine and unpeeled oranges sits between them on the dinner table.
In the corner older brother reassembles his Christmas present which started off life as a DVD player, but is now a toaster.
Star’s husband presents his world-renowned sage and onion stuffing to a chorus of cheers. Star and sister hold a minute’s silence for the deceased turkey.
Gathered family eat, drink and are very merry indeed.
Near the window lights twinkle on a 35-year-old artificial Christmas tree which has branches missing and branches taped on but is still just about able to carry a vast array of sentimental decorations and skinny tinsel.
Children fight, babies scream, dogs bark. Star is surrounded by the people she loves dearly and they’re all laughing.
Camera pans out the window, where a real Christmas tree – bought in haste at a petrol station, positioned in the front garden and dangerously decorated with indoor lights – falls down, fusing the lights.
That’s my kind of Christmas. You can keep your perfect one.
Monday 8 November 2010
Stupid technology....
If you are one of those parents who needs to know every aspect of your child’s existence when they venture beyond your line of vision then inventors in Japan might be rolling right up your street.
An experiment currently running there is allowing full-time working parents the opportunity to watch every aspect of their little darling’s day while they are allegedly hard at work – you know checking Facebook and shopping on Amazon.
These suspicious mums and dads can not only know the exact location of their offspring, but a camera connected to a heart monitor will take a snapshot of what their youngster is seeing should their pulse rise to a level indicating that they might be under stress.
The Japanese say that the data from the brilliantly named ‘gyroscopic accelerometer’, GPS device and compass can only be accessed through a password-protected website which contains live updates of the kid’s play – pictures and all. Future designs will also include a microphone, which will mean parents can eavesdrop on conversations also.
The manufacturers say these devices will start at £400 a pop, more if you want a microphone. So for a mere £1,200 I can listen to my boys discuss loudly the merits of Red Power Ranger over Spiderman at school as well as at home, complete with pictures of them whopping each other over the head with schoolbags and large branches. I can wince as I watch them tussle violently with their mates like mini World Wrestling Federation players in the playground or tune in to see them jump from high walls or trees.
This is what I imagine they do of a day, this new technology could reveal their true lifes – my boys could well be criminal masterminds, hustling dinner money from classmates and throwing thinly veiled threats around like confetti.
It will also save me asking about their day when school’s out which will be a big plus. Today these conversations go a little like this.
“Hello darling son, I’m delighted to see you. School is really too long, I missed your smiling face.”
Grunt.
“How was your day son?”
Shrugs shoulders.
“The school curriculum really is fantastically choc-a-bloc with all things educational. What did you do all day?”
“Nothing”.
“What did you get for lunch in that delightful establishment one calls the canteen?”
“Crisps”.
“I imagine we have loads of fascinating homework to complete tonight eh?”
“Shut up”.
All this new technology is all well and good when it works in your favour, but when it hampers your very existence it’s not so hot.
A few days ago I took the passenger side off our car when I had a tussle with a trolley bay in a supermarket. The thing just jumped out at me from nowhere. I dented the two doors badly and left a considerable amount of stone silver paint behind as a reminder of how women shouldn’t really be allowed to operate machinery any more technologically taxing than a vacuum cleaner.
Yesterday I decided that since the kids were off school for half term I’d have a nice day, go off the air and head for the park. I packed the car with all the stuff one needs when heading to the park with four kids – tent, puncture kit, first aid supplies, pram, tranquiliser dart and gun, substantial refreshments, mountain of wipes, vast amounts of money, mountain rescue contact numbers, nappies, sheep dog etc – and put all the kids in as well.
The car wouldn’t start. It made a ticking noise and a sign screamed ‘Engine Malfunction, Engine Malfunction!!’
You see the car is one of those fancy pants hi-tech vehicles that flashes instructions to tell you what’s wrong. It has also been known to shout some of them in an annoying computer voice, presumably for the benefit of blind drivers.
So I took all the kids out and phoned the mechanic – who is tellingly on speed dial. The guy came out and asked me if I was the wife of that poor, long-suffering man who has no end to car troubles. I said I most probably was.
He asked me if I was the one who accidentally blew up her husband’s car in the town centre one Christmas. I said I was. He asked me if I was the one who had an almost magnetic attraction to gates and gateposts, mysteriously burnt out five clutches and if it was me who crashed into her father’s car in his own driveway. I said I was.
After assessing and presumably having a conversation with the car he told me that due to the fact that I had crashed into yet another inanimate object the door’s hi-tech sensors were damaged. He says the car had spent all Sunday night and the early hours of Monday morning shouting and flashing at no one in particular that ‘This door is damaged and won’t close properly’, ‘this door, this one here, won’t close and it’s making me anxious’, ‘This door!!! Won’t close!! Wasting the battery, Arggghhhh!!’ The result being that unless we spend ‘big, big money’ on two new doors we’ll have to jumpstart the car every time we go out.
So it looks like I’ll have to use the cash I had wished to spend on super spy technology on stupid car technology instead.
An experiment currently running there is allowing full-time working parents the opportunity to watch every aspect of their little darling’s day while they are allegedly hard at work – you know checking Facebook and shopping on Amazon.
These suspicious mums and dads can not only know the exact location of their offspring, but a camera connected to a heart monitor will take a snapshot of what their youngster is seeing should their pulse rise to a level indicating that they might be under stress.
The Japanese say that the data from the brilliantly named ‘gyroscopic accelerometer’, GPS device and compass can only be accessed through a password-protected website which contains live updates of the kid’s play – pictures and all. Future designs will also include a microphone, which will mean parents can eavesdrop on conversations also.
The manufacturers say these devices will start at £400 a pop, more if you want a microphone. So for a mere £1,200 I can listen to my boys discuss loudly the merits of Red Power Ranger over Spiderman at school as well as at home, complete with pictures of them whopping each other over the head with schoolbags and large branches. I can wince as I watch them tussle violently with their mates like mini World Wrestling Federation players in the playground or tune in to see them jump from high walls or trees.
This is what I imagine they do of a day, this new technology could reveal their true lifes – my boys could well be criminal masterminds, hustling dinner money from classmates and throwing thinly veiled threats around like confetti.
It will also save me asking about their day when school’s out which will be a big plus. Today these conversations go a little like this.
“Hello darling son, I’m delighted to see you. School is really too long, I missed your smiling face.”
Grunt.
“How was your day son?”
Shrugs shoulders.
“The school curriculum really is fantastically choc-a-bloc with all things educational. What did you do all day?”
“Nothing”.
“What did you get for lunch in that delightful establishment one calls the canteen?”
“Crisps”.
“I imagine we have loads of fascinating homework to complete tonight eh?”
“Shut up”.
All this new technology is all well and good when it works in your favour, but when it hampers your very existence it’s not so hot.
A few days ago I took the passenger side off our car when I had a tussle with a trolley bay in a supermarket. The thing just jumped out at me from nowhere. I dented the two doors badly and left a considerable amount of stone silver paint behind as a reminder of how women shouldn’t really be allowed to operate machinery any more technologically taxing than a vacuum cleaner.
Yesterday I decided that since the kids were off school for half term I’d have a nice day, go off the air and head for the park. I packed the car with all the stuff one needs when heading to the park with four kids – tent, puncture kit, first aid supplies, pram, tranquiliser dart and gun, substantial refreshments, mountain of wipes, vast amounts of money, mountain rescue contact numbers, nappies, sheep dog etc – and put all the kids in as well.
The car wouldn’t start. It made a ticking noise and a sign screamed ‘Engine Malfunction, Engine Malfunction!!’
You see the car is one of those fancy pants hi-tech vehicles that flashes instructions to tell you what’s wrong. It has also been known to shout some of them in an annoying computer voice, presumably for the benefit of blind drivers.
So I took all the kids out and phoned the mechanic – who is tellingly on speed dial. The guy came out and asked me if I was the wife of that poor, long-suffering man who has no end to car troubles. I said I most probably was.
He asked me if I was the one who accidentally blew up her husband’s car in the town centre one Christmas. I said I was. He asked me if I was the one who had an almost magnetic attraction to gates and gateposts, mysteriously burnt out five clutches and if it was me who crashed into her father’s car in his own driveway. I said I was.
After assessing and presumably having a conversation with the car he told me that due to the fact that I had crashed into yet another inanimate object the door’s hi-tech sensors were damaged. He says the car had spent all Sunday night and the early hours of Monday morning shouting and flashing at no one in particular that ‘This door is damaged and won’t close properly’, ‘this door, this one here, won’t close and it’s making me anxious’, ‘This door!!! Won’t close!! Wasting the battery, Arggghhhh!!’ The result being that unless we spend ‘big, big money’ on two new doors we’ll have to jumpstart the car every time we go out.
So it looks like I’ll have to use the cash I had wished to spend on super spy technology on stupid car technology instead.
Monday 1 November 2010
Bad day....
Ever have one of those days when nothing, NOTHING, goes right?
Decided to go off the air on Monday and enjoy a nice, relaxing day with my delightful kids.
Youngest and middle boys had me awake all night with feverish jibber jabbering about people building roads through their beds, projectile puking and the like. Rose in the morning to find a nice letter from the bank to inform me about charges.
Packed everyone into the car and it wouldn't start.
A few days ago me and the car had tussle with a trolley bay in Dunelm Mill. The thing just jumped out at me from nowhere. I ripped off a good portion of the passenger side and left a sizeable amount of 'stone silver' paint on the bay.
The battery was dead because the doors wont close right. The car is one of those super intelligent ones which speaks it's mind. It tells you when you need petrol as well as flashing a 'you need petrol' sign, presumably for the benefit of blind drivers.
So the thing spent an entire Sunday night telling no one in particular that 'the door's not closed', 'the door's not closed', 'HEY STUPID!! THE DOOR, THAT ONE THERE, IT'S NOT CLOSED!!!!! It said it and it flashed it so much it exhausted the battery.
Stupid car.
Brought the kids back into the house and the youngest boy puked everywhere while the baby screamed backing vocals and the older boys gagged and provided a running commentary of what said puke looked like.
Phoned the mechanic who said he'd be out in 10 minutes. Eight hours later he arrived, told me the battery was dead and that I need two new doors for the car which will cost 'big money'. When asked to converse in monetary terms he puffed out his cheeks and said 'big, big money'.
And it's raining.
Have had better days.
Smile, please...
If there’s one thing I hate it’s being made to feel like a bad mother.
Believe it or believe it not, it has happened to me before. People judging me – whether that be for rugby tackling my toddler before he lifts a £300 bowl in Debenhams or encouraging a passion for bad 80s music – flings me way out of my comfort zone.
I have my parenting faults – we all do. But I put my all into it. I’ll be the first to admit that I maintain a deathly grip on my ‘fabulous mum’ crown and take great exception to anyone suggesting that I’m not a 100 per cent perfect parent.
This week I was given a telling off by a dentist who appeared to be 12 years old. I had taken the oldest boy for a check-up and was told he needed a filling in one of his milk teeth.
She discussed the matter using fancy dentistry related terms – all primary and secondary incisors this, right-side molars that – and suggested that my terrible parenting literally bored a hole in my son’s beautifully white teeth.
As she examined his teeth she cross-questioned me on exactly how many fizzy drinks the child has in one day.
I informed her that I can count on two fingers the amount of fizzy drinks the child has had in his entire seven and a half year existence – once when he drank a mouthful of cola at a wedding in 2006 and again when he consumed a glass of fizzy orange at his friend’s birthday party. I told her I remember these reckless incidents of extreme parenting as we had to endure the crazy sugar rush and severe grumpy slump afterwards and wished not to repeat them.
I could barely fit my high horse into her cramped dental surgery.
The dentist smiled like she knew I was lying. She wrote in a folder – presumably ticking the very, very bad mother box, and threw professional glances at her assistant who also made a ‘you’re so lying’ face.
They were making me nervous. And when I’m nervous I talk.
I told them that my boy drinks nothing but spring water. Water and milk, maybe, but only on special occasions like birthdays.
She asked me if the child ate sweets. I gasped in a horrified manner, pointed and told her that the child never, ever ate sweets. Never. I covered my boy’s ears and told her that my children were yet to discover that sweets had actually been invented and I would thank her not to mention those sugary works of the devil in my presence.
I told her that in fact I often gave them small pieces of fruit and pretended they were sweets. I told her that there is more sugary content in the Lough Derg pilgrimage diet (as in bread and water) than in what he consumes daily.
She asked me to explain then, with this ferociously strict diet, how he managed to get a big, bad decaying hole in his tooth.
I told her that I was totally bewildered by this development, that I couldn’t explain it. That the boy brushes his teeth 20 times a day. That his tooth brushing actually borders on obsessive and that I encourage this obsessive behaviour by carrying a toothbrush and paste around in my handbag. And that I also have a stopwatch with an alarm – that I never let him go more than 40 minutes without brushing. And that for his last birthday I bought him a supply of dental floss.
It was probably the most uncomfortable half hour I have ever spent. I’ve been in some strange spots before but never had I had to lie more profusely to protect my ‘Fabulous Mother’ crown. I wasn’t going to let some 12-year-old dentist scrape the shine off it with one of her implements of torture.
Truth is the kid eats sweets, like every other kid on the planet. May God forgive me the child drinks diluted orange the odd time. I know these dentist types would have all our kids eating apples and drinking sparkling water the daylong but outside influences – like wicked grandmothers who ply kids with lollipops – do exist. This is the real world.
Hopefully this bump on the road to perfect parenting will pass soon, the kid can get his tooth filled and I can make my way back to Mother of the Yearsville.
Believe it or believe it not, it has happened to me before. People judging me – whether that be for rugby tackling my toddler before he lifts a £300 bowl in Debenhams or encouraging a passion for bad 80s music – flings me way out of my comfort zone.
I have my parenting faults – we all do. But I put my all into it. I’ll be the first to admit that I maintain a deathly grip on my ‘fabulous mum’ crown and take great exception to anyone suggesting that I’m not a 100 per cent perfect parent.
This week I was given a telling off by a dentist who appeared to be 12 years old. I had taken the oldest boy for a check-up and was told he needed a filling in one of his milk teeth.
She discussed the matter using fancy dentistry related terms – all primary and secondary incisors this, right-side molars that – and suggested that my terrible parenting literally bored a hole in my son’s beautifully white teeth.
As she examined his teeth she cross-questioned me on exactly how many fizzy drinks the child has in one day.
I informed her that I can count on two fingers the amount of fizzy drinks the child has had in his entire seven and a half year existence – once when he drank a mouthful of cola at a wedding in 2006 and again when he consumed a glass of fizzy orange at his friend’s birthday party. I told her I remember these reckless incidents of extreme parenting as we had to endure the crazy sugar rush and severe grumpy slump afterwards and wished not to repeat them.
I could barely fit my high horse into her cramped dental surgery.
The dentist smiled like she knew I was lying. She wrote in a folder – presumably ticking the very, very bad mother box, and threw professional glances at her assistant who also made a ‘you’re so lying’ face.
They were making me nervous. And when I’m nervous I talk.
I told them that my boy drinks nothing but spring water. Water and milk, maybe, but only on special occasions like birthdays.
She asked me if the child ate sweets. I gasped in a horrified manner, pointed and told her that the child never, ever ate sweets. Never. I covered my boy’s ears and told her that my children were yet to discover that sweets had actually been invented and I would thank her not to mention those sugary works of the devil in my presence.
I told her that in fact I often gave them small pieces of fruit and pretended they were sweets. I told her that there is more sugary content in the Lough Derg pilgrimage diet (as in bread and water) than in what he consumes daily.
She asked me to explain then, with this ferociously strict diet, how he managed to get a big, bad decaying hole in his tooth.
I told her that I was totally bewildered by this development, that I couldn’t explain it. That the boy brushes his teeth 20 times a day. That his tooth brushing actually borders on obsessive and that I encourage this obsessive behaviour by carrying a toothbrush and paste around in my handbag. And that I also have a stopwatch with an alarm – that I never let him go more than 40 minutes without brushing. And that for his last birthday I bought him a supply of dental floss.
It was probably the most uncomfortable half hour I have ever spent. I’ve been in some strange spots before but never had I had to lie more profusely to protect my ‘Fabulous Mother’ crown. I wasn’t going to let some 12-year-old dentist scrape the shine off it with one of her implements of torture.
Truth is the kid eats sweets, like every other kid on the planet. May God forgive me the child drinks diluted orange the odd time. I know these dentist types would have all our kids eating apples and drinking sparkling water the daylong but outside influences – like wicked grandmothers who ply kids with lollipops – do exist. This is the real world.
Hopefully this bump on the road to perfect parenting will pass soon, the kid can get his tooth filled and I can make my way back to Mother of the Yearsville.
Monday 18 October 2010
The Screamin' Demon
Never mind the Commonwealth Games, I’d say to the BBC that there is something much more worthy of the licence fee unfolding in our house – the curly-haired lunatic’s terrible twos.
The youngest boy, who turned two just last month, has taken to screaming like it is an actual Olympic sport and he is gearing up to represent Ireland in London 2012.
No longer does he ask for stuff, he points and screams until said item is placed in his hand. If something troubles him he screams until that thing is put to rights. We are sometimes fearful of making eye contact in case we might inadvertently set of a catastrophic chain of events concluding with an hour of noisy and pointless screaming.
And this is no ordinary screeching. We’re talking ear-drum splitting, window cracking wailing which makes birds flee from nearby trees in fear for their lives. The boy’s noisy protestations can only be compared with what I imagine Satan’s motorbike might sound like with a troubled ignition throttle – rattling up from a whimper to a level seven hellish wail in five point six seconds.
He throws the odd strop at home, but in true kiddie tantrum fashion he saves the biggest hissy fits for when we are in public places.
But what the kid forgets is that we have been down this road twice before. We have quite literally been there, done that and are the proud owners of some fabulously colourful fitted ‘I survived the Terrible Twos’ t-shirts.
Just last week Finn had his two-year check-up with the health visitor and had I informed her that the boy was a placid soul, we had as yet to witness any tantrums and that perhaps we would escape the dreaded terrible twoness this time around. I wondered why she laughed so heartily.
Two days later the boy took great exception to my refusal to feed him chocolate cake for lunch and staged what I’m not afraid to admit was a very innovative protest in the cereal isle of Sainsbury’s.
He kicked off with a low and whiney cry, followed by a bit of arm swinging which could be compared to the actions of a drunken bare-knuckled boxer. The child, who unfortunately bears a frightening resemblance to the late Ollie Reed, then did this foot stomping dance – one foot stationery while the other stomps in a circle – and turned the volume up considerably. He concluded his performance with a big deep breath and an ear-piercing, eye-watering scream on the exhale which lasted an amazing one minute 20 seconds. I’m sure the Olympic swimming team would head hunt him if they knew. Not many people can hold their breath for that long never mind scream for the entire duration. Surely the Guinness book of records should be informed.
After consulting my mind’s vast catalogue of ‘tantrum dealing tips’ I practised my well-honed methods – pointing, laughing, more pointing and gradual withdrawal of attention.
We are, after all, the adults in this situation and therefore are not scared by loud screaming and stomping of feet. We are not even perturbed by the way he balls his fists, tenses every muscle in his body and turns his face beetroot red like he is about to physically combust.
We have seen it all. The oldest boy’s terrible twos were peppered with varying degrees of head banging. The boy would hit his head off the side of his cot/doors/floors etc while the husband and I stood back pondering why he was taking this particular line of action. Do kids not know that the pages of history are littered with these types of protest? You know the ones where they hurt themselves instead of inflicting pain upon others to make their point and that they rarely work.
The second boy used high-pitched screaming as a medium of expressing his annoyance at those troublesome twos. But this was no ordinary screaming either. We often compared him to the scary risen-from-the-dead bad guy in ‘The Mummy’ films. But whereas the Egyptian bad guy was aided by fancy computer graphics to look like he had unhinged his jawbone, our boy just opened his mouth impossibly wide and screamed au natural. The husband and I spent this particular phase laughing and pointing at him also.
So we have embarked on our youngest boy’s journey through the terrible twos and we don’t yet know what to expect. But we are secretly hoping that the London Olympics might open a ‘screamin’ demon’ category, for there will be no prouder parents than the husband and I when the child brings that gold home to Ireland.
Monday 11 October 2010
The Troubles... again
My oldest son was born six years after the ceasefires here in the north. At the time I remember wondering what world we had brought him into and if he would have a drastically different childhood than that of my husband and I.
Because, in all honesty, we were not afforded a ‘normal’ childhood. We saw things children shouldn’t have and we lived in fear for our young lives. For us murders, bombs, shootings, soldiers and tension were as normal and everyday as homework and hanging around street corners.
Like it or like it not our memories are forever peppered with the horrific events that shaped our early lives as well as Northern Irish history.
When I was a young girl, not much older than my oldest son, I saw a man shot dead by the army as I stood, bag of sweets still in hand, outside the shop at the bottom of our street. I, along with a lot of other people who call this place home, had many other traumatic experiences growing up. As a teenager fretting about boys was as normal as bomb scares, a first kiss more daunting than a full-scale riot. It is frightening to think back on what passed as ‘normal’ in our young lives.
Our street was a stone’s throw away from one of the largest and most frequently bombed army bases in Northern Ireland. The Europa Hotel had literally nothing on Fort George Barracks. My husband grew up within an area within Belfast affectionately called ‘The Murder Triangle’ and had many, many harrowing experiences that kids should not have had to bear witness to.
I know, in the grand scheme of things we two got off relatively lightly. We were extremely lucky in that none of our immediate family were killed in the Troubles here but we, like every single other child of the conflict, were affected deeply by our own individual experiences.
This is not something I want for my children.
Last week dissident republicans attacked our city again. They planted a car bomb across the street from where I grew up, where my mother still lives. My mother – ever the drama queen – was actually driving past the scene when it exploded after having persuaded a police officer to let her home through the security cordon. She wasn’t injured, just badly shaken up.
Dissidents activity is now the norm in this city, bomb hoaxes an everyday thing. We have come to expect the odd bomb, a fact in itself which makes me mad.
Despite what the police and the politicians say these people are doing a good job at dragging us back to the old days. Not only are they planting massive car bombs they are planting seeds of sickening fear and suspicion once again our minds.
And what’s different for me personally this time around is that I have children to protect. It is the most natural instinct for a mother to want to keep her children from harm and it’s relatively easy when that which may harm them is visible. When that danger could be in the car parked beside you in the shopping centre, being assembled in a house nearby or being transported in the van stopped alongside at traffic lights it’s all the more worrying.
It sickens me that the path we walk home from school is once again littered with debris from the latest bomb, that the shops we frequent have shattered windows and twisted shutters. It sickens me that I have to try to explain the reasoning behind this new conflict when I fail to understand it myself. The last time it happened, I was the kid and it needed no explanation, it just was what it was – the Troubles – as much part of our environment as the constant rain.
It’s all rather bewildering to me, what must it look like to a child?
I had hoped that when the time came I could explain the Troubles to my kids with the aid of dusty old history books, now it seems I won’t have to. They can just look outside their window.
Because, in all honesty, we were not afforded a ‘normal’ childhood. We saw things children shouldn’t have and we lived in fear for our young lives. For us murders, bombs, shootings, soldiers and tension were as normal and everyday as homework and hanging around street corners.
Like it or like it not our memories are forever peppered with the horrific events that shaped our early lives as well as Northern Irish history.
When I was a young girl, not much older than my oldest son, I saw a man shot dead by the army as I stood, bag of sweets still in hand, outside the shop at the bottom of our street. I, along with a lot of other people who call this place home, had many other traumatic experiences growing up. As a teenager fretting about boys was as normal as bomb scares, a first kiss more daunting than a full-scale riot. It is frightening to think back on what passed as ‘normal’ in our young lives.
Our street was a stone’s throw away from one of the largest and most frequently bombed army bases in Northern Ireland. The Europa Hotel had literally nothing on Fort George Barracks. My husband grew up within an area within Belfast affectionately called ‘The Murder Triangle’ and had many, many harrowing experiences that kids should not have had to bear witness to.
I know, in the grand scheme of things we two got off relatively lightly. We were extremely lucky in that none of our immediate family were killed in the Troubles here but we, like every single other child of the conflict, were affected deeply by our own individual experiences.
This is not something I want for my children.
Last week dissident republicans attacked our city again. They planted a car bomb across the street from where I grew up, where my mother still lives. My mother – ever the drama queen – was actually driving past the scene when it exploded after having persuaded a police officer to let her home through the security cordon. She wasn’t injured, just badly shaken up.
Dissidents activity is now the norm in this city, bomb hoaxes an everyday thing. We have come to expect the odd bomb, a fact in itself which makes me mad.
Despite what the police and the politicians say these people are doing a good job at dragging us back to the old days. Not only are they planting massive car bombs they are planting seeds of sickening fear and suspicion once again our minds.
And what’s different for me personally this time around is that I have children to protect. It is the most natural instinct for a mother to want to keep her children from harm and it’s relatively easy when that which may harm them is visible. When that danger could be in the car parked beside you in the shopping centre, being assembled in a house nearby or being transported in the van stopped alongside at traffic lights it’s all the more worrying.
It sickens me that the path we walk home from school is once again littered with debris from the latest bomb, that the shops we frequent have shattered windows and twisted shutters. It sickens me that I have to try to explain the reasoning behind this new conflict when I fail to understand it myself. The last time it happened, I was the kid and it needed no explanation, it just was what it was – the Troubles – as much part of our environment as the constant rain.
It’s all rather bewildering to me, what must it look like to a child?
I had hoped that when the time came I could explain the Troubles to my kids with the aid of dusty old history books, now it seems I won’t have to. They can just look outside their window.
Monday 4 October 2010
Holier than thou. No chance....
Our oldest boy Daniel is currently getting quite extensive religious training in anticipation of his First Holy Communion, which he makes during this term.
This involves him colouring in a host of pictures of Jesus (orange curly hair, bushy beard, white t-shirt), learning a load of prayers off by heart and thanking God for a whole host of things which he apparently invented – like time, water Playstations and shoes.
This religious work involves bringing his ‘God book’ home and asking us to answer questions on various religion-related topics, something I find rather daunting.
Now I’m not one for wearing my religious views and opinions on my sleeve but the fact is despite being brought up a Catholic I have lapsed a little in my faith.
In years gone by I went to mass, said my prayers religiously, was (and still am) a good, kind, caring and loving person. I have sky-high morals, put people high above material things, love my neighbour and have never coveted goods, wives or things of that ilk.
I only ever asked for God’s assistance twice in my life. Both were big deal situations – I needed a miracle – but despite a lot of prayers, the big man didn’t hear my distress call and I suppose we haven’t been in contact for a while.
When I was a child I found mass – and I’m being brutally honest here – incredibly boring. It was a whole lot of chanting, kneeling, standing up, sitting down and a bit of repetitive praying. The smell of incense would make me nauseous and I resented shaking hands with the person sitting next to me after watching them pick their nose just 10 minutes before. I went to mass only because I felt my mother would kill me if I didn’t.
I honestly didn’t get a lot out of it. My parents taught me life lessons, morals, tolerance and compassion. I certainly didn’t learn those things at Mass as I spent a most of my time standing outside the Church chatting.
I know I’m not alone on my views. Whilst the older generation is mostly made up of God fearing church goers, my generation seem to be falling away from religion in their droves. This is not because we are a band of morally challenged yahoos, more that organised religion hasn’t really evolved in a way which speaks to us.
Therefore I’m going to find it difficult teaching my young sons about religion this term. Partly because I am void of blind faith and the fact that a lot of it is totally bewildering.
Already this week we have learned that God is THE most important person in his life, not Spiderman, not Red Power Ranger, not even me. The big man is more important. And he has been instructed to put God before all things and all people from now on. As always in religion there were no actually written instructions as to how exactly to carry out this task. I suggested that instead of fighting with his brother or wrecking the living room they might both spend a few hours praying quietly to God.
My kids have experience of many different religions. Our own extended family are deeply religious and it works for them. We have Japanese friends whose religion dictates that they pray before everything they do – even giving long and lengthy praise before allowing us to eat our Happy Meals at McDonalds. A small child of one of our Indian friends once told us that we like the ‘wrong God’ when he spotted the Sacred Heart picture on the wall. Each to their own I say, no one is more right than anyone else.
So now my son is starting his journey into his religion and needs me to hold his hand along the road. I believe it's important that he has an open mind, and when he’s old enough, to make those decisions for himself, without my or anyone else’s dogma running around in his head, and I will support any decision his makes on the matter.
Rant over, Amen.
This involves him colouring in a host of pictures of Jesus (orange curly hair, bushy beard, white t-shirt), learning a load of prayers off by heart and thanking God for a whole host of things which he apparently invented – like time, water Playstations and shoes.
This religious work involves bringing his ‘God book’ home and asking us to answer questions on various religion-related topics, something I find rather daunting.
Now I’m not one for wearing my religious views and opinions on my sleeve but the fact is despite being brought up a Catholic I have lapsed a little in my faith.
In years gone by I went to mass, said my prayers religiously, was (and still am) a good, kind, caring and loving person. I have sky-high morals, put people high above material things, love my neighbour and have never coveted goods, wives or things of that ilk.
I only ever asked for God’s assistance twice in my life. Both were big deal situations – I needed a miracle – but despite a lot of prayers, the big man didn’t hear my distress call and I suppose we haven’t been in contact for a while.
When I was a child I found mass – and I’m being brutally honest here – incredibly boring. It was a whole lot of chanting, kneeling, standing up, sitting down and a bit of repetitive praying. The smell of incense would make me nauseous and I resented shaking hands with the person sitting next to me after watching them pick their nose just 10 minutes before. I went to mass only because I felt my mother would kill me if I didn’t.
I honestly didn’t get a lot out of it. My parents taught me life lessons, morals, tolerance and compassion. I certainly didn’t learn those things at Mass as I spent a most of my time standing outside the Church chatting.
I know I’m not alone on my views. Whilst the older generation is mostly made up of God fearing church goers, my generation seem to be falling away from religion in their droves. This is not because we are a band of morally challenged yahoos, more that organised religion hasn’t really evolved in a way which speaks to us.
Therefore I’m going to find it difficult teaching my young sons about religion this term. Partly because I am void of blind faith and the fact that a lot of it is totally bewildering.
Already this week we have learned that God is THE most important person in his life, not Spiderman, not Red Power Ranger, not even me. The big man is more important. And he has been instructed to put God before all things and all people from now on. As always in religion there were no actually written instructions as to how exactly to carry out this task. I suggested that instead of fighting with his brother or wrecking the living room they might both spend a few hours praying quietly to God.
My kids have experience of many different religions. Our own extended family are deeply religious and it works for them. We have Japanese friends whose religion dictates that they pray before everything they do – even giving long and lengthy praise before allowing us to eat our Happy Meals at McDonalds. A small child of one of our Indian friends once told us that we like the ‘wrong God’ when he spotted the Sacred Heart picture on the wall. Each to their own I say, no one is more right than anyone else.
So now my son is starting his journey into his religion and needs me to hold his hand along the road. I believe it's important that he has an open mind, and when he’s old enough, to make those decisions for himself, without my or anyone else’s dogma running around in his head, and I will support any decision his makes on the matter.
Rant over, Amen.
Monday 27 September 2010
Jail's no place for kids....
Due to the fact that my baby daughter has got herself into a non-stop round-the-clock feeding routine I am often found sat in front of the telly these days.
Finn has helpfully buried the remote control somewhere out in the front garden in a mass grave which includes a monster truck, three plastic soldiers and a half consumed apple.
We haven’t yet purchased a combined metal/plastic/rotting food detector to locate these items so I am forced to watch whatever channel is on – because hauling myself off the sofa and across the room is simply too much like hard graft and the boy hasn’t yet mastered working the buttons to fulfil my channel switching bidding.
Something happens to a person’s mind when they are subjected to too much daytime TV. I can physically feel my brain cells exploding while viewing the morning entertainment shows. And as for the chat shows, it takes a lot of coffee and chocolate biscuits to chase away the dark clouds of despair after witnessing yet another poor young mother air her dirty laundry for the entertainment and amusement of a vulturous audience.
And not only am I subjecting myself to such drivel, the youngest boy is learning by the example set by Mr Daytime TV. If this continues he will begin to handle his toddler group disagreements by suggesting the other little folk ‘talk to the hand, coz the face ain’t listening’, chanting ‘DNA test, DNA test, DNA test’ loudly at random parents and informing little girls in the group that he ‘ain’t yo baby daddy’.
In a move to salvage what little working brain cells we have left I decided to tune into a few kid’s programmes instead. One, in particular, made me ponder what influence aforementioned Mr TV – someone I trusted with the education and supervision of my children – was having on my kids.
This programme was set in a prison, as in a joint where convicts hang out.
The Slammer, as it is called, is a fictitious prison for entertainers who have ‘committed crimes against show business’ ¬– like being totally rubbish or dropping a ball while juggling as opposed to grievous bodily harm, armed robbery or actual murder.
The prison has all the trappings of a real joint except the wings are adorned with beautifully coloured triangle flags and balloons. The inmates – instead of serving their time and facing a parole board – earn their freedom through the medium of dance and song in the Freedom Show performed in front of a crowd of invited school children.
The mind boggles.
The head honcho of the joint is a big, jolly governor who wears a spangled white suit and gold bow tie, you know like the real ones do. There’s even a long-term ‘resident’ of the prison although apparently he’s not doing a 10-year stretch for manslaughter he’s inside because he’s a very bad ventriloquist.
Now apart from feeling rather uncomfortable about a children’s programme being set in a prison – call me strange but I much prefer the old tea shop or nursery school setting – I object to the fact that the programme makers are glamorising the jail setting.
I often threaten my children with jail – ‘if you don’t tidy your room I’m going to call the cops and they’re going to haul your sorry ass off to jail’ and ‘you can get a three-year term for telling your father to shut up’ – and I don’t want them imaging this place full of colourful bunting, friendly, helpful staff, chips for dinner and daily variety shows for their entertainment. I want them to imagine cold windowless cells, grey-coloured slop for dinner and terrifying cell mates with names like ‘Skinner’ and ‘Buckets of Blood’
I want to instil in my kids a healthy fear of breaking the law and jail in general. Programmes like this, regardless of their comedy aspect, might give today’s kids a false representation of what incarceration is actually like – some of today’s youngsters might be sorely disappointed when they grow up to be criminals and find that jail isn’t half as much fun as it looked on the telly. Hell, some of these kids might fall into a life of crime just to get a chance to see Diversity or Aleshia Dixon in a prison concert.
Come back Mr Jeremy Kyle all is forgiven.
Finn has helpfully buried the remote control somewhere out in the front garden in a mass grave which includes a monster truck, three plastic soldiers and a half consumed apple.
We haven’t yet purchased a combined metal/plastic/rotting food detector to locate these items so I am forced to watch whatever channel is on – because hauling myself off the sofa and across the room is simply too much like hard graft and the boy hasn’t yet mastered working the buttons to fulfil my channel switching bidding.
Something happens to a person’s mind when they are subjected to too much daytime TV. I can physically feel my brain cells exploding while viewing the morning entertainment shows. And as for the chat shows, it takes a lot of coffee and chocolate biscuits to chase away the dark clouds of despair after witnessing yet another poor young mother air her dirty laundry for the entertainment and amusement of a vulturous audience.
And not only am I subjecting myself to such drivel, the youngest boy is learning by the example set by Mr Daytime TV. If this continues he will begin to handle his toddler group disagreements by suggesting the other little folk ‘talk to the hand, coz the face ain’t listening’, chanting ‘DNA test, DNA test, DNA test’ loudly at random parents and informing little girls in the group that he ‘ain’t yo baby daddy’.
In a move to salvage what little working brain cells we have left I decided to tune into a few kid’s programmes instead. One, in particular, made me ponder what influence aforementioned Mr TV – someone I trusted with the education and supervision of my children – was having on my kids.
This programme was set in a prison, as in a joint where convicts hang out.
The Slammer, as it is called, is a fictitious prison for entertainers who have ‘committed crimes against show business’ ¬– like being totally rubbish or dropping a ball while juggling as opposed to grievous bodily harm, armed robbery or actual murder.
The prison has all the trappings of a real joint except the wings are adorned with beautifully coloured triangle flags and balloons. The inmates – instead of serving their time and facing a parole board – earn their freedom through the medium of dance and song in the Freedom Show performed in front of a crowd of invited school children.
The mind boggles.
The head honcho of the joint is a big, jolly governor who wears a spangled white suit and gold bow tie, you know like the real ones do. There’s even a long-term ‘resident’ of the prison although apparently he’s not doing a 10-year stretch for manslaughter he’s inside because he’s a very bad ventriloquist.
Now apart from feeling rather uncomfortable about a children’s programme being set in a prison – call me strange but I much prefer the old tea shop or nursery school setting – I object to the fact that the programme makers are glamorising the jail setting.
I often threaten my children with jail – ‘if you don’t tidy your room I’m going to call the cops and they’re going to haul your sorry ass off to jail’ and ‘you can get a three-year term for telling your father to shut up’ – and I don’t want them imaging this place full of colourful bunting, friendly, helpful staff, chips for dinner and daily variety shows for their entertainment. I want them to imagine cold windowless cells, grey-coloured slop for dinner and terrifying cell mates with names like ‘Skinner’ and ‘Buckets of Blood’
I want to instil in my kids a healthy fear of breaking the law and jail in general. Programmes like this, regardless of their comedy aspect, might give today’s kids a false representation of what incarceration is actually like – some of today’s youngsters might be sorely disappointed when they grow up to be criminals and find that jail isn’t half as much fun as it looked on the telly. Hell, some of these kids might fall into a life of crime just to get a chance to see Diversity or Aleshia Dixon in a prison concert.
Come back Mr Jeremy Kyle all is forgiven.
Monday 20 September 2010
Watch your back Mr Kipling..
Three weeks into the new school term and we’ve all come down with the lurgy bug from hell. This particularly nasty bug – we’re talking dizzy heads, razor-blade tonsils, severe grumpiness, hallucinations, coughing like a 60-a-day smoker – claimed the youngest boy as it’s first victim. As soon as he ceased with the hacking cough the oldest son came down with it, then the middle boy got it then finally I was floored by it after a full seven days sans sleep, wiping floors, moping brows and shoving seemingly endless supplies of bed clothes into the washing machine.
The baby has stayed strong and bug free throughout – testament to the power of breastfeeding.
And as usual, the husband didn’t get the bug. This, he swears, is because of his superior O’Neill genes. The O’Neills of old, he says, spent their days out on the battlefields of Ireland fighting and hacking off heads – and in the process getting a good bit of fresh air – while the Brehans, my smarty pants law-making ancestors, spent their days in darkened, dusty rooms reading books and being generally wise and condescending.
And so we all spent our youngest son’s second birthday party attempting and failing miserably to overdose on sugar-based products and consume salty snacks. I know we’ll look back and laugh at the camcorder footage of us all wheezing and puffing while blowing out the candles and of the ‘Happy Birthday’ chorus peppered with bouts of loud hacking, rattling coughing.
Despite my sorry state I still managed to bake the boy a cake. I modelled my masterpiece on the white bunny rabbit he so lovingly named Rambo. The cake was a glorious concoction of sponge cake and coconut buttercream icing with a few chocolate buttons for the eyes, nose and mouth. When I unveiled it at the party everyone assumed it was a little dog. I couldn’t find the words to tell them it was supposed to be a rabbit. I just bit my lip and tried not to cry.
A few years ago (when my cake baking abilities were still sub-standard) I made the oldest boy a cake in the shape of a white racing car. I was so pleased with my creation I showed it off to my sister who later described it as, and I quote, ‘a roast chicken cake’. I later described her as ‘a cow’ and said she was jealous of my far superior cake decorating abilities. In hindsight she may have had a point. The thing looked like a raw chicken with go-faster stripes down the two sides. I can’t imagine what the attending children thought….‘Mummy, why is Daniel’s mum asking us to sing while he blow outs candles stuck on top of an uncooked chicken?
I used to be a rubbish cook. In my student years I would regularly muck up making even Pot Noodles. I literally couldn’t put the hot water into the plastic container without having a minor scalding-related catastrophe. I once made a cheesecake for the husband –who was then my boyfriend – which had the consistency of vegetable soup. He ate it and from that day to this when someone mentions cheesecake in conversation he makes an involuntary retching motion. Years later he married me despite my glaringly obvious flaws in the kitchen. That’s true love right there people.
My cooking has improved enormously over the years. This is partly due to the fact that children are brutally honest when it comes to food. If something looks like boke – which my cheesecake certainly did – they will inform the chef in graphic detail. So I bought myself a cook book, studied hard and am now renowned in our family for my cooking. And it’s for the right reasons, not for making stew that tastes like socks actually smell.
My cakes have also risen in standards in the years since. It is now a rule that I bake a cake for every birthday, anniversary and celebratory occasion in our family. People actually look forward to sampling my next creation as opposed to the past when they would stock up on the indigestion remedies and make sure the doctor’s surgery has a spare appointment slot for the next day.
For the middle boy’s last birthday I created an edible dinosaur world complete with volcano. For the oldest boy’s affair I made a massive Ben10 Omnitrex cake. The husband usually requests vanilla cream cake for his birthdays and I fashioned a strawberry marshmallow pink christening cake for the little girl’s big day last week – although the marshmallows were, in all honesty, a last minute idea used to mask the fact that I made the icing a tad too runny.
I’m not one to blow my own trumpet but Mr Kipling, if you’re reading this, watch your back, I now too make exceedingly good cakes.
Monday 13 September 2010
The Green-Eyed Little Monster....
On the day I was born my father brought my 9-year-old brother and 7-year-old sister to see me in the hospital. It was not a particularly pleasant meet and greet. My brother asked if I could be taken back and swapped for a boy baby. He said he absolutely did not want another flipping sister, he was already quite fed up with the one he had. My sister stated quite clearly that she was our Daddy’s favourite and that me, blowing in here with my chubby cheeks and cutesy gurgles would not, repeat not, be stealing her crown.
I suppose the passing of 35 years has seen them arrive at some form of acceptance of me. The same can’t be said about our littlest lad. The passing of seven weeks has seen little or no acceptance of our baby girl.
He uses several methods to show his displeasure at her arrival – from giving her a welcome slap on her face to simply pretending she doesn’t exist. His new trick is to stand beside her pram while she slumbers peacefully and yelling ‘Argggghhhh Baybeee!!!’ in his best and loudest scary voice.
We held the baby’s christening at the weekend. The priest conducting the ceremony informed us beforehand that this was the first baptism he had done in this, his new parish and that he was more than a tad nervous. We sat up in the front seats of the packed chapel and threw him smiles of encouragement and thumbs up signals every so often.
There are a few reasons why we don’t sit in the front seats in chapel and those reasons are called Daniel, Caolan and Finn. At least from the back of the church it’s easier to field questions about God, religion, the universe and everything without being given the evil eye by the priest for talking during Mass.
Daniel, who turned around to whisper to those seated behind him that he finds the whole ‘God thing’ really boring and that he was missing ‘Monster Jam’ to be here, sighed dramatically and loudly throughout the ceremony. I thought it unwise to threaten him with violence in the house of God but I pulled a muscle in one of my eyelids by overenthusiastically issuing a variety of ‘wait until I get you home’ looks.
Caolan, the boy who can ask approximately one question per second and never waits for an answer, inquired from the front seat what the big deal was about God. He also wondered aloud if ‘that fella’, as in the priest, ‘ever talks about anything else except God’ and why ‘that boy’, as in Jesus, was holding his heart in his hand (as seen in the Sacred Heart picture), why said heart was glowing and how said heart could properly function when he was wearing it outside his jumper as opposed to under his skin.
As the husband tried to hush the boy he turned his line of questioning to other things. He wondered if God was friends with Santa – who is also all seeing – and if God believed in vampires. Without taking a breath he wondered why God was actually given the title ‘Almighty’, if he was in possession of laser beam eyes and also if he was as tall as Godzilla or in the same height bracket as, say, Spiderman. He also questioned why no one has ever caught sight of this God fella. If we’re honest with ourselves, people, these are the questions we’d all like answered.
He continued to interrogate the husband while I tried to free a hand to render him either unable to speak – or if that didn’t work, unconscious – and concluded loudly with a ‘we’ve been here for like, half and hour, and he has just went on and on about God, God, God the entire time.’
The littlest lad got fed up with the focus being solely on his sister and while we stood around the water font he entertained the congregation with a strange dance reminiscent of drunken Ollie Reed on the Terry Wogan show. I don’t imagine the church choir knew ‘Wild Thing’ with which to accompany his moves but I don’t think he cared much. He was determined to steal his sister’s thunder on her special day.
The rest of the service was spent physically restraining the boy from getting up and getting down, strutting around in the aisles like a mini Mick Jagger.
The green-eyed little monster has a future on the X-Factor for sure.
Monday 6 September 2010
Back to 'normal'
We have finally returned to ‘normal’ after the long, long, jeepers creepers they were so very long months of summer. Normal in our house means everyone getting up grumpy in the morning, shouting a lot while mouth is full of breakfast cereal/toast/toothpaste and much finding of shoes and losing of minds.
Getting four kids ready and out the door is a task not for the weak. I know my kids will grow up thinking their mother was either a retired drill sergeant or directly descended from some random nasty European military dictator or other.
From the minute they rise in the morning I yell a chorus of orders. ‘You! Eat!’, ‘You! Shoes!’ and ‘You! No talking, brush!’, ‘You! Stop looking so cute!’ with a load of finger pointing thrown in for dramatic effect.
Such was my hurry to get the lads back to where they really belong that we showed up at the school, uniformed, suited and booted, the day before term officially started.
We rose early on Monday morning. I fed babies and threw bowls of breakfast at various people, shouted a little, told individuals to remove their sleeping, slobbering faces from the kitchen table, hunted for shoes under beds, cursed a lot and tamed some seriously unruly hair.
I packed them all into the car and set off with 10 minutes to spare until the bell (hey, get me). I should have guessed when we pulled out onto the almost deserted main road that things were amiss. I should have realised when we got to the school and the only thing moving was a big bit of tumbleweed gently bobbing along past the very locked gates.
I drove at high speed past the school, kids squealing with delight from the back. I gave a big ups to Jesus and Ford Motors for inventing tinted windows so that other ‘normal’ humans going about their ‘normal’ day-to-day business – like going shopping in their pyjamas – couldn’t see my utter mortification. And I’m glad that the windows offered some UV protection because I wouldn’t have wanted any innocent members of the public to have been scorched by the severity of my pure, undiluted embarrassment.
So off we went home to suffer another day in each other’s company. And by that I truly mean to enjoy the last day before the summer holidays actually concluded.
These ‘hiccups’ are all too common these days. I blame lack of sleep; the husband blames lack of brain cells.
I waited in last week for the obligatory visit from the health visitor. I arranged for the older boys to be minded so that we’d have a reasonably quiet house. I waited and waited and cursed a bit for having my day held back – for I am one extremely busy lady, really I am.
I cursed this lovely woman for keeping me from drinking coffee, eating chocolate biscuits and watching rubbish daytime TV programmes in peace. Heaven forbid she would have called half way through Murder She Wrote and I would have converse with her and miss who actually killed the rural hotel owner. I just couldn’t risk that.
Three hours later I was positively pacing the living room floor. When the TV presenter mentioned that it was Monday, not Tuesday I realised that the late health visitor wasn’t actually late, she was early. As in not due until the next day early.
A few days later I had the baby in town and met an old friend who cooed over my little girl and asked me what we had named her. I swear there was a 25 second delay where the question reached my ears, made it’s way through the sea of dead and malfunctioning cells in my brain, processed the question, registered it and sent back a message for communication through my mouth. My friend stood gawking at me while this slow process progressed and breathed again when my brain and mouth worked once more in unison and allowed me to utter my daughter’s name. I told her the child is to be christened MaolÃosa Grace but for some strange reason about our house she is referred to only as Maggie Moo mirroring the nicknames of my boys – DanGo, Caolan Bailen and Finnbo O’Neillio.
Things may have gone back to routine with regards schools, but it’ll be a rather frosty day in hell when the word ‘normal’ is used to describe any member of the O’Neill house.
Monday 30 August 2010
Summer's O-V-A-H
The school holidays are O-V-A-H, as in over. To be honest, I was over them two hours after they started and we had nothing to look forward to but eight weeks of predicted rain, an imminent new baby, and grumpy, terribly bored children and no prospect of a summer holiday – bar an overnight stay in Altnagelvin Hospital’s maternity hotel and spa – looming on the horizon.
The kids have been looking forward to heading back to the classroom much in the same way as people look forward to sticking forks in their eyes. For me the end of the school holidays heralds a return to normality, a return to nice, comforting routine, a return to having half as many kids making half as many demands for a precious few hours. I also love, of course, that my kids can return to be being wonderfully edumacated once more. I love that they are getting a chance to learn to do stuff gooder – like fighting over wrestling cards and sticking dangerously sharpened pencils into their classmate’s legs.
The boys often have to write a summer diary for their teachers, detailing what they did, where they went, who was there, how darn exciting it all was. All with pictures and postcards to illustrate.
Other kids in the class will no doubt have their pages filled with fantastic stories of adventurous holidays in the sun, pictures of themselves with Mickey Mouse, postcards from far away places. My boys will be able to fill an A4 page with their adventures. I dare say it’ll go something like this…
‘We stayed in the house watching miserably from the living room window while the rain lashed the pavement. The most exciting place we visited was Sainsbury’s on a Saturday and it was incredibly, incredibly boring. It rained there too. The Playstation was our only salvation. Our mother got very fat and very grumpy as the holidays progressed. The blasted woman went to hospital and came home with a very noisy little person who kept us awake all night, adding (if humanly possible) to our misery. We had a rubbish summer, and if we are honest with ourselves, we are glad it’s all over.’
Due to the fact that I have just had a baby my brain is unable to function fully. I’m not firing on all cylinders so to speak. Sleep deprivation and pure hope had led me into the false belief that I had enough school uniforms to see us into Christmas at least. These uniforms are washed, ironed and folded neatly in the lad’s wardrobes. It never thought to me that the boys might have grown over the summer. You see I thought, like plants, kids needed actual sunshine to grow and that our horrendous Irish summers might stunt their growth thus eliminating my need to go and spend a fortune on grey school trousers they’ll put the knees out of within a week.
Alas, no, my theory on the sunshine links to stunted growth were drastically wrong and
those boys have shot up despite the weather. The oldest boy has outgrown his and needs new ones, the middle boy has outgrown his, but not grown enough to fit the oldest boys hand-me-downs. So it’s a new kit all round.
Looking for grey school trousers two days before school actually starts is much akin to seeking out the lost secrets of the Knights Templar – as in impossible. All those ‘Super-organised mammies’ must have bought up all supplies in July making the rest of us ‘fly by the seat of your pants’ mammies look really, really bad.
Yeah, thanks for that.
My boys will be sporting a new range of school wear this season. I’ll be calling my creation the ‘uber-improvised uniform’. The middle child (he whose hand me down trousers are too long) will have specially designed frayed hems. I will achieve this look by taking a pair of nearly blunt scissors and walloping off about 4cms from the legs.
My oldest boy will be sporting a fashion which has been prevalent on the Paris catwalks this season. His hems will be ‘designer extended’. To achieve this, slightly trickier look, I will be roughly sewing on the material I removed from the middle boy’s trousers to his. Bob’s your uncle, the job’s a good’un.
You mark my words; this new trend will certainly take off. Come October you’ll all be doing it.
Watch out Tina Turner....
Having four kids is tough going. Perhaps lack of sleep has rendered me super-paranoid but when they huddle in the corners of our house talking I imagine my children are not discussing Monster Trucks or Spiderman but are secretly scheming to create a synchronised timetable of parental torture.
I’m sure they have worked out a plan to ensure that every minute of every day and every night is consumed with some random demand or another.
I was at a birthday party at the weekend. Not your average one, mind, this one was for my grandmother, Susan Sweeney, who celebrated her 99th year on this planet surrounded by her family and friends. The party was held in the old folks home in Donegal and as a party piece she belted out the ‘Isle of Inisfree’ and another few numbers over a microphone, accompanied by a band. Tina Turner had better watch her back, I think a future in the entertainment industry beckons for my Granny.
I had the baby with me and a few of our family friends asked me how things were going. I whined for a bit about the hard work four kids can be, that I was knackered, blah, blah de whingey, and whiney blah.
One of the lovely ladies sat nodding sympathetically (hello there, Grace Gallen from Rathmullan). This was a woman had nine children, her sister had nine also. I felt like a bit of a wuss complaining about my mere four. Clearly they made women from much stronger stuff back in the day. These girls raised their kids, ran houses, tended to farms and businesses, cooked and cleaned and it never took a wrinkle out of them.
Here was me with half as many kids and not half as many woes, whinging about being run off my feet. We don’t know we’re living, to steal an old phrase.
Whenever I feel like our house resembles the monkey enclosure of the zoo rather than the peaceful haven of tranquillity I wish it was I head on over to the Discovery Health channel and laugh at those poor parents who have a few more kids than myself.
Jon and Kate plus eight have, you guessed it, eight kids – a set of twins and four-year-old sextuplets. They have to travel around in an actual minibus the same as we used to travel in for school trips.
Then there’s ‘19 Kids and Counting’ over on LivingTV. The Christian Duggans – Jim Bob and Michelle – are the proud parents of nine girls and 10 boys. What is amazing is that they all have a name beginning with the letter J and wear polo shirts every single day. TV is banned in their house – dear God why, I ask myself, Mister TV is the finest babysitter in town – and their teenagers abstain from most types of everything, including any physical contact except ‘Christian side hugging’.
What is more amazing is that their kids are incredibly well behaved. In fact I have stopped watching this programme in recent weeks due to the fact that my four children make a bigger din and a messier mess than all of their 19 kids put together.
I have since made a rule to watch programmes that make me feel better about my noisy, messy family and not worse. I don’t want to see mothers of eight wearing make-up and with proper, actually brushed hair. I do not find it entertaining to see a mother of 19 smiling and coping effortlessly while dishing up a healthy, nutritious dinner for 21 people. It just makes me feel bad about serving my kids beans and toast for the fourth day in a row.
I prefer to tune in to a programme that is more a reflection of my own family situation. So it’s back-to-back Simpsons from now on.
I’m sure they have worked out a plan to ensure that every minute of every day and every night is consumed with some random demand or another.
I was at a birthday party at the weekend. Not your average one, mind, this one was for my grandmother, Susan Sweeney, who celebrated her 99th year on this planet surrounded by her family and friends. The party was held in the old folks home in Donegal and as a party piece she belted out the ‘Isle of Inisfree’ and another few numbers over a microphone, accompanied by a band. Tina Turner had better watch her back, I think a future in the entertainment industry beckons for my Granny.
I had the baby with me and a few of our family friends asked me how things were going. I whined for a bit about the hard work four kids can be, that I was knackered, blah, blah de whingey, and whiney blah.
One of the lovely ladies sat nodding sympathetically (hello there, Grace Gallen from Rathmullan). This was a woman had nine children, her sister had nine also. I felt like a bit of a wuss complaining about my mere four. Clearly they made women from much stronger stuff back in the day. These girls raised their kids, ran houses, tended to farms and businesses, cooked and cleaned and it never took a wrinkle out of them.
Here was me with half as many kids and not half as many woes, whinging about being run off my feet. We don’t know we’re living, to steal an old phrase.
Whenever I feel like our house resembles the monkey enclosure of the zoo rather than the peaceful haven of tranquillity I wish it was I head on over to the Discovery Health channel and laugh at those poor parents who have a few more kids than myself.
Jon and Kate plus eight have, you guessed it, eight kids – a set of twins and four-year-old sextuplets. They have to travel around in an actual minibus the same as we used to travel in for school trips.
Then there’s ‘19 Kids and Counting’ over on LivingTV. The Christian Duggans – Jim Bob and Michelle – are the proud parents of nine girls and 10 boys. What is amazing is that they all have a name beginning with the letter J and wear polo shirts every single day. TV is banned in their house – dear God why, I ask myself, Mister TV is the finest babysitter in town – and their teenagers abstain from most types of everything, including any physical contact except ‘Christian side hugging’.
What is more amazing is that their kids are incredibly well behaved. In fact I have stopped watching this programme in recent weeks due to the fact that my four children make a bigger din and a messier mess than all of their 19 kids put together.
I have since made a rule to watch programmes that make me feel better about my noisy, messy family and not worse. I don’t want to see mothers of eight wearing make-up and with proper, actually brushed hair. I do not find it entertaining to see a mother of 19 smiling and coping effortlessly while dishing up a healthy, nutritious dinner for 21 people. It just makes me feel bad about serving my kids beans and toast for the fourth day in a row.
I prefer to tune in to a programme that is more a reflection of my own family situation. So it’s back-to-back Simpsons from now on.
Wednesday 18 August 2010
A family of six....
We are slowly getting used to being a family of six. The lads have welcomed their new baby sister into our home and our hearts with varying degrees of comedy and a few insults.
When the child arrived home from the hospital she was slightly jaundiced, as in a tad tan. Caolan looked at her slightly bewildered and asked if “she is from America?”
Daniel inspected his new sibling and commented that she had ‘hands like a witch’ and looked like a ‘boy with a dress on’.
After a few days as the baby’s features changed and she morphed from squishy-faced newborn to cutie pie, her brother Caolan said she looked like ‘an old granny who has forgotten to put in her teeth’.
Her youngest brother, he who has been replaced as the baby of the house, just huffs, administers the odd slap to his sleeping sister and tries to flush her blankets down the toilet.
I’ve found that my time is not my own these days. I’m feeding the baby myself, partaking in a bit of what the midwives call ‘demand feeding’, as in feeding the baby when she wants, not, say every four hours or so. Our child is very, very demanding, wanting fed approximately every 16 minutes. So I have to fit everything I want to do in those precious 16 minutes of ‘me time’.
I have become an expert on express cuisine, throwing together and serving up a family dinner in 13.5 minutes, leaving myself a leisurely two and a half minutes to eat and perhaps check the teletext news before the ravenous screaming demon lets up the pipes again demanding sustenance.
I can also shower in six minutes, get dressed in three, dry my hair in two, apply make up in four minutes and have a full minute all to myself to just stare meaningfully into space contemplating how to productively fill the next 16 minutes of ‘free time’ after the next feed.
I ventured out unexpectedly this week on a casual errand (I know I’m a maverick, but I haven’t been outside the front door in about five weeks) and leave the baby with her dad. He knew that there was no food available – as I am ultimately the sole provider of sustenance. He also knew about the whole 16-minute window thing. I promised him I wasn’t venturing a great distance, that I’d be there and back in 14 minutes, leaving us a full two minutes of breathing space that we could use to guffaw and chuckle at the old irrational panic he felt at being left alone with an eternally hungry newborn.
We synchronized watches and I set off at speed towards my destination. Due to traffic it took seven long minutes to reach where I was heading, two to run from the car, one to run back because I had forgotten my purse, 30 seconds to have a swift conversation with an old friend and another 2.5 to make my purchase and run back to the car. All this time I was calculating that I was leaving myself three minutes to make a seven minute journey, therefore leaving the husband a full four minutes to deal with a deranged, ravenous, irrational and inconsolable baby.
I had even set the alarm clock on my mobile to beep when my time ran to 15 minutes. And beep it did. Precisely 30 seconds after that beep the husband called to inform me that the baby was gearing up for a level seven hissy fit, then the child’s screaming drowned out his voice.
My return journey took a little longer than expected due to a hoax bomb alert – 20 minutes longer to be exact. Therefore I was away from home, and more importantly the baby, for a whopping 36 minutes. But I was kept fully informed of the situation through the medium of panicked shouting and very bad words from the husband and wailing shrills from the baby over the phone at intervals of approximately two minutes.
After 36 minutes I returned to the fold to find the husband had aged about 10 years, his eyes where bloodshot and there was sweat on his brow. His hearing hasn’t been the same since due to the high levels of wailing he endured.
It was not the relaxing break I had imagined, if truth be told. I doubt I’ll ever venture outdoors again. I imagine it will get better in, maybe, 18 years or so. I’ll hold out.
When the child arrived home from the hospital she was slightly jaundiced, as in a tad tan. Caolan looked at her slightly bewildered and asked if “she is from America?”
Daniel inspected his new sibling and commented that she had ‘hands like a witch’ and looked like a ‘boy with a dress on’.
After a few days as the baby’s features changed and she morphed from squishy-faced newborn to cutie pie, her brother Caolan said she looked like ‘an old granny who has forgotten to put in her teeth’.
Her youngest brother, he who has been replaced as the baby of the house, just huffs, administers the odd slap to his sleeping sister and tries to flush her blankets down the toilet.
I’ve found that my time is not my own these days. I’m feeding the baby myself, partaking in a bit of what the midwives call ‘demand feeding’, as in feeding the baby when she wants, not, say every four hours or so. Our child is very, very demanding, wanting fed approximately every 16 minutes. So I have to fit everything I want to do in those precious 16 minutes of ‘me time’.
I have become an expert on express cuisine, throwing together and serving up a family dinner in 13.5 minutes, leaving myself a leisurely two and a half minutes to eat and perhaps check the teletext news before the ravenous screaming demon lets up the pipes again demanding sustenance.
I can also shower in six minutes, get dressed in three, dry my hair in two, apply make up in four minutes and have a full minute all to myself to just stare meaningfully into space contemplating how to productively fill the next 16 minutes of ‘free time’ after the next feed.
I ventured out unexpectedly this week on a casual errand (I know I’m a maverick, but I haven’t been outside the front door in about five weeks) and leave the baby with her dad. He knew that there was no food available – as I am ultimately the sole provider of sustenance. He also knew about the whole 16-minute window thing. I promised him I wasn’t venturing a great distance, that I’d be there and back in 14 minutes, leaving us a full two minutes of breathing space that we could use to guffaw and chuckle at the old irrational panic he felt at being left alone with an eternally hungry newborn.
We synchronized watches and I set off at speed towards my destination. Due to traffic it took seven long minutes to reach where I was heading, two to run from the car, one to run back because I had forgotten my purse, 30 seconds to have a swift conversation with an old friend and another 2.5 to make my purchase and run back to the car. All this time I was calculating that I was leaving myself three minutes to make a seven minute journey, therefore leaving the husband a full four minutes to deal with a deranged, ravenous, irrational and inconsolable baby.
I had even set the alarm clock on my mobile to beep when my time ran to 15 minutes. And beep it did. Precisely 30 seconds after that beep the husband called to inform me that the baby was gearing up for a level seven hissy fit, then the child’s screaming drowned out his voice.
My return journey took a little longer than expected due to a hoax bomb alert – 20 minutes longer to be exact. Therefore I was away from home, and more importantly the baby, for a whopping 36 minutes. But I was kept fully informed of the situation through the medium of panicked shouting and very bad words from the husband and wailing shrills from the baby over the phone at intervals of approximately two minutes.
After 36 minutes I returned to the fold to find the husband had aged about 10 years, his eyes where bloodshot and there was sweat on his brow. His hearing hasn’t been the same since due to the high levels of wailing he endured.
It was not the relaxing break I had imagined, if truth be told. I doubt I’ll ever venture outdoors again. I imagine it will get better in, maybe, 18 years or so. I’ll hold out.
Monday 9 August 2010
Baby brain...
Our baby girl has been with us now for nearly three weeks. She has yet to master the whole sleeping a little at night thing, so therefore we’ve been partaking in a bit of extreme parenting – ie surviving on several short 10 minute bursts of sleep nightly and having to pretend to be fully functioning humans during daylight hours.
I had almost forgotten how crazy it was having a newborn around the house – you must realise that it has been a whole two years since we did this last – but we’re relishing fully all the severe sleep deprivation, the constant feeding, the soggy shoulders constantly covered in baby boke, the mountain of nappies, the hours of preparation it takes to actually leave the house, the grumpiness. Honestly we are.
The thing I don’t really relish about this new baby haze phase is the isolation. I don’t keep normal hours, not like other humans. These past few weeks I have become a nocturnal creature, up all night partying with our girl, sleeping till noon, well till 9.30am at least. Being up all night and sleeping all day was much more fun when I was 19.
The postwoman, bills in hand, is my only friend – and she, for some strange reason, is of the thinking that I’m a rather eccentric, scary haired lunatic who tries to strike up conversations about often random and bewildering topics just to talk to another grown up.
“What about that war in Iraq, eh?”
“Yes. The war, indeed. Here are some final demands and courts summons’ for your perusal.”
The husband is my only link with other human life outside my four walls. The poor man is bombarded with questions when he comes home of an evening.
“What news hath you of the outside world?” I demand.
“Nothing exciting,” he says. “I had quite a boring day, actually.”
“Tell me NEWS!” I scream.
“We need petrol in the car,” says he.
“You are joking,” says I. “Petrol? Jeez, Louise! That’s BRILLIANT!
“Yes, yes. Brilliant,” says he, backing away.
And although it sounds like a barrel of laughs, spending the daylight hours wearing night attire isn’t all it’s cracked up to be – particularly when dapper business associates and posh neighbours show up at the front door while you’re kitted out in your terribly unflattering polka dotted pyjamas and vintage MC Hammer t-shirt circa 1985.
Having a newborn about the place is at times terrifying, no matter how many newborns you’ve encountered over the years. They are unpredictable and frankly, loose cannons at times.
I remember shortly after our eldest boy was born we had an incident of baby projectile vomiting. I never knew babies could puke great volumes of liquid vast distances and I’ll not lie to you, readers, I panicked. I called my parents in a state at 5.30am, not long after that I called the emergency doctor, getting the poor man out of bed to speed to our house. I had seen The Exorcist and while I waited for the doc I honestly toyed with the idea of bringing in the parish priest of Finaghy Road North, so that we could rule out demonic possession. In the end the bleary-eyed doctor prescribed more sleep and to go slightly easier on the old irrational panic to this new mother.
And fathers are by no means immune to the horrors which often accompany dealing with a newborn. When the husband was a brand new father he bravely volunteered to mind the boy while I had a bath. Five minutes later the man was practically banging down the bathroom door. I presumed that something awful had happened – like the husband’s hair was on fire, aliens were invading the earth or perhaps the child had combusted – swung open the door just in time to allow the husband access to the loo into which he was violently ill. Apparently changing the child’s dirty nappy had set off a catastrophic chain of vomit-related events.
This time around we know the score, we’ve been down this road before three times already. We’ve been there, done that and have literally got the soggy shouldered, boke backed t-shirts to prove it.
Monday 2 August 2010
Sweet baby girl.....
Ladies and gentlemen, I present our precious baby girl Maoliosa Grace O’Neill. She was born on Wednesday July 21st, weighing 9lbs 10 oz and is healthy and happy and a total doll.
In the end I didn’t have to be induced, thank goodness. I was already a few days late when labour started. I dread to think what weight the child would have been if left for 10 more days. I dare say I’d have made the front page of the Irish News with the north’s first 18lb baby.
Fourth time around labour wasn’t as bad as I thought it was going to be. I’m sure any expectant mother, whether it’s your first or your tenth baby, gets somewhat anxious when it comes to the birth. Me particularly as things seem to happen rather quickly.
My first son was almost born in the corridor of the Royal in Belfast. I remember walking to the nurse’s station and informing the girls there that I thought the baby might be arriving in a relatively short space of time. They were watching Coronation Street, the one where Gayle’s evil husband drives the family’s people carrier into the river. I was told to go back to bed that I wouldn’t be having a baby until morning, presumably until the whole Coronation Street drama died down. I assumed that me being new at this game, them being skilled and experienced midwives that they knew the score. Perhaps I am a unique case, but ten minutes later I was being propelled down the corridor at approx 60mph to the delivery suite where the boy was born seconds later.
The second boy was almost born in the construction site of the newly built south wing of Altnagelvin Hospital after the husband got us completely lost on the way to labour and delivery (there’s a lot to be said for dummy runs and planning your route to the maternity ward). The husband thought that on this occasion he might have to deliver the baby with the help of several dungareed construction workers.
When my third son was born the hospital sent me home informing me that, you’ve guessed it, there was to be no baby till morning. An hour later the husband was making a frantic dash across the bridge to the hospital, honestly believing, yet once more, that he was going to have to deliver the child himself.
This time around when I presented at the hospital on the Wednesday morning and the midwife told me no baby till much, much later I asked, even for the sake of the husband’s sanity and nerves that they keep me in for even a few hours. Since I had a ‘history’ of express deliveries they fortunately agreed to keep me there.
The midwives told me that I was nowhere near even established labour and to take a walk around the hospital, in my night attire, in the hope that the walking and the shame of dandering around in my nightie (perhaps even encountering a few dignatories and news crews opening a fancy new wing) might get the ball rolling.
One minute the husband and I were strolling leisurely around the new hospital admiring the artwork and taking bets on what time the baby would arrive, the next ‘hell on wheels, the baby’s coming’.
I had made plans for a lovely water birth, whale sounds, hippy chanting and incense. Truth was, the midwives hadn’t even time to fill the birthing pool.
Our beautiful baby girl arrived safely at 4.23pm in the wonderful new midwife led unit at Altnagelvin Hospital to the sound of bath water running. Thanks to Midwife Claire Lynch and trainee midwives Kate and Claire, all went beautifully.
She’s been in our lives now for a week and it seems like she’s always been here. She’s a real blessing. Although we’re getting no sleep and can barely manage to string a sentence together she has brought even more sunshine to our house.
I had always wanted a daughter. My Mum and me have a special relationship – she’s truly my best friend – I always wished for a daughter so I could mirror that closeness in my own later years.
I discovered I was pregnant the week my father died last year. I can’t help but think that once my father reached heaven, he had words with the big man up above and sent me my baby girl. Thanks Daddy.
Still pregnant......
I have been pregnant now for 156 weeks. Yes, that’s right, three years. Well it certainly feels that way and with an induction date (tomorrow at 2pm if you’re the praying, lighting blessed candle type of person) looming I will try anything, ANYTHING, to get this baby to arrive au naturale.
This week I’ve taken advice from friends, family, people in shop queues and Facebook pals on the best ways to induce labour. Some of my fellow pregnant ladies will be well aware of the usual, desperate measure labour triggers, but I have to say if laughter and total bewilderment brought on contractions I’d have had this baby two weeks ago, so strange were some of the suggestions.
A friend of mine swears that watching Jaws II brought on her labour both times. Not Jaws I or Jaws III mind, it has to be Jaws II. She went into labour an hour after watching the film with both her sons. Another friend swears by Father Ted, she laughed so much her waters broke.
Another friend advised me that cutting the front lawn in terribly unflattering and ill-fitting swimming attire brought on labour with her daughter with hours. Another friend advised me to plan something important. When she organised her brother’s surprise 40th birthday party celebrations, she took off to the hospital 10 minutes before the party started and her brother shared her new son’s birthdates.
My sister cried so inconsolably with happiness when Peter Andre got to number one with his relaunched Mysterious Girl single that she had her second son that night.
Swinging on the swings at the park seems to have a good success rate, as does impersonating a horse (as in galloping in a horsey-type fashion down a preferably bumpy road), salsa dancing while eating hot curry, a good old-fashioned pray and getting a fright.
At this stage in the game all of those suggestions seem like a little too much hard work. Praying seems to be the less strenuous of them, and the good Lord knows I’ve been on the line with him many, many times in the last few days but unfortunately my begging prayers and promises to actually go to mass (not just lazily contemplate it) EVERY Sunday for the rest of my life have been thus far ignored.
Back in the day, when a pregnant native American woman was near term and showed no sign of going into labour, tribe members would tie her to a rock in an open field and stage a mock ‘attack,’ pulling up their horses only at the very last minute, in hopes of inducing labour. The Pilgrims, for their part, would stand women whose babies were late against a pole, strap them to it, and shake it about a bit hoping to shake that baby loose. Hey, they’re unconventional but I’ve contemplated jogging on the beach while eating fresh pineapple and even bungee jumping. I’ll give anything a go once.
As you read this I’ve sent my husband out to the darkest depths of the garden shed to fetch the car jump leads. It got our old 1997 Astra back on the road when it broke down on the Glenshane Pass, it’s bound to work on this baby.
Wish us luck.
This week I’ve taken advice from friends, family, people in shop queues and Facebook pals on the best ways to induce labour. Some of my fellow pregnant ladies will be well aware of the usual, desperate measure labour triggers, but I have to say if laughter and total bewilderment brought on contractions I’d have had this baby two weeks ago, so strange were some of the suggestions.
A friend of mine swears that watching Jaws II brought on her labour both times. Not Jaws I or Jaws III mind, it has to be Jaws II. She went into labour an hour after watching the film with both her sons. Another friend swears by Father Ted, she laughed so much her waters broke.
Another friend advised me that cutting the front lawn in terribly unflattering and ill-fitting swimming attire brought on labour with her daughter with hours. Another friend advised me to plan something important. When she organised her brother’s surprise 40th birthday party celebrations, she took off to the hospital 10 minutes before the party started and her brother shared her new son’s birthdates.
My sister cried so inconsolably with happiness when Peter Andre got to number one with his relaunched Mysterious Girl single that she had her second son that night.
Swinging on the swings at the park seems to have a good success rate, as does impersonating a horse (as in galloping in a horsey-type fashion down a preferably bumpy road), salsa dancing while eating hot curry, a good old-fashioned pray and getting a fright.
At this stage in the game all of those suggestions seem like a little too much hard work. Praying seems to be the less strenuous of them, and the good Lord knows I’ve been on the line with him many, many times in the last few days but unfortunately my begging prayers and promises to actually go to mass (not just lazily contemplate it) EVERY Sunday for the rest of my life have been thus far ignored.
Back in the day, when a pregnant native American woman was near term and showed no sign of going into labour, tribe members would tie her to a rock in an open field and stage a mock ‘attack,’ pulling up their horses only at the very last minute, in hopes of inducing labour. The Pilgrims, for their part, would stand women whose babies were late against a pole, strap them to it, and shake it about a bit hoping to shake that baby loose. Hey, they’re unconventional but I’ve contemplated jogging on the beach while eating fresh pineapple and even bungee jumping. I’ll give anything a go once.
As you read this I’ve sent my husband out to the darkest depths of the garden shed to fetch the car jump leads. It got our old 1997 Astra back on the road when it broke down on the Glenshane Pass, it’s bound to work on this baby.
Wish us luck.
Tuesday 20 July 2010
Missed the last bus to Coolsville....
Two weeks into the school holidays and I think that the husband and I have survived reasonable well considering. Yes, considering that our house is full to capacity with other people’s noisy children. How did this happen? I thought for sure that the guy who had a garden full of bright and colourful play equipment would have the full quota of street kids, including my own two. I go out of my way to make our house boring and dull. For the love of God why are they congregating here?
Apparently the joy and excitement at the expensive bright lights and colourful plastic that have been invested in by one of our neighbours has worn out. They are bored of all that and would prefer to come round our gaff, leave mucky footprints and sticky handprints everywhere and eat all our food.
Since I am off on what people laughingly refer to as maternity leave and am supposed to take it somewhat easy. I have looked the dictionary. Under ‘easy’ it does not explain that one must physically break up fights between seven year olds about which superhero group is the best – those nice Marvel lads or the dudes from X-men – or use the Heimlich manoeuvre on a five-year-old who is choking on half a worm dropped in his mouth by a well meaning pal.
I’d like to think that my kids are well mannered and are good ambassadors for the O’Neill family when in other people’s company. I’d like to think they’d refrain from insulting people, using bad language and physical violence when they are away from my watchful eye. Maybe it’s wishful thinking. But this week I have discovered that all 7-year-olds are brutally and painfully honest, to the point of inducing real tears in other people’s parents.
In the past week I have heard one of my boy’s friends make a slur on my weight. As in why is your ma fat? I felt like bursting in to the room, brandishing the vacuum cleaner in a menacing way and shouting “I’m pregnant, you scoundrel! I didn’t in fact eat all the pies. You see how the extra weight is confined to around my tummy area only? Do you realise the sacrifice and suffering I have endured to not eat chocolate cake for every meal? This time next week I’ll be back in my skinny jeans, you mark my words.” (At this point waving the vacuum pole in the air for dramatic effect) “Do you hear me boy? SKINNY JEANS!!”
I have also been called, and I quote, ‘stupid and boring’. This was because I was unfamiliar with some of the lyrics from High School Musical. The little girl in question was horrified that I, and here is where I hang my head in total and utter shame, have never watched a programme called Glee. Apparently there are cooler and hipper mums around who know all the words to these songs and quite happily sing and dance their way around their kitchens with their offspring. Am I a bad mother?
I may be wrong here, but the last time I looked singing rubbish eighties soft rock numbers into hairbrushes did not a cool person make. Perhaps they have changed the definition of coolness. I honestly thought that by refraining from wearing elasticated waisted ‘Mom jeans’ and liking Susan Boyle was all the effort needed to make me ‘cool’. Perhaps I should up my game. Perhaps I have been left lonely on the roadside as all the other mas speed past onboard the last bus to Coolsville, waving Enrique Inglasias posters out the windows and wearing Lady Gaga-style outfits. Oh, my coolness where art thou? When did you desert me?
I pondered this apparent lack of coolness for days. Hell I even looked up the lyrics to ‘Don’t Stop Believing’ on the net. Then I wised up.
I suppose everyone’s perception of coolness is worlds apart. As long as my boys at least think I’m borderline cool then that’s fine with me.
And I suppose it’s sweet that for a short time kids think that their mum and dad are the coolest people on the planet, casting a dark, uncool cloud over other parents. The idolising doesn’t last long, however. There comes a time when the coolness is replaced with total and utter parental embarrassment, a stage which I have been preparing for for a long time, an area where I am most skilled. Embarrassing my children is the sole reason I became a parent (alright, one of them anyway).
In the meantime I shall hunt out my Kiss records and Def Leppard t-shirts. I shall hook up the karaoke machine to the front porch and belt out a few tunes full throttle. These kids think their mas are cool? They aint seen nothing yet.
Apparently the joy and excitement at the expensive bright lights and colourful plastic that have been invested in by one of our neighbours has worn out. They are bored of all that and would prefer to come round our gaff, leave mucky footprints and sticky handprints everywhere and eat all our food.
Since I am off on what people laughingly refer to as maternity leave and am supposed to take it somewhat easy. I have looked the dictionary. Under ‘easy’ it does not explain that one must physically break up fights between seven year olds about which superhero group is the best – those nice Marvel lads or the dudes from X-men – or use the Heimlich manoeuvre on a five-year-old who is choking on half a worm dropped in his mouth by a well meaning pal.
I’d like to think that my kids are well mannered and are good ambassadors for the O’Neill family when in other people’s company. I’d like to think they’d refrain from insulting people, using bad language and physical violence when they are away from my watchful eye. Maybe it’s wishful thinking. But this week I have discovered that all 7-year-olds are brutally and painfully honest, to the point of inducing real tears in other people’s parents.
In the past week I have heard one of my boy’s friends make a slur on my weight. As in why is your ma fat? I felt like bursting in to the room, brandishing the vacuum cleaner in a menacing way and shouting “I’m pregnant, you scoundrel! I didn’t in fact eat all the pies. You see how the extra weight is confined to around my tummy area only? Do you realise the sacrifice and suffering I have endured to not eat chocolate cake for every meal? This time next week I’ll be back in my skinny jeans, you mark my words.” (At this point waving the vacuum pole in the air for dramatic effect) “Do you hear me boy? SKINNY JEANS!!”
I have also been called, and I quote, ‘stupid and boring’. This was because I was unfamiliar with some of the lyrics from High School Musical. The little girl in question was horrified that I, and here is where I hang my head in total and utter shame, have never watched a programme called Glee. Apparently there are cooler and hipper mums around who know all the words to these songs and quite happily sing and dance their way around their kitchens with their offspring. Am I a bad mother?
I may be wrong here, but the last time I looked singing rubbish eighties soft rock numbers into hairbrushes did not a cool person make. Perhaps they have changed the definition of coolness. I honestly thought that by refraining from wearing elasticated waisted ‘Mom jeans’ and liking Susan Boyle was all the effort needed to make me ‘cool’. Perhaps I should up my game. Perhaps I have been left lonely on the roadside as all the other mas speed past onboard the last bus to Coolsville, waving Enrique Inglasias posters out the windows and wearing Lady Gaga-style outfits. Oh, my coolness where art thou? When did you desert me?
I pondered this apparent lack of coolness for days. Hell I even looked up the lyrics to ‘Don’t Stop Believing’ on the net. Then I wised up.
I suppose everyone’s perception of coolness is worlds apart. As long as my boys at least think I’m borderline cool then that’s fine with me.
And I suppose it’s sweet that for a short time kids think that their mum and dad are the coolest people on the planet, casting a dark, uncool cloud over other parents. The idolising doesn’t last long, however. There comes a time when the coolness is replaced with total and utter parental embarrassment, a stage which I have been preparing for for a long time, an area where I am most skilled. Embarrassing my children is the sole reason I became a parent (alright, one of them anyway).
In the meantime I shall hunt out my Kiss records and Def Leppard t-shirts. I shall hook up the karaoke machine to the front porch and belt out a few tunes full throttle. These kids think their mas are cool? They aint seen nothing yet.
Monday 12 July 2010
Anyone see my pink highlighter?
The dog, Buddy, ate an entire pink highlighter this morning. When I questioned him on this crime he denied all knowledge of ever even seeing the marker and blamed the youngest boy instead. I don't know who to believe....
Green fingers...
Worms and snails and puppy dogs tails, that's what little boys are made of. Well that's what the contents of the youngest boy's jean pockets are anyway.
The waiting game
I am formally playing the baby waiting game. This baby is due to arrive in six days time, but at this stage I feel like I can’t possibly go the distance.
It truly feels like this has been the longest pregnancy in history – peppered with such sparkling highlights as five-month long bouts of morning sickness, cleaning products sniffing obsessions and spaghetti bolognaise phobias.
I’ll be glad to be ‘normal’ again. In fact I plan a maternity-style bonfire to rival any eleventh night affair, except mine will be packed to the rafters not with tyres, old sofas and placards bearing derogatory remarks about people of another persuasion but stacked with horrendously unflattering elasticated waisted maternity jeans, matronly looking flowery tops and bottles of gloopy Gaviscon.
Something peculiar happens to a girl in the last weeks of pregnancy. People no longer converse normally to a heavily pregnant woman – they want to talk about babies and nothing else. I find myself starting conversations with people about topics as broad ranging as the recent budget to the situation in Iraq. No matter what the subject people turn it around to bumps and babies.
“What about that budget eh? Bit dramatic, everyone’s up for the chop.”
“Never you worry your pretty little head about that silly old budget, you concentrate on cutey little baby blankets and pink fluffy bunnies.”
“Ammm, OK then.”
And why is it that people feel that it is OK to invade the space of a pregnant woman? Complete and utter strangers, who would walk past a ‘normal’ person without saying a word, are suddenly over patting the bump and taking great pleasure in scaring you with their nightmare birth story.
The last few weeks of pregnancy are torturous enough without having to hear about ladies whose actual heads exploded in childbirth or who went actually mad, as in like seriously mad – mooing like a cow and everything – with the pains of labour.
Forget the cutesy ‘Baby on Board’ t-shirts mums-to-be are prone to wearing, I’ve put in an order for a few ‘Back off the Bump or Die!’ and ‘Pregnant and Dangerous, stay well clear for your own safety!’ t-shirts.
I was to take a tour of the new wing at our hospital last week to familiarise myself with the place. The midwife who had been explaining the place described the new multi-million facility as ‘like a hotel, a spa even.’
I don’t know what these midwives do of a weekend but the last time I went on a luxury break it did not involve excruciating pain, and abundance of drugs – perhaps I’ve been frequenting all the wrong places – and the most I went home with was a ‘complimentary’ bathrobe, not a tiny human being who will drain my finances for the next 18 years. Also, as far as I know you can stay in these hotels for a little longer than six hours before they chuck you out.
I seem to be suffering from severe grumpiness; no one is safe from my wrath.
As for those scoundrels who call, Facebook and text constantly asking for news of the baby I’ve taken to switching the phone off and have left a message along the lines of….
“You have reached the O’Neill residence. There is currently no news, no sign, no shifting and no ‘word of me yet’. I am still the size of a small semi-detached house and extremely, extremely irritable. If you’d like to leave a message please do so, refraining from mentioning anything that will tip me over the edge to insanity – topics to avoid include jump start cables, 10-month-long pregnancies and 15 pound babies. Should your message annoy me in any shape or form I shall dispatch my children to your abode, have them daub poster paint stick men on your living room curtains and bad words all over your car. This will then be entirely your fault. You have been warned. Ba-Bye!
It truly feels like this has been the longest pregnancy in history – peppered with such sparkling highlights as five-month long bouts of morning sickness, cleaning products sniffing obsessions and spaghetti bolognaise phobias.
I’ll be glad to be ‘normal’ again. In fact I plan a maternity-style bonfire to rival any eleventh night affair, except mine will be packed to the rafters not with tyres, old sofas and placards bearing derogatory remarks about people of another persuasion but stacked with horrendously unflattering elasticated waisted maternity jeans, matronly looking flowery tops and bottles of gloopy Gaviscon.
Something peculiar happens to a girl in the last weeks of pregnancy. People no longer converse normally to a heavily pregnant woman – they want to talk about babies and nothing else. I find myself starting conversations with people about topics as broad ranging as the recent budget to the situation in Iraq. No matter what the subject people turn it around to bumps and babies.
“What about that budget eh? Bit dramatic, everyone’s up for the chop.”
“Never you worry your pretty little head about that silly old budget, you concentrate on cutey little baby blankets and pink fluffy bunnies.”
“Ammm, OK then.”
And why is it that people feel that it is OK to invade the space of a pregnant woman? Complete and utter strangers, who would walk past a ‘normal’ person without saying a word, are suddenly over patting the bump and taking great pleasure in scaring you with their nightmare birth story.
The last few weeks of pregnancy are torturous enough without having to hear about ladies whose actual heads exploded in childbirth or who went actually mad, as in like seriously mad – mooing like a cow and everything – with the pains of labour.
Forget the cutesy ‘Baby on Board’ t-shirts mums-to-be are prone to wearing, I’ve put in an order for a few ‘Back off the Bump or Die!’ and ‘Pregnant and Dangerous, stay well clear for your own safety!’ t-shirts.
I was to take a tour of the new wing at our hospital last week to familiarise myself with the place. The midwife who had been explaining the place described the new multi-million facility as ‘like a hotel, a spa even.’
I don’t know what these midwives do of a weekend but the last time I went on a luxury break it did not involve excruciating pain, and abundance of drugs – perhaps I’ve been frequenting all the wrong places – and the most I went home with was a ‘complimentary’ bathrobe, not a tiny human being who will drain my finances for the next 18 years. Also, as far as I know you can stay in these hotels for a little longer than six hours before they chuck you out.
I seem to be suffering from severe grumpiness; no one is safe from my wrath.
As for those scoundrels who call, Facebook and text constantly asking for news of the baby I’ve taken to switching the phone off and have left a message along the lines of….
“You have reached the O’Neill residence. There is currently no news, no sign, no shifting and no ‘word of me yet’. I am still the size of a small semi-detached house and extremely, extremely irritable. If you’d like to leave a message please do so, refraining from mentioning anything that will tip me over the edge to insanity – topics to avoid include jump start cables, 10-month-long pregnancies and 15 pound babies. Should your message annoy me in any shape or form I shall dispatch my children to your abode, have them daub poster paint stick men on your living room curtains and bad words all over your car. This will then be entirely your fault. You have been warned. Ba-Bye!
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