The Forty-First month: March 2008

Walking at Capel-y-ffin (a weekend with G'ma & G'pa)

Saturday 8th

Pete away in France visiting Mr Wilks. I am really enjoying being with you and feel we are really close at the moment. It’s so much more relaxing if I just focus on you and don’t try to do anything else.

Friday we went swimming to the Dolphin pool – water deliciously warm. At first you hold on to me, than gradually as the hour passes, you start to separate. After an hour you were busy splashing around 3 metres away from me holding onto the ‘flotation thing’ – the noodle, as I floated around the pool, also on a ‘flotation thing’ watching you enjoy yourself. I felt wonderfully relaxed afterwards.

We whiled away another hour at Mina rd park playground – you like to have a short go on everything and love the helicopter shaped climbing frame. ‘Mummy you be the co-pilot.’ We flew to India and ate pretend sandwiches and then went home again. Lunch at Jesse’s house with Sylvia. You two sat opposite each other and giggled incessantly, egging each other on and not eating much lunch. We finished off Daddy’s birthday cake, a rather successful chocolate sponge smothered in butter icing.

Afterwards we sat in their beautiful garden soaking up bright winter sun between chilly gusts of wind, while you and Jesse ran about on the lawn, climbed the wooden ladder up the apple tree and tried the hammock. We left after 3pm and you were so exhausted you fell into a deep sleep in the car from which I woke you when we arrived home. After supper, we had a leisurely bath together and your were full of hugs and kisses. I see how the more I engage with you the more co-operative you are – you even ask me to brush your teeth or hair.
Nowadays you often say, mummy be with me, play with me, come in my ‘tunnel’ (as you call the space under the stairs where you play). You want all of me a lot of the time, in contrast with the mornings when you are at playgroup. If I am up for it and am not distracted by household/admin tasks, I can really enjoy our company, but I can also feel exhausted by the end of the day by your emotional demands.

I am trying a new tack of leaving piles of mess in the kitchen and not being so methodical about clearing up after each meal, just to see what it feels like – strangely liberating at the moment – to feel that it is more important to engage in the moment: playing with you or in the evenings, doing something I really want to be doing.

Today: Saturday. We went to the zoo in the rain with Jimmy. You were both transfixed by a puppet show from Mr Brown’s Pig, moderate quality, but a memorable experience anyway. While the other children laughed and shouted out responses, you observed it all, entertained but not joining in the crowd’s answers to the puppeteer’s questions. We left the pushchair behind (because I am finding it too exhausting to push you around these days) and by 2pm you were losing the plot, sitting in puddles outside the zoo because you wanted to be carried. We were about 5 mins from the car and I insisted that you walked, and you dissolved into a hysterical state. I had to hold you in my arms and calm you down. Even as you went for a wee in a puddle (after some persuasion) you were crying.

I left you to sleep for an hour an a half on the sofa when we got back and I still managed to get you to bed by 8.15 after playing dinosaur snap instead of stories. You were great when I was cooking dinner – you squidged Play Dough at the kitchen table, chatting away to yourself and telling stories about what you were making.