A not so subtle illustration

I have been asked so many times over the past six years (gosh, can it be almost 7 since Ellanor left us?!), what "should" people do or say around their loved one whose baby has died. It's a tricky question to answer, because it's not as simple as any finite hard and fast rule. Commonsense, I would like to think, plays a decent part in anyone's approach as to how best they can work their way through with their friend/loved one.

But I will give an example (below), which - oh what a surprise! - is an excerpt from my book, and hopefully illustrates just one of the ideal ways that I was shown the space with grace (as I put it) to simply *be* in any given moment. Only a very few special people are able to do this, unfortunately, from all accounts I've come across in my time, listening to others' stories of loss and a desire to not have their situation waved or hugged or talked away. I'd like to think that by sharing this, there might blossom even more of those graceful angels amongst us:

     One of my oldest, dearest friends was having her 30th birthday celebrations at a restaurant in the city. I had been looking forward to the outing ever since we had received the invitation. Stacey and I had lost touch for a few years – different schools and then different neighbours and work commitments had caused us to drift apart – but we had reconnected just days after Ella died, when Stacey called me out of the blue. It was a moment of pure uplifting joy for my soul as she entrusted to me the secret that she was in the early stages of her own precarious, uncertain pregnancy after already suffering two miscarriages. I could hear in Stacey’s voice the hesitant mixture of hope and anticipation with fear and nervousness about the baby’s survival and I identified with it instantly.
     Stacey went on to deliver a healthy, strong boy into the world. I finally mustered the nerve to meet up with them when the little bloke was about thirteen weeks old. I cried with joy for my friend but felt a tugging at my heart that I assumed would always happen now when I met any friends’ children for the first time. I was not wrong, as it turns out.
     Stacey was so lovely the day I met her son. While I was taking all this in, her pace and conversation slowed to match mine. Nothing was said in an attempt to gloss over my obvious pain. There was no rush to comfort me, no outstretched arms that made me feel awkward and obliged to accept a hug I didn’t want, no gestures that led me to believe I was being inappropriate. I quietly wept as I held her son and Stacey just sat with me, very focused and still. It felt so good. Gradually, we began to talk and I thanked her profusely for being so, well, normal towards my reaction! This was how I had hoped it could be and if one person, just one decent person in my life, could deliver me this space with her graceful presence, then I considered myself extremely fortunate.

She's onto the lot of you

This poor poorly poppet of ours, she is still working the lurgy through. I have been up since 5am listening to her cough to the point of the awful noise that heralds the necessity of a bucket beside the bed, just in case whatever you hear coming up actually... well, comes out. Poor darlin.

While I was lying next to her in an attempt to settle her so she wasn't alarmed by all the kerfuffle from her lungs, she asked me, still in a haze of delirium (for I don't think she was fully awake), "How will I know whose boots are mine?"

"What's that, sweetpea?"

"If someone else has the same boots as me with the flowers all on them.... how do we know which ones are my ones?"

Don't ask me how, but she knows you're all asking about the boots. She's onto the lot of you. But it's okay, we've got it all worked out. We're going to check the size. Because it's hardly likely that if anyone else has her boots, they're going to also have the same size. Sorted.

I wish she would get better, this is the extended cough that just won't simmer down. We're meant to be going to a 5th birthday party this afternoon. There is no WAY I am subjecting her friend, The Birthday Girl, or anyone else to this. So the news broke earlier. Party plan-dashing was declared at 6:16am EST. There was a moment of silence and we bowed our heads over the body. And then the LGBB's face crumpled as what she just heard actually registered in her brain. There would be no fairy dress-ups for her today, no cake, no present for The Birthday Girl.

But perhaps the hardest part of the "punishment" to swallow - ewwwww - is the fact that she caught this cold off another child who should have stayed home. It starts young. How many workplaces have you been in where people come in sick and don't go home and you spend the rest of your day avoiding them and then, when you start to feel that rasp in the back of your throat and your breath feels suddenly hotter in your mouth and then congestion begins, you curse them, don't you?
(Mind you, I think I've encountered more people who stay home at the slightest sniffle when they're hardly ill at all...)

I certainly feel UTTERLY wretched for doing this to my LGBB! It's the first party she's had to miss due to illness. But I'm certain The Birthday Girl's mother, plus the other party goers' parents, will thank me. Even if my child doesn't. 

What to expect when you're expecting a Cocktail At Naptime

In the year 2000, I was expecting my first child. By month two of the gestation, I was eagerly poring over a copy of the seemingly staple and somewhat stuffy (personal opinion only) self-proclaimed "iconic" pregnant woman's bible: What To Expect When You're Expecting. I have to say, it took itself very seriously.

By the time my little Bliss-Bomb arrived in 2006 - that's her there, nawwwww - I felt like I had a handle on what to expect. After all, I was now expecting for the 10th time. I was done with the expecting part, certainly the reading of what I was going through and what I could expect. I wanted to get to the euphoric huggies-commercial baby-gooey-lovin' part!

It didn't happen. Of course it didn't happen. I mean, it did, but it also SO didn't live up to my expectations that I had built upon over the intervening six years as I waited to bring home my first child.

Then, when I got my Bliss Bomb home, I scoured the "modern-day" new mother's bible, Baby Love, but still.... STILL I did not feel one bit normal. I hardly felt placated. I mean, this book told me what to do with my baby and it was good for that. But, being a girl who gets by without a mother or sisters or any influences like that, I needed.... well, I needed a bloody cocktail at naptime friend. Who knew?

I know what happened now.  What I didn't have was the real take on the gig. The bit about the episotomy I'd get. And the bladder weakness I'd be subjected to. And a random leaky alpha boob that could squirt a sales clerk at ten paces. What if I had been forewarned? Prepared? Chortle-chortle...... I would have scoffed in this book's face if it had tried to convince me before my sweet cherub had arrived that I would be faced with any such quandry.

And this is where the book - Cocktails At Naptime - comes in. If you've been under a rock in the mummy blogosphere, not only will you not have heard of its existence (and shame on you), but you also won't know that Gillian Martin and Emma Kaufmann co-authored the book and have never actually met. It's now the stuff of folk legend, I'm sure, for it remains a mystery to me how anything so well crafted has been put together by more than one person who don't even live in the same country. As a wannabe published author myself, I find that a remarkable feat on its own.

But as it stands, I've devoured Cocktails At Naptime cover to cover and I have to say, this book is such a delightfully refreshing, funny - frankly - pisstake on the entire debacle oh sorry, miracle that is bringing home a new baby. You can't help but laugh out loud, even if you're the hardest nut to crack. Hmmmm... like me, when it comes to babies and taking them at comedic value (I mean, come on, just look at my history).

This is the sort of book that can span the years. It will be equally as comfortable in the hands of someone who is in their babymoon, in the throes of those first delirious months, and in the first, second or third year (and beyond) as a retrospective. The biggest appeal about Cocktails At Naptime is that it's like that friend who not only encourages you to be led astray to the 'dark side' of succumbing to that want/need/desperation to see yourself as still normal even though you're a mother now and still haven't gone back to being your previously knowable self, it's also there to educate and even guide (in the most frank and real and "They didn't write that, I didn't actually just read that?!" kind of way).

I began reading this book after being approached by the authors to host a review as part of their bloggy tour - a request I could not turn down, as I was frankly very chuffed at simply being asked - and thought it would take me the usual aaaaages to read. I am an awful reader, I'm bad at it. It takes me months to finish anything, even books I adore.

So I was delighted that this was a read that was, obviously, so captivating that even little old slow-poke me devoured it in a couple of afternoons. AND I retained information. AND I had a bloody good time reading it.

In no particular order, I give you some of my stand-out favourite bits sorry, sections is a more comfortable word, considering the subject matter (and without giving too much away, a-course, because then what would be the point of my blog's very first ever GIVE AWAY at the end!?!?!):

• Say hello to your new vagina (authors' words, not mine) - I told more than one friend in the first few months that I was certain I was being applauded every time I used the toilet because.... LOOK AWAY NOW, GENTLEMEN AND LADIES....... I could hear clapping. Full on clapping when I *aherm* shook the drips. Turns out, it was the Labia Sisters still not snapped back to their original form. Now, there, right there, is sommit they do NOT explain in any preparation class I've ever graced (my words, not authors').

• Did the person doing the needle-work have glasses that looked like the bottom of a Coke bottle? - For serious, that question made me draw in my thighs to protectively cover The Girls. I mean, HOW did Gillian and Emma know the description of my Obstetrician? Were they there?? Uncanny.

• Your boobs and you - made me feel so, so, so normal about my previously decent and generous cup-size expanding to something of gargantuan proportions, five times larger in terms of cup size, in fact (never to go down, by the way, and don't be thinking that's fun... there's nothing FUN about carrying around a craptonne of weight in one area of your body - think scoliosis and permanent back strain, people, as well as not fitting into anything anymore because of that localised area alone)

• Your stretch marks - and their marbling design. Oh, Lordy-maird, yes. Sob. Yes. I could show you photos but honestly, we shan't go there. I still want readers tomorrow.

• "He said/She said" - very informative, a must-have for those times where the new mother is feeling so low and thinks she's reacting normally to everything her partner does or says (in Twitter terms, the hashtag would be a resounding, #newsforyouhoney)

This book, simply, has a little bit of everything. I don't think anything was left out, or if it was, it's so full of great stuff to dip into that you won't notice. There are too many things to list as my fave because really, it all was. A really spiffy read! And without trying to sound trite, I have to say... Awesome job, Gillian and Emma. Truly.

There's only one slightly negative thing I'd like to say:   Where were you four years ago?!?! I so could have used this then (even though, strangely, it's so validating even now to read your book and realise, owh migod, I was normal back then!)

You know possibly the best bit?  You can WIN yourself a copy - I have two here, thanks to the remarkable posting efforts of Joanna at Finch Publishing to get them to me quick-sticks last minute - to either covet for yourself or give away (they are so speccy, honestly, what a fantastic present) to a mum in your life who could use the giggle and confirmation.

So.... I know it's been done already, by Holly to name just one, but I want cocktails, people. And not just a name. I want details, I want recipes.

Your favourite cocktail: Hit me with it in a comment below! The best sounding two, with ingredients, score themselves a free copy of the book, Cocktails At Naptime.

Yes, it's all about the alcohol.

And here's the fineprint: 
Sorry, only open to Australian residents.
Don't worry so much about the quantities, I can make that up as I go along - muahahahahaaa
Competition closes 8pm Sunday, so get your comments in quick!

Everybody loves a fart joke, come on

This is a repost of an entry I made last year. It just surfaced and I giggled, despite myself, so thought you might get a larf or two as well...



There are few things that don't eventually end up amusing the LGBB. She'll usually find the 'yumour in anything. But I really love watching the facial journey as performers/entertainers/TV shows/relatives all get put through their paces if she's in one of *those* temperaments.

Take, for instance, this photo essay that I shall call "Funny Mister Man" - what Lolly called him - the clown who was entertaining today in the open library at the festival we visited in our district.

You'll see here the expression I like to refer to as the Prove Your Worth - characterised by the triple chin-esque pursed-lipped grimace. The angle of the head is a give-away - this look says to me I hereby reserve my judgement of your entertainment value and I shan't give away anything of my ruling until I am assured of your hilarity.


The poor dancing fool in front of her will then get the lift of the chin, an almost imperceptible grimace of uncertainty. This look says... you'll have to try much harder than that to impress me, but you're getting there. Keep up the good work.







Then, surely, the LGBB will begin to lose herself in the entertainment. A very faint yet brief smirk crosses her face. You're almost in... but don't stop trying your best, Funnyman.







So the poor sod tries balloon animal joke after twirling umbrella-hat joke....






...which all fell flat. Apparently. Although in her eyes, I see the slightest encouragement, with the lifted brows.








And then. The Master does it. A farty-noise....






.... Oh, NOW you're talkin' toddler language. Or... bottom burping it, anyway.









One more "prrrrfppppbbbbt" complete with poking out tongue and googly eyes and she was putty in his hands.










It's such an awesome day, this community festival. We went last year for the first time.*

So we've vowed now to go each year and so far, the first two years haven't disappointed! Today we had a picnic on the grass, like last time. We've come home for a rest (OMG OMG OMG she is asleep!!!!) before heading out tonight for the fireworks display. Last year it was great. Here are some shots. Check out how little the LGBB was! Awwww. She wasn't even walking yet.



















* Er, despite living in this area for eleven years... it was one of those things we used to see each year, if ever we happened to drive through, you can't miss it for the traffic and the balloons and carnival rides - but was never something we would have enjoyed just the two of us. It's a family-oriented festival for the community, one which we felt so, so, so separate from, year after year the feeling got worse.

What does your kids' lunchbox say about you?

Psssst..... Join me here tomorrow for a Cocktail give away!


This is something that I've always genuinely wondered but I am also always too nervous to ask because of the fear of backlash. Seriously! There is a certain defensive contingent of the Motherhood that bands together and takes down anyone seen to be having fun being a mother. Come on... you and I both know it's out there. You hear it in the play centres and playgrounds. I don't know about you, but when I come across it, I can sometimes (depending how strong I'm feeling that day) feel like hiding my efforts for fear of being picked on by fellow mothers for being a "try-hard" when, really, it's a usual and normal thing for me. Let me explain.

Ever since the LGBB has been going to occasional care, I have really enjoyed packing her a lunch (for the most part, you know, except those mornings where I just can't get going... rare for me as I'm an early rising morning person). Call it my hark back to Enid Blyton books - although there will NEVER be any tongue sandwiches served in this house, the LGBB has a no-tongue sanga guarantee - where the characters always sounded so excited to have their bottles of pop, cold chicken drumsticks and ooble-ooble biscuits, but I just get into the whole segmented, pieces of sandwich, little smattering of something sweet, healthy medley of snacks, lunch thing.

Lately, I have been experimenting with the Japanese bento box style of lunch. Think of it as scrapbooking but with food. With this, it can be as simple as taking a cookie cutter to a cheese sandwich and bingo! You have something that looks so special that it is devoured, no matter what action is going on around them.

A while back, Lolly also used to enjoy eating healthy things like cherry tomatoes, grapes and salmon sandwiches (if I took the crusts off, flatten with a rolling pin, then spread with cream cheese and thin sliced salmon before rolling up and cutting like sushi, it was even more exciting than triangles!). But then I started to notice that more often than not, particularly when she was at 3 year-old kindy two mornings a week, her lunchbox would come back with just the sandwich eaten. Lots of wasted, good, fresh, healthy food. And THEN.... she let slip one day that "Chelsea shared her yummy biscuit with me."

"Oh, really?" I asked, eyebrows so raised I thought they might lift off my face. I would have thought that was against some sort of policy. "What kind of biscuit?"

They were Oreo cookies, as it turned out. And it hadn't been the first time little Chelsea had shared her Superstar Mega-Tastebud Eye-Popping lunch box treats with her bestie, my daughter. Apparently, from the sounds of it, Chelsea is a child you want to be friends with - she has all sorts in that box, from the cookies to crisps. Adding insult to injury, the LGBB began to make statements that I knew she had heard from someone else, such as, "My lunch is yuck." You only have to know my kid and her love of not just plain old "cheese n budder" sandwiches but pretty much most foods to know that eating is on her list of Most Fun Things To Do - she is the only child you will find still sitting at the party table, finishing her plate.... and sometimes other people's before she grew out of it, oh dear.... long after the other children have run off again to play. She is a good eater. And I know her well enough to know that I keep her lunch food simple if I want it eaten - none of it had ever before been branded "yuck". Mushroom casserole, that was "yuck" and I could handle that, it was to be expected. Vegetable stirfry, that too was "yuck". But not a plain sandwich. So I knew I had to nip this in the bud quickly.

As it turns out, the biscuits were being sneaked to the LGBB - and I could tell, because she hasn't yet learned to fib, so the cheeky giggle and hand over the mouth as she told me kind of gave her away. I explained to her the importance of letting Chelsea eat her own lunch even if she was being nice by sharing. She kind of understood but, come on, what kid wouldn't pass up their salad lunch for a bikkie!? I know I would!

Far be it from me to decide for another's child what goes into their lunchbox, but I was not supremely pleased that my child's lunch was beginning to continually go uneaten in favour of these other delicacies. So I did my first "real" mum thing. I went to the teacher. She was gorgeous about it. No, they didn't allow children to share and, yes, she was going to encourage the girls to sit away from one another at lunch time (or go in different groups) because there were other issues of exclusivity beginning to form around Chelsea's desire to absorb every bit of the LGBB to the exclusion of all others - something I am deeply diligent about discouraging, but that's another post for another Mother Heart Linky day!

I now skewer those cherry tomatoes with little animal head shaped tooth picks (purpose made) and every cherry tomato is once again devoured. I make flowers with cucumber and 'stalks', I stick 'feet' under apple portions and make umbrellas out of other healthy little bits and pieces. It takes as long as cutting and then sticking them in the bottom.... and it guarantees they get eaten. She gets a cheese slice cut with little cookie cutters as well and, with some of the stamps and cutters my sister in-law sent me (she's Japanese, and lives in Japan... handy for my growing obsession because that is the home of food-in-cute-shapes!), I make penguins, bears, cars, boats.... And the LGBB is delighted. She's back to eating everything.

And now, to my question (and the reason why I ask it):
I have mentioned this food preparation fetish practice of mine to various friends with children of a similar age and their responses - these are friends, mind you! - range from "Oh GOD, I don't have time for any of that in the morning" to "Why would you want to make more work for yourself? Just shove some shit in a sandwich, cut it and bung it in a lunchbox. Seriously." I've also had a couple of "Awwww, I wish I had the patience but I don't" sort of backhanded compliments as well. And it has left me to wonder: With these sorts of attitudes from my friends, what am I setting my daughter up for at 4 year-old kindy next year or school the following year?

To me, when my young child is away in the care of someone else and surrounded by the different energies of upbringings represented by a whole swag of kids, I want her to open her lunchbox and remember that Mummy did something special for her and that she belongs. I don't want to "shove some shit" haphazardly in there and be done with it. I'm also not saying that I do the cutesy cookie cutter sandwich thing every single day either. But by and large, there will be something unique in her lunchbox and I am disappointed that there might (will) come a day that it causes her anguish because of being teased. For if the mothers who are my friends are willing enough to roll their eyes at the care I take, then I can bet there will be worse out there ready to let Junior know, when s/he comes home and says there's this girl who has shapes in her lunchbox (I admit, it probably looks uber-posh but come on! It's just a cookie cutter, I'm not whittling sandwiches into art with a sharp knife for hours!), I can guarantee there will be some whose responses to their children that will not be measured or respectful of the LGBB. And I know it can happen that way. And the only way I see avoiding it is to stop doing it.

From my friends' responses alone, I realise it may be intimidating to some mothers who see other mothers doing something that appears over the top for their children. I know I have done it. Judged, in fact, for if I am honest that is what I am doing. Without a second thought, I can wipe off my own feelings of inadequacy about not doing it "this way" like I have seen someone else do for their child and it sometimes, on a low day, makes me feel better if I tell myself how tedious it must be for that person to be constantly making sure their child is dressed perfectly or has a hair style that looks like an hour was spent on it. That's all MY stuff, though! That's a reflection of my feelings of shortcoming. I grew up with a mum who, now I am a mother I can see, was very self-conscious and used to put down the efforts of my friends' mothers to me. It is deeply sad to me, looking back now, that my mother was in such an intimidated place and, more so, that she found it acceptable to expose me to it.

Hmmmm! This post has ended up in quite a different place to where I thought it would when I began. However, my question still remains.... and I don't expect anyone to answer this publicly, unless you want to! Self-reflection is a personal thing.

What do you put more effort into over other things for your child? Is there any one thing in particular? And how do you really feel, as a person and fellow mother, when you see where an obvious effort has been made by another mother (or father)? Does it affect you in any way, or only on certain days?



 This post is part of Seven Cherubs' Mother Heart Linky, Thursday. 


Addendum: Considering Alliecat's really insightful comment, I think it's probably pertinent for me to point out that I realise the effort I put in to my child's lunch could possibly viewed as over the top ;)  But it is something I get a sense of satisfaction out of doing - it fulfils something creative in me as well as gives enjoyment and an element of surprise to her. Win-win in my books! Although I go to a certain amount of effort here, at least one area of my house or another is always a mess, I never iron, I'm lucky to brush my teeth and have a shower by 12pm some days (yes, still! yes, I know she's four) because I procrastinate about loads of stuff as a mother. So please don't be thinking I'm spinning all plates all the time just because I consider her lunchbox a chance for me to create a work of art. Cheeeeeers!

This is a job for..... Eddie Teddy

It's Eddie Teddy's turn to stay at the LGBB's place this week. This little kindy bear has been everywhere, by the looks of things.

Lolly has been waiting all year to get him to come and play with her and today, she was bursting with glee when she showed him to me when I went to pick her up. Only thing is, whatever began last night (along with the screaming, clawing at the wall while still asleep, bed-wetting nightmare she was having) and appeared to be dormant this morning, had surfaced again. And by 5.30, Eddie was called to arms - literally - and ended up spending his first early night with our poor poorly sausage. I think she's brewing an infection (of the "my wee's hurt" variety...) along with a head that feels like it's been in an oven and yet she's complaining of the cold.

Tough gig, but somebeary's gotta do it

And just as a side note, I am really loving what the kindergarten have done with this bear and encouraging the gathering of stories. How unique must every kindy bear be! So special. I can see, with the adornments on the pages of some of the parents who already have kids at school, that they know how it's done. The presentations are gorgeous - cute decorations, simple, very sweetly worded stories about where Eddie has been while staying at their house for the week, and such a precious memory for the class.

I forgot all the filled-with-wonder things that happen to young kids. I hope the innocence stays in all of them for as long as they feel safe to hold onto it and I wish for each of those sacred hearts a way for them to remain true to their inner self, regardless of all the fads and fashions they'll no doubt get bombarded with as they grow older.

There are satellites of lurve in our vegie patch!

We made a no-dig raised vegie bed yesterday. A little something for the LGBB to tend. She's really loving watching her tomatoes grow and diligently waters them. They're very healthy and robust, with heaps of sweet little yellow star flowers on them. Oh, how I hope it fruits! They will be our very first if they do.

Quiet! Concentrating. Soil carrying is tricky when your spade is only the size of your hand.

Just checking Daddy's doing it right...

Here is Nanna, tending her vegies' home. Very serious business.

That greenery against the fence is a tall weed. D'oh. Forgot to remove that one. But it looks healthy, non?

Today, I took Lolly down to the local nursery and we bought a couple more punnets of seedlings to add to our growing little salad bowl. Now we have leeks and rocket. The cucumbers didn't work. Some good for nothing slug (or possibly Jazz.... same diff, really) ate them AND the basil I was trying to grow. I never have any luck with basil. But parsley? You need a nice big bunch of flat leaf parsley and, apparently, I'm your supplier. I cannot kill the stuff, it is just loving its spot in the middle of our garden. Rather inconvenient but it was there before we dismantled the buildings around it.

Doesn't this just make you want to make a big pot of parsley soup? Ahhh, I love ingesting Green.

When I got busy planting the punnets in their new home, I could not for the life of me get that Def Leppard song out of my head.

So now, I shall implant the song in your head. Because I'm evil sharing like that. See if you can go a meal where rocket is one of the ingredients and not sing it. Ever again. Or are you a bit mad like us and do that already? Steve loves Def Leppard. They're his favourite band. They sort of came with the package back in 1993 - "Love me, love the Lep" - oooooooooh-kay. So I did.