Family quarterly result

Three months old today.
Three months old today.
Everybody clap their hands,
We're three months old today.

(Well, actually yesterday, but we don't like to ruin a good story/swim-class song with the facts.)

Yes, little Miss S is a full season old already.

And right on cue, (well a day prior actually; 16/11/2009), Little Miss S did her first ever roll over.
Back to tummy.
Genius.

The end of the fourth trimester also means that we no longer have a bub who eats/sleeps/poos, but rather one who eats/plays/sleeps. Then /poos.

It's a definite and clear demarcated transition in life; the first eyes wide open stage, where the outside world starts to come into the brain and things like dads and brothers and (sadly, this is true) television start to get noticed (her favourite appears to be the Simpsons); anything with colour and light which moves and shakes and stimulates the grey matter into making new pathways.

Cos lets face it, you can only have eyes for mum's boobs for so long.

Its all very exciting for a parent (not so for others, granted), because it means she's starting to think.

Now if only she'd start thinking about chugging down a bottle of mum's mammaries finest homebrew we'd be laughing. Granted she does now make a tiny effort, and dad did manage to get a whole 2o ml into her in one go. (Woohoo!) Which he learnt is about a fifth of what she should drink in a session. (Boooo...)

Speaking of television and battles and learning about things other than breasts; did we mention The Boy?

Master M has covered all of the above in having accomplished what many a 50's baby-boomer (as opposed to a Naughty's baby boomer, as we're sure this lot will be known) has failed to achieve in their lifetime; he appears totally capable of working a television and video recorder. (For those reading this in five years time, a video cassette recorder, a.k.a VCR, is a big box into which you plugged a slightly smaller box which contained magnetic tape onto which was recorded moving pictures. I'm sure there'll be one in a museum somewhere. Alongside the garden sprinklers.)

Hence he can now fire up said box, eject tapes he doesn't like (i.e., dads windsurfing stuff) and put on things he does like (e.g., The Wiggles), and change the channels on the telly until it comes up with "a seven!" which to him now means 'video will play soon'.
(Dam us for teaching him numbers so early...)

On the "one step ahead" front, he hasn't yet discovered that the power switch on the wall renders all the above obsolete.
And if he works that one out, we'll change the VCR to channel eight.

But all this, frankly, is chicken giblets compared to the real offspring story of the week.

(I warn you, its not pretty. Weak hearts leave the room please.)

There was dad, doing his best as little Miss S had scratched her face, sitting on the deck with her lovingly laid in his arms under the rays of a setting Sunday sun, trying to clip her fingernails...

"Clip".
One gone.
"Clip"
Gettin' there.
"Clip"
"ARRGHH!!"
Not only did he clip the nail but also managed to take a sliver of fingertip off with it into the bargain. (He could tell how much - it was still there in the clippers.)

The girl yelled.
Dad freaked a bit.
(Ok, a fair bit.)
Blood flowed.
Pressure applied, and after a few quick sucks to clean it up, the bleeding stopped.

As, remarkably, did the crying.

Still, just to be sure to be sure, mum bunged Miss S into the car seat (in which Miss S soon fell fast asleep...) and had her all checked out at Monash medical centre, where remarkably there was no queue and lots of apparently semi-bored paediatricians, and even a plastic surgeon (who quite enjoyed looking through a microscope at the sliver which mum had brought in a small box), eager and willing to offer opinions.

And they all agreed.
It wasn't that bad; there'd be a little scar and maybe a slightly shorter finger nail, but that putting in a stitch would only result in an equally non-obvious scar anyway, so...

Officially Miss S' first accident, band aid (not even a Wiggles one either) and Mercurochrome (ouch).

Good one dad, you muppet.

Still, there's nothing like a good old disfigurement of your offspring to convince yourself you love them more than life itself.

"Sorry."
Love,
Dad.


.

Baby boob bottle battle

We're having a battle with the bottle.

No, not the Boris Yeltsin "too many sherbets" common or garden variety bottle battle.

Nor even a Dr Suess beetle battle in a bottle with their paddles with the bottle on a poodle and the poodle eating noodles. ... a muddle puddle tweetle poodle beetle noodle bottle paddle type battle.

We're talking the drinking bub bottle battle.

It seems that the irresistible force (that be workplace admin: "Mistress P, your planned maternity leave up") is meeting the immovable object (that be little Miss S: "I wont drink from no stinkin' bottle, gimme a boob you bastards").
And hence we have a battle.

We've tried warm milk, cold milk, slow flow teets, fast flow teets, mum feeding, dad feeding, holding her close, holding her away, holding her facing down, holding her facing up, tickling the lips, itching her cheek, doing when she's calm, doing when she's happy, doing when she's hungry...
Nuthin.
Zip.

Well almost.

The light at the end of the force-feeding tube is that now she'll at least not howl with derision when she is just shown the the bottle.

The only remaining thing to do appears to be the old hold out.
Who can crack first.
She who's hungry, dads sanity, or mums exploding norgs.
(If you never hear from this blog again you'll know who won.)

Not that life has been all baby bottle battles.

By our reckoning, as of 9 November, it will be 11 weeks since we had a night of continuous sleep.

Ahhh...
Sleep.
Alright, the girl is doing a lot better than she was, usually making it to 3 or 4am each night and mostly just one wake-up. And given daylight saving we really cant blame the boy for waking up AT 5:50AM ON A BLOODY SUNDAY, so we shouldn't be complaining. Still, all this sleep deprivation has lead dad to ponder the question of how to get a suitable quota of shuteye, and hence reach the considered decision that (and we quote) "I'd give my left testicle for 8 hours continuous sleep."

Seems a fair trade.

The other conundrum this raises is that of (child)free time.

In days of old, free time was measured in days and hours.
Now it seems to be minutes and seconds.
Hence come 9:00pm each night the question must be asked; kids are finally fedded and bedded, do we a) hit the sack and give ourselves at least a chance of near 8-hours accumulated sleep, or b) have some couch collapsing telly time just by ourselves like normal developed country humans. In the end it's a compromise; a quicky mug of Cadbury hot chocolate, ANZAC bikkie and a typically futile flick through the channels cos there's nothing to watch. (Dam you reality TV.)

Still, it hasn't been all bottle battles and scene setting for castration in the A+P+M+S household.

The last two weekends we've been out of town, making it three in a row. (Hence the lawns look more like a jungle.)

Following on from Cry Baby weekend (see last blog post), the tribe packed the Griswold family truckster twice more, the first time heading to the beauty of Wilsons Prom where all and sundry gathered to celebrate Uncle Ray's 70th.

Not having accommodation in the Park itself, the tribe was ensconced in a cabin at a caravan park in Yanakie, about 30km away from the action, necessitating a somewhat "exciting" post-party midnight drive back to the shack dodging the scenery. Lets just say it was only through the grace of the mechanical geniuses at Fuji Heavy Industries (a.k.a Subaru) that we managed to arrive back at our humble adobe minus the coat of arms moulded into our bonnet.
And not by lack of trying either.

The following day was rather magical. While mum and dad contemplated a sprint for home during midday kiddie sleeping routines, the boy had other ideas.
"Nanna Pappa's caravan!" he cried, indicating a desire to head back to the Park and see his grandparents caravan, and presumably, grandparents too.

(We later learned it was the 'different from his' Thomas train collection in the van that he really wanted. Kids eh...)

A quick call to N&P and the family was back in the truckster, only not to nanna and pappa's van, but to the northern end of the park and "Five Mile Road", where rumour was that there were some amazing wildflowers after the big fires of earlier that year.

And indeed there were.

As Master M noted, there were Jeff ones (i.e., purple), Murray ones (i.e., red) "Yellow wiggle" ones (guess that colour...), but no Anthony (i.e., blue) ones. Hence an Anthony hunt was on, with Pappa and Nanna and mum and dad and little Miss S marching over hill and dale, until... there it was.
The one Anthony flower in the entire Park.
Which Mike tried to pick and bung in his pocket.
Oh dear.
(We luckily made it out of the park gate unmolested by enraged Rangers.)

The following weekend it was back to Sandy Point for the annual "SHQ Melbourne Cup" weekend windsurfing event and hooten-anny. Only this time there was not much windsurfing (one brief session for dad) and not even much hooten-anny'ing. Most of the time was spent with Master M getting reacquainted with Miss C, his girlfriend from the previous year's windsurfing weekend (only last year she didn't have much hair, and hence he called her baby, even though she is actually older and arguably wiser - lucky he didn't try to put her in a corner), and her brother Master D.

All the fun and excitement of weekend ultimately culminated in a "too little food, too little sleep, too late at night" tantrum of John McEnroe-esque proportions from Master M.
Oh the shame.
We're not sure if the first-time parents-to-be (in 4 weeks) sharing the house have recovered.

But it wasn't all tantrums.
There was lots of walking too, mainly a bit before 7am in the morning when Master M would bound into life and hence a stroll was in order with dad to prevent waking everyone in the house, and particularly the poor childless chap sleeping off the previous nights partying on the lounge.

During one morning stroll, a sad and sorry wombat that was somewhat passed his use-by date, courtesy of a mistaken believe it could out-headbutt a car, was spotted on the side of the road. He/she/it was still remarkably wombat-looking, though lying on its back with paws stuck up in the air.
"Wombat!" the lad exclaimed.
"SSShhh.." said dad. "He's sleeping".

On arrival back at the house the lad was very keen to tell others that they'd seen a wombat but had let it continue its rest. Though he apparently failed to recognise it was still there the next day. And the next. Only it had been tipped back upright by a kind soul and didnt seem to mind the flies on its nose.

This was not the only wombat story of the fortnight.

There we were, reading "Diary of a Wombat", when it occurred to dad that a) this was an Australian book (unless theres been a mass wombat immigration program going on we haven't been privvy to) and b) there was the odd Americanism in the book. This lead to the following dad/boy exchange;

Dad {reading book aloud}: "Wombat bashed the garbage bin."
Dad {pondering aloud} "Mmmm... wonder why they didn't say 'rubbish' bin?"
Boy {seriously}: "Maybe wombats like rubbish bins?"

The lad is a lateral thinking genius.

(If only he could work out how to win the baby booby bottle battle...)

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Cry Baby Weekend #1

We all thought it would end in tears.

The inaugural "Cry Baby" weekend, starring four babies under the age of 6 months plus Master M and his trusty sidekick Master A, was held in the very same house at Sandy Point that dad and Mistress P were married in. Its all rather circular really.

The babies in question were all related, though not in the common or garden variety way, but rather through employer; all being produced via at least one parent who worked in the climate section of the Bureau of Meteorology. The last time such a baby boom occurred in the same workplace was the disastrous El Nino of 2002/03, hence it was with some trepidation round the water cooler when a baby onslaught was on the cards again. Trepidation proven correct; we've been bubbling at the edge of an El Nino all year, with dust storms blanketing Sydney, Melbourne's driest first six months on record, and record breaking heat in winter. And now it appears Cry Baby weekend may well be the straw that breaks the thirsty camels back - the Southern Oscillation Index has fallen 8.3 points since Cry Baby weekend alone (and still falling as we write).

In days of old a trip to Sandy was all beer and BBQs and stories of bravado, where too much windsurfing was barely enough and nights were for regaling the boogie boarding adventures of the day.

How things have changed.

The hardest-core activity of Cry Baby was changing the morning stink-bomb nappy, while days were spent either strolling the streets and beaches with a pram, eating, lounging on the couch while your bub had a nap, eating, feeding a carrot to the horses, eating, and catching 40 winks infront of the coonarra. Oh and eating.

Given the eating, and in particular the number of desserts everyone brought for the weekend, "Cry Baby" may have been otherwise termed "Cake Biting" weekend. We think we ate approximately our body weight in Pav alone. Each.

As for the kiddies, well they were on their best behaviour all weekend. And much as we all thought they'd be triggering each other off in Dresden-like crying firestorms, it was quite the opposite. If anything they appeared to calm each other, allowing photoshoots on the floor and lots of "ohh-ing" and "ahh-ing" from the mums and dads. (Or maybe the serenity from the bubs was simply a by-product of them always having a view/smell of at least one lactating mum at all times.)
In fact much of the weekend seemed to be spent just staring at bubs.
And conversely for the bubs, boobs.

Apart from the older two kiddies that is. They decided that playing with trains would be high on the weekends schedule. Only problem being it had to be the train that the other one had. Hence they were either a) clutching an armful of trains as though their life depended upon it, or b) crying and/or chasing the other to get whichever train they needed (note: not wanted; needed).

For all this battle of train wits, when it came time to go home there was Master A yelling out "BYYYYE!!" as he jogged up the driveway, while Master M leaned out the doorway waving a hearty "SeeYaaaaaa!!", just like the couple of old mates that they now are.

In fact master M loved the weekend so much that when he arrived home he decided that he actually did not care much for the humdrum life in the Baghdad end of Hampton, rather he wanted to be back at "someone-else's house" - that being the name he adopted for the place we stayed in after mum and dad explained to him that we weren't going to be spending the weekend at home, rather at "someone else's" house.

He wanted to be back there so much that when he returned from childcare the following Monday, he refused to be coerced into entering the slum he previously called home, but announced that he was off to Sandy Point/"someone-else's house" and bolted out the driveway. Followed by mum, who didn't manage to catch the sprinting little devil till he was a dozen houses down the road, as running while clutching a pillow you use for breast feeding a bub + a flapping flat nappy can slow you down a bit.

This enthusiasm for a home away from home wasn't even dampened by the long drive back, during which the lad almost managed to down a full bottle of luke-warm milk + read his newspaper (a Thomas the tank engine flyer on safety at train stations; the only thing we can heap praise onto Connex for) + admire the rushing scenery on a windy road near Korumburra. We say "almost", as he regurgitated the previous and now somewhat-curdled contents of the bottle all over his clothes/seat/newspaper leading to an impromptu roadside stop and strip.

After which, he announced that sitting in his seat was a bit "tough".
And indeed it would have been.
It bloody stank.
(Arguably second worse stink of the holiday after the trips-end nappy overtopping bin at the house. "Smell that'll outlast religion" as Kenny would say.)

In a vaguely similar manner, about half an hour later little Ms S also started demanding milk of the mum's-boobs variety, and hence another impromptu stop was called for. This time in the sleepy Westernport hamlet of Lang Lang, long known in family circles as the place where a) dads-dad used to ride his bike an impressively long way - from East Brighton - to work on a farm cos he loved the cows, and b) where dad did his Non-Commissioned Officer training when his school demanded a second year of army cadets from him, and dad reckoned he'd rather be a 'yeller' than a 'yellee' if he had to keep doing it. About all Lang Lang taught him (apart from how to yell) was that huntsman spiders don't particularly like having Aerogard blown on them from a can. While its being ignited into a flame thrower.

Hence... Lang Lang playground it was for a Ms S top-up and nappy change. Which lead mum and dad to muse that having kiddies will actually get them to see a whole lot more of rural Australia than they ever did being footloose and fancy free and tearing through every country town at 10% over the legal limit.

That said, they'll mostly be seeing playgrounds.

When finally home there was no peace for the wicked, with Ms S having to go see the council nurse for her first ever jabs. Poor little tike; an oral dose of vaccine-goo plus a needle in both legs.
She yelled.
Dad cringed.
Mum stayed safely outside in the playground with Master M.

And then Ms S, just as her big bro did 2.25 years earlier, slept right through the night - if you call 9pm to 5am all through the night - for the very first time, just like a (slightly perforated) angel.

Cry Baby weekend #1.
We all thought it would end in tears.
But actually it ended in very big smiles.
(And a rather smelly bin.)

Chocolate dreaming

Cherry.

Sad to say, but the first taste the girl will have had besides milk will be, as for her bro, cherry.

And no, it wasn't cherry chapstick (not that theres anything wrong with that), rather cherry flavoured 'panadol for kids', the end result of a very unhappy little girl with a sore tummy.

In fact, cherry is now arguably the first taste a modern noughties kiddie gets outside of milk and spew. Which probably tastes like milk.

The reason for the upset tum tum??

Well, it may have been the cake.

The story is something like this..

Having been somewhat indisposed on his birthday (what with a certain little miss coming into the world and all that), dad didn't really get a chance to celebrate the 40th anniversary of his birth. Hence the somewhat amazing chocolate mud cake from some fancy schmancy Mt Eliza bakery was bunged in its box and into the freezer for safe keeping.

Gordon Ramsey would have had kittens.

Hence said cake was kinda forgotten about till the weekend before last.

"Hey, lets do birthday cake...!" chimed dad.

So they did. With a nice organic decaf plunger coffee on the back deck in the glorious spring sun.

The thing was so solid yet sticky you needed a crowbar to lever your own gums apart when eating, but it was divine - at least the quarter the family was able to eat before they all started rolling about like Mr Creosote.

By the end of it all, Master M looked like he'd stuck his head in a bucket of mud. It. Was. Bliss.

But bliss it was not for poor little Miss S, who subsequently was ratty as all get up, most uncomfortable in the aforementioned tum and windy. Indeed, not a happy camper at all.

Could we have evolved the worlds first chocolate-averse daughter???

Being scientists we needed a repeat experiment.
(Plus Master M wanted cake and was singing the song.)
And sure enough, it does appear to give Miss S's tummy the grumbles.

Granted the medical profession probably hates us, but a quick look on the web reveals that it probably wasn't the caffeine getting into mums milk, rather it may well have been the theobromine, a.k.a the stuff that makes your dog puke if the bugger eats your easter egg collection.

And while common or garden variety Cadbury's probably doesn't contain enough to knock many people about, it seems the fancy bakers chocky actually has the highest theobromine of all and is a definite suspect in the tummy trubs.

From now on we get our cakes from Brumbies.

In the mean time master M and dad have been sneaking the odd bit of cake from the fridge without letting mum see.
It's less cruel that way.

In fact to compensate for his sister, Master M has subsequently developed a choccy fixation that appears to be entering his wider psyche.

e.g., He no longer sees "Scrufty" jumping in muddy puddles in his Bob the builder books. He's jumping in chocolate. (And woe betide the parent who tells him otherwise.)

And arguably somewhat un-PC, he arrived home from childcare proudly announcing how he'd played with his little dark skinned friend that day:

"I licked Kulkin! Kulkin made of chocolate!".

Oh dear.
That's so 'Hey Hey its Saturday'.

Its entirely possible all this chocolate thought has fired him up a little too much though, cos the lads learnt to run.

We're not quite sure when it officially happened as we're not Olympic walking judges able to white flag away a gold in one fell swoop (we still feel for you Jane Saville), but its clearly happened.

However... (there's always an 'however') it unfortunately appears that the boys running has the nimbleness of an oil laden supertanker, and hence his dashes are somewhat restricted to a straight lines.

Which would kinda explain his inability to divert around a tree that was in his path when he went all Usain Bolt on us at the zoo.

'WHACK!!!"

Nose first, straight into the sapling.

The sound alone brought tears to our eyes. Let alone his.
He subsequently looked like he's gone 10 rounds with Mike Tyson, only the parallel universe Mike Tyson that bites noses instead of ears.

Poor lad.

We bought an icy pole to try and get something cold onto his proboscis, however as soon as he realised it was an icy pole, he stopped his shallow moaning (yes, remarkably there was only momentary crying, and more an understandably sooky moan) and he just wanted to eat it.

(Oh the healing powers of cheap icy confectionery. Surely if they could combined flavoured ice with penicillin humans would live for all eternity)

The upshot of all this - everyone said "Ouch!" when they first saw him, and he proudly would announce "I ran into a tree!" as though it was an act a sane person would do.

Note to parents; teach them to turn.

Finally, a couple from the "from the mouths of babes" file.

Article A:

"Sarah s talking!" said the boy...
"Is she? What's she saying?" asked mum

"I love Michael!"

Awwww.... schucks.

Article B:

Mum was chatting with dad about how things used to be pre-progeny, and started saying "...yes, but, if we cast our minds back to the old days..." when the boy interrupted sharply.

"NO. It's the way it is."

So right you are lad.
So right you are.

Ok, we would end there but we really had to add this one.
The best name we've encountered for a child care worker thus far - master M's new carer...
Ms Smack.
(Tru Dinks.)

Break it down -Tummy Time.

You're bleary eyed from waking in the night.
Your shoulders hurt from so much rocking.
Your shirts all have vomit stains on the shoulders.
And Lady Macbeth-like; your hands have that faint eau-de-poop you just cant get off.

Yet the little girls first smiles and coos make you go all wobbly at the knees.

Yup - we've already skipped over that first few weeks when you barely get a "hows your father" from the bub and we're into the next stage.
The stage of vague recognition of the world.

Unfortunately this recognition of the world also includes the dreaded witching hour, and hence there is an increase in the cry factor - right on cue when dad arrives home from work.
"Hi dad. How was your day? Mum was really nice to me. I started crying 20 minutes ago. I'm going to scream at you now. "

But its not all tears and tantrums.
The little miss is slowly managing to sleep just that little bit longer in the night. Well, kinda...

Case in point.
Mum&Dad being the sleep zombies they are, had gone to bed in time with the girl - 9pm (yes, being a parent is that wild) - fully expecting to be woken the ISO-standard 3 hours later with a bub demanding a grease and oil change.

Sure enough, sometime later, bleatings were heard in the dark.
Something felt a bit different.
Mum&Dad rolled over and stared at the clock.
2am.
2am!
That's {counting fingers} FIVE HOURS STRAIGHT SLEEP!
("There is a god!" rejoiced dad.)

However contrary to expectations, the bleatings were not the girl but rather number one son in an extremely rare nocturnal wandering, complete with subsequent swan dive onto the marital workbench and none-too-subtle request for bed buddies and/or Chuggington DVDs.

Which subsequently woke the blissfuly sleeping little Miss S and it all ended in 2am tears.
("Geez, gods a bit of a prick really..." mumbled dad.)
Cie La Vie.

But anyway,... she's slowly/occasionally sleeping more hours and that has to be a good good thing.

As are her somewhat amazing abilities with Tummy Time.
(We'll have to pause here; we cant help but sing "Tummy Time" in tune to "U Cant Touch This", a.k.a, 'Hammer Time', by MC Hammer - its the curse of living our formative years through the eighties.) Only we're already having to be extra careful if we pop her face down on the change table as it seems she is somehow (levitation maybe?) able to move herself several inches forwards and backwards. Now thats, as we say in the parenting biz, extreme tummy timing.

Just, hopefully, not off the edge of something high. Onto something hard.

All this cuteness of the early childhood weeks is also a constant reminder to Mum&Dad that - barring unforeseen cock ups (scuse the pun) - we wont be seeing any of these stages again in our lives. Which is kinda sad. Well for the cute stuff anyway; the sleep deprivation and poo up to our elbows we can probably go happily to our graves without repeating.

As for the boy...
Well he is slowly coming to terms with the little Miss, and hence his hugs are now genuine acts of affection and less attempts to smother her out of existence. (Its a fine line...)

And he's still cute as a button too. And still going through his very own firsts.

Is this case (and only parents will understand the joy this brings to a parents heart), the first time he has announced he wants to use the potty.
Yes.
Wants.

Mum&Dad were so stoked they said "You get a reward! What do you want boy??"
"CAKE!" he replied.
As we had no cake, he was offered another first.
His first Tim Tam.
What we haven't told you is that this all came about because he was in the bath and didn't want to wallow in his own pee. Hence he ate the TT in said bath, dipping it in a few times for good measure. Tim Tams, bath, applauding parents - he was like a pig in poo.
Just not his own.

Next day dad had a shower (as you do).
"Whats this brown ring round the tub??" he bellowed.
That be arguably the worlds first Tim Tam bath ring.
Here's hoping the cleaning lady didnt think it was what it looked like. (It was all a bit "Chokito scene from Caddyshack" really.)

Its also a somewhat significant, if not slightly depressing, time when your progeny first teaches you something you never knew. No, not as in "don't hold a naked baby above your head when they haven't had a wee for a while" indirect teaching, rather common or garden variety master-to-grasshopper education.

In our case it was train signals.
While looking at yet another Thomas the Tank Engine book, dad asked Master M what the "arm out" semaphore train signal meant. M said "Stop".
When he asked about an arm down signal, M said "Go."
As dad had no idea he just nodded in agreement, with later investigation revealing the lad was spot on. How he learnt this we have no idea - it isn't in the text of any Thomas we've seen - so we'll just have to assume that humans are born with this instinct which is subsequently lost with the progression of time.

Finally, the lad has also decided that if mum can nickname little Miss S "Pumpkin", we all need vegetable names. Henceforth, according to Master M, his new name is 'potato', mum is 'broccoli' and dad is Mr 'Bean'.

Some may say, how very apt.

1/1008

One month old today.

Yes.
Seriously.
Already.

Seemed like only yesterday mum & dad were hanging around in a big white room waiting for a doctor to hurry things up, reading the newspapers, snacking on jelly snakes and twiddling their thumbs thinking the girl would never arrive, then...
WHAMBAM...
a month old.

Just like that.

It'll be bras, booze and boys (not necessarily in that order/with dads blessing) before we know it.

In the meantime there's a beautiful little girl who can already lift her head up off the floor during tummy time, has grown her first ackers (baby acne is stock standard stuff, with the added bonus of being a window onto her teenage soul), is experiencing the joys of her first sickness (a dreaded cough, brought to you via big brothers childcare; surely the petri dish for all modern man's sicknesses), and felt the warmth of her first global warming enhanced Melbourne temperature record (29.9°C in the first half of September).

Better pace yourself grrrl.
One month down.
At least 1007 to go.

Sleep, suckling, and sparrows flatulence

"What in the wide wide world of sports did we used to do with all that spare time???"

We seem to remember asking ourselves this exact question when Master M was a wee lad, but now we look back at that era like we were fair dinkum bludging it in lazy land; we'll call it our Paxton phase.

Ok, so with the first babe you're wondering what in Fords name to do in every new and unusual circumstance, feeling out of your depth and the proverbial fish out of aqua all at the same time, and indeed it is hard yakka - dont get us wrong, but...
...with a second, while you know the ropes (well, vaguely remember stumbling through their tangles), everything has an added "other child" complexity factor that you never even dreamt about.

Lets, for example, take the seemingly simple act of sleep.

Sleep.
Ah yes, we remember you well.

While the lass is still feeding every 3-4 hours during the night, at least with number one you still had a vague choice about when you got up in the morning; i.e., if the bub had a feed at 5am you may well be able to rest till 8.
But when it comes to having bub number two, well, 8am... tell 'im he's dreaming.
Cos number one is up at 6am, or earlier if woken by number two feeding, and then thats it.

You're up sunshine.
Even if the sunshine isn't.

And it seems no amount of "Does the clock say 7? It isn't getting-up time till the clock says 7..." will cut it with the lad.
He wants up.

Not to mention that being spring and with twilight officially commencing at 6:05am, it means the birds are a chirpin' well before the alloted awakening hour, and hence Master M cant be convinced that the rest of the world is not up and about and watching Thomas the Tank Engine videos at such an unFordly hour.

"Birds are talking!"

Yes.
The birds are talking.
Thank you Mother Nature.

All that said, the little Miss is not too bad in the wee small hours, and has managed a couple of four and even five hour breaks between feeds during the hours of dark. Which is a pretty stunning turnaround from the first few days at home when night was day and day was night and its seemed never the twain shall meet.

She's an impressive learner this one.

Not to mention grower.
We're now up to 4.4kg and motoring along powered only on premium unleaded mum juice.
Sure she has already had her first cold, and sure she has had Krakatoa-like vomits (usually over mum and/or dad) that leaves you thinking there surely cant be anything left in the tummy, but it doesn't stop her coming back for more.
And more.

But then mum's glad for it too.
Indeed all the mums.
Being a second kiddie, we're still doing the weekly catch-up with the first kiddie mothers-group mums, a number of whom are also dealing with suckling infants.
At one such catch-up, dad was somewhat perplexed at the high correlation between a) infants crying, and b) new mums crossing their arms. Till it was explained that the wonders of evolution have resulted in a "let down" (as in milk) reflex which accompanies the cries of a newborn.
Even one that isn't your own.
Its kinda cute.
If not moist.

We're also now discovering the differences/joys between boys and girls.

First, pink is good.
Which is infact great when Dad puts the new red towel in the wash with the new white baby suits 'n booties and pinks the lot.
"Hey, who'll know - she looks great!"

Secondly, quicker nappy changes.
Dad reckons he's saving seconds every change by not having to check that the willy is pointing down and into the nappy, as opposed to up and allowing overtopping during wee wees.
("Thats potential extra sleep time gained right there...")

Finally, the boy.
Boy oh boy.
Theres a tad bit of jealousy going on, which is taking the form of random acts of naugthiness in order to get attention.
Any attention.
Which has also been accompanied by an apparent confusion between the english terms "why" and "how".

Hence the question "Why did you hit mummies arm?" is responded to by:
"I did it like this!"
...followed by a second, albeit lighter, demonstration arm whacking.

We know its not a put on cos when the question was:
"Why did you hit your head on the chair?"
he also tells us he did it like this...
...and clobbers himself again. Complete with "thats-gotta-hurt" factor.

And yes, we did indeed try rephrasing the question to:
"What were you thinking when you did that Michael?"
to which he paused, thought and answered;
"Wiggles!"

Fair enough hairy mutt. (At least he's honest.)

Finally, Mike has also supplied us with his version of whats happened over the past few weeks.

In his own words, here is the Michael Henry Watkins abridged version of this very blog;

"Sarah was in mummy's tummy.
Then in her house. {i.e., the house of blue light humidicrib}
Then she came to visit."

She's here to stay lad.
She's here to stay.

(You reckon we get bags under our eyes like this for mere drop ins?)

Postscript: Sarah's first brush with "fame"... Mum noticed a nice chap at the next table making goo-goo eyes at lil Miss S while mum and dad were having a coffee and filling out Ms S' official Birth Registration form at Ricketts Point Cafe'. Mum had no idea who it was, but dad pointed out it was Paul Mecurio. We figured either he was admiring her twinkle toes or wondering what she'd taste like (with a nice beer of course), but he came ..t.h.i.s.. close to being asked to sign as witness on Miss S' birth certification. (We chose our wonderful friend Lyn.)

Postscript II: To all the incredible mums from the mothers group who have brought us dinners (one every Monday and Wednesday!) - you are amazing.
And we're so lucky.
Thank you.

.