Moving along

This from two months ago, ladies and gentlemen. From the makers of "the crab" we now proudly present, "the poodle":

And our latest release: the knee walker:

Our mothers group is currently holding a sweep stake as to who will be the first to walk: one of the mothers (33 weeks pregnant, with a recently broken leg, in a cast for 6 weeks but determined to be up and about for the new baby) or Alice. I know who my money is on...

So, my wager on Nerida, but today all our thoughts with Auntie Shell xxx

Birthday message for Grandad Yardley

Next time I'll use the Harbour Bridge as a background, but the sentiments are sincere...

Rainy day activities

The autumn weather has been a little unpredictable for the past few days. Thanks to the constant stimulation at daycare, Alice expects round the clock entertainment and so I have been on the hunt for rainy day activities that don't involve shopping at Westfield Bondi Junction.

So yesterday, we ventured to Westfield Eastgardens. Kidding - this was in fact on the way back from a swimming excursion to a new pool. Despite the Westfield obsession, we are quite pleased with our discoveries at the new shopping centre - an indoor playground, a supermarket with no other customers and clothing shops with sales that have sold out of size 8 or 16+, but all the other sizes in abundance (the clientele are either malnourished or obese it seems) and little cars for little people to ride around in. Alice wouldn't get in, since she enjoys being up high in the supermarket trolley so much, but next time...

The new pool was great - we've decided to stop swimming lessons (because, let's face it, she's not learning to swim - it's all about familiarity with the water until she is old enough to follow instructions or in Alice's case, looking around and smiling at anyone within range and ignoring both me and the teacher) and so it was our weekly off-curriculum revision time for jumping off the side and "Eyes in, ready go". She spent most of the time smiling at the old ladies who stood chatting in the baby pool and despite lying prone while I floated her up and down the pool, exhorting her to, "Kick, kick, kick", she probably got more exercise than any of them. Didn't see much "Swim, swim, swim" from anyone else in the pool, in fact.

The highlight of the rainy day was a trip to the children's library. The heavens opened so we were stranded there for a while, but Alice had such fun with the books and the cushions and moved like lightening around the area. At once point, she made a break for freedom towards the exit, but set off the alarm, since she was carrying a book. Completely over-excited, she slightly missed the point of a library being a place to be quiet. She did enjoy saying, "Shh" a lot. And "Tigger" - there were a few posters around. Neither word was exactly sotto voce. There's a few photos here - she really had such a great time that I took quite a few. As we left, there was a chorus of "Goodbye, 'Stripey' ", from the somewhat bemused staff.


Selecting books to read

A touch of the Nora Batties, but actually standing - books have many uses

Oh, the fun of climbing on and off the cushion

Conveys something of the speed of her excited travel

Resting on the cushions

Here I come with another one, Mum

Phew - exhausted

Alice, you shouldn't have...

Slightly delayed by her pre-Easter absence from daycare, I was, just yesterday, presented with Our Heroine's most recent artistic efforts. Admiring it for the 1000th time last night and wondering if she had particularly specified how many kisses to add, I held it up for the artist to examine with her critical eye.

"Did you make this for us, sweetie?", I cooed.
"No", she replied.

...but I didn't

Nice weather for ducks

As birds are the new black in Alice's little world, we recently went to feed the ducks, swans and pelicans at Centennial Park. Alice rode her bike.

The ducks and Alice very much enjoyed the bread that we took with us. Happily, it wasn't old and stale, as not a single crumb made it out of Alice's sticky paw for the birds.

Despite her carbo-load, Alice maintained high excitement levels and repeated her new favourite word "Bir" at will. We are learning new words by the day at the moment - aside from animals, they are all words that will ensure Alice's demands are met with minimum margin for error: "Rusk", "Tuddle" [cuddle], "Mil" [milk], "More" [any food substance], "Shoe" [Take off my sock/ I am about to pull all of your shoes out onto the floor and there is nothing you can do about it], "Bebeeee" [A child under 10 is approaching and I would like them to smile at me].

We took her again later in the week, and she can now manage "Duck". Sounds a bit like "Dog", but I know what she means.

Stages of Recovery over the Easter weekend

Good Friday: requesting her first solid food in three days at Tom and Kirrily's seafood fiesta - a prawn



Easter Saturday: bored with Baby Nurofen ("No, No, No"), she decides to bring her own temperature down by sitting in front of the fan



Easter Saturday: out on her bike with silly hat to protect her little sore ear from that harsh 22 degree temperature. Pen still in hand - you just never know when she will want to take a few notes for her blog.




Easter Sunday: feeling much better and on an Easter bunny/egg hunt around the lounge




Refusing to indulge Mummy in an Easter Egg roll ("No, No, No") - preferring to bang them together.




Enjoying a joke over lunch on Easter Monday:

When does "No" really mean "No"?

Alice turned a corner on Easter Sunday and has started to get a bit better, at least during the day. The poor thing has had to take so many medicines over the last two weeks that she has necessarily perfected the art of refusal. When presented with anything that she doesn't want (or sometimes something that she does), she will shake her head vehemently and wave her hands about, saying, "No, No, No". The accent is very home counties, meaning the result is more like "Nair, Nair, Nair".

The more she does this, the more I am convinced she is getting better. Earlier in the week, she was so tired, lethargic and poorly that she fell asleep in the most unlikely places, such as while riding Little Friend Amba's bike and on all fours, with her head on my leg while I was sitting on the floor. She couldn't really be bothered to raise her head to look at food. Now she is happily refusing everything...at least for a few minutes. I suppose after a fortnight of helplessness, she is enjoying asserting her will.

Drama Queen that she is, waving her hands in front of her face adds to the vehemence of the refusal. Here she is having refused apple:

I really didn't want it Mum.

In this sitting, she refused and then accepted everything offered to her including her body weight in red grapes, 2 yoghurts, all of the carrots from my plate from our Easter roast dinner and 2 rusks. Yes, she is definitely on the up!

Alice says "Happy Easter"

Now that we are not going away, this weekend will be all about chocolate.

Sheepish. Or not, as the case may be...

I am forced to retract some of yesterday's vitriole. It seems Gina and I both have some corrections to make. I must state that her book is in fact entitled, "The Contented Toddler Years" and does not purport to be complete. However, the misnoma is still hers, as this seems to be the autumn of our discontent, here in Sydney. There are no contented little or big people to be found under our roof.

I took poor old Alice to the doctors this afternoon - I scared the dragonlady receptionist with the (true) tale of her 39.8 (103.6) temperature and scored an emergency appointment. Contrarily, Alice was bouncing off the walls by the time we got there. She had just learned to say the word, "Rusk" and she wasn't afraid to use it. Her temperature was normal and she was pointing at every man who came through the doors and yelling, "Da-da". However, Munchhausens by proxy was not the diagnosis. In fact, she has a severe middle ear infection. Poor lamb.

So we are forbidden to fly and our Easter weekend in the land of the long white cloud/ the place where sheep outnumber people (since most of the population is to be found working behind a bar in London) is cancelled. Alice is now taking antibiotics and I am no longer forcing teething concoctions onto her gums. I am slightly mollified by the fact that she has grown an upper right molar this week, so my efforts have not been entirely in vain. Hopefully the gel that was being applied to her bottom left gum spread about the mouth a bit...

Hopefully more cheerful news next week, once the drugs have kicked in!

Fortnightis Horribilis - warning, whinge alert...

If it were not for the PG rating of this blog, I'd use a slightly stronger adjective. The last two weeks have been rubbish. Last week's cold and cough were just about over when the tooth from hell started to appear. Alice has already grown one molar, which involved three nights of broken sleep (perhaps one wake-up around 9.30 and some grumbling during the night) and a daily application of the secret magic gel from the Paddington (al)chemist. [I think that I have written before of the way that this product is produced from a hidey hole behind the counter while the pharmacist rubs his hands together and all but mumbles, "hubble bubble"]. But this tooth - well, it would take the biscuit if she had eaten anything at all in the last two days. Poor Alice - she has spent most of her days since Sunday, lying on one of us, moaning quietly. By day. By night, the moans rise to hysterical screams, calmed only by Baby Nurofen. If we are lucky. She's running a fever, her nose is streaming and she has a bit of nappy rash to boot. To you, Robin Barker, author of "Baby Love" who says that teething has no side effects, I say "pah" and to you, Gina Ford, who affords it not one entry in "The Complete Toddler Years", I say "Incomplete".

I know that we just have to get through this, but oh, how I wish it were over. I now have her cold from last week so we are feeling generally low. Stu is a champ and is sleeping in with her, but her screams are enough to wake the entire appartment block and probably do.

In other news, on the rainy day in between things to complain about, Stu needed to work so Alice and I needed to make ourselves scarce. Inspired by Madison's love of fish, we set off for Sydney Aquarium. Alice had a "ripper" of a time - it was how I imagine she would be at a dog show. Each time we got to a different fish tank, she pumped her arms and legs in mad excitement. "Fssssshhhhhh" was declared loudly, as she pointed in all directions. The underwater walkways with sharks, stingray and dugongs were places of wonder and she was completely beside herself. Nextdoor, at Wildlife World, we touched a snake, which was very exciting, as we have been learning that they say, "sssssss". Alice regaled the crowd with her impression of this: "ssshhhhhhhhhhh", she said, with one finger over her lips and stuck up her nose.

We bought an annual pass and will be going most weekends in winter, I would think.

Black and Gold

Auntie Shell bought us a great CD that still spends most of its time in the stereo, ready to go. She and Alice used to particularly enjoy dancing to "Black and Gold". Here, Alice reprises the dance routine before breaking formation.

I was on my way into the shower so had to cut the footage. Apologies for the abrupt ending.

Bikie Chick

Alice loves, loves her bike that she received for her 1st birthday from Nanna and Grandad. She is keeping well out of the bikie wars occurring here in Sydney and sticking to the safer confines of the park.

Faster, Mum!

Going to get a rude awakening when she realises that most "push bikes" do not actually get pushed...

Visit to the Physio

We reached the 14 month mark with still no signs of standing up, so - following Doctor's orders - we pootled off to see a physio. Alice knows Jo, a specialist in pregnancy, post-natal and baby stuff, well from "our" weekly pilates class last year and was overjoyed to see her again. Since Alice felt completely at home, she lost no time in demonstrating all her skills (walking across a room on her knees, pirouetting on her bottom and being on one knee, as though she were about to propose).


As expected and hoped, she was pronounced to be physically fine and "obviously very bright" (mother puffing up self-importantly taking all the praise for Alice's good qualities and blaming bad ones on the influence of too much Baby Einstein). We apparently should not expect her to walk before 16/17 months because she is busily developing all the muscles in turn rather than getting up and taking a risk by learning, quite literally, through the school of hard knocks. I had been worried about her ankles because they seemed a bit bendy but all is well there and she has "advanced" fine motor skills (she's good with her hands) for a baby of her age.


So, much relief, and another couple of months of sitting in cafes peacefully, rather than chasing her into the bins and out onto the street (as demonstrated by Little friend Cora at Bellagio last week). I'm sure you all think I'm nuts to have been worrying, but am ever paranoid about the late discovery of my thyroid thingy in pregnancy and the continual questions at her check-ups to be sure that she is developing normally as a result.

Alice completes several laps of Centennial Park on her knees