The little listener

“Mom, there are lights on at the hospital,” Hannah tells me as we drive by.  I’m not sure why that should be weird since it is the middle of the day and the sky is full of clouds, but she says it as if it’s something super strange.

“There are always lights on at the hospital Sweetie.  There is always someone that needs to go to the hospital, no matter what time of day it is.  The hospital is open all day and all night.  Sometimes babies are even born in the middle of the night.

“Really?” She asks me, wanting to hear more.

“Yeah, remember before Daniel was born, I was in the hospital all night?  I didn’t have him in the middle of the night, I had him in the morning, but some ladies have babies at night.”

“So which one of us did you do a poo with when we were coming out?” She asks me with interest.

I try unsuccessfully to contain my laughter that is slightly laced with mortification. “How did you know about that?”

The cheeky eavesdropper

“I heard you telling someone a long time ago.”  Probably The Jess or Romana.  I don’t generally go around telling people that.

“That was when Daniel was coming out,” I tell her between laughs.

“Why did you poo?”

“Well, you have to push really hard to get a baby out, and if you don’t do a poo before it’s time for the baby to come out, then with all that pushing, a poo comes out too.”

Note to self, don’t talk about stuff when Hannah is even remotely in earshot.

And FYI, it’s normal to poo during birth.  Midwives take care of it as it happens and the mom is usually none the wiser.  The only reason I know is because I felt some wiping while I was pushing.  A giant baby head nestled against your perineum kind of trumps any feeling of poop coming out.

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Copyright 2014 Sheri Thomson

Outwitted by a 4 year old

As I lift my eyes from my own bowl of food that I’m hungrily downing, I can tell Hannah doesn’t want to even try her dinner.  She gets two options on her plate, one of which she has to eat all of.  After an initial screaming session which included sitting at the table until bedtime, since we introduced the choose one and eat it all practice, she’s been eating like a champion.  But I can tell she is struggling with these particular options; a very small amount of mustard chicken, or half of a prawn gyoza.  There is also the optional brown rice.

“You know, I didn’t used to like peas, but Daddy and I decided that I should eat vegetables to be a good example to you guys.”  I tell Hannah as she stares at her dinner in disgust. “So you know what I did?”

“What?” She asks me.

“I used to put some peas in my mouth, then drink something nice straight away to wash down the peas and not taste them much.”

A look of concentration crosses her face as she digests what I’ve just told her.

“And after a while, I didn’t mind eating peas.  I actually like them now.”

“How about you get your chocolate milk out of the fridge, and you can try it too?”

She looks excited and runs to the fridge.  She doesn’t usually get chocolate milk, but I got two single serves in a show bag at the Easter show.

She takes a bite of her dinner and then washes it straight down with chocolate milk.

My bite, drink, swallow trick works and she starts eating her dinner.

“What stuff do you still don’t like?” She asks me.

“Hmm…Well, I still don’t like beef.” I tell her.

“So you could do this with beef.” She says matter of fact whilst looking me straight in the eyes.

Oh snap.

I can’t tell her that I won’t eat it, whilst I’m sitting next to her, making her eat a dinner she really doesn’t like. “Yes, when we have beef, I can take bites and wash it down with something yummy.  We can do it together.”

She looks at me and smiles, happy in the knowledge that I will have to gag down my dinner too.

Remind me not to make beef for a very long time.

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Copyright 2014 Sheri Thomson

There’s pee on the floor

“Choo Choo!!!!”  I say as excitedly as I can possibly force myself to whilst moving my arms around my sides like that straight thing that goes across old train wheels to make them go all at the same time.  “It’s potty train time.”

“I DON’T WANT TO!”  Daniel yelled.

I try numerous tactics to make going potty (and getting to the potty) fun:  potty train, bug potty (he really likes bugs), bribery, etc. but none of them work.  Instead, Daniel prefers to wear no underpants  or nappy and then pees on the floor.  Or the bed, or lounge, wherever he is at the time, really.

Finally I am able to coax him into wearing undies after I buy a pack of way overly priced Thomas the Tank Engine underwear. They do nothing to get him to sit on the potty though.  He still pees where he stands and then walks around with wet undies without a care in the world.

I can see that he knows exactly when he needs to pee.  He stood in the bath one day, looked at his penis, and then watched as he soiled the bathwater.  After that, I notice the he often stops and looks at his crotch region, even though it is now covered in Thomas underpants, before peeing all over the floor quickly followed by walking away as if nothing happened.  He is just being stubborn and won’t sit on the potty.

Time is running out, so I lay down my nice-y nice-y tactics and go for something I know he will respond to: threats and bribery.

“Potty time,” I tell him cheerfully.

“NO, I DON’T WANT TO, ” he yells stubbornly.

“Well, you can either sit on the potty, or go in time out, your choice.”

He stands there for a couple seconds deciding his best course of action, before happily stating that he’ll sit on the the potty like it was his idea in the first place.  He runs to the bathroom with a smile on his face and sits on his little potty with glee.  Why didn’t I think of this before?

He sits there while I read him an entire Thomas book, but nothing happens.  We repeat the process every hour.  I know that as soon as he pees in the potty once, he will get it, so I wait patiently, reading the same 10 or so Thomas books over and over again for days. He’s finally happy about sitting on the potty, and I’m happy because that is progress.

One day, Daniel runs to the bathroom, opens the door by himself, and then stays in there for a while.  At first, I think he’s going potty, but he comes out saying nothing, so I say nothing too.  He must have been playing with his bath toys.

“Come on buddy, time to sit on the potty.” I tell him a few minutes  later.  We get in the bathroom and I open the lid on his little potty.  “There’s pee in there!” I exclaim.  “You did a pee in there all by yourself!”  That’s when I notice that his dark blue undies are wet at the front.  The wet patch blends in so well with the dry that it’s hardly noticeable.

“Yeah, I did.” He said, as if it were nothing.

So what that he forgot to pull his undies down, he actually peed on the potty!

I make a big fuss and give him a lollipop which he is delighted about. Plus, I’m right, it only takes one pee in the potty and from then on, he consistently pees in there.

It’s so nice not having to clean pee off everything all day.

Poo is another story.  He has no problems pooping in his undies and then walking around in it as if it’s not sticking to his butt and smelling disgusting.

He still likes running around with no undies on sometimes, which sometimes equates to pooping on the floor.  Usually he waits until we go out to poop because he is wearing a nappy.  It’s kind of a running joke with the creche ladies at church.  Every time he is in there he poops.  They only have to come out and look at me and I know they want me to come change his nappy.

We only have 18 days left.  18 days to somehow get Daniel to poop in the potty.  18 more days, other wise he can’t go in the kids club on the cruise the kids and I are going on with a pregnant Aunty Jess.  18 more days or he’ll either have to tag along  with Jess and I all the time on the boat (which means Hannah probably would too), or I’ll have to pay for a baby sitter, which wouldn’t be nearly as fun as kids club.  They won’t be in kids club all day everyday, just for a few hours each day.  It’s fun for them, they love stuff like that, plus Jess and I can relax without worrying about kids falling overboard, in the pool, or running off with strangers.

18 days.  Fingers are crossed.  Bribes are being upped.

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Copyright 2014 Sheri Thomson

I should write a blog post

I know I haven’t been writing much for a couple of weeks, but I’ve been really busy with uni and kids and housework and vegetable planting.

Then Aaron started reading the Hunger Games and suggested that I read it too because I’d really like it.

He was right, now I’m engrossed, so sorry, but I really want to know what happens to Catniss and Peeta in book 2, so I’ll have to write a proper post later…..

NO SPOILERS PLEASE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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Copyright 2014 Sheri Thomson

Daylight savings (is my nemesis)

I’ve been really tired recently.  Partly because of the intensive three day chemistry workshop I had to go to since I take introductory chemistry externally.  We external students still have to do lab work, so the best way for us to do so is to cram all 6 labs that the internal students take over an entire semester into just 3 days over the mid semester break.

Each morning, was spent getting myself and the kids ready, eating breakfast, and then making lunches.  I dropped them off at a friend’s house for the day and then I was at uni all day.  When I got home, I made a quick dinner, washed the dishes, and then spent the rest of the evening preparing my lab book for the next days experiments before going to bed.  Preparing the lab book was really time consuming since we needed to make all sorts of tables with rulers, write experiment aims, etc.

The main reason for the tiredness though, is daylight savings time.  Whomever thought it was a good idea to turn the clocks back in autumn clearly didn’t have small children.  According to Wikipedia, one of the original purposes of daylight savings time was to reduce the use of incandescent lighting. The U.S. has only had daylight savings time since the 1970s due to the energy crisis.  In Australia, only New South Wales, the ACT, Victoria, and Tasmania use daylight savings time.  The other states do not.

The first day of daylight savings was rather unfortunate.  Both kids had been sick, one with croup, the other with bronchitis.  Despite going to bed late, one of them woke up coughing at 4am, which of course woke the other one, followed by Aaron and me.  The second day was pretty much the same.

The next couple of days they slept until 6 (their usual wake up time), probably because they were so tired from all their 4am starts.  I was so excited at the prospect of them sleeping until 6am again, adjusting to daylight savings time.

Except they didn’t.  It’s been what, 2 weeks now since daylight savings started?  Something like that.  Every morning they wake up at 5.  FIVE a.m.  Their body clocks are so tuned to what used to be 6am that no matter what time they go to bed, that is when they wake up.  Except that now 6am is 5am.

“Mommy, I want my light on.” I heard Daniel yell this morning at 5.

I ignored him.  He’s been yelling different things at 5 for about a week.  One morning he wanted a bandaid on his foot.  Another he wanted to go sit on Grandma’s bed (Grandma’s bed isn’t even in this house).  Sometimes he wants to get out of his room.  It’s always something though.

He kept yelling “Mommy, I want my light on!”

We kept ignoring it, hoping he’d give up and lay back down and go to sleep.  Plus we didn’t want to give in to demands from a 2 year old at 5am every morning. You know what happens, you give in once and then it becomes the new normal.

The cheeky 5am waker (he gets contact dermatitis from slobber and food, which is why he has a rash around his mouth)

A couple minutes later, all was quiet.  I closed my eyes and tried to go back to sleep.

Click.  We heard the distinct noise of a light being switched on and saw a faint glow of yellow through our open bedroom door.

Little footsteps came closer and closer to our room then suddenly stopped.

Click.  Daniel giggled after he turned our light on and then climbed into our bed, clearly very proud of himself, and jumped on Aaron as soon as he got up.

Daylight savings – I hate you.  Actually it was the end of daylight savings time, but whatever, it still sucks.

P.S. Click here to check out this interview I did on Media Shower.

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Copyright 2014 Sheri Thomson

What happens if you jump

“What happens if you jump in a muddy puddle?!” Daniel often asks me cheekily.

“What happens?” I ask him back.

“You get all MUDDY!!!” He says whilst laughing like it’s the funniest joke he’s ever heard.

Recently though, he’s started expanding his questions.

“What happens if you jump in a table puddle?” He asks, already laughing in anticipation of his answer.

“I dunno, what happens?”

“You get all CHAIR-Y!!!!”

“What happens if you jump in a tree puddle?”

“I dunno, what happens?”

“You get all LEAFY!!”

Then Hannah joins in and they ask each other what happens when they jump in random things.  One asks, the other answers and they both laugh heartily.

Eventually, it turned into people.

“What happens when you jump in a Mommy puddle?” Daniel asks Hannah.

She thinks about it for a couple of seconds and then says “You get better at stuff.”

Daniel: “What happens if you jump in a Daddy puddle?”

Hannah: “You get ice cream!!!”

Daniel: “What happens if you jump in an Aunty Jess puddle?”

Hannah: “You get babies!”

Note to self, don’t let kids jump in an Aunty Jess puddle.

Daniel: “What happens when you jump in a Rosie puddle?”

Hannah: “You get naughty!”

 

These are some funny kids

Daniel: “What happens if you jump in a Daniel puddle?”

Hannah: “You get cheeky!”

Daniel: “What happens if you jump in a YaYa puddle?”

Hannah: “You get treats!”

Daniel: What happens if you jump in a Grandma puddle?”

Hannah: “YOU GET TREATS!!!”

Me: “What happens if you jump in a Hannah puddle?”

Hannah: “I don’t know.”

Me: “You get cute.”

Hannah: “YEAH!!!”

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Copyright 2014 Sheri Thomson

And we’re back

Toy trains and wooden tracks were strewn about on the living room floor. The couch cushions we stacked precariously to make a little cubby house, or as Daniel likes to call it, a “bug house.” A big plastic truck sat in the middle of the hallway. Daniel’s pants were laying on the playroom floor (he likes to take them off). Dishes were piled on the kitchen bench. I only do them once per day, and I hadn’t and that time hadn’t come yet. Crumbs covered parts of the dining table because I didn’t have time to wipe them up before taking Hannah to school.

Daniel in his “bug house.” Rosie loves bug houses too.

At least I was dressed properly when the Telstra guy unexpectedly knocked on my door today though.  Not like the time the mailman knocked on the door when I was brushing my teeth and only wearing a towel. TPG did say that someone would come today, but then we called Optus, and requested to switch carriers. I assumed the Telstra guy wouldn’t come. Even if he did, I didn’t expect him to come inside.  How embarrassing.  Normally it wouldn’t be so bad, but Daniel has bronchitis and wasn’t at daycare today. Or yesterday.  He only goes two days a week.  I let him watch movies all day and even put the train stuff in the living room.  I normally don’t let them bring toys in there.  That’s what the play room (a.k.a. the dining room) is for.

Today was his second day at home all day, and he was feeling much better.  Yesterday he sat on the couch pretty much all day feeling pretty miserable and coughing lots, but today he was jumping around, dumping out toy buckets, making messes, and getting stir crazy in general.  I couldn’t play with him very much though because I have to keep up with my uni work.  The two days that he normally goes to daycare, I do my university stuff.  If I don’t, I’ll fall behind, and there’s no way I’ll be able to catch up.  Not with chemistry.

Needless to say, it was kind of embarrassing letting someone in the house when we were sitting on the couch watching a movie in the middle of the morning (I was watching my lecture on my computer. Daniel was watching a movie as he jumped on the couch and spread trains all over the floor) while the house is a bomb.  Oh well, we have internet now, so I don’t care.

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Copyright 2014 Sheri Thomson

I have no internet

I’m going to make this short because it’s 9:31 (I’m usually in bed by now because I get up at 5am) and I’m still at YaYa’s house, borrowing her internet connection.  I had to come over and do all the uni work that needs to be digitally turned in by tomorrow.

The internet is kind of important when you’re an external university student (where everything is online except the 3 day workshop), and a blogger. But TPG doesn’t seem to care about that.  We haven’t had any internet in a week.  First it started annoyingly dropping out, then it totally died and hasn’t resurfaced since.

Aaron called TPG (our provider) who said they’d call us back in 48 hours.  They didn’t.  Needless to say, we called them back, and they guessed that the problem was due to all the recent rain.  Perhaps the exchange is flooded.  They rent Telstra’s lines, and they said Telstra can’t come fix it until the 8th.  Yes, the 8th.  That makes keeping up with uni very hard.  Not to mention my blog, emails, etc.

Instead, we decided to switch our service to someone more reliable, but the new connection isn’t getting hooked up until the 11th.  It’s to be another rough week, but hopefully it will be better in the long run. Plus we will have cable TV, which is a whole lot better than what we currently get.  Right now, sometimes we have reception, sometimes not.

So if you’re wondering why I haven’t answered your email, or posted anything, it’s because I have no internet, and when I do get a moment to steal someone else’s connection for a bit, I have to catch up with all the uni work I should be doing.   Sorry.

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Copyright 2014 Sheri Thomson