Dirty Laundry

Just a little bit of cute before the new year.

Exhibit A, Exhibit B

This picture pretty much sums up all the problems in my life right now.

Scenes From Christmas

Christmas Melt Down

Strangely enough, two years ago, on this day, I shouted at a teenage girl who ran up to me with a charity tin, squealing, “Give us money!”

Me: If you rattle that tin in my face again, you little slag, I swear to god I’ll smack you.

I don’t know what it is about December 20th, but it’s a day that tends to make me lose my grip a bit. Today, my tenuous grip on sanity was shaken further by a 9 month old who’s teething and fighting a cold at the same time. Everything I tried to do this morning was rebuffed with a barrage of what I can only imagine was baby cursing, so much so that I was tempted to wash her mouth out with soap. (I DON’T MAKE MY BABY EAT SOAP. No calls to child services, please.) Putting pants on became akin to being jabbed by sharp objects. Putting a coat on was obviously a fate worse than death. Being put on trial for war crimes at The Hague was infinitely preferable to being strapped into a car seat. And going round the shops? Don’t even ask.

The last few weeks have been something of a struggle. The Prawn, for lack of a better word, has been behaving like a jerk. I know it's because of the new teeth that are forcing their way through her gums as well as the lurghy that has taken up residence in her respiratory system. It seems terribly unfair that babies can't behave as WE do when we get sick- simply take to their beds and wake up only occasionally for sustenance. But no, they are afflicted with the jerk reflex which causes them to behave as if they have spent most of their short lives with a pack of wolverines. Not only that, but they infect US as well and through our own sickness, we are expected to be patient and understanding of their antics all while battling sleep deprivation, a sore throat and migraine.

I hate myself for sometimes wishing that she'd just disappear for a few hours or having to leave her in her crib, screaming so that I can do some screaming of my own into a convenient pillow. No mother should feel that way about her kid, I think, but I'm pretty sure that just about every one does at one point or another.

Motherhood is all about the guilt. Asking Santa for a happy baby for Christmas.

Playtime

The Prawn is just on the brink of sentience. Although she discovered vanity some time ago, (she gets unnaturally excited about her own reflection in the mirror. I sense a world of teenage image dramas in my future) she is just learning that there are many things in the world with which to interact and eat. So, obviously, this means it’s time for toys.

The Prawn’s favourite toys are as follows:

-Any laptop within reach.

-Any mobile phone within reach.

-Any electrical cord within reach.

-Any remote control in reach. (which usually results in us having to watch the shopping channel with subtitles that we can’t figure out how to turn off.)

-The strings on the hood of Daddy’s sweatshirt.

-Daddy’s guitars.

-The recycling.

-Crap she finds on the floor, no matter how well we’ve hoovered it.

If someone had told me that babies were the same at cats, (wanting to play with anything but the stuff you buy them) then we probably could have saved a lot of cash.

There are a few playthings, however, we’ve bought her that can hold her attention for more than 5 minutes.

Mozart Magic Cube, by Munchkin. A gift from my parents. This thing is pretty bitching, actually, despite our feelings about toys that require batteries. It has 8 works by the master of babysmarts himself programmed in and a choice of 5 instruments-harp, French horn, piano, flute, and violin- that are available on each side of the cube for individual or orchestral listening. Each side flashes to the beat of it’s instrument so it makes for a cool visual experience as well as audio. The Prawn digs kicking it around the room, turning on and off instruments. It’s the toy that is inevitably kicked by one of us while we’re trying to get the Prawn to sleep, setting off a cacophonic version of "Là Ci Darem la Mano" and triggering a desperate attempt to find which edge of the cube boasts the “off” switch.

Wooden Shape Sorter, by Mothercare. Mothercare has a small, but fairly decent range of own-brand infant toys that do not squeak, squawk, chatter or play stadium volume music. The Prawn just doesn’t need that shit. (Translation: we don’t need that shit) While visiting my folks, they dragged out and sterilized all of my baby toys and out of all of them, the Prawn tended to gravitate toward the shape sorter more than any other. (Save for the xylophone, but that’s only because it had a stick attached to it that was clearly perfect for poking an eye out with) Upon our return, I managed to find one that didn’t holler “GOOD JOB!” upon putting the shape in the correct slot to bring home for her. She’s spent a lot of time chewing on the pieces and banging the sorter itself on the floor, no doubt endearing herself further with our downstairs neighbours.

Black Labrador puppet, by Folkmanis. This is the first thing that she’s chosen herself. There’s a lovely children’s toyshop in the trendy downtown area where my parents live that sells imported wooden toys, fun games and other unique stuff. We held a number of things out for her to look at that were met with the withering indifference that only an 8 month old can muster. However, when we held out the Labrador puppet, she reached her arms up for it. Little surprise, as she is fascinated with The Rock Star’s family dog, Dougal, who is also a black Lab. So, we bought Mini Dougal home where she has proceeded to lie on him and bury her little face into his fur, giving her an outlet for her love of the real thing which would most likely be very dangerous as Dougal is a total nutter.

I think probably many people go slightly mad their child’s first Christmas, but I’m saving the bulk of my crazy for her first fully sentient holiday. She’ll be getting a tambourine from Santa this year and that’s about it.

Considering that everything she REALLY wants to play with is ours anyhow, perhaps I should just wrap up my car keys for a bit of extra magic.

A Christmas Story

It’s taken me almost a week to get my ass back into gear, but considering that I’ve been living with a jetlagged 8 month old for the last few days, I’m surprised I’m still standing.

So, it’s that time of year again. This Christmas is particularly exciting as I will have the opportunity, to actually, you know, decorate. While living on a boat has it’s advantages, especially if you like ducks, fish and manual toilet emptying, a rather large disadvantage is not having the space to swing a cat, let alone put up a Christmas tree. Mr. DD and I always tried to make do with a tiny plastic tree which was never large enough to accommodate our already vast collection of ornaments. (When we were married, my mother threw an “ornament” shower for us, so we’re all good on the hanging stuff front).

This year, while we finally have the space, we also have someone living with us who will want to get physically, spiritually and orally acquainted with said Christmas tree, so it’s going to be a little bit of a challenge to decorate like I’ve always wanted and still make sure that there is only a wisp of a chance that the Prawn will decide that Christmas lights are tasty and nutritious.

My father once wisely said that Christmas is a holiday that’s always tinged with melancholy due to the fact that it cannot be celebrated one Christmas at a time; every Christmas is a reminder of all the Christmases that have gone before.

I suppose I was around 15 or 16 when I had a sudden and unsettling realization that Christmas was never going to have the same kind of magic that it had for me as a child and it made me terribly sad for a number of holiday seasons. I’m not sure I even knew how to articulate how I was feeling, but I just knew that it “wasn’t like before.”

On my first Christmas home from college, we travelled up to Pennsylvania for the annual family Christmas get togethers. The Christmas Eve celebration (typically my favourite part of the whole holiday) was held at the house of my mother’s cousin, as it had been for years. (She’d taken over the party from HER mother, my grandmother’s sister) It was actually snowing, making the woods where her house was achingly picturesque. I’d left something in the car, so I’d crunched back down the driveway to get it. On the way back, my foot shot out from under me and I ended up flat on my back in the driveway. As I lay there, looking up at the falling snow and hoping that I wasn’t suffering from a concussion, I suddenly hear the faint sound of a choir in the valley below singing “Silent Night.”

It was a strange and happy epiphany I had at that moment; I suddenly made peace with sense of loss from Christmases past and knew that although that feeling of wonder that I’d experienced as a child was gone, it would be replaced with a warm, more familial feeling as I grew older. I’d look forward to it for different reasons. I’d celebrate it in different ways. The melacholy that had afflicted me for years evaporated, leaving behind the knowledge that it would leave behind only a happy, nostalgic ache, once every 25th of December.

So, lying in the driveway, snow slowing soaking through the back of my coat, I smiled.

This year, I've found that some of that sense of wonder has returned. It's my job to make Christmas happen for my daughter. (Even though this year, she will be more interested in eating Christmas than experiencing it.) All of the beautiful things that I remember from my childhood can come to life again for her, as well as new things that Mr. DD and I will create for ourselves.

I can't tell you how excited I am about that.

Not Enlightened

Should my daughter ever choose a spiritual path, I'll give you two guesses as to which way she probably WON'T be going.

Cute Update

Just a quick update from this side of the pond; Thanksgiving was lovely and full of opportunities for the Prawn to interact with cousins various. The other bit of cute in this picture is The Tadpole, one of our goddaughters. Matching outfits courtesy of The Tadpole's parents. (The Prawn's godparents)

Taking Flight

So, we're off. Wish us luck.

The doctor issued us a prescription for Piraton, which I believe is an anti-histimine, to give to her in a VERY small dose after watching the Prawn attempting to fling herself from my grasp in his office. I'm not keen on giving it to her, but after a serious attack of cranky this afternoon, I'm not sure what I'll do on a 777 if she chooses to do it again. (Look for an escape hatch of some sort, I imagine.)

At any rate, we're off to the New World!

The Cranky

Okay, so remember when I said about 3 or 4 months ago that that the Prawn's teeth were coming in? Well, I was pretty wrong at that point. I was hoping to attribute her cranky behavior to teeth coming in because I didn't want to believe she was just behaving like that for the hell of it. However, now the teeth really ARE coming in and it's time for me once again face the fact that there are occasions that, while I love her, sometimes I don't like her very much.

There are moments when she is almost unbearably sweet. Peekaboo is her favorite game of late and it's amazing to listen to her laugh with delight. She's also recently gotten the hang of waving. And sticking out her tongue. All very cute and lovely and I adore her. But then we try to put her to bed.

Up until now, sleeping hasn't really been so much of a problem. She'd drift off quickly after being deposited in her cot. But now it's all about the screaming.

My theory is that it's all part of the new clinginess that also involves screaming when one of us walks out of the room for a minute, even if we're not out of eyeshot. She's not been a fretful or nervous baby by any means up until now, so these new screaming fits at bedtime are a bit of a new thing for us.

We are definitely of the Controlled Crying school. There is no way that we want this behavior to continue and DEFINITELY not to extend into the middle of the night, like it did last night. (I've got bags 2 miles long under my eyes) We leave her to it for 5 minutes before going back in to re-insert the dummy, kiss her and walk back out again. We leave it slightly longer the next time. Luckily, she's never really gone beyond crying for 2o minutes. Yes, I know that we are lucky.

The reason it is easier to use the Controlled Crying method is that she's developed a new cry which sounds exactly like a pouty child throwing a tantrum. This is the bedtime cry. No real tears, just forced crying. It's funny, but it's kind of been the first warning that cognisance is on it's way- she's already learning how to play the system. "I shout, Mummy and Daddy come back and then I can stare at them innocently while chucking my dummy down the inaccessible side of the cot and bashing the bars with my feet."

At any rate, times they are a-changin. In a week's time, we will be across the Atlantic, visiting my parents in Maryland. Before we get there, however, we have to get on a plane for 7 hours and while checking her into the hold seems an attractive option, it's not strictly legal, so we went ahead and bought her a seat. Am I going to be a holistic Mummy and try to keep my child entertained for the best part of a day in a confined space, or am I going to put Medised into her bottle, have a glass of red wine and fall asleep?

Take a guess.

Reasons Why The Prawn Should Be Watched At All Times

Everyone told me that this would happen someday. I laughed, thinking that neither I or Mr. DD would ever be silly enough to let it happen, but happen it did.

The Prawn has eaten poo.

I am pleased to say that I was not at home when this rather disgusting snack occurred. I was, however, in touch with Mr. DD on MSN. Suddenly a message pops up.

Mr. DD: OMG, OMG, OMG

Me: What?

Mr. DD: OMG, IT'S SO DISGUSTING I DON'T EVEN WANT TO TELL YOU.

Me: What??

Mr. DD: I THINK I'M GOING TO BE SICK.

Me: WHAT??????

Mr. DD: The Prawn just ate her own poo.

Me: WTF?!! How did that happen???

Mr. DD: I changed her and SERIOUSLY, I turned my back for a second and when I turned around, she's all face down in the nappy going NOM NOM NOM.

Me: ........

Mr. DD: Seriously, I thought I was gonna barf.

Me: YOU were going to barf? What about HER???

Mr. DD: I cleaned her up. She's happy as larry.

Me: OMG, that is so heinous.

Mr. DD: I know.

Me: Can you give her a breath mint or something before I come home?

Daylight Stupid Time

To be honest, I've never really given Daylight Savings Time much thought. It's just always been, "Oh better change the clock so I don't end up looking like a big dork showing up early or late for work."

But you know what? Fuck Daylight Savings Time. Fuck it right in the ear. Has Daylight Savings Time ever had a cranky Prawn start shouting at it at 5 instead of 6 in the morning? NO IT HAS NOT. (To be fair, it is Mr. DD who gets out of bed in the morning to deal with the Prawn, but I know he's not loving it either.)

So now it's a question of how we can wrestle her back into a sleep pattern for civilized people. My best guess is that this will involve rather a lot of shouting from a 7 1/2 month old who's wondering why the hell she's still not in bed at 9 pm even though she is being repeated run over by the Sleep Truck. The Sleep Truck is more appropriate for the Prawn than the Sandman as she'll be all, "AAAAAaaaaa, NANG NANG NANG, AAAaaa, NANGzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz" rather than gently drifting off to sleep.

Meh.

All the News That's Fit To Print

While I don't usually resort to "list" posts, I have to admit that life is getting in the way a little. So here's the latest from Prawn Central.

-Me and the Prawn popped over to our local Olan Mills studio yesterday to record, for posterity, the image of her in her Halloween costume, which will no doubt be dragged out someday at her wedding. Or her first date. Even the emo kid behind the camera (who no doubt, in his spare time, takes moody black and white shots of roadkill and develops them in his own darkroom while listening to The Cure) was amused by my little lobster. The Prawn, however, was not so much in a mood to pose in ways best befitting her costume. It is now all about the tummy for her (a complete 180 from her early babyhood) and to hell with this sitting shit. Emo boy managed to get a few good shots that I ordered 8x10's of and was told that I could pick them up in 28 days.

I'm not sure what parallel universe Olan Mills is operating in that it takes them 28 days to print a photo when I can print one in about 40 seconds.

-So, we've kind of stopped trying to dress the Prawn. At some point in the last few weeks, clothes have become poisionous and to be avoided at all costs by way of extreme body contortions and loud shouting. This goes for nappy changing as well. Handy, as colder weather is most definitely here. It's gotten to the point where I think, "Who is it really going to hurt if she goes out with most of a bowl of sweet potato and carrot down her front?"

-We now have two distinct sounds for pleasure/interest and displeasure/frustration. The happy noise is largely, "deeg, deeg deeg!" and the unhappy noise is mostly "NANG, NANG, NANG!" Strangely, my mother told me that she remembered NANG NANG NANG quite clearly, so perhaps it's a genetic thing.

-In preparation for her trip to a weekend with Mr. DD's hairy rocker buddies, we've purchased the ear protectors that you can see in the above picture. She looks tragically cute and doesn't seem to particularly mind them, which is a mercy, because last year, I came home from this gathering with ringing in my ears that persisted for nearly 2 days.

-Definitely starting to enjoy this whole motherhood gig more now that it's apparent that we have a sentient creature on our hands who has preferences (Mummy's homemade food over jars. Yay!) and moods. (Good or bad, mainly. And boy there's a big difference.) The days when I feel overwhelmed or upset are fewer and far between and most of the time I just can't believe my luck at having this happy, healthy little creature in my life.

Fall Shenanigans

Just a bit of Prawny goodness.



My father in law finally got rid of a car that has been sitting in his garage for almost 40 years. This was no small task as the thing weighs about a ton.






The Prawn and the lovely leaves that grow up my in-law's beautiful house.



Sunday morning in the Tree Cathedral.



Prawn and Daddy.



Prawn and Mummy.

Twelve Bar Blues

Just a little movie of the Prawn rocking out to her Daddy's noise.

Toys From the Dark Side

It was inevitable, really.

While I’ve touched on my feelings about the state of children’s playthings today, it never really hit home until a truly diabolical toy reared its ugly head in our daughter’s toy chest.

Last week, I ordered a second high chair and playpen (aka Baby Jail) for use at Mr. DD's parent’s home from one of many fairly anonymous internet baby retail sites that litter the web that all operate under one principle; there’s good money to be made from people who have no idea what they’re doing. When these items arrived, it appeared that we’d picked up a stray from someone else’s order because along with the Baby Jail and the high chair, there also appeared an excersaucer. I had considered buying one of these things for the Prawn, but had always slightly feared the amount of space that one of these things would take up in our apartment which is already filled to bursting with baby gear.

I considered returning the item. Since my Father In Law had paid for the purchase, I wanted to be sure that his credit card hadn’t been charged for something we didn’t order in the first place. But once we discovered that it hadn’t, I was inclined to keep it. Otherwise, I just knew I was going to get stuck with a courier charge to send the damn thing back where it came from, so I sucked up my vague moral compunctions and brought the damn thing home where it started racking up points against it right from the getgo.

First of all, it is in the shape of a pink sports car which is so icky that I can’t even begin to describe it. But, noted my inner voice, you didn’t actually pay for this, so it’s probably slightly ungrateful to bitch that it makes your daughter look like a very small Malibu Barbie home for spring break. Fair enough, inner voice.

Secondly, I’m not 100% sure that it wasn’t put together by little slave children somewhere. But, piped up my inner voice again, you didn’t actually PAY for this, so none of your money has gone to factories in China and Taiwan that make 10 year olds sew soccer balls with their teeth. Good point, inner voice. No money of mine to the slave trade.

Thirdly, and this was the deal breaker….it makes noise. At this point, my inner voice had little to say other than, Will you shut that fucking thing up already?

Mr. DD and I made a pact early on in parenthood that we would avoid toys that made unnecessarily irritating electronic noises. In a world with Mozart and crickets, it is a wonder to me that grating midi music was ever invented. We had been to too many homes with a plethora of these obnoxious playthings and have always been determined never to let these instruments of Satan into the Prawn’s life. (Okay, I accidentally bought that set of stacking rings that not only make noise, but revolve as well, but thankfully, the music is of good quality and fairly innocuous.)

In this excersaucer’s case, it was the “dashboard” of the chav-tastic pink sports car that was the offender. Three benign looking buttons transformed our living room into a hellish reverberating chamber for the most nerve plucking midi horror at the most ridiculous volume that we could have imagined.

“Erm, why don’t you give that back to me a sec?” said Mr. DD, snatching the dashboard from under the gleeful hands of the Prawn and heading for the sideboard to find a screwdriver. I personally was all for smashing the offending piece of kit, but thankfully, Mr. DD has a basic knowledge of electronics and with a judicious wire yank, disabled the noise making device, leaving only the flashing lights and the rather more organic clicking sounds made by the “steering wheel” and the “gearshift”.

As I write the Prawn is enthusiastically gumming her new toy and smiling at me as if to say, “Don’t worry, Mummy. I won’t let the crass materialism that this pink sports wagon represents corrupt my malleable mind. Thanks to your wise instruction, I shall grow to be both virtuous and non-materialistic, dedicating my time to charity and my fellow man.”

She’s yanking your chain, says my inner voice.

I know, I reply.

Mummy Group

So the Prawn and I have recently entered the tender realm of the Mummy Group.

Meeting a huge group of new people is always a bit daunting. The lure of the Mummy Group, of course, is that you all have one thing in common, so at the very least, even if you turn out to be chalk and cheese, you can always talk about, well, poop. There's always the danger of running into someone dangerously unstable or weirdly competitive in one of these estrogen fests, but so far, so good.

It's sort of that first day at a new school feeling for me everytime I go, although I've been attending for about 3 weeks now. Everyone there obviously knows eachother or is related to one another, so just plonking the Prawn down on the mats, taking a deep breath and making small talk is not the easiest thing in the world for me. The other mums aren't unfriendly or anything, but given a choice between talking to someone with a shared history (childbirth classes, family ties, etc) and me, I often end up sitting and smiling, twiddling my thumb while the Prawn bangs seven shades of merry hell out of a xylophone. My job is to make sure she doesn't get carried away and hit the 2 month old sitting next to her over the head.

It's good to go to these groups, however, if for nothing else, than for a bit of baby comparison. The group I frequent is for under 1's, so there's a fair amount of age range. There are a good few 1 and 3 month olds as well as a generous helping of 8 month olds, so the Prawn is pretty much the only one in her age range. However, I've come to think that perhaps she might be a little ahead of the growth curve since she is both taller (she's got a daddy who's 6'2") and heavier than several children who have just celebrated their 1st birthdays. A future career in the WNBA beckons.

Most of the women in the group seem nice and normal, although I have to admit to knowing none of their names, despite the fact that I have been introduced to some of them up to three times. Their babies, on the other hand, I know by heart. A lot of conversations are started with, "Hey...Adelia's mum? How did you and Alexander's mum meet? Did you go to the parenting classes with Kimberly's mum?" Ludicrous.

At and rate, I have been forced to confront the fact that I am, in fact, pretty shy. Although I was a theatre major in college and wanted to believe that I had an outgoing, performance personality, I think I knew deep down that rooms with loads of people I didn't know in them made me want to hide under the sofa. For anyone who's ever taken the Meyers/Briggs personality test (one that actually works, btw) I USED to be an ENFP, but having taken it fairly recently, have become an INFP. (the E for Extrovert and I for Introvert) Perhaps I've changed or perhaps I'm just a little more honest.

On other Prawn related matters, I've been doing some shopping. My favorite purchase thus far has been "M is for Metal" which is a Rock alphabet book that I ordered from Meg's neck of the woods. Due to the Post Office lunacy in our parts, I imagine this is stuck in a sorting office somewhere and I'm just about chewing my arm off to see it. I also just broke down and bought the Prawn a pair of rock and roll Robeez that will hopefully keep her from finding new and interesting ways out of her socks. In the summer, this obviously wasn't a problem, but in winter, I'd prefer to keep her feet covered if at all possible. She's only just discovered that she's capable of manipulating objects in her world fairly adeptly and uses her new found knowledge to make short work of footwear.

You heard it here, folks. All the news worth telling.

Grub

So, we're still chugging along here with teh solidz.

It's trial and error, really. When someone can't really tell you if they're enjoying something or not, you'll settle for them not spitting it out. We have tried, care of Mush, cucumber and avacado (a fairly enthusiastic reception) and chicken and vegetable soup with the addition of potatoes instead of pasta. (Mainly for Mr. DD's and my benefit as we had it for dinner as well. It enjoyed a mixed reception with the Prawn, who's still on the fence when it comes to meat.)

Although I taste the food I make her, not being hugely strong of stomach, (yes, some diapers still make me gag) I have never actually tried any of the Prawn's store bought organic food. (We have some on hand for moments when, quite frankly, I can't be arsed to shove something in the blender due to excessive Prawn shoutage.) Mr. DD was trying, unsuccessfuly, to feed her an Ella's Organic sachet the other day (broccoli, pea and pear) which was mixed with baby rice.

"Look, Prawny! Yum yum! This is really...BLAAAARGH!" he said, sticking a small spoonful in his mouth and nearly retching in the process.

"Um, okay, You don't have to eat this anymore. It tastes like socks." he concluded to the Prawn.

I Can Has Foodz?

I’ve been doing a lot of laundry this week.

Putting something in your mouth and chewing is something we largely take for granted until we have to teach someone else to do it. Especially someone who, as of yet, has no teeth and has subsisted for 6 months of life on an entirely liquid diet. (Quite frankly, the Prawn can remain toothless for as long as she wants. The minute they come through, Mr. DD and I are going to have to start brushing them and I can only imagine that this process will be only slightly easier than trying to tango with an octopus.)

So, we’ve started on solids.

There is quite literally a bewildering array of advice in terms of weaning floating around. When you should start. What you SHOULD give. What you SHOULDN’T give. How much salt is too much? How much sugar is too much? Do you mash, mush or puree? I myself have been given conflicting advice by two midwives working AT THE SAME SURGERY. In light of this obvious lack of organization among health professionals, I have taken my own path which is called, “Feed My Daughter Things That Don’t Make Her Vomit Or Bored Enough to Simply Smear In Her Hair”. It seems to be working out okay. My full color recipe book of the same title will be in stores in time for Christmas.

We are pretty much still at the textured goo stage. In a fit of supermommy ingenuity, I prepared an actual meal for the Prawn several nights ago; the same meal that her father and I were having, which included salmon, mashed potatoes and peas. This was after I was tremendously pleased with myself; not only had I prepared a tasty, nutritious, low salt meal for my daughter, I had made enough for two MORE meals for her which I promptly stuck in the freezer.

Of course, it made the Prawn gag. Try as we might, shovelling ejected comestibles back into her gaping maw, we could not get her to eat until we gave up and went back to the organic puree that we’d been starting her out on. (Which, by the way, looks god awful, but she seems to think that a broccoli, pea and pear combo is manna from heaven.) So, to the health visitor who so confidently proclaimed that babies don’t NEED food to be pureed, even at the beginning, I say please kiss my ass. YOU feed her. I am investing in a hand blender asap and the Prawn WILL eat her food in liquid-ish form for a bit. In fact, next week, I'm going to give some recipes from Mush a whirl.

It could certainly be worse. I could be feeding her crisps. I could be putting Coke in her bottle. (No shit. One of the midwives I talked to early on told me she’d run into someone who was doing this) I could be I could be Britney Spears. Eating mushy food for a bit will not be the worst thing to ever happen to the Prawn.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have an appointment with a stain treater and three bibs covered in day old Weetabix.

Baking on the Edge

My mother is an extraordinary baker of cakes. Although it has been rather a long time that she had to make one in the shape of a large doll or flower garden, in the heyday of my childhood birthday parties, her cakes were not only tasty, but works of art. I remember hanging out in the kitchen while she used her bewildering array of cake decorating supplies- little silver nozzles attached to bags that spewed forth colourful icing, most of which I was allowed to lick when she was finished. (Then she’d spend the rest of the day trying to peel me off the ceiling depending on which food coloring she’d used.)

Every one of her culinary sweet things was an unqualified success aside from the unfortunate batch of cupcakes that she prepared for my 4th grade class that ended up tasting exactly like Rubber Cement because we glued little ears and whiskers onto the cake wrappers. Whoopsie. Luckily, this was in the days before frequent, petty lawsuits. Mom now sticks to more adult friendly cakes that include copious amounts of rum and raspberry cordial and less industrial adhesives.

The Prawn is now officially half a year old. I remembered seeing a photo of a ½ birthday cake that my mother made for me smeared all over my face and thought I’d like to do something similar. (Make a cake, not smear it on my face.) In preparation, I bought my first icing bag and nozzles at John Lewis, thinking that everyone including the cashier who rung me up could probably see that my first attempt was likely to be a bit of a hash.

“I’m going to bake you a cake, girlie,” I told the Prawn.

“I don’t doubt it, Mummy,” she seemed to say, “but the day will likely end with more icing on you than on your chocolate sponge.”

In the meantime, between the purchase of ingredients and decorating implements, my brother in law and his lovely girlfriend went and got themselves engaged. So it was pretty obvious that one cake was not going to cut it.

Betty Crocker is my cake goddess and her mixes always produce cakes of extraordinary moist tastiness, so the process of turning one of those babies out wasn’t too difficult. My only regret is that my tongue is not adequately shaped to get all the batter out of the spokes of the mixer. It is a feat of self control that I waited until after switching it off to begin the licking process.

The icing was another matter. My only frames of reference were dim and fuzzy memories of haunting the kitchen while my mother worked. I remembered the white icing bags, the nozzles, the food coloring…but not exactly how to use them. Without being excruciatingly boring, I will suffice to say that I now have 2/3rds of a can of salmon colored frosting left over and a shirt that’s going to need some stain treatment before it goes in the wash.

At any rate, you can see the results. My BIL and his now fiance returned from their holiday (they spent a week at Mr. DD's uncle's villa also) last night (We call them Duff and Trumpet. It's a long story) and we celebrated their impending union by demolishing a bottle of champagne, all of the engagement cake and part of the Prawn’s birthday cake.

The Prawn, being too cranky to remain vertical and conscious for the bulk of the celebration, will get her token frosting-smeared moment this afternoon with lunch for the benefit of posterity.

I hope to become more proficient at the art of cake decoration before she asks for a Taj Mahal themed birthday party.