Loving Mother’s Day

So, did the flowers, chocolates and assorted lovely Mothers Day gifts from my 2 little offspring make up for the countless painful hours that I spent in labour on their behalf? Absolutely.

Nothing makes a mother feel more loved and appreciated than the handmade offerings that are slaved over for many days by her children. Nothing beats waking up to see two faces peering at you over the duvet, demanding that you get up straight away for their ‘surprise’. And no shop bought card could ever be as special as one that is made with 100% undiluted love – and a craft cupboard load of tissue paper, glitter and glue.

I know that out of all the breakfasts eaten throughout the year, none is appreciated more than one whipped up by your child. Whether it might be a soggy piece of toast and a beaker of milk or a congealed Weetabix that has taken on the texture of setting concrete, it all tastes that much better because you didn’t have to make it yourself.

I was actually treated to smoked salmon and a poached egg this morning.  Admittedly my daughter did have some help here, but, as I was immediately informed upon entering the room, she did wear the oven mitt and was in sole charge of rolling the salmon.

With an offering such as this how could you ever possibly hold a grudge over the mind numbing pain brought on by your pelvis shifting for hours on end and your muscles contracting like bellows.

It’s funny how when you are a child you believe that Mother’s Day is all about the parent. When you grow up and become a parent, you actually realise that the day is really all about the child.

In my daughter’s case, it really was all about the child. This was the day she entered the world.

Damn that fairy

This past week has been something of a traumatic toothy experience for my daughter, and a scary glimpse into her dental future for me.

First she started off in the dentists chair, for what we thought would be a quick once over and out. It turned into several x-rays, and the photographic proof that she has more cavities than a rabbit warren has burrows. This news made my jaw drop. When the dentist turned to me and told me that I would have to improve her diet, my chin all but hit the floor.

As if it wasn’t bad enough that my child’s baby teeth were full of holes, I was being accused of pumping her full of Coke and Coco Pops for breakfast and filling her lunch box with pick ‘n mix. Marvelous, just marvelous. Everyone knows that asking a mother what sort of diet their child has is paramount to calling them hopeless, useless and completely irresponsible.

If I believed for even a millisecond that I was any of the above (and we’re only talking about diet control duties here, not mothering as a whole)  I guess I would have just hung my head down to meet my jaw and wished that the floor would open up and suck me on in. But I don’t believe that, so I decided to argue my case. Or rather defend myself, and say how incredibly healthy her diet actually is.

Chocolate is a treat in our house, sweets are a rarity (the last consumed were 2 jellybeans given by the doctor, go figure) and fizzy drinks are a no-go. She brushes and flosses twice a day, and resigns herself to 99% of the contents of any of her party bags going into the bin.

So short of sucking out all the sugar from her fruit, vegetables and wholegrain bread as well, I am at a loss of just how far I can go to improve her diet and stop the rest of her teeth dropping out as well.

I’m sure everyone claims the same, and the dentist probably just sits there thinking to himself  ‘Madam, you do protest to much’. But I was, to put it mildly, shocked, upset and riled up. Not at my daughter, or even really at myself, but at all those other countlesslittle Fruit Loop eating children out there. The ones boasting a perfect set of knashers, who are undoubtedly served up nothing but junk by a mum who doesn’t know her arse from her electric oven.

Seeing my stress levels increase, the dentist did try and pacify me somewhat, telling me that some kid’s teeth just can’t handle the same amount of contact with sugar. For the record, and for anyone else wondering what you are supposed to do in a situation like this, the dentist told her to start using a pea sized amount of adult toothpaste (not enough fluoride in the kids stuff when they are 7/8) and then not to rinse her mouth after. He also said to rinse her mouth out with some water after everything she eats, to brush her teeth after any treats and to steer clear of anything with any flavour.

OK, maybe he didn’t say the last, but he may as well have.

Her menu has now become as unappetising as a horses nose bag. The Sultana Bran (at 22.7% total sugar) is out and the Puffed Wheat (at 1.8%) is in. Not hard to see why Puffed Wheat is so low, it looks, tastes and bobs around on the milk like a handful of saw dust. The juice cartons have left her lunchbox, along with the ‘healthy’ fruit cereal bars and boxes of raisins (natures equivalent to candy floss).

Even the yogurt is being re-assessed for it’s high sugar content and then rationed. Quite frankly mealtimes are becoming a bloody nightmare. Still, what to do. Until her teeth are back on track and we can start again with a blank slate, I reckon it’s better to be safe than even sorrier.

It does seem that nothing on the shelves for kids these days comes without a cup or so of sugar thrown in for good measure, and this seems criminal. Cigarettes packets now host graphic images of the consequences, alcohol abuse is highlighted in hard hitting TV campaigns and even the danger of the sun is spelt in no uncertain terms, yet any company can target kids with their fat, salt and sugar laden foods, and no one seems to mind. Yes, the boxes are all labeled with food contents so a parent should know, but surely the kids ‘healthy breakfast cereals’ could at least veer a little more towards actually being healthy.

Little wonder that childhood obesity is taking over the way that it is, when these companies care more about profit, than doing their bit to try and prevent future generations becoming balls of doughy lard, with shorter life spans, diabetes and no teeth.

Anyway. Off my soapbox and on to the next dental disaster took place this afternoon.

Yesterday afternoon, with a referral in hand, we trotted off to the nearest Orthodontist. Several more costly x-rays later, and we were seated to be told even more news. The expensive sort of news. Is there any other? Apparently her lower jaw is too far back, her teeth are too far forward and she’ll need a plate to bring them all back together. OK then. So that will be another $1700.

On the bright side the plate comes in a wide variety of pretty colours, something which I am now using to try and sell the idea to my daughter. The idea that I steer clear of the whole issue of discomfort, increased saliva and the problems that she will have stringing two words together when it’s in.

That wasn’t actually the worse part of the days bad news . Oh no. Not at all. The news that really had me jumping up and down with glee, was the glimpse into her future and the joys that are still to come. The x-ray also showed crooked adult teeth making their way down, that would in time require a full brace to be glued onto her teeth, for a rather reasonable $6000. Once again it does come in a choice of colours. Train-track grey, or the more expensive and less effective clear plastic. Hmmmm. Decisions, decisions.

So was that the end of the bad news? Don’t be silly. Add to that a tooth that’s gone AWOL. That’s right a missing tooth. No, I can’t say I saw that one coming either.

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I  guess at some point the tooth fairy got the hump with us, possibly for not leaving enough under the pillow, and as revenge decided to swipe a tooth to make us pay. Literally. In the form of a no doubt ludicrously priced false tooth when the other one falls out. Have to say that if I ever catch that damn fairy she’ll be lucky to make it out of there with both her (or his) wings intact.

So was that the end of the bad news? I’d say. Don’t you think that’s enough to be going on with?

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Father’s Day

Today I toed the Hallmark line and recognised a day of appreciation for the other side of my children’s gene pool…

I organised card making, lived with the stress of finding a gift and made sure that I got up early enough to have ‘the breakfast’ ready at exactly the right time. Given the length of the lay-in taken by the Father in question, I did at least have plenty of time for that.

All of these duties for the day are of course part of the job requirement and I don’t mind at all.

That is until ‘the day of rest’ idea is milked down to it’s last drop with one too many requests for tea. Then comes the realisation that Father’s Day is only made possible by the MOTHER, so why oh why are we the ones that end up running around like a blue bottomed fly?

That said, Happy Father’s Day to Dads everywhere.

Definitely NOT a morning person

Sitting on the train at 5.58am I have to wonder what on earth I am doing here. I am not a morning person, by any stretch of the imagination. My idea of morning is the last snooze on the alarm, before it becomes so insistent that it vibrates itself off the bedside table.

Yet here I am, getting up in the dark, getting dressed by feel and actually leaving the house by moonlight. Even the dog was surprised to see me emerge from the bedroom. He came out barking at what he must have thought could only be an intruder and then sat watching me, head on one side, as I tip toed about gathering my thoughts and things and making a cup of tea that I didn’t even have time to drink.

And for what reason am I now sitting on the train, my head still spinning and marvelling at how many cars are actually on the road before sunrise? That would be an early morning ‘Business Chicks‘ breakfast in the city. I ask you, what was I possibly thinking a month ago when I said I’d love to go. The idea of having to travel for an hour on public transport for my breakfast is unusual enough. The fact that I’m doing it for business even more so.

I’d better quickly add at this point that horrible timing aside, it was a really well spent couple of hours and listening to the highly motivating Naomi Simson, Chief Experience Officer (field of study)of RedBalloon Days made it well worth the trek.

As a freelance writer, I rarely have the need or the desire to travel far from the safety of either my home or my slippers. The capacity of my wireless pretty much dictates how far I go. I deal with clients from all around the world and work with a companies across the country, yet as a general rule, I rarely mingle with ‘real’ people. Networking these days exists in a mainly cyber based capacity and that’s just fine by me.

There are of course plenty of perks to the sort of ‘workstyle’ that I choose. For a start I can be here for my children – a mixed blessing some days, as previously written about. The best part is I can schedule my day around what I feel up to doing when I wake up. Well, apart from that is the daily breakfast time at the monkey enclosure, the panic stricken school run (with run being the operative word), frantic toddler playtime around the entire house, a lunchtime battle to get soup into a tightly closed mouth, a second trip back to the school, combined with a quick walk to pacify the dog and keep him from chewing my slipper and that final dreaded 2 hour kiddy count down, from dinner to bath to bed.

Yes. Apart from all of that, I think I can say that all in all, I absolutely get to plan the day around myself.

It’s hard to believe I know, but in between all of the above (and let’s not forget the additional cleaning, cooking and ironing) I do actually manage to get a fair amount of work done. The freedom of wireless allows me to move from one crumb and jam infested surface to another, as I watch Lego being flung far and wide out of the corner of my eye. While it’s certainly not an ideal environment for the creative process to evolve, it’s as good as it can hope to get for now.

So, what are the upsides of working for yourself?

Well firstly, there’s the joy of being able to wake up in the morning, feeling and looking like something that fell out of a nappy and not having to go through the croaky voice ritual as you call in sick. There’s the right to wear slippers with your chosen work outfit and the ability to stay in your dressing gown if everything else you own is still creased beyond hope in the ironing pile. There’s the absence of any vicious office gossip or water cooler politics and no need to be nice to a boss who’s plainly incompetent at his job, hygienically challenged or prone to making completely inappropriate personal comments. There’s the freedom to come and go as you please and stop for as many lunch breaks, tea breaks and ‘lets see what’s in the fridge’ breaks as you wish. And of course there’s the advantage of working next to the kettle and within easy reaching distance of a packet of Tim Tams at all times.

Now I won’t lie. Of course there are downsides to this solitary existence.

It can sometimes be incredibly hard to get your brain cranked into gear first thing in the morning. Especially when surrounded by last nights dinner plates and a train set. It’s even harder to get it started again when you’ve stopped for your 3rd tea break. A lack of intelligent adult conversation can leave you unable to string anymore than 5 words together. Being your own boss and leaving a job until the 11th hour does mean you often end up working while you eat your dinner and through your favourite TV show. Days when you never make it out of your pj’s or near a hairbrush can leave you looking like a homeless person. And then of course there is always that worry, that if you can reach a packet of Tim Tams, they have a nasty way of all ending up in your mouth and then moving south onto your thighs.

All in all, if I had to weigh up the Yin and Yang of self employment, then personally I’d say it beats having to haul yourself out from under the duvet every morning and catch a train in the dark. The novelty of wearing non fleecy clothing and high heels instead of Crocs did make the 5.15 alarm call worth all the effort. But it was the smile on my little boys face and hearing an excited cry of ‘Mumney’ when I came back into the house that made me realise nothing would ever make me want to go back to wearing matching clothes and working 9 to 5 again.

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