A natural performer

Twinkle, twinkle: take 1: 

Twinkle, twinkle: take 2

 

Highly traumatic?

Nina is in her bedroom, with her Papa, whining away. She had what we call a complete toddler meltdown. She was fine up until the moment when she was supposed to follow A- into the bedroom and go to bed, at which point she did her thing where she wants to walk rather than be carried, and then refuses to actually walk. 

   Anyway, the problem is that she appears to be losing her afternoon nap. On Saturday, she didn't nap, although she rested quite quietly for an hour or so. On Sunday she slept for more than 2 hours. Today she didn't sleep at nursery - same as two days last week. I asked my mother when kids drop their nap and she said that in her recollection it's older than this, and that the process is highly traumatic for both parent and child.  Reports from the internet indicate that some children do drop their naps by this age. Just in time, I guess. Further reports from the internet advise insisting on a quiet time, with the toddler in the bed and no Mummy going in. Saturday's experience suggests we can try that and it might work. We'll see, I guess.

 

Mixer taps

When you wash your hands here, about 99% of the time, the taps are configured so the cold comes out one side (and is really very very cold) and the hot comes out the other. The hot is either very very cold for about 30s to a minute, or is really very very hot. I guess the theory is that you put in the plug, run both taps to fill the basin with water of the desired temperature, and then wash. But of course, no one would actually do that in a public bathroom, certainly not in a pub, or a bar, or an airport, or really, much of anywhere. And there usually isn't a plug (and, people: it's 2011, not 1890). The funny thing is that they are aware of other arrangements - the so-called "mixer tap" which - get this!! - mixes the hot and cold and sends them pre-mixed out of one single tap! But even quite modern buildings, like the annex space that hosts our apparently-recently-renovated bathroom, still have the old system. On top of that, sometimes the stream of water is so close to the sink's edge that you have to squish your hand up against the ceramic to get it wet. And very very cold. 

Well, the other day I was in the shower and Amps was helping Nina in the bathroom. I commented that the temperature was fluctuating. Amps, washing Nina's hands, commented that I should be glad that the hot and cold at least come out from the same place, in the shower. I had this vision. Elderly people would break hips every year, pregnant ladies would fall down, madly hopping from one end of the tub to the other, to get from the way-too-cold shower head to the way-too-hot shower head and back again before getting burned, or getting hypothermia.  Americans, Canadians, Europeans, and everyone else in the world would visit and exclaim about how this is just silly, isn't it? English people would agree, in theory, that there might be more comfortable ways to shower. But it would be traditional.

                              from http://anglopole.wordpress.com/2008/06/01/english-houses/

 

Insy winsy spider

These days we wake up to singing, really cute singing. If we stay in bed and keep listening sometimes we hear a whole song cycle, followed by something like "ummm, and what else is there? oh: TWINKLE, TWINKLE, LITTLE STAR ..." and so on. It's a great way to wake up. My favourite is still "the Ninas on the bus say 'I love Mummy' " but that's a bit rare. The other day, though, I got: "The insy winsy spider ran up the water spout; down came the rain and washed the spider out. Down came the rain and washed the spider out. Down came the rain and washed the spider out .." whose tune morphed into twinkle twinkle about half way through. 
   A couple of days later, it so happened that the sun came out. Nina got SO excited: "Look Mummy the SUN! It's the SUN! Mummy!!! The SUUUNNNNNNN!". I guess as far as she's seen, for ages now, well: down came the rain and ...  
Today she's sick and I'm not sure what with. It happened about 10 minutes before I got to nursery to pick her up. I got there and she was clinging to one of the women and coughing and rubbing her tired little eyes. We got home and she clung to me and coughed and rubbed her eyes and said her bum hurt. We had Tesco naan with peanut butter (me) and jam (her) eventually. You know you're having a rough time when scrambled eggs are beyond your logistical capability. (Tesco naan is actually really great: soft, nicely flavoured... ) She fell asleep really easily, finally, but she's whining and crying in her sleep. It's sad. And I don't know what's wrong or how serious it is, which is hard. 
  In other news, Nina's got a toy baby. It's realistic-looking, enough that it can really startle you if you come upon it suddenly. Anyway, the baby spits. Well, not really, but in Nina's world it does. And when it spits, Nina tells it that if it spits again it will get a time out. She looks at it very seriously in the eyes. Then she says "ok, you're going to have a time out". She is delighted with herself. The baby sits in the corner and Nina says "stay there until I get you" and then she goes back and says "are you ready to say sorry?" and then the baby comes up to me and she very earnestly tells me that it has said sorry. All of this repeats. Indefinitely. Up to 40 times. It's hilarious. I asked her why she thinks the baby wants to spit so much. She grinned, and said "spitting is really funny". I gather that it's rather a struggle for her not to spit, and she's doing really well. 
   yet more news, such as it is: Got a paper rejected, which really sucks as it's with a student and it's been a long journey for this work. Got good reviews of another grant proposal, which is great. Teaching starts next week - not so great, as what with being 32 weeks pregnant now I'm still concerned about passing out, and standing and talking is awkward. Well, that's the update. I hope to put some videos up here soon but can't be bothered right now. This inner baby that I've got is tiring, extremely active, and it's very distracting! And easily visible from across a room.