She bakes cookies ! *

I have the Edmonds Classics cookbook from the library, and it's mostly full of recipes for biscuits (i.e. cookies if you're in North America), cakes and slices. The temptation for a sweet-toothed domestic goddess-in-training to try some of the biscuit recipes, was too great to resist.

First up was the recipe for ANZAC biscuits. They're full of coconut and rolled oats, so it's easy to pretend that you're actually doing your body a favour by eating half a dozen in one sitting - never mind all the butter that went into them. I did have a slight problem in that, even though I set the oven to exactly the required temperature, I had to remove the biscuits after five minutes to avoid ending up with a mess of sweet charcoal.

This recipe gets 9/10 for being so easy to make and 10/10 for yumminess.

Next up, the recipe for gingernuts. To make these, I had to cream a large hunk of butter with brown sugar and golden syrup.

I have vague memories of "creaming" from school cooking classes when I was about twelve, but obviously I had completely forgotten how much hard work this is.

Attempting to transform refrigerated butter (and sugar and syrup) into a light and fluffy mixture, is foolhardy without a cake mixer.

Attempting it with dodgy wrists is simply insane.

The resulting biscuit wasn't as pleasing as the ANZACs; I'm not sure if I worked the batter into sufficient fluffiness, but I am sure that I won't be making these again - not without a cake mixer anyway.

The recipe for gingernuts gets 2/10 for making my arm nearly drop off, and 5/10 for not tasting ginger-y enough.

I've typed in the recipe for ANZAC biscuits below:

ANZAC Biscuits
1/2 C standard grade flour
1/2 C sugar
3/4 C coconut
3/4 C rolled oats
100g butter
1 Tab golden syrup
1/2 teasp baking soda
2 Tab boiling water

Heat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius. Mix the flour, sugar, coconut and rolled oats. Melt butter and golden syrup. Dissolve baking soda in the boiling water and add to butter mixture. Stir butter mixture in the dry ingredients. Place level tablespoons of mixture 4-5 cm apart on cold oven trays. Flatten with a floured fork. Bake about 15 minutes or until golden (for me it took only 5 minutes). Makes 22.

* A reference to the Barbara Streisand movie, Yentl, in which Barbs dresses up as a boy in order to enrol into school. It's all very Mrs Doubtfire/Some Like it Hot, and a girl falls in love with Barbs-boy because he is so sensitive. There's a line in the movie where the lovelorn girl exclaims "You bake apples!".

It's the teeth again

These are the things I tried when Baby's teeth started bothering her this afternoon:

1. A teething rattle which has a water-filled piece at one end, straight from the fridge.

But she wouldn't take the hint and bite on the damned thing, so big failure there.

2. Nursing.

Funnily enough, although nursing is usually the panacea for just about all of Baby's woes, this time it didn't work. She either cried harder as soon as I laid her on the pillow on my lap, or arched her back and studied the mobile hanging from the ceiling.

3. Bonjela.

I rubbed a pea-sized amount on her gums and waited for her to recognize the yummy flavour. She didn't care, and continued to wail.

4. Bouncing her on my knees.

This worked great, but after an hour my legs got tired and my voice was starting to go hoarse from so many repetitions of This is the way the parson rides, parson rides, parson rides...

5. A rusk and a spell in the vibrating rocker.

Again, a big winner. But only for about half an hour. Also, the vibrations tend to stimulate Baby's poo-making muscles so we don't want to overdo it.

6. Putting her in the hammock, with a lullabies CD on the stereo.

I was surprised that the lullabies, set against a background of wave sounds, really did settle her, as promised on the CD cover. She only started fussing again when her hunger finally caught up with her (it'd been over five hours since her last feed).

...then the boy came home and put her to bed, leaving me to wallow in the fatigue which set in even before the TV news had ended.

Anyone want to buy a 1991 Honda Civic?

Parking spaces are at a real premium in my street, which is why I'm so grateful that I have my own garage. But my new car resides there now, and my old Honda is taking up space on the street - space sorely needed for the boy's car.

I'm thinking of selling the old 'un via the Internet, but my experience with on-line auctions to date has been limited to items less than fifty bucks and no bigger than a golf umbrella.

And there's that whole thing of, is it safe to have strangers coming over to inspect the vehicle during the day, when Baby and I are home alone? If prospective buyers want to take it out for a test drive, should I go with them, or hold onto their Rolex until they return?

Hmmm...so much to think about...

Mind candy

Yesterday I very nearly bought one of those women's gossip magazines, and I blame it on Brangelina.

The headline on one - I think it was New Idea - told me that Brad has left Angelina; another magazine - Women's Weekly, perhaps - announced that they were getting married.

And now, even though I never actually cared about Hollywood goings-on, I'm really curious as to what's going on with those two.

Going automatic

Later today I'm trading in my trusty old 1991 1300cc Honda Civic sedan for a nifty little Toyota Echo; it's an automatic, with air conditioning, ABS brakes, a decent car stereo and only 35,000 kms on its mileage-o-meter.

The Honda has served me well; it never broke down on me and only needed expensive work ocassionally in its ten years as my "wheels". But I will not miss the crappy stereo, the boot cover which has knocked several unsuspecting passengers (and myself) on the head, its oven-like atmosphere on hot days and its inability to go up those big hills in fourth gear.

But I probably will miss my life savings which will have gone into its purchase.

Still, this will make getting Baby to sleep on those "difficult" afternoons, a little more fun.

I'm a goody two-shoes

I found it at Pants, pants, pants.

You Are 18% Evil

You are good. So good, that you make evil people squirm. Just remember, you may need to turn to the dark side to get what you want!

How Evil Are You?

Where are the cows?

Last night the boy went out on the town with some business associates, leaving me in charge of Making Baby Stay Asleep. She wouldn't go to drop off on her own, and I had to go in and feed her to sleep after an hour of wailing, but in the end she was down for the evening.

For entertainment I had two choices - watch Bram Stoker's Dracula on the telly, or Bride and Prejudice which I'd rented out on DVD (and which the boy had successfully avoided watching all week).

Being fond of vampire stories, I initially chose Dracula, but wasn't able to get past Keanu Reeves' terrible performance. Now, I'm the last person on Earth to get all snotty about people's acting ability, but if I can notice when someone's doing a bad job then he really must be doing a bad job indeed. So, despite Gary Oldman's freaky turn as the Count, I put on the DVD.

An aside - I've watched lots of English-language Indian movies, and I get the impression that featuring a huge, exuberant Indian wedding must be compulsory for any Indian director. Like the need to include a steamy sex scene in almost any Hollywood thriller.

Doing a Jane Austen Bollywood style sounded like such a clever idea, but I have to say that this movie didn't do it for me. I'm thinking that if I were a Hindi-speaking Indian, I probably wouldn't enjoy the real thing. As far as musicals go, I'd still prefer to watch the BtVS episode Once More With Feeling.

How TV makes me want to clean

Despite strong resistence to reality TV shows in general, I've started watching How Clean Is You House every Wednesday. Each week, a pair of housecleaning professionals visit a particularly unkempt house and turn it into something the health inspector wouldn't throw a wobbly at.

One reason I enjoy seeing strangers' homes put to the test, and failing, is that it makes me feel so much better about the state of my own home.

The other reason I'm compelled to watch the show is that it motivates me to do something about that corner of my bathroom, behind the toilet, which is almost never cleaned because it's too dirty.

I'm sure I'm not the only person on the planet who won't clean something because it's too dirty.

Besides, I'm going to have to host a mother's group one day.

Guy stuff

Guy Food
One of the reasons I decided to be the cook in this household was to ensure that there would always be vegetables for dinner. However, our dinners don't tend to have a lot of fresh vegetables in them, and this is why - I've been cooking guy food.

Apart from the odd (meat-based) salad, and stir fries when I can't be bothered going through any more cooking books, I've found myself making mostly stodgy cheesey dishes. Those're the things that the boy likes and comments on. I like them too, otherwise I wouldn't continue risking my lactose-intolerant tummy's several times a week.

But really, there has to be more clean, green stuff in our diets. That's why I'm resisting the idea of adding cauliflower cheese to the menu; sometimes vegetables ought to be just naked.

Guy Movies
The boy brought home Sin City last weekend. I'd already read many reviews and knew what to expect - violent stories told with a testosterone-y twist. I was absolutely right. Two things about this movie stand out:

- a scene in which a psycho cannibal murderer, played by Elijah Wood, is tied to a tree trunk. His limbs have been lopped off and his own dog about to devour him.

- the actress who plays Rory in Gilmour Girls as a streetwalker turned tattletale.

It wasn't a bad movie; it certainly wasn't a boring movie. But it really wasn't a nice movie.

Surfin' the sofa

It's gratuitous Baby photo time, folks. And this time it's a picture of the wee one doing tummy time on the fish cushion (the hairy arm belongs to her daddy).

Nothing like roadworks to put you off your lunch

Distractible child that she is, Baby is on a nursing strike and sleeping strike today. Lucky for her (but not for me) that the men digging up the footpath opposite our house, only work during business hours.

Just wait till they start work on the footpath right in front of the house.

The painters are in

The painters are in.
I'm up on the blocks.
The Curse is upon me.
Auntie Flo's in town.
I've checked into the Red Roof Inn.
I'm closed for maintenance.
The Crimson Tide is in.
Dracula's teabags are in the house.
I'm flying the red flag.
There's been a massacre at the Y.
Moses is parting the Red Sea.
My red-headed cousin from Virginia is in town.
There is red thread in my sewing machine.
I got a scarlet letter.
It's too wet to plow.
I'm out trolling for vampires.

Yep. In case you didn't get the massive hint, my Carefree-free days are gone, after nigh-on fifteen months. Boo-hoo.

p.s. thanks to Aunt Flow's World of Menstruation Euphamisms.

My shipment's come in

Imagine my feeling of pure joy when I checked my front porch this morning, and saw that my package from Amazon had arrived. The Buffy, Angel and Firefly books are going to be my constant companions for the next few weeks (that is, when Baby allows it). If only I could keep my sleep-deprived eyes open long enough to finish a chapter...

Freaky Critters

Today, in my baby-free hour, I went out to a couple of exhibitions at the local city gallery. The first was a Michael Smither retrospective. The way Smither makes landscapes look alive, yet his people look like shiny plastic figurines, is great - but I was really there to see the works of Patricia Piccinini.

Piccinini's made a name for herself creating strange creatures which are supposed to be the result of genetic engineering, like this, this and this Go on, click - it's pretty weird stuff - the last one was especially disturbing; it's a depiction of a family of creatures that look like an unfortunate cross between pigs and humans.

Supposedly these creatures have been bio-engineered to help out humankind one way or another; there were exquisite drawings of such creatures playing with babies and toddlers (but of course they can't have been drawn from life, young children simply don't keep still that long!).

I always use the fact that I'm a mother of a six-month old as an excuse for my lack of creative output, but Piccinini has a nine-month old and it hasn't stopped her from thinking up some mind-boggling life forms.

Watching the penultimate episode of Buffy Season Six

I always thought it was so sad that Jonathan had to die in Season Seven. Of the Trio, he was the only one who showed any sense of right and wrong; yet he ends up getting sacrificed to open the Hellmouth, while his killer Andrew goes on to become a watcher-in-training.

Yeah I know, lots of great characters die on the show and he's just one of them. But I felt really sorry for him - maybe because it's easy to relate to someone who was a geeky "nobody" in high school.

For the record

Here's a rundown of the intimate details of Baby's life...

Food that Baby likes:
pureed pear, with or without rice cereal
pureed apple, with or without rice cereal

Food that Baby will eventually swallow after it sits in her mouth for about five minutes:
potato, with or without rice cereal, pureed or fork-mashed
kumara, with or without rice cereal, pureed or fork-mashed

Food that Baby will spit right out, even making gagging noises first for effect:
avocado, with or without rice cereal

Food which is next on Baby's list of food-to-try:
pureed courgette

Why I will persist with the avocado:
I read that it can make Baby's poo go bright green. I have to see this.

Usual number of minutes between putting Baby down in her cot, and her going quiet:
0, as long as I don't try it mid-afternoon or later.

Usual length of Baby's naps:
For a couple of weeks they were over an hour but now she's catnapping again (45 mins).

Number of times Baby wakes for attention after her bedtime:
1-3 times between 6.30pm and midnight; 1-3 times between midnight and 6.30am

Longest stretch of sleep this month:
6 1/2 hours, two nights ago

Baby's height/length:
67 cm

Baby's weight:
Just over 7kg

Baby's favourite playthings:
Bouncing in her hammock
Her little scrunchy fabric book
Her rattle/water-filled teething ring

Things that make Baby chortle with glee:
Her daddy's funny faces
The dragon hand puppet, when it's tickling her with its forked tongue
Being swung through the air
Being bounced, in my arms of on my knees
Biting my nipples

Lower incisors

Baby's been teething; I can tell because when she bites my nipples for fun it hurts a lot more than when she used to gum them. I'm assuming this is why all of the sudden she's not taking her naps during the day, and waking up even more frequently than usual during the night.

Bonjela doesn't seem to work; I rub it on her gums but she then licks it off until there's none left. Letting her chew a rusk or teething ring does seem to soothe her, but if I want her to nap then I have to feed her to sleep.

Apparently there could be smelly, runny poos to look forward to.

Inconvenient boobs

I suppose I shouldn't really complain about the fact that my boobs have more than doubled in size since they became Baby's instant milk machine; having a biggish chest sure does make the rest of one's body look petite, and that's a definite plus.

But I do miss being pert.

I miss being able to wear little strappy tops in summer, without the robust, canti-levering foundation garment underneath.

I miss sleeping on my stomach without fear of puncturing something.

I miss wearing shirts that fit perfectly across the shoulders, yet don't bind across my chest.

I hate having to list, can I breastfeed in this?, to my list of good shirt criteria.

I miss being able to run across the street without the feeling of twin water-filled balloons bouncing striking my chin.

I worry that, by the time Baby's off the mummy milk, my boobs will be different sizes.

And I will no longer be able to refer to the pencil test* without feeling wistful.



*The pencil test is one which tests "pertness". You place a pencil underneath one boob, and if it stays where it is then you ain't.

Hooray for Huggies

It's not my thing to plug products - just movies and TV shows, normally - but in this post I sing the praises of Huggies disposable nappies.

Almost exactly one week after Baby's last poo, I was greeted at this morning's first nappy change of the day, with one so massive you'd think Baby had been digesting an entire sack of potatoes (pureed, of course). As you'd expect from a poo which has been brewing for a whole seven days, this one completely filled the nappy - it's a total wonder why it didn't burst its banks. In fact, this product did such a good job that I didn't even detect the poo onslaught with my usual nappy-sniffing test; it'd been so effective in keeping the toilet-y smells within.

Thanky you, Huggies, for saving me from the potentially gruesome task of a complete bedlinen change, clothes change, baby-clean and seriously thorough scrubbing of my fingernails.

Baby's first overnight trip

Baby's godparents (not FlyingKiwi, who is her god(less) parent) got married yesterday, in a picturesque little town known for it's wine and crafts. Although they're really cool people who have wonderful taste in baby clothes, I was dreading going to the wedding because it would mean overnighting away from home i.e. Baby's routine would be completely disrupted.

It's funny how such a small person can have so much luggage. We had to practically dismantle her bedroom and put it into three bags, in order to re-create her home environment in our hotel room. Then we got there, and realised it wasn't going to work anyway; there was no CD player for our white noice CD, the musical aquarium (essential for her naptime and bedtime routines) couldn't be fitted onto the travel cot provided, and the room didn't have blackout curtains.

On the plus side, she absolutely charmed the wedding party; she and a boy baby of similar age got on like a house on fire (she's going to be a big flirt when she grows up, oh yes), and there would have been no shortage of baby-friendly arms if the boy and I needed a break.

Speaking of the boy, he was the groom's best man so I got to see him all dressed up in a tux; he was by far the prettiest male in town (pretty in a manly, rugged sort of way of course).

When he couldn't locate the Blistex with which he intended to lubricate the wedding bands (just in case), he used the stuff from Baby's bum cream jar. I just had to tell you that.

Just as I'd feared, Baby didn't sleep too well. I ended up having to feed her to sleep, about every 2-3 hrs through the night; she wouldn't nap at all.

But I think she had fun.

...and now for some culinary success...

I'm starting to realise that the key to cooking food which the boy will love, is to make sure there is plenty of cheese in the recipe.

This dish was really yummy, although I have to admit I was quite alarmed to see just how much oil goes into the pasta sauce (which is basically equal parts oil and cream). Fortunately the pasta soaks it up really well and then you can forget you saw it.

It's from Jo Seager's Easy-Peasy Summer Entertaining
Pasta with Grilled Asparagus, Broad Beans and Lemon (serves 4)

500g asparagus
2 cups shelled broad beans
350g dried penne pasta
100 ml extra virgin olive oil
2 cloves garlic, crushed
grated rind and juice of 1 lemon
3 tsp chopped fresh mint
100 ml cream
1/2 cup freshly grated parmesan cheese
salt and freshly ground black pepper

Trim the asparagus and slice in half lengthways.

Place the asparagus in a grill pan or on a barbeque, brush with a little oil and grill 3-4 minutes each side until charred and tender. (I don't have a good grill, nor a barbeque, so I put them in a hot frying pan with a little oil and shook them around until they were nice and grilled-looking).

Blanch the beans in lightly salted water for 2 mins, then remove with a sieve.
Run cold water onto the beans and remove the hard outer skin. (This bit was a pain in the arse because it takes so long to remove the skin off each and every bean. I may use frozen peas next time.)

Return the bean water to a boil, add pasta and cook for 10 mins until just tender.

Heat the oil, add the garlic and lemon rind and fry gently for 3 minutes.
Add the beans, mint and cream, and heat gently.

Drain the pasta and toss with the asparagus and the bean sauce.
Stir in the cheese and lemon juice to taste.
Season and serve in a warm bowl.

He's so lovely

I'd been led to believe that the boy and I wouldn't be exchanging presents for Valentine's Day, and I wasn't too put out about it. It's pretty hard shopping for gifts when the buggy doesn't get into the doorway of most shops, and I'm not organised enough to order something online ahead of time. Just finding a decent greeting card took a while (I chose a card with a romantic picture of that lovely couple Shrek and Princess Fiona).

And then the boy rang me from work, asking whether I'd checked my emails lately. He'd sent me an Amazon gift voucher. Within the hour, I had chosen a bevy of Buffy books.

I'd actually intended to spend exactly the value of the gift voucher, but it's tricky when the cost of freight seems to vary depending of how much the books add up to. So I thought, What the heck, just order whatever I want:

"Slayer: The Last Days of Sunnydale" by Keith Topping;

"Why Buffy Matters : The Art of Buffy the Vampire Slayer" by Rhonda Wilcox;

"Reading Angel : The TV Spin-off With a Soul" by Stacey Abbott;

"Finding Serenity : Anti-Heroes, Lost Shepherds and Space Hookers in Joss Whedon's Firefly (Smart Pop series)" by Glenn Yeffeth;

"Buffy The Vampire Slayer: Radio Sunnydale" (music CD).

No more parenting books for me.

Carbs is the key

Don't let anyone tell you that feeding solids to help a baby sleep better at night, is just an old wive's tale.

Ever since I started giving Baby rice cereal (with or without the addition of vegetable or fruit purees) every day, she's been sleeping better. Not twelve hours straight or anything, but in 4- and 5-hour blocks instead of 2- and 3-hour blocks.

Unfortunately I haven't necessarily gotten any more sleep as a result, because some nights I just can't get to sleep even when I'm tired. Maybe I should increase my own carbohydrate intake.

Culinary disasters

Life as a domestic goddess-in-training hasn't been without it's failures; while my Kumara and spinach gnocchi, Deli salad, Cottage pie and Grilled asparagus with broad beans and penne pasta in creamy sauce were all big hits with the boy, some dishes were so bad we had to throw them out and eat pizza instead:

Warm lamb salad - It's a dish I love when ordered at a restaurant, but when I try to make it myself (with or without a recipe) the results are always iffy. Once or twice it's been nice, but I seem to have a real problem cooking lamb. In fact, the last time I made this, I gave myself a bad tummy.

Pork and beans - actually, I have a problem cooking pork with anything. Every time I cook pork (I haven't tried roasting it), it tastes really...I dunno...gamey.

Salmon Risotto - the recipe scored pretty highly on the easiness scale, but it's confirmed my suspician that I shouldn't bother cooking anything with tinned salmon when the fresh or smoked kind is available.

Considering my history of giving myself food poisoning though, I'm probably doing okay so far.

Like Bonanza but with extra cussin'

I rented some Deadwood episodes on DVD this weekend; it's another one of those shows which I've heard good things about, but never got to see on TV because it screened about three hours after I'd gone to bed.

Despite the exuberant swearing throughout the show (not to mention watching a dead man being fed to pigs), it's not so unpleasant that I couldn't enjoy it.

Deadwood is loaded with characters to love, hate and pity; the ruthless saloon owner and his unwashed cronies, the ex-state marshall and his Jewish business partner, the doctor who apparently spends most of his time "up to my elbows in snatch", the foolish townie who's been duped out of twenty grand for a used up gold claim and his laudanum-addicted wife.

It was interesting to see their take on Calamity Jane; the character I saw seems a zillion miles away from how Doris Day played her. She's coarse and loud and vulgar and not at all pretty. But put a sick orphaned child in her care and she's all tender and vulnerable (maybe she has an inner-Doris).

I'll be looking forward to seeing the rest of Season One, though it's going to be hard fitting it in with watching Desperate Housewives, House and Lost, as well as getting my blog fixes.

A new addiction

Having made my very first online auction buy today (a stroller for when Baby and I go out in the car), I fear that I have now become addicted to TradeMe. It's a good thing I've never been a shopaholic.

The Machinist

I was pretty intrigued by this movie when I heard about it. Apparently Christian Bale, who played Batman in Batman Begins, had to starve himself to the point of looking like a concentration camp inmate, in order to play this role.

On the cover of the DVD it says that The Machinist is like a cross between Fight Club and Memento (both great movies, especially the latter).

Well it is; very much so.

It's a fine movie. I find it just a little too similar to both of the movies it's been compared to, but if you've not seen either (but are the sort of person who'd enjoy both) then you'll probably really like it.

There's an unhealthily thin man who hasn't slept in a year - the machinist; a strange workmate with an accent like Elvis' whom no-one else can see; a factory from hell; a prostitute who'll give it all up for the machinist; a single-mum waitress who befriends him; and enigmatic post-it notes on his fridge.

Oh, and there's also a huge reference to Dostoyoevsky's The Idiot, but I've never read it so I can't tell you it's significance.

Explosive

I started feeding Baby hyper-mashed pototo last week. Everything was going fine; her initial reaction to this new food soon developed into acceptance and now she seems to like it.

But the worrying thing is that Baby hasn't pooed since her first taste of spudliness. It's been four days.

In the past, she's sometimes held on for two days; then when she did poo the resulting mess was just ALL OVER. So you can perhaps sense my concern.

Baby's next poo could well put us knee-deep in the brown stuff.

No, not letting this go...

It still irks me to see that erroneous sub-heading on the Serenity posters everywhere I go. That's why I took a photo of one; so I could post it up and irk someone else.

I even painted in a big arrow to make it really obvious. Come on, I can't be the only person who's outraged.

Conversations with asleep people

Some people talk out loud in their sleep; there you are, dreaming that you're about to miss the bus to school to sit a very important exam in the nude, when your bedmate suddenly starts talking geekspeak at the top of his voice. It's really quite distracting.

But the boy goes even further.

Sometimes Baby wakes up and cries in the middle of the night, and she can't possibly be hungry. So I turn to the boy and ask him nicely to PLEASE WAKE UP AND GO SETTLE THE BABY! The boy then sits up, throws off the duvet and pats my thigh, saying in his most soothing voice, "Hush hush sweetie, it's sleep time". So I tell him that Baby isn't even in the room with us, and he replies "It's okay 'cos I'm smiling".

That's when I realise he's talking in his sleep.

Last night at around 1am, Baby woke up and cried, in just the same way as I've just described. I woke the boy up etc etc. He said she was fine. I asked whether he was talking in his sleep again. He said, "Not as far as I know, no".

But yes, he WAS talking in his sleep. Again.

Every time this happens I get really annoyed because it means I've got to go and try to settle Baby without feeding her. But I can't exactly punish the poor guy, because he doesn't even know he's doing it. I should at least be grateful he isn't one of those people who walk out of their homes, pick up strangers and have sex with them, all whilst still asleep (I've heard of it).

Or maybe he's just pretending.

Geek or serial killer?

Actually, I reckon some people are both.

Here's a wee quiz, sent by my friend Desiree, to test your powers of differentiation (I got 7/10).

I think I'm cured

For a while there I was reading nothing but parenting books. Then, when I tried to wean myself off them, I became addicted to parenting discussion boards instead.

But I've become bored with reading about other people's problems with their respective baby's sleep patterns.

The best thing I got out of reading stuff like "Help! My child wakes up every hour at night and screams!" every night, was knowing that:

a) I'm not the only one with a baby who doesn't sleep through the night and

b) there are some parents out there who are worse off.

It probably helps that, at six months old this coming Saturday, Baby seems to be settling into a routine of her own which doesn't leave me with bloodshot eyes and an inability to concentrate for more than five minutes.

Yes, Baby is turning 6 months. She's a big girl now, with her own upright car seat and her own blue and orange high chair.

She's learned how to make her hammock bounce up and down by lifting and dropping her wee bum, and she's into Baby Einstein DVDs.

She chortles when I hold her to my chest and jump up and down, and goes quiet when she hears someone sing ...Old McDonald had a farm/ee eye ee eye oh...

She likes squished up pear but makes faces when it's squished up apple.

Oh, I feel another baby photo post coming on...

the begetting of sleep

There's this saying which is oft-quoted in books about babies and sleep, "sleep begets sleep". The idea is that, if your baby gets plenty of daytime sleep then she'll sleep well during the night too, and vice versa.

Well, bullshit.

Yesterday Baby had about four hours of day sleep, twice as much as normal. And last night she woke up for attention SIX TIMES - twice as often as normal. The previous time Baby napped that well, her night was just as wakeful.

I really, really really must stop reading those parenting books.

He's Angel, but he's not Dark Angel

I've walked past the poster advertising the movie, Serenity, every day for weeks now. But only this afternoon did I notice that underneath the movie title are the words "...from the creator of Buffy and Dark Angel" Eh?! Dark Angel?!

It must be a local faux pas, because the version I found on the Internet was gaff-free.

Did New Zealand get the first draft copies of the poster or something? Has anyone else noticed?

A website that answers some of those worrying parenting questions...

I was innocently searching for online information about a brand of baby sleeping bag called Go-Go Baby. Little did I suspect that the search terms "go go baby" would result in a solution the problem of how to prevent your little son from growing up gay.

Oh, and just in case you don't realise just from reading the content - it's a joke site.

The movie with the giant penis suit

We rented two DVDs to watch this week, The Yes Men and The Machinist. The latter sounds pretty promising because 1) it stars Christian Bale, who managed to make a Batman movie interesting, and 2) it's been described as "Fight Club meets Memento" - two favourite movies of mine.

But tonight I was in the mood for a laugh, so we watched The Yes Men, which is a documentary about a couple of imaginative anti-Globalisation guys (this is their website) who impersonate WTO representatives at various straight-up conferences around the world.

They get away with presenting the abovementioned giant penis suit as a textile-based solution to the twin problems of 1) managing workers remotely and 2) the need for a work life balance.

They also give a po-faced lecture to a roomful of economics students about their plan to feed the excreted waste products from First World-ingested hamburgers, to the starving poor in the Third World.

You could enjoy this movie just for the hilarious pseudonyms they work under, like Dr Adreas Bichlbauer and Granwyth Hulatberi. You could learn something about the evils of Globalisation. Or you could just enjoy the giant, inflatable penis suit.

How to spend hundreds of dollars in less than an hour

Having only bought ourselves a new king-size bed last weekend, today we turned our attentions to Baby's retail needs.

Actually, I'd only realised 2 or 3 days ago that the rented car capsule she's been using, is due to be returned on Tuesday. So we urgently had to buy her a new car seat. And since it's quite hard trying to spoon pureed apple into Baby's mouth when she's half-reclining in her infant rocker and playing with the baubles hanging off the toy bar, a high chair was next on the list.

What you're supposed to do is go to at least a couple of specialist baby shops, look at every model and compare prices; maybe even try to get a discount for buying both items at the same shop. But due to Baby's ultra-short awake times (she was due for a feed and a nap within the hour), that didn't exactly happen.

It was more a case of making a beeline for the most visually attractive model, quickly trying Baby in it and checking that it wasn't the cheapest one in the shop (assuming that you get what you pay for - as it turned out we bought the second most expensive of each item) and snapping it up before the shop assistant even had time to talk us into the most expensive models.

Oh, and we also got a pair of really cute, hot pink infant sunglasses.

Five most exciting events of yesterday

A fellow mum, who's daughter was one of those babies you can take anywhere 'cos they seem to sleep all the time, told me that's no longer the case. Welcome to the real world, pal.

I've thought of a way to stretch out snacker-Baby's feeds. All I have to do is take her visiting, during what would be her feed time. Yesterday she went about 5 hours between feeds because we went to see a friend, where she had a whole new ceiling to stare at.

Realising that Lost, Desperate Housewives and House are all starting on the telly from next week.

Making my first foray into online auctions, when I bid $4 for a Jolly Jumper look-alike on TradeMe (today I had to increase that to $13).

Finding a copy of Tracy Hogg's The Baby Whisperer solves all your problems (she doesn't really, but it's got some good ideas) at the library.

I really must get a life.

Spilled blood

Finally that moment came, which I've been dreading ever since we noticed how fast Baby's finger nails grow.

I accidentally clipped off a tiny bit of Baby's finger.

All the "I'm so sorry"'s in the world didn't make any difference to my little girl, who shrieked in surprise and pain; she'd been right all along to resist my attempts to cut her nails, hadn't she?

The timing couldn't have been worse. It was just before her morning nap time and all hope of her putting herself to sleep went out the window.

Please excuse me while I flagellate myself.

Deli salad

After the relative success of the spinach and kumara gnocchi, I decided to postpone trying the fish pie recipe until winter.

My next attempt at domestic goddess-ness was to be Salmon Risotto, from a recipe found in Jude Dobson's Baby and Toddler Recipe Book. The results were edible, but nothing to write a blog post about - although perhaps the unexciting flavour was due to the fact that I'd miscalculated the number of cartons of fish stock I needed to buy.

The Deli Salad was much more rewarding; it was really easy to make and tasted great, which would have earned a good score on Flying Kiwi's scale. On the other hand, the recipe calls for meat and she's vegetarian, so maybe not.

Deli Salad is my version of a recipe found in Gabriel Gate's guide to everyday cooking. I substituted chunks of ham off the bone for the turkey, tinned mango slices instead of fresh, lemon juice instead of red wine vinegar, salad leaves instead of beans and omitted the chives, walnuts and carrot (the latter two because of allergies).

And here's the original recipe:
After-Christmas Tukey and Mango Salad (serves 2)
3 tbsp plain yoghurt
juice of 1/2 lemon or 1/2 tbsp red wine vinegar
large pinch of curry powder
salt
freshly ground pepper
2 cups turkey meat, thinly sliced or cubed
1 tbsp finely chopped walnuts
1/2 ripe mango, diced
1 cup cooked beans, cut into small pieces, or 1 cups salad leaves
1/2 grated carrot
2 tbsp chives, cut into 5 mm pieces or other herb

In a salad bowl, mix the yoghurt, lemon juice, curry powder, salt and pepper.
Add the turkey meat, walnuts, mango, beans, grated carrot and chives. Toss well and server immediately or refrigerate for 10 mins before serving.

Easy peasy.

All about the Buffyverse on Wikipedia

Oh my goodness. Why did no one ever tell me there was so much written about Buffy and Angel on Wikipedia?!? Why did I not think to look on Wiki for Buffy articles?!? I could just drown in Buffy-ness!!!

The cutest insomniac

It's high time we had another gratuitous shot of Baby, isn't it? Here she is, all dressed up and ready to head off to a pre-Christmas barbie with our American friends. Aren't those the most scrumptious jeans you ever seen?

a dog's dinner

Imagine you're a starving Kenyan kid, and someone offers you a free nutrition-packed meal. All you have to do is add water and you've got all the calories, protein, vitamins and minerals you need.

Then imagine finding out that you've been eating dog food.

I can only compare it to that moment back in my childhood, when I realised that those delicious meaty things I'd been gobbling down were lamb's tongues. Tongues of lambs. Just like your own tongue, but cut out of the mouth of a poor little bitty woolly lamb. Need I add that I could never touch those things again?

Anyway, I digress.

According to the woman who's planning on donating the food to the Kenyan kids, it's all kosher (so to speak) and nothing yucky. All the same, it'd be best not to let on to the kids that they've been eating the same thing Rover is.

In which Johnny Depp manages to look like Michael Jackson

The boy sent me out to buy Charlie and the Chocolate Factory yesterday - ostensibly for me, because I am the Depp fan in this house, but also because he's a big fan of Helena Bonham Carter.

I'd heard not-so-positive reviews of the movie, so I didn't expect to be wowed or anything. However, I really liked it. The Oompa Loompas (or the one actor who played all of them) were great and their songs were cool, Depp was suitably weird and Charlie's four grandparents were a hoot.

The only thing I wasn't so sure about was the ending. It's been many years since I read the book, but I really don't remember Wonka having a reconciliation with an estranged father, nor do I recall the big family-is-everything...thing (I've been having a damned hard time thinking of the right words these days; blame it on motherhood and sleep deprivation). This is surely a Hollywood add-on, especially the father and son thing. Ang Lee did it with The Hulk and now Tim Burton has done it with Willy Wonka.

Overall though, I enjoyed it and I'm looking forward to viewing the extras tonight.

Happy Chinese New Year

Yep, the Year of the Dog is upon us. That means big, council-funded Chinese cultural shows during the weekend, lion dances featuring at several Chinese restaurants about town and those ubiquitous little red packets of lucky money.

My family has never been big on traditions; we don't buy new clothes to wear for the new year, we stopped having celebratory dinners ever since my brother and I became too busy with our own families, and it's illegal to play with firecrackers outside of Guy Fawkes' Night.

But we do believe in those little red packets of lucky money - that is, my mum believes in giving them out to the children (i.e. that's my brother and I, and our respective partners and offspring) and we recipients believe in getting the handout. I suppose now would be a good time for my brother and I to start giving out little red packets to our own kids, but I don't know if we're supposed to. After all, unmarried adults are regarded as children; maybe we're off the hook indefinitely because both of us siblings are technically children.

I'll be dropping by at my mum's later on this arvo, but it's going to be a short visit though. For a while Baby hwas able to stay awake for an hour and a half before needing a nap, but lately she's regressed to needing a nap after only an hour at the most. It's not very convenient as it means that by the time we've got to Mum's house it's already nearly time to come home again for her feed and naptime.

Have a good one. Woof.

Sleeping on a full stomach

Baby's got a new habit; because she's usually not hungry when she wakes up, and because she normally has really short naps, she now has a tendency to be ready for her feed and her sleep at the same time.

Having a baby who's hungry and tired at the same time isn't ideal, because she can be too tired to feed and too hungry to sleep. Hmmm...

Usually I manage to feed her a few minutes before putting her down for her nap. Otherwise I do her nap routine, leave the room and then have to re-enter five minutes later because she's just decided she's hungry after all.

Is this a bad thing?

Well, the good thing is that she'll sleep better because she's got a full tummy. It also means minimal cry-time before she falls asleep, because she's nice and relaxed.

The bad thing is that I fear she's developed an association between feeding and sleeping, and that's going to get in the way of her sleeping-training. It also means that maybe she won't feed unless she's ready to sleep (maybe that's why she's never hungry when she wakes up in the morning). So in the near future when she needs only one or two naps during the day, maybe she'll only want food once or twice a day.

Despite my worries, I'm glad that today she's had nice long naps. At long last, she's napping like those babies in the parenting books (not that I'm reading them any more, oh no, but if there's one lying around the house then it's just a waste not to leaf through it...). It's such a pleasure to watch her play with her daddy in the evenings and not be overtired already.

..and the gnocchi was delicious in spite of my efforts...

At the weekend I gave the spinach and kumara gnocchi recipe a try (I've typed it below in case you want to try it yourself), so I sent the boy to the supermarket for spinach, kumara (that's New Zealand's sweet potato, to you non-Kiwis), flour, Parmesan cheese and butter - actually, the only ingredients we already had in the kitchen was the salt and pepper.

I ran into trouble right at the beginning; the recipe says I need two medium kumara. How big is medium anyway? Then I realised that I also needed 3 egg yolks; I'm allergic to eggs so I couldn't use 'em, but I had no idea what to substitute for them. So I did what I usually do in such a situation - if I don't know what it's for, just leave it out (which probably explains why I gave up cooking for other people years ago).

In the end though, despite the fact that I completely ommitted 3 egg yolks, used way too much kumara and had to add lots of extra flour, forgot to chop the cooked spinach until after I'd tried to mash it into the kumara, and put all of the grated Parmesan cheese into the mixture instead of only using one third and sprinkling the rest over the top before putting the whole lot into the oven), I produced some pretty tasty gnocchi.

Here's the recipe if you're curious; it's from NZ Woman's Weekly Easy as 1 2 3 by Robyn Martin:

Spinach and Kumara Gnocchi (serves 4, or two brave people)
350g fresh spinach
2 medium kumara
250g tub ricotta cheese
3 egg yolks
1/4 cup flour
3/4 coarsely grated Parmesan cheese
freshley ground black pepper
1/2 teasp salt
50g butter

Wash and cook the spinach in a saucepan, drain and cool. Squeeze out as much liquid as possible then chop finely.
Peel the kumara, cut into pieces and cook in boiling, salted water until tender. Drain and mash.
Stir in the spinach, along with the ricotta cheese, egg yolks, flour, 1/4 cup Parmesan cheese, pepper and salt.
Shape tablespoonfuls of the misture into egg shapes and roll them in flour.
Bring a large saucepand of salted water to a simmer. Add the gnocchi and cook for 2 mins or until they lift off the bottom of the pan. Remove them from the water.
Place the gnocchi into a greased, ovenproof dish.
Melt the butter and pour over.
Top with the rest of the cheese.
Bake at 200 degrees Celsius for 20 minutes.
Serve with tomato pasta sauce (I used shop-bought sauce).

Exasperation

Baby's nap training was going well - in the last week, the time it takes to put herself to sleep decreased from almost an hour to sometimes less than a minute (although each nap still only lasts 45 minutes). But this weekend it's gone a little backwards, and I blame the boy.

It's not that he'll pick her up if she gets hysterical - that's perfectly understandable (as long as he doesn't then rock her to sleep, which he did last weekend, to my annoyance); I think it's because Baby has so much more fun during the weekend because he's around.

It seems to me that Baby goes to sleep more easily during the week because I'm relatively boring. Under my care, the most excitement she can expect, is tummy time, rolling around naked on the floor (that's her not me), occasional swings (where I sit her on my hands and swing her from side to side) and endless opportunities to watch me do housework.

The boy, on the other hand, happily makes up for not being there during the week (he gets home in time to do her bedtime routine), by giving tons of cuddles and hours of the kind of play that daddies are so good at. So it's probably no wonder that when Daddy's home all day, Baby doesn't want to sleep.

But that's no excuse to cut short Baby's nap time just because she's been protesting for over half an hour. In doing so he may well have cancelled out a whole week of sleep training. I'm just a little irritated. I can see now why some people become control freaks.

Mmm...baby rice...

Today was the day I started Baby on solids.

I mixed up some baby rice cereal with cold boiled water, according to the instructions on the package, but it looked a little lumpy - sort of like badly made porridge. But that didn't faze me because it's really only supposed to give her a taste of non-milk food.

She opened her little mouth as soon as she saw her specially-bought Tommee Tippee silicone-tipped spoon approach, loaded with yummy rice-y goodness. Obviously she was expecting something tasty.

But I could tell this was going to be a work in progress when I watched her face crumple as though to say "what the...?" and slowly work the stuff out of her mouth with her tongue (the rest of it came up when I put her down for "tummy time").

Tomorrow I'm going to try mixing it with a little breast milk to see if she likes it any better.

In pursuit of the perfect recipe book

You know how I've started to take an active role in our household's dinner-making duties? Well, after a week of stir-fried this and stir-fried that, relieved by two nights of pizza, it's time to try something different.

I came home from one of my walks with a couple of recipe books from the library; nothing fancy of course, anything that has the words "...for dummies..." or "...for beginners..." is probably right up my alley. So far, I've only found one recipe in each book which I'm game to try (one is for fish pie and the other is for kumara and spinach gnocchi).

I'm pretty fussy about what I'll try. It's not enough that the photo of the finished dish looks scrumptious; I have a whole mental list of criteria before a recipe starts to look good:

1. the recipe has to be easy to follow. Numbered instructions are the way to go.

2. the list of ingredients shouldn't be too long - preferably five, tops. And if there's anything I can't pronounce or have never seen in a supermarket then I'm not making that.

3. if making a dish requires a piece of equipment I don't have, I'm not interested. This includes whisks, blenders, mortar and pestles and terrine moulds.

4. if one or more key ingredients is something I'm allergic too (or something Baby could become allergic to), then the recipe's no good. So that means nothing with eggs, carrots, nuts or chicken. And you know that means that cakes, vegetarian dishes and risottos are probably not on the menu.

5. I'm ethically opposed to the idea of veal (think of calves who've been separated from their mums at birth, stuck in a dark barn and deliberated malnourished in order to produce that nice, light-coloured flesh), so no veal dishes please.

6. measures have to be metric, because I can't convert from empirical in my head.

7. and the picture of the finished dish has to be suitably appealing.

So, just because there's nice photo of Nigella Lawson or Jamie Oliver on the cover, it doesn't mean I'm going to find a use for it.

Manipulative? I wish!

I have Ms Mac to thank for this quiz...

Your Birthdate: October 12

You're a dynamic, charismatic person who's possibly headed for fame. You tend to charm strangers easily. And you usually can get what you want from them. Verbally talented, you tend to persuade people with your speaking and writing. You are affectionate and loving, but it's hard for you to commit to any one relationship. Your strength: Your charm Your weakness: Your extreme manipulation tactics Your power color: Indigo Your power symbol: Four leaf clover Your power month: December

What Does Your Birth Date Mean?

A step toward domestic goddess-ness

Finally there are cooked dinners at the Short and Sweet household; the Plunket people thought it would be good for me to do household chores while Baby is awake (thereby leaving me free to nap or whatever when she sleeps), and cooking should be one of them.

But I have baggage when it come to cooking; I lost interest in anything to do with hot kitchens in my teens, after years of helping my mum every evening and weekend with her Chinese food business. On the other hand, the boy and I are both heartily sick of those ready meals, and the lack fresh vegetables in my diet was taking its toll on my digestion (further details would simply be Too Much Information).

So, despite the fact that the only cooking I am comfortable with is stir-frying or toasting, I've taken on the role of dinner-maker. It's not so bad really - the need for fresh ingredients gives me more reason to go for a walk; the spectacle of food preparation gives Baby something to look at when she's not practising her rolling or doing her tummy time; I have something to keep my mind off Baby's I-don't-want-to-sleep-and-you-can't-make-me protests; and most importantly, the boy and I are now eating more healthily.

The boy is not used to eating Chinese food so often though, so I might even scout out some new recipes (gods forbid!).

I also find myself doing a heck of a lot more cleaning too, all in the name of entertainment for Baby. For the first time in my life I am seriously considering buying an apron.

visible lines

You know, there is one thing more unsightly than VPL (visible panty line), and that's Visible Breast Pad Lines.

The ugliest vaccine

Unfortunately for Baby, there's a meningococcal B epidemic in New Zealand. There is a vaccination program, but it requires several jabs over several months and each jab makes her utterly miserable.

Yesterday Baby had her five-month vaccinations, and her third and last meningococcal B (Mens b) vaccination. Contrary to the nurse's assurance that most babies don't get so unwell with the third one, the poor wee scrap is feeling very poorly indeed. When I went in to give her the 10pm feed last night, I just about scalded my hands on her feverish skin.

2.5 mls of Pamol (Paracetamol for babies) and two hours of cuddling and rocking later, she was finally back in her cot asleep.

Until 3am, that is. Baby marked her 22-week birthday with a scream that threatened to burst my ear drums (I was sleeping in the spare bed in her room).

"Time for some more Pamol", I thought. Despite it's supposedly "pleasant" taste, Baby sure doesn't like it; we've always had to syringe the stuff into the side of her mouth a little at a time, to minimise spit-up. On the fifth and final squirt, an ominous gurgle came from the back of her throat and before I could say "where's the tissues?" she'd puked up the entire dosage - as well what looked to be her total milk intake for the last three feeds.

"Oh good job, Violet" I silently muttered as I attempted to mop up the baby, my lap and the rug, not only was she not medicated but I'd have to wait at least four hours before I could try again, and she was now hungry, dehydrated and exhausted as well.

One good thing came of it though; all that regurgitated liquid cooling on her body seemed to help with her temperature.

Needless to say there wasn't much sleep to be had by either of us, and I can look forward to another night just like it. But I was not at all pleased to see that Baby's so-called third and final Mens b jabwill not be the last one after all .

Why do they all hate Wendy?

I normally avoid reality tv like three-day-old pooey nappies, but I now regret having missed most of the last season's Project Runway. By the time I caught on, eight designers had been eliminated and Wendy Pepper was already the girl most likely to be ignored at the after-show party.

But who would have thought that the show was so big? That you can actually buy the garments (and other stuff, including a Project Runway Barbie!!) from the show?

Tonight's episode was a bit rubbish, because it was just a big end-of-contest bitching session among the entrants, mainly targeting Wendy and the Brit, Vanessa.

But if we get the next season on tv, I'll be there. Trinny and Susannah, you've met your match.

The Second Book report from PBA (Parenting Books Anonymous)

I'm afraid I'm still reading parenting books, though lately I've been concentrating on sleep books:

Brian Symon's Silent Nights gives a really good explantation on how sleep cues work. At the beginning of night time sleep, both tiredness and various cues (e.g. darkness, being in bed etc) contribute to putting you to sleep. As the night goes on and as you continue to sleep, the amount of tiredness decreases; this means that the external sleep cues are increasingly important if you wake up and need to fall back to sleep again.

Symon is an advocate of the CIO (crying it out) method of sleep training. He's very convincing, right up until you actually try to put it into practice and find that listening to the crying is just too stressful.

At the other extreme there is Elizabeth Pantley's The No-Cry Sleep Solution. It's appeal lies in Pantley's promise that you can get your child to learn to fall asleep on her own without tears, as long as you are very patient and follow her method. Most of her case studies are parents who've been co-sleeping with their baby for months (or years); what a boon this book must be to ex-attachment parenters. The book contains lots of suggestions as well as worksheets for the reader to log existing sleep patterns and progress, which is great for people like me who, truth be told, like to be told what to do.

However, where it falls over for me is the need for patience. This method is supposed to take possibly weeks or months - by then my body will have adjusted to surviving on 2 x 3 hour sleeps per night.

But wait - there's more! I've also been reading the Serenity movie magazine. It's one hundred comic-book sized pages of character profiles and behind-the-scenes details. A publication such as this would be useless without some input from Joss Whedon, and there's plenty of that.

I've nearly finished Hideyuki Kukuchi's Vampire Hunter D,a vampire story in a futuristic setting not at all like the Buffyverse. While it's a good story, I keep getting the feeling that the translator's grasp of English could've been better. So it's a little surprising to see the translation credits go to someone with an English name (Kevin Leahy).

Carrie Fisher's The Best Awful though, is not keeping my attention. Although she's a very witty person, I just can't relate to the Hollywood world which is the setting for this story. It may end up being a non-completer.

The best of 2005

Just when I couldn't think of anything non-baby-related to write about, glomgold tagged me for a meme:

Four jobs I've had in my past:
Computer programmer
Shop assistant
Library assistant
Call centre operator

Four things I want to do before 2006 is over:
Get my boobies back
Sleep through the night
Start going out in the evenings again, sans baby
Move to a bigger, more child-friendly house

Four things I say a lot:
Shit
Bloody Hell
Pleeeeeease stay asleep
Is that a pooey nappy? Did you just poo your nappy???

Four things I don't trust:
My instincts
Advice from religious people
Salespeople
Winston Peters (a particularly unsavioury NZ politician)

Four things I do trust:
That the boy will always think of a way to make my life a little easier
Those lovely Plunket people who help me with my babycare concerns
That no matter what, something will come up which will prevent Baby from sleeping through the night
Lawnmower men whose lower legs are covered in grass clippings

Four people from history I'd like to meet:
Mulan. If she actually existed.
Jesus Christ. If he actually existed.
King Arthur. If he actually existed.
My ancestors in China. I'm pretty sure they existed.

Four best movies of 2005: (movies I saw in 2005, that is)
Finding Neverland
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Dogville
Serenity

Four best books I read in 2005:
We need to talk about Kevin, Lionel Shriver
Diary, Chuck Palahniuk
Q and A, Vika Swarup.
The Lovely Bones, Alice Sebold

Four people tagged:
The Editter
EB
Boudica
Nigel Patel

The lawnmower man

I've just fired the guy who has been doing my lawns for the past few years. That is, I left a message on his phone asking him to please send me the final bill, which is no doubt enormous by now because I haven't received one from him for maybe a year now (and don't think that means he's forgotten to charge me), because I've made other arrangements.

I think fifteen bucks to mow a couple of postage stamp-sized lawns is exorbitant, because he leaves most of the grass clippings behind (mostly plastered all over the walls of the house), and doesn't bother trimming the bits down the side of the fence. So he's gone, matey.

The lawnmower guy has been irritating me for a long time now, but I never got around to doing anything about it. But the other day a complete stranger, who just happened to be a competing lawnmower guy, started chatting to me outside my house. He was friendly, seemed to appreciate that I hate hearing the sound of a weedeater at dawn, and Baby liked him. Plus, his lower legs were completely covered in grass. If that isn't the sign of a dedicated grass cutter I don't know what is.

I will keep a close eye on him though, in case he morphs into a giant gopher-like lawn-eating creature from the Stephen King story.

Never wake a sleeping baby...

Baby and I had another visit with the Plunket Family Centre, the people who are helping me sort out our (okay, my) reverse cycling problem. Their feed-often strategy doesn't seem to be working, so I've been given a daily routine to try on Baby.

The Plunket nurse who gave this to me stressed how important it is to get Baby to get her five feeds per day during the day, rather than during the night.

Tell me about it.

Having a little more predictability in my day would be great. I could actually make appointments and be pretty sure I can turn up.

I'm supposed to wake her up for a last-feed-of-the-night at around 10pm, the theory being that this will avoid having to get out of bed and feed her at midnight or 1am. I'm a little sceptical whether this will work (I've read that there's maybe a 50/50 chance of success), but what's the harm in trying?

Well, for a start, the very thought of waking up Baby at night on purpose gives me the heebie jeebies.

What if she wakes up, feeds and then doesn't want to go back to sleep?

But on a slight tangent - just talking to the Plunket nurses always gives me a feelgood. They're really encouraging and tell me how normal my anxieties, and Baby's foibles, are. That's a heck of a lot more than I get from socialising with the mother's group - the mums I talk to only want to chat about how well everything is going. That's sooo not blogworthy.

A room of her own

Baby moved into her room last night (though I'm going to sleep in a single bed next to her cot for the next few weeks). In hindsight, the timing of the move wasn't the best - but then, just about any time is a bad time for a baby to be moved from the master bedroom to what was previously the family storage room.

I thought we'd have trouble with the move, when Baby didn't fall asleep during her buggy ride, timed to coincide with all the furniture moving. After over an hour of being pushed up and down the neighbourhood's bumpiest streets, Baby stayed determinedly awake. Then she screamed herself silly for the last twenty minutes before conking out. Not a good start.

Then it looked as though the storm was going to make it hard for her to fall asleep. The gale force winds had not only blown over a whole section of the corrugated iron fence dividing our property from our neighbours' - it was trying to blow the fence back up again too.

In the end, she did fall asleep in her new room. Only she woke up about three times before midnight and about five times after midnight.

Routine rebound - baby cunning

We'd gotten into a nice, predictable routine for Baby's daytime naps and bedtime. For her naps, we'd sing her a couple of lullabies and rock her in the darkened bedroom, before putting her down in her cot just about asleep. (For bedtime, this is preceded by a warm bath, and I try to give her a feed if she isn't already too tired to eat.)

But, at least for day naps, that's all changed.

Just as we expected, Baby's associating certain things with sleep - lullabies, rocking, being wrapped in her blanket or zipped into her sleeping bag etc. Only Baby doesn't seem to like going to sleep. So as soon as we start crooning (or doing anything else which is associated with sleep), she starts to arch her back and cry, as though to say "I don't hear you I don't hear you I don't hear you!".

This kinda makes the whole point of having a pre-nap routine a little...pointless.

We're now having to be surreptitious. Don't announce that it's nap time, just sneakily carry her into the bedroom for a little "quiet play"; no lullabies, just croon some easy-listening songs; no rocking, just cuddle her until she's nice and dozy.

And we're having to keep changing our strategy every time Baby catches on. It's a little like the eternal battle between predator and prey, between bacteria and antibiotics, between 'flu strains and 'flu jabs.

Where did that year go?

We weren't planning on welcoming in the new year in person, but Baby woke me up at 12am on the dot so I got to silently wish her a happy new year while she not-so-silently demanded a midnight feed thank-you-very-much.

It's hard to believe a whole year has been and gone already. In the last twelve months, I have:
-started a new job so that I could concentrate on library school,
-dropped out of library school (probably permanently) because I got pregnant,
-found out that pregnancy is not necessarily synonymous with the word "glow",
-left my new job to go on maternity leave,
-found out at first hand what child birth is really like (my mum was right - it sure does hurt),
-welcomed an unbelievably cute little person into the world
-and gained some idea of what sleep deprivation torture must be like.

Now that we have a baby in the family, I know that time is now going to pass even more quickly than it did before. In what will seem like a matter of seconds, Baby will transform into a crawler, a walker, a talker and a pre-schooler, respectively. Next thing I know, she'll be hawking her modelling portfolio to prespective agents, and her daddy will be warning off her biker boyfriends with a shotgun.

Happy New Year!

See the little fishies

I went to every New Age shop in town, as well as several music shops; not a single white noise CD could I find. There were a couple of sleep aid CDs, but these were aimed at adults and were full of tinny orchestral music and Barry White sound-a-likes.

However, I did find Fisher Price Ocean Wonders Aquarium, and at 20% off, too.

For the last week, it's been taking us up to four hours to settle Baby down for the night; tonight, we had the aquarium installed on the side of her cot and it was a matter of going back there every 5-10 minutes to turn on the music and light show.

Okay, so it's been one and a half hours now, and she's still pissed off that we've left her by herself to sleep; but at least she quietens down for a few minutes every time I push the button...

Rocking the groceries

The boy sent me out to the supermarket this afternoon, while he stayed home and tried multiple times to put Baby down for a nap (he failed, but not through any lack of skill on his part - he's actually way better at settling her than I am - but because Baby is having an exceptionally wide awake weekend).

Although my shopping list was pretty short, I chose to push a big trolley around instead of lugging a basket.

Every time I stopped in an aisle to look for an item, I found myself unconsciously rocking it backwards and forwards, as if to keep the bag of apples asleep.

In search of white noise

I've read that playing white noise in the background can help a person sleep better, and it's been suggested as an aid to increase the length of Baby's naps. We've already tried having the radio on untuned, but we get this annoying high-pitched frequency in amongst the general hum of static.

So today I had a browse around on the 'Net, in search of some examples of purpose-made white noise. Wow, did you know there's a website devoted to CDs of white noise?

I quite liked the sound of some of the titles on this site; they have Baby's First White Noise, Baby's Vacuum Cleaner, Baby's Electric Fan...

Moving away from the strictly white noise, and more towards the lullaby theme, I also found CDs to calm fretful Christian babies and whiny dogs (that's two separate CDs I'm talking about)!

The boy told me that he finds whale sounds soothing, but I don't think the serenading of humpback whales would put me to sleep, judging by this sample.

Now I'm no New Ager, but the sample I heard from the Raindreaming CD sounds absolutely gorgeous; I'm tempted to search out a copy just for myself.

But for Baby, I think it'll be either rain sounds or waves ; she's heard the sound of rain already so it's nothing new, and the sound of waves lapping at the shore has always worked wonders for my own stress levels.

Oh yeah - has anyone used the Fisher Price Ocean Wonders Aquarium as a sleep aid for their baby, and does it work?

Christmas Day

I think it's a little weird that the boy is so into Christmas, because he's not Christian. I used enjoy Christmas because of all the parties, but now that I don't get to go to parties, it's all bah humbug to me.

Anyway, the boy says he believes in Christmas because it happens to be Mithras' birthday. I wasn't expecting to hear that the boy worships an ancient Persian deity who just happens to have plenty of similarities to JC, but there you go.

So...that's why the boy likes to give good Christmas presents. Baby's first ever Christmas present was a big and fluffy dragon hand puppet; I think she may have been a little overawed by it (it's almost as big as she is), but it'll probably grow on her.

The boy got a t-shirt with the name of our hometown printed on it. This may not sound cool to you folks who live in tourist-y places like New York or Hollywood. However, in NZ, to wear a t-shirt with our hometown printed on it is like wearing a t-shirt with a picture of Rolf Harris or Hilda Ogden on it. Sort of "so naff it's cool". Anyway, he liked it lots.

And me, well I'd asked for a little ghetto-blaster; one of those small, cheap, compact ones. I really only wanted one because I wanted to try playing white noise in the bedroom while Baby takes her naps. What I got was this sexy wee thing. We tried it at Baby's very next nap, but unfortunately it was tuned to the same frequency as the taxis so it didn't quite work that time...

Baby's present to us was oodles of awake time; this was bad because she's hardly napped at all and it's starting to show; but it was also nice because she gave the boy, who has a cold, tons of smiles to cheer him up.

Merry Christmas.

Not just a grumpy mum

Flying Kiwi and The Editter came by to visit the ever-gorgeous Baby today. Fortunately for them, this time she hadn't just had her vaccinations (they were postponed until January due to a new Ministry of Health directive), so a much more pleasant time was had by all.

If I'd remembered to, I could've gotten out the camera to take some happy group photos, to replace the ones we took last time - the ones where the adults are grinning heroically and Baby is doing an imitation of that famous Edvard Munch painting.

As is usual when I get together in person with fellow bloggers, the conversation turned to what we'd been reading in each other's blogs, and it was noted that the tone of this blog is often a little dour. In fact, it was jokingly suggested that I re-name it to Short and Sweet 'n' Sour. Well, maybe I will.

I can't help writing about all the less-than idyllic moments in my day; if musicians didn't get sad, there wouldn't be the Blues, would there? Besides, few things turn me off more than an overly-sweet, sentimental Pollyanna-ish blog post. You won't come across many of those here.

Which NZ bands?

My friend Mike wants to take some Kiwi music home with him.

I would have recommended Bic Runga, 'Nesian Mystic and Goldenhorse, but his taste runs more to the traditional Seattle sound i.e. Screaming Trees, Soundgarden and Pearl Jam.

So I thought, perhaps he'd enjoy Shihad or The Datsuns?

Anyway I can't really think of any more, what with Baby screaming in the background (yup - she's tired but she won't sleep) and me trying to get by on no REM sleep...

So if you know of some NZ bands or particular CDs which you think Mike would like, leave a comment.

Being a mum of a newborn means never having to say you're sorry...

...that this year you won't be sending any Christmas cards because, hell, it takes enough effort just getting out of bed in the morning

...for not bothering to dress nicely for the family get-together, because none of your party clothes are suitable for breastfeeding

...that Christmas nooky is out of the question, since any block of time in which Baby sleeps is a block of time which could be used for napping or blogging

...for devouring the entire fancy cake which was bought especially for sharing at the family get-together - breastfeeding required calories, you know

...about your inability to talk about anything but the latest theory on infant sleep

...but everyone's getting socks for Christmas 'cos it's too much hassle trying to steer the buggy around the department stores

What does one get for the boy who has everything?

Once again I have the problem of what to get as a present for the boy. As he's already told me, if there's anything he wanted he would have bought it himself by now.

I was thinking, how neat - in a cheeky, ironic kind of way - would it be to present him with a t-shirt with Baby's mug on it. He's her number one fan, so I'm sure it'd make him smile even if he didn't dare wear it anywhere. And maybe he actually would wear it. But the trouble is, I only thought of it yesterday and it's now way too late to buy the plain t-shirt, select and prepare the image, and wait for the local image shop to do the rest. Maybe for his next birthday, eh?

I can't really think of anything else which:
a) he would like,
b) doesn't cost as much as a TVR sports car and
c) I can get hold of in time for Christmas

bearing in mind that:
d) I'd prefer to be able to get to the shop on foot and with buggy.

Oh yes, and there's the fact that I have no money (having spent all my savings and maternity pay on bills) so technically the boy would be paying for his own present.

Perhaps it's time for one of those sappy but sweet gift ideas, like a coupon book of hugs (or something more x-rated, except he's gonna have to wait a while before he can cash one of those in).

Sleep training update - I'd give myself a "D"

The sleep training is not going so well, actually. At first, Baby would protest for 20-30 minutes before falling asleep. A couple of weeks later, she started to take maybe up to hour to fall asleep. Lately, she often vocalises for half an hour then cry for half an hour and still not sleep. And I'm just talking about naps here - naps which only last 45 minutes...

It's all my fault. I'm afraid I've been a little inconsistent. I've been offering Baby quite frequent feeds - as often as every couple of hours - in order to stop the reverse cycling. This, and her ultra-short naps, means that sometimes she feeds right before she goes to sleep. In one or two out of her four naps, she's being nursed to sleep (and one nap will be in her buggy). That's a big no-no when you're aiming independent sleep.

But I'm not going to do anything about it for at least another three days; Baby gets more jabs on Wednesday and she'll need to be, well, babied.

a reader survey

Hands up please, if you see pop-ups when viewing this blog.

Party girl

Baby attended her biggest social function so far, today. She and I, and my two friends from Seattle, went to a pre-Christmas barbeque. In a crowd of probably about twenty other people, ranging in age from about seven months to seventy-something years, Baby managed to be the centre of attention all afternoon.

I'd assumed that she'd want me to hold her the whole time, but I couldn't have been wronger. Not only didn't she mind being worn in the frontpack by Mike, whom she'd only met yesterday, but she even fell asleep on his chest. The hussy:-)

Frankly, I was surprised that being in a big crowd like this didn't freak her out, as she'd done when I took her to the Salvation Army play group. But the boy has a good explanation for her relaxed demeanour. Because I didn't know anyone at the play group, I wasn't all that comfortable. On the other hand, I knew just about everyone at the barbeque pretty well, so I was relaxed and so was she.

I guess that explains why Baby threw a wobbly last time she and I took my mum grocery shopping.

old life / new life

My overseas visitors have arrived in town, after a couple of days on the Abel Tasman track. We won't be seeing each until tomorrow though because, frankly, I'm absolutely knackered tonight.

I'm knackered because I've been up since 6am and spent most of the day trying to get Baby to nap, listening to Baby protest and cry instead of napping, and trying to settled the resulting overtired baby.

Baby must be knackered too, because she slept from 6.20pm until 8.40pm before waking up for her next feed - usually she goes down around 6.30 and wakes up half an hour later for her top-up.

And the boy, well the boy is always knackered on Fridays (unless there's free beer on offer) because it's the end of a long, hard working week.

But apart from being knackered (it's such a good word isn't it, only it can so easily be mis-heard...), I'm also a little nervous because I don't know how well tomorrow's get-together's going to go.

My friend and I have only met up a couple of times.

The first time was over ten years ago (in Florence) when I was a youngish, adventurous backpacker with a fondness for Italian Renaissance art and a knack for chatting up strangers.

The second time we met up (I was visiting his home town) was about six years ago when I was a well-paid culture-vulture with a collection of Prince CDs and a knack for chatting up strangers.

Now I'm a stay-at-home mother with leaky boobs, a frighteningly bad haircut (soon to be masked by increasing hair loss) and an obssession with finding methods for getting babies to sleep.

They know about Baby, of course, so I'm sure they'll understand that when we go out I have to be home again in time for Baby's next booby fix. They probably aren't going to expect late nights over wine and spirits (well, not with me anyway) and dinner at the most fashionable eatery in town, because it's just too for me hard to go out in the evenings if I'm on booby duty the whole time.

So maybe I'm worrying about nothing.

All the same, maybe it's going to be weird meeting up again now that I've changed so much. I hope he and his missus don't get really bored.

It's a Hasselhoff Christmas

The boy came home from work the other day proudly bearing one of his Christmas presents to me - one that was not on my list; it's a David Hasselhoff CD, The Night Before Christmas.

It's not that I'm a fan, but ever since the movie Dodgeball even the mention of his name makes me chuckle.

I've yet to play it, but I will once Baby wakes up. I think it's important to develop her sense of humour early on.

p.s. The boy also brought home a present which was on the list - fresh salad veges for my lunches.

p.p.s. Apparently he also has a copy of Serenity on DVD on order, for my third Christmans present.

I shan't be letting him go in a hurry...

It was in the stars

Ah...now I know why Baby is so hard to get off to sleep. It's because she's a Leo.

Too hot

It's only 24 degrees Celcius, but it feels oppressive. Maybe it's because it's fairly humid; maybe it's because you can feel the sun burning right through your skin.

I took Baby out for a walk this afternoon in the buggy, because we'd already had one cry-it-out nap in which it took her two hours to settle into a 45 minute nap. Unfortunately, it was so hot out that by the time we'd gone to the beach and back (a two hour trip) I was sweating like the proverbial. I'm thinking that's why Baby only managed to snooze for about half an hour (because it was so hot, not because I was all sweaty).

It's too hot even for t-shirts and capris - it's really singlet and shorts weather, but I'm presently too chesty for a singlet and none of my old pairs of shorts fit.

This uncharacteristic heat seems to be taking it's toll on Baby too - she's only been in bed an hour, and has already woken up crying three times.

I'm thinking about holidays again, perhaps one with air-conditioning and a nice big swimming pool.

All I want for Christmas

1. some Buffy books, to distract me from my parenting books addiction

2. on DVD, all those movies I haven't been able to go see at the cinema: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit; Charlie and the Chocolate Factory; Serenity; and The Corpse Bride

3. fresh veges for dinner (we've been living off greens-free ready meals for months)

4. a holiday (accompanied by a super nanny if necessary)

5. a promise from my mum to supply less unsolicited advice, and more practical help

6. a bigger house with a bigger yard

7. perfect napping habits for Baby

8. as much sleep as I need

9. legs that go all the way up to my armpits

10. and world peace

Babytalk for boys

I was pleasantly surprised to find Brand New Dad, a web site all about babies and parenting - aimed at dads. And there's some funny stuff here too, like this Homedaddy article (a regular column) about how a stay-at-home dad's day completely revolves around his baby daughter's nap times (something I can related to).

It's interesting to see what concerns dads have, compared with those of mums.

I suppose Brand New Dad is to BabyCenter (and pretty much any other baby-oriented website), what FHM magazine is to Cosmopolitan magazine.

no longer a Cosmo girl

A nice neighbour, whom I got to know because she has a three-week-old daughter, remembered that I'm a magazine-holic (as well as a Parenting Book Addict, which is why I really can't pass up a parenting magazine).

Even though we've only met a couple of times and chatted briefly, she was kind enough to drop a small pile of magazines in my mailbox this weekend:

New Idea, which I never buy but always leaf through in search of pictures of glamourpusses without their makeup on;

House and Garden, which I used to buy back when I was going to renovate my house; and

two issues of Cosmopolitan.

I've bought and read a great many Cosmo magazines in my adulthood, and mainly for two things: sex tips and fashion spreads.

But I didn't enjoy these two issues. Cosmo is no longer relevant to my life. It's not just because the magazine is aimed at teens and twentysomethings, because I used to read it in my thirties. I think it's because these days sex is something I look back on with very fond memories, and fashion is something I was interested in when I could wear itty bitty tops without fear of giving myself black eyes ('cos you have to wear 'em bra-less).

Current magazine-buying nowadays is limited to Practical Parenting and Little Treasures (parenting mags, of course), but I still get the odd Empire , because once upon a time I was a total arthouse film freak. I like to think that, however boring I must now seem now, there's an interesting arty-farty intellectual lurking in me somewhere just waiting to re-surface.

What's worse than having a bad haircut?

It's bad enough having a fringe at the back of my head (it's called "styling" - well, not on fine Asian hair, it isn't), and not being able to just wash and go without fear of looking like a right nong; now I'm suffering from childbirth-related hair loss.

For the last few days, the number of hairs I find entwined in my fingers after my post-shower finger comb, have increased to maybe half a dozen, instead of one or two at the most. So I looked it up in my Baby Love book and, sure enough, I've succumbed to yet another item on the list of "things that happen to you after you have a baby".

According to my book, I'm going to continue to lose more-than-usual hairs for maybe another five months. Then I get to enjoy my scalp's new-found nakedness until approximately twelve months after Baby's birth, before new hairs grow.

Time to go shopping for hats.

Baby's Wot's Hot / Wot's Not list

Wot's Hot:

- Talking to herself in the middle of the night, thereby keeping her poor mother from falling asleep

- Pretending to be really hungry when it's 4am, then flashing a big grin at her mum to let her know she actually just wants to play

- Kicking, whether it's in the bathtub or in the buggy

- Scratching any surface she can get her nails into

- Caleb, the toy doggie that goes "woof woof" when she hits it

- By sheer force of cuteness, forcing her parents to stop whatever they're doing and play with her

- Withholding poo for as long as possible so that when it finally comes, there is no nappy in the world big enough or absorbent enough to hold it in

- Her hands, especially the thumbs

- This strange activity called "rolling over"


Wot's Not:

- Being flipped over onto her front for tummy time

- Taking naps

- Having a boobie thrust in her face when all she wants to do is study the ceiling or find out where that loud noise came from

- People wearing spectacles (for some reason they're scary)

- Being forced to cover those interesting appendages at the end, i.e. feet, with socks or booties

- Being strapped into anything, including the buggy

- Sitting in two day's worth of poo because she held it in for so long and it's now arrived all at once