Posts Tagged "humour"
Yo Mama
Well you can’t knock Kai for his ability to keep me on my toes.
The night before last he broke all records sleeping the longest stretch of his ENTIRE LIFE!!! A whole six and half hours all in a row. And after he’d woken up, guzzled down his usual few gallons of milk and gone back to sleep he only woke up a further ONCE!!!!!!!
I’m not sure you’ve grasped the significance of this.
He woke up TWICE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And yes, the exclamation marks totally justified. And YES I’m going to shout a lot in this post and DON’T CARE.
Because not only did he only wake up twice, he didn’t want to get up till 7am… AND… spent the whole night in his cot in his OWN ROOM.
Perhaps you’re wondering (like I did) whether someone secretly swapped out my genetically flawed Hyper-No-Sleep 5000 baby with a regular, normal, standard issue one.
But no, it was really Kai.
Do you know how I know?
Because of LAST night. Last night, after jubilantly celebrating all day that ‘This was IT baby!’ and that we’d really turned a corner, phoning all my friends and relatives and stopping random people in the street to grab them by their lapels and look with crazy frenzy into their frightened eyes and squeal “SIX AND A HALF HOURS!!”
Last night when I sauntered off to bed safe in the knowledge that I most likely had at least three hours before being woken up, and probably another three or four hour stretch after that.
Last night when Kai was awake all fricking night.
So no. Doesn’t look like that was IT baby. Looks like that was just a horrible cruel fluke.Quite possibly because Kai nearly knocked himself out on the skirting board that day and I had two rather large glasses of wine. Yep, nothing like a mild concussion and alcohol laced breast milk to guarantee some sleep.
And of course because I’d been treated to night of half-decent sleep the night before, a night of virtually no sleep hit me extra hard. And I was so tired this morning that… well… I’ll tell you how tired I was. EXACTLY how tired.
Because I’m starting a new thing. It’s called ‘This Mama so tired’.
It’s kinda like ‘Yo Mama so fat’ except better. And less horribly offensive. (And yes I know it’s not grammatically correct but it’s hip, innit?)
So here’s mine – then you have to give me yours:
This Mama so tired that… she realised that she’d thrown her dirty underwear in the toilet rather than in the laundry basket
This Mama so tired that… when writing a birthday card for one of Kai’s buddy’s she wrote
To Kai, Happy Birthday Love Kai x
This Mama so tired that… she can’t SEE!
I’m not kidding! I seriously thought I might be going blind. I booked an appointment at the opticians and prepared myself for the worst but turns out my eye sight in test is fine (phew!). Well, no worse than it’s ever been – I still have a slightly lazy eye. Apparently I’m just so exhausted that even the muscles in my eyes are tired! Thus giving me rather screwy vision, especially in bright light. The lovely leather elbow-patch cladded Optician prescribed me a decent pair of sunglasses and some sleep. He even may have used the word ‘dear’ and patted my arm.
THAT’S how tired I am.
So how tired are you Mama?
P.S. I’m know I’m being horrible and excluding Dads here but Yo Pappa doesn’t really sound right does it? Men folk – if you can pull it off or think of a Dad equivalent then by all means do so…
——————————————-
Read MoreThe Sleep Deprivation Carnival 2009!
Hello all!
I’ve got something a bit special planned for you this week – Sleep is for the Weak’s very first Sleep Deprivation Carnival 2009!
Now doesn’t that sound fun? And not at all weird and depressing?!
As most of you know, sleep is an especially big problem in our house. Kai has never slept well, rarely managing more than a couple of hours unbroken sleep at a stretch until recently, and having immense difficulty both falling and staying asleep, with a horrendously out-of-wack body clock that still often thinks that 4.30am is a very good time to wake up and start jumping up and down and screeching like a frickin banshee.
It’s been an especially tough couple of weeks for one reason or another (as you’ve probably noticed from all my “I’m tired!” tweets! – sorry about that, very dull I know) and I thought what better way to put the ‘fun’ back in ‘barely functional’ than to host my very own carnival.
I know I’m not the only one for whom sleep is a difficult issue. Like it or not, sleep deprivation is a real experience for most parents with a new baby and effects everyone to a greater and lesser degree. If you’re lucky, it will only be an issue for perhaps the first few weeks, but for more many of us, severely disrupted or lost sleep can be a major problem for many months (or even…dare I say it…YEARS! *gulp*).
In the middle of those long nights and exhausted, bleary-eyed days, sometimes a sense of humour and the solidarity and support of my fellow parenting peeps (and chocolate and twitter of course) are the only things that gets me through. So I thought it would therapeutic and a bit of fun to invite you all to share your sleep deprivation stories.
You could write about:
- The worst night’s sleep you every had
- Something stupid you did while seriously sleep deprived
- The sleep problems you may be experiencing with your child at the moment (you never know, people may have some tips for you)
- How lack of sleep has effected your day-to-day life
- Your best sleep deprivation survival tips or no-sleep remedies
Or even better
- How you survived sleep deprivation and came out the other side and now have babes that sleep like angels -giving us poor parents still in the thick of things the hope that THIS WILL PASS!!
Write your post (or use an old one) and either post a link in the comments section below or email me using the contact button on your right. Next week I’ll post a review of all your submitted stories for us all to share in.
Feel free to use the badge at the top of this post and link back to me if you like, or just to make it extra easy for you here’s a HTML code that will insert the image directly into your blog with no uploading required (cause I’m nice and super clever like that):
Joining me from Twitter or Facebook and haven’t got a blog? You can still take part! Just write and submit your entry via email and I’ll be sure to include them in the round up next week.
As an extra bit of fun I am also inviting you all to submit photos of yourselves looking seriously sleep deprived.
Here’s one of my very brave friend Mark to start us off who is busy looking after his very elderly grandpa (which I think counts as parenting in any one’s book)…
Again, email me your pics and I’ll display them in a rogue’s gallery next week. My lovely husband Ant and fellow sleep-deprivation partner will pick his favourite who will then be awarded a random sleep-themed not at all crap fabulous prize. And just to prove to you that Ant has suffered with the best of them, here’s one of him to add to the mix…
Enjoy and good luck! The deadline for submissions is midnight next Sunday 27th September so don’t miss out!
P.S. If you fancy giving this venture a plug via the share buttons below that would be just FAB and I will love you forever.
—————————
Read MoreIntroducing: The Baby Show 2060
It was a rather long night last night. Not quite a talking bread people kinda night but not far off.
And as I lay, trying to block out the whining and sniffing of the giant baby draped across my chest feeling very sorry for himself, having given up trying to put him back in the completely useless cot for the millionth time, I ended up thinking back to that post about baby gadgets and all the crap cluttering up our attic.
And I wondered… what gadgets do you reckon Kai’s children’s children will be ordering from their Mothercare catalogues in preparation for their first borns?
Side note: I’ll still be alive obviously and irritating the hell out of all my children by refusing to die. Holed up in some cottage somewhere surrounded by cats and writing steamy vampire erotic literature (because that’s all that will sell in the future).
Anyway…
Future baby gadgets. Here are my top 5 Baby Show 2060 contenders:
1. The ‘Operation’ Style Baby Monitor
You know that game right? Operation? With the man with the flashing nose and the elastic band in his leg that always got lost? Well since we already have camera monitors and movement monitors I reckon it’s only a matter of time before all homes mount an electronic representation of their baby on the wall that will alert them to said baby’s every need and complaint. Hungry? The tummy will flash. Cold? Skin will light up blue. Colic? Wailing siren and emergency lock-down procedure will initiate, sealing all doors and windows with cry-proof barriers to protect the neighbours (and stop us running screaming into the street) and deploying medicinal gin (for the parents, natch).
2. The Zero-Gravity Baby-Gro
Thus causing contained baby to become weightless enabling more comfortable all-night pacing. (Did I mention that Kai has just been weighed in at a whopping 26 and a half lb?!)
3. The Simpsons/Family Guy branded Baby Translator
As featured on the Simpsons to turn all those baby gurgles and gibberish Ikean talk into real worlds, but with translations spoken by the voice of baby Stewie from Family Guy (Don’t worry about the cross-show legal copyright complications – Family Guy will have bought out Simpsons by then, being as it is the far superior show). No longer would we have to guess what that gobbledegook nonsense accompanied by frantic gesturing meant when our Stewie-Speaker would reveal the truth: “Hello, mother. I come bearing a gift. I’ll give you a hint. It’s in my diaper and it’s not a toaster.”
4. The Baby Stasis Machine
In which our adorable little bundles of joy (who we love) could be cryogenically frozen (quite safely) for short periods (say a day or two – week at most) while we read a book / catch up on the housework/ go on holiday.
5. The Selective Hearing Ear Plugs
Fitted in a mother’s ears they would filter out all sounds that are not absolutely essential. For example , “Mummy I put the cat in the washing machine” you would hear. Unimportant whining, the sound of CBeebies (Reloaded), endless noisy battery operated toys, your husband talking about football would all be blocked. Silence is set as the default but you can also programme your ear plugs to instead play relaxing music, stress-relieving affirmations, or talking books read by Antonio Banderas.
So there’s mine. What parenting inventions would YOU like to see on the market in another 50 years?
NOTE: All the above ideas will be listed at the patent office shortly so no copying people. I need a future income to feed my cat hoarding, reclusive, vampire literature writing lifestyle after all.
————————————
Read MoreGo-Go-Gadget Mother
I was recently asked by someone representing a big name toy and baby supplies company (yes I am totally bragging!! My first PR contact!) if I would like to contribute to a booklet for new parents on the essential items all parents need in preparation for the birth of their first baby.
And this got me thinking (and of course going yes! yes! yes! where do I sign!)
What DO you need when you’re having a baby?
And my answer came as something of a surprise.
Not much. In fact I struggled to think of many ‘must haves’ at all.
Now don’t get me wrong. I like stuff as much as the next person. But if you’d asked me that question before Kai was born I’d have been able to list off REAMS of items that I was sure were an absolute necessity to raising a healthy child and, most importantly, being a good mother. In fact, I was rather obsessed with having the right stuff.
I spent a long time before getting pregnant fantasising about having a baby. I’d imagine what it would be like to have a enormous bump, spending entire mornings with pillows stuffed up my jumper, admiring myself in the mirror and going ‘Oooh’ when I bent over (and eating lots of chocolate – oh wait, I did that anyway). Of course, in hindsight, I would have had a more realistic experience had I strapped a wriggling 8lb puppy to my tummy that liked to use my ribs as a kick board and head-butt my bladder, and stuffed a water balloon down my kegs that would leak slowly and at embarrassing moments, like when I laughed and sneezed. Oh and then just to REALLY get in the right frame of mind I would have to eat enough cheese to give me raging heartburn and come down off some hard drugs to give me that whole crazed mood-swing psychotic edge. I was a delight when I was pregnant I can tell you.
Anyway. When I did get pregnant I was beyond excited. This was it! Everything I had ever dreamed of! But what I hadn’t realised was that inbetween the getting pregnant bit (which was fun!) and the having your baby bit (not so fun!) there are 40 long weeks. 40 weeks!! That’s a long time. Once I had done with the puking stage (which lasted a good half of it) when I was too busy doing anything apart from trying to sit upright without hurling, I began to get a bit bored. Well, not bored so much. Antsy. I was fed up sitting around on my rapidly expanding ass. I wanted action.
So in typical Josie fashion I bought a file and some index dividers and some pretty paper. And then proceeded to read every baby magazine/book/online guide I could get my chicken-greased fingers on (the chicken is a GREAT pregnancy story – I’ll save that one for another day). And I made notes, and cut out pictures.
I planned god damn it. I planned my giant ass off.
Because I was determined to be a good mother. And reading all these magazines I quickly learned that good parenting = getting the right baby equipment. Obviously! Because bringing a baby into the world without a ready prepared co-ordinating nursery, room thermometer and ergonomic bath support? Well, that’s nothing short of neglect.
And then, after 40 long weeks and one day, Kai arrived. Beautiful, demanding, wide-awake Kai. Who from day one had very fixed views of the world and what he wanted from it. And that was a world in which fancy gadgets had very little place.
Here are the things that were especially useless:
1. The beautifully co-ordinated nursery – he still hasn’t slept in it for any length of time. It is currently surving a far more useful purpose as a place where we shove a lot of crap storage room and place to keep the ever increasing mountain of laundry.
2. The changing bag (that matched the pushchair of course!) – it survived 9 months before being ripped apart by Kai and having various baby-led weaning food-stuffs leak all over it whilst in transit. It was also far too small once I started needing to transport said foodstuffs and toys and sippy cups and spare clothes and sun cream and my bottle of gin (joking) and everything else. My advice? Go to TK Max and get a big, cheap messenger bag or a rucksack and throw everything in there. You’ll cry less when it gets wrecked.
3. The baby swing. Bought in desperation for our power-screaming colicy baby. It was very expensive. It had four speeds AND music. Of course he just screamed all the louder when you put him in it. Only, to music with a kind of rhythmic WAAaah WAAaah. It was quickly retired to the attic.
4. The bath support. We used it, oooh, three times? Then realised it was far less fiddly to just dunk him in there.
5. The Bumbo – Kai HATED it. And at four months old worked out how to catapult himself out over the back. Attic!
6. The very firm and unmouldable (and expensive) breastfeeding support pillow. Probably self-explanatory. When I lay Kai on it it put his mouth about four inches higher than my nipples. So when my back gave in I just used a pillow. A normal household multi-functional pillow. There’s a novel idea for you. Get this – it even comes with removable covers! That don’t cost extra!
And MOST importantly:
7. The baby books. None of them were written about Kai or seemed to bare any relation to the knowing, determined child I gave birth to. And worse, not only were they useless, they made ME feel useless. Life got a lot better once I relegated them to a high shelf and the charity shop.
So the lesson from this tale? Your baby really needs nothing but you. Your arms, your patience, your love. And most of all your permission to be as unique and unpredictible as they like. Yes it’s a soppy ending but it’s true, and a lesson I have learnt every day many times over.
NOT us... but you get the point.
Next time we’re just getting a new baby sling and that’s it. Oh and a vibrating baby bouncer (that one WAS a life saver), and we’ll re-use the co-sleeper crib but OF COURSE we’ll need a new mattress. And I want an electric breast pump next time.
Actually pass me that Mothercare catalogue? Oh and them post it notes, thanks.
—————
So over to you (cause I’m loving the comment love) - what was the most useless item that you purchased or were given for your first baby?
—————
Read More
