These days

  These autumn days are wild and windswept.

One moment they are humid and heavy, ripe with old summer gone to seed. Sun-hats and sunscreen and sweaty sheets, kicked off in the night. The next, the air turns cold and these days tumble into thoughts of green apples and roast vegetables. Hot chocolate under blankets, pink rain-boots, and waiting for the leaves to fall.

These days are 10 chubby fingers and 10 chubby toes, waving in the air. New words learned every day; brothers and sisters holding hands; and twirling: joyful, exuberant twirling.

Long hours these days are passed with kisses and big, beautiful smiles. Raspberries blown into fat-creases on perfect little thighs.

Small fingers softly exploring my face.

They are fevers and 'flus; mountains of tissues; long cuddles through sad nights.

These days are taking those first, glorious steps outside into the autumn air, when everyone is finally starting to feel better and the four walls of our house have drawn uncomfortably close: freedom at last. Cafes and coffees, exploring old streets and new, a row of rainbow-hued watering-cans.

All too much excitement for some.

In the kitchen

Mummy-blogger creates amazing recipe for cake that she cooks with angelic children in pristine kitchen. Cake tastes like extra-rich mud cake but is actually made from organic beetroot, powdered kale and sun-dried goji berries. No sugar or gluten in sight. Mummy-blogger and aforementioned angelic children cover cake in silky-smooth icing, then use tweezers to artfully place edible flowers all over, creating culinary masterpiece. Only, not in my house. I won't be winning any Mother of the Year awards for healthy toddler foods (or clean kitchens), but Madeleine, Harry and I have been having a ball flexing our baking muscles of late.

Madeleine is going through an "I can do it myself" phase, which is frequently excruciating to watch but also so sweet, seeing her confidence and independence burgeon. Also, Harry is a most appreciative sous-chef, grinning and gurgling and kicking his little feet with gusto from his front-row seat on the kitchen floor.

Lately Mr B has been working a lot of nights, meaning Madeleine is in bed before he gets home. She is really missing him. Everything right now is about Daddy. I convince her to eat her vegetables each night by shaping them into a face on her plate and calling it "Daddy." I talk her into wearing pants on a cold day (when she would much rather wear a tutu) by telling her, "These are Daddy's favourite pants."

When we baked chocolate cupcakes last week, they were "for Daddy." When I told her in the morning how Daddy had gobbled his cupcake up when he got home, and that he said it was delicious, she radiated pride. "YEAH!" she yelled, balling her chubby little fingers into fists and punching the air.

Then yesterday, we made sugar biscuits "for Daddy." She was so excited, and determined to do it all herself. Madeleine mixed the dough, rolled it, pressed out the shapes, made the icing, chose the colour, decorated the biscuits. Harry was helpful, too. He laughed and said "Hoo" a lot.

I texted Mr B a picture of Madeleine decorating the biscuits and told him she was making them for him.

Then at around 6.30 that night, just as she was finishing her dinner and finally about to have one of her biscuits for dessert, Daddy walked through the door. He'd seen my text and thought, "That's it." He packed up a whole lot of work to do from home at night, and hurried back here to surprise her before she got into bed.

I pulled out our best floral china, and Madeleine and Daddy had a tea party with the biscuits she had made all by herself.

I won the lottery

Harry has been crying. "What's up little man?" I ask, bending over his cot, and tears instantly transform into an enormous, gummy, open-mouthed smile. "Hoo!" he laughs, "Ahoo!" and I turn my head aside so he can't see me smiling, because it is night-time and all the books say not to engage babies in play during the night, so that they can learn when to sleep.

A frantic scuffling is heard and I turn back around to see Harry now grinning fit to burst, head wiggling from side to side and both legs kicking around like socks in a washing machine. Cotton blankets and muslin wraps are flailing everywhere.

"Now look here, it's 4am," I tell him, though I can't help smiling too. "Ahoo!" Harry responds, never taking his eyes off mine. It is a laugh exactly like his sister's at the same age. I ditch the books and pick him up and cover his dimples with kisses. There is nothing, nothing in this world, like the smell of a baby. They should find a way to bottle it and distribute it and there would be no more war.

"Oh my god," breathes Mr B drowsily from beside me in the bed. We look from Harry to each other and back again, both overcome with wonder. Neither of us can quite believe that we made this chubby, cheeky, loving little boy. It just doesn't seem real that he is ours. That of all the parents in all the world, we and only we get to be his Mummy and Daddy. That the universe has trusted us with the task of loving Harry and protecting Harry and teaching Harry for the rest of our lives.

:  :  :

I am making Madeleine's lunch when she interrupts me and asks to be picked up, little hands reaching, beseeching. I take her into my arms and she rests her head on my shoulder, the way she has done since she was one week old. Then she tilts back until she can look me in the eye. Places a sticky hand on either side of my face and pulls me in for a big, hard, sloppy, on-the-mouth kiss. Then another, and another. Madeleine is kissing me almost fiercely, gripping my ears to make sure I don't get away. As if I would ever want to.

I can't. I can't even. There are no words. What did I do in this life or 100 others that was so good as to earn this reward? To be loved by Madeleine? To be her Mummy? How is that even possible?

:  :  :

Harry is crying again. This time the sun is up and he is wiggling in his rocker in the playroom. He is hungry. But before I get a chance to pick him up and feed him, Madeleine takes control. "Harry!" she cries with glee. She wobbles over and rests her head beside his in the rocker. He stops crying. She stands up and faces him and when their eyes meet, both of them smile at each other. I feel a blast of pure happiness that is almost painful. "Harry! Harry!" Madeleine cries again, and then she twirls and tap-dances around his rocker and around the room, to entertain him. His eyes never leave her.

:  :  :

The house is steeped in rare quiet. Both of my children are asleep upstairs, and so is Mr B. I am alone in the lounge room, reading, and it is surreal and precious and quite beautiful because I am almost never, ever alone these days.

There is a baby monitor in Madeleine's room and it is not emitting a peep. There is another monitor in our room, where Harry sleeps in his cot beside our bed. Through it, I can hear two soft snores in tandem: both Harry and Mr B are dreaming.

A lump forms in my throat and I am so filled with love for these three that it takes me quite by surprise.

I think of all the little things I've been complaining about and dwelling on lately. The kids have both been sick. Mr B has been working a lot of nights, leaving me to handle the dreaded bed-and-bath hour alone. Money is tight, until I can get back to a bit more work. I am tired all the time. Bone tired. An aching, dragging, brain-fog weariness that never lifts. I am approximately three hundred and eighty-four years old. And I look it, too. My body feels like I am pushing through mud just to walk from room to room. I forget almost everything, and confuse the things I do remember. I'm snippy and impatient with Mr B, though he doesn't deserve it.

But on this night, all I can think of is how insanely lucky I am. How those three sleeping upstairs are my FAMILY. I can't quite comprehend how that came to be. This much love. I didn't even think this much love existed.

Absent-mindedly I rub my aching feet, curled under me on the couch. This perfect family, it's like I'm looking in at someone else's life. The realisation that this is MY life and MY family doesn't come easy. I don't feel deserving. Surely someone else would do all this much better than me? I feel like I won the lottery.

Frozen, melted

Here is how we avoided the heat on the weekend. While Harry and Mr B had nanna-naps together in the bedroom under the air conditioner, Madeleine and I headed out on a mama-daughter date to see Frozen at the movies. This was Madeleine's first movie. She is not even 20 months old and I wasn't sure how well she would cope, so I chose seats next to the aisle just in case. But from the opening credits she was mesmerised. Beautiful snowflakes, twinkling over the oh-so-familiar (to me) Disney palace, had her breathing "Wowww." She laughed, she held her breath, she cried "Weeeeee!" as the characters slid down mountains of snow and ice and sailed through the air. When Princess Anna puckered up to receive a kiss from Prince Hans Madeleine made loud kissing noises herself, to hurry them along.

We didn't need our two seats. Madeleine spent the entire movie on my lap, and it was a perfect cuddle. While never taking her eyes off the screen, she would reach back from time to time to stroke my face or hair, or find my hand in the dark and hold it. When the scary snow-monster began roaring, she turned her body around to face me so I could cuddle her tightly, but the draw of the movie was too much. Little hands wrapped tightly around my neck, she insisted on twisting her head back around to continue watching.

As we walked out of the theatre, hand in hand, I asked Madeleine if she had enjoyed the movie. "More?" she asked. "More? More? More?"

It is simple, silly things like this that make my heart swell and make me so happy to be a mother. I absolutely loved my afternoon with my daughter, introducing her to something that for most of us is so ordinary - a movie - yet to her was nothing short of pure magic. I felt a crazy sort of pride walking out of that theatre with Madeleine, a kind of "I'm with her" Entourage moment that had no grounding in logic and was all heart.

When we arrived home, Harry and Mr B were still asleep. We sneaked upstairs and Madeleine jumped on her father and covered him with kisses to wake him up. I picked up Harry, who had woken with a jolt from all the noise, and he gave me his sweet, soft, old-soul grin that never fails to put a lump in my throat. He smelled amazing. I kissed him and kissed him. I could kiss those chubby cheeks forever.

(Oh and the best part? Nobody had told Madeleine about popcorn or choc-tops, so she was content to sit through an entire movie munching on an apple.)

Mother

I came across this post by Alyssa of Kitch Bitsch last week and thought it was just lovely. Following a survey of 40,000 people from 102 non-English speaking countries, "mother" was voted the most beautiful word in the English language*. Isn't that wonderful? Here is a taste of what Alyssa had to say about "mother": The first word we speak. The first person to comfort us. Mother is love. Mother is home.

If mother has intrinsic beauty then why don’t I feel beautiful? I am mother to a son and two daughters. To them I am beautiful; they see what I can’t see. To them I am tickles and cupcakes and morning cuddles, my squishy belly a pillow. My daughters brush my hair and choose a vintage dress for me to wear each morning. They aspire to be like their mother.

It is not hard to see their beauty. They giggle and dance and sing. I stare at their cherubic faces as they lay sleeping. I kiss their velvety skin and breathe them deep into my lungs. They marvel at what their bodies can do, how their legs can run and jump.

They remind me of a time when legs were just legs. Before they were dimpled legs or hairy legs or jiggly legs. Before the lens of judgement. Before the term post baby body was even invented.

::          ::          ::

Every night while I feed Harry, he glances up at me and smiles. I rest him on my knees and he smiles some more. He follows me with his eyes as I move about the room, grinning when I am near and crying when I move out of sight. I calm his sobs by softly stroking his cheek with my finger. I kiss his feet to make him laugh. When I snuggle him to my chest he falls beautifully, adorably asleep, arms akimbo and mouth wide open in a totally trusting snore.

Does Harry think I am beautiful? Without a doubt he does.

When I wear a dress Madeleine wants to wear a dress. When she runs barefoot she wants me to do the same. Madeleine won't wear those cute little hair-clips you can buy for little girls, but she will insist on having bobby-pins in her hair, if I am wearing them too. We brush our hair at the same time, brush our teeth at the same time, and when I put on make-up Madeleine wants some too, so I pretend to make her over. If I make myself a cup of tea, Madeleine runs to get her tea-set and pours me a second cup from her little floral teapot.

Does Madeleine think I am beautiful? Absolutely. And she wants to be just like me.

But if this is the case, why am I so hard on myself? Why do I narrow my eyes and frown at the post-baby-squish I see in the mirror when I take a shower? Or the lines I see around my eyes when I lean in close? Looking down at my hands as I type these words, my skin appears tired and old from constant washing and cleaning and scrubbing and pushing-prams-in-the-sun(ing). And to be honest, "tired and old" is how I feel all over. My hair these days is best described as "bleh." Most of my clothes have holes in them, and spit-up all over them, and they were never stylish to begin with.

Why do these things bother me so much? Madeleine and Harry don't simply not-care about these things, they don't even know that they exist! To Madeleine and Harry I am beautiful, and I am beautiful because of one irrefutable word: mother.

I loved that Alyssa reminded me of this. You can read her whole post here. If you love your mother or if you are a mother (or both), it will warm your heart.

* Other popular words were "passion," "smile" and "eternity," as well as "lollipop," "hiccup" and "banana"

Stuff and nonsense

↑↑ Evidence #657 that we live in a small world: Madeleine went to daycare dressed in this ridiculously cute hotdog-pretzel t-shirt the other day, a gift from one of my best friends in the world. As we were entering, one of the dads also doing the drop-off admired her shirt and said "that's my favourite city," and of course I said "me too." We got talking and it turned out we'd lived in New York at the same time and were practically neighbours (he was in the Lower East Side and I was in SoHo), and he used to manage one of my favourite restaurants, where my friends and I would go all the time. And here we were, half a world and an ENTIRE different lifestyle away, dropping our little girls off to play. ↑↑ I took this photograph on the way back from a coffee run because I saw the leaves on this little tree and thought "WHAAAT? IS IT AUTUMN ALREADY?" And then I realised the leaves weren't turning brown for the season, they had actually burned up during the recent heatwave. Poor tree.

I have been indulging in a little bit of we-can't-catch-a-break feeling sorry for myself dumps lately. On Friday night I had sudden and extreme pains in the chest and stomach, and thought I had some kind of food poisoning. After a sleepless and very painful night I went to the hospital first thing the next morning, and had emergency surgery the same day. Seemed I had an inflamed gall bladder which was also causing problems for my liver, so they whipped the gall bladder out and "oh by the way I stitched up a small hernia behind your belly button on the way out." Thank you, two pregnancies in quick succession, which apparently caused all of the above (not the heatwave). Now I've been told "don't walk, don't drive, don't lift anything," instructions that are almost IMPOSSIBLE to follow when you have kids (which explains the hernia - I had no choice but to ignore the "don't lift after giving birth" instructions in order to care for Madeleine). Last night I was a bit teary. Madeleine cried for ages after going to bed because I had to have the babysitter lift her in there but she wanted her mummy. Then Harry cried and cried because he had wind but I couldn't hold him the way he needed to be held due to the wounds in my chest and belly. Of course Madeleine did eventually get to sleep, and Mr B cuddled Harry until he fell asleep, but I just felt useless as a mother and like I'd let them down by being sick. Again. I think my body has had enough. I have been pregnant and/or breastfeeding (with a little thing called "giving birth" in between) constantly since 2011. During my pregnancy with Harry, I was sick for nearly the whole time. Nothing serious, mostly viruses carried from daycare to Madeleine to me, but it wasn't fun. I'm a bit over it. And now we have the medical bills to pay on top of all our other bills (thank you, multiple unanticipated problems during home renovation), right when I'm working my lowest hours ever.

BUT... I live in a beautiful house in an amazing city - the first time I've felt "at home" since leaving New York - I have an incredibly hard-working, loving and supportive husband who is also very good for a laugh, and the two most adorable children I could ever wish for. So when I'm not feeling sorry for myself, I feel incredibly thankful. It's all worth it. It really is.

↑↑ This guy and his funny faces! Last week I wrote what I guess you'd call a sponsored post (in that I was given a gift voucher to go shopping and wrote a bit about what I bought). I so rarely do these kinds of posts because they sit uncomfortably with me, and I wonder how you feel about them - I don't want you to feel like I'm trying to sell to you or use you! A while ago I made up my mind to only accept gifts etc with posts if I would a) actually happily spend the money myself anyway, and b) think what I'm writing about might interest or benefit you (or both). And I've followed that rule in every one of the (very few) sponsored posts I've ever written. Last week after I wrote about my little boy and his beautiful Very Hungry Caterpillar stash, Mr B read the post and said it was "delightfully snobbish." It got me thinking. Because I hadn't intended to be snobbish at all, delightfully so or otherwise. I thought I was being truthful. And I wondered if I was being too apologetic in the post because I was worrying too much about your reaction. I don't know. What do you think? Am I being unfair on the sponsor? On you? On myself?

(And here I am, worrying about your reaction again. But you matter to me! I can't tell you how amazed I constantly am that you take the time to read this blog, and how much that means to me.)

I'll leave you with this little video because it is pure joy. If you ever get chocolate gelato all over your face and front on a 42 degree day, this is how you should clean it off.

My very hungry caterpillar

Summer afternoons with this little caterpillar are spent lying on the floor, face to face, smiling at each other. They are spent wandering around the back courtyard, looking at the plants and bees that cling to life in the edges and cracks alongside the tiles (we are yet to build a real garden). Summer afternoons are hiccups and spit-ups and tight little fists. Fat-folds and curly toes and dimples in the elbows. A big sister, one shoe gone, racing like a whirlwind around our little baby-mat of calm. Summer afternoons... and mornings, evenings and nights... are the slow minutes ticking through the nursing, just me and Harry and the sound of him greedily sucking. My hungry little caterpillar LOVES to nurse. All. The. Time. But that's ok with me. Those adorable, kissable fat-folds and dimples don't come cheap: they are hard won, out of pain and exhaustion and love, and they are my prize. You could say, if you wanted to, that all those long hours of feeding my hungry little caterpillar are turning him into a beautiful (chubby) little butterfly.

Wait for it...

In case you're wondering, Harry's Very Hungry Caterpillar tummy-time mat in these photographs came from Target, part of an Eric Carle range that makes me want to buy All The Things. Harry has this lovely caterpillar jersey wrap, too, and I confess I also have my eyes on this play-mat, a box of socks, and the world's sweetest caterpillar-in-a-box toy. We are not merchandising-averse in this house (just ask Madeleine and her Peppa Pig collection).

Target was never somewhere I thought of shopping before having a family. But while I still love to buy local, hand-made and unique things for my children, finances and our specific needs don't always make that practical or affordable. Target has become my go-to place for a broad range of cute, hard-wearing clothes and nursery and kitchen items that I use for Madeleine and Harry every day.

So when Target Australia approached me to work with them on this post to help promote their upcoming Everything for Baby Sale, I jumped at the opportunity. They gave me a voucher to go shopping for Harry, and I put my Sensible Hat on, purchasing this video monitor so that we could keep both ears and eyes on our precious littles when they were sleeping upstairs and out of earshot (because it's not at all creepy to watch your children sleep. Erm). But then I saw the Very Hungry Caterpillar range and Sensible made way for Spontaneous. So anyhow...

Here are some more of my favourites from Target's baby range:

* Such a stylish, modernist crib (and the matching change table). Love! * Gorgeous knitted blanket in triangles * If I had another baby girl I would dress her in this and about 100 other rompers from the Catriona Rowntree collection * Adorable knitted rattle * This sweet little fox reversible quilt / play-mat

The Everything for Baby Sale starts on 30 January, and there are some big savings so if you need to stock up for little ones in your life OR find gifts for friends with babies, now is the time!

Cabin fever

(Alt. title: Five Toddler-Friendly Activities for Surviving a Heatwave) Because taking about the weather is where it's at, right? It was hot in Melbourne last week. Really, really hot. Like, 40+ every day (except Monday, which was a measly 34 degrees. Pshaw, I laugh in the face of 34 degrees).

We are lucky that our new house has AC in some rooms, so we shut the doors and pulled the curtains and stayed indoors for the week. And, hey, we didn't die of heat exhaustion, but after a few days locked in a house with a not-really-one-to-stay-home grown-up, a toddler, and a newborn, the cabin fever very nearly finished us off. At one point, Madeleine was reduced to amusing herself and letting out energy by running up and down the house at top speed (which admittedly isn't that fast), yelling. She'd start at the front door, calling out "AAAAAAAAAAAAH!" punctuated by the thump-thump-thump of her chubby little legs, until she reached the back door. "More?" she'd eagerly question me for permission, and then when I said OK she'd race off again to the front door: "AAAAAAAAAAAAH!" At that point I realised I'd better get creative with the indoor activities.

So, shamelessly ripping off the idea from this post on the lovely blog Rockstar Diaries, here are five things we did indoors to make it through the heatwave with our sanity intact.

Day 1. Baking banana muffins

The bananas in our fruit bowl were no match for 40+ degrees, and became overripe overnight. I'm not normally a banana bread or banana muffins kind of person, but needs must. I adapted a banana bread recipe from Stephanie Alexander's Kitchen Garden Companion, and Madeleine and I got down to business while Emily cuddled Harry for us. It must be a super-forgiving recipe because what with the distractions of cooking with an 18-month-old, I made all kinds of mistakes, like forgetting to add key ingredients until much later, not softening the butter, and getting my measurements wrong. Admittedly the muffins didn't rise the way you'd normally want muffins to rise so they weren't all that pretty, but they were absolutely delicious: super moist, very bananary (you are allowed to make up words during heatwaves), and not too sweet. Let me know if you want the recipe and I'll be happy to send it to you.

Day 2. Busting out the new toys

Madeleine got so many toys for Christmas that I kept some of them hidden for "rotation purposes" to make room in our playroom and keep her entertained. As we started to run out of distractions, I busted out some of those new toys. A simple but effective winner was an alphabet of magnets given to her by her little friend Alice.

Day 3. Finger painting

This activity was a BIG winner for about half an hour, until Harry decided (in no uncertain terms) that it was time for a breast-feed. But that would have left me unable to actively supervise Madeleine. The thought of my little girl, covered in paint from head to toe, choosing to leave her little table and roaming the house with paint-covered finger-tips at the ready, was more than I wanted to imagine. So we had to abort this activity earlier than she would have liked, and let's just say peace did not reign in our house that morning.

Day 4. Pretending to be pets

One of Madeleine's favourite indoor games is to chase the dog, get the dog to chase her, and mimic the dog's behaviour. She pants, she sits, she rolls over, she begs. It's not classy, I know, and I probably won't be winning any World's Best Mother awards for letting her do this. But it makes my daughter SO HAPPY to play Being a Dog. She loves that puppy so, so much.

Day 5. Bed-sheet forts

Madeleine REALLY LOVED this fort. We played a lot of hide-and-seek, we had a tea party with Peppa Pig and Baby Suzy, we tickled baby Harry, chased the dog in and out, and lay on cushions just kissing and cuddling each other. I painted a sign that said "Fort Madeleine" for the front and was quite proud of my efforts, but Madeleine absolutely hated it, crying "No! No!" until I took it down and put it away.

Then the cool change came through on Saturday and we all took a grateful walk to the zoo. How do you guys cope when you're trapped indoors?

ps. Gratuitous cute baby Harry shot. Oh, those dimples! Those fat-folds!

Snippets

Yesterday morning while I was feeding Harry, Madeleine walked up to me with a smile. She took my face in both her hands and gently kissed me on the lips, twice. Then she crouched down and rested her cheek on the still-nursing Harry. That was a pretty perfect moment.

Here are some other snippets from our lives lately.

~ Blooming beauties in the conservatory in Fitzroy Gardens.

~ Lazy picnic on a summer's afternoon.

~ Captain Cook's house.

~ Little smiles.

~ A girl and her dog.

Out of print baby

My gorgeous friend Sonya sent Harry this onesie in the mail last week. It makes me so happy. I can't wait until he's big enough and chubby enough to wear it! The folks at Out of Print Clothing say they "scour library stacks and dusty bookstores" to find the "classics and curiosities" that end up on their clothing. And they have a conscience, too: every purchase makes possible a donation of one book to a community in need, via their charity partner Books for Africa.

What book would you most like to see on a T-shirt?

I'd wear this edition of I Capture the Castle with pride. And of course we need to find Madeleine something with this. And then, well I just can't help myself...