Here’s an update of Liam’s development, as he hurtles towards being 3 years old!

Behaviour and Environment

During the school terms, his older brothers go to school, and Liam gets to hang out with me all day. We have our little routines. We have our weekly grocery runs, coffee dates, play dates, gym classes, story time sessions, outings and activities. We have snacks, lunches at home or while we’re out. It’s just him and me.

He’s really pleasant, easy, fun to be with, ok sometimes he’s demanding, but I know his quirks and I know how to work around him… so basically we have a happy little groove between us.

But during the recent 7 week summer holidays, he has had to play and compete with his older brothers – all day, every day.

As a result, my summary of him seems a little harsh, yet it’s all part of his life experience, and what makes him who he is.

Liam has been naughty, difficult, noisy and his behaviour has been awful. It’s such a hard thing to deal with, because I can see what’s driving him. I can see he just wants some attention.

He’s frustrated because his two big brothers will spend hours building intricate lego structures or playing an elaborate board game, and he wants to play too. Instead… he smashes everything onto the floor and steals the important pieces of the game, just so that they will play with him.

Or they will be lazing in bed reading a book or working on a puzzle, and he will come along and rip posters of their walls and tip their shelves over, just so that they will play with him.

It always ends in meltdowns, tears and fights. From everyone! Including me!

So in a way, he’s not really being naughty. He’s just trying to communicate his needs… and well, it’s been a tough couple of months trying to keep everything balanced.

Because, he’s not the only child who needs some attention. There are two others. Not to mention there are two adults in the family who needs some loving. So yes. Balance is the key.

We take things as a week-by-week balancing act. One day I might spend a couple of hours with my oldest boy. While my husband will hang out with the younger two. And the next day my husband will take the middle boy, and I’ll have the other two. And then during the next session I’ll have the youngest one and so one.

This keeps everything quite peaceful.

And it’s worked so well because my husband was on leave for a little bit over the Christmas and new year period.

When it’s just me looking after the kids, most days, they will all play happily for a couple of hours. But after that, they get bored and will need some direction. I either have to do an activity that makes all 3 kids happy. Or I have to send one kid into another room to work on something (nothing too special or the other 2 will get jealous) while I do something with the other 2 kids.

Or I just take them to the beach. And everyone is happy. Including me.

“Education”

Liam can identify lots of letters, numbers from 0-12, colours, shapes and symbols. Drawing and writing is an activity he just loves. And I believe he finds a lot of comfort in it. I take a little scribble pad and pencils wherever we go, and he enjoys looking at my past drawings and reading out the letters and numbers.

He has shown keen interest to write letters, so I have been teaching him to write his name. And while I’m at it, I’m trying to teach him to read simple words – not because I’m trying to get him ahead academically – because he just really enjoys it!

Speech

He speech is pretty impressive! He is a real chatterbox and he can talk and talk and talk, if you let him. It can be a bit exhausting, to have someone be in your face and talk at you all day. But I’m not complaining, I try to see it as his little gift.

I get him to re-tell stories of our day, just to help him gather and organise his thoughts, because they can get a bit jumbled and random most times! Kinda cute, but it’s hard to listen to hours of random, mangled sentences.

Gross Motor Skills

Liam is pretty active and coordinated. He can go for long walks, ride a 2 wheel scooter, sit on a big-kid swing, climb up a climbing frame. He can’t ride a bike yet (hasn’t worked out the peddling action).

I’d say that he’s not very daring or adventurous, in a physical sense.

He’s confident to splash around in shallow water, but he’s not brave enough to put his head underwater.

Fine Motor Skills

Really excellent here. The kid plays with big-kid lego, he can use a scissors, do a 48 piece puzzle, peel stickers, glue things, and other fine detail activities.

Sleep

He sleeps at 7:30pm, wakes up 6:00am. As long as he has one 1 hour nap in the day time, he’s fine. And he’s not fussy about when he has the nap.

Imagination Play

Every day Liam can spend 30 minutes to 1 hour playing by himself, with cars, drawing, water play, lego, blocks, or puzzles.

I’d say the biggest activity he is missing out on, is imagination play. I went to a friend’s house recently, who had a cubby house for her daughter. The little house was decorated like a real house, with a kitchen set, photo frames on the wall, tables and chairs… Liam was transfixed. He played inside for aaaaages and didn’t want to leave.

I can see how he would get a lot out of more age appropriate toys!

Social Skills and Friends

He doesn’t have many proper friends at the moment, as he’s a bit young. He prefers to hang around older children, because that’s what he’s used to at home. And he loves the company of adults.

When he is around other kids his age, he is very confident and he stands his own ground. He can be a bit bossy and loud when trying to get his point across, which scares the other kids who are a bit timid.

Separation

Since Christmas, Liam has been very clingy towards me whenever someone comes to babysit. He cries, wails, flings himself on the floor, and shouts things like “Mummy don’t go away!!!!”. He’s been cool with it for years and it just came up suddenly and we’re not sure why he’s changed in this way. We’re thinking maybe it’s just an age thing?

Eating

Ah. He has been a terrible eater lately! He loves cereal with milk. Apples. Any kind of sweet or salty biscuit. Noodles. Bacon. And he loves to snack on raw carrots. That’s about it.

He utterly hates pasta, curry, rice, stir-fries, casserole, potatoes, bread – sometimes he will reluctantly eat it, if I feed him.

Most days, when we sit down for a proper lunch or dinner meal… he utterly refuses to eat anything I give him. He refuses to feed himself. And he would rather put himself to bed than to eat what I give him.

But if I spoon food into his mouth, he WILL eat it, reluctantly and slowly. And just like that, he trained me to feed him.

Each mouthful is painful, full of fights, toilet breaks, whining, falling off the chair, crying. Some days I have no idea how much he has eaten, I felt so bad, yet he happily goes to sleep at the end of the day. And I tell myself, if he’s hungry, he’ll wake up in the middle of the night and I’ll make him some warm milk and toast. But he never wakes up.

Heh it is kind of my fault too. As I go through the day, out and about, driving from one event to another, I just throw random food at him for morning or afternoon snacks, a small bag of pop corn, an apple, half a bun with melted cheese on it, a jelly snake, rice crackers, a small carrot. And by dinner time he’s not hungry and I wonder why!

So, basically, I haven’t been very disciplined with his eating!

School

Liam will go to a Pre-Kindergarten for 3 year olds in a few months (he has to turn 3 first!). This particular centre came highly recommended, and it is also a 10 minute walk from our house. He was put on a waiting list, and after months of waiting, we finally got a call and was told that Liam had a place. I was sooooo happy. I know he’ll love it!

(He has been asking when he can go to school for several months now. And he desperately wants his own lunch box.)

But of course, I am struck by that familiar bittersweet feeling – I am totally freaked out that my littlest baby is going to a school AND I am dizzily excited that as he grows older, my life (and my relationship with all my children) will grow and evolve.

The other day my toddler took his favourite bunny outside to play, and subsequently used it to rub CHALK DUST OFF THE CONCRETE.

Mr Bunny looked awful. He looked like he was run over by a hideous, dusty rainbow.

My toddler was a little upset.

So I brought Mr Bunny inside and gave him a bath. I couldn’t quite clean all the dust off his fur, so I decided that he needed a good soak.

I actually filled the bowl right to the top and placed a weight on his belly so he was completely submerged.

But it looked really creepy. As in horror-movie creepy. His head underwater. That frozen smile. Those innocent, black beady eyes peering up at me happily, from just beneath the surface of the water.

It made ME A LITTLE UPSET!

So I tipped some water out of the bowl and resolved that Mr Bunny was relaxing and enjoying a lovely spa treatment.

That’s what I told my toddler anyway.

My kids received two ant farms for Christmas.

And on one BORING, hot stinking day, during the summer holidays, both my kids ran up to me and pleaded… PLEEEEEEASE CAN WE SET UP OUR ANT FARMS PLEEEEEEEEEEASE????

I have no idea what I was doing at that time. My toddler was asleep and I was probably doing something that just involved… you know, me. Maybe I was painting my nails. Or browsing through cook books. Or plotting cycling paths through the city on my iphone.

Because when they came up to me with sparkly eyes, smiling faces, big grins and this song and dance about ANTS, I was filled with annoyance, disinterest, guilt, resignation and more guilt and so I thought…

OH OK WHAT THEY HELL.

LET’S CRACK OPEN THE SCIENCE SETS.

OH GOD WHAT WAS I THINKING?

Suffice to say, the kids were REALLY excited. They tore open the boxes and started to throw and bang pieces together in a crazed, non-thinking, hyper-active, testosterone-filled way.

I swear it was like watching monkeys bashing sticks and rocks together. I was all – Dudes, let’s lay all the pieces out carefully and read the instructions.

But they insisted they knew how to fix it and that they didn’t need instructions… after all, they were MALES.

Whatever.

So I stood back and after a few minutes, they were stuck in a tangle of tubes, o-rings, half pods, and pod dividers… and they cried OH MUMMY, PLEEEEEEASE HELP US!!!

Sigh. So I disassembled their disaster… laid everything all out, then carefully went through the instructions, step by step. I could see them writhing in pain. I was going sooooooooooo-ooooooooooooooo slowly.

The boys started to shout advice and grab things and jam them in my face – MAYBE YOU NEED TO USE THIS TUBE AND PUT IT HERE?!? WHY HAVEN’T YOU PUT MY RED PODS TOGETHER?? OH NO I’M MISSING A POD LEG!! I CAN PUT THAT O-RING ON FOR YOU. THAT’S MY POD LEAVE IT ALONE.

I was trying to building TWO ant farms at ONCE. I was trying to direct them to do various parts of the assembly AND I was using my feet to nudge the kids away. I looked like a kung-fu master, using which ever spare hand or elbow to swat away wayward fingers.

In the end, they – quite maturely – agreed that they were slowing me down and they would leave me alone and come back when I had finished both ant farms. So. FINALLY!

Behold!

Who designs these kid’s toys anyway?!?! Sheesh!

Ok I admit. It does look quite cool. But it is annoyingly delicate… and one small knock from a toddler and the whole thing is going to come crashing down. Sigh.

My 6 and 8 year old came rushing back with their eyes bugging out of their heads, with hoots and smiles and praises for their AMAZING MUMMY. Again, they were VERY, VERY excited.

But in assembling the ant farms, it occurred to me that we had to find the ants ourselves.

And of course, there were instructions for collecting ants. You had to soak a cotton ball in sugary water, plant the cotton ball at the bottom of a container, place the container near the ants… so on and so on. You even have to dig INTO the ants nest and harvest ant larvae.

But these instructions did not include any advice about how you can dig into an ant’s nest and not be bitten to death by millions of really, really angry WILD ants.

Freaking great.

The boys found a large nest along our sloping driveway. But it was in the sun. And we were going to be there for a while. So I asked the boys to go back to the house to put on their socks, shoes, and hats… so that I could GET A FEW MINUTES HEAD START TO BEGIN THE TRICKY ANT NEST DIGGING.

They were so excited that they came back 10 seconds later, wearing roller skates(???), and carrying pod tubes, a bowl of sugar, spoons and various dangerous gardening tools. WTF! I just asked them to get socks, shoes, and hats!!

They were insane!!! The mere whiff of adventure brought on this thundering force of single-minded, testosterone fueled stupidity!!!

Can you imagine the scene? On a slopping driveway, with roller skates, they were lifting up bricks with spades… they were climbing behind rose bushes with little containers of sugar and tubes and cotton balls… ants were swarming around them and climbing up their legs… they were frantically smacking the ants away, flinging sugary water in the air, and shrieking from all the bites. ON ROLLERSKATES!!!

And my toddler? He was so excited by his brothers’ excitement that he wanted to be bitten by ants, stuck with rose thorns and fall over on his backside as well!

I just stood there holding my face in my hands laughing and crying at the same time.

They were crazy.

Stupid. Yet Loveable.

Ahh, I love my boys.

My toddler is 2 years and 8 months and he is finally toilet trained for day and night!!

I announced it on Facebook last week and I had a few people ask for the exact details of how it happened, and the whole process, so I thought I’d write it all out here.

We started many months ago, when the weather was warm. For an hour or so each day, we let him run around outside with no nappy on. He did wees everywhere! We would always point it out to him whenever he would do it, and we’d make a big positive fuss about it.

“Hey look what you did! You did a wee! Wow that’s what your wee looks like!”

Soon he was aware of what he was doing. And he started to tell us “I DID A WEE!” – but he’d tell us after the event occurred.

We’d always encourage him to wee in the potty, or sit on the potty to do the wee. It was all relaxed, fun and exciting.

But it went on for months. And many times it seemed totally pointless. He made such a mess everywhere! There were a lot of poo accidents too. Outside and inside the house. Argh.

I started to get grumpy every time he made a mess on the floor. Our “fuss” lost its positive chirp and took on an irritable edge. So soon he stopped telling me about his wees, and I would just “find” puddles on the floor.

And when I’m walking along, and slip over a puddle of wee, I yell something to the effect of “LIIIIIAM YOU’RE SUPPOSED TO BE DOING YOUR WEES IN THE POTTY NOT ON THE BLOODY FLOOR!!!!!!!!“

Which of course, didn’t really add any encouragement to the whole situation.

During that time, it was near the end of the year, I was a very busy with work, Christmas concerts, gift shopping, catching up with friends and general holiday preparations… we were out and about every single day, and I hardly had any time to give him his “wee practice” at home. He was in nappies a lot and his progress totally went backwards.

And of course, it was a cycle, the more mess he made, the more I’d just leave his nappy on, and the worse he’s get at controlling his wees and the more mess he’d make, which made me more stressed, and him more stressed…

Anyway, once the school holidays arrived, I was much more relaxed with our daily routines, the weather was warm, the kids played outside for HOURS… and we had lots and lots of “wee practice time” for Liam.

We offered Liam a little chocolate button every time he got a wee into the potty.

And with all the practice, very quickly he was great at sitting on the potty and doing a wee. We had a potty in the house and out of the house too. The kid got so much chocolate!

He still needed a nappy when we went away from the house and at night too.

A few weeks later, we went on holiday to visit my husband’s parents. It was a bit of a gamble, but we decided to take the potty and continue the potty training.

The car trip was going to be 8 hours, which meant he was going to be in a nappy all day, and we thought this factor would bring him backwards.

But for some reason, possibly the change in environment, a different looking toilet, the hint of Christmas around the corner, Liam decided he was now going to do all his wees and poos in the toilet.

And he has been 100% ever since! Day and night.

He does need help to climb onto the toilet. Which yes, is a little irritating when I have to attend to him 6-8 times a day, but the up side is fantastic!

He also wakes up 1 or 2 times a night, so I have to help him onto the toilet. Or sometimes he doesn’t need to go at all during the night.

…

So there you go.

In the end, I believe toilet training is a combination between the parent’s perseverance, positive training, and the child’s individual nature.

My other 2 children took slightly longer to get the hang of it.

They were both day-time toilet trained by the time they were 3 years old. One was night-time toilet trained by 4 years. But the other was such a deep sleeper, that it took till he was almost 5 years old.

This is very embarrassing.

A few days ago, I discovered that my third child can draw people!

He draws a circle head, two big eyes, two pupils, and two legs sprouting from each head.

Apparently my two older children taught him.

I was like – HOLY SHIT! LIAM CAN DRAW A PERSON!

And the kids were all – Yeah yeah, that was so last week mum.

Sigh.

No wonder it’s a stereotype that the last child tends to “get away with everything”. The parents don’t seem to notice what they do! Haha! Oops.

Did I mention that my 2.5yo loves the colour pink?

Well he does.

I was in IKEA the other day, and look what he found.

A pink table.

And look at the pleading expression in his eyes.

“Please mum can we buy it? I really like it.”

It took me ages to negotiate my way out of it.

And in the end I had to drag him away, kicking and screaming.

Liam is 2 years and 8 months old now… but I have to admit, most times I think of him as a 4 year old.

He is definitely a lot more “grown up” than my other children, when they were this age. And because he is the youngest of 3 kids, it astounds me how much more he has been exposed to.

This kid collects money, he loves watching Batman and Star Wars cartoons, he owns a stack of Ben 10 trading cards, he is obsessed with fart jokes, and he swears under his breath. His eyes sparkle when you talk about computer games, and he will talk back at you – non-stop – about every single wii game that we have on our shelf.

It makes me feel a bit sad sometimes, that maybe he’s missed out on an “idyllic and innocent moment in childhood” where kids entertained themselves with simple things like cardboard boxes.

But I guess that’s the magic of having multiple children – discovering how different they all are, and discovering how you can love them all with the same intensity.

This photo just floors me. Within his features, I can see hints of him as a young man. You can stare at his eyes and get lost forever – did I really create him? Is he really made from half of me?

Liam is timid and mild-mannered when he’s with strangers, but he’s bold, reckless and loud when he’s with his brothers.

I can have long conversations with him, I can reason with him, he can tell jokes and make me laugh, and we can read stories together. He’s so expressive and adorable with his words and speech – he’s at a wonderful age.

On the downside, he can be a hell of a whinger. If he wants something, he nags and nags and nags in that high pitchy irritating whiney way, clings to my legs, and makes his body floppy and lies on the floor whining, until I send him to his room.

And currently, sending him to his room, is enough of a time-out for him to change his behaviour.

Last year he had quite a strong “fussy” personality, where he was very (VERY!) particular about dirt, sand, colours of objects and other little things. He was annoyingly high-maintenance.

But now, he’s pretty easy-going. As long as I explain what is happening or about to happen, he doesn’t freak out or complain. He’s pretty sensible!

Liam is almost potty trained. He doesn’t need to drink any milk before his sleep. He doesn’t have a favourite blankie or toy. He does suck his thumb though. He has a 1 hour nap, once a day. He sleeps 12 hours straight through the night.

He is a very un-adventurous eater. He doesn’t like to try new foods. He loves fried kway teow and that’s about it.

Oh and he still loves pink things.

My other two boys are 8.5 and 6.5 years old. All three of them play and get along very well… and they fight and argue all the same. They ALL like the same things – cycling, balls, skateboards, sand, beach, computer games, art+craft, reading, boy movies – which makes it really easy to entertain them at the same time.

As much as I grizzle about them all the time – they really are great kids, and I’m real proud of them.

As you can probably tell, things are peachy at the moment. Being a mum is a walk in the park. And I’m absolutely loving life right now.

My 2.5 year old toddler loves the colour pink.

Yes, he’s a boy and he is obsessed with PINK PINK PINK!

The other day I found a little box under my son’s bed – full of pink things that he had collected.

It was so adorable.

My heart melted :)

Oh my, 4 years on, this post still makes me crack up!

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Hey dude, want some pizza?
21 April 2007

After his birthday party, my 4 year old was over the moon with all his new superhero toys.

There was way too much pretend fighting in the household for my liking.

So yesterday I went to my toy library and borrowed the LARGEST and PINKEST DOLL HOUSE I could find.

Which led my son to create some rather interesting scenarios.

This one was my favourite.

Apparently Spiderman wanted spaghetti for dinner, but he got angry, because you know, turtles are slow.

I wrote this post in December 2003, when my first born was 9 months old.

I read it now, with crystal clear memories of those few days – it was the first time I’ve experienced a teething baby.

I remember it was so difficult to manage, to do my daily tasks, to look after him and myself. I remember struggling to find time to have a shower! And the sleep deprivation was just horrific!

Now with 3 children, I always crack a smile when I remember those moments of being a first time mother.

I realise have learned so much and changed so much over the years.

I am by no means an expert parent, but it’s good to look back to see how far I have come.

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Callum and I had a pretty awful weekend. Callum’s 5th and 6th teeth cut through, and he was the GRUMPIEST AND CRANKIEST LITTLE KID EVER!

Usually he’s pretty independent. He would spend hours just crawling and climbing all over the place. He likes to explore the shelves, cupboards, rooms, behind couches and tables. He likes following the cat, shuffling through the junk mail, sliding the chairs around.

And as long as I’m in the same room keeping an eye on him, we’re both having a pleasant day doing whatever we need to do.

He also sleeps about 2-3 hours in the late morning. And 1 hour in the late afternoon. So I get heaps done during the day.

But good lord, since Friday, he was in so much pain – poor thing. He didn’t sleep at all during the day.

He whinged and blubbered and cried all day. He wouldn’t let me out of his sight. He wouldn’t even let me stand up to get something. He just wanted to cling onto my leg. Or sit in my lap. Or have me cuddle him. Or hold him. Or bounce him up and down while he grizzled and grumbled. All day!

My husband was on a scuba diver rescue course all weekend. So it was really hard work on my own. and I was pretty down.

But by Monday – just like that – things were back to normal.

I was so very relieved. I took him out for lunch and he was the happy little kid bouncing on everyone’s knee again. Thank God!!

These are some photos from the same week. My son and I were mucking about on the grass, playing a crawl-under-the-cushion game. He was a little too interested in eating leaves.

After a while, he got bored and started head-butting the cushion from underneath. He made it fall on top of himself, let out a very girly squeal and then started to crawl with the cushion on his back – like a turtle. Thoroughly enjoying himself.

It was very funny. But I guess you had to be there.

A few weeks ago, our family went on a weekend trip away… and this is my little toddler and I, sitting in the middle of a grassy field.

This whole field was covered with very tall weeds. Weeds that were taller than I was!

My 3 children and I played a game where we created a maze in the tall grass and chased each other around, until we laughed ourselves silly and fell over.

The sun set and threw a golden light over the whole meadow. We were panting and giggling and itching and glowing.

It was beautiful.

This post was written in November 2003, when my first child was 8 months old.

Back then, going to a mother’s group (or playgroup) was one of the best things I did as a new mother. It saved me from going insane, it was my social network, it was my girl time, it was fun, enjoyable and relaxing.

There were 8 of us in the group, and we met up every week for 4 years (until our oldest kids went to kindergarten).

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We went to our playgroup today!

Callum is the first in the group to crawl – and it wasn’t a good thing!

I spent most of the morning chasing after him, while all the other mums relaxed with a cup of tea. He was chasing the other babies, stealing their toys, trying to suck people’s toes and trying to grab the chocolate biscuits.

Eventually I let him loose in the baby play area. And I caught him examining himself in the mirror. It was too cute!

Then he successfully climbed through one of those plastic cubby houses.

We cut his hair the other day. It was getting long and feral looking. I was too nervous to use a pair of scissors, because Callum REALLY likes shiny things, and I was afraid that he might try to grab them as I snipped his hair.

So we got out the clippers and gave him a number 6 all around. Now he definitely looks more like his dad.

September 2003. I took these photos of my first born child, when he was 6 months old. It’s basically a photographic progression of our daily night time routine.

Every evening, after the sun had set outside… my husband would return home from work. He would put his things down, and I would excitedly tell him about my day. My whole day. The baby’s day.

Then it was bath time – his special time to bond with our new baby. The house was always so calm and quiet. We would put on soothing music, dim all the lights in the house. We would bring out the bathtub and set it up on out dinner table. It was magical.

Carrying a bathtub full of water from the bathroom into the dining room was very tricky. So we found it easier to boil water in a kettle, then mix it straight in the bath. We’d test the temperature of the water with our elbows. Then test it again, just to make sure.

My son loved bath times!

We’d smother him with organic rosehip oil, and then give him a little baby massage, and some tummy time.

For nappies, we used to fold large, square, terry towel nappies into triangles, and fasten them with a great big safety pin! Then we’d slip a plastic pilcher over the top, so there were no leakages. We were hardcore!

We’d tuck him into his cot, he’d watch his mobile for a bit, and minutes later, he would be fast asleep.

Ah these memories and these photos… they are so precious. They make me so warm and happy. But at the same time, they make me laugh.

I should make a photographic progression of our night time routine NOW – WITH 3 KIDS!

It’s utter chaos and madness.

Yet at the same time, I’m sure I’ll look back at those photos and they too will make me warm and happy.

I couldn’t decide which was the best thing about this moment.

The fact that my husband and I were sitting at a cafe table, having a cup of tea, enjoying the weather, having an adult conversation, with no children noises.

Or, that my three children were sitting by themselves – beautifully sharing ONE ICE CREAM.

I wrote this post in May 2004, when my first born, Callum was 1 year old. It was the first – of many – “midnight scares” I have had as a parent.

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It was 2am. I was sleeping like the dead. Passed out. Utterly unconsciousness from a long day’s work. I was dreaming of tropical sunsets, pineapple cocktails and 7 large Thai men massaging coconut oil into my back.

That is, until I heard a noise.

A strange, cold howling noise that made my eyelids fly open. I stared into the darkness. I didn’t dare move. I just laid very very still. WHAT THE F*** WAS THAT NOISE??

It sounded like a dying cat. A dog? No a SEAL. A BABY SEAL! THERE’S A BABY SEAL IN MY SON’S BEDROOM! I leapt up and fumbled around in the darkness as I tried to find my pants. My head was in a blur of tropical seals drinking coconut oil.

The noise was horrific. A dying baby seal, tortuously gasping for air.

I stumbled down the hall, into my baby’s room and switched on the light. There was no seal. But no seal meant MY SON was making THAT NOISE. And one year old boys are NOT supposed to sound like DYING SEALS.

I found my son, red faced and gasping for air. Was he choking? Was there something wrong with his lungs? Is he convulsing? Nothing in my entire life had prepared me for the feeling that exploded in my stomach. It was sickening.

I was frozen, trying to make sense of what I was seeing. Callum was crying. He was trying to breath in, but made barking seal noises instead. He obviously wasn’t getting enough air and was red-faced and gasping. I was horrified. Zillions of first aid steps whizzed through my head. Check for breathing. Check his air passages. Check his temperature. Good lord, it was the scariest moment in my life as a parent.

There was nothing stuck in his airways. He was still in control of his body. He just wasn’t getting enough air and he was freaking out.

I screamed for my husband.

I suddenly remembered reading a home remedy for a congested air passage. We grabbed Callum and ran to the shower. We turned on the hot water and hovered his head over the steam. The heat from the steam soothes the constricted muscles.

All three of us sat on the floor of our steamy bathroom.

Silent. Hearts racing. Heads dizzy from shock.

Callum started to feel feverish and started to shake.

My husband and I looked at each other sharing only one thought, “Oh god, do we really want three kids?”

Things calmed down after we took his temperature, gave him some baby panadol and called the 24 hour health nurse. I was so relieved.

Callum’s mood lifted considerably after the drugs, food and cuddles, so we decided we weren’t going to drag him to the doctor at 3am.

Which turned out to be a wise move, because he happily went back to sleep by 4am.

The next day I was still edgy and tense. I didn’t sleep well.

I was exhausted.

I told my mum about it, hoping for some sympathy and offers for babysitting. But she laughed, as she waved me off with her hands. “Aiyah, why so dramatic? No big deal lah. It happens to all babies.”

And in a matter of seconds I felt happy that I wasn’t the only mother in the world to wake up to the sound of a choking baby, and somewhat pissed off that I’ll never have an original baby story to tell the world.

…

It turns out that the night before, we gave Callum a whole cup of cow’s milk. He’s not allergic to cow’s milk per se. Only large quantities of it bring about a mild swelling in his throat, hence his inability to breathe properly.

Thank God I read all those parenting books with all those “stupid” home remedy tricks.

This is my 2.5yo, Liam throwing a tantrum.

This is also Liam looking up at me to make sure that I was WATCHING HIM THROW A TANTRUM.

The truth is, I am so indifferent to tantrums in public, so much so, I think he looks quite cute. I suppose I can say that without any fuss at all, because 1) he’s my third and last baby, and 2) I’m completely OVER the whole tantrum thing. What-ever kid.

We were at our weekly gymnastics class, during the free play session…

Liam stepped off a pink car (as it was the end of his turn anyway) and a little girl took the pink car from him.

Liam decided he wanted the pink car back, so he pushed the girl away, and at the same time, the girl’s dad found a BLUE car and gave it to Liam.

But Liam refused to have the blue car, because he likes pink. The dad was like WTF, and I tried to explain that Liam prefers PINK things…

But at the same time I decided that Liam wasn’t having any car because he shoved the little girl…

And so here he is throwing himself on the ground, rolling and shouting,

“I WANT THE PINK CAAAAAAAR!!!”

The whole car exchange happened in 5 seconds…

And the tantrum lasted 15 minutes.

(Which isn’t that bad actually.)

(And I still love him to bits.)

I wrote this post in July 2003, when my first child, Callum, was 3 months old.

In Australia you can go to a special indoor, heated hydro-therapy pool and have swimming classes for your baby. The mother (or father) is in the water with the child, and everyone sings and does actions.

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Our 2nd baby swim class!

Callum was much more relaxed this time.

We swished and swayed in the water and he ALMOST gave me a giggle. But he was distracted by the 6 month old baby (all the other babies are only 3 months) who was showing off by paddling with his hands and doing somersaults in the water.

Cal still hasn’t got full control of his neck muscles, so he loved floating on his back. The rest of the time, he was Mr Floppy Head.

I find it cute – but frustrating – how babies and kids just LOVE nursery rhymes and kid songs. I can’t STAND them. Grrr. They are just so twinkly and silly and irritating!

There’s only so many times I can sing along to ‘The Wheels on the Bus’ in a high-pitched, chirpy sing-song way while gritting my teeth. Sigh.

I guess as long as the kids are enjoying themselves, I’ll be happy to put up with it :)

The other day I was reading some of my old posts and I was filled with a wonderful sense of nostalgia and strength. I love that I have an online record of my life as a new mother… and I really wanted to share some of it again with everyone. Enjoy!

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Apr 17, 2003

Callum was born Saturday 12th April 2003, 3:00pm.

I was in labour for 15 hours and although I had an ‘au naturale’ birth, I did end up having an epidural.

That was fine with me, because after the birth, I lost quite a bit of blood, I got whipped up to intensive care and had a 9 hour blood transfusion. I was also on standby for emergency surgery (to surgically remove my uterus,before I bled to death).

But I recovered and went home 4 days later.

Nonetheless, I’m doing GREAT!

I’m on this SUPER-DUPER high.

My baby is happy and healthy and adorable and burpy and pooey and hungry and just doing really REALLY well.
He’s a *dream* baby. I’m sooOOooOoo happy.

Lots of people have asked about the name we chose.

Callum : Scottish Gaelic form of the name Columba – which is Latin for dove-like. Columba was the name of the 6th Century Saint who brought Christianity to the West of Scotland.

These pictures were taken when he was 4 days old – looking all cute, crinkled and pink and puffy.  So very cute!

It’s been a tough week at our house.

My 2 year old has been sick with the flu, had a runny nose, a chesty cough, a high fever for 3 days… and not to mention a really shitty attitude.

His sleep has been disrupted. He’s been lethargic and floppy. He’s been losing weight and getting sicker and sicker by the day. He has been very miserable, and I have been cuddling him a lot, and GIVING IN TO HIM A LOT.

It’s kind of amazing and funny at the same time… that as a parent, when your child is sick, you find yourself suddenly filled with so much love and patience. So much more than you ever thought possible for yourself.

When you’re in that situation, you seem to have an overwhelming sense of strength, clarity and purpose, and yet helplessness and vulnerability too. You’d do anything to make your child better. Anything to keep them alive.

I guess in a way, it is an enriching experience.

But other than that…

Having a sick child is a fricking PAIN IN THE ASS.

Liam would go the whole day and refuse to drink anything. Complete, utter refusal.

First he wouldn’t drink any water or milk. So we started offering him other fluids like orange juice, then apple and blackcurrant cordial. He would sip and spit it out.

Heck we even went to the shops to buy him all the stuff that he loves, but he isn’t usually allowed, like – chocolate milk, a can of fizzy raspberry soft drink, a can of soya bean drink. He wouldn’t go near any of it.

I mean, how do you make a kid drink fluids?!? That is, without forcing it down his throat and choking him, otherwise known as the Chinese Aunty Torture method.

I remember my aunties would squeeze open the lips of children, flip their heads way back and pour medicinal drinks down their throats… until they were coughing and spluttering it all back out, through their noses… and it just makes a terrible mess all over their face and necks.

I personally don’t remember having that done to me, maybe we were all lined up and it happened to my cousins? Or my little sister? Then again, only one of us needed to go through that in order for the rest of us to get the message.

Anyway, I was getting really, really stressed and frustrated with my 2 year old.

For 2 days, we tried ignoring the whole situation and treating The Drinking Of Water like it was no big deal. Then we tried bribing, giving rewards, offering special treats, happy talk with lots of kisses and cuddles. Then we tried scolding, punishment, time-outs, and all that jazz.

The number of times he spat out everything we gave him, threw it all over the floor, threw a tantrum, threw furniture around, cried, screamed and flung his body around – it was countless. I was at my wit’s end.

Then (in this photo above) I casually handed Liam yet another cup of water. It must’ve been a good couple of hours since the last drink I offered him. And I was so nice to him in those hours. He sat on my lap. We played puzzles. We watched his favourite movie. We read books and I sang to him.

But he must’ve sense how tense I was about “the drinking of water”. He saw that my casual gesture was forced and desperate, and that in this battle of the wills, I was vulnerable.

Because instead of drinking it, he poured it down the front of his shirt.

And then he gave me those apologetic eyes. He was all squeaky and pleading, “I’m so sorry mummy. It was an accident.”

But it was SO NOT an accident.

I almost lost it. In that moment, I wanted him to be very, very far away from me. But I also felt so sorry for my poor, sick, miserable child.

I wanted to explode in a fit of frustration and anger, guilt and compassion.

(I took a photo of him instead.)

So. Yes. It is possible to feel equal amounts of love AND loathing. At the same time.

It’s crazy. But that’s parenting for you.

There has been a lot of rain these last few weeks.

And at the end of the day, there’s only one thing you can do with 3 very active, rowdy, young boys bursting with energy and excitement.

You put raincoats and boots on them and take them to the park.

This is the creek that cuts through the middle of our local park. It’s basically a water catchment for all the drain water flowing from the streets.

It’s not exactly a sparkling blue lake with meadowy aspects.

BUT it’s got flowing water, rocks, stepping stones, muddy islands, tadpoles, a waterfall, lots of trees and a narrow section of the creek where kids can jump over to get to the other side. It’s absolute heaven for little people.

Usually my husband takes the kids to the park at the end of the day.

But because he’s away at the moment, I have to do it. I irritates me a little, because I have a zillion things to do back at the house. And I have to be honest, I get very bored, standing around doing nothing, for an hour… in the cold, wet rain.

Not to mention, in winter it gets pretty dark by 5:30pm. And I feel absolutely crazy, being that irresponsible mother who lets her children play in the dark, on slippery rocks, in the pouring rain.

But, sigh, the kids love it.

They always come home wet, muddy, exhausted, smelling disgusting, but with big, wide, happy smiles on their faces.

So I always try to slow myself down and try to enjoy the moment.

Yesterday, I took this snap (above) with the camera on my phone.

Quick, scroll up to have another look!

I let my 2 year old climb the rocks by himself. He negotiated all his footsteps very carefully and made it to the waterfall’s edge.

The whole time (and every time) I watch my children play – I am at war with myself.

On one hand I think – Holy crap! That’s so dangerous! I shouldn’t be letting them do that!! What if they fall and split their head open on the rocks? Break their teeth and lose an eye? Blood will spill and it’ll be on your watch Karen.

And on the other, I’m all – Oh just chill Karen. Kids have to be kids. You can’t go around wrapping them up in cotton wool. This is what childhood is all about. Remember all the stuff I used to do when I was a kid? They’ll be fine.

And I just stand there, in the rain, tense and tormented by my own thoughts. This is one of the things I dislike about being a mother. All this constant worrying is such a drag.

Anyway. Funnily enough.

This particular day, my middle child (6yo), was perched on the OTHER SIDE of the waterfall, after I took this photo.

He took a step, slipped off a rock and PLOOP! He went in face first, straight into the lake. He was completely submerged in brown water and sludge… and re-emerged 3 seconds later, spluttering and shouting and looking like a swamp monster from outer space.

I saw everything in slow motion. And what did I do?

I laughed. I totally cracked up.

I can always rely on Sean for slapstick comedy. It completely made my evening. Just what I needed to shake me out of my own self-inflicted grumpiness.

He was a bit shocked, but thankfully he saw the funny side of it and was very cool about it in the end. Not to mention, I was all – Aww you poor baby. Did you hurt yourself? Are you cold? Let me give you my jacket.

We all walked home… wet, smelly, exhausted and very happy indeed.