Wading pool (Anna)

I know, I know. We've been extremely absent. Not in our lives - just in our blog posts. We've been back from France for weeks; had a great trip, but haven't found the time to post. Emma is terrific and we've been enjoying her. We've even taken a photo here and there. But no blogging. Oh well, sometimes life wins. Especially during the long evenings of summer. We've had some lovely moments, regardless of whether they were captured and recorded for prosperity.

Today, we set up our paddling pool in our front garden. (The same pool that Emma might have been born in, had our hopes of a home water birth come to fruition.) It took us a while to set it up - we had to retrieve our pump from our friend, borrow a hose, blow the pool up and then fill it. And of course, our main motivation for all this - a hot and sweaty baby and our fantasy about her splashing around in the pool on a very hot Saturday afternoon.

When we first airlifted her into the pool, she cried. Of course, we pulled her out, and decided that she was just responding to the fact that the water was too cold. So we shuttled warm water back and forth from the kitchen in tupperware containers until it was warm enough.

Emma, of course, being an independent sentient human being who doesn't do what we want just because we're (scoff) her parents, still had no interest in getting in.

So, to encourage her, and because we were hot, WE got into the pool.

And that's where our neighbours found us - two adults playing in a paddling pool with a bucket, two spades and a rubber duck while Emma pottered around us industriously making sure we didn't get up to any mischief.

(actually, this is a slight lie - by the time our neighbours found us, Emma has been in the pool with us for a good half hour before deciding to get out again, but that doesn't make such a good story.)

Paris

Nous sommes a Paris. L'enfant - en Bretagne, avec grand-parents.

Even our typing has a terrible French accent.

We are in Paris, on our two day holiday from our bigger holiday in Brittany. For the first time, we have spent the night away from our beautiful little baby, who is currently being spoilt rotten by her Granny Heath and Grandad.

We have all been staying in a wonderful restored farm house in Brittany that is owned by some very generous family friends. We flew in from Canada, obviously - Heather and John from Australia. A lovely way to have a holiday. No internet, there, so we've been blissfully disconnected from the rest of the world.

You'll be pleased to know that, while we've been in Paris, we have resisted the desire to check in on them 50 times a day, but must confess to bringing out the camera every few hours to look at photos of our little one and coo over how lovely she is and how much we miss her. We talk about how much we love the way she spins around in circles before falling to the ground in giggles, the way she runs away from us and stops at the last minute to make sure we catch her, the long and involved stories she tells us in her bilingual part-English, part-baby language, and how wonderful she smells. And then we talk about something else for a while.

Having a few days away from her is really nice, too. We've been staying up late, having French meals that start at 9pm in restaurants that have no high chairs. And our conversation hasn't revolved around scheduling in the next nap (except our own). It's like we're actually humans (grown-ups) in our own right!

Photos to come when we're back home.

Touched (Anna)

I love, love, love Emmy's childcare centre. This is nothing new, but today confirmed it once again. 

Sunday is Mother's Day and also my birthday. I turned up to pick up Emma from childcare this afternoon and I found that we had all been given a beautiful laminated photo of our baby, with their hand print on the back, a beautiful poem talking about the passing of time and how we're going to want to remember what our babies looked like when they were little, with "Happy Mother's Day" written on it. That's enough to make me tear up right there. And they had made two of them for us. No awkwardness, no humming and hahhing about which of us to give it to. They even used different photos so they're not identical. 

As if that wasn't enough, across the doorway was a long, six-foot poster that said "Happy Birthday Anna", with the footprints of all the babies in Emma's group, and some beautiful photos of Emma in action at childcare. I was incredibly moved. Some of the kids still had paint on their feet from the project. 

It made me happy. In a really uncomplicated, pure kind of way. Happy that people had taken the time to do something so kind for me. Happy to have photos of my beautiful daughter smiling at me. Happy to have a piece of artwork with babies' feet all over it. Happy that Emmy is in such a wonderful place where she learns how to get covered in paint at the same time as she learns how to do nice things for people. 

And very, very  happy to have the kind of sappy partner who thinks to suggest it in the first place. 

I expect I will keep it forever. 

More cute things (Anna)

- pulling a pan out of the cupboard, toddling over to another cupboard, putting the pan on a shelf, patting it reassuringly, waving, saying "bye bye" and closing the door. 

- I was talking to her about her Grandad and joking that she needs to learn to say "Hi Grandad. Can I make you a cup of coffee?" before we go to Europe in four weeks time.  I asked her if she could say "coffee" and she started doing her silly fake cough. For the rest of the evening, every time I mentioned Grandad, she coughed. 

Lots more cute stuff, too, but no time. 

Back in the swing of things (Anna)

The longer we don't post, the harder it is, because there's so much to catch up on. Granny Heath's visit. Emma's several weeks of being sick. Caroline back at work, etc,etc. And I don't know if we still have any readers left anyway. 

So, in the interests of getting our momentum back, here's a quick post. 

10 adorable things that Emma is doing at the moment. 

- putting her lips on our cheeks and saying "Ma"; also blowing good night kisses

- pointing at cars and proclaiming gleefully "bus!"

- putting the TV remote to her ear and saying " 'ello"

- sitting on our laps with a plastic spoon and feeding us

- sharing her pacifier with us when she thinks we need comforting

- pretending to be asleep on our bed and then wriggling off and running away

- insisting on walking to the park rather than being carried

- passing us her favourite books to read...for the 20th time in 5 minutes

- doing the sign for help when she needs something (a relief from the grunting noise she was making before)

- bouncing up and down and dancing when she hears music

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, EMMA!!!!

Countdown (Anna)

One more sleep until Granny Heath arrives from Australia for lots of cuddles, stories and play-time. (Oh, Mum, we forgot to tell you, Caroline and I are going on holiday and leaving you on Emma duty for the next three weeks...;))

Four more sleeps until Emma becomes the daughter of parents who have a one-year-old. Rough translation: Emma turns one on Saturday!!

Measuring things in sleeps is a little tricky, of course. Emma will have approximately 12 sleeps (if we're lucky) before her birthday, while we might might considerably fewer than 4 if we are kept awake by some random munchkin who decides that the witching hour (known in our house as the "bitching hour") is the best time to practice her singing. But, it's ok. We're confident that once she turns one, she'll never wake us up in the middle of the night. Ever again. Right? Right?