Scaredy Cat, Scaredy Cat, part 2

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(This is the post I had originally intended to write when I completely digressed and turned the post into one about my own fears and the tales of Gainsborough Old Hall. (Oops, it turned into a post about me, me, me again, didn't it?!))

DD1 (soon to be 6) is scared of the dark. This is immensely ironic as she was one of those babies that could not sleep unless the room was so pitch black that it was impossible to tell which part of the room you were standing in. 

Not only is she afraid of the dark, but this fear appears to be getting worse - it is also starting to apply to a slightly dim light, and it is also starting to manifest itself in the house when the lights are on. No longer is she happy to go to the toilet on her own past a certain time of the day. I practically have to hold her hand at all times. Bedtimes only work as she shares a room with her sister, and with the landing light on and the door "wide open - as wide as it will go". 

I understand more than anyone this irrational fear - I struggled with it for long enough myself as a child. However, I can pinpoint the start of my fears to a specific time and a specific event. DD1's fear seems to have crept up on us with no discernible trigger. 

Am I destined to accompany her everywhere once the lights go out? Will I be spending a fortune on nightlights for every room?

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*Must buy DD1 this book, such a lovely story!

Wishing We'd Never Discovered Nick Jr

DD1 is eating strawberries. She is wearing a white top and dribbling strawberry juice down it.

Me: "DD1, watch what you are doing, you are getting strawberry juice down your top"
DD1: "Oh"
Me (muttering under my breath): "...strawberry juice... stains horribly...never come out"
DD1: "Don't worry mummy, you just need to put some Vanish on it."

Come back CBeebies, all is forgiven.


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(There's a longer post here somewhere on advertising and the effect on young children. Maybe I'll write it when I have a little more time to think.)

Five Year's Time Meme

I've been tagged at Lou in the "5 Years" Meme. I liked this one as it is a nice spontaneous one that I didn't have to think too hard about.

The rules are: answer the 5 questions, and pass it on to 5 other bloggers. Dead simple.

Where were you five years ago?

On maternity leave with DD1. She would still have been in the horrible nightmare of her first 8 weeks. Those first weeks when I was so tired I didn't know what to do with myself. She had terrible reflux as a baby, and would throw up pretty much most of her milk around 15 minutes after having fed. This meant we were on a nightmare cycle of perma-feeding. She wouldn't sleep properly as she was always hungry of course, and never put on enough weight. It was my most miserable time, and my health visitor was convinced I had a form of post-natal depression, although I still think it was more to do with the tiredness, as it lifted when she got stronger and started sleeping better. Strange how the overwhelming memory seems to be that tiredness, although she has brought such joy.

Where would you like to be five years from now?

Dull, I know, but probably pretty much where I am now, with a few more crow's feet! - I think I'm in a pretty happy state. In a slightly tidier and more "finished" house maybe (so many little jobs, sigh).

What is on your to-do list today?

Cleaning, cleaning and more cleaning. It's been two weeks since I let my cleaner go, and I haven't got round to finding a new one yet. The ironic thing is that I didn't think she was up to my imagined standards, yet in reality I am probably one of the messiest people I know. Still, at least I'm not paying someone to not clean properly - perfectly capable of that myself!

What five snacks do you enjoy?

Savoury over sweet any day!:

1) crisps - any variety, any flavour

2) dips - preferably with (1) above, but not fussy - will also eat them with veg, breadsticks, fingers... houmous top preference

3) Cheese... with a nice crunchy cracker

4) Nuts - roasted & salted

5) OK, under duress, my only sweet thing - Haribo sweets, yum. Childhood flavours.

What would you do if you were a billionaire?

Wow, a BILLionaire... not just a common or garden millionaire? I don't think I could even begin to comprehend what that would feel like. You hear about millionaires losing everything, or lottery winners managing to spend their entire winnings, but unless you bet it all on a horse, I would imagine a billion or two would never really run out. So, I suppose all the usual boring stuff - houses, holidays, cars for family and close friends. I would probably give a lot of it to charity - you would have to do something good with it. I dunno...bathe in champagne everyday...?

On that flight of fancy, I'd like to pass this one on to some of the blogs I have discovered recently:

Young and Younger

Monkey Mummy

Tiddlyompompom

Housewife Confidential

Wait Till Your Father Gets In

The Gallery - 7 Deadly Sins; Sloth

For this week's Gallery entry, I decided to concentrate on only one of the deadly sins (my personal favourite...not including gluttony... or lust...)

I know this is not particularly original, however, I had to post it. This is DD1 at the weekend, when she was having a slothful moment. She is normally such a fidget - always moving, continuously on the go, that moments like this are quite unusual when they do come, which makes them all the more enjoyable!

Is This The Ultimate In Working Mother Guilt?

My current working pattern involves 3 days in the office, and 2 days from home worked in around the school run. However, from June/July onwards, I'll be doing 2 days office, 3 days at home, as the company I work for is moving buildings and trying to encourage as many people to hot-desk as possible in a quest to save space.

It was therefore high time to reassess the working arrangements. Up until now, I had been using a desk in corner of the "family room". However, this is slowly no longer a family room, but a room full of children's junk, so it was really time to come up with another option.

As I have mentioned before, we live in a Victorian terrace, and the layout of the bedrooms is a little unconventional by today's standards. We have four bedrooms in total - three on the first floor, and one on the second floor. The third bedroom on the first floor was originally very small in comparison to the others, and is now even smaller, due to the fact that previous occupants took a chunk out of it at some point to enlarge the bathroom. Up until this weekend, this was DD1's bedroom. There was enough space for a bed, a small wardrobe and a small bookcase - in fact, the perfect size for a study. However, what were we going to do with DD1?

The top floor has one extremely large bedroom that, eventually - funds permitting and if I can ever work out where to squeeze a shower room - I would like to divide into two bedrooms for the girls. However, at the moment they are really still too young, and need to be on the same floor as us. The only feasible option was therefore to put the girls together.

Since the Easter weekend, they have therefore been sharing a room, which they both seem to love (it is great to see them getting on so well). Unfortunately, it has also coincided with DD2 developing a really awful cough that gets much worse at night, so I now not only feel guilty for kicking DD1 out of her bedroom (even if we did give her plenty of opportunity to object and it meant making more room in the playroom), but I now feel terribly guilty that they are both not sleeping well due to my laziness. As you will no doubt point out to me, I could just have moved my study into the spare room on the top floor without too much additional upheaval. You would be right, but it's just too far to walk to the kitchen when I want to make myself a cup of tea!