When I see you every day I say "Mm-mm"
It may surprise you (or, at least, any of you who have met me) to hear that I spent last week looking after a baby. Yes, a real one.
Some of you know, or will readily deduce, who the baby belongs to, but let's leave it anonymous. We'll call the baby Ginny. She's a year old, and her parents had a slightly unexpected childcare shortfall. I wasn't working, so offered to step in - and to my immense surprise was taken up on it. People are willing to trust me with sole care of a baby? The fools :)
Anyway. I popped over for a couple of days the preceding week to remind Ginny who I was, as she hadn't seen me in a few weeks. She seemed happy hanging out with me, and willing to trust me to feed her and so on. Her parents reported that she sleeps soundly at night, and I've observed before that she is a very smiley baby whom I've rarely heard cry. How hard could it be?
Well, the short answer (as those of you with children will doubtless have guessed) is "er, quite hard, actually". At nearly 13 months, Ginny is not-quite-talking and not-quite-walking. She crawls at a speed only slightly slower than greased lightning, and loves playing with doors.
She was also, it transpired over the course of the week, teething. So she was uncomfortable and unhappy but unable to explain why. We had a lot of conversations which (interpreting her side of it), went like this:
G: I want the Thing!
Me: What's that? Is it a drink?
G: No!
Me: Is it a banana?
G: No!
Me: Is it a walk? A cuddle? A nap?
G: The Thing!
Me: A story?
G: Why won't you give me the Thing :(
Which was frustrating for both of us. Also, on account of the teething, Ginny switched to waking up a few times in the night. Although Mummy was home overnight, I'd offered to get up and do nightshifts if necessary. Both Ginny's parents sing to her, which she likes, so I'd been advised to try it. Finally! Something for which a lifetime of folkclubs has rendered me ideally suited :)
I warned Ginny that if she didn't go to sleep I was going to break out the mining disaster ballads. She eventually dozed off 9 verses into Morley Main (why yes, it is a 4-verse song). Later in the week, I was forced to break out the big guns and sing a musical setting of The Highwayman (seventeen verses and everybody dies). Ginny gave up and went to sleep ;)
She does like listening to singing, though. My rendition of Wind the Bobbin Up, complete with actions, held her transfixed one rainy afternoon. Well, either that or she thought I was a complete idiot. Hard to tell.
It also turns out I'm not that good at getting food into slightly unhappy, teething infants. Although I didn't realise it at first, I was trying to feed her too quickly, so she kept saying "no". So I gave up and let her out of the high chair. So by the time Mummy got home, Ginny was on the brink of starving to death. Or so you'd think - I reckon she was just trying to get me into trouble. On Thursday, though, I experimentally cooked scrambled eggs. I like my eggs extremely runny but figured that would be bad, so put (to me) terribly overcooked eggs on toast and served it up for lunch. Instant hit! I could barely spoon it in fast enough. I like to think I'm a decent cook, but I've never before served a meal where every mouthful got a spontaneous round of applause.
(When I say "eggs on toast", it was more "eggs near toast". That way I could do the messy bit with the spoon, and Ginny could pick her own bits of toast up at her own pace. She seems to have no interest in operating the spoon herself, but likes to pick stuff up. And good grief can that girl make a quarter of a cherry tomato go a long way.)
So, in short, I walked around a lot bent over (ow!) because Ginny is still learning to walk. I learned the knack of getting everything done in the time the baby goes to sleep (mercifully, she seems to have read the rules on naps and is OK with following them). I found out that it's a lovely feeling when a small person claps at you delightedly. It's even quite nice when a baby crying at 3am cuddles up to you like you're the thing that can make it all better.
I learned to be completely surprised by the things she understood. She's remarkably obliging with pushing arms through sleeves, or lifting up feet to put leggings on. She's clearly worked out the relationship between that bit of the worktop and the nice crunchy stuff that turns up at mealtimes (if you stand too near the toaster, she gets quite expectant). Watching a baby work out how the world functions is fascinating. I'd very happily look after her again.
But I was awfully glad to give her back and run away back to my normal state of existence :)
(This post with grateful thanks to cuthbertcross, who taught me to change a nappy when scarysaxon was still small.)
Some of you know, or will readily deduce, who the baby belongs to, but let's leave it anonymous. We'll call the baby Ginny. She's a year old, and her parents had a slightly unexpected childcare shortfall. I wasn't working, so offered to step in - and to my immense surprise was taken up on it. People are willing to trust me with sole care of a baby? The fools :)
Anyway. I popped over for a couple of days the preceding week to remind Ginny who I was, as she hadn't seen me in a few weeks. She seemed happy hanging out with me, and willing to trust me to feed her and so on. Her parents reported that she sleeps soundly at night, and I've observed before that she is a very smiley baby whom I've rarely heard cry. How hard could it be?
Well, the short answer (as those of you with children will doubtless have guessed) is "er, quite hard, actually". At nearly 13 months, Ginny is not-quite-talking and not-quite-walking. She crawls at a speed only slightly slower than greased lightning, and loves playing with doors.
She was also, it transpired over the course of the week, teething. So she was uncomfortable and unhappy but unable to explain why. We had a lot of conversations which (interpreting her side of it), went like this:
G: I want the Thing!
Me: What's that? Is it a drink?
G: No!
Me: Is it a banana?
G: No!
Me: Is it a walk? A cuddle? A nap?
G: The Thing!
Me: A story?
G: Why won't you give me the Thing :(
Which was frustrating for both of us. Also, on account of the teething, Ginny switched to waking up a few times in the night. Although Mummy was home overnight, I'd offered to get up and do nightshifts if necessary. Both Ginny's parents sing to her, which she likes, so I'd been advised to try it. Finally! Something for which a lifetime of folkclubs has rendered me ideally suited :)
I warned Ginny that if she didn't go to sleep I was going to break out the mining disaster ballads. She eventually dozed off 9 verses into Morley Main (why yes, it is a 4-verse song). Later in the week, I was forced to break out the big guns and sing a musical setting of The Highwayman (seventeen verses and everybody dies). Ginny gave up and went to sleep ;)
She does like listening to singing, though. My rendition of Wind the Bobbin Up, complete with actions, held her transfixed one rainy afternoon. Well, either that or she thought I was a complete idiot. Hard to tell.
It also turns out I'm not that good at getting food into slightly unhappy, teething infants. Although I didn't realise it at first, I was trying to feed her too quickly, so she kept saying "no". So I gave up and let her out of the high chair. So by the time Mummy got home, Ginny was on the brink of starving to death. Or so you'd think - I reckon she was just trying to get me into trouble. On Thursday, though, I experimentally cooked scrambled eggs. I like my eggs extremely runny but figured that would be bad, so put (to me) terribly overcooked eggs on toast and served it up for lunch. Instant hit! I could barely spoon it in fast enough. I like to think I'm a decent cook, but I've never before served a meal where every mouthful got a spontaneous round of applause.
(When I say "eggs on toast", it was more "eggs near toast". That way I could do the messy bit with the spoon, and Ginny could pick her own bits of toast up at her own pace. She seems to have no interest in operating the spoon herself, but likes to pick stuff up. And good grief can that girl make a quarter of a cherry tomato go a long way.)
So, in short, I walked around a lot bent over (ow!) because Ginny is still learning to walk. I learned the knack of getting everything done in the time the baby goes to sleep (mercifully, she seems to have read the rules on naps and is OK with following them). I found out that it's a lovely feeling when a small person claps at you delightedly. It's even quite nice when a baby crying at 3am cuddles up to you like you're the thing that can make it all better.
I learned to be completely surprised by the things she understood. She's remarkably obliging with pushing arms through sleeves, or lifting up feet to put leggings on. She's clearly worked out the relationship between that bit of the worktop and the nice crunchy stuff that turns up at mealtimes (if you stand too near the toaster, she gets quite expectant). Watching a baby work out how the world functions is fascinating. I'd very happily look after her again.
But I was awfully glad to give her back and run away back to my normal state of existence :)
(This post with grateful thanks to cuthbertcross, who taught me to change a nappy when scarysaxon was still small.)