NS March 19th, 2010

You may remember that, around a year ago, I told you about my robot persona and how this robot got Noble Girl to do pretty much anything. Of course, it caused some embarrassment in public, but well worth it in my opinion.

Since then, I’ve been voice to numerous objects and imaginary friends, with characters including: Washa Washa, the flannel that talks in a funny voice while it scrubs NG’s body at bathtime; Mrs. Mouse, the meek and mild rodent that implores noisy children to eat their dinner quietly and without too much mess; Crazy Dancer, the madwoman who starts falling down and dancing uncontrollably to make the children laugh when they’re being especially grumpy; Queen, the regal lady who graciously accepts bows and curtsies and speaks softly and kindly to her loyal subjects; Pirate, the gruff-and-tough sailor who talks to the kids when we’re stuck in traffic; and Tree, a high-pitched, cheerful lass who explains topics relating to animals or nature — all affable, harmless creatures of mine and NG’s imaginings.

Yesterday, however, a new personality came to life. One that was entirely my creation and invoked, spur of the moment, in a desperate attempt to drink a cup of tea before it went cold. “Behold!” I said in an enthusiastic voice (though Noble Girl and Noble Boy had no idea what that meant) “The Queen’s cousin, the Duchess, is here — look!” Then I did two spins in quick succession and suddenly, I was an uglier, meaner version of Mary Poppins, with a terrible British accent. The Duchess drew herself up to her full height and looked down what I imagined to be her wart-covered nose at the children. She sniffed and sighed.

“What is this?” she bellowed. “I didn’t ask to see these children, what are they doing here? How did you get into my house, young lady?”

NG, wide-eyed and with a smile on her lips, replied: “I live here! Who are you, please?”

“Who am I? Who am I?!! I am your majesty the Queen’s sister, the Duchess. But I’m not as nice as her and I don’t suffer fools gladly. Are you a fool, young lady?”

“No,  I’m a little girl.”

“Well I don’t like little girls either. OR little boys. Unless…”

“What, Duchess, what?” NG was practically wetting herself with glee at this new arrival.

“Well, I can tolerate children but only if they do as they are told and let the Duchess drink her cup of tea before it goes wretchedly cold. And no whining. The Duchess canNOT tolerate whining. Do you think you can do that?”

“Oh yes, Duchess, yes! We’ll be good while you drink your tea! Can we go sit in the living room with you?”

“Certainly. But we will march there. Royalty do not ‘walk’. We saunter and march or glide. Got it?”

“Yes! Oh, I love you Duchess,” she said as she threw her arms around my hips and hugged me tightly.

“Hmm. Well, I love you too. Now come tidy up your toys and then read a book on the sofa with your brother, very nicely, while I have the royal tea. Okay?”

“Okay!”

I know it’s wrong, I know. It’s manipulative, lazy parenting. But damn if it isn’t also fun and efficient. The Duchess means business! She not only got NG to eat all her dinner, including all the spinach, but got her through the bath and to bed without so much as a wobble. As far as I’m concerned she can stay as long as she’s getting things done. Soon, not even the Duchess will be able to prevent a meltdown on the high street or a plate of food pushed away without being touched. And at that point she will likely have to fly away on her jewel-encrusted dragon. But for now, she’s gold dust. I’m keeping her.

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Tags: children, imagination, parenting, personalities

• Antics of The Noble Child , Funny Ha-Ha , Human Oddities , Parenting 101
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NS March 12th, 2010

She came home, draped in her grandfather’s arms, delivered like a bouquet of roses to my door. Her heavy lidded eyes saw me and her lips smiled, almost imperceptibly. I laid her on the sofa, removed her shoes and coat, smoothed her hair from her forehead and watched her forefinger rhythmically stroke her upper lip as she sucked her thumb.

I closed the door and my heart swelled, glad for her to be back in the warmth of my mother bear’s den. I sat down beside her. She put her head in my lap. Looking down at her face, I marvelled at her beauty and absolute perfection. I gazed for a long time at her ivory cheek, then the pores, then the blood and tissue and bones beneath. Beyond that, the cells, the tiny living particles of life that, together, made her. From my body and his. We made her.

That never stops blowing my mind.

I scoop her up, put her to bed (dress and all, at her insistence) and turn out the light. Downstairs, I begin to tidy up the things she brought home from school and her grandparents’ house. I see three yellow daffodils, tied together with iridescent ribbon, on top of two cards. One is white and depicts a human-like figure with blue construction paper legs, yellow arms, a green body and long red hair. Above it is scrawled ‘Happy Mother’s Day!’ Inside, she has attempted to write her name, though only two of the letters are discernible as such. The figure on the card is smiling. My fears that she thinks of me as a brooding, cross, shouty demon are allayed for now.

The other card is red and circular and, in a teacher’s hand, tells me ‘I love my mum because…’ with her answer dictated and written below. It says:

“She is a very special mummy because she does everything by herself.”

I’m not sure whether that’s good or bad, whether to laugh or cry, so I do a bit of both. Hand over mouth, alone in the dining room, a silent, anguished, joyful tear slides down my cheek. I press the daffodils to my chest and look at the grinning face of my daughter’s imagining. At a time in my life when I feel that everything is changing and anything is possible, an assertion of independence is just what I needed to hear that. That someone has complete confidence in me, even when I don’t; that someone remembers my smiles when all I dwell on are my flaws — that’s more valuable than any gift from a shop she could ever give me.

Tags: mother's day

• Antics of The Noble Child , Parenting 101 , Squish Squish
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NS February 24th, 2010

All except one of the following happened to me today. Can you guess which is false?

• One of my children climbed onto another, unsuspecting child’s back and began to wriggle around in what looked remarkably like a mating ritual in a David Attenborough nature series
• While brushing my teeth at the sink, naked except for a towel draped round my shoulders, I was assaulted from behind with a battery-operated pasta-twirling fork
• When I walked upstairs to check on my daughter and her friend, I found them pretending to have babies on the toilet. Talk about a water birth!
• I burned the children’s dinner  so let them eat peanut butter and Pringles instead
• My son, in his haste to get to his precious ‘mamas’ (i.e. my boobs), managed to pull my nursing top down and expose my breast while I was talking to another parent at a coffee social this morning at my daughter’s pre-school
• I read an article in the Daily Mail and vehemently agreed with it Sorry, even I couldn’t keep a straight face while typing that

Any guesses?

• Antics of The Noble Child , Funny Ha-Ha , Parenting 101 , That's Life , The Noble Baby
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NS February 2nd, 2010

Is a lot of ‘screen time’ for kids really as horrific as people like to make out? Are children rotting their brains, giving themselves virtual lobotomies, by watching television, playing video games, working on computers and using hand-held music devices/e-readers/mobile phones? A recent report showed that children in the US spend nearly eight hours per day consuming media — nearly as long as the average adult spends at work. I’m sure statistics are similar for children in the UK. This has really freaked some people out. It used to freak me out. I felt (and still feel) guilty for the amount of time The Noble Child spends staring at a screen. But increasingly, I’m asking myself why children consuming media is considered such an atrocity and why we are so panicked about it.

Full disclosure: my three-year-old watches a couple hours of television a day. She knows how to play simple games aimed at pre-schoolers on the computer. She can take photos on our digital camera. She instinctively knew how to use an iPhone when first exposed to one, with little explanation or demonstration. She could double-click and click-and-drag by the time she was two years old. The girl is tech-savvy. But so are her parents. My husband’s career is in computers. We are both active members of online communities; he on his sports forums and I with the blogosphere and Twitter. We both have iPhones. We both like to watch films and a few select TV shows. We stream videos. We take photos and upload them. We read a lot of our news on the computer screen, not from a newspaper spread over the breakfast table (though I do buy a broadsheet a couple times a week — nothing beats the weekend papers in bed). We’re fully linked in, wired up and logged on. So why wouldn’t our daughter (and eventually our son, too) be?

If that’s ALL she did then, yes, it would undoubtedly be unhealthy. If she lacked imagination, social interaction, literacy and communication skills or physical energy then, yes, I would be concerned. But she doesn’t. She is unimaginably sociable, friendly, outgoing, polite, empathetic and energetic. She can watch Finding Nemo contentedly but then jump up (sometimes in the middle of it) and want to play Bears or Hot Lava or Horsey Ride. She’s plainly thriving and developing at a normal pace. So the more I hear and read about the hysteria and see chests being beaten and hair being torn out by guilt-inflicted parents and drama-loving media sources, the more I think we’re blowing this all out of proportion. We all know that “studies say” and “experts suggest” that children have limited screen time, but what is the impetus for all these studies being conducted? Why the money, time and resources spent on finding out whether something that is unavoidably a part of our lives, and our kids’ lives, should be kept away from them?

The first response is to say they are being done for legitimate scientific and social purposes, to ensure that consuming all this new media will not have detrimental effects on us (which is a legitimate concern, certainly), but I have to wonder if at least some of this concern stems from the fact that advances in technology and our lifestyles have changed so rapidly in the last 10-20 years, leaving us little time to grow accustomed to it gradually, that our heads are left spinning, unsure how to process all of the information, choices and consequences. I also wonder if it’s something every generation does, where those who were once young and hip all of a sudden realise that they have grown older and a new modernity has set in, one which vastly influences the way they, and particularly their children, live their lives and spend their time. Often, it is our children who are least scared of these changes and we are the ones left scratching our heads and muttering phrases like “Back in my day…” while fixing whatever newfangled invention is ‘taking over the youth’ with a suspicious stare.

Rock music used to be considered the devil incarnate. Then it was films and TV. Then it was rap music and racy ads. Then it was video games. Now it’s mobile phones and computers. Different decade, same ol’ worries. Old/familiar = good, virtuous; Young/new = scary, unknown.

I saw a poll recently (can’t remember where or I’d link) where parents were asked how much TV their kids actually watched versus how much they told other people their kids watched and the discrepancies were not marginal. More than three-quarters said they felt their children watched too much television but, when asked, most halved that time. So are kids consuming too much media or are we just making each other feel guilty about it by under-reporting and hiding it because we don’t fully understand it? Is this just one more way in which parents are blamed for not being perfect, or are the ‘experts’ right to caution us about the effects of the Age of Tech?

I haven’t fully made up my mind yet. I vacillate between beating myself up and trying to curtail media usage to embracing it and reminding myself that my children are well-rounded, loved and properly cared for, regardless of ‘screen time.’ After all, you wouldn’t be reading this post if it wasn’t for CBeebies. I get time to ponder and write (which makes me a better person and mother) and my children learn yoga poses from cute little animated figures, set to soothing music and chattering laughter.  Is that really so bad?

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Tags: children, guilt, hype, media, parenting, TV

• Antics of The Noble Child , Home and Hearth , In The News , Parenting 101 , That's Life
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NS January 5th, 2010

• You are so used to not being able to shut the bathroom door that you forget to close it when you have other (adult) people over
• You regularly find Calpol crusted into your hair
• You go up to comfort your teething baby on New Year’s Eve and find a way to balance your cocktail glass on the cot
• You recoil from the clock in horror as you crawl into bed at 5am on New Year’s Day, knowing  you have a full day of CBeebies, being jumped on and wanting to die a slow, miserable death ahead of you
• You think nothing of wiping your children’s snot on your jeans if a tissue isn’t handy
• You walk into your bathroom to find your 3-year-old’s bottom waving in the air, demanding to be wiped, and a tub full of the lovely bath products your 1-year-old just dumped inside it with exuberance
• You have been given the evil eye for ‘letting your children run wild’ but only seconds later been given the evil eye by someone else for being too harsh in reprimanding them
• You have to use an abacus to figure out when you last had sex (or at least not just a quickie at nap time)
• The thought of falling pregnant again fills you with a fear not unlike that of Sigourney Weaver’s character in Alien when she comes face-to-face with a slimy, monstrous being who wants to make her life miserable and/or eat her innards
• You’re so disillusioned with keeping your already-filthy carpet clean that you don’t  bother cleaning up spills anymore

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