BAAAAH!

Pre Tadpole and Tigger, friends with little munchkins would describe “mommy brain” to me, which apparently is the result of spending day in, day out with noisy young kids singing nursery rhymes and changing pungent nappies with minimal mental stimulation, thus turning your mind into a one-track bowl of mush.

I experienced it yesterday.

While Dancing Queen (my part time nanny) was over, I took the pug dog for a much needed lengthy walk, welcoming the quiet of the park and the crisp January air. We trotted across part of Regent’s Park that follows a relatively deserted outside edge of the London Zoo – or at least, a portion of the zoo where the animals tend to often be in hiding. Today, however, the sheep were busily munching food and milling about. “Look!” I excitedly exclaimed out loud. “Look at the sheep! Baaaah!”

And then I embarrassingly realized that I’d just announced that to my dog, who could, as you might expect, have cared less.

Imagine That

Parenting. It’ll make you say, think, and do things beyond what you ever imagined. Things that 10 years ago you’d have made fun of. Things that 10 years from now you’ll look back on and laugh about (I hope).

So here are the Top Ten things that I never imagined about parenthood…

1. That I would truly consider 8 hours of unbroken sleep (read: no pregnancy-induced peeing in the night, no babies crying) the ultimate luxury.

2. That I would actually (and successfully!) try on 3 pairs of designer jeans and a mini-skirt in a cute little boutique while wearing my sleeping newborn in a Baby Bjorn.

3. That I would gulp coffee while shaving my legs in the shower – all in the interest of multitasking to save time.

4. That I would wake up at 2am singing “Polly Wolly Doodle” in my head and, once I realized it, I would ‘get it out of my head’ by replacing it with “This Old Man.”

5. That I would nonchalantly, in graphic detail, discuss the day’s poo (my baby’s, my toddler’s, my dog’s) with Hubby at the dinner table.

6. That I would throw a dog toy to entertain my dog… while feeding my baby a bottle… while reading a book to my toddler.

7. That I would consider – even for the briefest moment – using a child harness.

8. That I would instinctively reach out my cupped hand to catch my toddler’s vomit and save it from staining and smearing into the carpet.

9. That I would use, like you see in old movies, my own saliva in order to clean my child’s sticky face. (Honestly, I only did this once.)

10. That I would actually contemplate my husband’s desire to have 8 children.

Quiet, Please!

It was quite a normal morning, as mornings go these days now that I am the tired mother of two under two… and the dog makes three.

Hubby was away on business, so I was on my own. By 8.00am I had managed to get my kids out of bed, bottle fed, newly nappied, and dressed. The dog had his chow and a fresh bowl of filtered water (which, mind you, Tadpole had just dumped all over the floor). I was dressed, or so one might call it since I had something on other than my pajamas, fashion sense having probably been left at the hospital when my second baby was born. I had managed to wolf down a bowl of cereal, move all the trash (and we produce a scary amount) from the garden to the front step, throw allergy-friendly ingredients into my over-worked bread maker, stuff a load of whites into my miniature washing machine, skim my email, wash, sterilize and make Tigger’s bottles for the day, and serve Tadpole a bowl of organic quinoa loaded with British summer berries – which he typically loves but was today adamantly rejecting.

And it was chaotically loud.

Outside the window was the sound of pouring rain. “Singing in the Rain” was playing cheerfully from iTunes. ITunes was temporarily drowned out by the answering machine picking up a call. The call startled tiny baby Tigger. Tigger was steadily fussing, probably because of the noise coming from teething Tadpole. Tadpole was screaming at the dog, who was gladly taking the breakfast that he had offered the ever-eager pug. The pug was barking at the front door, originally because he had yet to get outside for his morning walk, but then at the sound of our postman who deposited today’s mail through the front door’s slot. And the clanging door slot caused me to let out a mini-yelp, why I’m not sure since the same clanging has caused me to jump every single day since we moved to London.

That was it. Rain or shine (usually rain, here) I had to get everyone out of the house. It was only eight o’clock but we had a long day ahead of us and I already felt like we’d been up for eight hours.

After managing to corral Tadpole and bundle up Tigger, load them into the e3 double, attach the pug to his lead, and locate my own coat, keys, mobile, and a tenner, we headed outside. It sounds simple, but those tasks and the related activities took approximately 37 and 1/2 minutes...

First Tadpole didn’t want his coat on, then the phone rang, then the baby spit up all over his outfit and had to be changed, then Tadpole severely dirtied his nappy and required a new one, then the dog randomly darted upstairs and had to be called back down, then the bread maker finished it’s rapid cycle requiring me to promptly remove the fresh loaf, then I realized that there were no bottles (gotta be prepared!) for Tigger in the nappy bag, then Hubby called to check how the morning was going, then Tadpole got fussy cuz he couldn’t talk to his daddy, then Tigger started screaming because he was hot from being bundled up too long, then I couldn’t find any more poo bags for the dog, then Tadpole started whining because I wouldn’t stop everything and blow bubbles with him…

We finally managed to get out of the house. By then it had stopped raining. There was bustle on the streets as the fruit man loaded his wares onto their stands, mums walked their kids to school, commuters clipped it to catch public transportation, and cars and buses whizzed by.

Tigger had promptly fallen asleep in the lower carrycot of the double buggy. Tadpole was silently enthralled with the sights and sounds of the city. The pug was happy to be out sniffing every corner. And I sighed with relief.

Who’d have thought, in a million years, that I would have to escape my own house to the busy streets of rush-hour London just to find some peace and quiet.

Where...?

In Babyland, that’s where.

Since the exciting arrival of Tigger in November, I’ve been buried under piles of dirty nappies and ridiculously sleep deprived. Two bouts of mastitis, several colds, three new molars, the holiday season, out of town guests, and 10 weeks later, I have emerged from the newborn chaos into a place with not much more time than before, but a tiny bit more mental capacity (or so I’d like to believe) to sit down and blog a bit.

Cheers, to 2007!