Category Archives: Modern Life

Family, Parenting

Not a perfect mother

Generally I think I’m a pretty good mother. My kids are pretty polite. They have good senses of humour. They do their jobs around the house, mostly without complaint or too much nagging. They are lovely with younger kids. They know they are loved.

But held up to the light of my sister-in-law’s mothering I’m afraid my mothering looks a little slapdash to say the least. Now I will say that she is a former nanny so well qualified to be a mother… having your own kids is different though wouldn’t you say?

Last night we had her two kids, aged 4 and 2 and a half, to stay the night. Our first sleepover. The youngest, a little girl, has really come on with her language and was able to tell me she was hungry and what she was hungry for. After dinner (which she had at home) she ate two tomatoes, a yoghurt and two plums. She’s such a good eater. They both got ready for bed when asked with no fuss and brushed their teeth, asking me for help to get to the back teeth.

In the cubby house
The 2-year old cousin enters the lounge room cubby house

At about 7.30 – half an hour after their regular bed time – and while watching Cars (a surprisingly good film), they asked to go to bed. They are both dry, the little one calling out to me to take her to the loo at about 11pm.

We then ate our Thai takeaway with the big kids.

In the morning they played with our two for a while before asking me if I could help get them dressed… and therefore get out of bed. For breakfast the little one had two bowls of Just Right, a plum, a pear and about a third of a bowl of porridge. Her brother had one big bowl of porridge. I’m documenting this because I’m frankly astounded by how much she eats and the fact they do so without whinging or fussing.

Then they made a cubby before heading outside to get wet and dirty in “Mudworld”.

The boys make the dam

The boys make the dam in Mudworld

Quick quick help me fix the walls

The dam walls start to break – but the little ones just look on delightedly as Hugamuga desperately tries to shore up the walls.

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The dam finally breaks

The dam breaks – success?!

Baths and lunch – what child eats Branston Pickle sandwiches?! And then Mum came and picked them up.

Drink up!

I'm just going to take a break...

They are Stepford Children – perfectly behaved. Cute. And they eat!

So what lesson could be learned?

Maybe all new mothers should spend a year nannying before giving birth?

Hmmm how low do we want the population rate to fall?

Ahh forget it. My two are gorgeous. I love them anyway just the way they are. Anyone for porridge?

No? Just me again.

House, TV

A grand design

12 Comments

Today I thought I’d write about my favourite television program of the week. Yes even more than Ramsey’s Kitchen Nightmares or Desperate Housewives, the show I most look forward to is Grand Designs… on ABC1 at 6.05pm on a Thursday… and there’s an earlier series shown on Tuesdays at 11.00am.

What I love about this show is the dreams that fuel it.

Kevin McLeod is the host and he can speak several European languages, an impressive addition to his passionate love for the subject and obvious regard for his subjects – both human and material.

Every episode Kevin follows the journeys of people who want to build their dream house. From modest budgets to magnificent, every design has vision and a story behind it. And no build is without its challenges.

We watched Tuesday’s episode yesterday of an Irish couple who were building an LA inspired mansion on a steeply sloping block. Today’s was of an English couple in Tuscany, lovingly restoring a derelict castle having coped with 4 years of Italian bureaucracy. One of my favourites was an older couple building a Roman inspired guesthouse in Southern Italy for just 19,000 pounds. Extraordinary and inspiring, and another of a couple who’d lived in a shed for over 13 years, who built this fantastic house out of wood – a bespoke kit home from Norway. It was beautiful.
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Bespoke is one of Kev’s favourite words. 🙂

Now we may never build our own home – in many ways I can’t think of anything worse – but watching these people turn their dreams into brick and wood and mortar is inspiring. It’s a program of hope. Maybe that’s why I love it so much. Great to watch such positive energy, to absorb it through our telly.

Everytime I watch this show I think “You know what? We should do this show in Australia.” I’d have like to have seen it done on the house opposite us for example or my cousin’s house… both amazing houses… and they must be the tip of the iceberg.

After all – building your own home is the Australian Dream.

The question is who would be the host – could there be another Kevin McCloud somewhere down under?

Fashion Victim, Hugamuga, School

Clothes maketh the school

11 Comments

Monday night and I’m at the Opus Concert, a concert put on by the Department of Education to celebrate musical excellence in our public schools. Hugamuga was in the Chorale and it was a fine concert.

Anyway I’m sitting there next to an older father who also has a daughter at Hugamuga’s school in his year. We do the polite how is your son/daughter finding the school and then it begins:

“Oh well I think they’re pretty slack on the uniform.”

St Trinians ex the Sun

“Mmmm?”
“Have you seen the girls? The skirts so short they look like hookers. Girls wearing stripey socks, I saw a girl smoking in public. It’s terrible. The school should be more strict.”
“And have you communicated this to the school?”

No. He hadn’t.

And there’s my point. Don’t whinge at me if you’re not prepared to do anything about it!
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I felt quite disgruntled.

Partly because I hate the no action thing but also because frankly I think he’s right. They could smarten up the uniform just by insisting on “proper” school shoes and dropping the polo shirts which just look slack. They could smarten it up just by insisting the kids actually wear it.

With one child now at a private school and the other at a public school the gulf between the pride in the uniform (and by extension the school) is very obvious. It even affects how I feel about the schools. I’m second guessing my decision to send Hugamuga public despite the sound academic reasons for doing so… and partly it’s because of the uniform.

Which is crazy.

But it does reflect the universal truth that first impressions count. We judge others on the state of their dress. Are his shoes clean? Does the tie clash with the shirt? Could she wear a shorter skirt? Lower cut top? Dowdier cardigan? Why would a school be any different?

Clothes maketh the man, and in this case, the school… and yes, I’m going to contact the school. Because I’m bolshy like that. 🙂

Introspection, Random, WA

Eighties flashback to Atlantis Marine Park

A recent post on The Worst From Perth made me laugh… and remember one of the first dates I went on with Groover.

We went up to Atlantis Marine Park to see the Dolphin show… It must have closed pretty soon after and the dolphins went to Underwater World – now AQWA. It was a pretty sad story actually because the dolphins had been caught in the wild. They had some babies. By the time the dolphin show thing stopped, they couldn’t reacclimatise so they went to Underwater World. And then, as we know just a few years ago the last three dolphins died mysteriously.

Anyway back to Atlantis Marine Park… there were all these limestone statues in a big circle and we had fun getting up close and personal with them…

Club Capricorn

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Club Capricorn

Okay, perhaps not the best look, but this was before we got really PC in the mid-nineties…

I always wondered what happened to them… and now I know thanks to TWOP!

Health

Always read the fine print

Do you read the fine print of medication your doctor prescribes?

Always?

To be honest I take no more than a cursory glance usually but when I was recently prescribed Celebrex for this weird numb toe that I’ve got well I thought I’d read the fine print. This was mainly because my doctor said “You’re not allergic to sulphur are you?” I don’t know why but that made me think – “what’s in this thing?!”

So I looked it up on Dr Google and discovered all manner of nasty side effects – the types of things that you hear advertised on American television ads for all those drugs they push.
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“This drug is great but causes this this and this to happen and don’t take it if you’re that that or that.” The type of advertising that makes me instantly think: “There’s no way I’d take that!”

So I read further and discovered that you shouldn’t take Celebrex if you are on cold and flu medication, which of course I have been given this nasty cold that I have. But it doesn’t say how long you have to wait until you’re clear of the effects of the cold tablets. I figure it can’t be much more than 8 hours given that the effect is supposed to wear off after 4… so I ring a pharmacist and check and I’m good to go.

Now probably I wouldn’t have died or anything but given the list of possible nasty side effects when you take this drug on its own – I’m glad I checked the fine print.

Extracurricular, Family

OMG! I forgot it was Mother’s Day!

10 Comments

Well not that it was Mother’s Day. Of course I remembered it was Mother’s Day and was looking forward to breakfast in bed and a day when the kids slaved after me. And I was planning to pop over to Mum’s with a bunch of flowers and have a cup of tea.

Goshen
This is my extreme Mum, sledding at Goshen, USA, earlier this year.

I was still feeling rather sorry for myself in bed nursing my cold when the call came.

“So we’ll see you at 12 for lunch?” says Dad.
“What?”
“Lunch at the club – your whole family – remember? I booked it ages ago?”
“… um… yes… okay we’ll be there.”
“Oh and don’t forget Groover’s mum.”
“Sure…” I say weakly falling back against the pillow.

“Is there something you want to tell me?” asks Groover.

Dad had booked us in to his club for lunch weeks ago. I’d forgotten. Hugamuga and Groover were going to football at 11.30am and we hadn’t told his mother that she was invited along too.
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I swung into action. Rang the coach – turned out Hugamuga wasn’t on the list for this weekend anyway – warned him that Groover wouldn’t be there to be a runner (the coach was okay with that). Groover rang his mum and told her to get her glad rags on – he was taking her to lunch.

And we were ready. Drugged up to the eyeballs in cold and flu tablets but dressed, made up, in the car.

It was a very pleasant lunch and thank goodness it all came together.

In the afternoon I was a “proper” mother and ironed my kids’ shirts for school. (Usually I make them do it themselves)

And it’s FYO dinner night at the Redsultana house tonight!

Because frankly my dears, while I could give a damn, I need to put my feet up. After all, it is mother’s day, remember?

PS: Is it Mother’s Day or Mothers’ Day? Some apostrophe help would be greatly appreciated. I originally wrote Mothers’ Day as it is a day for all Mothers right? But then it looked wrong and I thought well really you only have one mother (or two maybe if you’re a surrogate or adopted) so maybe it should be Mother’s Day… What do you think?

PPS: FYO = Find Your Own

Dippity, Parenting, School, Youtube

Are laptops for school children a good idea?

Homework

I’m sitting here with my daughter’s school laptop in bed (feeling crapola with a cold) as I write this so I’m aware that I’m being a bit hypocritical…

Here’s the thing. My daughter has gone to a new school this year. A school that insists that every child should use a laptop from Grade 5. Their argument is that we live in an age where computers and digital devices are a part of our lives and that we should make use of every tool we can to educate our children. And yes, I get that.

But since we’ve had this third computer in the house we barely see our 11 year old. It’s Youtube 24/7 – or until Groover goes mental because we’ve been shaped again. She doesn’t seem to read books anymore – it’s chapter after chapter of fan fiction.

We insist that she uses the computer in public and we’ve learned that you take the laptop away from her at bedtime – what I’m not seeing is a whole lot of homework done on the computer and given that, I wonder why the school doesn’t store the wretched things in the classroom. Do they really need to take them home?

The only good thing is that at least she’s not fighting with my son now over the second computer.

So here I am enjoying her MacBook interface on our wireless system (which doesn’t seem to work for my work laptop) and whinging.

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And part of it is my old fashioned sense of media. I want my child to enjoy books as books! Not fan fiction. Although, having said that if she was writing her own stories… well now, that would be different. And maybe endless reading of it will lead to writing her own…

In the meantime my darling Dipp has earned a merit award at school. So maybe the laptop isn’t the monster I make it out to be.

Oh, you ask, why do I have precious time on the new toy? Ah, she’s out on her brother’s bike getting some fresh air.

I asked her first!

Some parenting tips please! How do you manage computer time in your home?

Creative Commons License photo credit: Apollo-Jack

Health, Introspection

I’m FINE, thank you

11 Comments

SavannahOne of the speakers at a recent forum I attended was psychotherapist Jackie Furey. An entertaining speaker, I found her words touched me in ways I can’t explain… or maybe I can… what time of the month is it?

She talked about it being fine… in the way that when someone says “how are you?” You say: “Fine.”

Jackie says in psychotherapist-speak, fine means:

Fucked up
Insecure
Neurotic and
Emotional

Is she right?

Her message was that if you don’t do your feelings, they’ll do you. And I guess that’s what touched a nerve with me. I don’t think I have been doing my feelings and once a month – bang – they do me.

I’m teary, emotional, paranoid, despairing.

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Yesterday I noticed that my big toe on my left foot was numb… that weird feeling numb just before you get pins and needles – you know what I mean? I can feel the fuzziness go up the back of my leg and I think it ends in my neck. My toe has now been weirdly numb for two days.

Maybe it’s unconnected but somehow I wonder if my feelings are doing me. I’m off to the doctor tomorrow to check it out and maybe a chiropractor or osteopath as well.

Of course, Groover has been completely supportive… “Maybe you’ve got MS”, he says not helpfully, “…or Motor Neuron Disease… you never know it might be some sort of stroke…”

Thanks darling, just remember, you said “In sickness and in health”.

That should shut him up.

🙂

UPDATE: I’m fine. Hehe. Well, I probably have some swelling in the lower sacral part of my spine which is encroaching on a nerve so I’m going to try some antinflammatories and see if that works, do some physio or chiro, and if it’s not fixed in a couple of weeks do a cat scan to see if that gives us more clues as to what is going on. As well I’ve had full bloods taken in preparation for a general check up. The first for years. Am I a bloke?

In the meantime it’s just me and my fuzzy toe.

Current Affairs

And now for some real reality tv

Growing up in India would have its challenges I suspect. Especially if you have the misfortune of being dubbed a “good luck baby”.

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Extracurricular, NSW, Work

Why you shouldn’t criticise Fashion Week

5 Comments

my little black dressA couple of days ago I was in Sydney for a work shin-dig while Australian Fashion Week was on and I posted a slightly sarcastic post about what a fashionista I was… not.

I waved a trendy vermilion scarf at the fashion gods my friend, and the gods turned to look at me in my LBD and sighed.

That one is tempting fate, they said. And poof! They flicked a finger in my general direction.

The fashion gods give

Oblivious I sashayed downstairs to meet my fellow part-tay goers, enjoy a little pre-dinner drinkie, and hop on the bus.

I love your dress, some cooed and I felt pretty good about my outfit. The ultra-cute Lisa Ho number (okay from last season but I just love it), my S&M boots. I felt hot.

We had the canapes, the entree and a few beverages and I wandered upstairs to the ladies.

The fashion gods take away

Now I should point out that the dress is a little – tight – and despite my best efforts – control tops – it had been a bit of a struggle to zip up.

So I sit down and breathe out and as I do, I feel something give.

A certain tightness across the torso had lessened.
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I bring my hand behind my back and realise the horrible truth:

The zip had split. Completely.

A wardrobe malfunction of mammoth proportions and most of the evening to go.

How I survived

Luckily that vermilion scarf I’d waved earlier in the evening was draped, shawl-like, around my shoulders. I pulled it down to cover the zip and walked carefully back to my table. Luckily our table was against the wall and I was able to slip my leather jacket over my dress without exposing my back to an audience. But dancing later? No. I don’t think so.

The Lesson

And that is why I say, my friends, you must never diss the fashion gods or any festival they might choose to support. They have the power to use fashion against you!

Fashion week? A brilliant event for all. That’s what I say… now.

Sydney Harbour

The confident smile of someone who doesn’t realise her zip is about to leave the party without her.