I think this must be an awkward age in girls, maybe not awkward, just very, very, girly.

Poss recently hit the magic double digits. We were actually a little bit concerned about her prior to this. She seemed all together too naive. Too interested in all things girly. A bit ditsy??? NOPE. It turns out that when you have a house full of ten-year-old girls it becomes evident that they are all like it. Surely I was not like this at ten??

I’ve been through ten with a boy and sure, he was annoying, smelly, whiny, all of that. Nothing like this though. Rhubarb is a thinker. He’s analytical, he’s a touch too dry and sarcastic, but that’s always been his way. He likes sci-fi and fantasy so he fits right on in with his two nerdy parental figures (here I point out that one is way more nerdy than the other). He’s just reasonably easy to get along with. He’s had his moments over the years but by ten – sorted, fine. He’s mostly a reasonable human being and I get along with him – mostly.

Poss though, gee. She’s very clever and she too has a good sense of humour. (She has a unique and unfortunate lack of empathy but we’re working on that and that’s just her really). It’s the girly stuff that gets me. When you see ten-year-old girls en masse it’s scary. The squeal. They giggle. They talk about oh so silly things. They dress each other in ridiculous outfits. I surely was never like this. Apart from being a touch annoying, oh my god I’m scared.

She’s becoming something. You can see it bubbling just below the surface. I mean, she’s always been a girl. She’s always liked pretty things and been sweet and just thoroughly different from Rhubarb. This is not just that. She’s developing a more adult sense of her femaleness. It’s in a childlike form. But it’s there. She’s growing up. *sniff* I’m scared about where this is going. She’s going to be there very soon. In the scary land of female puberty.

She told me just the other day that one of her school friends got her period. I tried not to react. I told her that was very early. I was secretly panicking. It will be a while before she has to go through that but CRAP. I’m way not ready for this. Despite, as I previously stated, being sure that I was never like this at ten. I do remember what I was like at 12
and 13
and 14.
OMFG. Kill me now.

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about this topic. I should explain.

We are renting. We used to have a house, which the bank owned and we were supposedly paying off, but we sold it and moved overseas for fourteen months, spending much of our equity in the process. Yes, we know, it was silly and impulsive and whatever. It was great for us as a family and great for our kids and we’re okay with it so, okay.

Anyway, we’re renting and our landlord recently sent around surveyors to measure the block of land and all that stuff that they do. We spoke to him at that stage and he said it was nothing to worry about. Well, a few months later (of course) we get a letter in the mail from the council, just letting us know as a resident of ———- Street, that there is a proposed development at Number…… hang on a sec, that’s us! So, this time when we contact the landlord he tells us there’s still nothing to worry about. He won’t have the money for ages to carry out the development and “no, no, no, don’t worry” – that your lease is expiring we’ll just keep it month by month after that and I promise to give you two months notice. Well, we kinda trust him, kinda. He provided us a written contract to give us this much notice when the lease expires and we feel that he will and he’s a pretty chilled landlord so, okay, it’s a rental. We may be in a position to buy a new house when we get kicked out of this one, we may not but we’ll deal with it.

The thing is, I feel sad. It’s actually a lovely old house. Sure, the landlord did a seriously dodgy job of “renovating” it fairly recently and it needs redoing at some point. It needs rewiring. The previous tenants used it for growing very large amounts of marijuana and it needed some refitting just prior to us moving in so it’s had some dodgy history. The thing is though, it is a lovely old house. It still has some of the original features like the gorgeous, gorgeous ceilings and the little leadlight windows high in the side walls of some of the main rooms. It’s charming. I really disagree with demolishing houses just so you can split the land in half and build two new pieces of crap. I’m not saying I don’t like new houses. New houses, designed with some real integrity and a sense of the era in which we are currently living can be amazing. This is not what he wants to build. He wants to build pieces of hideous crap that he can sell on for a quick profit. It ruins the character of the area and it’s just crap.

So, he wants to build a piece of crap, and demolish this nice old house, fine. There’s a demand for it. The new houses will sell. It’s up to him. But I wonder about this house. As I’ve already mentioned, this house has had some dodgy history. I also believe, though, after having lived in it, that it must’ve had some marvelous history. It’s an old house. People have lived and loved and possibly died in this house. They have been happy and sad. What I feel most of all from it is an immense sense of the positive.

I’m not claiming that there is any tangible evidence of this, but as soon as I walked into the place. As soon as we walked into it, we both felt that it was a really positive place to be. I was around 28 weeks pregnant with Grub, we had been home in Oz for two weeks and were desperate to find a place to live. We weren’t so desperate to find somewhere, however, that we had been able to accept living in any of the shithole’s we had previously inspected. This place, though, just felt right. And it needed to feel really right. We were planning the homebirth of our beautiful Grub and I needed to know we were gonna have what felt like a home for me to give birth in.

We made the right choice. This house has been a really comfortable home. We had our amazing homebirth and our Grub began her life here. I really feel though, that beyond what my happy, insane family brings to the house. The house itself contains a sense of peace and comfort. A sense of calm and homeyness and happiness. What happens to all the positive energy contained within these walls when this house is flattened?

I think I came to thinking about this for selfish reasons. After Grub was born here, this place has become kinda sacred to our family. I feel sad about it’s impending demise. I’ve joked to Beefcake that I will request a few floorboards from the spot where Grub was born – buy them from the landlord if I have to (I actually wasn’t joking)- in an attempt to capture some of what is special about this house for us. I can’t save a little bit of every spot in the house though, (obviously) and it wouldn’t really help if I could. The sum of all the things this place is and has been over the many decades that it has stood on this land will still be lost when it is demolished.

I just really wonder. I’m sure we’ve all felt a sense of positive or negative energy upon entering a building or a space. If that is actually a thing, where will that thing go when this house is gone?

Yesterday Pudding had a make-up swimming lesson as he was sick for last weeks lesson. I was still in bed with mastitis so I didn’t go. Pudding refused to get in the pool. It wasn’t his usual swimming teacher and I think that freaked him out a bit, plus, he didn’t want to. Beefcake got really annoyed though because this stupid effing swimming teacher woman told him that he had to force Pudding to go in the water because “You can’t just let her have what she wants”. When Beefcake told her that, no, he wouldn’t force Pudding to go in the water if he didn’t want to, the annoying woman said “well you have to make her think it’s your idea”

WTF??! He’s three!

Don’t get me wrong, we don’t enjoy paying for swimming lessons that don’t get used, but will he be more positively disposed towards swimming if we force him kicking and screaming into the water? Aaahh, no.

On top of that, the other problem was of course that the woman insisted that Pudding was a girl and kept using female pronouns to refer to Pudding despite being repeatedly corrected. This pissed Beefcake off mightily. Pudding does get referred to as a girl fairly frequently. Apparently when he was tantying in the supermarket after the pool a couple next to Beefcake at the checkout were trying to decide his gender quite loudly.

It does annoy me a bit too. It’s not that we have a problem with him being called a girl (although sometimes it annoys Pudding) it’s that people automatically assume a child with long hair is a girl and seem to want to make such a fuss that we could dare to have a long-haired boy. He does have very “pretty” blue eyes though. Actually that’s another of my all time fave comments from strangers about my children: “Oh, it’s a boy, well you couldn’t call him handsome with those eyes. He’s more pretty”. Yes, I think he’s lovely but OMG how annoying can people be.

So:

This is what Pudding looked like before Daddy got fed up with him being called a girl.

Daddy decided that he could do it himself because cutting hair is easy and anyone can do it. Didn’t he do a great job?? Call him Brother Pudding.

Mummy used her phone to send her sister a pic and they both decided maybe it would be better if we put some product in it. Ummmmm, no.

Daddy took Pudding to the hairdresser and held him on his lap while Pudding told the hairdresser he hated her. The hairdresser told him she was making it longer each time she snipped (I think that was lovely of her) and Daddy had to promise junk food. Daddy had to pay $22 to finish ruining the way Mummy’s baby looks, but at least it’s kind of even now.

He looks so big. It’s scary and upsetting. My poor baby. I loved his wild and crazy locks.

My friend has this theory that Pudding’s hair was drawing wild and crazy vibes from the universe and that was what made him so um… vibrant. We’ll see, no change so far though!

On another topic, Rhubarb came to me to say goodnight last night and we had a great conversation. I am such a great parent, we have great open lines of communication. It went like this:
R: Mum, I just cut my toenails.
A: Wow, exciting news.
R: No. Mum, seriously, that’s not what I wanted to tell you.
A: Okay, what is it?
R: Well, I smelled my feet and they smell really salty (ey???) and disgusting, when did my feet start smelling like that?

Gee, that was worth taking seriously. I’m glad we had that conversation. I’m not sure what made Rhubarb think I would be interested, but I was not. I told him it was all part of getting older. He said he hopes his feet don’t end up like Beefcake’s.

Okay, this is a bit of a rant. It’s a loving rant but still a rant. My Beefcake, my beautiful, talented, intelligent Beefcake is actually a complete moron. He has a very good friend. I should say we have a friend but really, this guy is kind of annoying and he’s really been Beefcake’s friend for a long time. He lives far away in a European country with his lovely European wife and he is, like Beefcake, an unashamed nerd.

We were lucky enough to spend some time with them as a family, in said European country, last year and the nerds formulated a plan. Yes the idiots, I mean nerds, decided that, as they are both rather, full-figured gentlemen, they could show the world a thing or two. You see, lovely European wife and I had mentioned to two fuller-figured gentlemen that they could perhaps do with losing some weight and were in negotiations with them as to how this should happen when they came up with a brilliant idea. A documentary. A documentary made by them and entitled “Two fat bastards can climb Mt Everest”.

Now, fine, it sounds like an okay gimmick, could be done. However, their plan??? No training. Maybe a few practice runs at the local rock climbing wall, some laps around the block.

Seriously.

My moron of a husband and his brainless friend believe that two out of shape, middle-aged men can climb Mt Everest and not only survive but reach the summit. You may think they were joking. They were not. Beefcake has had a year to reassess his standpoint on this issue but no, he stands firm. He could do it, if he wanted, it would be easy. He’s a moron. But it’s alright, he’s way too lazy to do it anyway.

He just found out last week that his nerdy companion has lost all of his weight and is fighting fit. Plan ruined.

Beefcake stands firm, because, you know, he knows everything.

I have mastitis.

I woke up this morning in agony. I have a fever.

I’m writing this with one hand, lying in bed.

Precious Grub has been feeding all day. This should help but it’s agony.

I feel as though I’m dying.

Pudding watched Playschool this morning.

Playschool is good. I don’t mind it really. My kids have all been mesmerised by it. It’s not the first time that Pudding has watched it. Oh no, not by a long shot. I won’t pretend to be the Mummy who never turns on the t.v. just so she can get five minutes of something done. He has watched t.v. before and he’ll do it again. I digress, sorry, had to divest myself of that guilt.

Today on Playschool, they made freshly squeezed fruit juice. How lovely. I happened to be on the phone to my sister while this occurred but I was watching in a detached sort of way as they added a selection of fruit and proceeded to decorate the different juice glasses, with peel and fruit and such, to represent animals. Oh how lovely.

Beefcake was dressing Pudding for we were heading out and he made sure to interrupt my phone call to tell me that Pudding wanted to make juice. I nodded, didn’t really take it in, whatever. Pudding was persistent, however and as we proceeded on our errands, repeatedly reminded us that he wanted to make juice.

Now, this is where it gets weird, Beefcake and I, fully went out of our way to see if we could buy a juicer. We were just about to walk to the checkout of BIG W with one when I pointed out that my low carbyness and his *ahem* Beffcakeyness, really meant that the juicer would not get used. Really, at all. So, we didn’t buy the juicer, but wow, we really suck at the whole saying no thing. We’re going to have to work on it.

Anyway, you can imagine how well Pudding responded, because, you know, he is not going through the most horrendously awful threeishness that has ever been witnessed on Earth, ever, really. He doesn’t like to tanty. He’s calm and rational. He can be reasoned with. He doesn’t want to thrust him hips and thrash about screaming while being strapped into his carseat. He would balk at the thought of screaming at the top of his lungs all the way home and (actually my heart breaks a little bit at this) saying over and over “cuddle me Mummy, cuddle me”. He certainly wouldn’t continue to tanty on the floor of the car upon our arrival at home and then progress to the front door and stay there. Scrteaming. For half an hour. NO.

We’re terrible parents, Beefcake had urgent work to do and sat down at his laptop. I went into the backyard and hung out some washing. From out there it sounded as though he was being maimed, or possibly kidnapped. I was able to retrieve him after a while and we mushed fruit through the food processor then strained it labouriously. How lovely.

to be unable to keep your house even remotely habitable. To not be able to muster the energy to do something about it despite being well aware of and duly frustrated by lack of habitability?

I have some ishoooooos with cleanliness, I’ll admit. I do prefer my house to be a certain way, you know, to be able to see the floor, to have a sofa which is not encrusted with unidentifiable globs of, well, who knows?

Now, I know, I have a four-month-old baby who likes to be held against my body for about 19 hours out of every day. I have a three-year-old who seems to be compulsively messy. (Just to give an example, we have those letter magnets on the fridge and every day, WITHOUT FAIL, he heads over and sweeps them onto the floor, nods his head and with a satisfied look and turns to find another area of the house he can destroy. I leave them on the floor now.) I have a ten-year-old with a very strong sense of the orderly, it’s just that her sense of what is orderly may involve laying out everything she will require for school the next day on the lounge room floor – and leaving it there - so that she can check it before she goes to school in the morning! I have a twelve-year-old who….well, he’s just smelly.

To top all that off, I have a pelvis. A pelvis which decided to pack it in on pregnancy #3 and has left me in pain and with limited mobility pretty much ever since, actually, I was starting to get better around the time Pudding turned 2 – and then I fell pregnant again, so, yeah, I have to limit my activity. Fine.

On paper, I have a really good case for being a lazy slack-arse. But I have the gene, you know, the superwoman gene. The one which causes a part of my brain to malfunction on a daily basis as I sit amongst the filth and detritus left by my children (and Beefcake). My malfunctioning brain cannot shake the “bad mother” feeling and so I sit and I feel bad and I can’t be bothered to fix it (maybe scrape some of it into a pile in the corner) and feel bad.

Today, though, I think I’ve hit on what the problem is. You see, my darling Beefcake works from home. He has done ever since we returned to the land of oz from far away in March. It’s good, in it’s way. He sees more of the kids, he helps out with things like the grocery shopping because – pelvis. BUT, he makes mess. He makes a horrendous mess, and I , because he is here do less. You see, when he was at work I had to play the good housewife, so that he would return to a beautifully preened nest filled with beautifully preened babies after spending his day working to provide for us. His being here not only adds more mess, but he has taken away my sense of direction. Robbed me of my mission to trick him into thinking I am perfect and AMAZING. Cos he’s here and he sees it all. There is no chance to do the mad clean-up in the last half-hour before he gets home, and frankly there’s no motivation to do it.

So, I sit and feel bad.

Ahhhhhh, much better, I knew it was all his fault.