Saturday, April 28, 2012

Hannah (Banana, not Montana)

I went back to bed for a rest at lunchtime, being a bit tired after driving Hannah to the airport the previous night (four hour round trip plus stopping time at the airport, arriving home just after midnight).  As usual I had about 3 minutes and 45 seconds of peace before someone came to join me.

Em: What are you doing Mummy?
Me: I'm just trying to have a little sleep sweety.
Em: I need to has a sleep too.
Me: Why don't you go and watch your DVD with daddy?
Em: No, I doesn't got to watch that DVD.
Me: Why not?
Em: I don't like it! I need to have a little sleep, like you Mummy.
(gets up into the bed with much grunting, kicking, shaking the bed etc.  Settles down under covers next to me. Pause, for about 5 seconds).
Em: Why is you tired Mummy?
Me: I had to drive Hannah to the airport last night, and it was a long way so I didn't get home till really late.
Em: Hannah was knocking at the door this morning?
Me: No, that was the courier man.  He had a parcel for Krisia and Sarah in the front house.
Em: Oh.  Where is Hannah? Is she in her bed?
Me: No, she's on an aeroplane.  She's probably nearly in Hong Kong by now.
Em: But why is she in Honko? She needs to be in her room!
Me: No, remember, Hannah has gone back to England now.
Em: But why?
Me: That's her home, it's where she lives.
Em: But I like her!
Me: I know Em, she's going to try to come back and see us again soon, but she lives in England. That's where her mummy and daddy and sisters are.
Em: Hmmph. (gets off the bed and stomps towards the door) She doesn't got to live in Ingerland. Her bed is in her room in Raglan.  She lives in RAGLAN, NOT INGERLAND!

So, Hannah, you've been told!  It does remind me of when we were leaving England to return to New Zealand, and on being told the news, Hannah's little sister Freya said "Well I think that's a rubbish idea!"  Obviously, the MacDoualls need to move here...

Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Imaginary Sibling

For a long time Ember has been talking about 'my green house'.  It's a convenient little device she uses for things such as:

Em: I had a chocolate egg!
Me: Yum, lucky you.  Did you save me any?
Em: (pause) Yep, I got one for you at my green house.

There are all sorts of things at Ember's green house including babies, dogs, cats, lollies (sweets), cars and aeroplanes.  But the most recent addition to the green house is Ember's big sister, Alicia.  I should point out at this point that Ember is an only child, and I don't know anyone called Alicia, nor can I think of any stories we read or shows she watches that have an 'Alicia' in them.  I can't remember the first context in which Alicia cropped up, but she has occurred in a few conversations now, entirely self-prompted by Ember.
Me: Who's Alicia?
Em: My sister.
Me: I didn't think you had a sister.
Em: Yep, I does, she lives at my green house.
Me: Where did you hear the name Alicia from?
Em: From my sister.
Me: Yes, but where else? Do you know someone else called Alicia? Is there someone at Preschool called Alicia?
Em: Nope.
Me: Where did you get Alicia from then?
Em: From my work. My sister, Alicia.
Me: How old is your sister?
Em: Um. Five.
Me: Does she go to school?
Em: Yep, she goes to Raglan Claba School*
Me: Well where does she live?
Em: In my green house.  She's at my green house now.  We got a cat and a dog, we got two dogs, the girl dog is nice and the boy dog is naughty. The girl dog is called Mella and the boy dog is called Robot.
Me: What about the cat?
Em: The cat is nice. Her name is Flower.

*We live in Raglan, and the Raglan Club has a car the same as ours.  I suspect this is the origin of Alicia's school!

Alicia has come up a few times now, and each time I get the same response to age, school, etc.  I suppose if you can have an invisible friend, why not an invisible sibling?!


Here are a couple of other recent Emberisms worth a mention:

Ember making her two toy cows 'talking' to each other:
Cow 1: I got to go poos
Cow 2: No you doesn't, cows don't do poos, they do milk!

In the bath (playing with a plastic seahorse after having her hair treated for lice (again)):
Em: When I was a baby seahorse, I eated some nitties and they made me get all yucky and I was a pink seahorse.  But I was a green seahorse and the nitties made me yucky and turn pink.  But then the fairy come and she turn me back into a green seahorse again!

Saturday, April 14, 2012

A Very Dangerous Spoon

Ember and I were having breakfast in the lounge this morning.  At her request, Ember was having "Seventy rice bubbles with too much milk" sitting in her Winnie the Pooh chair which has a little table attached.  I sat down on the couch behind her, happening to find another teaspoon nestled under a cushion, so I put it next to Ember's chair so I'd remember to take it out to the kitchen.

Em: (finding the other spoon) Who is this spoon?
Me: No-ones
Em: But whose is it? Who is using it?
Me: Nobody, it's a spare one I found on the couch.
Em: Shall I use it?
Me: If you like.
Em:  Ok, I will use this spoon and you can put this one (her spoon) on the couch.
Me: Ok
Em: But be careful, that spoon's been chewed with Ember breath.
Me: What?
Em: I was just using it for my rice bubbles so it's got Ember breath on it.  Don't touch the breath Mummy!

Friday, April 13, 2012

Career goals...

For a while now Ember has said she wants to be a doctor when she grows up.  This has mostly been since her own hospital experiences, and mostly because she wants 'a cool eye machine like Dr Rosser'.  Last time someone asked her what she wanted to be when she grew up she replied "A doctor and a tiger."  Occasionally it has been teacher, which I blame on Nana Jay.

The other day though, she came out with something completely out of the blue on her own when we were sitting in the car waiting for Simon.

Em: When I grows up, I doesn't want to be a doctor any more Mummy.
Me: Oh, ok.  What do you think you want to be instead?
Em: Um, a mummy!
Me: That's a nice idea.  How many children are you going to have?
Em: Um, five!
Me: Boys or girls?
Em: Both.
Me: How many of each are you going to have?
Em: Um, five!
Me: So you're going to have five girls and five boys?
Em: Yep.
Me: So you're going to have ten children all together?
Em: Um, yep!
Me: What are their names going to be?
Em: Robot. And Rosie. Robot's a boy and Rosie's a girl.  And they is friends.  Robot is nice to Rosie.
Me: Ok, what about the others?

With a bit of humming and haa-ing, she eventually came up with the following list of names, entirely on her own - the girls' names were Rosie, Flower, Mella, Maida and Cake, and the boys' names were Robot, Porridge, Roast Beef, Robot Again and Bed.

I think she's going to be very busy!

Warning - contains toilet talk!

Ember toilet-trained a little later than some of her peers, partly because she just didn't show any signs of readiness and partly because she had a pretty major illness in September last year, which I haven't blogged about yet, but might another time.  Anyway, a little while ago I decided enough was enough and while changing Ember's nappy I said "Ugh, that's it! No more nappies!"  Ember looked at me and said "Are there no more nappies Mummy?"  "Uh, yeah, that's right, there are no more nappies." I replied.  "So do you want to put on some knickers?"  I held my breath but she just said "Yep, ok!".

We had accidents all that day, and a couple the next, but with a combination of over-the-top wees celebrations, and jelly bean bribery, by day three she was an expert and we've really had no puddles since.  However, "number twos" have been much more of a struggle.  Like many kids, the idea of sitting on the loo for longer than necessary and putting in the effort required for "twos" didn't appeal to Ember, so she got in the habit of waiting till bedtime when she had a night nappy on.  The added bonus of this (for her) was that once stories were read, the calendar day was 'ticked' and the other sleep delaying tactics exhausted (pun intended), she could then summon an unwilling parent with a cry of 'Mummy, I've got poos!"

Speaking of bribery, there was a great moment in the FourSquare when we were buying a bag of jelly beans as reward for going to the toilet.  A lady behind us in the queue was talking to Ember and said "Ohh, they look nice, can I have one?"  Ember laughed and grabbed them back, saying "no!".  The lady said "They look yummy - what are they?" Ember replied "Poos and wees lollies" which both puzzled and amused all onlookers!

Since bribery worked so well in the initial stages, I've been trying to convince Em to complete her toilet training by promising to buy her the Scooby Doo toy she was desperate to have in a shop a few weeks ago, if she can do poos in the toilet all the time.  We had a couple of successes, and I think at one point she asked "Can I have a Scooby Doo now?"  My reply was something like "Only when there are no more poos in your nappy."  Apparently I should have been more specific as shortly after that she stopped going altogether and lasted nearly a week, despite twice-a-day doses of lactulose for the last three days.  I finally said to her "Please just go poos Ember, you're going to have a really sore tummy!  I don't care if you go on the potty or in your nappy, just go!"  She looked at me all confused and said "But you said poos in nappies wasn't allowed" and I felt like the worst mother in the world!  At least the 'drought was broken' after that.

Anyway, all of that is leading up to a little conversation we had last night, after I came in to change the second nappy of the evening.  Quite often Ember wants something to eat in bed (a habit we accidentally got into and haven't been able to break) and this evening she said to me.

Em: When you finished getting away the poos, you can go and wash your hands and get me a sandwich.

Yes Ma'am!

Tuesday, April 10, 2012

Man's best... Investment?

Ember is crazy about animals, particularly dogs and cats. Whenever we come across people walking their dogs (which is fairly regularly as we live by the beach) she wants to stop and say hello. After constant pleading to "be gentle" with our cat, who joined the family when Ember was two, Em refers to patting an animal as "gentling". It's a nice verb :) I have also been reinforcing with Ember that she can't just go running up to dogs, she has to find out who the owner is and ask them if she can pat (gentle) their dog.

Yesterday while wandering through town, we saw a couple sitting outside a cafe with a cocker spaniel.
Em: Can I gentle your dog?
Man: Yes, he's lovely and soft isn't he?
Em: What's his name?
Man: Cesky, see (shows her the dog's collar) That says "Cesky"
Em: Where did you get him from?
Man: From the pet shop.
Em: What did you pay for him?
Man: (laughing) About $400 dollars. That's a lot isn't it? (to me) She asks all the right questions doesn't she?!

Quote of the day

Ember: (struggling to climb off my lap) Mummy I can't get down coz I got these crazy pants on!

She is wearing a skirt.

Thursday, April 5, 2012

Best Frenemies

Ember has a best buddy at creche called Aidan.  They became fast friends at Toddlers, but Aidan is a couple of months older so moved up to Preschool earlier than Ember.  Absence seems to have 'made the heart grow fonder' in this instance at least, as now that Ember is at Preschool too, they are back to their old ways.  There is occasional heart break when they are being too silly together and have to be separated, but generally they play quite nicely.

However, being three, there is always occasion for tears, and one such occasion happened yesterday.

Me: Did you have a good day at Preschool?
Em: (smiling and seeming fine) No! I had a bad day Mummy.
Me: Why, what happened?
Em: Aidan said "Poo poo bum bum"!
Me: Oh dear..!

I mentioned this to Yvette, one of the teachers, and apparently she had had a similar conversation with Ember earlier in the afternoon:

Em: Aidan said "poo poo bum bum" to me!
Yv: Well, you konw what to do. You need to say "Aidan, I don't like it when you call me that.  Please stop it."
Em: I did say and he won't stop, he keeps saying "poo poo bum bum" to me.
Yv:  Then maybe you need to go and find someone else to play with.
Em: But I want to play with Aidan!

Apparently the rest of the afternoon went something like this:
A: Poo poo bum bum!
Em: No, Aidan I don't like it!
A: Poo poo bum bum!
Em: (crys, runs away for a little while, comes back)
A: Poo poo bum bum!

Repeat, ad nauseum.

It's just lucky my Dad isn't still around as, hearing this story, the first thing he would say to Ember on seeing her would be "Poo poo bum bum"!

Know your place Mummy!

This would be quite a short post, but I need to provide some context for my non-New Zealand friends.  If you're a Kiwi, feel free to skip to the conversation ;)

In New Zealand we have three main supermarket chains - Pak 'n' Save, Countdown and New World  (until recently we had Foodtown as well, but I think they've all become Countdown now).  There are superette chains like 4Square as well, but those three are the main ones.  Pak 'n' Save, as it's name suggests, is all about low prices - they are big concrete warehouse type buildings and shopping there is generally a bit of a scrum. You have to pay for bags, bring your own bags, or dive for the cardboard boxes as the floor staff bring them out.  For UK friends, it's a bit like the Asda of New Zealand, but not as posh :)  Countdown and New World are more like Sainsburys - a bit of a nicer shopping experience and slightly greater choice (plus they pack your bags for you), but you pay a little more for the privilege.

So there's your context.  Anyway, Ember and I had taken Hannah in to the Hamilton bus station on Sunday and I decided to take the opportunity to go to the supermarket.

Em: Where are we going now Mummy?
Me: To the supermarket.
Em: But I don't want to go to the supermarket! That's not a good idea.
Me: We need to get some food and things.
Em: I will wait in the car.
Me: You can't wait in the car Em, I'll be a long time.
Em:  That's ok, I wait for a long time.
Me: You're not allowed to wait in the car by yourself for a long time.  You can choose which supermarket we go to if you like.  Should we go to Pak 'n' Save, New World or Countdown?
Em:  Um, well... Countdown is pretty amazing, but I think we have to go to Pak 'n' Save.

I'm not sure what she was implying... :)