Co-Op

We are a co sleeping, attachment parenting type of team, me and my wife. I didn’t know what these words were until Claire told me, so I didn’t even realise parents could be pigeon holed into genres until recently. Knowing what we are, I’m happy with it.

For the majority of Neds career as a son, we’ve been running a deal – the deal being that he has a cot in our room, and he sleeps in it, but it he’s restless, Ned gets to sleep in our bed, where he can get fed by Claire every four hours or so, and stick his feet in my face, while we get to be uncomfortable. The deal hasn’t been the best we could’ve agreed upon in my opinion – I sometimes get the feeling Ned gets more out of it than we do, to be honest.

Still, all good things must come to an end – the ‘end’ being the fact that I managed to grump and sweat through the assembly and completion of his bed. We have begin to gradually ease him into bedroom sleeping, and his first attempt (his afternoon nap) went surprisingly well. We’re easing him into it, so his first night he was in his room for about 75% of the night, then he came back into ours when we woke up.

Obviously, Ned sensed that something was up – when he turned left, he didn’t headbutt his dad, and when he rolled right, he was no longer getting a facefull of breast. This annoyed him so much that he decided to selfishly get a cold, knowing that his parents, because he had been really poorly before, would panic as the slightest hint of a chesty cough and he would get his prime bedding arrangement until the cold subsided.

So all in all, the beginnings of success, marred only slightly by the hidden intellect of a child who nears his 18th month on this planet. I’m impressed.

As a side note, I’m currently listening to the latest solo album by Rich Collins, and I like it a lot. Only parents will get this paragraph, and I imagine that it’s not just my wife who will be embarassed by this.

We’re going to the Zoo, Zoo, Zoo

Claire had managed to get last Sunday off. That, coupled with the fact that I’d managed to get Monday off meant that we’d created a weekend. To celebrate this, we took ourselves to the Zoo, bringing Ned because that’s the right thing to do when you are a parent.

Things started off well. I was given an ice lolly. This bears no relation to the rest of the blog, but I think it’s important to note that I managed to have an ice lolly before 10am. In your face, system.

Going to the Zoo on a school day was a genius decision – it meant that, upon arriving, there were exactly 20 cars parked (including ours) and one coach of school children. We effectively had a lot of the Zoo to ourselves at times.

To be honest, many of the animals you’d consider exciting – lions, monkeys or reptiles, for example, weren’t moving (lazy) meaning Ned wasn’t interested. We did manage to get front row seating to watch the penguins. Here is Ned  eagerly watching, wondering what the hell a penguin actually is.

Like all days out, we stopped for some lunch, pausing between mouthfuls to comment on how expensive it was because that’s what you do on a day out.

We also watched the camels while Claire dry heaved at them from a distance. Good lord does she hate Camels.

Though Ned wasn’t too interested in most of the animals, he did take great interest in the Goats, who were calm and relaxed enough to allow him to get really close, even though Ned went a bit ‘Mice and Men’ on one (exceptionally) patient goat.

The highlight for us was the giraffes. The lack of people in the zoo meant we had the whole section to ourselves. There is a walkway that enables you to walk into their shelter and see them face to face when they’re in there. It was this feature that enables us to have a silent, beautiful 5 minutes – Me, Claire, Ned and Giraffe. It’s one of those moments that rarely happens, and is short, but you never forget. Ned pretty much lost his mind at this point.

As a side note, it is also our wedding anniversary today. I’d like to personally congratulate the both of us for getting to another year, and can only hope my beautiful, wonderful, vastly more intelligent than me wife is ok with me referring to our anniversary as a side note.

Speech Level Up

Couple of things my son has learnt:

A few new words: ‘Tree’ ‘Two’ and ‘Wow’ – the late yet welcome arrival of the Sun, coupled with the lack of wet grass has enabled us to take Ned outside more. Claire has been saying ‘Tree’ to him a lot – why, I don’t know. Maybe she likes trees, maybe she’s near trees a lot when they go. Regardless of the reason, repitition, the key learning method that should be applied when trying to teach any 1 year old who doesn’t care what you’re trying to do, has worked. Upon approaching a tree, Ned will inevitably, give it a hearty pat on the bark and remark ‘Tree’ to anyone within earshot whether they want to be stated the obvious or not.

‘Wow’ is something that was inadvertently drilled into him via repitition as well. In an attempt to keep him interested for more that 5 seconds in, well, anything, I started exclaiming how amazing it was by a loud intake of breath, followed by a ‘WOW!’ – this would keep Ned interested. The side effect of this is that now, when he sees something new, or something he likes (such as Bubbles) he will exclaim ‘WOW!’ while shaking his fists in excitement. Last weekend, we went to a park, where there were lots of trees. Ned loudly exclaimed ‘WOW! Tree!’ Which I’m noting down as his first sentence.

‘Two’ is a combination of him picking one number out of ten he finds amusing, and endless episodes of Numtums. Ned loves Numtums. He really does.

I’m not so fussed.

Summer Breeze

As most in the UK will agree with, Spring took a year off, leaving most of us with an extended Winter including highlights such as more snow than anyone wanted, more rain than anyone needed, and more parents despairing at being stuck indoors than anyone will care to remember.

Then, as of last week, things began to change, a sort of spring/summer amalgamation has begun to form (I will call it Sprummer). It’s sunny, but not THAT sunny. It’s warm, but not quite warm enough. But luckily, the weather has been at an acceptable enough level that we can finally plonk Ned outside.

Don’t get me wrong, Neds been out a lot – out for walks, out in the snow, out and about, out on the pull (last one is a lie) but Last week really was the first time he’s been ‘Out’ to properly play, and not had to wear a hat, jumper, coat and gloves.

It’s been brilliant. watching him potter about our garden is truly a joy to watch – he struts about, picks up mud, walks over flower beds and even falls into bushes – all the things you want a dangerously mobile boy to do. This weekend, Claire was working as usual, leaving me and him alone. We spent the majority of it in the garden, Ned spent a lot of the time picking up huge chunks of dry mud and delivering them to me, like dirty offerings to his Dad God. We even brought out the bubble machine, and if there’s one thing my son loves more than mud, it’s bubbles. Pop (Or ‘Pap’, as he pronounces) is one of the words Ned uses in correct association with an action, so we spent a long time ‘Papping’ bubbles together. We took a stroll to the shops, only pausing every 5 steps to pick up all and any Daisies that were growing in everyones front garden.

On Sunday, me and Ned went over my parents as usual, the addition of the lovely weather meant that we could not only go to a hardware store (which had an entire streets worth of outdoor playhouses, meaning Ned became the Mayor of babytown for a while) but we also could run around their back garden, which included activities including pushing Ned around at dangerously high speeds in a Wheelbarrow, watching my son throw leaves into the  pond, desperately pulling him away before he fell in the pond, and deftly removing all fist size rocks from his grasp every time he picked one up.

What I’m basically saying is the Sun is amazing, and as someone who hates being hot, and who prefers the snow, even I can sit back (Sweating profusely) while proudly watching my son trying to eat a rock as big as his head.

Summers arriving guys, rejoice.

First Year Anniversary

Today offically marks the first anniversary of my first post on this blog – to be perfectly accurate, technically the anniversary of the blog would have been yesterday, as it was created with no content on the 9th, but It’s probably better to use this day instead.

So, with a year done on the blog, what is there to talk about? what have I discovered? well, as anyone who has been reading this blog for a while will know, I like lists, so:

- My son changes almost daily – some of the stories I have written in the past, looking back on now, I imagine are almost unbelievable to any non parents. Some even read like they’ve been lifted from some sort of terrifying tv series about the dangers of parenting. I assure you it isn’t, and according to other parents I’ve spoken to, it’s on par if not tamer than other experiences.

- Parenting is HARD. I mean, really, REALLY Hard. I don’t think I’m quite getting the point across how hard it can be if you’re unprepared. Claire read a ton of stuff about parenting, and was failry clued up on the things to expect. Even now she checks online regularly to see if the slightest quirk in our son is normal. I wished I had read at least a few things instead of ‘winging it’ – it may have made the first few months a little less terrifying.

- Parenting is SCARY. Genuinely terrifying at times, I think back to the time Ned locked me out of the car and think to myself – what would have happened if he didn’t accidentally unlock the car? what if he dropped the keys? what if he started choking on them? what if he got our of his seat, started the car and drove off? I can’t bear to think of it much because it makes my stomach turn. I think about recently, when a diagnosed flu by a doctor turned out to be a chest infection that had our son on breathing apparatus, and could’ve had Ned being tube fed. I think of how helpless I felt then and its at those moments, you really understand what it’s like to love something so much you’d rather anything happen to you than him.

- Parenting is BRILLIANT. An Honestly, Undeniably amazing experience. When Ned first gave me a kiss (It was disgusting, and his nose was running), when Ned said ‘Dada’, when he first walked, crawled, when he first said ‘Clock’ (Which still sounds like ‘Cock’) – when all these things happened individually I thought to myself ‘there’s no way life can get better than this’ – but he continues to amaze me every day. Watching him grow and develop, the way he laughs, or plays, or curiously examines something new – it’s all fascinating to see, and in the back of my mind I think to myself ‘I did that’ or ‘That’s my Wifes handiwork, that’

- On the subject of my wife, I have learnt that she is more amazing than I have ever given her credit for. Before Ned arrived, she was already a pillar of strength that I could rely on – someone who was always there to soothe any worries I had. Post baby, she has become even stronger. Anyone who can raise a child that still gets up every few hours in the night, still breastfeeds, still never sits still and is probably only going to increase in energy levels deserves anyones respect. I love her, and I literally wouldn’t be writing this if it wasn’t for her.

- I have learnt that you learn how to be a parent simply through time – as a dad, you are completely useless to begin with. There are very few on this planet that are naturals. But, from the first awkward nappy change to a year later where you’re practically doing it while you’re watching TV – if you stop for a minute, take a step back and actually see how far you’ve progressed as a person, you see that you’re not doing a bad job at all in the grand scheme of things.

So, in conclusion, Parenting has been the scariest, proudest, stressful, happiest time of my life so far, and if it continues like this, it’s only going to get better.

So, what’s next? originally, this blog was put up in my ongoing quest to make Claire laugh. It was never really the plan to be public domain, though it’s great that it is. It was also the plan to do it for a year, and see how I feel after that. I think I’ll take a week off, recharge the batteries, but I’ll be back the week after, business as usual.

So thanks – thanks for sticking with me these past 365 days everyone, It’s been fun. Talk soon.

Fear Itself

Fear is a great and terrible thing.

Take for example, my fear of spiders. If you had a tiny insect with 6 legs, I would barely register it’s presence. Seven legs, I may look at it, wonder at the odd number of limbs it possesses, and continue with my day.

Eight legs, however, reduces me to a fear paralysed child that only takes his eye off the monstrosity to find a glass. Or a rolled up magazine. Or a shotgun. Or anything that is going to put distance and safety between me and it.

A perfect example of this would be that a couple of months ago, I woke up normal time (5-6am, thanks son) and stepped into the shower. A daily occurence. Reaching to the dial to turn the shower on, I noticed a spider, perched atop the shower head like a tiny gargoyle, only instead of stone it was made of evil.

I recoiled in horror. The fact i had been a foot away from it was enough to make me feel physically sick. I broke out in a sweat, and was temporarilly paralysed by fear. I was also naked, meaning that visually, the spider was probably as terrified of me as I was of him.

It took about 20 minutes to dispose of that one, and the rest of the day involved me twitching and looking around in a blind panic every time I felt something, or thought I saw something out of the corner of my eye. I suppose this is why things like this are an irrational fear.

I’m talking about fear because last weekend, my son developed one.

Ned has been scared of things in the past – The Whale on ‘Baby Jake’ or the shapes on ‘Mr Maker’ are the two most obvious ones that spring to my mind (though the Shapes no longer pose a threat to him – I do still find them unsettling, however)

This fear though, is something that does make me sad, because up until recently, it was something he truely loved.

Bath times are something that Ned adores – simply running the taps made him tense with excitement. He’d spend ages in there, and removing him caused him to cry and try to jump back in.

At my parents on Saturday, Claire was working late, so Myself and my mum decided to give him a bath and get him ready for bed so Claire wouldn’t have to when she got home.

The bath was made ankle deep and filled with a few toys (a boat and a few balls, if you’re really interested) Ned was stripped down and lowered in. Then, if happened.

He began to cry, tears rolled down his cheek as my mum picked him up, wrapping him in a towel. I checked the water, it was fine. Lowering him near the bath only created more tears. It was only after redressing him and staying the hell away from the bath did Ned return to normal. He looked haunted, like a Vietnam Vet.

The other day, we tried again the bathe him with exactly the same results, thus confirming my suspicions – Ned was now afraid of the bath (or being clean, I’m not sure yet)

Checking online revealed that this is a very common occurence in young kids, and that they eventually get over it. It’s still a shame though, as up until last week, bath times were in his top ten of things to do (which is a very elite list, including things such as standing on books, eating bolognese and Claires breasts)

I guess a common solution to better understand the fears is to google them – I know it helped me, knowing that our son wasn’t just being odd – in fact, there’s millions of odd kids out there that decide that one day, they’re just going to be terrified of the bath. We’ll just have to ride it out for now and become masters of the sponge bath until he decides he’s no longer scared.

It is odd though, but then again, so is being naked, paralysed in fear by an arachnid at 27 years old I guess.

Next week Tuesday is officially the first anniversary of the blog – wow, that came quick, so expect cake and some sort of party.

Don’t, actually. It’s a blog. What’s wrong with you?

Ned fashion

Ned is a lot better now -Thanks to all who sent messages.

Today, I will be showcasing a handful of pieces from the Ned Packer clothing collection, modeled by the man himself.

Here we see Ned modelling the new spring ‘Ballet Class’ range. Sporting borrowed leggings (gifted to him some weeks ago due to nappy leakage) combined with a baggy long sleeve band T-Shirt. Perfect for slouching about the house or perfecting those squat thrusts.

Pictured here in a more reflective pose, we see Ned attired in his ‘Ready for college’ look. This is a standard look across the Ned range – brown cords and something stripey. In fact, Neds entire wardrobe is 80% stripes. Good lord his mother loves stripes.

This is taken from the ‘All in one, all for fun’ range. Note the onesie coat offers extended protection from the dangers of after rain muddy grass, but sadly doesn’t extend the protection to the face, hence the David Bowie style of natural face paint seen in the image.

Here we see Ned showing off the ‘Just because it’s March doesn’t mean Christmas is over’ Bed time wear, posing casually while brushing his teeth – also proudly displaying his multitasking skills.

Proudly modelling his ‘Hiking is serious business’ range, We see Ned here bravely striding through the elements buffeting his thick coat and causing his bobble to wobble in the breeze. Note the bag nonchalantly slung over his shoulders, as if he doesn’t even know it’s there (he doesn’t)

And that’s it for this week – I now have a four day holiday. God bless Easter (at least I think it’s him we’re thanking)

Talk next week.