Nursery fees

There’s been a lot of debate on this recently, some of it sensible and objective, most of it raging and irrational.

To listen to some people you’d think that nurseries were a new phenomenon, they’re not. Mill owners started them in the early 1800’s because it was a way of encouraging cheap labour (women) to work for them. I went to a nursery in the ‘60’s. Ok, they were far more informal in those days, usually self organised affairs where a group of mums would be given free access to a church hall and they’d all take turns apiece to look after the kids. As I recall, the downside of this arrangement was that, in lieu of a rental fee for the Church hall, we were all expected to attend Sunday school.

Parents have always needed nurseries in some form - if only to prevent them being driven insane by the incessant chatter of three year old's - and children have always needed them in order to develop the social skills that will be essential in a few years time when they start school. All that has really changed is the formality of the nursery and the degree of need of the parents.

In an ideal world women really would have a genuine choice to either work or stay at home and look after the kids. In reality most households now rely on two wages, they might not need two full-time working wages but the vast majority of women – and let’s face it the difficulties here are usually dumped on the women – have to earn a wage and, by definition, this means someone else looking after their children for at least a few hours each week.

The other more recent change is the amount of legislation now surrounding nurseries. These were all brought in for the right reasons but they all seem to be based on the idea that parents aren’t capable of distinguishing between a good and a bad nursery by themselves. So, in theory at least, all nurseries are now wonderful places for your children but, as a direct result of this legislation, are far more expensive.

Anyone who’s paid any attention to the nursery debate will have heard at least one person say “If you can’t afford to bring up your kids don’t have any!” 

In an ideal world we would all be able to sit down with a big bag of popcorn and watch the man who uttered this comment explain to his young, broody, wife how she can’t have a baby because interest rates are set to rise and the car needs new tyres. I could be wrong but I suspect it would be a blood and gore spectacle of epic proportions.

No, for the majority of couples, having a child is not a wholly rational decision driven by a spreadsheet and economic predictions, if it was I suspect London would now be a small village populated entirely by the gentry, all having to cook and clean for themselves because the poor had become extinct. Most of us enter parenthood well aware that we will be broke for at least a few years, in fact most people will go through a period in their lives when things aren’t going so well and a helping hand would be appreciated.

And after all, that’s all we’re talking about; a few years. Why should a couple’s entire life be affected by the fact that they can’t afford to get through the first few years of a child’s life without some help?

Which leads me on to another popular comment in this debate, namely “Why should I pay for other people’s children to go to nursery?”

One of the people who came out with this statement was Stephen Davies, of the Institute for Economic Affairs, which begs the question why is he still in a job as he patently doesn’t understand how tax works. Just for Mr Davies, let’s have a brief look at the concept of tax.

Most of us love the idea of good roads, fires that get put out before the entire town burns down, police that keep ourselves and our property vaguely safe, schools that produce roughly intelligent children, armed forces that give us a fighting chance of still living in our own country tomorrow and a health care system that tries its best to ensure we’re still breathing when the new day dawns.

People from the right of politics usually suggest that government and taxation shouldn’t be involved with these things and that we should all just pay for them directly, usually because they can afford to. They see little wrong with the idea that you should flash your credit card before the fireman turns on the water, primarily because they have every intention of owning one of more of the fire stations involved.

However, most of us wouldn’t be able to afford these basics by ourselves, so we all pay into the tax pot and take out of the pot dependant on need. Some of us contribute far more than we take out, some of us take out far more than we put in. Some people think that’s unfair, some think that it creates a more level playing field and a better and happier society, which ultimately benefits us all.

So when people say “Why should I pay for your child’s nursery place?” I ask why they think that I should pay for their children’s school place when I have no kids at school or why I should pay for their hospital stay when I’m perfectly healthy.

Surely, in any sane world, we would all accept that bringing up a young family is a short but financially taxing period in any couple’s lives and that is makes sense to help them out through these few, short, years? I think this is especially important when we’ve gone out of our way to manufacture a society that pretty much insists that women should work and labels those who stay at home to look after their children as somehow “unemployed” at best and “scroungers” at worst.

The last comment you always hear is “If it’s too expensive don’t work”, which once again appears to be the reflections of a person that doesn’t like to get too involved with thinking and who would probably be at the front of the queue accusing you of being a lazy scrounger if you ever did decide to take them up on the offer.

Yes, for some, work is just a mundane, drudgery, that - pay-cheque aside - has few if any redeeming features and if this is your situation I’d suggest that a five year break – if you can afford it – wouldn’t be a bad idea at all. However, for most of us work brings far more than just money and if you’ve just spent the last ten years fighting your way up the corporate ladder you are probably not entirely happy about the prospect of starting all over again in five years time – which is almost certainly what would happen.

If you want to build your career then the most you are realistically going to get away with is a year off work, followed by a few years of part-time work and then back full time until you croak or retire – whichever comes first. And that is if you have a very understanding and appreciative employer!

So it’s not really a question of being able to afford the nursery today, it’s a question of being forced to pay out more than you earn now in order to have any hope of a decent salary in the future.

It just seems an impossible situation; we complain that women are under-represented in the higher echelons of business and government but them give them the choice of look after your children or build a career - try to juggle the two and you’ll most probably be accused of being both a poor mother and a slacker at work.

The age at which children are going to nursery is a side effect of all this. There are now one and two year olds spending most of their time in the care of others. I’d be shocked if the parents of these children had freely opted for this arrangement because I suspect it’s not that good for either the child or the parents. In reality they probably felt they had little or no choice in the matter and that this arrangement was the best of a poor bunch. Sadly, until government and business open their eyes and realise that they bear much of the responsibility for this situation, little is going to change.

I remember in the ‘80’s that crèches where all the rage. People talked about all businesses having one. Ok, your child might still be being looked after by someone else but you would be able to pop in from time to time during the day and were only ever a short run away if there was an emergency. It sounded ideal... right up to the point that business decided that looking after the needs of their workforce was not their responsibility. I dare say some forward thinking companies do provide crèches but I imagine that they are very much in the minority these days.

On a personal level this debate isn’t too much of a concern. We changed our careers deliberately to give us more flexibility and far more time with our boy. We knew there would be a financial hit involved with this move - although in truth we didn’t realise quite how hard a hit it would turn out to be - but we figured it was worth it – which it has been.

We are also fortunate enough to have my mother living just down the road, so if I can’t cover for my wife, she will usually pop over and feed Marty cake and biscuits until we return. As a result Marty didn’t have to go to nursery until he was three, by which time the government was happy to pay for 15 hours a week, which is generally enough for us.

We also live in a fairly rural area so nursery costs here bear little resemblance to those in London, where they could readily be mistaken for a defence budget.

I find this more than a little odd though. Virtually every person I’ve ever seen working in a nursery is either on, or is very close to, the minimum wage. So where is all this money going to?

Is there a nursery mogul somewhere, sipping pina colada on his 50ft yacht and haggling down the phone in a fiendish attempt to corner the market in Pampers and Calpol?

The Older Parent

Pretty much every year there will be at least one article in the media involving age and parenthood, whether it’s people being too young to have kids, or being too old to have kids.
 

What I find most bizarre about these articles is the eagerness with which people offer their opinions on a matter for which the sentence “What the fuck has it got to do with you?” would appear to be tailor-made. Yet offer them they do.

There was an article a few years ago about a rich elderly lady who became pregnant at the grand old age of 60 something. As a result the Radio 5 phone-in was alive with indignation and phrases like “It’s disgusting!” and “It’s against nature!” were being bandied about with venomous delight.

I haven’t got a problem with people having opinions on things like this, I just find it odd that they should. After all what effect will it have on “Mrs Angry from Tunbridge Wells” if a 60 year old has a child?

Are they jealous? I can’t see why they would be. Are they concerned for the child? Again, why? They have a rich parent who has all the time in the world for them and has a reasonably good chance of still being around and compos mentis when they’re ready to fly the nest. Is it an ideal age to have kids? Maybe not... but I think it’s a better age than many seem to think.

As you might have already guessed I was getting on a bit when my son was born, not dramatically so but 48 wasn’t an age I’d have picked if offered the choice. That said, I’m not sure what age I would have picked. 

According to the ‘experts’ we should all be procreating in our 20’s when all our biological bits and bob’s are at their prime. Which would be fine if parenthood was just about biology but realistically that only covers the first 9 months, after the birth it settles back and takes a back seat, only being wheeled out for special occasions such as when relatives gather together to dissect your children – he’s got his father’s eyes, his mother’s smile, his aunt’s elbows etc, or for when your offspring are being particularly exasperating: “Oh my God! He’s sooo like his bloody father!”

No, opting to become a parent just because you’re currently fertile would be like getting a tattoo just because you’re particularly drunk, which of course happens.... but that doesn’t make it a good idea.

The usual arguments against having a child later on in life are a bit limp to be honest. “How will you ever keep up with him?” Is one. To which the answer is “He is 3 ft tall and I’m 50 as opposed to dead!”

Of course he’ll be quicker than me one day, but that’s the natural order of things. I could beat my dad over a mile by the time I was 12 and he was 36. I dare say Marty might be able to make this breakthrough slightly earlier but it’s hardly going to be a drama when he does. And of course this all presupposes that people in their 20’s are fit and healthy and studiously steer clear of Greggs because they wish to beat their eight year old at the egg-and-spoon race the next morning.

Another argument is that the older parent will be dead before their child has flown the nest. If you push it too extremes this is a possibility but sadly none of us know how long we’re going to be here for so it’s hardly worth worrying about. The truth of the matter is that kids cope with the death of a parent much better than they do with their parents divorcing. So, logically at least, we should all be delaying children until we're really sure we're in a solid marriage, even if that does mean you're getting on a bit when they finally arrive. Sadly, I suspect the strength of a marriage isn't much easier to predict than life expectancy - we all know at least someone who we expected to be divorced by the end of the reception and who are still happily married, then others who appeared to be soul-mates but were on the phone to their lawyers before the honeymoon had even finished.

To my mind, fertility aside, most of the requirements for being a decent parent develop with age, although I’m not sure if this isn’t a chicken and egg scenario. For example, most people are far more patient in later life, but is this the effect of age or the effect of having children? I am certainly more patient than I ever was in my 20’s but I’m probably far more patient than I was just 4 years ago, which is hardly a surprise when you discover that impatience calms down small children in much the same way as petrol calms down small fires. No, taking a deep breath, counting to 10 and then screaming “Oh My God! Is that a steam train?” works much, much, better.

But what about other vital parenting commodities, like time? I guess the only thing you can say with any certainly about time is that it seems to vanish the moment the kids arrive. It’s quite shocking really! I used to have loads of it now I can’t find any of it at all! I’m only writing this because Leanne has taken my son out to see Santa and it’s another 5 minutes before the potatoes need to go in the oven - and as you can see from the posting date of this Blog, that didn't really work.

Time really is essential to parenting; Kids demand it, lots of it, and life can turn quite nightmarish if you don’t set aside enough of it. The problem is that you aren’t setting aside time for yourself – which I used to find quite easy - you’re setting it aside for your kids and I suspect people are more likely to do this when they are older. Not because age bestows upon you some sort of saintly benevolence but just because you’re more likely to have done most of the things you wanted to do for yourself and are now more inclined to do things for others, especially if the other in question is small, cute and entertaining.

In short, I think being a parent is easier when you’ve done everything you want to do for yourself and have got bored with the idea of eight hours sleep.

Why Do We Feed Our Kids Crap?

How to wear a healthy diet

If you have spent the last 30 years living the life of an agoraphobic hermit with an allergy to newspaper ink and a deep mistrust of the internet you might, just might, have missed the news that the UK is in the middle of an obesity crisis that is now affecting our children.

Oddly enough this news doesn’t seem to have had much effect on how we view kids and food. I found a terrific example of this on a website that listed ways in which you could entice your child to eat more vegetables. It had all sorts of odd ball ideas but the one that really caught my eye was their suggestion for enticing your child to eat broccoli; dip it into sugar sprinkles first!

I kid you not! Apparently the author is convinced that most children will come away from this experience thinking, “umm broccoli is nice, shame it had so much sugar on it, I’ll try it on its own next time”, and not, “Sugar! I LOVE sugar!... Shame it had that green shit stuck to it!”

A classic example of children and culinary inertia are the kids menus at most of these so called “Family Friendly” restaurants. I’m sure the chefs in these places are still wearing flares because little seems to have changed since the 70’s. Pretty much the entire menu revolves around the theory that if you coat something in breadcrumbs or batter and then deep fry it, kids will eat it. As a fop to the governments 5-a-day campaign - and to add a bit of colour to a plate that would otherwise be various shades of brown - they now scatter a handful of peas over it and, just to ensure that your child can barely walk afterwards, they finish it all off with a desert that is roughly the size of the kid eating it.

Worse still – in my opinion at least – is the eagerness with which some parents get their children hooked on soft drinks. I’ve seen kids that have barely started weaning sucking ‘juice’ out of a bottle. And you know what’s most odd about this? The fact that the majority of us don’t think there’s anything really wrong with this!

Our children are going to grow up in a world where they will be constantly subjected to temptation, constantly encouraged to take on far more calories than they really need. Yet they are often raised with the idea that in order to quench their thirst they have to consume sugar.

The poor beggars don’t have a hope in hell! Every time they feel thirsty they’re going to reach for a sugar drink, because that’s what they associate thirst with. So instead of satisfying this base need with the zero calorie liquid their body actually craves, they’re loading up with hundreds of excess, empty, calories.

I’d say I was shocked at how sanguine people are about sugar if it wasn’t for the manner in which the “sugar” debate has taken place. It’s astonishing just how aggressive an industry this is; every time a scientist has dared to suggest that sugar might not actually be that good for you, the big sugar companies have hit back with everything from sugar sponsored pseudo-science, to out and out character assassination. In short, there is nothing sweet about the sugar industry.

To prove the point I will make you a bet; following the recent spate of media articles on the dangers of sugar there will, within the next 3 months, be a barrage of counter arguments run in almost every national newspaper, questioning the veracity of the earlier claims – without offering any solid scientific argument against them - and suggesting serious character flaws in the scientists making those earlier claims.

This will then be followed by one of those articles that comes out every few months anyway, in which a 98 year old climbs mount Everest whilst carrying a Sherpa, kills a tiger with his bare hands and then goes on to win Mastermind. When asked, he will then put it all down to his diet of refined sugar, whiskey and Havana cigars.

I for one don’t really care about the debate itself. I think it’s quite clear that sugar, especially sugary drinks, are best taken in moderation, so Marty is being brought up with the notion that if you are thirsty you drink good old fashioned water and if you think you’re going to get sweets two days on the trot, think again.

I’m working on the theory that there are enormous corporations out there willing to spend billions to tempt Marty and his mates into drinking lots of sweet, fizzy, drinks and heaps of fat laden food. It doesn’t really bother me that they don’t give a flying fuck about the health of my boy - I don’t give a great deal for them either - but I’m certainly not going to help them in their quest to boost their profits at the expense of my sons health.

Sadly, I still seem to be in a bit of a minority on all of this. I guess part of the reason is that parenting habits change very slowly; what worked for your parents and for you will work for your children. My mother was raised during WWII when rationing was all the rage. As a result she, and her mother, looked upon sugar rich and fatty food as a treat for her kids. The next generation maintains that approach but because those foods are so much cheaper and more readily available the ‘treat’ becomes commonplace.

In fact the word ‘treat’ seems to have undergone a transformation. I recall a treat being something that you had once a month or once a week, cake with Sunday lunch for example. These days ‘treats’ seem to be things you dole out on the hour, every hour.

I guess another factor in all of this is that whilst most parents would be a bit worried if their children were overweight, they would be absolutely mortified if their child was deemed malnourished or underweight. As a result most of us are going to opt for a bit too much, rather than a bit too little.

This isn’t helped by the fact that ‘normal’ is now far heavier than it used to be. If you are comparing your child to his friends you will no doubt be comforted by the fact that he’s about the same weight as all his mates. Sadly, there’s a very high chance that the entire group is heavier than they should be. Yes, he or she is ‘normal’ but that doesn’t mean they are a healthy weight. An easy way to test this is to look at them when you’re getting them ready for bed. Can you see their ribs? If the answer is yes, then they are probably a good weight. If the answer is no then your child is probably overweight and, sadly, if they start off life overweight the odds are that they will struggle with their waistline for the rest of their lives.

Another factor is just general ignorance and complacency. Many parents are themselves overweight and just don’t view it as a problem. Many more parents are just unaware of some of the issues. A perfect example of this is our attitude to ‘fruit juice’ particularly those juices aimed directly at children.

If you listen to the advertising you could be forgiven for thinking that these fruit juices are great things, after all they are chocked full of vitamins and they contain real fruit, often with no added sugar! What can possibly be wrong? Well, sadly, the answer is ‘quite a lot’.

The biggest issue is that these vitamins are floating in a sea of sugar. Yes, it’s natural fructose but it’s still sugar and there is an enormous amount of it. To drink one of these drinks for the vitamins is like drinking Malt Whiskey for the pure mountain spring water it’s allegedly made from.

The second point is that if you want to consume fruit, eat one! Drinking a fruit isn’t that good for you for two reasons, firstly when you smash a fruit up and extract the juice you’re really just making flavoured sugar water. Secondly, whilst there’s no more sugar in the juice than there is in the fruit – assuming you didn’t buy one of those drinks where they do actually add yet more sugar – you are going to drink far more than just one fruit.

For example, in a typical glass of freshly squeezed orange juice there are about four oranges. Yet, whilst you could quite easily drink two glasses of juice, it’s highly unlikely that you could eat eight oranges in a single sitting. In other words, by drinking the fruit you are taking on board 4 times the amount of sugar than you would if you just sat down and ate it. You will also still be hungry and will have missed out on a lot of fibre.

But aren’t we all supposed to be eating 5 fruit and vegetables a day? Yes, we are but the key word is “eat”. Drinking eight oranges does not mean you’ve just whipped your 5-a-day target because the high sugar content is doing you more harm than the vitamins are doing you good. As a result most fruit juices only count as one portion in the 5-a-day regime, regardless of how much you drink.

The manufacturers are all perfectly aware of this of course but it doesn’t stop them trying to persuade you that their products are good for your children, even when they know that’s almost certainly not the case. Have a look at the labelling on kiddies fruit juice next time you buy some. Many will contain a phrase that is something along the lines of “Forms part of your 5-a-day” and have a logo that looks a bit like the 5-a-day logo but isn’t quite right. This is because they aren’t allowed to use the real logo and wording because they contain far too much sugar.

Another con that far too many of us fall for are these ‘energy drinks’. If I take a walk around my local football pitch after the youth teams have been playing, the ground is littered with the tops of these energy drinks. Here we have a field full of litter louts, running around like crazy and all leaving the pitch slightly fatter than when they went on because they have just consumed the best part of 500 calories – assuming they had a bottle at half time and one at the end of the match. And why did they drink this nonsense? Because they and their parents have been told that in order to achieve their sporting best they need to consume a shed load of sugar and salt. Which would be fair enough if it wasn’t for the fact that it’s complete and utter bollocks!

The only people who get any genuine benefit from these drinks are those few elite athletes who really are pushing their bodies to the limit. For the other 99.99% of us it’s like pouring nitro-glycerine into a lawnmower – you might start off believing you now own a super mower but all you’ll end up with is a scorched lawn with a myriad of 2-stroke engine parts embedded in it.

So, in a rather large nutshell, that’s why Marty doesn’t drink juice or soft drinks. We’re not fanatical about it, after all sugar and fat are fine in moderation, but I think it’s important that he grows up with the idea that water is the best way of quenching thirst. I also hope he grows up with a very sceptical view of the food and drink industry, an industry that seems to have mislaid its moral compass... always assuming it had one in the first place.

The art of Toilet Training

Toilet training - SIT!

Babies and toddlers are things of wonder and delight but hidden within the unremitting joy lies a biological imperative that cannot be denied; what goes in, must come out. 

Sadly, regardless of how besotted with your offspring that you may be, what comes out is never cute, never cuddly and, whilst it might cause your face to form all sorts of odd expressions, a wistful smile is unlikely to be amongst them.

Early questions tend to be “Oh my God! Is it supposed to be that colour?” Followed by multiple variations on the theme “You don’t seriously expect me to deal with that do you?” All in all, I think it’s safe to say that most parents are fairly anxious for their little one to master the art of the toilet as soon as possible.

Of course, there are other reasons behind this desire; disposable nappies are pretty expensive at the best of times and cause untold damage to the environment, whilst the traditional towelling nappies leave your washing machine running at maximum and the entire house smelling of stuff you’d much rather it didn’t smell of. 

There are alternatives. If you can afford them they do disposable nappies that don’t have a half life akin to Plutonium and, if you are really hard-core, you can go for a pot of moss and quick reactions!

Apparently this was the option taken by a friend-of-a-friend. By all accounts, it relies on an almost zealous regard for the environment, a good watch and a very keen eye on your child’s facial expressions. I have great admiration for this approach but I strongly suspect I’d have needed waders and a nose clip before entering the family home if we’d ever attempted it.

Of course what this method really relies on is toilet timing, whereby you get your child into a routine and take them to the loo just before they need to go – with luck. This approach used to be very popular when nappies needed to be washed by hand but went into decline upon the arrival of disposable nappies – why would that be I wonder? As a result of this relatively recent change you get a huge variation in advice these days; some say you should get your child using a potty almost from the word go, others say that you should let them lead the way and avoid putting them under any undue pressure to ‘perform’.

Part of the reason why the advice differs so much is because they are often addressing two different phenomena. Toilet timing is just getting your child sat on a potty at the right time of the day and really just needs attentive parents, a settled routine, a good watch and a lot of luck. However, toilet training relies on your child recognising when the 'urge' is upon them so they know when to go to the toilet themselves. You could start 'timing' from an early age, if the desire takes you, but genuine toilet training requires your child to develop sufficiently to be able to recognise when a 'movement' is about to happen and it's pretty pointless starting this before the age of two simply because most children don't have the prerequisite neural development in place till then.

In the end we opted for quiet encouragement, whilst remaining as relaxed and sanguine about it as we could, mainly because putting our child under pressure seemed a bit pointless but also because I have never, ever, met an able bodied adult who failed to learn how to go to the loo - so I couldn’t see much point in making a huge issue out of it. 

Alas, the UK tabloids see things differently and have been beating the toilet training drum lately because some children are turning up to school, aged 4, and still not toilet trained. I grant you that this seems to be taking 'sanguine' a little too far but I still believe that you have to let the child take the lead on this and that being 'pushy' is only going to back fire farther down the line.

As it was Marty seemed more than happy to maintain the status quo, ominously so. We started trying to persuade him on the joys of sitting on a toilet at about the age of about eighteen months. We even bought him his own little loo, complete with a flush button that sang dubious faecal and urinary related songs along the lines of “We’re all going to the loo tomorrow, loo tomorrow, loo tomorrow....” Sadly he wasn’t impressed.

I wouldn’t go as far as to say that Marty ‘enjoyed’ pooing in his pants, but I got the impression that there was a certain element of satisfaction, after all he didn’t have to stop playing; he could just pause, do the business and get right back to his toys.

Whilst dealing with the aftermath was less than amusing there was actually a lot of fun to be had just watching him ‘go through the motions’ - so to speak. He’d stop what he was doing, take on a misty eyed expression as he looked off into the middle distance, slowly turn red in the face and then, suddenly, out of the blue, he became an absolute dead ringer for Martin Clunes! I should have taken a video of it!

Anyway, amusement aside, by the time he reached two I must confess that I was starting to get a little worried. Potty training appeared to revolve around the adage “You can lead a horse to water but you cannot make it drink”; try as we might Marty just wasn’t the least bit interested in sitting on the loo to do his business. Six months later and nothing had changed, then one day the conversation turned to Nursery.

One of his friends had started nursery already and Marty had been invited to a party held there. Boy was he impressed! Not only was the place filled with little boys and girls but they served up cake on demand and it was crammed to the rafters with toys the likes of which he had barely dreamed of. Would he shut up about this place? He would not.

Of course, for the parents, the approach of nursery is a real worry when your child is stubbornly refusing to engage in toilet training. Fortunately, nursery was also the solution. One day, with no expectation of success, I told Marty that they wouldn’t let him into nursery if he couldn’t go to the toilet ‘like a big boy’. At the time this news seemed to barely register but about an hour later he asked to go to the toilet for a wee and by the next day he was perched on the loo doing a number two!

And that was that! He’s been pretty much perfect ever since! Yes, there have been occasions when we’ve had to isolate a corner of the house and wheel out the pressure hose but they have been very few and far between.

Of course a little boy cannot just sit down and have a wee for any length of time. Within a week I had my own quiet moment disturbed by a little voice behind me whispering “Oooh daddy! That’s a clever wee!” and since then he has insisted on standing up to the toilet to do his business. Sadly, he's not satisfied with this and we have been anxiously attempting to convince him that his dream of the 'standing-poo' is just that, an unattainable dream.

Within a few short weeks he was so confident in his new found ability that he started giving little kids a hard time every time we saw one; “Daddy, I wee in the toilet!” He proclaimed, pointing in the direction of the smaller child, “But babies, babies wee everywhere!” To which I could but nod sagely in agreement.

One thing I have learnt during this process is how wholly unaware women are to the art form that is urination! To females the wee seems to be a mundane bodily function, whereas for us males it is an ever evolving art. How high, how far and how long are competitions that boys engage in until well into their dotage.

A typical example of this is the “The Butchers Shop” in Johannesburg. Ask a woman and she’ll just tell you that they do the best steaks this side of Pluto, and right they are. However, if you ask a bloke, whilst they might mention in passing that the food is pretty darn good, what they will really focus on are the gents urinals; they fill them with crushed ice and leave it to their male patrons to produce whatever work of urinary art they are capable of. Marvellous stuff!

The Wonderful Two's

The invisible man

There are a number of childhood misnomers and I'm glad to report that “The terrible two’s” is one of them. Yes, Marty has had his moments; he has been known to collapse gracefully to the floor in a fit of inconsolable tears, he has been known to scream. He can be a bit of a bossy little bugger when the feeling takes him and it has to be said that he can barely look at an envelope these days without wanting to push it.

I had rather hoped to follow all these idiosyncrasies as they occurred but I was struck down with  2 slipped discs last March and they rather took the fun out of sitting down to do anything other than immediately standing back up again. So now that I am approaching full fitness again I thought I’d do a summary of the last year, a year that was far from terrible.

Of course I’d heard of the terrible two’s - most parents of older children can’t wait to tell you all about them and do so with a rather worrying degree of relish. In my mind’s eye I’d built up a picture of a more diminutive version of the teen years; we'd awake one morning to discover our bundle of joy had turned into a mumbling rebel who hated us and insisted on wearing his Thomas-the-Tank-Engine hat back to front and his nappy half way down his arse. Fortunately this was not the case.

In truth this last year has been lovely. Ok, Marty is considerably more likely to break down in tears than he was a year ago but, on the other hand, in between the bawling he’s much more likely to have his parents in tears of laughter.

One of the most fascinating facts that I learnt about a child becoming two was that they finally attain an intellect that exceeds that of the family dog! In truth the word “fact” might be open to question here. Yes I read it and yes the author claimed knowledge on the subject but it’s also very, very, obvious that said author had never, ever, met our dog. I don’t wish to do her down but we have a female Boxer and I swear we have moss growing in the garden that could run intellectual rings around her. I suspect Marty became officially smarter than our dog when he learnt to fart.

That said, during the ‘two’s’ the intelligence of the child grows at an astonishing rate. Barely a day goes by without Marty exhibiting something new, whether it be a new word or a new physical skill. Alongside this, and probably the most impressive change, is that he has started to develop empathy and altruism.

I suspect this is one of the hardest things as a parent to grasp and I have my wife and Dr Chris Green’s book “Toddler Taming” to thank for what little insight I have gathered.

The mistake that is very easy to make is believing that your two year old is just a mini version of you, and the fact that it’s now possible to have a conversation with your child, albeit not a very coherent one, only adds to this erroneous belief. You hear parents berating their child for snatching something off another kid, or for refusing to share and they act as if the kid ought to be aware of the social transgression. In reality you might as well rebuke them for failing to understand quantum mechanics.

A two year old is only just getting to grips with a sense of self, let alone with how that self interacts with others and one of the joys of the two years is watching that change take place. Marty now recognises when people are happy or sad, he’ll share his dinner with me, although usually just after he’s taken a bite out of one end and slobbered all over the other, and whilst he’s still not entirely comfortable with the idea of sharing, he is at least willing to occasionally give it a go.

On the other side of the coin he still firmly believes that the world revolves around him. There’s nothing you can do as a parent to change this belief, it’s just a developmental stage and he or she will eventually work through it – this can often take 60-70 years. The other thing you have to get your head around as a parent is that this “the world revolves around me” attitude isn’t a flight of fancy or a sign of a selfish, spoilt child. It is a genuine belief; it is only during the two’s that a child starts to come to terms with the idea that they are not everything; that mummy and daddy are not actually apart of them, that they have finite boundaries and that they cannot control everything in the world around them. As adults we take our sense of self and identify so much for granted that it’s hard to imagine that we actually had to learn these things.

Marty also knows what he likes and what he doesn’t like. Sadly this is usually not what his mum and dad like and don’t like. To navigate this shoal of potential friction requires negotiation skills, the ability to know when to make a stand and when not to, and the ability to quickly distract.

The later is surprisingly easy as young kids are astonishingly gullible. Marty can be just about to go off on one and I’ll suddenly shout “Look! Train!” Instantly the bawling stops and he’s looking around eagerly for the train Just in case he picks up on the fact that we're 5 miles away from the nearest railway line I quickly follow up with, “Oh Marty, did you miss it?”

“Yes!” He announces with barely a hint of suspicion.

“Oh, what a shame, it was a steam train just like Spencer...” And off we go, the argument forgotten, the amateur dramatics over for another day.

The only down side to this use of the fictitious train is that we all now shout out “Train!!” the moment we see one, which wouldn’t be a problem except that it happens to me when Marty is nowhere in sight, which seems to worry my work colleagues.

Of course all this negotiation, distraction and deciding when to make an issue of something has to come from the parents, and most importantly both parents have to approach it in pretty much an identical fashion if it’s going to work. This was quite easy for us as Leanne decided what she was going to do and then told me what I was going to do. 

To be honest, she so patently knew what she was talking about that I didn't have a problem with playing the accompanying fiddle, and it must be said that it seems to have paid dividends in that Marty has quickly come to learn that bawling and tantrums get him nowhere and ignoring his parents counting “One... Two... Three” is never a good idea... although that still doesn't stop him occasionally giving it another try... just to be sure.

I guess the other thing to try to remember in all of this is not to take it personally. Marty is not acting-up because he wants to wind me up, he’s barely capable of even understanding that concept, he’s doing it to prove or disprove this growing idea that he might not be everything. Can you imagine how distressing that must be to a little kid? To have spent all your life so far with the utter conviction that there is only you in the world and that everything you see, hear, smell and touch are merely different facets of yourself. Then suddenly you start to suspect that this might all be wrong and that you might actually just be a tiny, fragile, powerless being set in a world that is almost totally outside of your control. No wonder they break down in tears all the time!

That said, I do still have to remind myself that Marty isn’t an adult , that he isn’t an evil, calculating mastermind, twisting me about his little finger just for the sheer fun of it but that he is in fact just being two.

So on the whole we seem to have managed to avoid most of the tantrums...but if I ever need reminding that an emotional explosion is just a heartbeat away all I need do is change his routine, just a little bit. I have learnt the hard way that two year olds love routine and, far more importantly, will fight tooth and nail if they even suspect that there’s the merest possibility that it might in any way be disrupted.

Bedtime is the most obvious routine and following the now established ‘rules’ of bedtime results in a happy, relaxed, process that see’s Marty fast asleep within minutes. However, change one single aspect of that bedtime routine and the house is going to sound like a cross between an explosion in a fireworks factory and the collapse of the Hoover Dam – his mother once added an extra verse into ‘Bar-Bar Black Sheep’ and you’d have thought the sky had fallen in.

I guess if you live a busy and frenetic life delivering this calm routine might be a bit of an issue, however we are now blissfully dull so it’s rarely a problem... and it does have its up sides – Marty must be greeted in the morning by his mum, if I try all hell breaks loose! Sadly, this means I have to have the lie in’s. Isn’t life terrible!

So that’s why the two’s are not so terrible, but what has made it so wonderful?

Well the fact that you can now actually have a conversation with him is a real joy. Ok, the conversation is a bit limited – mainly to trains, food, dinosaurs and dragons but that doesn’t limit the joy. It’s the pat little phrases and off the cuff remarks that really make you smile.

We were in ASDA when he had a ‘moment’. 

“Marty! Look at all the fruit!” I said in a feeble attempt to distract him. With tears running down his face he looked up at me and said, “I can’t see the fruit! I’m too busy crying!”

Currently his most popular phrase is “Daddy I need the toilet! Help please!” Then, if I’m still sat in my seat a tenth of a second later, he cries “Quick! Quick, daddy! Before the wee comes!”

Many of the conversations are just surreal. We were quietly eating lunch one day.

“I’m not a chip.” Marty casually announced.

“Are you not?” I replied, wondering if he’d somehow managed to break into the drinks cabinet.

“Nooo.” He stopped and stared off into the middle distance, obviously giving it some thought.... “I’m a fish-finger!”

I could go on all day about his language skills - and one day I probably will - but the other activity that really stands out is his love of hiding, or ‘oydin’ as he prefers to call it.

The moment I walk into the house he stops whatever he's doing, clasps his hands over his eyes and announces loudly, “Can’t find meeeee!”

Does he truly believes that the simple act of putting his hands over his eyes renders him invisible? I’ve no idea... but he certainly acts as if he does.

Since he’s obviously so good at hiding he usually feels the need to help out a bit. “Daddy! I’m oydin in the tent!... Can’t find meeee!”

Maybe it’s just me but I do find it all a genuine joy to come home to.

King of the Railway

In training

It’s been quite some time since I wrote anything on this blog, not because Marty has suddenly become dull – far from it - but because I did my back in earlier this year and have been unable to sit down and type ever since.

It eventually dawned on me that my back was not going to miraculously improve so I moved the computer into the bedroom. It’s not ideal but at least I can now lie down on the bed in relative comfort and once more relate the trials and wonders of parenthood.

So what’s been the biggest change this year, aside from my inability to sit down and pick things up? Well I guess the ditching of Tigger and the embracing of all things “Thomas” has been one of the more obvious changes.

Tigger had been Marty’s most beloved toy since he was about 6 months old. I suspect most of the attraction was based on the fact that Tigger could bounce around the room with wild abandon whilst Marty could barely drag himself across the floor. Certainly the love seemed to grow, right up until the moment Marty rose unsteadily to his feet and, mere moments later, bounced high into the air.

The fact that bouncing was now easily accomplished and relatively commonplace seemed to lower Tigger in Marty’s eyes. ‘So what else can you do?’ appeared to be his attitude and, sadly, the reply was ‘not a lot.’ Leanne and I both found this a bit of a worry, partly because we actually quite enjoyed watching and singing along to the Tigger movies every night before bedtime, but mainly because we’d spent weeks painting an 8ft high mural across Marty’s bedroom wall, a mural dedicated solely to Tigger, Pooh and the rest of the gang. However, Marty could not be brought around and, as Tigger sat more neglected with each passing day, Marty’s eye went a roving.

Quite how he settled on Thomas is still up for debate, was it a toy Leanne purchased at a car boot sale? Was it me encouraging him to watch an episode of “Thomas and Friends” on the TV? These were out and out accusations at the time as we both took great exception to this fascination with a train that did nothing but let off steam and roll his eyes whilst an aged Scouser droned on about tracks, buffers and the fat controller. Where were the songs? Where was the adult humour within the kiddies program? What had happened to all the bouncy, bouncy, fun, fun, fun?

Fortunately, over time, we've both come to appreciate Thomas and his enormous retinue, which is just as well as Marty barely talks about anything else.

In fairness we didn't have the greatest of introductions! The early episodes of Thomas & friends do take a bit of getting used to; the controller is unashamedly fat, nothing moves other than the trains themselves and Ringo Starr narrates the unfolding drama in a dull, monotone, drone. In truth, considering just how basic it is, I suppose it’s actually quite well done but it was a bit of a let-down after the Technicolor wonders of Walt Disney.

To compound our unease Leanne bought the film “Thomas and The Magic Railroad”, a star studded extravaganza featuring - amongst others - Thomas, Alec Baldwin and Peter Fonda. Alas, it turned out to be the worst film I have seen since I attended a late night showing of “The Wild Women of Wongo” - the only difference being that ‘Wonga’ was billed as being the worst film ever made, whereas ‘The Magic Railroad’ just quietly sidled in and grabbed this accolade whilst my brains dripped slowly out of my ears.

If you ever meet Alex or Pete out-and-about one day and they are being a tad annoying, a little ‘lovey’ and possibly more than a bit full of themselves, just whisper “Thomas And The Magic Railroad” into their collective ears and watch as they shrivel before your eyes and quickly shuffle off into the darkness, heads bowed low, eyes filled with shame.

It so incredibly bloody awful that’s its only redeeming feature is that Madonna and Eddie Murphy weren't in it. I was so upset by this film that I spent the next week desperately trying to rekindle a love for Tigger in Marty’s heart... all to no avail.

Fortunately, things have since improved. Thomas has modernised! He now talks, he’s CGI, he has lots more friends, the films are actually entertaining and Ringo has been cast aside in favour of a narrator that can be understood by people from as far afield as the Wirral - I must admit that I was a little miffed by this last change as Ringo is actually a distant relative of Marty’s. I'm not sure that Ringo is aware of this claim to fame but I’d like to think that, if he is, it offers him some comfort in his dotage.

The latest Thomas film is “Thomas & Friends: King of the Railway” and I'm glad to report that it is light years ahead of the ‘Magic Railroad’ – mind you so is ‘Battlefield Earth’. I won’t go into details but suffice to say that it’s that age old story of multi-millionaire rebuilds castle with the help of umpteen steam trains – we've all been there!

Films aside, it’s as an educational tool that Thomas and the gang have most impressed me. I was lying on the sofa a few weeks ago, quietly moaning in pain as my heat mat tried valiantly to ease the suffering in my lower back, when Marty came up and started playing with the controls.

“Ooh! That’s a little like Edward!” He muttered pushing the buttons. ”Ooh! That’s a little like Henry!”

“Ooh! What the bloody hell are you going on about?” Was my silent reply and it was quite some time before I realised that Marty was looking at the numbers that lit up as he played with the dial. A ‘little like Edward’ was the number 2 painted on the side of the train Edward, a ‘little like Henry’ was the number 3 writ large upon on that train! I was well impressed!

Sadly, my amazement has been slightly tarnished by the fact that, if you write down any of the numbers from 1 to 6, all you get as an answer is the corresponding train, so despite holding out for, say, “It’s six, Daddy!”, all I actually get is a triumphant “It’s Percy, Daddy!” I have a sneaky suspicion that he’s more than aware of what the number is called but just prefers the train name.

The other more obvious, but none the less impressive, knowledge that he’s picked up from Thomas are colours. I did try teaching him colours when he was very young by telling him that the balloon he was holding was in fact a blue balloon. This somewhat back fired on me when he started calling every balloon he came across a ‘blue balloon’ and it took almost six months to get him back to the idea that it was actually just a ‘balloon’.

Leanne told me off for this so I stayed well away from colour until one day Marty waved a blue car in my face and announced, “Daddy! It’s a little like Gordon” I might have been a bit slow on the uptake with his move into numbers but even I could see what he was driving at here – although it might aid the narrative somewhat if I tell you that Gordon is a large and popular train within the Thomas sagas who’s hue is distinctly blue.

So what else have we learnt from Thomas? Well I've learnt that Facebook can actually be useful - Yup, I never thought I’d write that either. My wife discovered one of those local ‘to buy and sell’ Facebook groups and has since been buying Thomas related merchandise like there’s no tomorrow – for the grand sum of £15 we bought enough Trackmaster rail to go around the entire house, complete with umpteen trains and carriages. From this Marty has amassed an amazing degree of dexterity and learnt that battery powered toys do not mix with either sand or water.

I've also discovered a use for YouTube – how many unexpected phrases can I come out with today? Marty and I now spend the last 10 minutes before bedtime watching various steam train video clips on YouTube. From this Marty has discovered ‘real’ Thomas trains and I've discovered just how many sad bastards there are out there wasting their brief time upon this earth freezing their arses off on God forsaken platforms around the country just to take poor quality videos of steam trains.

We've also discovered an enormous amount about trains – far too much if the truth be known – which has infected Marty’s entire vocabulary. He no longer has a bath or a shower; he “goes to the wash-down”. He doesn't push things; he “shunts” them. We no longer park the car; we “pull into a siding”. Everyone else walks around the village, we "puff". Why hold hands, when you can “couple-up”? It’s all very entertaining.

So as Christmas looms Thomas emblazoned clothing is being purchased, Thomas DVD’s are being amassed and relatives across the country are buying various engines to run on the 7 miles of track we seem to have quietly acquired. And what is Marty doing as the big day approaches? He’s only starting to show an ominous penchant for Bob the Bloody Builder!

Typical!

The Age of Do

Marty is now deeply ensconced in one of the most memorable eras of childhood development, the age of “Do!” This is where he insists on ‘Doing’ anything and everything; from taking off his shoes and putting on his socks, through to rewiring the DVD player, driving the car and pretty much anything and everything in between.

This would be a wonderful, carefree, period of household harmony if it wasn’t for one little issue; his desire to do in no way matches his ability to do. He’s like the homeowner who insists on undertaking DIY despite not knowing one end of a nail from the other. Fortunately the consequences are not quite as dire; rather than finding himself standing amidst the rubble of a once fine home Marty finds himself caught up in a life that seamlessly flits between cries of joy when he succeeds and floods of frustrated tears when he fails.

In fairness to the little lad it’s actually quite an enjoyable mindset most of the time, providing you give yourself plenty of time. Marty’s favourite “do” is to climb up into the car by himself and then arrange himself majestically in his seat. If you give him three or four minutes he can do this perfectly well and we can then all join together in a round of applause, whilst Marty cries “Did it! Did it!” However, if you don’t have 4 minutes just to get a small child into a car then you’d best buy a bumper pack of industrial strength ear plugs because it’s going to be loud and tearful and I doubt very much if it will be worth the gain of 90 seconds.

One of the most surprising aspects of all this to me is that, despite suddenly being compelled to try his hand at absolutely everything, he can still be reasoned with. A classic example is getting him upstairs to bed.

At the moment he is into ‘Thomas the Tank Engine’ and is rarely more than a few inches away from his favourite toys; Thomas and Percy. He is also into cars of any shape or form. This is all well and good but it creates a logistical problem for him at bed time. He’s happy to sleep but isn’t going to do so unless all of his toys are sat at the foot of his bed so he can lie back on his pillow and stare boggle-eyed at them until slumber over takes him. But how to get these toys upstairs? Well, in the age of ‘do’ this means spending the next half hour trying to pick up all of his toys at the same time, which turns out to be impossible.

If you offer to help at the beginning he’ll just cry “No, No. Marty Do!” and start to bawl. However, if you ask again after 20 minutes he’ll actually pause to consider the offer and then hand you one or more of his toys and say “Daggy ‘elp now.”

Of course reason doesn’t work all the time, in fact it fails dismally most of the time, but as luck would have it there are a few other tricks. 

The simplest just works by doing the task in hand for him and then crying "Marty did it!" and giving him a round of applause. If he was in some way involved with the task he'll usually just give you a bit of a hard stare, verify that the task has now been completed and then graciously accept the paudits.

If this fails - and it isn't always possible - I then go for the 'distraction'. This works on the fact that small children are astonishingly gullible. Marty can be clinging onto the side of a shopping trolley, screaming like a banshee, turning odd shades of scarlet and puce and crying out “Marty do! Marty do!” as if the devil himself resided within. The west wing of ASDA turns to stare. Now what do you do? Do you fight it? Do you hide until it’s all over? No! You just calmly point over his shoulder and say “Look! Train!” 

It’s as if someone has just flicked a switch; the tears stop, the cries echo down the aisle and are no more and within seconds he’s back to a more acceptable colour.

This works brilliantly if there actually is a train in sight but to be honest it’s not a necessity, “Look! Plane!”, or “Look! Lion!” all work just as well. To be honest I think “Look! Nigel Farage!” would work... and if said it in a pronounced Scottish accent you might get to enjoy an even more comical reaction from Farage himself.