1. Excuse Me

2.  And Me

3.  Not Just Me

I give the boys a tub of fruit as soon as they get up, the Childcare With Serenedays principle being that I’ve always funnelled in at least one of their 5-A-Day before 7am.  So, while I was washing grapes and blueberries for Son 2 aged 21m, a little figure was pushing a green ELC chair across the kitchen. He likes to stand on a chair at the worksurfaces so he can see what Mummy is doing.  I like him standing on the chair, because at least I don’t have to carry him around. This morning, I wasn’t fast enough shutting up the dishwasher so he could get in. “Coos Me.  Coos Me,” he said, smacking the chair into my ankles.  He just is the cutest child in the world.

Son 1 aged 4y 9m doesn’t go to Nursery on Tuesday, so a sane start to a beautiful morning. The house is east-facing, so we had bright early sunshine streaming in to every room. “I wonder why Son 2 is waking up so early,” said The Man.  Both boys were lounging around in pyjamas, colouring, as I got ready.   Son 1 is great at colouring, does some amazing designs and spends ages choosing which colours and patterns to use. There are, of course, very many “Oh well done, Son 1, what a beautiful picture, I really like the way you’ve drawn that/colours you used/shapes you’ve made.   This morning, when Son 2, eyes shining,  held up his scraggy, holes gouged in it, scribbly biro-d yellow chick mask from the Environment Day, I realised the poor child has been trying to get the same response from me for ages.  Maybe when I’m less tired I’ll be smarter. 

I got back before Wonder Nanny left, which was a Good Thing. The boys were high as kites. They’d been to Nanna’s, who’d plied them with sweets and chocolate, and then to the playground in Nanna’s Village.  They were dirty and behaving badly, as they’d apparently done all day.  Son 1 tormented Son 2, and for the first time I witnessed Wonder Nanny snapping at him.  Thank God for that.  I have agonised over the quiet, reasoned, loving control she has over them.  Usually, when I come home from work, they are quiet, sedate little angels minding their ps and qs.  And then they go off like fireworks.  Because they were being so awful when I came in, there wasn’t the usual annoying disintegration for my benefit.  Son 2 sat still through his books; Son 1 was still pretty hyped but tolerable.  He gulped his bedtime milk. “Shall we ask the servant to bring us some more?” he asked. “Better not call him that,” I said.

1.  Happy Father’s Day

2.  A Family Day Out

3.  The Servant

Man I was wiped out after yesterday, celebrating Nanna’s Grand Old Age from 0830 till gone 11pm. I forgot to say, she loved the cartoon fireman mushroom Son 1 aged 4y 8m chose for her. Kitch. A language shared by the elderly and under-fives.  We really thought we were in for a lie-in, but Son 2 aged 21 m was up and roaring at 6am.  The Man went.  At 0730, when I went down to see them, sitting together on the big chair watching The Wiggles, I said “Happy Father’s Day.”  He’d forgotten. “I’d have made you get up if I’d realised.”  A silent and invisible licked finger wrote a “1″ in the air. 

The Office was at a huge environmental event. Cycle trails, hearty walking,  pond-dipping, willow-weaving, that sort of thing.  I’d said I’d go, and The Man said it was the sort of Family Thing he didn’t mind doing for Father’s Day.  Son 1 packed his golf kit, and wee headed on out. Son 2 fell asleep straightaway, Son 1 hung on until a few minutes before we arrived. We chatted to my colleagues, and went to look around. We got as far as Face Painting And Smoothie Making.  Son 1 was a pirate,. The moustache, caterpillar eyebrow and eyepatch we have seen many times before. But the fake cheek slash was a new touch. Wax-based, red blood running from it, like something off the Casualty set.   We set off round the trail and the boys were murderous.  We split into teams and played “Spot the butterflies.” They came alive. The behaviour switched, instantly. The Man and Son 1 beat me and Son 2 10 - 4.  Ah. Not hungry, tired, or hot, then. Just bored.

There were bees as well as butterflies, and dragonflies, and crickets. Foxgloves, cowslips, a lily pond. All in a scorching day, the sun baking down on the trail.  We took an hour to get to the first mile marker, and an hour back again.  Son 1 spent well over an hour in the Wildlife People’s tent, making a Father’s Day card with a butterfly on it and colouring face marks with felt tip. Son 2 tipped up all the sticker shapes, and I took him away. He had an owl mask. “Owl. Owl.”  Which meant: ” I would like to stand back on that chair and colour my owl like Son 1.”  Eventually I tempted him away with “Would you like some cake?” and we went for ice cream. The Man and Son 1 were a full half hour behind us, because the face mask had to be coloured perfectly. “Didn’t you try to get him away?” “About a thousand times.”  They played golf, and Son 1 had a quick game of pirates with a big boy in the playground.   As we left, Son 1 said “Can I have a servant?” “You’ve got a servant,” I said. “Daddy is your servant, he’s just not very good at it and I keep having to do it instead.”  “No,” insisted Son 1. “A servant. Something we buy. From the shop.”  “You mean a souvenir?”  “Yes.”  “No you can’t. You had too much yesterday.” = 2 Wiggles Activity packs, and a Disney Golf set. Back home I googled the Wiggles.  Bad News.  Liking Anthony is not original.  Good News. I do not need to be concerned about the “Spending Some Quiet Time With Dorothy,” Do-Not-Disturb signs left on the back of the theatre seats.

1.  Fascination

2.  Forgotten

3.  Forgiven

Both boys stayed in their own beds.  And Son 2 aged 17 didn’t start crying till about 0615.  Calloo, callay.  Son 1 aged 4y 5m invaded Son 2’s book-reading.  A crane parked on the road outside.  Big.  Orange.  Flashing hazard lights.  Son 2 was transfixed.  Seizing the mo, I read him the crane page from Dig Dig Digging.  He loved it.  And then, raptures and relish, the bin men came, so he got to watch the Rubbish Trucks Made For Gobble Gobble Gobbling.  He squealed and pointed for The Man when he came in.  He stared at pictures of vehicles in a photo book and stabbed at them with a little chubby finger.  He kept going to the window to see if anything else good was coming down the road.

At The Office someone was talking about their very elderly father, and some memory questions he’d been given.  He did all right on his name and date of birth.  But then when he’d been asked about his parents: “I know I had a mother, I just don’t remember her name.”  Ouch. Pang. Yow.

Very Late Indeed.  Two boys in the bath when I got back, shiny, wet, smiling.  They’d been to the Zoo with Wonder Nanny.  Son 2 held out his arms and tried getting his foot over the side to get out.  He cried and clamoured to be cuddled, and then instantly snapped his interest over to the sink, standing on the chair, can I help him wash his hands which is his favourite thing.   And Son 1 had coloured me a picture of The Incredibles.  “You will be amazed.”  “All day long I drew it.” “Do you really really like it?”  I love it.  ”I will do one for Daddy tomorrow.”