1. A Helping Hand 

2.  Holding Hands

3.  A Big Hand

I helped myself to a lie in. Just couldn’t get up.  Eventually we all got going, but Son 1 aged 4y 10m was being strident and shouty, demanding and mouthy, picking on Son 2 aged 22m, not tolerating him when he buzzed his games.  Absolutely normal behaviour for a 4 year old boy, but The Man and I are Very Tired.  I took them swimming in The Hotel pool.  Son 1 was great, swimming and splashing on the noodle.  He still wanted to bomb and splash, but it was too crowded. And he had make-pretend games he wanted to play… but I had to keep Son 2 from drowning. ”We need Daddy, don’t we?” said Son 1. I think I may have to agree with him.  Son 2, smiling and eyes dancing,  will jump off the side without fear. I let him go under without catching him once, but he looked so shocked as he came up, gleaming, blinking and coughing, that I didn’t do it again.  He’s not as confident in the water as Son 1 was at his age, but then I used to take Son 1 to swimming lessons every week, and just for a play swim on Sundays. He ended the session: “Cold!  Out! Towel!”

Back home The Man had been in a cupboard and found the old plaster-casting kit we had for Son 1.    We took a beautiful cast of his hand when he was 6m, on a very giggly Sunday morning, with me holding a comatose Son 1, Nanna holding the impression bag and The Man pouring the gunk in. i would love a cast of Son 2, but he never sleeps deeply enough.  Son 1 was desperate to do his hand.   We added the water, and I squodged the bag round Son 2’s hand. “Don’t move it, DON’T MOVE IT! I screeched. And then saw the frightened look in his eyes. “It’s ok, you’re doing fine,” I calmed down.  It set, and we peeled it off.  It looked good.  It needed to dry for two hours before we could cast from it. 

Son 2 and I went upstairs to put him down for a sleep.  We snuggled into the Double Bed.  He snugged me for a bit, then wandered off over to the other side of the bed. He fell asleep.  So did I. He woke a couple of times, and wriggled back towards me. He fell back to sleep. So did I. I woke up and saw his little face peering at me. “Up!”  We went downstairs. “Mummy come and see my hand!” Son 1 pelted out of the lounge. We went down to the kitchen.  The plaster cast of his hand is perfect.  Individual fingers… a complete little four-year-old hand with no Pompeii-like cracks or broken bits. It’s lovely. “Will you keep it forever?” said Son 1. Yes I will.

1. Organic Matter
2. Smile and Wave
3. Vegetable Matter
Son 2 aged 13m woke up in his cot at 0545. Hooray hooray. The Man was Tired, so I took the boys swimming one after another. Son 2 was so excited that in the changing room he sat by the cubicle door and bounced up and down. We sat in the baby pool in the Shallow End. There was Matter in the water. I checked Son 2’s swim nappy. It wasn’t his. I looked around. More Matter. I took Son 2 over to the lifeguard, stepping past a two inch turd lying at the bottom of the pool. “There is poo in the pool,” I told the lifeguard. “Where?” he said. “There,” I said. “And there, and there and there.” Son 2 was so keen to swim that I took him up to the Deep End where some Friends were swimming. Nothing sinister there. I watched the lifeguard go from the Shallow End to talk to his colleague at the Deep End. They changed seats. Nothing happened. 30 minutes later, a net came out. Stuff was removed from the Shallow End, many times. The net was emptied into a fire bucket. Then the fire door was opened, and the contents of the bucket were tipped onto the grass outside. As our Friend said: “Isn’t it lucky they shut the cafe?”

I took Son 2 back at the end of the session, and picked up Son 1 aged 4y 1m. At the pool, the wave machine was on, and I gave him a surfboard. He pulled himself on it and kicked and paddled effortlessly to the Deep End, where he joyfully bounced up and down on the biggest waves. Then he paddled himself over to the Tunnel, turned himself round and kicked himself backwards all the way along. Every time I tried to touch the board he pushed me off. “I can’t believe my eyes,” I said. “Where did you learn how to do all this?” “At my Nursery,” he said.

“But can he swim?” said The Man, back home. “No idea,” I said. I have taken Son 1 to swimming lessons since he did dunk-the-babies when he was about three months old. He hated going under water from the first immersion and has never budged his opinion. So now I never comment, never enquire, never try and make him do anything. The boys played, and I finished off the roast chicken dinner. I didn’t get Son 2’s on his highchair in time to avert major ice-cap melting tantrum. He couldn’t do it. Son 1 however, transformed himself into a Perfect Child. He rejected the courgettes and parsnips, but ate whacking great chunks of cauliflower and shovelfuls of leeks. He got his toy dustpan and brush and cleared up all the food Son 2 had flung overboard. Then, when I at last got near my meal, he sat on my knee and ate my cauliflower and leeks too. Apparently if you eat more vegetables after your pudding you have to have another pudding. We settled on a Scooby Doo Ice Pop.