Going to the National Gallery of Scotland with my 3 year old daughter
(written Tuesday at the hipster coffee shop...)
Even the metal ramp leading up to the doors is embossed and beautiful. Pull open the heavy doors and enjoy the warm greeting of the person wearing tartan trousers, who usually scrambles to help us when they see our bumbling, chaotic entrance, complete with buggy and baby and bags! ''Look! There are our turtles!'' all four of the them carved in stone, holding up the corners of the donation box planted in the foyer. My child stands in the most inconvenient places, unawares, watching in unself-conscious wonder while other visitors try to skirt around her into the inner doors. I feel them take a mental step back from us - but do not fear us, dear tourists and pensioners! We only come to watch and learn as you do, albeit in small baby steps each time - which is why we must visit more often - to sip up quickly the sights before our attention wanders.
We have our favorite friends - the stone turtles, the wooden lions (with their chair-weight bearing claws), the donkey next to the naked baby, the 'reindeer' crying at his death blow, the 'dead man' (Patrocles) lying like a slab of marble on the wall. We spot all the dogs and all the horses, immortalized in motionless liveliness within their lavish frames. My prancing, golden, high-pitched companion, though she only reaches my waist, sometimes sees the clearest. ''Why does that lady have no clothes on?'' ''I think that's a man, my love.'' ''Look at that horse! A big brown horse!'' (I think it is unfortunate, or perhaps artistic justice? This certain artistocrat should forever be standing next to the rich warm luster of his horses' rear end. The horses' ass outshines the appearance of his master.)
And we love to visit the upstairs gallery with the blue couches and the 'snowflakes' on the floor. ''I want to stay here forever because they have snowflakes on the floor...'' Before I visited with her eyes, I had never noticed the color of the beige patterned carpet or the fact that the walls and sofas were such a lovely blue. But then, there are 'our banerninas' (of Degas) and the painting of the horse we like and the sculpture of the tiger eating the antelope. And this time we noticed, 'Oh, the most beautiful picture! Mommy, come! Come!' with pinks and oranges and blues and yellows ('and no other colors, mommy') splashed recklessly across the canvas - a bridge between this dignified tour of the past and the irreverent spillings of new things rightly relegated to the Modern Art Museum.
I study the portrait of the young boy memorizing his book, wondering how the artist captured the sheen of almost blonde brown hair that remind me of my own masterpiece's gleaming? (But hers are brighter.) I would love to preserve that shining. Lifting the veil between the ordinary and the eternal.
And when we leave into the misty, cold, rain-slicked city, the whole world is a painting wherever we look.
Saturday, 16 January 2016
Tuesday, 12 January 2016
12 January 2015
Ah...Oh, so this is what the office looks like after the kids are asleep......hmmmm......Almost forgotten where the 'new post' button was...
So Titus got used to sleeping in my arms when he was sick a couple of weeks ago. I don't regret babying him like that at all (because, face it, he's a *baby* and how long does that last?) but I decided I really needed to get him sleeping solo in his own bed again.
And last night was *hard.* I'm using a combination of methods that I've gradually accumilated through Felicity's no-sleep toddlerhood....this one (don't remember where it's from) is where you pick up the baby when they're fussy, but then put them back in their crib as soon as they're settled - no matter how long it takes. Somehow, it helps when you count. I find that after 5 times it's remarkably difficult when they start to cry again, but it's one of those things that if you start it, you really need to follow through, or it makes the entire process *even harder* the next time. Do not surrender. This is a war you must win, or resign yourself to sleeplessness forever (HA! but no pressure, right?!)
So last night, it took 14 times to lay him down before he fell asleep in his cot. He woke up an hour later and it took another 10 times to lay him down again. He then slept until 2am - *angels sing* and I fed him (before Felicity woke up from wetting the bed and I had to get up and change her bedding and PJs until abotu 3am....) but then Titus woke up at 3:15am and I'm like, 'no Buddy....you ate really good only an hour ago - this is not an all-night drive through'
it takes 52 times to put him back in bed. (oh, and I was so done by about time 23.....) Finally, he gives it up about 5am and we're all able to go back to sleep.
And Felicity comes in at 6am wanting cuddles (she is succintly banished to her room until 7am when her clock changes.) 8am and I drag my unwilling carcass out of bed. (Thank you Lord I didn't have to get up before 8am!)
I'm telling myself it's an initial investment. It hurts now, but if I can get him to sleep in his bed again, it will pay dividends in the long run! And I honestly think the only way I was able to hold the line last night was because I got 3-something hours of solo sleep before all hell broke loose.
Tonight, it took 3 lay-downs before he settled. We will see how the rest of the night goes.
In the meantime, I'm going to go find the inside of my eyeballs for a while......
(We actually had a very good day today, much to my surprise. Sometime I will start blogging about my daytime activities when the nights become less exciting. Suffice to say, since Felicity was at nursery in the morning, I was able to go and buy her some larger t-shirts (I bought size 6s and 7s - 7 is still too big, thank goodness!) at the grocery store and sit and write silly poetry in a crowded coffee shop with my gorgeous baby for a while. {And not even a 'yummy-mummy-type' coffee shop - I was the only one with a pram there! Way to be hipster-wannabe me! Unfortunately, don't think it improved the poetry.....} Then this afternoon Felicity and I took a walk around some of the charity shops in town while waiting to pick up her medicine at the pharmacy.....we bought a new puzzle (with a map and flags of the world), a small plastic crocodile (he's going to be a hit with the other zoo animals....I thought he would be destined to be the antagonist but then Felicity informed me that 'he's a nice crocodile. He only eats vegetables') and 6 bratz dollies (50p each!) to paint new sweet faces on. Felicity and I had a great time then when we got home refurbishing our finds - I painted new faces on 2 of the dollies and she re-painted her crocodile (I think her painting looks better than the paint it came with actually...) The kitchen table still bears the evidence in acrylic paint....but no matter, we had a brilliant time! I was gratified that she took both new dollies with her in the bathtub (neccesary after the amount of paint distributed on hands, arms, faces....and also a good excuse to wash out the dollie's hair before they are assimilated into the household) and then dressed them in PJs before tucking them in bed with her. I had put her hair up into a tinkerbell bun to keep it dry in the bath and was breathless at how grown up and *long* she looked in her PJs dressing her dollies. I keep trying to call her a toddler, because technically she is still only 3, but she is really not! Where did this big girl come from? We have been reading a funny book from the library called 'Pizza Kittens' before bed the last 3 nights - which has an explosion of peas in the middle that makes us all laugh. Then, Felicity wanted to hold and cuddle and kiss Titus while we tucked her into bed and said prayers. Beautiful beautiful kids. Oh yeah, and we watched the Hobbit ('the one with the horses and the TROLL!') and ate pancakes for dessert after dinner.)
Life is Good. Just need more sleep.
So Titus got used to sleeping in my arms when he was sick a couple of weeks ago. I don't regret babying him like that at all (because, face it, he's a *baby* and how long does that last?) but I decided I really needed to get him sleeping solo in his own bed again.
And last night was *hard.* I'm using a combination of methods that I've gradually accumilated through Felicity's no-sleep toddlerhood....this one (don't remember where it's from) is where you pick up the baby when they're fussy, but then put them back in their crib as soon as they're settled - no matter how long it takes. Somehow, it helps when you count. I find that after 5 times it's remarkably difficult when they start to cry again, but it's one of those things that if you start it, you really need to follow through, or it makes the entire process *even harder* the next time. Do not surrender. This is a war you must win, or resign yourself to sleeplessness forever (HA! but no pressure, right?!)
So last night, it took 14 times to lay him down before he fell asleep in his cot. He woke up an hour later and it took another 10 times to lay him down again. He then slept until 2am - *angels sing* and I fed him (before Felicity woke up from wetting the bed and I had to get up and change her bedding and PJs until abotu 3am....) but then Titus woke up at 3:15am and I'm like, 'no Buddy....you ate really good only an hour ago - this is not an all-night drive through'
it takes 52 times to put him back in bed. (oh, and I was so done by about time 23.....) Finally, he gives it up about 5am and we're all able to go back to sleep.
And Felicity comes in at 6am wanting cuddles (she is succintly banished to her room until 7am when her clock changes.) 8am and I drag my unwilling carcass out of bed. (Thank you Lord I didn't have to get up before 8am!)
I'm telling myself it's an initial investment. It hurts now, but if I can get him to sleep in his bed again, it will pay dividends in the long run! And I honestly think the only way I was able to hold the line last night was because I got 3-something hours of solo sleep before all hell broke loose.
Tonight, it took 3 lay-downs before he settled. We will see how the rest of the night goes.
In the meantime, I'm going to go find the inside of my eyeballs for a while......
(We actually had a very good day today, much to my surprise. Sometime I will start blogging about my daytime activities when the nights become less exciting. Suffice to say, since Felicity was at nursery in the morning, I was able to go and buy her some larger t-shirts (I bought size 6s and 7s - 7 is still too big, thank goodness!) at the grocery store and sit and write silly poetry in a crowded coffee shop with my gorgeous baby for a while. {And not even a 'yummy-mummy-type' coffee shop - I was the only one with a pram there! Way to be hipster-wannabe me! Unfortunately, don't think it improved the poetry.....} Then this afternoon Felicity and I took a walk around some of the charity shops in town while waiting to pick up her medicine at the pharmacy.....we bought a new puzzle (with a map and flags of the world), a small plastic crocodile (he's going to be a hit with the other zoo animals....I thought he would be destined to be the antagonist but then Felicity informed me that 'he's a nice crocodile. He only eats vegetables') and 6 bratz dollies (50p each!) to paint new sweet faces on. Felicity and I had a great time then when we got home refurbishing our finds - I painted new faces on 2 of the dollies and she re-painted her crocodile (I think her painting looks better than the paint it came with actually...) The kitchen table still bears the evidence in acrylic paint....but no matter, we had a brilliant time! I was gratified that she took both new dollies with her in the bathtub (neccesary after the amount of paint distributed on hands, arms, faces....and also a good excuse to wash out the dollie's hair before they are assimilated into the household) and then dressed them in PJs before tucking them in bed with her. I had put her hair up into a tinkerbell bun to keep it dry in the bath and was breathless at how grown up and *long* she looked in her PJs dressing her dollies. I keep trying to call her a toddler, because technically she is still only 3, but she is really not! Where did this big girl come from? We have been reading a funny book from the library called 'Pizza Kittens' before bed the last 3 nights - which has an explosion of peas in the middle that makes us all laugh. Then, Felicity wanted to hold and cuddle and kiss Titus while we tucked her into bed and said prayers. Beautiful beautiful kids. Oh yeah, and we watched the Hobbit ('the one with the horses and the TROLL!') and ate pancakes for dessert after dinner.)
Life is Good. Just need more sleep.
Monday, 11 January 2016
11 January 2016
I love my kids.
Titus and I were jamming out to the Monkees and 'Hit the Road Jack' while I cleaned the kitchen and fed him baby rice this morning. He was giggling and bouncing and so cute!
Felicity, Simon and I have been playing 'Pop to the Shops' a lot this past weekend. She has also been asking me to 'PLay Ponies with me, Mommy!' incessantly!
Good days. Not much time for myself, hence lack of blog posts, but great times.
Titus and I were jamming out to the Monkees and 'Hit the Road Jack' while I cleaned the kitchen and fed him baby rice this morning. He was giggling and bouncing and so cute!
Felicity, Simon and I have been playing 'Pop to the Shops' a lot this past weekend. She has also been asking me to 'PLay Ponies with me, Mommy!' incessantly!
Good days. Not much time for myself, hence lack of blog posts, but great times.
Friday, 1 January 2016
1 Jan 2016
The fireworks display last night was something else. I fell asleep long before midnight, but the noise easily woke me up. I debated whether to get up or just pull the duvet back over my head, but in the end, I'm glad I struggled bleary-eyed to the window and caught the finale. They had fireworks shooting off from the castle (?) and carlton hill at the same time - fantastic! Then when the Edinburgh town fireworks were over, I heard bangs from the opposite windows and looked out towards the sea to see the fireworks being shot off from Portobello (?) and Musselburgh - and even some from out North Berwick way, it seemed.
Then I settled Mr. T as quickly as I could so I could go back to sleep! For a long time after I went to bed, the rock-rhythm-bass reverberating across the city, blasted by enormous loudspeakers in town no doubt, kept me on the edge of consciousness thinking...... I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I, IV-IV-IV-IV-IV-IV-IV-IV-IV, V-V-V-V-V-V-V-V-V, I,I,I,I,I,I,I,I,I,I,I.........UGH. (Musician problems.....)
Happy New Years everyone.
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