Julie's Boggle

We went along to an R.E.M. concert last night. Something that had required lots of planning – “seated” tickets bought almost a year ago, special parking booked near Twickenham stadium, baby-sitter arranged, and so on. A proper night out with the appropriate-sized hole gouged out of our bank balance to prove it.

So I guess my expectations were fairly high. Which was not a good place to start from. Because I felt – in a word – disappointed.

If we’d been veteran concert-goers, there would definitely have been elements of the afternoon/evening that would have gone a lot better. During long periods of casting my eyes about the crowd, I noticed that said veterans:

• didn’t arrive until just before the main act (a good call, because the openers weren’t really worth it and just added 2+ hours to the time spent in hard seats)
• had binoculars with them to see the tiny figures on the stage
• had ear-plugs to protect their hearing from a serious excess of bass
• brought their own food to make up for the over-priced, under-par food being sold on site
• smuggled in their own water bottles to get around the stupid rule that water bottles bought at the bars must have their lids removed! (I know! )

So why did the music disappoint? Well, I expected to be engrossed; carried away by the songs I’ve known and loved for years. R.E.M’s distinctive, laid-back melodies and quirky lyrics that have accompanied me on long journeys and kept my brain from stagnating when it wasn’t required for admin tasks at work. In short, the perfect music to sit back and enjoy at a concert on a balmy August night.

Instead, there was mainly a mix of noisy, beat-heavy numbers that weren’t familiar (to us) with one or two old favourites thrown in, and most of the time we couldn’t hear the words. Behind the band, a very impressive, real-time, technicolour display was going on but I still felt easily distracted. It was hard to feel involved.

Part of the disappointment is a direct result of me not doing my homework on this concert. I’ve been too content with the R.E.M. albums I own already (Automatic for the People being a particular favourite) and haven’t really taken the trouble to find out what their new music is like. Times have moved on, and evidently, so have R.E.M.’s songs. If I’d realised how much of what they would be playing would not appeal to me, I’d have put the money towards a slap-up meal for two instead! Ho-hum.

Jon is pretty good at keeping his top gum-line well hidden. And he doesn’t welcome probing advances in that particular area either. (Kudos to Daddy on getting this photo!)

Consequently we were slightly late in spotting the middle two of his top teeth — getting a glimpse of them for the first time about a month ago when they were already protruding slightly.

We did a little better with the third one which Tom caught sight of just as it broke the surface a couple of weeks back.

Something that is not necessarily easy to see in the above photo is the skewness of the incisor on the left (your right). It really has picked a funny angle.

Right next to it, is the gap in Jon’s top jaw that went with his cleft lip, so it’s not obvious that he’ll even have a fourth incisor – possibly just a gap in his milk teeth that will be fixed when they go back and graft some bone into his gum in about 6 years time. Shame, another op for our little guy… But it’ll give him pretty teeth!

As might have been apparent in my previous post, I embarked on our caravan holiday with a fair amount of trepidation. This turned out to be unfounded and everything went far better than expected.

So well in fact that we have already made plans to go again next year!

The caravan we hired was not a recent model, but it was still fairly well kitted out. At one end, it had two 2-seater couches that faced each other (in theory, the eating area). These were transformed into their alternative configuration: a narrow double bed, at the earliest opportunity, and left that way.

On the other end, was a long couch that could become a single bed. (There was some sort of arrangement that could have given us a bunk bed above that but we didn’t experiment.)

What we did experiment with, quite early on, was putting the couch into single bed formation and then stripping off the cushions/mattress, to see how Jon’s camp-cot would stand on it.

Ahem. It turned out that the bed was quite narrow, and only two of the camp-cot’s feet would be supported by it. We increased this tally to three by lying the caravan’s folding table on top of the bed. That just left the final foot… After some head-scratching and various attempts at re-arranging — including an abortive attempt at squeezing the cot into the caravan’s gangway (would definitely make getting to our bed a tricky prospect), we finally tried putting the bed’s cushions into a pile (they were quite firm) and rested the final foot on that. Voilà, baby bed done!

By the afternoon of the first day (Saturday), most people had arrived and our camping “village” (Blue 6) was abuzz with activity. All around us, tents and gazebos were going up, cars were being unpacked, supplies stowed away, and children racing around everywhere, simply thrilled to have all their playmates in this novel environment.

From the second day, with the exception of the Day Off in the middle, our days fell into a fairly standard routine.

We tended to wake up around 07h00 which was when Jonathan and various other baby “alarms” went off in surrounding tents. From then, we had until 09h00, when one of us put Jon down for his nap while the other went off to the excellent morning worship and bible study session. (There was a 07h15 session but those were not for us! :yawn: )

From 11h00 to 12h30, Jon went off his group, “Emeralds”, for babies between 1 and 2 years. (The toy collection there was excellent and Jon got along fabulously.) The main seminar sessions were run during this time, which was great as Tom and I could go together. About 8 seminars were run in parallel, making it quite hard to choose some days!

After the morning session, we invariably stopped by the coffee and freshly-made doughnut stall in the vending area. Mmmm. Warm, crisp, sugary doughnuts… (Why would anyone want Krispy Kreme when they could have these!)

Lunches tended to be laid-back affairs, usually involving fresh bread and other goodies from the on-site farm stall. In the afternoon, more seminars were run and in the evening there was worship and teaching. Tom and I took turns to attend these two sessions.

We all really enjoyed the free time in the camp. All the kids got on so well with the older ones being very good with the youngsters like Jon.

For suppers, we were divided up into groups so we only had to worry about cooking (for 7 adults and 6 kids!) on one of the nights. On the other nights, we just showed up. [We also learned that there are meals that work very well in a camping-type environment, and others that should be avoided!]

We did see the advantages of a tent in that it provided a great spot for cosy late night group chats, while rain was pattering down on the “roof” above us.

However, for all the space limitations, the caravan had a lot going for it. We enjoyed the hot water for washing up (once we learned how to switch it on ), and the fridge was a great asset that we were able to share with a number of tent-dwellers. And narrow as it was, the caravan’s double bed was very comfortable and snug under our king-size duvet. (Next year, I’ll know to take a proper pillow…)

So yes, caravan again next year. But a bigger one (to avoid the camp-cot shenanigans), and with some chairs and an awning to expand our living area. Maybe we’ll even have a built-in toilet to help with avoiding the 5-minute walk to the loos at 3am…

(All photos shown here can also be seen in this album.)

Having just finished re-adjusting all baby-proofing for the extended arm-reach that sitting next to things gave him, I came into the lounge one morning, a day or two after he had started crawling, and found Jon kneeling at the coffee table. Oh dear.

The besieged items on the coffee table retreated further into their shrinking zone of safety.

Since then, kneeling is all the rage. It is done at every possible opportunity, and dragging on parental trousers to get into position is a big favourite.

Unfortunately, Jon has also discovered other things that can be used as hand holds.

Like cupboard handles.

And the amazing thing about that, is that with the right combination of pulling and dragging down, cupboards can be Opened to reveal all sorts of Fascinating New Toys!

Cue the start of the search for handy widgets that stop our lovely kitchen cupboards being opened for baby curiosity.

Kneeling unsupported is still at a very early stage. And a wobbly, look-Ma-no-hands posture has been known to turn into an uncomfortable tumble forward or backward, often followed by some wailing if the surface that meets his head is not a soft one. (The poor little guy is currently sporting a dark bruise on his cheek as the result of one of of yesterday’s spills into a hard edge.)

It’s hard to predict whether standing will evolve naturally from kneeling, but it’s a dead certainty that walking will follow standing. I think at that time, the coffee table’s functionality will be restricted to after-Jon’s-bedtime hours.

In the meantime, I just think it’s great that our little guy has come so far on this wonderful, often painful, adventure of figuring out how it all works.

And I’m really glad that he gave us a whole year off first!

We’ve been watching Jon experiment with various forms of locomotion for a long time now. Back in May he was fully into rolling. He also became very good at shuffling himself backwards which led to all sorts of interesting scenarios where he got himself stuck under our sofa, under the dining room chairs, under other people’s sofas, etc.

Finally he worked out a shambling version of leopard-crawl which was very useful for getting him out of these tight spots. So we’ve been watching with interest to see what would evolve next in this complicated, self-taught study of physical control.

We’d seen Jon trying out various things that involved getting his pelvis off the ground, but each time it all collapsed again and it was back to leopard crawling.

I’m guessing that there was a lot of muscle toning and tuning continually going on, because one day, he tried again and it just worked. Suddenly he had himself properly on all fours and all the limb coordination came together, and that was it! Crawling at last. *warm parental glow*

For a few days we had occasional lurches back into leopard-crawl, but soon this was well behind him, and now the confident slap or thud of little palms on the floor coming up from behind is a brilliant indicator that young Jon is on the move.

(I have a great video of him crawling that first day. Slipping into a partial leopard-crawl and then back again, tongue out in concentration. It’s here if you want to see it. And if your media player won’t play it, I’d recommend trying the free VLC player.)

The month after he turned one was a busy time for our young Jonathan — he spent it learning all sorts of new and fun things he could do with the wondrous body he’s been given!

For quite a few months we’d seen him moving all over the flat – more on that later. But once he was on the floor and moving around, that was it. He was on the floor until we sat him up again.

Then one day, he suddenly figured out how he could get back to sitting again all by himself!

In Jon’s case, he did it the first time by means of a sneaky trick: reversing, on his front, into a corner and just keep going. That first step quickly evolved into reversing towards any solid surface, and then a day or two later, he was doing it in the middle of the floor. Gosh.

I’m sure the advantages of this minor milestone will not be immediately apparent to those of you who have long forgotten what it is like to be floor-bound and very short. But being able to sit up is a Big step for someone trying to get through Muscle and Limb Coordination 101.

For example, in the above picture, from his sitting position (as opposed to lying on the floor) Jon can both see into, and reach, the groove in the back door’s frame that seems to trap a variety of garden debris. And what do you do when you find this sort of thing? Well, if you’re Jonathan, you are naturally curious as to what it tastes like and whether it’s any good to eat. (His powers of discernment are not strong in this area! )

It has also opened up the exciting possibilities of sitting very cosily next to the large crate we have protecting the hi-fi. Not a place any sane parent would naturally sit their baby. Especially when it would mean that the baby could now reach the hi-fi over the top of said crate!

And he needs to learn that he’s never going to fall asleep sitting up in bed!

But all that aside, it really is great to see Jon’s little baby-form sitting up so straight and playing so beautifully by himself.

And this simply because he was able to both find his toys AND sit up again, without any help from Mum or Dad at all! Some progress is just wonderful.