Julie's Boggle

Jon – my dear little “big boy”, your delightful smile and shining eyes can lift the darkest mood.

Playful and cheeky, you are more of a little boy now than ever before.  Full to the brim with boyish self-confidence that lets you believe you really can do anything when it comes to climbing; and obsessed with trains, planes and automobiles of every sort.

It’s hard to know where to start when it comes to describing how you’ve changed over the last year.  Not so much on the physical side, especially since you were walking already this time last year (just), but on the emotional side, it feels like we’re getting to know a whole new person!

There’s no denying that things have been a little stressful for you these last few months and this brought out the prickly side of your personality.  You went from having a very easy life, where you and Mummy just got on with things, to experiencing some major upheavals in the form of the arrival of little Jessica and some nasty sharp molars all around the same time.

We’re really pleased to see that you seem to like having Jessica (“baby-sista”) around and have accepted that she’s a part of the family without manifesting too much in the way of jealousy.  It’s definitely been getting easier for you week by week (especially now that the worst of the teething is over) and we love having our sunny, helpful little fellow back.

You’re so much more independent now – some days straining against the adults who want to try to help, or fighting to do things your own way.  It can be a bit hard for everyone at these times but we’re learning together on this one, trying to figure out the win-win solutions where we all come out of it loving and respecting each other.

As parents, it’s hugely rewarding to watch you achieve something new.  Riding your birthday scooter — little tongue poked out in concentration, putting puzzle pieces together, drawing circular patterns, getting a box of juice out the fridge, climbing into your car-seat by yourself.  All so novel and such fun.  “I did it!” and “I a big boy Mummy” are two favourite phrases at the moment.

Your talking is still coming along in leaps and bounds.  One sign of this is the way that you can actually have a conversation of sorts with someone outside of the family and they will generally understand some of what you are saying.

The talking, especially over the last six months, brings out more and more of your personality – and we love it when the little statement “That bit funny!” pops out in response to what you see as curious or amusing.

Just in the last week you’ve figured out how to ask questions so we’re expecting a lot more of those!

Of course life doesn’t sit still and there’s going to be a lot more upheaval in your life coming very soon.  From the imminent holiday to SA (which will probably be the first one that you actually remember), to our big move to Durham in September – these next three months are going to be a busy time, but we’ll leave that for another chapter!

Tom here (using Julie’s blog because so many people read it) with some pictures of baby Jessica.

First off, my two beautiful girls about 9 minutes after Jess was born:

Second, a picture Julie took while Jessica was asleep this morning:

Then her first bath (which made her quite cross):

Finally, the family:

That’s enough for now – I’ve left one or two nice ones for Julie to post later.

I’ve been wanting to write a post with updates on Jon for ages now, but it’s become very hard to pin down specific changes when there are so many different areas where he’s changing all the time.  In the end I decided that I wouldn’t try to be too structured, but rather put down things that we’ve particularly noticed or that have made a noticeable difference in our lives.

The highest ranking one is definitely Communication, because one aspect that has really come on in the last 8 months is Jon’s talking.  And watching this fundamental skill develop from scratch has made me realise how communicating so quickly becomes the means of defining one’s sense of self-identity.

The first stage is discovering as a child that using one’s limited word set to describe a particular need to a participating adult can result in it being fulfilled.  This is pleasing.  The words are few though and expectations are low.

Stage one is enhanced as more words are learned [and understood by the adult interpreter], and a broader range of desires can be described and met. Simple two-way conversations start to take place, insignificant choices are offered (“Do you want to read Dinosaurs or the Caterpillar book tonight?”) and significant decisions are made (“Di-dor!”).  An even more pleasing sense of autonomy is introduced to the evolving brain.

From here though, we move to the second stage where an expectation starts to develop.  The belief that goes with the primitive speech and autonomy is that because a request has been expressed in words, it will be fulfilled / agreed with.  And this is where the problems can start…

“More cake!”

“No nappy change!”

“Mummy carry [me].”  (I think he has a strong sense that I avoid this wherever possible lately. )

“No carry / pushchair!  Walk!  Walk!”

“No warm coat!”

When Jon gets into one of those moods (fortunately not all that common), it all becomes a rather complex game of parental cunning and toddler psychology.  (And yes, it all starts to overlap a lot with general discipline, especially when the words are combined with a physical act like running away.)

Is he testing boundaries?  Or is he perhaps just hungry / tired / unwell thus justifying a little extra leniency? Is this an argument worth having?  Either way we want to be consistent and firm but without sounding like dictators or squelching the delicate ego overly much.

The first option is usually to try a distraction, or to offer a simple choice to get past the sticking point: “Do you want to walk or ride your car to your change mat?”  There have even been occasions where logic will work, but there’s a certain skill level required in explaining things to a stubborn toddler at the best of times.

If those steps don’t resolve the impasse, and particularly when the clock is working against you, the fall-back option sometimes has to be: “plough on regardless”.  Often requiring some sort of forceful physical intervention.  It seldom results in a win-win outcome…

Over the last 6 months, I’ve seen the full range of reactions in Jon when it comes to over-riding his personal belief in his right to make demands and have us go along with them.  The best case scenario is grudging acceptance, which means the incident is forgotten about in a minute or two.

An exasperating variation is the switch to a full-on state of negation.  This means that Everything the adult says must be greeted with refusal — nothing will do, even if it implies a huge personal sacrifice so the point will be made!  It’s a stressful form of self-punishment, and will usually end in tears being shed over the (unnecessary) personal sacrifices.

The last and most extreme case (Jon’s version of a tantrum, I think) is rare.  It’s an intense state of crying that can go on and on (we’ve never actually waited one out past 10 minutes) – by which time the original request is forgotten, and a simple hug, reassurance and a big nose blow will restore life to its proper balance.

Looking back, life seemed a lot simpler in the days when Jonathan couldn’t really talk, and we could simply impose our parental will on him and, for the most part, have him accept it.  (Even when he didn’t, we were bigger and stronger and faster than him, so we tended to win without much effort.)

How things have changed…

Fortunately, Jon’s default state is as a rather amiable chap, and we are getting better on the psychology and mood-reading that are required for the other times.

Now we sit back and watch how adding a tiny sibling to Jon’s immediate circle will re-shuffle the family dynamics all over again.

The February archives were a little slim on photos in general but fortunately we had one proper “day out”, with picture-taking, that captured this moment.

The big orange label on Jon’s front is because we were visiting Bramley’s, our closest “indoor adventure playground” – a great way to exercise toddlers on a rainy winter’s day!

On the afternoon this was taken, Jon was getting a lot of pleasure out of being allowed to “help out” with the housework – trailing our lovely cleaner, Adam.  Here he’s clutching the vacuum cleaner ["VAC-leaner"] pipe in his hand, and he was in the process of gamely pushing it around his bedroom carpet.

In choosing this month’s smile, I was quite torn between the photo above and this one, taken on the same day.  Both of them showed examples of Jon’s gentle smile to great effect.

(As an aside, Jon is wearing a warm top ["wahm-cop"] of his own choosing which he outgrew about 4 months ago, but still loves to pick out.   The text is mostly inaccurate but it is wonderfully cuddly!)

Over the last 6 months, Jonathan has become very fond of teddy bears, adopting a number of mine to supplement his originally meagre stockpile.  These bears seem to fill a special role in his collection of toys, perhaps in that they are the most cuddly and also the most easily anthropomorphised?

Jon tends to treat all bears equally, although the slightly bigger ones do end up spending more time with him.  When he’s in the mood, the bear of the minute will be given a sweet little cuddle with a corresponding “Aahh!”  (Filling in the response he hears so often from us when we see him dispensing a hug! )

A definite element of bear-popularity is that they can ride pillion on Jon’s little pushcar (albeit slightly more under Jon than behind him), and they fit well into his toy pushchair.  Both of these allow Jon to show his bear just how fast he can get them from one end of the flat to the other.  He also likes how they can sit on his booster seat, where they get diligently clipped in and fitted with a bib before being fed some favourite meal, like “hot bread”.

(Tom managed to get this lovely shot the other day during the morning wake-up routine.  These bears which had spent the night with him were clearly very deserving of some Jon-love.)

In all the impromptu photos that have been captured over December, somehow there weren’t very many in the best smile category.   (Perhaps the latest bout of teething has kept Jon in a more sombre mood this month.)

Having said that, this was one of my favourites where Jon is laughing out loud as he plays with his Christmas present from us: a wooden train track.  (For reasons known only to himself, Jon has developed an avid enthusiasm for cars and trains over the last 6 months which made our choice of present an easy one this year! )

Every so often, the perfect day shows up together with the perfect opportunity to make great use of it.  On this particular glorious Autumn day, about a month ago, Jonathan and I met up with a friend and her little one and headed down to the Diana Memorial Playground for some toddler fun.

Jon responds really well to having a friend to follow / lead around – it helps to focus him on a particular activity (e.g. charging around the climbing frame), as well as getting him to look around and explore more than he would if he were by himself or with children he didn’t know.

He and James had a grand old time trying everything out.  Unfortunately the pictures didn’t come out brilliantly with the sharp bright light leaving everything in shadow or over-exposed, but I thought the two above did a good job of highlighting both the toddler enjoyment and the light extremes!

I love the way that Jonathan is still very easily amused especially by basic “horsing around” type games.  When I got this photo, he’d decided to lie down on the floor on a spare change-mat and I was getting him to shriek with laughter just from some gentle tickling with my foot.

After only a minute or two of clicking away, I ended up with a whole set of pictures that I liked too much not to share:

I’d been thinking recently that it would be good to get Jon started at a nursery group sometime soon – especially before life starts to get exciting around Easter next year.  With that in mind, I called up the only nursery I had a real interest in (by virtue of its reputation and location) to see if they had any vacancies.

Before I go on, I should briefly explain the term “nursery” in its UK context.  It’s got quite a broad definition as people use it to refer to any formal organisation which looks after groups of pre-school aged children, i.e. from baby to 5.  Nurseries vary widely in the ages (from this range) that they will take, and the hours that they provide each day.  They also tend to vary in how much they charge and in details like whether they provide meals and whether they are open in school holidays.  To give a feel for the costs involved, a full day’s care in a typical London nursery, which includes three meals + snacks, will set you back between £60 and £70.

I tend to think of the nurseries that provide the full day service as having more of a childcare role.  To be sure, they will also offer all sorts of child development, but they exist primarily for parents who work and don’t have someone to look after their child during the day.

Contrasting with this are the nurseries that operate limited sessions, sometimes only in the morning, or with a shorter afternoon session thrown in as well.  (Sometimes called “nursery schools”.)   They don’t tend to provide meals and they don’t fit in very well at all with the typical working day.  These nurseries, in my book, are purely there for child development opportunities.

The nursery I was keen on for Jon falls firmly into the second category.  It runs 3-hour morning-sessions, 5 days a week, and 2-hour afternoon-sessions 3 days a week.  Term-time only.  The afternoon sessions are aimed at the youngest children (2 to 2.5yo generally), with perhaps 2 or 3 of the older children from the morning session staying on (with their packed lunches) to give them the experience of a longer day in preparation for starting “big” school.

I knew when we went for our first visit, that they were quite booked up until January.  But Jon fitted in so well, and made such a good impression, that we were offered a place that same day!  (After the head teacher made a plan to juggle staff around to fit him in.)  I was very impressed myself with the little class that we stayed for, and happily accepted.

Thus began Jon’s formal interactions outside the home.  The sessions he attends run from 12h30 to 14h30 on Mondays and typically involve between 8 and 11 other toddlers with either 2 or 3 adults.

There is not much that is convenient time-wise about those hours , but we are managing.  At the moment, the routine has shuffled around so Jon has an early lunch at 12h00 (so we can leave at 12h25 at the absolute latest), and after I pick him up, with the mandatory homeward dawdle, he gets a nap from 3-ish to 4pm.  (Which can be a bit of a challenge.)

I’m still fine-tuning my time-management and have yet to experience a Monday that doesn’t involve jogging, with the pushchair, to make it by starting time, but we’re getting there!

It is rather nice to have that little chunk of time to myself (will become even more precious next year I’m sure), and Jon seems to love it.  Particularly today, which followed a week’s “half-term” break, he was tripping over his feet and other little people to race inside.  From next term (January), he’ll start going 2 afternoons a week, and then we’ll see how Jon and our finances go from there.