Doffa lives in our hearts now

Its been a summer of wind and sadness. Although it was expected after a long illness, we lost our Doffa - our grandmother, mother and mother-in-law. She’s left a hole in our lives the size of Lake Taupo. How much do you tell a 6,4 and 2 year old of the ‘death-nitty-gritty’? Quite a lot, it turns out. We’ve talked about hearts stopping and souls leaving a body and cremation (which is being all burned up into ashes), and what means to be alive or dead. We talked about heaven but overdid it perhaps a touch, I realized, when they started talking about how cool it is and how much they want to go there. Dad had the most comforting description of the state of our loss - ‘Doffa lives in our hearts now.’ Out of the blue Little Brother summed up the heaviness in all our hearts -‘I just wish I could see Doffa again.’ Ever logistically minded he continued, ‘But, we can’t. She lives in our hearts now. Its like, we ate her.’ At four and a half he is the bearer of harsh truths for his grandfather - ‘You have to live by yourself now Granddad.’ he told him one day shortly after the event. Another day he informed him ‘You’re fat, Granddad.’ We made a book about Doffa’s life and the kids drew appropriate pictures - like one about the way she liked to line up her shoes beside her bed when she was little, a picture of her dancing (which she loved) and skiing (which she loved). There are pictures of the handsome kind friend who wrote to her and asked her to marry him, a picture of her 3 sons wrestling, and of course lots of battle scenes between dragons and droid armies. I’m sure she would have loved it. They dictated a page of what they remember about her : She likes to give us hugs - She likes to give us presents sometimes. - Doffa uses her manners. She likes it when we write her letters. She reads us stories. Granddad reads us stories too. Actually Granddad reads us more stories than Doffa. She gives us strawberries. It seems the past tense is hard to grasp at that age. Its been a summer of expected and unexpected death. What a shock to learn we are all closer to heaven than we think. Our cousin Rachael at 41 years old was diagnosed with, battled and lost her life to cancer in just three weeks. She lives in our hearts now, too. Its been a summer of gratitude. We were lucky to know and share the lives of two amazing women. ‘I’m going to live until I’m one hundred’ Little Brother says. ‘Sadly, we don’t get to choose how long we live’ I tell him, going for full disclosure now, the gloves are off - ‘when our time is up, it’s up. We have to make the most of everyday we do have, with the people we love.’ Its a lesson that we are never too young or too old to learn.

Social Etiquette and Christmas Cards

It all started off with mostly good intentions. We are house bound with a tired toddler, a vomiting 4 year old and a 6 year old with an elephantine ankle following a nasty bee sting. In a effort to make the best of a bad day, I got festive. A couple of weeks ago I bought some christmas stamps, for the sole purpose of converting the piles of discarded artworks lying around the house into christmas cards (recycling, aka typically cheap). Never mind that they are mostly droid battle scenes and dinosaur/monsters killing each other with extensive weaponry caches. But now the whole exercise has become a lesson in social etiquette. Little brother made a intricate card, stamped his name carefully on it, and decided to keep it for himself. Then he fell back to sleep. Big Brother has been prolific in his jingle-bell generosity, working on cards for all the boys at school. Now that he can write there's no on-the-spot editing possible by mum. These were the range of his messages Dear A, Please invite me to your house. Dear B, Hope you have a christmas. Dear C, You are my third best friend. (I suggested that while might be true was it really necessary to write it down so black-and-white/honest? 'Perhaps you will hurt your friends feelings?' I asked. 'But Mum,' he replied, 'thats what he calls me!' 'Carry on then.' I capitulated.) Dear D, Have a good trip to Africa. (Are they going to africa for christmas? I asked. 'No, he replied, I meant to write I hope you HAD a good trip to Africa. Last Christmas.) Dear E, Happy Birthday. Dear F and G, Happy Christmas. ('I wrote that one to both of them' he showed me, obviously proud of his corner cutting abilities. 'Oh, great, which one gets to take it home? I asked. He cracked up laughing, 'Don't know!' he said. We laughed at the thought of how they'd have to decide.) Then came the envelopes. He put them all in and sealed them. 'Have you written the right person's name on the front? I asked, helpfully 2 minutes too late. He ripped them out of the envelopes and put them in new ones. He wrote their names on the front. Job done. Phew. Next year we'll probably go for a simple message on his Club Penguin page. Snail mail is so complicated and frankly, so, like, 2011.

From the mouth of the babe

Emerging from the babble are real and actual words. Usually just one at a time, but there is a self belief written all over her face as she looks you in the eye, grabs your nose in a killer grip, and says 'Mouth'. Or points to the sky and says 'Boat.' Up until now we have had names, and the two most useful words in the world - 'More' and 'NO'. I say 'Have you had enough?' and she says. 'No. More. K?" She has recently added the opposite of 'more ' which is 'Nuff', but it is not usually used in conjunction with food - rather if she is being bear hugged by her brother she yells out 'NUFF!' Each word is a complete sentence with full stop. This is an example of a conversation we might have. A: 'EreeDada?' (she uses sign language of hands palm upwards for where is..) Me: He's at work. A. Work. Me: He's gone to work in the car. A: Car. Me: He's gone to work in the blue car. A. Blue. Like a little computer she absorbs the data and spits it out the other end. I'm not the only one she copies, as I found out a few days ago. We were leaving the Polling Booth, and she turned and waved at the nice polling lady who'd given her a sticker - 'Bye Bye. See-ya. Poo Bum.'

Testosterone Surges

Beware the 4 and half year old boy. This is the age of the testosterone surge, which in Little brothers case means lots of fighting games, poo jokes, increased appetite and crazily physical behaviour. The best remedy is an older brother to wrestle with and be put into place by (although I admit, there needed to be a bit of fore-planning there, but other 4 year olds also fit the bill). Its this age that people start commenting about how their 4 year old is 'really really ready to start school'. Usually when they get to school they settle down but, it can be a sprint for the those gates on the day of their fifth birthday. I have mixed feelings as little Brother approaches school. He is ready in the 6-weetbix-a-day-testosterone-wrestling-poo-joke sense, but I will miss being around for his particular wisdom and thoughtful insights into the world. For example we were watching a disabled man get out of his car with two walking aids. 'Why do people use poles when there is no snow?' he mused. At play centre he has had a burst of creativity involving mixed media collage. He isn't one to go along with the planned activity - he's into layers and layers of paper and glue, sellotaping toothpaste boxes onto pieces of paper, and random collections of objects glued painted and glittered. Its a play centre philosophy to never ask a child ' is that a picture of a tree?' but rather to ask 'tell me about your picture'. It means the child has free range imagination wise and never feels that their picture has to conform to someone else's idea of 'what it should look like'. Its certainly not going to be like that at school, where peer pressure (to conform in lots of ways) will be a prevalent experience. But enough maudling, I am going to make the most of my time with him over the next 6 months and commit to a few wrestling matches myself. I am excited for his big step into the world of education, and for the school to be gaining such a amazing individual. They will all no-doubt love his bottom-inspired humour and his insightful commentary of the world.

Terrible Twos meets The devil wears Prada

I was trying to explain Little Miss Nearly 2's unreasonable behaviour to the boys, as she screamed and wailed at the injustice of not being able to have 6 teaspoons of sugar on her porridge. "She has just worked out that she has her own thoughts and opinions, and she doesn't have to do what anyone asks anymore!" God help us. With a screech like a banshee and more than her fair share of determination she is the poster girl for Independence. She is sweet as sugar and spice most of the time, but once she sets her mind to something (like getting the toy the boy was playing with), its time to call in the UN Peace keeping force (aka Mum). The words are just starting to explode like rapid fire out of her super-charged toddler brain, and although they get pretty mangled by the unpractised speaking apparatus, they are all there - 'Share!' she told her Grandmother, when she spotted her with the chocolate. She talks in full ernest-faced sentences but they are completely untranslatable. Single word commands are her favourite way of ruling the universe. 'No' gets used even for yes, 'Stop' is useful for the boys, 'Mine!' is ever-popular, and she is cunning enough to understand the benefits of a sweet smile and sticky 'Please'. She also can spot 'lowas' (flowers) and knows her fashion. 'Itty', she says as she points to her favourite bright sparkly top (pretty!). The other day I was looking in my drawer, and she came to help. 'Itty' she pointed to a red cardigan. 'I was looking for this', I said, pulling out a blue t-shirt and putting it on. She frowned, looking confused. 'Dadda?' she asked. 'No, its mamma's' I said. She looked back at her choice, pulled it out of the drawer and pushed it at me ' Itty. Itty. ITTY!' she yelled. I put it on. 'Itty.' she said with unmistakeable air of 'I told you so' and stomped off. I was stunned and secretly thrilled with the knowledge that someone in this house is going to notice what I wear! She loves to be helpful (very different from the boys at that age who spent alot of time taking things apart to see how many pieces they could be deconstructed into). She is the person I ask when I've lost something. She is especially good at finding shoes, not just her own, but visitors also. She gets the boys shoes in the morning and chases them around and throws them at their heads. 'UUUUs' she commands. I think the Terrible Two's is not a fair description of this age group - she is not terrible at all, she is fabulously gorgeous, but she is just dealing with the frustration of being unable to make everyone else understand that she is the centre and ruler of the Universe. It's a toddlers job, to rule the world with a screech. And the terrible part is that it is my job to teach her that the world doesn't work like that.

Not rubbing it in, but WE WON!

We are a very patriotic family. When it comes to rugby and singing the national anthem, that is. Big Brother has been learning it at school, and with all the All Black Games, there's been alot of God of Nations as favourite singing in the car. Even Little Miss not quite 2 is known to start belting out a reasonable tune with lots of haka-esque leg slapping and tongue pointing. The boys know most of the Te Reo maori and englsh versions - with a few cute mistaken words - my favourite line is 'guard pacific's triple star from the SHARKS of strife and war'. We've been flying All Blacks flags, and wearing facepaint and temporary tattoos. We certainly had a fabulous world cup, with many family visiting to stay and see the games at the Wellington Cake Tin. Big Brother was full of interesting playground statistics 'I am so freaking out!' he told us before NZ vs. France the first time, 'NZ has versed France FOUR times and France have won 3 times! I am so FREAKING out!" We've also had lots of discussions about sportsmanship - and even (finally) been able to discuss what it is to be a good winner. Hoorah!

Just when you thought I'd given up blogging..

I'm not sure how the last two months have slipped away without a blog up-date. Time flies when you're racing around like a mad mama. What have we been up to? Highlights have included a ski trip to Wanaka, a visit to the farm in Makahu, playing rugby every weekend, and just spending time with the kids, and with their lovely grandparents, with friends and family. Skiing was a big adventure and this year the boys took to it like ducks to water. They are both skiing now, going up the chair lift, and the pommer lift. They loved the gear, and the freedom, racing off down the mountains weaving in and out of the skiers and generally giving their mother a heart attack. Big Brother is officially a faster skier than I am now, racing past me, seeking out the little jumps on the side of the piste, and flicking through his turns. He also discovered another passion - ice climbing - if he wasn't on his ski's he was up some snow covered ice face, kicking his boots into the hill like a pro, then sliding down at top speed. He didn't enjoy his last lesson much, as the instructor kept telling him to 'slow down, slow down'. It was just like skiing with Mum. As we drove out of Wanaka he looked out the window of the car at the beautiful southern alps, and said "I'm going to climb all those mountains one day". Little Brother was a star, his goal was to do the pommer independently, then the chairlift. He achieved it no sweat, and it was such a great buzz to be able to ski all together. Little Miss did not make it up the mountain this year, but had a wonderful time with her grandparents, charming them with her smiles, and games, and going on picnic lunches to one stunning lake side beach or another. With a few long car journeys we have some mammoth games of I- spy. We have a few variations on the game now - I-spy colours, and I-spy imaginary. Big Brother must have been listening at school after he won a few games with his new found knowledge - the first clue was something beginning with A. The second clue was we get something from it. Once we gave in the answer was AIR - we get oxygen from it. The other memorably long game was the clue something that was the colour red. After much guessing it turned out to be a thin ring of red gas that surrounds the sun. We didnt get that one either.