The voices in my head

Now that we have three talking children it's like the voices in my head have multiplied. Driving in the car I now have a 4 way channel of conversations -
Me, thinking - "What are we having for dinner, where do I have to be, when and what combination of equipment/ children/ clothing/shoes/ cash do I need, must remember to email/phone/text/yell/clean/scrub/move/put back/find the ...."
Big Brother and Little Brother -"And then, the droid army smashes Fluffy the puppy, but the puppy cries 'wah,wah, "" Yeah, and then the Ninja master with the black belt goes pow pow pow, " "No, the monster eats the puppy" 'NO, that was so awesome", "Thats what makes you beautiful"
And Little Miss - "Mamma, show you - bird!" "Mamma, show you - Ho-co-coca" (helicopter, but it took me a while to work out that one), "mamma - show you - digger". "mamma,  TURN CORNER"...

Its overwhelming at times. Three little fizzing brains and one slower, more list-based one (when did I stop imagining stories in my head?) coming out with wonderful observations on the world.
It can get confusing - Little Miss has been asked - Do you want the blue one, or the green one (cup, shoe etc) so many times she thinks anything she wants is called "Blue-Red"
"BLUE-RED, BLUE-RED, ' she yells, pointing at the green cup. Or the cheese.

The boys consider everything to be Awesome - 'Its an awesomely rocket!'. After a swimming lesson where Little Brother sobbed the entire half hour, except for the part he was howling hysterically after getting water in his nose, he climbed out of the pool and greeted his brother with - 'That was awesome!'

And then there is the problem of the number of feet. In our house, we have three each - the left one, the right one, and of course the wrong one. Is this right? they ask - No, its wrong - put it on the left one. Is this the left one? No, its the right one, but also the wrong one....

Big Brother asked me "Mum, can I have one of those card things, you know, those card things that have credit, you know, a credit card?
And the other day he opened a conversation with -" Mum, you know how you don't like feeding us...."

English as a first language

Little Miss 2 is opening her mouth and a what seems like a torrent of words are coming out. One at a time, now and then strung together, coupled with lots of crinkled noses and perfectly sincere looks.
'Day? Work? Dadda?' she asks her father every evening.
'Yes, thanks darling, I had a nice day at work' he replies.
She is naturally tidy - 'Shoes. Off.' she tells visitors. 'Outside' (If they don't get the hint she picks the shoes up herself and flings them out the back door)
She is naturally bossy - 'BOYS !' she yells in their faces, 'Car! One...three...One...three'
She is naturally parroting her parents, and brothers - and yesterday chased her brother around yelling 'Bugger. Bugger.' We decided she was only reminding of his unfinished porridge, but there sure is a lot of things lost in translation.
She is testing out descriptive words - 'Hard' she said as she turned on the tap of the home brew barrel and it poured all into the boots and over the floor. 'Open. Biscuit. Stool. Where stool? Ahh, stool. Up. Biscuit. Open. Hard. Ahh, Loff!' (L-off as in fell-off, not to be mixed up with L-over) 
Non verbal communication is no problem with her peers. One friend described her interacting in the sandpit with a boy, who was holding a sandy car in his sandy hands. Little Miss was holding the waterhose, and waited for the boy. When he was undecided about how to proceed, she looked exasperated, took the car from his hand and washed it, gave him back the car and washed his hands for him with the hose. Problem sorted, no language required.

The older boys have an increasing amazing grasp of language -and what they don't know they simply make up. One day Little Brother was helping me bake gingerbread bunnies, and we talked about dipping their ears in chocolate - 'yes, 'he declared, ' we could make chocolate bombs. You know, chocolate Vo-vos - Did you know Mum that Vo-vo is maori for bomb?'
(Needless to say I didn't know that)
Another day Big Brother and I were perusing the secondhand shop at the dump - I explained all this perfectly good stuff had been thrown into the rubbish by people - and he was amazed - 'You could throw out everything!' he exclaimed. 'Lets look really hard, Mum, and we might find something from (whispered in awe) : China!'

The one language that I refuse to tolerate though, is winge-ish. I have a tactic, and I can't remember if I copied it off some genius now unattributed, or I made it up in a mind numbing sleep deprived brilliant moment. Try doing this : When any of the children whine or complain, whinge or moan, or tanty, - first, keep a straight face - look really confused, then think for a while, perhaps jiggle your ear violently liked you've got a mosquito stuck in their. Then, dismiss them with a apologetic and slightly loud -  'Sorry, I don't understand.'  If they try again with the whole 'wah-wah-wah-wahwah ' give them a cheerful, 'Nope, nope, I don't speak whinge-ish, only english - can you repeat that?'
Even a two year old can get the gist of this farce, and it feels so utterly superior in a teaching-a-valuable-life-lesson way.

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.