Teddy Sledge

Things we have had to explain to ToddlerGirl about Christmas this year:

* It's not guaranteed to snow on Christmas Day
* Just because it is snowing doesn't mean it is Christmas Day
* Father Christmas and Santa Claus are the same person; you won't get presents from both

Actually, she won't be getting presents from either, as we're not really comfortable with that tradition. Why? Well, we're not religious types and the idea of an omnipresent person who watches and judges you and rewards you accordingly isn't something that I choose to subscribe to. I'd ideally prefer moral compasses to be directed by internal values than external incentives. The whole "you must be good or you won't get stuff" thing can have unintential side-effects in the long-term, and I'd refer you to Alfie Kohn (or my previous post) for further info.

However, recognising this is a sensitive subject and trying to be respectful of other people's beliefs makes the 'not doing Santa' line harder to walk. Father Christmas already came to preschool and gave ToddlerGirl a book. I'm telling her that's her present from Father Christmas. She will be getting stockings and presents on Christmas Day, but that's not contingent on her behaviour; I don't have a mental tally of how good or bad she has been and therefore which presents she is or is not entitled to. Although it is amazing how many people just assume everyone does Father Christmas... How many times already has she been told "have you been a good girl for Santa?", "I hope Santa brings you lots of presents", or, when she doesn't want to leave somewhere she's having fun, "you have to go or Santa won't know where to bring your presents" (if he "knows when you are sleeping, knows when you're awake, knows if you've been bad or good", surely he knows if you are in your own house or not?)

You can't apply a logical approach to Father Christmas, though I know of several children that are terrified by the idea of a strange man breaking into their house, which seems utterly logical to me. And I know of children incredibly distressed as to how Father Christmas will get in if they have no chimney. At times, they're more logical than you'd credit, kids.

So I'm telling her Father Christmas doesn't come to our house. He may visit other people's houses, but we have lots of presents already. I'm hoping this is an adequate compromise. I don't want her to be "that" child in the playground the other mothers hate for shattering illusions, but equally I don't want to be railroaded into a tradition which has no real benefit. If I'm going to lie to my kids, I need a better reason than that. Anyone wailing about "the magic" will get short shrift. There's plenty of magic to go around; just watch my toddler playing in the snow. There's no need to fabricate it. I've long believed Father Christmas is more for the adults' benefit anyway. If Santa's so lovely, how come he's so often used as a threat? "If you don't behave, Father Christmas won't come!"

We're treating Father Christmas in broadly the same terms as Peppa Pig. Father Christmas is in around 90% of the Christmas Specials I've seen thus far anyway, I'm not going to be so "bah humbug" as to ban any mention of his name, or any image of his face from our home. In that spirit, when ToddlerGirl asked if I could make something out of an empty nectarine tub, I couldn't think of anything other than a sledge... It's not a Santa sledge, though she insisted it is pulled by deer.

Look at my beautiful balloon deer! Technically it's probably an antelope as it has horns rather than antlers but I've only been trying the old balloon modelling thing for three days so as improvs go, it'll do for me...

If you want to make a sledge for teddy, take:

* An empty fruit tub
* Wrapping paper
* Tinsel
* A bit of curling ribbon

Wrap the tub in the wrapping paper, sellotaping it down inside the tub.
Sellotape tinsel around the top of the tub
Sellotape ribbon to front so that sledge can be pulled along by optional deer.

Fairy hat

"Mummy, I need a fairy hat for the party, can we make one?" she says. My mind flicks through all my fairy-touchpoints, from Tinkerbell (the hatless hussy) to Fairy Godmothers (kindly but also hatless), and I can't think of a single fairy that wears a hat. I wonder whether the request comes from watching Ben and Holly's Little Kingdom, but Holly wears a crown and ToddlerGirl tells me that just won't do.

Turning to my old friend Google, I find this video on how to make fairy hats, and look, it works! And all you need is some newspaper, sellotape and curling ribbon. Not technically hats, as such, but I've made a couple and they turn out remarkably sturdy. They do not, however, stay in place when your fairy is bouncing on a bouncy castle, which, given she spent pretty much the whole party there, rendered the whole hat-making process somewhat obsolete...

Thinking about it after the event, as I tuck into some fantastic Victoria Plum jam (from Dream Preserves, aptly named), it hits me - why did I not think of Victoria Plum? She had the best hat ever!

Victoria Plum made a big impression on me as a toddler. So much so, that I wanted to call my baby brother Benjamin after her friend. Sadly my nan had named her dog that already, so it was not to be. I like to think Ben Elf from B&H's Little Kingdon is a distant relation of Benjamin's. Or maybe Ben is just a good name for elves. Take note, J.R.R. Tolkien.

When it comes to hats, it is hard to beat Victoria Plum's bindweed flower. I used to love picking these flowers for my toys to wear as 'hats', and never could understand why my mum hated the stuff. Even though it runs riot in the garden, I still think it is the prettiest of weeds. But you could probably make Tinkerbell's entire outfit out of one bindweed flower these days.

Maybe the feeling that Tinkerbell is a bit too sassy compared to Victoria Plum is just a sign I'm getting old, though I've never liked her; I thought she was quite nasty in the original Peter Pan book, albeit truer to the original idea of faeries as fickle and malevolent creatures. The smart-talking added-sass Disney version of Tinkerbell does not sit well with me either. Look at Betty Boop - a cartoon character aimed at adults in the 1920s, a self-confessed sex-symbol - and see how Tink's been borrowing from her wardrobe. Interesting how things change.

But then I look at the Victoria Plum and wonder just how practial a long skirt is for woodland-living, and wonder why no fairies wear trousers. Or capri pants, even. And as I look a little longer at Ms Plum, with her 80s hair full of fluffy bigness, I realise that's probably why she wore a hat. What a nightmare that would be to manage! But if ToddlerGirl decides she wants a fairy hat in future, I think that's the way to go.

Drum kit

(Note for readers: for some reason Blogger appears not to 'see' capital zs - so excuse the lowercase where it should be uppercase below - if anyone knows a fix to this problem, do share!)

I was vaguely aware of the launch of zingzillas, but I don't really like the 'people dressed up' style of childrens' programme. It was probably for that reason that I glossed over it until relatively recently. "Oh, people dressed up as monkeys pretending to play in a band, yawn..." said my brain. How wrong was my brain! The characters are growing on me, but the format of the programme looks at a different style or aspect of music (and sometimes associated dance) each week, and it's actually quite interesting. My 1 year old loves it - and there are few more hilarious things than watching a 1 year old dance. I'll put zingzillas on, he watches it, I watch him...

As musical introductions go, I'm much more a fan of that than Space Pirates. I chanced across that briefly a couple of weeks back. The gist is that some kids ask for music based on a theme (e.g. 'holiday'), and the Space Pirates find and play them three tracks; one a 'classic' music video, one a live performance and one a pop-song interpreted by spacerat-puppets. But I never needed to see this again, where I least expected it, lurking inside an apparently innocent kids' programme:

My ears! My ears!! Get back on the Vengabus, you Euro-pop-manglers!

Continuing the musical/ear-punishment theme, I 'made' BabyBoy a drum kit, very loosely based on Tang's from zingzillas. It's approximated as best one can when one's working in the medium of rubbish... 'Made' sounds rather grand when it basically involved collecting tubs and kidding yourself that you needed more Betty Crocker icing. He loves it though, and the sound is not bad... Certainly quieter than the real thing, which is a plus in my book!

The drum-sticks were more properly 'made', to please my husband's paranoia of eye-putting-out, and have taken a fair amount of battering well. They are firm enough to get a decent "whack" but not so pointy as pencils or whatever else might work for impromptu purposes.

Take:
Tubs of various sizes
Some newspaper
Sellotape

For the drums, clean and arrange tubs... Er, that's it.
For the drumsticks, take two sheets of newspaper and roll them diagonally to form a long tube.
Twist the tube in on itself to make a stronger 'pole'
Bind pole tightly in sellotape.
Chop pole in two and tidy the ends. (I also wondered about 'frilling' the end of the newspaper before binding in sellotape, so you could create a 'sweeper' brush for the drum, but I haven't as yet got round to it.)

DIY story book

I suppose, if anything, Driver Dan's Story Train inspired this activity. When it comes on, I always have to pretend to be Driver Dan, ToddlerGirl is Hip and BabyBoy has to be Hop (rabbits, donchaknow). Sundry cuddly toys get to rotate the task of being Twinkle. The redeeming feature of the programme is the stories, which the eponymous lion reads in the later half of the episode - proper books! The first half is some loosely thrown together plot which has something to do with the following story. I'm not really a fan, but it is completely inoffensive and it is a good introduction to some stories I, sorry, we may not otherwise encounter. I've recognised a couple that have come on, but most are new to us. (Another way to find new books is #fictionfriday on Twitter, championed by HomeDad.)

ToddlerGirl's very into her imaginative play. She has a slightly disturbing fascination with pretending dried apricots are babies, and that she is a troll who lives under the bridge (for that, read dining table) who pops up to steal the babies and eat them. She likes it best if I pretend they are my babies and she has to wrest them from me with some semblance of a struggle... There is some deeply disturbing sibling rivalry subtext to this, isn't there? She also likes pretending to sail boats, while pretending her brother's a big fish roaming the seas, so it's not all baby-eating. Honest. She throws him back most times.

Anyway, today I decided to try and channel some of that imagination, as I was tired and wanted to do something sitting-downy. So I made a blank book and got her to tell me the story while I wrote it down. She then drew pictures to go with the words. It was quite good fun!

Take:

Some A4 paper, folded widthways in two (I used 5 sheets)
A needle
Some thread
Coloured pens

Take the folded paper and make two big stitches in it with the needle and thread to hold it together as a book. You could use staples if you wanted, but I couldn't find the stapler. And this way I don't have to worry about the staples coming out and getting eaten or embedded in feet/fingers/other.
Get toddler to tell you a story, and transcribe!
I went for the minimal intervention approach, although I did point out when we were starting to run out of pages that maybe we were getting to the end.

For those of you who are interested, here is the story ToddlerGirl wrote:

Once upon a time...
There was a car and a rabbit.
The rabbit was stuck up a mountain.
The car was stuck in the water. The car was sinking.
Fireman Sam likes rescuing things.
He is going to rescue the rabbit first.
He is going to climb up a ladder and rescue the rabbit.
Now the rabbit isn't stuck any more.
Fireman Sam is going to sail in a boat and rescue the car.
Fireman Sam loves me.
Let's have a picnic for Fireman Sam.
Everybody is happy!
Then Fireman Sam got stuck!
What a silly Fireman Sam!
The car can't reach him.
But the rabbit can jump up high and reach him.
The rabbit jumped high and rescued Fireman Sam.
What a clever Fireman Sam!
Now Fireman Sam isn't stuck.
The rabbit jumped down and they had a picnic and a tea party.
And nobody got stuck again. What silly things!

Small potato prints

I love Small Potatoes. It's like Creature Comforts but with potatoes: sing it with me! "Small potatoes on the moon! Small potatoes in the sea!" Utterly random, but hilarious. And remarkably short at 3 mins or so.

Being so enamoured, I did then feel a bit like a axe-murderer as I hacked into my Baby Charlottes for a spot of spud printing.  I was doing my Christmas shopping online (yes, I am that organised, sometimes) and found ChattyNora's wonderful posters, which although they are hand-drawn have a lovely retro-print feel. And then I had this idea that the kids would like making Christmas cards for the nearest and dearest - told you I was organised - and wouldn't it be simply darling for them to print lovely festive symbols and then shower them with glitter?

Yeah, right. There is a place for glitter, and it isn't all over my floor. I am reminded of the conversation I had with my husband earlier this week about getting a real fir tree for Christmas. There are not enough hours in my day for that amount of hoovering. It gets everywhere. And, with a TMI warning, I mean everywhere - and what goes in must come out. You know what I'm talking about. Glitter makes many things nicer, but the contents of nappies remain unimproved.

But if you wish to pursue the potato printing route, sans glitter, take:

Some small potatoes
A sharp small knife
Some paint
Some paper

Cut off the end of the potato to create a flat surface to work with.
Cut shape/pattern into the end of the potato - simple is best, in my experience. Holly leaf, snowflake and stars, for instance. The areas left raised are what will print, so you need to cut away quite deeply in order to get a clear stamp.
Splat spud into paint, wipe off excess if possible.
Make prints.

Needless to say, potatoes are not suitable for eating after use!

Plant races

Let it never be said I don't share my failures as well as success.

I stand by the concept as sound in principle, but let down by poor execution and maintenance. Time has been at a premium of late as I have been prepping like mad for job interviews, fending off vomiting babies and slumping glassy-eyed on the sofa at the end of it all. The more eagle-eyed among you may have noticed that blog output has dropped accordingly.

I can't blame that alone on the failure of this project, as it has been some weeks now and the plant pots are resolute in their determination not to hint at any sign of germination. But hang on, you say, what exactly was the project? Allow me to divulge...

Having watched the Mr Bloom episode on 'growing', and having had some genuinely interesting conversations with ToddlerGirl about the difference between something that is made and something that is grown, the idea was to plant two fruit stones and then race them, to see which grew first. The result, as you can see, is a dead heat. Possibly with the emphasis on dead.

I may un-inter the fruit stones and see if anything at all had started to happen before I lapsed in my watering efforts but, as I may have mentioned previously, I'm a bit rubbish at growing stuff.

If you want to try such an enterprise and have more commitment to the cause than I, take:

2 plant pots
Some compost
2 fruit stones of different species - we used plum and peach

Stick compost in pots.
Plant stones in pots.
Water regularly.
Wait.
And wait.
And wait.

All rights reserved to give up and revert back to watercress...

Watercress Oakley

I was in the pub with a friend (pre-kids, so long ago!) who was trying to describe this programme she had seen with blue rabbits and talking trees and it all sounded nonsensical and surreal... Not uncommon for things to sound nonsensical and surreal after a few bevvies, but I have latterly come to the conclusion that she must have stumbled upon Everything's Rosie.

It's got talking trees! The last kids thing I watched with talking trees was The Last Unicorn film. And that was a rather over-familiar, one might even say 'fruity', tree. If you have seen the cartoon, you'll know what I mean. If you haven't, here's the clip.

Is Oakley a derivative of that proto-tree? You decide...

If you want to grow your own Oakley, take:

A section of kitchen roll
Some Tipp-ex or white paint
A black felt-tip
Some cotton wool
Watercress seeds

Draw an Oakley face on the kitchen roll - using white paint or Tipp-Ex makes the eyes stand out
Stuff the roll with cotton wool
Sprinkle watercress seeds on top!
Water the seeds - keep the kitchen roll tube slightly damp to stop the seeds drying out
Wait a few days for Oakley's 'branches' to grow!

(THEN EAT THEM!! MWAH HA HA HAA!!)

Stick horse

Mock me, will you sock? Roaming defiantly un-paired? Well HA! This'll teach you.

I'm not a fan of princesses in general, but for Little Princess I will make an exception. She's 4 years old, charming, frustrating, stroppy... did I mention she's 4 years old? I'm told she's very like I was at that age.

Visually, it reminds me of King Rollo, but it's actually drawn by Tony Ross of Horrid Henry fame. Little Princess lives in a castle, with her Mummy, Queen (who's permanently wearing a headscarf, crown balanced on top) and Daddy, King (usually wearing a tie and scruffy jacket). They are pretty much a normal family but they happen to be royal. And there's sundry other supporting characters who live with them in the castle - take the Prime Minister, for instance. To quote his biog on the Little Princess website, he'd "rather ride around on his tricycle with the Princess than run the country". Obviously a Tory then.

It's very wittily observed. Little Princess is pretty much at the centre of all things, and yes, I can relate to the feeling that your household is run around your preschooler. Of the staff, the General is my favourite, all well-meaning bumbling and 5 o'clock shadow. He rides Nessie, the stick-horse which inspired this activity. Have you seen Monty Python & The Holy Grail, where the knights pretend to ride horses but are just followed by a chap clapping coconut shells together? It's that sort of deal with the General's horse. Plus there's a wonderful romantic subtext going on with the General and the Maid that's begging for it's own ITV2 miniseries. (How I wish I had a Maid! I'd settle for a General though, if he was good at washing up... heck, I'd settle for a dishwasher.)

I'm not keen on princesses, all beautifully useless waiting for their princes. And I do think that the 'princess' message pushed at our kids is potentially damaging, especially when there are books like this in school libraries today (as dissected in an excellent blog post by SenseofEntitlement). However Little Princess is much more "real" than the usual princess fantasies; being 4 years old helps, of course, as even princesses have to learn how to use the potty. All in all, it's one of the programmes that I will hop across to Five for; it foregrounds relationships in most of the plots, getting along with people, helping each other, and that sort of thing, but not in a preachy or idealised way. It's a world much closer to one that I recognise... apart from the Maid thing*. But if we had a maid we wouldn't have stray socks available for horse-transformations, so there's an upside for you.

Anyway, you can buy yourself a real "Nessie" for the princely sum of around £15. Or you can fashion your own by using the inner tube from some wrapping paper and a sock.

Take:

One sturdy tube of around 1m length (ours was from some old Xmas wrapping paper)
One sock - white for preference
Some newspaper
A rubber band
Some white paper and some brown/black paper - or fabric if you want something more permanent
Some felt-tip pens - washable, if you're bothered about re-using the sock

Take the sock and stuff it with newspaper, up to just beyond the heel.
Insert tube into neck of the sock.
Sellotape edge of sock to the tube, and loop a rubber band around it for added security.
Draw a face and spots on the sock
Cut out two 'arches' out of the white paper and fold in two lengthways.
Use sellotape to attach these 'ears' to the horse.
Cut a length of brown or black paper and frill it for a mane.
Sellotape mane to horse - I cut tabs and alternated the side I stuck the tab down to make the mane stand straighter.
(You could use fabric and stitch the mane and ears on instead - I was going for a fast make so didn't bother. If the appeal proves durable, I may re-make it in that fashion. If I can be bothered.)

Gee up! Get busy with the boxes and toys for an obstacle course/jump race for the littl'uns...


*And we don't have a pond either. Or an Admiral stood in it. Or in fact any staff at all...

Are you living with a toddler or foreign exchange student?

Let's check:
* Are you struggling with the language barrier?

* Do you regularly suffer from cultural misunderstandings, or appear to have mis-matched cultural norms?

* Do they have strange ideas about what constitutes weather-appropriate clothing for your climate?

* Do they regard with suspicion any food you present them with, or refuse to eat it at all in preference to their own tried and trusted favourites?

If you answered yes to all of the above, please check you haven't accidentally taken a stray foreign exchange student home from the supermarket instead of your own toddler. It's an easy mistake to make.

My parenting bookshelf

I know some parents dismiss parenting books out of hand - "I don't need books to tell me how to raise my kids!" - but I hope I wouldn't be so arrogant as to think there's nothing left to learn. (Arrogant, moi? Only when the mood takes me.) One thing I do know is that there's no one right way to parent: that's why there's so many different approaches and books on the market and not a single "Parenting Bible". Now, some may be more right than others but that's my personal opinion, of course...

So many of these books are just that though, opinion based. A book I really rate is 'Unconditional Parenting', by Alfie Kohn. It's one of the rare books that backs up what it asserts with proper research studies. Something that I think you will find lacking in many of the 'popular parenting programmes' on television today. Kohn takes a bit of a kicking from people who don't really understand his approach, and in part I believe that's because his book outlines the approach without really tooling you up on how to apply it. You have to think, quite a lot, about how it applies to you, your child, and the situation you're in. It's not a 'one-size-fits-all' naughty step for two minutes, forced apology and hug approach.

Being a parent is, to state the obvious, hard. I've always been either in education or employment and with the former you get grades to let you know how you're doing, and in the latter you have objectives against which you are appraised. Basically, there's always someone else there to sit you down and say "you're doing okay, good job!". With parenting, I miss that structure. I am Lisa Simpson, screaming "Grade me, grade me!" now school's shut down. (Which ironically is one of the points Alfie Kohn makes about how damaging reward-based discipline can be. You lose your ability to trust yourself, seeking praise and valuing only what others tell you is "right" or "good".)

With a few parenting years under my belt I am learning to trust myself more, particularly now I have a second child and know the world won't end if he accidentally eats dirt from the garden. I am learning to trust that I will make the right decisions for them, mostly - and if in fact I make the wrong decision sometimes, that's still a useful experience from which to learn and improve. But it's nice to be able to reach for a book at times when whatever's going on is foxing me a bit, or I get to the end of day like today when gritted teeth are the only thing that's got me to bedtime and I need some fresh resolve or ideas.

My general slant on parenting, the one I strive for, is a "working with" rather than a "doing to" approach. It's not always the one that comes easily, but it is the one that I aspire to. So, my parenting bookshelf includes:

Unconditional Parenting - Alfie Kohn
How To Talk So Kids Will Listen (And Listen So Kids Will Talk) - Adele Faber and Elaine Mazlish
When Kids Push Your Buttons (And What You Can Do About It) - Bonnie Harris


These are the ones I would recommend, and they all cover "toddlers to teens", so I expect to continue to get plenty of mileage out of them! I've read plenty of awful books too, but won't name and shame them here (who knows, maybe they work well for others). The Kohn book emphasises an approach, How To Talk So Kids Will Listen gives practical tips, and When Kids Push Your Buttons looks at how your own 'agenda' as a parent can create stress-points that cause showdowns between you and your child, and how adjusting your own attitudes and expectations can yield better outcomes.

I find the books helpful because they encourage me to think about things from different perspectives and consider what underlies the behaviour of my children, to try and deal with the cause and not the outward symptom. It also makes me think about how the effects of what I say and do as experienced by the person on the receiving end is not always the same as what I intend. For instance, when was the last time you were sent to your room to "think about what you've done" and actually thought about what you'd done as opposed to "this is SOOOO UNFAIR!"?! The toddler years are interesting in all sorts of ways, but boy, I'm glad I've got plenty of time to prepare myself for the teenage stage...