Who said Daddy's Girl?

My Daddy is very funny. He says his name is Far, but Mama calls him something else. Very confusing!

He has a great big cartoon smile and always makes me laugh and smile. Except when he pushes my arms through my sleeves. I don't know WHAT he does, but it just doesn't do it for me.

2 days a week, Far spends alot more time at home, and Mama smiles even more. Maybe she's happy he's home, or maybe she's just happy that he takes me for long walks so she can catch up on her sleep. Honestly, I don't know what keeps her awake at night! Moi?

Some mornings if I wake up very early, Far and I go upstairs to have breakfast, so Mama can sleep a bit. After a while, I get hungry too watching Far eat, so I start to make adequate noises to show him that he might want to think about waking the Sleepy One. And then he tries all sorts of tricks to make me think of something else. Rattles toys in front of me. Dances with me. Makes funny faces and noises. Pur-lease! If he was starving, would he care for a clown or a stand-up comedian? No, I don't think so. But I do appreciate the effort, though, so I give him 4 points for Artistic Impression.

Wonderful wonder week

On the last day Nonna and Morfar were here, I started getting cranky (or so they say). They were all talking about over-stimulation and over-tiredness and giving Morfar a hard time for playing too much with me. Then on Monday, Mama and I went to baby-massage. I don't know why she keeps going, because although I love a little massage AT HOME after my evening bath, I cannot see the attraction in lying in a too hot room full of other babies, naked. Can you? I think Mama goes there for her own social life improvement. And that's ok with me.

Anyway, the instructor gave all the mums a diagram showing which weeks they could expect us babies to be "fussy" (as if!), and whaddaya know? I was slap-bang in the middle of one. Apparently it's something to do with mental development and blah-blah-blah. I don't understand all that, but if you want to read more, go here. As for me, I just know I've been feeling funny and out of sorts and not understanding why things appeared different. And when I feel like that, I just want my Mama. And presto! Not too popular after 4-5 days of clinginess, I can tell you, and yet despite the night feeds which take up to 2 hours, the non-existing naps and the screaming never far away, my Mama can always be counted upon for more cuddles. Granted, she had a slight break-down the other morning, but I can tell you, I would have had one WAY earlier if it had been me.

Then suddenly this morning, I managed to somehow get a brainwave to her. So she stacked up lots of pillowsin her bed and propped me up against them. And I could sit!!! WEHE! I didn't even flop miserably to one side like I used to. So that's why I'd been feeling funny, I guess. My sense of balance was working over-time.

As she types this for me, I'm sitting in my beloved sling, because an evil woman has stuck a needle in each of my thighs. OUCH! And Mama didn't even yell at her! She said something about it being for my best. Yeah, right! More like vengeance! I think we're even. Until the next wonder week, which coincides with... Christmas!!!

Exhausting!

Who knew grand-parents could be so exhausting? I thought babies were supposed to be hard to keep up with, but have you tried keeping up with my Nonna and Morfar?

Reaching for the Stars

It doesn't take much to impress my parents. PFF! I whack a few dangly toys hanging above me, and they go berserk! The parents, not the toys.

See, they have this 'baby-gym' (at first, I thought they wanted me to lose weight, what with my dimply thighs, but in fact it's just 2 arches with tecnhicolour stuff hanging from it) and they put me down there a couple of times, but I just wasn't sure what they were expecting of me, so I just looked at them for a clue. After a few days, I thought I might have a go at the annoying monkey and - lo and behold - Mama started whooping and calling everyone to brag! Easy to please...

Although she's still not impressed with my 4 am hunger pangs. So I make sure I give her a HUGE smile when she comes to pick me up, to keep her sweet. I call it 'Survival of the Cutest'. But even my dazzling smiles can only achieve so much: after a good feed, I want to play, but at 5 am, Mama's sense of fun is kinda limited, I must admit. So she sometimes gets Far to step in and get me to sleep. Normally he's good for a laugh or 10, but I guess he's just not an early morning person either...

Last night I think I might have overstepped it a bit: I woke at 2 am AND at 4 am. She's not easily fooled, though, that mum of mine. So at 2 am, she just bounced me back to sleep and I had to wait until the usual feeding time. It's like being in a zoo!!! Soon she'll be dangling a herring over me and charging people for watching... Guess I'll have to give the herring a whack or 2 as well.

Life is Good

Mama has a cap which says 'Life is Good'. Can you believe it, she bought it before I arrived? When I was still a twinkle in her eye... Life was good BEFORE me? Boy, must it be good now!

My schedule is really tough, though. See for yourself:

Saturday: visit to Borough Market where we bought lots of goodies. OK, I can't taste them directly, but somehow it all distills down to me at some point. And the white stuff is Good!

Sunday: long walk through the 3 closest parks - Hyde, Green and St James. In nr 2 we even found a fountain with my name on! To celebrate that, I had a little impromptu al fresco snack beneath a beautifyl tree which was slowly turning Mama's favourite colour.

Monday: ok, not so good. An evil woman pushed a needle into each of my thighs. Just like that. And in the afternoon I got really hot and flustered and cried alot. But then the day ended well, as I was allowed to stay up late and fall asleep on Mama. wehe!

Tuesday: a bit of a boring day, as the weather was yuck and I was still not feeling completely well. So I'm afraid I was not very popular at the end of the day, especially as it took Far alot of work to make me fall asleep.

Wednesday: 100% good life again. We went for a long walk in Hyde Park (aka my back garden) and saw lots of squirrels! All that excitement made me tired, so by 8 pm I was snoozing in my bed. My popularity rates soared!

Today was even better. Mama and I had a lie-in and then we went for dim sum lunch with Far on the South Bank. Afterwards Mama and I walked to Covent Garden, but then I got hungry so we went home.

It's a tough job, but somebody's got to do it...

Creature of Habit?

She is cunning, that Mama, I've got to hand it to her.

I've tried to conduct a bit of guerilla crying (ostensibly there's no reason, so they both agonise over it, hihi), just for fun. After trying everything for a few days (and I mean EVERYTHING!), Mama thought she might as well try what she had vowed never to: a routine. Not being a creature of habit herself, it goes very much against the grain, but I could see that the crying was getting to her, so I was willing to play along. Ha! As if...

But I must admit that so far, I actually quite do like it. So for the past 3 days, I've had my dinner at the same time as most Danes (6 pm), then a nice bath, followed by a good crying session, a battle of wills, some random spitting out of dummies just to make them run down the stairs a dozen times (it's good for the heart!)... Finally, I take pity on them and fall asleep.

Well, it's well worth it, as last night I had the most amazing dream: I dreamt that Mama fed me when she went to bed, WHILE I WAS ASLEEP. Surely that can't be! I then sleep like the proverbial baby until 5:30, where I wake up full of energy. The same cannot be said for Mama. So I try to charm her with some Class-A smiles, but although she loves my dimples, she finally puts me back into my bed after I've eaten my full. And there I sleep until almost 9 am.

My new trick? I don't DO naps... I wonder how she'll work around that one?

Parklife

Ah, what an end to the week! On Friday, the weather was glorious and we were both in a very good mood, so Mama suggested that we have lunch with Auntie Jen. A few hours later, we were 'seated' at an outside table at the local Thai place: me enjoying yet another al fresco nap, and them enjoying a red beef curry. Then Mama and I went on to Hyde Park and had a loooong walk! I really liked that, especially theMemorial Fountain just for me. What do you mean it's for another princess? That can't be!

Anyway, on Sunday, we did the same walk in reverse order with Far, and as an extra bonus feature (just like DVDs), Far and I then went for a walk just the 2 of us so Mama could get some time on her own. Now, I would have spent the time sleeping or pampering myself or in any other way indulging, but no, she chose to do practical things around the house. As if I keep her from doing that!!!

But then the weekend ended on a not-so-funny note when Mama and Far decided they should try to get me to sleep a lot earlier than usual, which I did not find amusing in the least! And I let them know in no uncertain terms!!! But at the end, they won, and I dozed off around 9 pm. Only to then be hungry again at 2:30 am. What was wrong with the previous system of all of us going to bed at 10:30 pm and me sleeping until 6 am? OK, I know what's wrong with it: I cry all evening, and that's not so cool.

Result: I have them all confused about whether to attempt a routine or not. And I don't like it when they are confused, because then I get confused too! So today, I'm just cranky and the solution we settled on is that Mama put me in the nice green sling, while she browses the internet for ideas and inspiration on how best to go about this parenting business. If they would just listen to me, I'd tell them. But it's as if they don't understand what I am saying. How can that be?