Mornings

I guess we are quite lucky that Finley wakes up some time between 6.30 and 7.00 in the morning. Sometimes he even sleeps in until 7.30. The other parents we know tell us that they get woken up between 5.00 and 6.00am, some even before that! But this morning, Finley was sitting up in bed slapping my arm/head/back trying to get my attention at 5.06am (probably due to the fact that he missed his afternoon nap yesterday and went to bed super early). I tried hiding under the pillow/duvet, but he's too clever for that game. When he started pulling hair and pinching the soft sensitive skin on my ear lobe, I relented and 'woke up', giving him desired attention.

I'm still feeling quite fluey and headachey and I'm starting to wonder whether I have the same bug as Fin since he seemed to get over his cold in a few days and only really had one bad night of crying and feeling miserable. I, on the other hand, seem to have day after day of crying and feeling miserable.

Checking my mail in bed, I was cheered up by a really nice and unexpected mail from Elizabeth Pantley. I had forwarded on a mail from the GPN (Grahamstown Parents Network) onto various mums I know and had included Elizabeth on the list. The email I sent was about reflecting on the amazing job that all moms do everyday: "admiration for the greatness of what you are building when no one sees". In her email she said "As a mom of 3 teens and a second-grader -- Thank you Amanda - I need this today". I had the same feeling then that I used to have when Finley was a small baby and I would constantly find myself awake in the middle of the night, breastfeeding this little person in the dark and quiet. Everyone else around sleeping, except for all the other moms like me in the world, with their newborns in their arms or lying next to them, silently suckling. Its a sense of solidarity, of knowing you aren't alone, no matter who you are - a first-time stay at home mom in Grahamstown, South Africa or a parenting expert, bestselling author and mom of four in Washington, USA.

As many of you may already know, Finley loves showering. But it has only been in the last week or so that he has started to actively seek it out instead of waiting for us to undress him and take him to the bathroom. The boy is determined. So every morning when Brad goes to shower, Finley promptly stops playing with the empty box/wet wipes packet/stuffed animal that has interested him, crawls to the end of the bed, turns around to climb off the bed (our mattress is on the floor so it isn't such a big climb), and with a peculiar fervour makes a beeline to the bathroom where he can hear that the shower has already been turned on. Once there, he shrieks with delight as his well-thought-out plan is being realised and pulls himself up to a standing position on the side of the bath. The next few minutes are spent pleading with dad to lift him up and share the shower with him, when that fails, he resorts to playing a wild game of peekaboo with the shower curtain and indirectly spraying himself and the bathroom floor with water.

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