Full-time Mummy

Since going back to work full-time, I made the vow that I would try really hard to make weekends special with the toddler. I see far less of her now that I don't have two days a week when it's just us alone, so I try to think ahead about the precious Mummy and toddler moments we can have.

This weekend went as follows:

Friday evening

Planned

Try to get away a bit early to spend some bonding time reading a book together

Actual

An overrunning meeting meant I was late back. But never mind, I was there to give the toddler her bath. In which she had such a mega-tantrum and thrashed around so much that I physically couldn't lift her out of it. It was like wrestling an angry dolphin.


Saturday

Planned

A quiet day at home doing craft activities and maybe learning to read (why not?).

Actual

It started well.

I turned my back to empty the dishwasher, and the toddler chose this moment to impress me with her anatomy vocabulary: "Mummy I painted my nose and my chin." That bottle of Kahlua you can just make out in the background is medicine. (For me, not her. I haven't stooped that low. Yet.)

Sunday morning

Planned

Giving TheBloke (TM) a chance to do some revision for upcoming exams by taking the toddler to soft play where she would practise her physical skills and have a great time burning off some energy. I would catch up with some friends with children the same age and have a lovely cup of tea. We would finish at least three sentences between us.

Actual

The toddler wailed for about an hour and a half and refused to leave my side (this has literally never happened before). The only time she would go and play would be if I would come with her. This, readers, is how I found myself halfway up a sodding climbing wall, whilst simultaneously boosting up two toddlers, who'd found themselves unable to go any further. Then I had to crawl through a metal tunnel (not designed for adult knees), across a rope bridge and then realised that the only way back to the floor was down a sodding slide. My arse got stuck.

I did not manage a lovely cup of tea. The only sentence I finished was, "I think we ought to leave now." The toddler put on her shoes... then (of course) ran immediately back into the soft play area. Shoes are verboten in the soft play area. So, thinking she finally wanted to play, I tried to take her shoes off again. The sound she made was something akin to the sound Monty Cat makes when you accidentally stand on his tail.

She lay on the floor at my feet and banged her bottom up and down. The only reason I could figure for the tantrum was that she neither wanted to stay nor did she want to go home. Great. A two year-old with an existential crisis.


Sunday afternoon

Planned

We would make carrot cakes together. It would be educational with weighing, identifying ingredients and understanding how heat changes batter into cake. She might even be able to grate the carrots by herself.

Actual

All went well until I asked her to weigh out the sugar. Once the sugar was in the bowl, she stuck her chubby toddler hands in, and grabbed and handful and ate it. When I told her that was naughty (I had already said, "Don't touch,)" she threw the remaining sugar in her hands in my face and tried to tip over the bowl with the flour in. When told very sternly that that was naughty, she lay on the floor and tried to kick me as I went about adding the rest of the ingredients.

She did, however, do some funny dancing this afternoon, so she just about redeemed herself. But her quarterly performance review is going to involve some difficult conversations.