It’s been a while…that seems to be a common intro to my blogs of late, but life is busy. Life is full. Life is great.
I finally have more job satisfaction that I can shake a stick at (and am really working on making that a permanent state of affairs rather than just a one-off! Oh the life of a freelancer hey!). I feel like I am starting to get somewhere with this balance of work and life malarkey at long last and I am so proud of and delighted with our cottage, especially our garden now that Spring has sprung, and am more in love than ever with both of my boys. The husband for his awesome building and gardening ideas and skills, and for simply being my rock and best friend (this is going to be a bit of a soppy blog I think so just roll with it, or roll your eyes, I won’t be offended). And of course, my gorgeous little bundle of joy, my boy, my Paddington, for being an absolute legend and for teaching me so much as he learns about the world and his place in it. (The world, by the way, is very lucky to have Pads in it as he brings the fun and I reckon he is going to be one heck of an adult human when he grows up!)
He makes my day every day. Watching him grow and develop and learn is such an honour and a privilege and 100% the best job/role/responsibility I have ever had. I feel so lucky to have him in my life and he makes my life better. I love being part of, and also chief witness, to my boy’s on-going discoveries of the world around him and he helps me to slow down and see the world through his eyes, and the world looks really exciting and fun and beautiful and ripe for the exploring from where Pads is standing!
He is a sponge at the moment, soaking up new words, experiences and learnings every day. And he constantly amazes me with the speed he picks new things up at. Take his words for instance, he has always been a chatterer, mostly a lot of gobbledly gook, but earlier this year proper words began forming and now he is really playing with new words, confident with his favourite ones and practicing ones that catch his attention the most every day. (‘No’ is one that he is very definite about and he has grasped the power and effectiveness of this particular word very quickly!)
We do have to watch what we say around him from now on though, and crucially how we say them too, as he loves to repeat and is starting to appreciate what words are the most fun to say, and have the most impact, or garner the best reaction from us – and we all know which words they are!
It’s fascinating to hear what words or phrases resonate with him the most. We have been in the garden a lot over the past couple of months so his favourite words of late are ‘dig’. ‘garden’, ‘water’ and thanks to the hubby’s amazing pizza oven building skills, ‘fire’. He probably says these words at least 20 times a day. He has also picked up ‘fowa’, for flower, which I am very proud of, or sometimes he just points to flowers and says ‘mummy’ (ah, that’s my boy!).
The other day we were playing with his cars and trucks, and I happened to say the seemingly banal statement: ‘the truck is in the way’. Well, this phrase has stuck and Pads has run with it. He says it over and over in succession, proudly uttering his first formed sentence with gusto. It might not be an overly useful one, (unless he goes into traffic management or something) but it’s a super cute one, and I swear that he swapped the ‘truck’ for ‘car is in the way’ the other day, when I was reversing the car and there was a car in the way, which would make him a child genius surely?!
His manners are progressing well, with ‘pwease’, and ‘cank-oo’ sinking in slowly but surely. I have always wanted a well-mannered, polite son, the kind that will have people nodding and aahing and saying ‘that Paddington is such a lovely young lad’ to their friends, so this is an excellent start my boy.
He runs with confidence now too, enjoys a sort of skip and spin around the garden often, is learning to ‘scoot’ on his scooter, is very proud of having his own little orange garden chair, and is learning to manage his new beautiful wooden balance bike (an early birthday present from us as we just couldn’t wait to see him on it any longer!). He also loves to go on the ‘wee’, which is not the toilet as you may think, but a slide of course! We have one in the garden (thanks Aunty Lorna!) and aside from digging, it is his favourite thing to do, which is brilliant as it gets us all outside in the fresh Welsh air regularly.
He is a joy to be around. Laughing more often than not, with a cheeky twinkle in his eye that makes me proud, and with an infectiously playful outlook on life. He has made me appreciate the little things in life in such a way that my quality of life has increased massively despite not having as much money or time or freedom to do as I please as I once did. My regular activities and outings have become much simpler, less flashy or impressive I guess (no more eating out several times a week at the latest restaurant opening, or going to cool concerts and theatre shows – for now at least!). But instead we fill our days with singing silly songs in the car; dancing around the living room; playing/me actually cleaning with Pads by my side copying my actions and getting stuck in with brushing, sweeping, wiping the floor etc.. (he loves to do this!); gardening, which must feature daily and he mostly loves to dig or rake and water the plants (and himself); building with blocks; drawing or colouring in with crayons and pencils – and I must admit, I am really enjoying a bit of therapeutic colouring in these days as a way to relax and unwind with my boy.
High on the list of weekly activities is going for walks – mainly because he is obsessed with his wellies and wants to wear them all the time but also because we live in the beautiful Brecon Beacons so we’d be churlish not to take advantage of what we have on our doorstep as often as possible; we have to check on the ducks at the canal often – they are always fine; and he adores playing with the cat. She likes to be chased around the garden, no really she does!, she sees it as a game of wits and skilled moves, and Pads thinks the way she jumps over the long grass, runs up the tree and tries to catch flies is just delightful.
Bath time has become more of a challenge however, with him not wanting to have his hair washed anymore, and he is most definitely a little tinker in spirit, knowingly throwing books, food etc on the floor for a reaction and becoming quite insistent about what clothes he wants to wear or not wanting his nappy changed when he is busy playing. There have been a few tantrums in the middle of a busy street which are less fun, but all part and parcel of parenting Paddington. His independent streak is coming to the fore and he is going to be a little rascal for sure (but I do secretly love this about him too – speak to me again when the proper terrible twos hit however!)
Back to the gardening however, as this is what is filing our lives with so much fun and discovery at the moment. We have planted lots of seeds: sunflowers and nasturtiums are in Pads own special patch in the front garden and I am really hoping they bloom just as he is. We have a special mud area that I will leave unplanted for him to rake and dig and flood with water to his heart’s content. He cannot get enough of carrying around his mini garden tools and wearing his mini gloves which are still too big for him despite apparently being toddler-sized, helping me to tend to our new plants and tidy up the garden, and his dad has been digging us an amazing tiered veggie patch in the back so Pads also loves ‘helping’ him throw mud around and collect stones.
He has a penchant for garden centres, walled gardens, kitchen gardens, flower shows (he made a bee-line for the display mud kitchen at the Cardiff RHS show and was a pro at making mud cakes and a making a mess!) and generally being out in the great outdoors with trees to hide behind, herbs to smell and branches and flowers to observe and interact with (i.e try and pull or poke or walk off with!). There is definitely a budding gardener in my boy (hoping for more of a Geoff Hamilton than Alan Titchmarsh though if I’m honest!)
If it is possible to love your child even more each day – which I reckon it absolutely is – then I can’t imagine how much I will love him by the time he is 18. He is a beautiful soul, has a wickedly funny bone and the best sound in the whole wide world is when he laughs out loud.
My boy is fast approaching his 2nd birthday and time is rattling along so fast, if I could I would press pause so I had more time to soak up everything that Pads is teaching me and notice every little thing that he does and picks up with each new day in tiny, microscopic detail. In lieu of that being an actual option, I am grateful to have kept a written record of parenting Pads so far and vow to get back to being more thorough and regular with this as I want to remember everything.
Paddington, my boy, thank you for being you. Now let’s go and dig in the garden!
parentingpaddington 