As parents of twins, we shameless hoover up any goods offered to us.  A spare cot? Yup, that would be great.  Baby clothes?  Yes, thank you. A while back, I returned to the Dutch Mama some of the clothes which she had given to us which the boys had grown out of. She looked at them and said “these are lovely things, but half of them aren’t mineâ€. Also, it appears, we are not very good at returning things to their rightful owners. When we were in Ireland, we drove through a North Cork where the Dutch Mama’s sister is the postmistress.  “Should we stop and say hi?†asked Mr. Waffle. “Probably not†I said, “but, if we did, we could point out to her that Michael is wearing a very nice t-shirt that once belonged to her sonâ€.  In summary, I am not sure who lent us what, so I cannot say who lent us the t-shirt with “Little Lord Foster Baby†written on it but I suspect that it may be someone whose first language is not English.
Boys
Vomit
The boys had some bug over the weekend which they transmitted to their sister. Daniel was sick regularly, Michael occasionally and the Princess once. Daniel took us by surprise, vomiting for the first time on Saturday at lunch time. We rushed to comfort him and change him and remove our own vomit covered clothes. We returned to find Michael happily splashing about in the pool of vomit on the floor while the Princess looked on in profound disapproval. The washing needed to keep pace with three vomiting children is phenomenal. This was why when I heard a choking sound while holding Daniel in our bed, I spun him round to spare the sheets and managed to get vomit on the mirror, the wardrobe the walls and the door. All wipe clean surfaces you will note. As of Monday morning, the waterfall of vomit seemed to have ended. Although poor Michael, got sick in his sleep on Sunday night and when we got him from his cot on Monday morning, he was cold and clammy which, obviously, will help him recover from his hacking cough. No vomiting all day Monday but on Monday evening Daniel got sick (once) as did Michael (twice) and Mr. Waffle (once). Today only Daniel got sick (twice). Could it be that matters are improving?
Mama!
I find that one of the hardest things about being a mother is leaving your child in distress.  This morning, poor Michael was sick, tired, spotty (chicken pox, of course, have found myself humming all day “and another one down, another one down, another one bites the dustâ€) and needy. If I put him down, he howled. If anyone else held him, he howled.  He’s normally such a cheerful little boy but this morning he was miserable and he needed his mama.  Daniel was neither sick nor spotty but he also wanted some maternal attention.  Their mother, however, was off to work and they howled in vain, punching the air in indignation with their chubby little fists and crying piteously “Mama, mamaâ€.  On the way to work, I dropped the Princess off at her course.  “Please Mummy, stay just a little while longer†she said plucking my trousers. “Sweetheart, I have to go to workâ€. “Just one last hugâ€. “OK, one last hug, but then I’ve got to goâ€.  I placed herself in the arms of one of the course organisers and she fought furiously while wailing “I want my Mummyâ€.  My last sight of her this morning was of her furiously red face contorted in distress with big fat tears rolling down her cheeks.  I stayed outside the door for a moment listening to see whether she would calm down but she continued to sob “je veux ma mamanâ€.  Alas.
The sound of elastic snapping
It’s 38 degrees today. No air conditioning in our sunny flat. No air conditioning in my sunny office. And I am busy, busy, busy. Mr. Waffle isn’t exactly idle at work either but he’s been picking up a lot of the slack at home, while I hunch over a hot computer post 9.30 when our children finally go to bed. Need I say that both of us are up regularly during the night?
Yesterday the creche rang me to say that they would replace the cover of our car seat which got dirtied in their building works.
Me: Sorry, I didn’t see it, my husband collected the boys.
Them: But later when you saw it at home, how was it?
Me: My husband had put it in the wash. And he hung it out to dry and he dropped the boys to the creche this morning because I left the house at 7.30 for an 8.00 am meeting, so I have no idea what the damage is, but I’d say it washed out alright or he would have mentioned it.
Them: Silence.
Me: See, in our household, my husband looks after that kind of thing.
I feel that I am a cliché, running all day at work and running at home and only just managing to catch some of the balls that are in the air. At work, if I don’t write something down, I have no chance of remembering it and even then, some of my notes from the previous day can be baffling (is that somebody’s name, a new policy initiative, what?). As well as having a lot of the kind of competing deadlines that interviewers love to ask about we have a new trainee who is keen as mustard and entirely ignorant about what we do. This combination is proving a little difficult in the short term.
Yesterday, the boys were the last kiddies in the creche and the Princess was the last one waiting to be picked up from her course, the second last little soul having been picked up by her mother 50 minutes previously. The Princess was sitting on her own in a big room at a little table colouring conscientiously under the, slightly dour, supervision of a middle aged man (I suppose, it was hot and he wanted to go home). It was depressing.
Last night Michael woke up with a temperature and was up for a couple of hours. Being Michael, he was cheerful but he was hot. Since it was 30 degrees in the boys’ room anyway, I suspect that didn’t help. The Princess woke up with a temperature. Mr. Waffle took the morning off to tend to her but poor old Michael recovered so well that he was escorted to the creche along with our only healthy child and a message to them to call me, if he seemed unhappy (I called them, he was described as being as happy as someone could be with a temperature of 39 when it’s 39 degrees outside – I will have to rescue him when the Princess wakes from her nap). During the morning Mr. Waffle called to say that the Princess was very cheerful but he had taken her to the pharmacy to get something for her heat rash and they said “that’s no heat rash, that’s chicken poxâ€. What do you think might be wrong with Michael, people?
Survival of the fittest
R in the creche tells me that yesterday she heard a faint cry and turned around to see Daniel whacking another child on the head while, simultaneously, Michael slapped the misfortunate mite merrily on the bottom. It’s a jungle out there.
Negligence
Michael can now clap hands and puts his arms up in the air when he wants to be carried.  He twists his hair around his fingers. He doubtless does this because he wants to endear himself still further although he knows he is my favourite child. How does he know this? Because yesterday he saw me at different times let both of the others fall off the bed.  Alas. Poor bruised little mites.
