Being the one with the flash camera I'm rarely ever in family photos, I'm always the one taking them. Sometimes that bothers me but usually I'm so busy snapping away I don't even notice. But the lack of photos of me with the kids was brought home to me sharply thanks to James' recent obsession with photos of himself. He loves to sit on my lap and order up "Baby James photo", "James and Charlotte photo", "Daddy James photo", etc. He's quite clearly put out that there are no recent Mama James photos.
Then we went away for a family reunion on the weekend. Once again I was designated photographer and I snapped away while people ate, talked and mingled. As the night wore on my poor little man was getting more and more tired. Eventually he sidled over to me and I thought he was going to ask for bed for sure. But instead he turned his pleading eyes up to me and said, "Pwease? Mama James photo pwease?" How can you resist that? So I quickly set the camera, let him climb onto my lap and then extended my arm and hoped for the best. The result was one of the better self-portraits I've ever taken.
The best part about this photo is the reaction it got from James. On the night he just said a triumphant little YEAH. But at home when I put it on the monitor for him he froze, staring at it and then he turned to me, eyes huge with wonder.
"Mama James photo!"
"Yup, Mama James photo. You like it?"
"YEAH! My like it! My like it!"
And then he did the cutest little happy dance, galloping around in a small circle and giggling with glee. When he stopped and I managed to stop laughing I asked him if he wanted me to get him a copy for his bedroom wall.
"YEAH!" he squealed, "Mah bedroom wall! My like it!"
Being the mother of a small boy is to be a movie star in a world without critics.
I recently had the pleasure of waiting around for an appointment with a friend in an office where a radio was tuned, rather unfortunately, to the ongoing aural assault that is Mix 106.3. Following on from a particularly nasal Kylie number we got what I think has to be the worst offering John Farnham has ever presented to the public, "What About Me?" I hate whining at the best of times but this song is in a league of its own. It's makes me want to beat someone to death while piercing my own ear drums with a knitting needle.
The sheer horror of it fresh after Kylie made me groan out loud in frustration and my companion turned to regard me coolly.
"You're not particularly patient are you?" he asked and I had to explain that waiting I can handle, but waiting to a backdrop of awful music is really not my thing. Then an awful thought occurred to me.
"You're not like a closet Farnham fan or anything are you?"
Now this is a man whose publicly acknowledged preference for music runs to techno and metal. He was even sitting there in a Mastodon T-shirt and Gojira hoody and was clearly deeply unimpressed that I would even ask him such a thing. He stared at me for a second.
"What do you f#$king think?"
Okay, point taken. But what I had been trying to suggest, rather insultingly as it turned out, is that John Farnham might have been a secret shame artist. We all have them. Someone we sing to when no one's around, claiming the CD belongs to a friend or was a gag gift we can't bring ourselves to toss if someone asks us about it. Or even one of those inherited loves from fruit-loop parents. Once I started thinking about it, I couldn't stop. I have so many songs and artists I love purely because of the time and place when I first heard them/came to love them. Here are my secret, and not-so-secret, shame artists;
Europe; First LP (okay, only) I ever got was a compilation called "Smash Hits '87". The only song my brother liked off the whole album was Europe's The Final Countdown and I would have to lift the needle and drop it back at the beginning at least twice every time I played it. Now here we are, 25 years on and it's the only song off that album I even remember. I crank it up every chance I get and remember my mad little bro' dancing like a freak and playing air guitar. It's also worth noting that Europe play right into my fetish for man bands with better hair and more makeup than me. Not to mention the coordinated dance moves, laser lights and explosions. Sad that today's rockers just aren't trying as hard. Of course, there's always 30 Seconds to Mars.
Jimmy Barnes; Okay, I'm not at all ashamed of this one but this one song is such a massive piece of my childhood that I had to include it. We moved to a farm when I was six and lived near a tiny town in the middle of nowhere. One of the only cool things about this town was the blue light disco and the coolest thing about the disco was when Jimmy Barnes Working Class Man came on and every single person would get up to help belt it out. It was the late eighties, early nineties, people had been doing it tough with interest rates and this song spoke to every person in the place. I learned how to head bang at the age of eight to this and Acca Dacca's Thunderstruck and for that, they will always be on my favourites list.
Fleetwood Mac; When I was 13 and just getting into music I had a tendency to play it a little louder than my parents probably would have preferred. We lived in a house where the living room had 12-foot high cathedral ceilings and my Dad had bolted the rather impressive set of speakers from our pretty decent stereo to the ceiling. About two minutes after I'd started belting out Def Leppard on my newly-acquired stereo my father yanked me out to the living room, sat me under one of the speakers and then cranked up Fleetwood Mac's The Chain until every cell of my body jerked to the beat and the windows shook in their panes. If I was going to play music loud, he informed me, it had better be good music and if I was anything like him, it better be at a volume where no one could hear me sing. I still love this song and I still play it at levels that would make most people's ears bleed. I just do it when no one's around to hear.
Creedence: Another one of my father's influences. I simply lack the capacity to play this at low volume. Can't. Be. Done.
Def Leppard; The first album I ever bought on CD was Def Leppard's "The Vault". I love every song on there but in particular "Pour Some Sugar On Me" and "Let's Get Rocked". That last one makes me feel incredibly rebellious and makes me fantasise about going on some sort of vodka-fuelled anarchist rampage armed with spray cans and brass knuckles. Also, check out the dodgy animation. Good times.
Snow: I've got no idea if Snow ever did another song but the phenomenon that was Informer was enough. Almost everyone in high school spent months trying to work out what the hell he was saying so we could copy it. Still haven't got a clue. And what the hell is that accent?
Enigma; Saving the best for last. I discovered Engima when they were onto their second album and the Enigma had been busted. Everyone knew it was Michael Cretu but it didn't make the music any less amazing. I first heard it at the 1995 Pagan Summer Gathering, a camping event I'd been reluctantly dragged to by my hippy parents. That reluctance melted somewhere in the first hour of landing when I quickly discovered that unwashed pagans come hand in hand with alcohol, weed, sex and no concept of anything as mainstream and boring as age limits. My first experience of Enigma was that first evening when The Cross of Changes got played through speakers as tall as me out over the valley at dusk. When I stood before them my body felt like it would be shattered by the beat. It was impossible not to dance and I instantly loved them. I only own the first four albums, as the rest were crap, but I play them to death and both my children were born to the sounds of Enigma (Charlotte to Three and James to The Screen Behind the Mirror).
Tonight was the first night I saw the official video for Return to Innocence (the first Enigma song I ever heard). It does not surprise me that it's beautiful and makes no sense whatsoever. But with unicorns and everything moving backwards it's not hard to remember what it felt like to be 15, stoned to the wide and plugged in to the heart of the universe for the very first time. Wicked.
A number of contributing factors have brought me to the point I'm now at. First, we moved house in a rush about two years ago. Second, my husband has had depression for a long time and it's basically been me trying to hold things together domestically for at least two years. Third, we have not had that critical moment where we accept that many of the things we used to do before children just aren't going to be on the agenda for at least another ten years. Finally, we are both former pack rats.
Those are the reasons for why we are where we are. No matter which way you cut it, we have too much stuff. And unfortunately it's not just "I'll never use that stuff" it's more "I'll probably use that ten years from now so I better hang onto it" stuff.
Charles' weakness is books. The man operates on the 18th Century system - books are valuable, each one takes a monk four years to birth, ergo we never throw a single one out and one day I will pass them on to my children in pristine glory and they will be on-their-knees grateful for the wonderful legacy I have bestowed on them. It does not bother him a whit that he'll likely never read half of them ever again in this lifetime or, that if he suddenly becomes unemployed/a paraplegic/develops Alzheimer's or any other reason that would make him want to read them again, that he can now buy most of them for less than $5 with free shipping from book depository. Nor does it concern him that the instant he croaks his kids will be loading up the nearest trailer with most of his beauties and gifting them to a very needy recycling centre.
My weakness is more insidious. Fabric and craft. I've got a whole wardrobe full of the stuff and I only just realised this week that I buy the things I need for specific projects and I almost never get creative with what's on hand. It makes no sense on earth to save every scrap from projects past because I am never going to use them. I had this epiphany only just last week when my aunt handed me a box of fabric scraps, trims and bias binding that she had received from an elderly friend who recently gave up sewing. That box was a veritable treasure trove. The things in it were likely extremely valuable when you considered how much the lady in question paid for them. And I am never, ever going to use them. It became the foundation of a very large pile of fabric and craft stuff destined for day care or charity.
The science of stuff and its accumulation is scary and intriguing all at once. To start with, so much of our stuff is disposable. Think about the plastic cutlery, straws and papers napkins you'll use in your lifetime. Stupendous. Now think of how many happy meal toys there must be cluttering up landfill. Terrifying. Then there's the accidental collections. I was discussing the accumulation of stuff with my Dad and he admitted to having about a dozen baseball caps that he doesn't remember getting in the first place and that he never wears.
Know how this starts? You have one hat you keep in case someone wants to wear it. You get a complimentary hat in a show bag, it goes with the first one. Someone notices you have more than one hat, they figure awesome, you collect, I've got Christmas sorted and they buy you another one with a cool logo*. Soon you're the guy that collects hats and you have to buy a rack to hang them all on. You have the power to make a day care centre somewhere very happy but you probably never think about the 11 baseball caps collecting dust that no one wears. Plus, you need something to hang on your rack now.
Finally there's the gifts. Why do we even buy each other gifts once we make it past the age of eight? Even if you buy me coasters because I need coasters, chances are they will be the last coasters on earth I would have bought**. And I'm the sort of person who feels so guilty about not liking gifts that I will have to begin a complicated series of maneuverings to get rid of the coasters in a manner that will make you feel that I liked your gift while simultaneously getting them out of my house as fast as possible. I will use them the first time you come so you feel that I appreciate your thoughtful gift. Then they will go in a cupboard for two years. If you do not mention them they will immediately be given to the Salvos. If you do mention them I will claim that my 72-year-old father took a fancy to them when he was staying with us and then they mysteriously disappeared. I will nod sadly and say he's getting a bit like that.
I'm on holidays this week and moving through the stuff with determination. Already one trailer load has left for landfill and another is being prepped for charity. There's also a sizeable number of things that must be returned and another massive garbage bag destined for the day care centre. The house is starting to look reasonable again and I feel like I can breathe. Now to talk to my man about his bibliophilia. The first step is admitting you have a problem...and then you can let the healing begin.
* One year my in-laws gave us an awesome biscuit jar shaped like a cupcake. The next year my Dad gave us another biscuit jar shaped like a cow. Charles and I looked at each other over the top of this quite cool gift and silently agreed that while it was indeed awesome, we would not let it grace our bench top for a single day because the instant anyone saw the two of them, we would suddenly be the couple who collect crazy biscuit jars. And we all know what happens after that.
** This is not strictly true. My mother-in-law bought me a set of coasters almost ten years ago now and they are still the only coasters I own and use. But you can see what an incredible fluke that is.
Every parent has those moments when you feel your self-control slipping. They push you just a little bit further than usual and suddenly you find yourself remembering what life was like without them and wondering whether you ought to have yourself committed for your decision to have children as your temper explodes with the fire of a thousand suns.
I'm not a patient person by any stretch of the word but I take a lot more crap from my kids than I would from anyone else. Unfortunately there are still moments when the hull of self-possession is profoundly, catastrophically breached. Tonight was one of those nights.
I'm on leave for a week to look after Charlotte because she's on school holidays. James is in daycare during the day and, without the little Viking around to initiate wrestling contests, she's pretty easy to deal with. We had a lovely, girly day together - watching the Tinkerbell movie, walking to the shops for lunch in the little bakery and she even helped me out with some Spring cleaning.
It was hard to see how the day could turn sour but when it comes down to it, I just don't give my kids enough credit. First of all James came home in a sooky mood. And not just a "please cuddle me on the couch while I watch some Dora" kind of sooky but the "nothing is going to make me happy, not even an army of tap dancing spider monkeys wielding lollies and chocolate" kind of sooky. Every word coming out of his mouth is leveled at that perfect ear drum-penetrating pitch and drawn out into a protracted whine designed to drive you insane.
Over dinner my nerves gradually fell apart as Charlotte commenced chewing and spat out every second mouthful into her hand to examine it because "it's just weird"; James refused to eat the Mongolian lamb he'd asked for, choosing to spread it over the table instead and ask for "more wice" instead; he also got up and down from the table, crawling around underneath in between and then dribbled his milk everywhere, purely to see how we'd react; Charlotte saw what fun her brother was having and immediately commenced whining that she didn't get any milk, only water. Once I'd gotten up to get her some she suddenly decided she didn't want any. Both kids topped it off by whining about the lack of dessert in their immediate futures.
At the conclusion of dinner an exhausted Charles announced his intention of having a quick nap and both kids sensed the weakness that was my separation from the protection of the Daddy herd and immediately went in for the kill. In this particular instance they decided I needed to adjudicate the division of the only chocolate under our roof at the moment - a two-fingered kit kat and three chocolate coins. Neither child was happy with the Solomon-esque decision handed down so they rapidly did their own little trade and of course, they both felt that was worse than what they'd started with and the world ended.
After making it clear that they were both on incredibly thin ice I left them to it in the spare room and went for some of my own time out. I'd been chilling for not more than 30 seconds when a sheepish Charlotte appeared with her hands behind her back.
"What?" I barked, eyeing her warily.
"Mamaaaaa...I did something not so good."
"What?" I repeated, rubbing my eyes.
"My necklace broke and all the beads went everywhere."
"How did you break it?"
Shuffle of feet.
"Um...it just broke?"
"Don't say it like it's a question, just tell me how you broke it."
More shuffling of feet.
"Well you know how you told me not to stretch my necklace too much in case I broke it?"
"Yes?"
"Well how much trouble would I be in if I accidentally stretched it too much and broke it?"
"Just show me," I sigh.
Even then I was managing to hold on to my temper. It wasn't until the moment that I was bent over on all fours, scraping up tiny glass beads from the carpet in the spare room that the breaking point came. Because a naughty giggle was the only warning I got that my incredibly solid Viking toddler had decided my back was an excellent landing site for his epic leap from the top of the great height that is the spare bed.
On the up side both kids were too busy laughing to take notice of the death threats that were bellowed at them.
I have a friend who told me once that anger isn't always bad - you just have to keep a firm leash on it and channel it into achieving something positive. It was a life-changing moment for me when he said that. I'm quick and passionate with my emotions, often to my own detriment. I'd accepted long ago that it will probably be several more lifetimes before I reach anything approaching Nirvana. But with those words I realised that providing I control my negative emotions (especially anger), I can use them as motivation to achieve or a spark to ignite others to action.
This week's negative emotion is not anger, it's just anxiety. There are a bunch of bad situations I have no control over at the moment and while some of them are closer to home than others, all of them are tying my guts in knots and giving me restless nights. Since there's almost nothing I can do about most of them (especially the work-related stuff), I've decided to distract myself with cleaning, catching up on sewing and exercising. Still wondering what the hell that little conversation actually meant? Do another 20 sit-ups. Worried about your husband's back? Go clean the spare room.
I am not the sort to obsess for long. Most things in life, as far as I'm concerned, are not worth more than 24 hours' worth of mental energy and angst. But somehow I've landed in a sort of thicket of issues and the sheer number of them means they're taking longer to push through than usual. So rather than fight my way out of here I'll just take this coming week of leave and channel all my frustrations into productive endeavors. Like cleaning out the walk-in wardrobe in the spare room...
I've been looking through the statistics from my blog recently and it's suddenly hit me that I've been here writing for almost two years and my readership now is much bigger than it used to be. I'm getting hits from all over the world and the people coming here are no longer just my friends and family who have seen my links on Facebook. Because of that I've decided it's time to invest some time and effort in making it all a little more user friendly. First of all there are now a bunch more little thingies down the right there to make your viewing pleasure simpler. You can now search my blog, see the most popular posts of all time (weirdly the one about how to prune really big trees) and I've given people the option of subscribing by email if they'd like to receive the posts directly.
Charles is also going to look into getting a Facebook page for the blog so if you're not a friend of mine on Facebook because you don't actually know me personally, you'll be able to subscribe to that and get your latest TC news through that. I might even start using the news feed to give out totally useless tips like "don't freak out if you spill red wine on the carpet, we know you needed an excuse to replace it anyways so make like the wine was the nail in the coffin and go by something pretty to replace it."
I'll keep you posted as things come up but please feel free to email me any suggestions or advice on what would make the blog better, what you'd like to see more of and most importantly if there's anything specific you'd like me to write about. Stay tuned kitties!
Okey doke peeps a number of you wrote in and asked for the kitchen voodoo recipe so over the weekend I whipped it up again and this time took some photos. I've listed all the ingredients you'll need and then broken the recipe down into its three components. First up, here's everything you'll need;
¾ Cup Brown Sugar
1¼ (190g) Cups Self Raising Flour
100g Butter
1 Egg
½ cup Milk
4 Tbs Golden Syrup
1 Tbs Cornflour
1½ Cups Boiling Water
Before you start set your oven to 180C and grease an oven-proof dish (at least 1.5L, preferably 2L).
In a bowl put;
¼ Cup Brown Sugar
1¼ (190g) Cups Self Raising Flour
Whisk the two until combined.
In a separate heatproof jug put;
100g Butter
½ Cup Milk
2 Tbs (60g) Golden Syrup
Heat until the butter is melted and stir until combined. Beat the egg lightly in a cup and then add to the milk mixture (make sure your milk mixture is warm, not hot, or you will cook your egg).
Tip the lot into the flour mixture and whisk through until combined and smooth, then spoon into your pre-greased ovenproof dish.
In a small bowl combine;
½ Cup Brown Sugar
1 Tbs Cornflour
Sprinkle evenly over the top of the pudding batter.
Finally combine;
2 Tbs (60g) Golden Syrup
1½ Cups Boiling Water
Pour the water over the top of the batter. To make sure it distributes evenly without disturbing the batter below too much, hold a large spoon upside down over the batter and pour the water over it.
I didn't get a photo of this stage because it looks so yuck I try to get it into the oven and out of my sight before I lose all faith. But if it looks like a huge muddy puddle immediately after a top-end torrential downpour, you're onto a winner. How long it will take to cook is kind of iffy depending on your oven.
The initial recipe said 40-45 minutes but my oven is less an oven and more some sort of wicked industrial kiln powered by the bowels of hell. It takes 30 minutes maximum in mine. So it would be fair to say that if your necklace heated up so much that it burnt your neck in the time it took to open the oven door and deposit your pudding, you won't want to go much longer than 30 minutes. If your appliance is more of the sedate slow-cook variety, give it longer. Either way when it comes out it should look like this;
Mmm, lovely golden-brown crunchy top. Inside should be a spongy gold and below that is the delicious butterscotch.
Oh yeah! Serve it up with some delicious ice cream...
...and share it around. It has the Little Viking Seal of Approval which means it's guaranteed full of win;
Although to be fair as far as the Little Viking is concerned Butterscotch Pudding is just a hot cake with warm, runny icing. And we know how he feels about cake.
