Dentist

"That's IT, young lady! If you don't start behaving, I'm NOT taking you to the dentist!"
I said that.
Yep, just this morning.
How many kids do you suppose you could successfully leverage the threat of a cancelled dental appointment with?

None?
Maybe a couple-right after Hell froze over with little pigs circling like seagulls in the sky?

Well She-Who-Worships-Pink immediately dissolved into a flood of tears:
"I'm SORRY!" 
"WAAAAAAH- please, PLEASE- I want to go to the DENTIST!!!"
"I'm so SORRY mummy!!!!"

This is not normal behaviour for a child-I know that. Neither is her obsession with her plaque...
But over the past few months, the Daddy Person and I have come to realise that trying to engender awareness in our child often creates obsessions.

Like the petrol thing.
Somehow I got roped into a discussion on petrol being poisonous (a long story) during which I mentioned that some silly people sniff it for fun and even sniffing it can make you sick enough to die if you do it a lot. So now Pinkster goes nuts in the service station every time I fill up, because she can smell the petrol and therefore, she will probably will die.

Yup.
A few too many frank discussions going on between the booster and the driver's seats I'm afraid. Mummy is merrily galloping through mine-fields and not even aware of it.

But some things you tell them just don't stick at all.  Like for the the past six months I've tried in vain to explain to Pinkster that twirling around the bathroom wafting a buzzing electric toothbrush through the air, while discussing the tooth fairy, does not actually get one's teeth clean.

Or in fact maintain them in any marketable shape that, said fairy, would be enticed to pay good money for.

So we had the plaque discussion. I brought in a magnified mirror and showed her the tiny build-up between two of her bottom teeth. I even used a dental plaque tool and scraped a bit off by way of a demo.

I know got the point across finally because she's brushing her teeth properly, diligently even perhaps a bit excessively.  But she 'watches' her plaque obsessively. When she rinses and spits, she scours the porcelain looking for bits of plaque. The plaque scraper is now a daily request.

So this is how she ended up in the dentist's chair, for the first time, this morning - holding a mirror, fascinated and clearly elated, as she watched all the plaque get polished off.

Half an hour after, at school, she marched around the playground grinning at her friends like the Cheshire cat...

.. reactions were mixed.

As the school bell rang she asked, panicking, how she would brush her 'new shiny' teeth after lunch.

"You have an apple sweetie, that will clean your teeth" and as I left I was thinking; 'Dear God, don't let her start asking for half a dozen apples everyday'.

 Linking up with the Multitasking Mummy

Attachments

Does attachment parenting have anything to do with getting too attached to stuff ?

A quick one today, I really wanted to finish something creative to link up with the CrazyMom's Friday Finishes, but here I sit in my undies (its hot!) with a sad faced un-walked dog and a sewing machine beside me and the babysitter due in half an hour!

We sent most of today test driving new cars. Our Toyota RAV4 is thirteen years old and guzzles petrol like you would not believe. I blame part of this on a lack of window tinting which is why the car is always hot and I have the air-con on ALL the time. Even through winter. (This is Sydney Australia, folks) Plus I mostly drive like a mad woman which, I'm told, is also not so good for fuel economy. But all that aside-it's majorly thirsty and our fuel bills are excessive.

But none of that matters to She-Who-Worships-Pink who tells us;
"but we've had Snowy since I was a BABY! She's my FRIEND!!."

Snowy is the name she's given our car and as you can guess, she's very attached.  So we've had a morning of showroom tantrums, and objections like;

 "This car makes me ITCHY!" 
"I don't like the way it sounds!"
"Buddy doesn't like it either.."
"I HATE IT!!!!"

One good thing about this is that the Car Sales People - renowned to cling to potential buyers like polyester suits on a summer day - seem to suddenly give you a lot of time and space for thought when your offspring is throwing a fit.

So short of us finding a car that comes in Shocking Pink or with a free supply of Barbie dolls,  I don't know how we'll get over this hurdle.

But Pinkster is not the only one who cant let go. As you've seen from previous posts, I can get very attached to some of her old clothes and go to great lengths (pun intended) to extend their wearable life.

This was a gift from a very good friend when the Pinkster was three years old, and I had to move the buttons over to make it smaller.

I just love everything about it - the cotton fabric the colours and the trim. Miss Pink however doesn't 'get' the cropped look, which is the way this top was intended to be worn.  It was funny to see her try to pull it down to her waist band.

So today I put the 'pedal to the metal' (OK carpet) and formed another attachment (I'm full of puns today!) with my other Toyota.

I was lucky in my attic stash to have some wide broderie anglaise trim that matches what's already on the top. Some days the Sewing God's are just with you...

So here it is, finished (apart from moving the buttons back) and the most time consuming part of the exercise was going through all the boxes in the attic.

 Now it's time to down tools (and keyboard) the sitter will be here any minute.

Only one problem with that - Mr Frenchie hasn't brought our child back from swimming yet, so we have a half dressed unwashed mother, no dinner started and no child to baby-sit situation developing.

Just a day like any other in our household :0)

Back on the Asphalt

As hard as it may be maintaining enthusiasm while waiting for the Daddy Person to press the camera button (in the end I made rabbit ears behind his head) this was the easy (and cute) bit of the 2014 school run.

The rest was more a case of trying to land on your feet and hitting the Asphalt running.

Last year She-Who-Worships-Pink was attending school in Kindyland which was daunting enough considering the five classes of 25 kids each. But in fairness it was separated from the main school with its own playground and facilities.

Not so this year, now we've joined the scrum.

Oh My Dog - school drop off in the big, BIG school..it's a three ring circus (but with several more rings).

We arrive in the midst of hundreds of gingham clad clowns barreling around, cartwheeling, ricocheting off each other, off walls, out of buildings through doors and hallways.  We are dodging balls and skipping ropes that whip through the air like a series of detonations spewing sports-equipment shrapnel.

Parents everywhere with stunned - 'if I could just remember your name' - expressions, are waving nervously to each other while ducking, weaving and trying to work out where to deposit their shouty, flailing excited offspring.
Others are staggering around Quasimodo style- hunchbacked under the weight of school bags awkwardly looped over a shoulder and their teary offspring firmly attached to one leg.

After the first school run, I found this little pearl on Face Book:

Well I cant exactly do what ever I want, but what I can do is plan my day and logistics.  All without halving the time-frame because of my little co-pilot's need to incorporate a multitude of pit-stops and "I neeed to look at it mummy!" detours..

Just give me another week and I might even get my Mojo back :0)

Things that go BUMP in the night

To say our girl is a restless sleeper would be the understatement of the century.

Forget tossing and turning; She-Who-Worships-Pink flips like a pancake and shouts while she's at it.
She's been this way since she was a baby.
Having spent two weeks on the road sharing a bedroom and sometimes bed with her, I know she's hasn't grown out of it.
Both myself and the Daddy Person know only too well the extent of her nocturnal gymnastics (not to mention nocturnal nudity) because we have the sleep debt to prove it and it's for this reason I've been making custom cot and bed bumpers for her since infancy.

Both her Stokke bassinet and cot were like a padded cells; I banked on the fact she didn't stay still long enough to smother herself and she was at a far greater risk of a concussion the way she rolled over smacking her little head against the wood sides.

When we graduated to the Junior Bed (IKEA's Gulliver) it came with one of those protective guard rails included. She she wouldn't roll out, but then we had the head banging to consider.

So after a trip to the local hardware and half an hour on the sewing machine I invented 'the safety sausage'!

The fabric is IKEA of course - I love the pure cottons and with Miss Pink's circus theme Light Blocking Bed Tent the bright colours and patterns fit well. Unfortunately Vitaminer Vimpel (the bunting pattern) fabric and curtains along with the rest of these fabrics seem to have been discontinued which is a crying shame.  I'm lucky I bought up when I could - I still have a stash :0)

So this is just an extra thick draft stopper (designed for a door). While we had the safety rail it rested against that to protect flailing arms legs and head.

A bit blurred but you get the general idea..

Now the rail has gone and the safety sausage is on the other side - that is when she's not dragging it around the house playing with it.

I'm on the look out for another extra thick one for the fur-person's bed: I noticed recently that when he's lying on his mat, his spine is pressed against our enormous heritage skirting boards.  This may explain why he's been sneaking onto the sofa at night.

Or he's just a cheeky, sneaky sofa sleeping dog that needs a good telling off and some closed doors to contemplate...

Sayonara Kyoto

It would be disingenuous of me to portray Kyoto as a picture perfect movie set for Memoirs of A Geisha. Although at least parts of the movie were filmed here. 

In fact much of Kyoto is a grey Cinderblock jungle with grimy air-conditioning units peppered like teenage acne all over the faces of the boxy buildings.

  A tangle of criss-crossed electrical wiring creates a spiderweb ceiling over the streets wherever you go.

Kyoto rail station looks like a sci-fi space-port but the modernity lasts only a block before function takes over from form.

Still Kyoto is full of contrasts and there's no getting away from the austere beauty you inevitably stumble upon just by taking a turn up the right alley. 

Our exit from the city is far more civilised than our entrance, no catastrophic fires to shut down the system- the Bullet Trains are running like clockwork again. 

I pull my window shade down as I find the landscape, between Kyoto and Tokyo, depressing. Between the dense pre-fab housing and the sparse small scrubby trees, the views are pretty bleak.  Besides I'm getting plenty more aesthetic appeal from a charming little Bento box we bought at the station. 

Nothing fake about this.

A Bugs Life

Well here we are at the end of another week. Mr Frenchie is back at work and since it's still school holidays, I'm running the all-day-rodeo solo, amongst piles of washing, half un-packed suitcases, and toys, toys and more toys.

The Orange Dog seems to shed when he's fretting, so in our absence (even with a loving puppy sitter) he's shed enough fur that we could build another dog. (I need to clean this house when I get a moment.)

But the toys!! Christmas toys, Birthday toys and souvenir toys, not to mention recent prize toys. I'm also tripping on the Orange dog's new chew toys (Santa was kind) strewn all over the living room floor.

There were parcels waiting for us when we got home and guess what?  Yep, more toys!

This little chatterbox below came all the way from France care of Pinkster's grandparents.  He's been a huge hit with her now that she's so enamored with everything robotic. He's actually sleeping beside me on my desk and I'm  not moving him or making any noise, because if he wakes up he'll drive me nuts!

I don't know if you're familiar with Furbys - but they have no off switch! A bit like kids- you have to leave them alone, let them chat amongst themselves, and hope they settle down eventually.

Any way since it's craft day and I've had all this 'stuff' going on, the only crafty thing we were capable of this week was home made play-doh insects.

 

Pinkster's pride and joy - her caterpillar. :0)

We threw in some bottle tops that we'd drawn eyeballs onto, googly eyes and drinking straws, then we cheated a little and used some left over Mr Potato head lips and teeth.

Thanks to The Coterie Blog for this genuinely fool proof  'velvety' play-doh recipe. You'd think with all the new toys, she'd be kept busy but I think I've turned her into a bit of 'make-stuff' junkie.  She needs a daily fix.

That reminds me I need to go through all the bits and bobs "..to make a [something] out of it.." she collected on our trip.

There are rocks, seed pods, drink coasters, chopsticks, interesting napkins, not so interesting napkins, wrapping paper, box lids, those little paper lids hotel room service puts over their milk jugs....

You name it, she kept it. :0)

Snow-Place like Kyoto

And just what do you do with yourselves in Kyoto, when you've had your fill of Museums,Temples, Kimonos and sculptured gardens littered with Bonsai?

Hit the slopes of course.

Don't ask me where we ended up here, (well you can and I'll look it up for you) but it's about a forty minute train ride out of Kyoto followed by ten minutes on a bus and another five minutes on a whopping great Gondola to ride up the mountain.

Don't ask me about the skiing either, we didn't get further than the kids park which was a fabulous idea for parents; two toboggan runs and a sort of carousel crossed with a toboggan for really little kids.

They will rent you everything, except hats and gloves, and it's fun with a capital F (and a great finish to our holiday in Japan). She-Who-Worships-Pink had been literally busting to build a snowman - tick, and ride on a toboggan -  big tick.

She was not just the pinkest girl on the run - she was by far the most vocal:

Postcards from Japan

Terror turns into fascination which develops into a bit of a crush actually.

We have travelled all the way from Philip Island, on the bottom right hand corner (sort of) of Australia to Tokyo with an overnight stop at home in Sydney. 

Just long enough to discover our hot water service has packed it in and to obtain a truly horrible quote from the only plumber who would come out on the Sunday between Christmas and New Year..oh well what can you do? We'll be wanting hot showers when we get home again..

Now we find ourselves at the Niwa - a gorgeous boutique hotel dead centre of Tokyo that has the funkiest high tech loos I've ever sat on. 

It scared the pants off me just looking at it but after sitting and pressing a button on the remote control I literally shrieked which of course brought the family running in. 

It has some quite startling functions and  the heated seat feels quite hot first thing.
But She-Who-Worships-Pink having discovered it, cannot get enough of the 'bottie-wash'. The the noises she makes behind that door are hilarious ...

But she's right, there's nothing quite like finishing your business with a nice warm 'bottie-wash'.

confessing again

FUSHIMI, TENRYUJI and a BAMBOO FOREST

The Fushimi Tori gates was our first stop today. For Mr Frenchie, a pretty grueling  hill climb with 22kilos of Pinkster traveling on his shoulders. The path is about 4 kilometers in total - I would guess we did about half that. For me it was just pretty and magical walking through the winding maze of ancient orange arches. I remember the scene from Memoirs Of A Geisha, with a 9-y-o Japanese girl running down this same path on the movie posters - minus the thousand odd tourists.

Miss Pink and the Daddy Person

The foxes of Fushimi

Tenryuji Temple had to be another setting for MOAG. The mystical sculpted gardens a little less mystical for the hoards of camera snapping tourists (like us). 

She-Who-Worships-Pink, however was completely focused on getting to and through the magical bamboo forest.

Kinkaku Temple of gold was another setting chock-full of Kodak moments and the second last item on Mr Frenchie's sight seeing list. However between the cab rides, long garden walks, lunch break and fake-food-spotting stops we were all a bit Templed-out, so we hit gold and then hit the cab stand.

This was the most we've packed into one day and we still managed to stop for lunch and toffee apples.
However, after getting back to our hotel and kicking off our boots, putting up our swollen feet, we discovered there was a rare showing of traditional Japanese theater including a Geisha dance just 10 minutes from the hotel. 
Boots back on and off we went..

Fake Food Fetish

She-Who-Worships-Pink has developed a weird fascination with the plastic display meals that fill so many Tokyo restaurant windows.

Last night we were passing a restaurant that happened to have some stools out side and the Pinkster grabbed one to sit on, pulling it up to the window.

"Mummy, Daddy, can I just watch the fake food?"

She's become a fake-food tourist. Our days sightseeing have been heavily  punctuated with frantic pointing and gleeful shouts of ;" FAKE FOOD! FAKE FOOD!" After which she spends at least five minutes per window, appreciating the displays, identifying and critiquing the authenticity of each piece.  

And making me take films and photographs of course. :0)

Here we have some fine examples of fake beans, fake burgers, fake muscles, fake ships and even fake beer.