"Tadaaaaaaa"

Little Miss is too cute for our own good sometimes. She has a charm that, I'm sure, will save her little bum plenty of times during her life!
When she is fiddling around with something, she get's engrossed, fascinated. You have never seen someone extract baby-wipes from it's packaging with such levels of concentration! Or deposit drops of milk from her Any-Way-Up-Cup on the coffee table so they make a pretty pattern.
The rest of the world will vanish. Gone. *Poof!* It's just her and her "project".
When we see what she's doing and we appear on the edges of her vision to correct her, she will take a step back, extend her hands to the "project" in a Vanna White-like fashion and exclaim: "Tadaaa" Or "Here you go!" Like she just did this amazing this for you. To please and impress you.
With this big smile, and this shiny angelic face that make you just want to put kisses all over it! It works now, just hope she realizes that "Taddaaaa!" loses it's functionality eventually......

All better again!

Well, we are all better again. The mucous has left the building..... Kleenex is going to have to let people go due to the severe dip in revenue since last week...
We are still dealing with one side effect now: The waking up between 01.00 and 02.00 looking for hugs and wanting to go in to Mammie and Daddy's bed.
She has had these phases before, and I am confident they will not last forever, but in the meanwhile...... oh man! She has gotten in to this habit of wanting to get as close to you as she could possibly get.
When I think about it during the day, I think it's incredibly cute and it makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.
However, when it's the middle of the night, you have got work in the morning and she just can't get comfy, it's less than practical. She will throw up one leg on your chest. Try and get her face SO close to yours that you can't help but shift your head, which makes her follow suit.....
It's a King Size bed but when she's in with us, it may as well be a match-box! :-)

On our first trip to the Netherlands with Little Miss, we bought her a little glow in the dark "Miffy" cuddly toy which has been in her cot wit her ever since. When we put Little Miss to bed, we will sit down next to her for a few minutes until she falls asleep. So too, last night. Sitting there, in her dark room, I could see the little Bunny glowing next to Little Miss' face. Then a dark patch appeared. And I could make out Little Miss' hand. She was snuggling up to Miffy. Getting her comfy feeling from this glow in the dark bunny. There is such an innocence in that motion. The reaching for something familiar and cozy. Her arms wrapped around Miffy she finally fell asleep.

It took her longer than usual to fall asleep but I strongly suspect that that was my fault. Usually Darren does the bed time routine but the poor man has done something to his back so I happily stepped in. I was a wee bit to chatty I think though! So the message that it was, in fact, bed time didn't really sink in with Little Miss until I tucked her in and switched off the light. And where Darren will be back down in all of 20 minutes, having brushed her teeth, washed her face, changed her Nappy and put her to sleep in her jammies, I took, oh.. 45 Minutes?! Obviously, I need the practice and should be doing this more.

Last night I had my first introduction lesson with "Curves". I know that in theory "Bigger is better" but I was taking this a liiiiitle bit to far. So, as of yesterday, I will be doing the "Curves Work Out" three times a week. They cram 1.5 hrs of exercise in 30 minutes and that suits me right down to the ground.
I was a little bit afraid that this would mean that I would not see Little Miss on Monday and Wednesday's, when I go after work. Luckily I managed to get home in time to see Darren and herself arrive home after Nannie's house at the same time as I.

I was wearing my glasses as my lens ripped and was still decked out in my brand spanking new work out gear. (that's how badly I did not want to miss her, didn't change after, just hopped in the car straight away!)
She was standing in the doorway when I stepped in and got a heartfelt "Maammmiiee!!! MY Mammie!!" and she jumped up on to my arms to give me this massive hug!
Now THAT's a welcome home! She gave me this big smile and said:" I like your glasses Mammie" and "I like your new new top" The kid is TWO! :)
(Let me explain the new new thing. At the end of last year, she got some nice shiny black shoes for the holiday season, she also had gotten new normal shoes not too long before that. These were her "new shoes" and she dubbed her black shiny shoes her "New New shoes". The New New has stuck for new things ever since)

I wonder how big the Caíthlyn dictionary will be in a few years? I does love me some kiddy-speak!

Have a great one everyone!

Little Trooper

No posts in quite a while, my blog-anniversary came and went and not so much as a syllable. "Why?" you may ask.
The answer is that all three of us have been battling various degrees of fever inducing, phlegm producing, head-ache causing illness.
I started the ball rolling with a nasty cold, and a fever. Man, if this is what menopause will be like, I'll pass, thanks.
Then, on Sunday night, I went to get Little Miss because she was crying for us and sounded, well... off, I guess. Being sick myself made me very drowsy but thank (the) God(dess) Darren had his wits about him and noticed Little Miss was burning up.
My man is THE man you want to have around when a situation requires immediate action. He proceeded to strip her of her PJ's and opened the window. Then he gave her some Dozol to take the fever down. By the time I realized what was happening ( I was REALLY out of it) it was 03.00 hrs and there was a 2 year old toddling around our bedroom. She had these very shiny eyes and seemed so hyper, the poor thing.

Darren stayed at home the next day to take care of both of us. (I must have done something SO right in a previous life to deserve this man...)
We gave Little Miss more medicine during the day, which she loves and she was not too bad. It's the nights that were the worst. (And still are, she has been up every night since, and this has been the case for over a week now)
I went back to work on the Wednesday and Nannie took great care of Little Miss as always.
Then, on the Thursday, I was in the supermarket with Little Miss in the trolley and noticed some white, well, gunk in her eyes. Thinking nothing of it, I took a clean tissue and wiped it off. Should have known it was not going to be nothing...... An hour later her eyes were producing the gunk at a rapid pace.
Lying her down to change her nappy made her eyes well up with these gel-like tears and her eyes were bright red. Darren and I decided to take her to the Doc's first thing on the Friday.

I am SO impressed with my little Honey. She was sick, had the snotsers in a big, big way. Fever, coughing like a 50 year old 2-pack-a-day smoker and after 5 days of this she still was smiling and laughing and being affectionate. She's a little trooper so she is!
Once in the office though, it's a completely different story. She is PETRIFIED of this man and his wife. I mean, hysteria inducing scared. He tried talking to her for a bit but soon gave up and just told me to hold her in a lock-grip so he could do his thing. Then he prescribed an antibiotic eye-cream and told me she "Is a moany child" and when I was trying to console her and told her she was a good girl he said "No she wasn't"

I should have just told him to keep his opinions to himself, that she had been sick for a week and how the heck would he have felt?!! Instead, I just packed her up, and left. Seething!
He may be good at the diagnosis part of his job, but for the rest he is just a rude, ignorant, old man that obviously does not want to be doing his job anymore. He complains that he is SO busy. This is true, his waiting room is always packed BUT he get's FIFTY Euros per consultation! I'd say he EASILY makes 700 Euros per morning. And then he has the nerve to complain that he is late for his lunch break? Or be narcky because a child is scared of him? She has never had a nice experience in his office! Can you blame her for being frightened?

And what get's me is that I just let this man say this about my daughter, when I am not normally one to shy away from confrontation.
Maybe it's the fact that he is very good at the part of his job that matters most. My mother in law swears by this man and as long as he makes sure my daughter is healthy and is thorough at that part of the job then I should make sure I don't get thrown out of the practice for tearing strips off him.
The Irish Health system is in a very sorry state indeed, that goes for Hospitals and GP's alike. The other GP's around are friendly but frankly incompetent. (One of them has several deaths on his conscience due to negligence, sometimes I wished Ireland had more of a "Sue 'em!" Culture, this guy should be locked away. The other is nice, but bad at their job, let one of the cousins walk around with a kidney infection for weeks. Until her mam took her to my doctor who copped it straight away)

Anyway, the drops worked fine and her eyes look less like she had 5 rounds with Mohammed Ali, but the cough remains..... She has been in with us every night and when she is there, she buries her face in my neck (Or Darren's) wraps her arms 'round and holds on for dear life.
She will almost crawl on top of you and it feels like she would crawl in to you if she could. It's like she craves the physical comfort of having her Mammie and/or Daddy there. Being able to provide that for her is so worth the exhausted feeling the next day.
It does delay the blogging quite a bit though. ;-)

Many cute and adorable things have happened and I will do my best to gather them together for a nice post, just not today.

Love Always,

Nynke