The Sandbox Files: Parenthood

So it has been nearly a year since my last proper blog update. Which in my opinion is far too long. In an attempt to encourage more blogging I am starting a new series titled Lessons Learned. The first of which follows below...

The First Word:

As you can see in the photo above, little Squeakers has come a long way in the last year. There have been several milestones and the majority of them would each likely fill a blog post on their own. 

One of the first milestones she reached was talking. Her first intentional and obviously more than meaningless babble word was “cat.” While also attempting to reach for said cat. It should be said that she said Dada long before muh-muh, but my wife insists that was meaningless babble. 

Since that first proper word her vocabulary has jumped leaps and bounds. She is constantly trying out a new word here or there, almost always with context, and then she doesn’t say it again for ages. Which causes us to look ridiculous in front of friends and family as we beg her to repeat them. 

Silly baby tricks. 

Squeakers is brilliant at mimicking actions, we attempted to use baby sign language early on and it seems one or two actions properly resonated with her and she still does them to this day. Because my daughter is adorable and I want to be told that on a constant basis; I managed to teach Squeakers a couple of commands to elicit coos from nearby adults.

At the moment her top three tricks are to “sound like an elephant” (essentially blowing a raspberry) ‘what a gorilla does” (several pats on her chest with her hands) and “blow a kiss” (kissing noise, slightly muffled by her open hand over her mouth.) All are adorable and always seem to impress.

 As silly and self serving as these things are, I love that most of them come about by either my wife or myself (usually me) being ridiculous to entertain Squeakers, only for her to attempt to mimic the motion. 

More...Noh

One of the signs that she has continued to use with more frequency is the sign for more. I think it originally started as the sign for milk and evolved into more. Squeakers loves music, all music and luckily for me... any music. 

What this normally means is that if she is upset or grizzly we tend to sing to her... that is, my wife sings beautifully, and i fail horribly with each attempt. Over the last few weeks she shows the sign for more and we have asked which song she wanted... at first all she wanted us to sing was “Twinkle,Twinkle.” 

I’m not kidding, last month I was doing our weekly grocery shop with Squeakers, and I sang “Twinkle, twinkle.” over and over for nearly 45 minutes. The looks I got from other shoppers ranged from adoring to pleading me to stop stabbing their ears. 

She has now started what I can only describe as skipping tracks. She does the sign for more, we suggest a song, she says “Noh!” assertively and we suggest another song. Usually after 5 or so suggestions and refusals I just sing a song from Aladdin. 

“Do you want to say hello?” 

I have rambled on a bit so I will close the blog with this last bit. Squeakers loves phones... all phones. She is particularly interested in the house phone and her parents mobile phones. She says “Hello” and “Buh-bye!” very clearly. Of course this means my wife and to a much lesser extant myself have fallen into that horrible cliche of making the people on the other end of the phone attempt to talk to our toddler.

I want to say, that as a parent, we know you don’t actually want to talk to our child. I will even admit to knowing that it is possible we are the only people that think it is cute. I also want you to know, that we don’t care about what you want, say hello to Squeakers!

Random #ClassyWife Quote:

I briefly touched on this topic in my last post. let us recap...

"The odd thing to me is how people (specifically women) treat me when Squeakers and I are out on the town. I wont go into the whole random strangers deciding they can randomly touch my child, that is a topic for another post.

I’ll title it something along the lines of "Bitch, I don’t know you!" Partly because I get a little ghetto when strangers get near my child and partly because my wife and I have been watching season 2 of Orange is the new black. "

As I mentioned last week Squeakers and I frequently spend a few hours every weekend as just the two of us, in order to give my wife a little bit of respite from her constant vigil as wet nurse/ child minder.

The last few times I have been out I have had several encounters with random strangers coming right up to the shopping trolley, or push chair sticking their possibly diseased hands against her cheeks or attempting to give her a kiss. 

Now lets all pretend for a second that I'm not quickly becoming one of those germ phobic hypochondriac parents. I can't be alone in wanting to prevent my three and a half month old daughter from getting another cold, which is only going to make her miserable, which will make my wife miserable which will obviously make me miserable. 

This sounds horrible, but there is something about my daughter that she only seems to attract vagrants. I'm not exaggerating, we live in a pretty nice neighbourhood, and we shop for our groceries in the slightly upmarket grocery. But there has yet to be any affluent attractive even remotely clean person that has taken interest in my daughter.

Unfortunately for me, Squeakers seems to give off a nearly undetectable beacon that attracts the type of person some people would normally cross the street to avoid if you came across them late at night in any neighbourhood.  

A couple of instances that stick out in my mind are the Veteran and the Motherly Meth head. I came across the older veteran at an electronics store when Squeakers was patiently drooling over her dress while daddy was drooling over the beautiful 60 inch curved LED High Definition flat screen televisions. 

The older gentleman walked up to me and began a conversation about the ridiculous cost for the tvs. In his defence despite reeking of stale cigarette smoke, he was dressed rather dapperly, he was wearing a golfing polo, slacks and loafers. He mentioned when he got back from the war he bought his black and white for a dollar off of one of the other soldiers in the barracks. 

While he was saying this he kept attempting to poke Squeakers in what I can only assume was an attempt to find her self destruct button. She eventually began to stir and expressed her annoyance in the only way a 3 month old could. She screamed, which provided enough break in the old man's conversation to allow me to escape both him and the urge to purchase a ridiculous new living room appliance. 

The situation with the Motherly Meth head actually occurred while both my wife and I were out together with Squeakers on the seafront while  attempting to purchase an overpriced bar of frozen cream and chocolate. 

My wife was ordering and I was cooing at Squeakers when a woman that looked exactly as you would expect a Meth Addict to look walked across the outdoor collection of tables from where she was sitting to have a look and tickle with our incredibly adorable bum magnet. 

She had shoulder length oily, stringy hair that revealed areas that were beginning to go bald. She was wearing cheap plastic sunglasses that despite their comically large size did little to hid the large boils and acne that riddled her face. She also had what looked to be recently closed scabs up and down her arms. 

She was wearing a t-shirt with the emblem of a band she had likely never heard of, burgundy coloured track shorts with the gag inducing Juicy logo written across her bum. I took the majority of these details in as she confidently strolled towards my family and began offering her sage advice such as, "Make sure you get right back on that horse (motioning towards my wife) the first two births were the hardest by the time you have the fourth you stop stressing over every little thing... "

My wife hadn't realized she was talking to us, but I thanked her and attempted to turn Squeakers away from her with a mumbled excuse about direct sunlight. She said oh don't worry bout that, a little sun never hurt anyone. When she attempted to reach down to pick Squeakers out of the push chair I pulled the chair back and half jokingly said to my Wife as we quickly escaped "Beeeech I don't know you." 

My wife is amazing... I may have mentioned that once or twice on this blog previously. Monday through Friday she cares for and entertains our 14 week old child while I am at work. I attempt to help when I'm home but as I am still little more than a glorified nappy changer my wife remains the primary care giver.

She wakes several times each night by an often screaming (which I mostly seem to sleep through except for rare occasions) and hungry child. The poor woman hasn't had a proper nights sleep since before the child was born. 

She cooks dinner nearly every night, and manages to stay on top of normal day to day household management (with ridiculously little help from me.) While she is managing this she is also furthering her career studying and completing a PR diploma. She also rarely complains, the woman is damn near a saint...

It's sick. Like seriously, how does anyone compete with that. 

My minuscule attempt at balancing the amount of time and effort my wife contributes is to take Squeakers out for a few hours on Saturday and Sunday.

It isn't much, and to be honest the longest it has been is 3 hours; but it allows my wife some time to herself to either have a bath, or a nap or if she is feeling ambitious she can clean the oven or the kitchen and living room floors. Not a choice I personally would make, but what can i say, she's insane.

The odd thing to me is how people (specifically women) treat me when Squeakers and I are out on the town. I wont go into the whole random strangers deciding they can randomly touch my child, that is a topic for another post.

I'll title it something along the lines of "Bitch, I don't know you!" Partly because I get a little ghetto when strangers get near my child and partly because my wife and I have been watching season 2 of Orange is the new black. 

No the thing that strikes me odd is how many woman are overly eager to volunteer their help when I am obviously struggling. Allow me to paint the scene. 

Last week Squeakers and I were tasked with the weekly shop. She was absolutely brilliant for about two thirds of the time we were there. It should be noted that I spend a ridiculous amount of time doing our shopping.

It drives my wife crazy when she is with me, but when Squeakers and I are on our own, it provides a nice amount of time for her to relax, or steam clean the stairs and carpets upstairs, whatever she is feeling that day. 

Squeakers started to get a bit fussy while I was attempting to collect the last few things on my list, which I mostly managed to calm by picking her up and holding her. The only issue being that pushing a large trolley while holding a fussy infant limits your range of mobility. I managed but was obviously struggling.

Two different women in separate aisles volunteered to retrieve things on hard to reach lower shelves. Which was out of the ordinary but not completely unheard of I'm sure. 

As I tracked down the final item I was searching for with my daughter secured back in the cart-child restraint  Squeakers decided to go into full apocalyptic melt down. She would calm if I picked her up, but as soon as I put her down, instant explosion of nuclear tantrum.

This was obviously unfortunate as I had to leave her in the child seat while I unloaded the suddenly ridiculous amount of groceries from the cart so the cashier could scan them and stare blankly at me and my screaming child as I hastily attempted to bag said groceries. 

Suddenly women in the queue behind me and in the surrounding queues were attempting to appease my daughter, which unfortunately for me only seemed to enrage her inner chaos demon even further. 

And then there were the suggestions and comments from the women, who I would wager ranged in age from about 19 to late 70's. 

"Have you tried picking her up?"

"... or rocking her?"

"...she clearly wants her mother..." This one was more or less mumbled but I shot her what I hope was a glare that will haunt her long after she left that store.

The comment that really bothered me though was this:

"Your braver than my husband ever was, he would never do the shopping, let alone with a baby." The woman than went on to ramble about grandchildren or something I'm not sure Squeakers had been screaming the entire time and I am fairly certain my ears were permanently damaged.  

There was another older woman that had been on her way out with her shopping, had witnessed my child's attempt to initiate World War III with solely her voice and decided she would rock the cart back and forth while I attempted to bag the rest of my groceries. 

I counted seven women attempting to offer their unsolicited help and advise and mildly offensive comments. The whole time I was packing all my goods as fast as possible and thinking how I could not believe the amount of people my gorgeous child was disrupting with her ever increasingly powerful set of lungs. 

When I managed to get to the car and load our groceries only to have another woman offer to return my trolley to the corral I realised, all of these women are only offering their help because I am obviously and ridiculously out of my depth. 

They aren't wrong, but i've yet to meet a parent that feels they have always had everything under control. Those who started to think they had a grasp on the situation, immediately lost that thought the day their next child was born.

As most of you all know I recently began a new job role. That new role includes occasional travel both around the UK and every once in a while a trip to continental Europe (mostly to Holland where our European headquarters are located.)

The previous week began with me leaving my wife and our daughter with my wife's parents while I continued on to my first trip to Holland (for some much needed training.)  It turned out it would be a week of a few firsts. 

Obviously it was the first time I have slept in a different country than my daughter. It was also the first time in nearly 4 years that my wife and I were in separate countries. It was a gentle reminder of how far our relationship has travelled.

Luckily thanks to the internet and Skype I was able to talk to my wife every night and talk at my daughter; as she still refuses to validate my pre-birth nightmares of her being born with the ability to carry on a full conversation.  (Seriously. I was really afraid it was going to happen.)

Obviously as I am writing this post I made back home with out any issues and thankfully Squeakers did not randomly beging crawling or walking, so other than some valuable father/daughter cuddles I missed little more than time with her. 

One of the things my wife and I have been discussing is whether or not she should express some breast milk to give her a bit of respite and to allow me the opportunity to feed our child, something my wife has had exclusive domain over thus far. This morning my wife had the opportunity to express and actually managed to gather nearly 4 ounces in under 15 minutes. And then we put it into the fridge to allow us to have an opportunity later in the day.

My wife daughter and I then joined my sister in law and her husband and two boys on a trip to a dinosaur theme park, (think less Jurassic and more puh-lastic) On the way to the park we managed to request a song and and the DJ mentioned our plans for the day, and all our names, which is the first time Squeakers name has been broadcast on the radio.  (My wife and I used to host a local radio show in Felixstowe a while back, which is why we were so chuffed.)

It was a brilliant day all around and I was able to carry Squeakers around in one of those baby bjorn harnesses for the majority of the day, which was nice though I was constantly checking to ensure she hadn't suffocated against my bosom. Due to the lovely warm day we eventually transferred her to the push chair as the combination of warm air and the constant radiator that is me, we wanted to avoid cooking her newly developing brain.

When we got home from the dinosaur park, my wife and I attempted to complete a few chores around the house. As the afternoon was winding down my wife asked if I wanted to attempt feeding our daughter for the first time. Attempt being the very accurate description.

Warming the breast milk was it's own tiny little adventure as it seemed to refuse to shake the chill of our tiny refrigerator. (Seriously it's a ridiculous little dorm fridge, I miss normal sized appliances so much.) After a ridiculous amount of flapping about and several texts and a phone call to one of our amazingly understanding friends the milk was deemed to be the correct temperature.

Which leads directly into our second dilemma, for what ever reason the teet/nipple/top thing was not inserted correctly which led to the majority of the breast milk pouring out of the bottle and onto the floor, my hands, the muslin and of course the poor child who was desperately attempting to salvage all of the breast milk as quickly as possible.

And although it was a bit of a fiasco, considering it was the first time she was fed via anything other than her mother's nipple, she took to it incredibly smoothly. My daughter is amazing. You heard it here first.

Prior to the birth of our child, my wife and I had a tried and true relationship dynamic. I was the irresponsible one and she was methodical and sensible one. This was almost always readily apparent dealing with anything to do with money or finances.

I have a want it-buy it impulse where as my wife actually takes the time to consider if we need it. The usual result of this is she would receive extravagant gifts... and I would receive thoughtful ones. Both gifts lovely in their own right. Though my gifts were typically received with tut-tuts about it being too expensive.

The other side of our dynamic is that for as long as we have been together my wife has doted on me similar to an overprotective parent. She wont enjoy reading that, as she never intended to come off that way.

It's important that you all know that i am not complaining in the following paragraphs, I am merely articulating a point:

She worries you see. She worries that I am not attentive while driving. She worries I wont look both ways when I cross the street. She worries I will attempt to complete any and all ridiculous menu challenges I happen to come across. She also worried that my teeth weren't brushed twice a day. (I incorrectly assumed once a day (after breakfast) was acceptable for the majority of my adult life prior to our relationship.)

I (incorrectly) assumed that once our child was born and she had an actual child to mother that she would mother me less. If anything our beautiful child has introduced a world of new worries to my wife. Woe is me. 

I could list the new worries that now plague my wife, but I wont. Suffice to say that my wife loves our child and me and wants to ensure we are both vigilant in helping her grow to an adult with as few injuries as possible.

We have had two instances of fears coming to life in the 10 weeks since the birth of my daughter. The first was an accidental tiniest nip of the tip of the tiny new borns index finger while attempting to clip her ridiculously thin but razor like nails. The second was a mis-step coming up stairs that led to a fall while carrying the infant.

Squeakers was not permanently harmed in either instance. After a few minutes of proper crying every thing was fine. The part that upsets my wife more than anything is that in both of these situations she was the parent responsible.

My wife has proven over the last two and a half months that she is and will continue to be an amazing and excellent mother, but i think a tiny part of her would really like for me to be the parent responsible for the next inevitable injury. She feels terribly guilty about both of these moments and would probably appreciate if I stopped bringing them up at every opportunity. (Awkward)

The fact is bumps, bruises and scrapes are a staple part of childhood, it is our goal as parents to limit the damage as much as possible for as long as possible, short of wrapping them in bubble wrap we can't prevent every injury. And if my two young nephews are any sort of evidence our child will have no intention of helping us successfully reaching that goal. 

My wife suggested a little over a month ago that I attempt the Blog Every Day April Challenge. The concept seems quite simple on the first day. It turns out that by the thirtieth day coming with a completely new concept to write about every day for a month is incredibly difficult.

I have been very lucky to have had a lot of very positive feed back from the majority of people. In fact I only had to de-friend one person the entire month. (Due to ridiculous anti-vaccine propagandising.) 

I have every intention of continuing to update this blog at least once a week or so, for as long as I have something to write about. Although it will be a long time before I attempt to do it everyday for a month again. 

I titled this post choose your own adventure; if you want my inane ramblings on one subject or another, contact me through one of the various means of social networking that brought you here in the first place. 

Before I end this post I want to publicly say how proud I am of my wife. A  few weeks ago even the thought of breast feeding in public terrified her. And yet today I saw her sit down in a crowded café whip out her breast and feed Squeakers with out any hesitation.

Even when a middle aged woman sighed heavily packed up her belongings and left the cafe. My wife continued feed the baby with out a care in the world. She is an amazing woman, and a fantastic mother.

One of the things that I am most excited about as a parent, I wont actually be able to experience for quite a while yet, but I am so excited to read and generally introduce my daughter to all my fan-fiction. Not creepy slash fan-fiction like the one where Harry and Voldemort run off to live as lovers before their final confrontation in Deathly Hallows.

I'm talking about The Chronicles of Narnia, and the actual Harry Potter books, The Hunger Games, (I might donate every copy of the Twilight saga to various countries as english as second language books, in the hope that my daughter will never know of the abomination that is a Sparkles in the sun Vampire.) 

I really hope that when some uninformed passerby stops my daughter at a comic convention and asks her Kirk or Picard she will correctly answer with Archer. And I will introduce her to both Star Trek and Star Wars and I will let her know both are great but I will patiently explain why one is better than the other. 

Our poor child has two extremely geeky parents. I guess I'm really hoping that the current age of the geek that we are living in never ends. I want to teach my daughter it's okay to get invested in films and TV shows old and new that provide her with hours of entertainment. 

#ClassyWife Quote:

Squeakers is two months old today. Which is ridiculous, because I am pretty sure I have barely blinked since I first saw her in that delivery room. The odd thing about this fact, is that today is the first day I have been the soul supervising adult. 

I should clarify, my wife was tired and wanted a small nap. I offered to take Squeakers out for a walk (she was very unsettled) in this sling holder thing we have. In the hopes that my wife would have an hour or two to her self, for the first time in two months.

We went for a short walk around our neighbourhood, and then when we returned to the house I did my best to keep Squeakers happy and quiet while my wife attempted (with out luck) to continue her nap. 

After half an hour or so of attempting to console the very distressed child, I was treated to the wonderful aromatic warning that the small child would need her nappy changed. We quietly trudged upstairs to the nursery and I discovered I would be dealing with my first Poo-filled nappy of doom, all by my lonesome.

Every other nappy I have changed up to this point has had at least one other responsible adult to help supervise. Normally my wife is still asleep in bed in the morning when I change Squeakers but at least she is there. 

Long story short I endeavoured to remove the heavily laden nappy and using probably 3 times as wet wipes as necessary I manage to remove all traces of faecal matter from my child. I am obviously far more proud of reaching this accomplishment than most of you will be having read about it. 

Sadly I only managed another half an hour or so of child entertaining before she began to wail in that impressive tone that implies to the mother two completely different messages. The first being "I NEED THE BOOBIES!" and the second which I can only assume is something along the lines of "THE LOUD ONE IS OBVIOUSLY NOT PERFORMING DUTIES AS REQUIRED! REMOVE HIM FROM MY PRESENCE AT ONCE!"

And at that point, my wife's very short nap came to an end, and she returned down stairs and fed the obviously starving child. Baby steps people. Baby steps. 

#ClassyWife Quote

Hooray for context: 

So I texted my wife (who was sitting on the couch next to me) earlier a simple message of "Hello Sexy."

She argued the validity of the statement, I countered and said I was entitled to my observations and opinions. 

She countered implying she thought I was sexy, and I told her she should have her eyes checked. To which she said "See!"

and then the following exchange took place:

Me: "I am allowed to say that, I don't have issues with my body image."

According to several child rearing books and websites, repetition is an excellent way for your child to be introduced to their first language. While this is fine for the infant, repeating things in a sing song voice over and over, and over, can drive new parents even further into their sleep deprived insanities. 

Luckily for the modern gadget enabled parent 'there's an app for that.' My wife and I both have Nursery Rhymes apps on our phones which are really just an archive of cheaply animated nursery rhyme videos. They allow us to broaden the scope of Nursery rhymes in our wheel house and help us attempt to retain a slight sliver of our sanity. 

I should make it known (Excluding the Alphabet song which is apparently a nursery rhyme as well.) that the only Nursery rhyme I know by heart is the Nightmare on Elm Street version of 1,2, buckle my shoe. Which I have included below for your pleasure. 

Now some of you might get all judgemental and be like "Stop singing that to our daughter." (I wont mention anyone specifically) But take a closer look at some of the more popular nursery rhymes lyrics, Freddy was late to the game as far as terrorising children is concerned.

I'm just going to list a few nursery rhymes with their actual lyrics and highlight what I feel is questionable material for children. 

Goosey Goosey Gander

Goosey Goosey Gander where shall we wander Up stairs and down stairs and in my Lady’s chamber. Old father long legs will not say his Prayers, Take him by the left leg and throw him downstairs.

So let me get this straight I'm supposed to teach my daughter to push old men down the stairs who don't pray... WHAT? 

Five Little Monkeys

Five little monkeys swinging in the tree Teasing Mr. Crocodile, “You can’t catch me!” Along came the Crocodile as quiet as could be and … SNAP went Mr Crocodile! Oh dear me!

It continues and counts down until the crocodile has eaten all of the monkeys, how is this okay?

IfI am Honest I think my problem with this next one has more to do with my minds insistance to see double entendres everywhere.

I had a Little Nut Tree

I had a little nut tree, Nothing would it bear But a silver nutmeg, And a golden pear; The King of Spain's daughter Came to visit me, And all for the sake Of my little nut tree. Her dress was made of crimson, Jet black was her hair, She asked me for my nut tree And my golden pear. I said, "So fair a princess Never did I see, I'll give you all the fruit From my little nut tree.

(A mature person would have written something dignified here, unfortunately I am not a mature person)

Piggy On The Railway

Piggy on the railway,  Picking up stones,  Along came an engine  And broke poor Piggy's bones.  "Oh" said Piggy, "That's not fair"  "Oh" said the Engine, "I don't care"

I just... I don't even... I've got nothing. I haven't even skimmed the surface, there are hundreds of these rhymes that we have been singing to our children generation after generation. No wonder we are all so screwed up in the head. 

#ClassyWife Quote: "Oh can we pose them?" (My Wife) 

Squeakers was given her first round of vaccinations today. Apparently she was very unhappy with the process. She is a little unsettled this evening but she has seemed to muddle through the rest of her day. 

As I am writing this I have a slight dilemma. I strive to write these posts in a conversational manner, hopefully sprinkled with my humour and wit enough that my few readers enjoy each post. 

My dilemma is simply this. It is very difficult to be funny and witty when a particular subject riles me to such a degree. I am a firm believer that everyone is entitled to their opinion. Most of the time I enjoy speaking with people with vastly different views than my own because it almost always encourages an interesting conversation. 

There are a fair few topics that are likely to raise the hairs on the back of my neck and send me searching my mind for some type of conversational grenade that will derail the discussion before I alienate my wife and my self from our friends. 

I wont go into every topic that puts me on edge. It would be dull, and it would likely annoy a large amount of my readers.  One or two might be alright though, if I behave.

Religion is a topic that nearly everyone has an opinion on. The amusing thing is that you rarely run into two people (excluding couples) with a similar opinion. The problem that usually arises with this, is that everyone believes their religion is THEE correct one, which obviously means everyone else is wrong. Obviously. 

Vaccinations have become a very hot topic in my life recently. Obviously as an adult no longer working for a needle happy government body (I mean that in a positive way, despite it reading as sarcasm) it has been a few years since I had to worry about inoculations and vaccinations. 

With a new child however, you can scarcely have a conversation in a room full of parents with out the topic of vaccinations being discussed. There is a well known celebrity in America by the name of Jenny McCarthy (AKA Crazy Anti-Vaccination Evangelist) that a few years ago almost single handedly began a movement of parents refusing inoculations. 

For the record, I think Ms. McCarthy is bat-shit insane. I know that her son was diagnosed with Autism and I understand that when something is happening to your child that you can't control that most, if not all people, will look high and low to find a villain to blame. 

The issue is that Ms Bat-Shit Crazy used her pull as a celebrity to appear on every talk show she could find in America and Europe and convince thousands of parents (who obviously struggled to think independently) that giving their child vaccinations could also result in them being diagnosed with Autism. 

She has recently publicly admitted that it is possible that the vaccinations were not the cause of her son's medical condition. Unfortunately the Anti-Vaccination movement has spread far beyond her now limited reach. 

Now that I am a parent I have a new issue. We have chosen to use our brains and the National Health Care (that I am very lucky to have as a resident of this adorable teeny-tiny country) and inoculate our child.

Is it rude of me to expect the parent's of children that will interact with my daughter to do the same?

I can't be the only parent that when I say I want nothing but the best for my child I automatically assume that includes the best opportunity to avoid life threatening diseases and illness. Right?

BEDA: Mischief Managed, Supplemental

My wife and I have been re-watching the Harry Potter Films. We finished the Prisoner of Azkaban about 20 minutes ago, which is way, way, beyond my wife's bed time.

In homage to the Marauder's Map (Which help's the young wizards further   entwine themselves in ridiculous mischief) I have decided to Highlight a few of my favourite #ClassyWife Quotes. We have seen the majority of them, but not all of them.

Mostly because a few of them require more context than I am normally willing to give, and because 24 days straight of attempting to come up with something witty is incredibly difficult. On that note thank you to everyone that have reached out to me privately to say how much you enjoy these posts, it really means a lot to me.

And now on to the #ClassyWife quotes that will more than likely earn me an elbow in the ribs at 3 in the morning when my wife is reading this. *Waves enthusiastically*

Most of the ones i am sharing in this post are less quotes and more behaviour or observational. For example That moment when I realised the size of my wife's head is the same as her cup size.

Another example of behaviour would be when my wife was beyond her due date she began to attempt any and all suggestions on how to bring on the beginning stages of labour. While attempting to bounce Squeaker's out using her giant birthing ball. Chanting "Go into labour!." Repeatedly.

You have to click this link to see the video... it is only 6 seconds long, you will be fine go ahead. I'll wait.

In my wife's defence the following was actually a direct quote from my youngest brother's wife. It is how ever too funny to leave out of this little collection.

"Three of my cousins worked at the same stripclub while they were all simultaneously pregnant. No really."-My brother's wife

And lastly, I have mentioned it here once or twice, but I really don't cook that often, and prior to the arrival of our baby it was only once in a blue moon that i would even attempt to make a meal. 

When I do cook, it is almost always some type of Mexican food: Enchiladas, Tacos, Burritos, Fajitas, Mojitos something along those lines, if any of you are invited to my house for a non holiday meal, you are likely to be eating something Mexican inspired. 

One of the reasons I like Mexican food is the ridiculous amounts of cheese that you can include in each recipe. Which brings us to another Classy wife observation:

Watching me prep the meal, my wife shoved grated cheese in her mouth. I said "That's measured out!" And with out missing a beat she spits it all back into the bowl.

I married THEE Classy Wife.

Out of context ClassyWife Quote: 

"That moobie is bigger than the other one." My Wife

I'm tired, which means as it so often does, I am grumpy. I have told several people that I can not wait until I am old enough to retire so that I can sit at home on my front porch and growl at neighbourhood children for walking on my lawn. 

There is something I find oddly attractive about being known as that grumpy old guy. It could just be that I would rather be thought of as a Grumpy old Git than a creepy old man. 

As funny as that character is, and for some reason I can do a spot on impression of his very unique voice. I personally would rather be associated with Walter Matthau or Jack Lemon. Or some weird spliced clone version of the two of them together. 

My wife amazes me in that she puts up with and loves me even when I come home from a long day in a bad mood, she almost always knows exactly what to say to make my day 100 times better. (Seriously how creepy is that .gif? it is sooooo distracting.) 

Today I wasn't able to get a hold of my wife for several hours. I wasn't too concerned at first, I knew she had plans with an Aunt and cousin that had come up to visit and spend time with her and Squeakers. I finally did manage to get a hold of my wife seconds after she walked in the door to our house.

I had worked myself in to such a state that my crazy brain was convinced she and Squeakers had been abducted by aliens. (The area of England we live in is the equivellant of Americas dirty south, U.F.O. sightings are not met with what I would consider reasonable doubt) 

Obviously they were both fine, she hadn't heard her phone ring (several times) No big deal, and now I get to feel silly for imagining the worst case scenario. Can you imagine my levels of anxiety when Squeakers is on her first date? 

Shudder.

The #classywife quote below would make a lot more sense in context, but it wouldn't be nearly as funny. 

#ClassyWife Quote:  The following conversation took place this morning:

My Wife: "She's the creature from the Black lagoon."

Me: "Did you just refer to your vagina as the Black lagoon?"

People are constantly asking my wife how she finds the time to do half the things she manages to juggle. The truth of the matter is if you want to do something, regardless of the amount of time that thing will take to do, you will make time for it. 

Having a needy infant constantly seeking your attention tends to take up a lot of your time. Today my wife managed to do a couple of normal daily house chores and study for her PR diploma (Which she started while pregnant and balanced with a full time job), despite the very unsettled baby that never wanted to be put down. 

Normally when I get home from work, my wife has managed to calm our child to a tolerable level and frequently has already began to prep our dinner. I feel ridiculously lazy in that all I seem capable of doing, is cuddling Squeakers and changing her if necessary, until my wife has either finished dinner or the baby is demanding hers. 

Writing this blog every night takes me approximately an hour and a half depending on the length of the post and how much information I need to verify. I don't start it until both my wife and Squeakers are in bed for the night, and then I type (rather loudly) in the dark. 

The point is having a child doesn't mean you have to stop doing the things you like. (Though the few times I have played a game on my xbox since her birth, my daughter wasn't home.) You just have to better manage when you choose to do them. 

I think that sharing responsibilities is one of the most important parts of learning to be a couple with a new baby. Both parents can easily fall into the trap of being the unintentional sole carer and not allowing time for themselves. (Though as the non breastfeeding parent, it is probably more likely to be my wife.) 

My point is if you are reading this blog for parenthood advice (Which I really wouldn't recommend) My advice is this. TALK TO YOUR SPOUSE. Having a newborn child did not suddenly unlock a psychic ability in either you or your partner. (Although the first time she says "My boobs hurt the baby is going to be waking up hungry about now, you will swear she is a witch.) I have proof!

Tonight after dinner, while Squeakers was sleeping soundly on my chest. Instead of taking a few moments to relax my wife decided to bake uber-yummy chocolate-mars bar-rice krispie-treat things... they are so good, but if you eat too many you can actually feel your arteries clogging. 

Fun Fact: It's Earth day, go outside and hug a tree or water a bush or something.