Today saw our first trip to Toys ‘R’ Us. This is a dangerous place and not one I ever want to visit with a child that can speak.

The morning was peaceful enough, Milo desperately practising his new trick of standing on one leg. He clings onto whatever happens to be in front of him, leans at a jaunty angle and then lifts the non-fulcrum leg off the ground, kicking and shaking it about as if he is drying his gumboot. Thus far his balance has been excellent. He is also just starting to ‘cruise’ as Gymbaroo would put it (shimmying sideways while holding onto something). This spells big trouble for the cats, and the Sonos speakers.

Learning from our desperate exile last week we loaded into the car as soon as the cleaner arrived. This week I refused to leave my child at the mercy of the wolves, or the high viz posties, and instead decided on a trip to Toys ‘R’ Us in search of more ‘stimulating’ toys after Milo’s eyes were opened on the weekend.

Well, this was hard. Much harder than I thought it would be; and I thought it would be hard. To start with, why are the lights so bright and cold in there? It is as if that giraffe guy wants to be able to conduct surgery at a moment’s notice if necessary. I also feel the frequency of the fluorescent bulbs is a little low, such that there is a nearly perceptible flicker at all times. Just enough to give you a slight tick in the corner of your left eye, but not enough to satisfy yourself that the bulbs are the reason. We were left with a general feeling of unease as soon as we entered.

Being the amateur parent I am I was surprised to learn it is school holidays currently, so 1130 on a Tuesday at Toys R Us was not as quiet as I had hoped. In fact quite the opposite; petting zoo at the front entrance, soft serve ice-cream everywhere and children hepped up on helium and Pokeman dashing about. Wise parents nowhere to be seen.

It is not immediately obvious where one is supposed to go either. Adjacent aisles swing madly from bug catchers to robo-velociraptors. There does not appear to be any age consideration to the groupings, rather the aisles seem to be organised by shades of pink or levels of violence; from ‘simulated’ through to ‘actual’. So we browsed for a while, Milo looking somewhere between disinterested and indignant. Tom Hanks at FAO Schwarz in the movie BIG it was not.

Eventually we found a section that seemed suitable, variations on a single theme; ‘activity centre’ with large buttons that cause vibrations and usually a vastly unnecessary racket. After pushing several of the ‘try me’ buttons and immediately concluding that I did not want to bring such a grating disquiet into our lives we moved on. It is genuinely difficult to avoid ‘gender stereotypes’ in your toy purchasing; there isn’t a huge amount between the pink and the violence except for tractors and other earth-moving equipment, although I was tempted to purchase an enormous model of the Millennium Falcon but thought perhaps my 8 month old son may not be adequately nurtured by such a toy.

Finally we settled upon the ‘Elefun Busy Ball Popper’ which is reportedly good for Milo’s coordination and understanding of ‘permanence’ (how a blue plastic elephant firing coloured balls out of his trunk can do that I am not sure) as well as a combine harvester, my compromised attempt to purchase him a vehicle without surrendering entirely to the gender stereotype; concepts of farming and food production can only be positive I am sure, and transcend gender boundaries.

We then dashed home for lunch (broccoli, capsicum, ham, cheese, bread, egg – essentially an exploded sandwich) and then it was time to unveil the new toys! The combine harvester was straight forward enough, it really doesn’t do anything. Milo tried hard to chew on its tyres and then eventually found a little red button that I had overlooked in the store; needless to say it made a horrific and not at all necessary engine sound. Other than that there’s not much more to say about the combine harvester. Milo quickly moved on to the red tennis ball, which is his favourite.

Of course we did not have the correct batteries for the cleverly named ‘Elefun’ so after a dash to the shop downstairs we were ready. The thing basically uses a jet of air to jettison small plastic balls out of its trunk, which must then be retrieved and inserted into its ear so they can be flung out again. Of course this is accompanied by a cacophony of elephant noises, carnival tunes and children singing; as if they could not decide which sound would be the most enticing and so decided upon all of them.

Milo looked quizzically at the Elefun, Huckleberry looked at it with suspicion. After a few goes of me pressing the big red button to commence the action Milo crawled away to retrieve and ultimately chew on one of the escaped plastic balls. Huckleberry stood watch to ensure the little blue beast was not here to stake a territory claim. Perhaps in days and months to come the Elefun will be a hit, but not today. The rest of the day was primarily spent playing with my shoes.

Elefun is Ele-lame

Dad’s shoes are great

After a nice afternoon nap mum was home, dashing in out of the rain. Milo then delightedly clung to her like a limpet until dinner, bath and bed.

• Apparent number of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle reincarnations – 7
• Number of Pokemon I know – 2 (Pikachu and Lickitung)
• Price per minute of toy utilisation today – $17.50
• Minutes of Le Tour Stage 3 (replay) watched – 45

To quickly recap Milo’s journey into the freezing abyss that is the Nation’s Capital:

• It was minus 6 overnight on Friday night and didn’t appear to surge beyond positive 6 all weekend;
• Milo therefore was dressed only as a blue bear or a white rabbit on rotation, both warm super-flammable, all man-made fibre onesies with ears and paws;
• Milo was not particularly impressed by his first live rugby experience (largely due to the temperature), and dressed as a white bunny rabbit he did not strike a particularly aggressive or intimidating figure; and,
• Milo enjoyed time with numerous friends and family; he was particularly enamoured of the toy selection offered by his cousin which perhaps made his makeshift collection of empty rum containers, plastic bottles, cardboard boxes and tennis balls look a little second rate. We may need to address this issue this week.

Unimpressed

Milo was up early so his nap came around quickly. Once he awoke Kuepps’ cousin dropped by to take care of him while I headed into town for physio pummeling (Milo related injury, more on this later). After his afternoon nap we played with Milo’s now rather pedestrian looking collection of toys and watched an episode or two of the IT Crowd. I fear Milo may be growing addicted to Moss’ antics and we may need to monitor this situation closely.

Milo peering intently at Moss and Roy

Kuepps arrived home to her usual warm, excited Milo welcome. We are however noticing a steady increase in Milo’s infatuation with his mother which quickly renders him a whingey mess if mum even moves slightly out of arm’s reach. Heart warming but logistically difficult for poor Kuepps.

• Maximum temperature experienced by Milo in Canberra – 6 degrees
• Favourite toy of the weekend – Bouncy hippo ball eating thing
• Number of Weet-Bix consumed today (combined Milo and I) – 6

Family fun-day Thursday meant Swim School take two, and this time we brought reinforcements.

Kuepps, Milo and I loaded up the bicycles and cruised our way to the pool. With an extra set of hands, disrobing and robing the slippery noodle was vastly more straightforward and before we knew it Milo was splashing away happily and grinning at mum who was watching from afar. The senior member of the group Lennox was a bit ropy today and looked much less Ogre in the ‘Trojan Horse’ event than last week. However the new benchmark was a first timer named Liam who arrived this week looking very smug.

When it came time for dunking Milo performed 15% better than last week; still shrieking and looking at me with disdain, but with less fury, and with less vigorous attempts to scale me and perch on my head. When it came time for Liam’s turn his mum gave ‘the secret command’ (as she put it) “OK, ready Leo, go” and the 8 month old child closed his eyes, took a deep breath and executed a perfect dive under the water, emerging with a wry smile and I am pretty sure a wink at the instructor. Lennox’s dad and I exchanged shamed glances as our children, looking like cats rescued from the washing machine, yelled at each other and clawed away at our faces.

Soon the class was over and with mum’s extra hands Milo was much happier in the shower and we dried and dressed him with relative ease (ie. he did not escape and crawl like a half-nude lunatic, panting and bellowing toward the exit).

Unfortunately Milo snoozed again in the Croozer on the way home which discombobulated him for the rest of the day, resulting in significant grief for poor Oma who covered for Milo’s gallivanting parents during the evening shift.

So, as per last week, a difficult Thursday evening and night lead to a very peaceful Friday. Milo and I explored plans to convert his little balcony into a ‘sensory garden’ (ie. astro turf and pigeon netting to stop him launching his German books over the edge) and then had a long lunch of Omelette and cucumber together as the fibre internet installers did their work. One of these technicians, a young man from Sunderland, was rather smitten with Milo, said that he was off to South America over Christmas to meet his ‘special one’ and that Milo’s mother must be an “attractive lass” (the very definition of a back handed compliment for me).

In the afternoon Milo and I watched our first episode of the IT Crowd together. Milo enjoyed this very much, hooting and bouncing throughout; it would appear his favourite character thus far is Moss.

Moss amuses me

I would also like to record two areas of fathering efficiency I have implemented around the house.

Firstly, toe nails. Milo’s finger/ toe nail situation is one of those areas in which I don’t excel. In relation to this subject I have in the past made one of those very foolish parenting comments that only amateurs make like “geez he hasn’t done a poo all day” (when in fact he has done three and I have just highlighted the fact I have just not been involved in any of them). On this subject I commented to Kuepps that it was interesting how slowly Milo’s nails grow (no, of course Kuepps has been cutting his finger nails regularly). Kuepps, quite reasonably, drew a line in the sand and said she would no longer be clipping his toe nails and that unless I wanted a clawed child who would bring shame upon the family at Gymbaroo and Swim School I would need to take over. I sheepishly agreed to this but then did not immediately take any steps to discharge my duties.

One evening this week Kuepps complimented me on finally clipping Milo’s toe nails, which looked terrific. I briefly considered taking this compliment but then thought better of it, conceding I was not responsible. We then presumed Oma was the one who had taken to his claws but quickly confirmed this was not the case. A little baffled we considered other plausible options; somebody, perhaps our strata manager who may have a key to our apartment snuck in during the night and clipped our child’s nails before silently departing as a gesture of good will for paying our strata fees on time? Perhaps the cats, finally accepting Milo as one of their own had groomed him? Eventually we concluded that Milo had in fact ground his toenails down in a free-range fashion due to an increased frequency of crawling correctly on all fours and a greater proportion of the day spent in bare feet. Miraculous fathering efficiency.

Secondly, bottle teat flow-rate. In an effort to thoroughly rinse and wash Milo’s formula bottle this morning I took to the teat with a bottle brush, a little too aggressively as it turned out, ripping a hole in the end of the nipple. Without an alternative we just persisted with the equipment available to us. So, after Milo’s afternoon sleep I offered him this new bottle, modified for speed. Milo did not hesitate and aggressively took to the bottle which delivered the formula at almost gravitational speed. Milo coughed and spluttered, and although a little more milk than usual ended up on his neck, he powered through the bottle in record time, an efficiency of at least 45 seconds over our previous personal best. Again, an admirable efficiency dividend that would make any austere government proud.

On Friday night we braved the highway to Canberra, Milo’s first taste of fiendish Canberra winter.

• New bottle consumption personal best – 1 minute 15 seconds
• New internet download speed  – 93 Mbps
• Current ‘sleep in Croozer’ ratio – 2/3

After the trauma of our exile, today was a day to take her easy.

Milo was up around 0600hrs and not his usual giggly morning self, in fact he was rather whimpery. Not interested in his weet-bix or chemical milk he wanted to be cuddled, or at the very least cling to my ankles while I shuffled around the kitchen. A quick inspection confirmed two new chompers on his upper gums are all but ready to emerge, likely a strong reason for his malaise. That will make four in total, a fearsome upper/ lower combo that will soon tear barbeque chicken asunder.

In an attempt to ease his gum throbbing I offered Milo some baby Nurofen, which he took with enthusiasm. I certainly read the dosage carefully and administered correctly but the Nurofen really zonked the little guy who fell asleep at 0830 and did not re-emerge until almost 1100. Milo seemed to have the right idea so the cats and I decided to get in on the morning nap, daddy daycare continues to be a tumultuous ordeal.

A hectic morning

We all re-emerged in great spirits. Milo drank his bottle swiftly and we were soon in the car in pursuit of our daily chores; the bright lights of the shopping centre beckoned. Milo chatted happily to himself in the car and then demonstrated terrific equanimity in transferring to the pram. First stop alterations shop in a second effort to sew the badge onto my tweed, success. Then to the bike shop for D locks to secure the Croozer from thievery, then mega-grocery shop including all of Milo’s favourites; peaches, strawberries, pears, eggs, yoghurt, barbeque chicken.

Exhausted from our impressive productivity we headed home. Milo was ravenous from all of his sleeping and sitting so we tore into the chicken together with our hands, perhaps the purest form of bonding two men can enjoy.

We then spent the rest of the afternoon playing with his eclectic mix of toys. If last week’s favourite was the empty carboard box this week’s is a dead heat between my spare leather shoelaces and the empty presentation box from a bottle of Diplomatico Rum. I enjoyed watching Milo’s synapses firing madly as they tried to plot a path to solve the problem of the Diplomatico box and the red tennis ball. The ball, at the bottom of the box was just out of reach of his eager fingertips. He could tease it a little and it would start rolling toward him but then he would lift it up to look, and of course it would roll back to the bottom. He repeated this process several times with increasing frustration until he simply flung the box across the carpet, and the ball rolled out. An elegant solution.

The Damir Dokic in me is convinced Milo is already throwing the tennis ball back in my direction when I roll it to him; but I think it is more likely the law of averages that flailing arms will, from time to time, strike the ball at the correct angle to send it roughly in my direction. I am sure I will continue this repetition until he decides he hates tennis balls.

A huge development today was the viewing of one episode of Game of Thrones during Milo’s afternoon nap. This comes on the back of two consecutive nights of Kuepps and I watching the West Wing (our first and second ever episodes). This is an indication of increased efficiency, or a decreasing quality of parenting. It is possible the two are inseparable.

Kuepps arrived home shortly after Milo roused and we headed back out to the bike shop to have her inner tube replaced (no, I do not know how to do this myself), in preparation for Swim School round 2 tomorrow. We then gave Milo his first baba ganoush (mixed reviews) while we enjoyed a snippet of adult conversation, picked up the bike when it was ready and strolled swiftly home as Milo’s usual evening crankiness bubbled up.

• Episodes of Game of Thrones – 1
• Episodes of West Wing – 2
• Favourite West Wing Character so far – Josh Lyman
• Follow up calls to internet company – 0
• Current internet speed – 3.27 Mbps
• Cheesey-mite Scrolls from Baker’s Delight for Milo – 1

Today is the day the cleaner comes.

Ordinarily we have Gymbaroo to take us in; a second home to shelter and nurture us. But it’s end of semester break. The Gymbaroo doors are boarded up, tumbleweeds curse its corridors. No $2.50 ham and cheese toasties grace its Breville machines. Outside a menacing, beady eyed Magpie prowls the carpark; or perhaps it is a Currawong, the two are difficult to discern from a distance. Regardless, we must leave. And, we have nowhere to go.

Milo and I hastily gather our things, taking only what we can carry on our backs and in our pockets, ransacking the fridge for anything lightweight and durable; yesterday’s sweet potato and green beans all we could muster. We try to take mental snap shots of this place. Like fuzzy polaroids moving from white to colour all too slowly, cerebrally shaking these rectangular cardboard memories with all our might as our precious seconds eek away. In our moments of sharp honesty we quietly concede we do not know when we will return. Neither of us articulate our fears, but perhaps we will never again stand within these four walls, never again will we be home. We open the front door, the frosty Sydney winter breeze cuts through us as we step out, into exile.

We wander aimlessly through the suburbs, faces shielded from the chill and from the eyes of passers-by who peer at us, pity on their faces. We keep to back streets, for safety and to secure whatever protection we can from the biting wind. It is 21 degrees celsius, but with the wind chill it feels 19. At one point we think we hear on the breeze the snarl of a pack of wolves, but then we realise there are no wolves in Australia and the sound is the postie on his 105cc Honda CT110. He waves cheerfully at us, I hide Milo’s face from the glare of his high visibility vest.

We trudge on, street after street, nowhere to go, nowhere to be, until after almost 100 minutes of physical and emotional torment with only a sausage sandwich with onions, tomato sauce and mustard from Bunnings to sustain us, we see on the horizon, a green swirly shimmer. I discount it as a trick of the mind; a mirage at best, a hallucination at worst. But as we walk it becomes more, not less, apparent and finally, yes I am convinced, we are saved. Campos Coffee.

We hobble in through the sliding doors; my chin, an hour more stubbly than when we set out on this journey. Milo, with no toys packed for him in the rush, sucking desperately on a teaspoon and the spare shoelace from my leather work shoes. We are served by a pleasant Irish lady who sees immediately our pitiful plight. She hastens our order, and although they don’t have precisely the menu to sustain men who have suffered as much as we have, she is able to pull together a pumpkin, feta, kale and rice salad, and a pork and leek sausage roll. And a strong latte.

We eat with gusto, Milo wisely tossing his green beans and sweet potato on the floor in favour of the ‘croissant crouton’ garnish on my salad. Finally we look up and realise two other travellers have joined our table, Gwendolyn and Gwendolyn’s mother. They share our fate; today they are getting their carpets cleaned.

We chat a while with Team Gwendolyn, and when we are strong enough to re-join the world we load up our meager possessions and begin the march home. What joy to be home. We dance with the cats and sing Michael Buble to each other before eating second lunch. We then flit about on the balcony (Milo eats third lunch – finely pulverised sugar cane mulch) before falling into our respective beds for a nap.

Soon after Kuepps is on her way home so we load up and meet her at the train station, and what a reunion. Milo is overjoyed to see his mum after such an ordeal. We try to explain it to her and she listens with great empathy, but in truth what we experienced can never fully be conveyed. Instead Milo nestles in the ergo on Kuepps’ chest, we hold hands and walk peacefully up the street to buy Pastizzis.

Milo with his pitiful spoon toy

• Total kilometers walked – 0.8
• Suburbs trudged through – 2
• Blisters – 0
• Fiendish Currawongs spotted and avoided – 4

After many weeks of planning, researching, testing, purchasing and a number of false starts today we finally got out in the Croozer – ze German choice for baby bicycle trailers “high quality, intelligent transport solutions for anyone who enjoys being out and about by bike and who likes to live life spontaneously and simply”. Spontaneous and simple, that’s us.

Not really all that spontaneous when it comes to it actually, and not overly simple. After Milo’s first nap (to maximise the chance of congeniality) I first put on my helmet and high viz jacket, then strapped him into the ergo carrier, then grabbed his nappy backpack, dummy with dummy clip, Sophie the giraffe, blanket, extra beanie and water bottle. Then downstairs to the basement, awkwardly squatted down with him in the ergo to unlock the Croozer, crab shuffled sideways, dragging the Croozer while supporting his little head with my other hand, manoeuvred the Croozer into a position to attach my bike, adjusted the straps, placed the nino in, ensured entertainment was in arms’ reach so his well documented displeasure with confined spaces didn’t overwhelm him before we were moving, reattached the ergo to my chest ensuring the little poof thing didn’t fall out onto the garage floor. Then I placed the backpack in the rear of the Croozer, unlocked my bike, wheeled it over, again squatted down to entertain the child as I hitched the Croozer into place on the bike. And we were off! Almost. Actually we rode around and around for about 5 minutes waiting for a car to leave the garage, there is no manual opening switch from the inside, only the weight sensor. Eventually we asked one of the maintenance guys for help, and we were off! Very spontaneous indeed.

Once we were moving however the Croozer proved a terrific machine; Milo flip-flopping between tolerance and enjoyment. This is a wonderful spectrum; car seats and prams and things of this nature usually result in a range of teetering displeasure to rage.

So we picked our way through the back streets while we both got used to it, keeping to the foot paths and using our bell to alert pedestrians who were without exception very polite. We caught two comments on the breeze as we passed “oh wow that’s so cool” and “oh, so cute”. The Germans do produce handsomely designed vehicles.

Eventually we arrived at our destination ‘The Good Guys’ to purchase a multi-region DVD player to watch our foreign version of the West Wing and a Digital Set-Top Box for our ancient Sony television without an internal tuner (more Ashes preparation). This transition was much smoother, Milo out of the Croozer and into the ergo with minimal fuss.

Neither the bicycle or Croozer was thieved in the time we were inside so we headed home. After about 10 minutes I noted Milo had fallen asleep – victory! So instead of continuing on our set path we detoured to the park and rode around and around for about 45 minutes while he napped. In the park I noted even the slightest upward undulation with the Croozer is significantly more difficult than the flat, so perhaps this could be a good sleep/ exercise routine for future. If we could fit a podcast in at the same time teaching us ‘balcony viticulture’ surely a rip would develop in the space/ time continuum.

 

Croozin

So we arrived home. Milo was refreshed and hungry for bolognese which we enjoyed together, I picked out and ate his kidney beans for him which, I think, is the very definition of love. Buoyed by our morning success we headed out in the pram for more productivity. Our corner dry cleaner unfortunately informed me he did not have the right implement to sew a badge onto the pocket of my tweed jacket but we had more success at our favoured framing shop, run by Czech twins, who had just the frames for our pictures. Seriously important tasks today.

Back at home Milo crawled around the balcony eating mint leaves, kangaroo paw, native violets, daisies, mulch, soil and I caught him using his little pincers in an attempt to lever up a dried up old worm. I drew the line at that and took him inside.

One great feature of staying home with one’s little baby, I have noticed, is the freedom to dance wildly with a captive audience. It takes very little to impress Milo, who enjoys all three of my dance moves. He sits up in my arms squealing, giggling and panting as we twirl around, executing the ‘point at the sky’, ‘running man’ and ‘chicken wings’ in sequence. Thus far his favourite track seems to be ‘Thrift Shop’ by Macklemore and Ryan Lewis.

After a languid afternoon tea of sweet potato and carrot it was time for an afternoon nap and as Milo awoke Kuepps arrived home; Milo bleary eyed and grinning. Looking to triple our luck Kuepps saddled up with Milo in the ergo and we walked up the hill to the chemist to buy more powdered food for the man, as we were running dangerously low on both human and chemical milk. A third successful jaunt for the day.

• Hours spent in vermiculture – 0.5
• Hours of dancing – 1
• Hours on the phone to new internet provider – 0.5
• Letters written to council about growing number of mynah birds – 0
• Hours spent researching the identity of mysterious neighbourhood trumpeteer – 0

So we didn’t get any Game of Thrones in, tally remains zero.

Baby growing is a milestones game. Despite your best efforts to ignore the temptation to peer over the proverbial fence (in this case ‘the internet’) to see when your neighbour’s infant is rolling, or eating lamb ragout, or smiling, or blogging, or teething, or playing the tambourine, or whatever, it is impossible to avoid comparing your child’s development to the ‘norms’ (which as you learn vary enormously, almost to the point of being unhelpful).

In our experience the most emotive and pressured of these comparisons is sleeping. Does your child sleep? How much does he sleep? Does he sleep through? Why doesn’t he sleep through? When he starts solids he’ll sleep better. When he starts formula he’ll sleep better. When you stop feeding him overnight he’ll sleep better, etcetera. You need to get on this early or he’ll learn bad habits (from YOU) that will mean his dreams of being an astronaut are forfeit and he will likely spend at least a little of his youth in juvie. To quote Chris Rock “you ain’t saving no college money, you saving bail money. That money’s going to Johnnie Cochran”. There are, of course, thousands of books written on this topic, and many thousand more opinions on how not to inflict these insidious bad habits on your child.

Milo is not a great night sleeper. He has always had a strong day sleeping game, but at night his desire to enjoy life to the fullest does not fit well with being asleep; some form of baby FOMO we think. His performances have also gone up and down several times over the last eight months, but certainly he is nowhere near sleeping from ‘seven to seven’, as the victory objective seems to be.

We have dabbled with various theories and attempted sleep discipline, but not in a particularly aggressive or determined fashion. He has a nice routine which we follow closely in the evening. We have experimented with ‘controlled crying’ to help him learn to settle himself but in our experience Milo will escalate his displeasure in a reasonably linear fashion, quickly reaching a point from which it is far more difficult to bring him back; and with the inevitability of the working day looming it is very difficult to not return to a technique that you know is more likely to help him, and therefore you, with some sleep. For example, settling him in your arms or feeding him.

Milo loves the dummy (or ‘schnuller’ – my favourite German word) when it’s time to sleep; he is almost impossible to settle without some sort of schnuller intervention before bed. Milo has a fiendish yet brilliant trick that he plays if you leave him to cry for too long, which is infuriating but at the same time genius. I can’t help but grin to myself at his practical cleverness. If left too long to whimper Milo will simply toss his schnuller out of the cot, usually quite some distance. For me this is akin to asylum seekers turfing their passports into the sea, or setting fire to their boats (if they do this). He is essentially saying “guys, it is now impossible for me to settle myself so you’d better come in here and cuddle me”, which we do.

At the moment Milo’s biggest concern seems to be sleeping in his cot on his own. At any point during the night if we bring him into bed with us he sleeps soundly in a gentle snorting, flailing sort of way. So long as you are content to be slapped in the face or kicked in the crotch every now and again, this is a perfectly sustainable way for everybody to get some rest. Kuepps and I have discussed this and come to the conclusion that she and I both sleep through the night, and have for many years. As do most adults we know. Everybody gets there, and so long as we are working together, and always trying to maintain our good humour, we will be fine. Although with an Ashes Series just around the corner it could be a perfect time to experiment with some funky sleep hypnosis, hold him by his ankles and rub his head counter-clockwise technique. I will be awake all night anyway.

I have thought about this today because despite the unsettled evening we had last night Milo slept very well overnight; nothing like a little swimming pool trauma to encourage some restful sleep in a lad.

Today was a far less energetic day. Milo was pleased to see my brother who came to visit us for lunch, and we all enjoyed beef burgers together in our most local cafe; Milo’s uncle was impressed by Milo’s ability to consume large quantities of beef patty. All of their high chairs are too large for little Milo so we are thinking of purchasing them one for our use when we are there; an indication that we are visiting too much? Not sure.

In the afternoon another brother then came to visit having finished his last exam for the semester, to pick up a bicycle and eat sandwiches. My brother resisted my offer of mid-afternoon Venezuelan rum and wondered whether this was a regular feature of my daddy daycare regime. For the internet record, it is not. Milo was captivated by his uncle’s very large size and bouffant of flowing hair.

We then spent the next couple of hours playing, dancing and rolling around. Milo has decided that all he really needs from me is to lie on the ground so he can clamber over me like a jungle gym, and gets quite tetchy if I attempt to involve myself in any more active way.

Jungle gym dad

The cavalry (AKA Oma) arrived at 1700hrs to take over so I could head out to watch the Swans capitulate against the Tigers. Kuepps arriving home tonight!

• Game of Thrones episodes watched – 0
• Adult conversations about politics – 2
• Hours unbroken sleep for Milo overnight – 6
• Number of daisies from the garden eaten by Milo – 2
• Podcasts listened to – 1 (‘Serial’ over, research being conducted for new show)

Kevin McAllister’s time home alone was a bit up and down. So too has it been for Milo and I.

I would suggest at this point Marv and Harry have fallen for all of the outer perimeter tricks; fireworks in the bin, scalding hot doorknob, slippery front steps. But they have somehow recovered from their horrific injuries and have made it inside the house. The ending, at this point, is not certain.

Yesterday (Wednesday) was family funday as Kuepps had to go up to the Gold Coast overnight for work this morning (Thursday being the usual day off). We look forward to her returning on Friday evening.

So, we are currently midway through our first ever 36 hour straight period as a twosome, which importantly includes an overnight. Today was also Milo’s first ever swimming lesson. Potentially a little ambitious on such a day.

Swim school, I am sure, will in time be something that Milo enjoys and looks forward to. Not so today. Despite Kuepps’ very sensible warnings, and our best efforts we arrived way too early for our 1130 class. After registering at the front desk and changing the wriggliest baby on earth on the floor of the male change room I made my first mental note for next time. Bring less stuff. Sunglasses? Not required. Ergo carrier? Not required. Jumper, tracksuit pants for me? Not required. Wallet? Phone? Not required. Not required.

Anyway I managed to get him into his very cute swimming outfit and then awkwardly carried all of our possessions out to the side of the pool where we began sitting and waiting. We were about 20 minutes early and about 3 minutes into that 20 I realised the most important reason why you want to move directly from the change room into the pool. Urine.

Milo, as all infants, pees all the time. His waterproof swimmers are good at catching serious trouble but allow urine to stroll pass unhindered. After about 3 minutes of sitting on my lap Milo began peeing and didn’t seem to really stop until it was time to get in the pool. I presume this was okay because we were sitting in an area with a concrete floor that gets hosed down regularly, but we were both thoroughly saturated before the class began.

Things started okay, bobbing around, collecting colourful balls and placing them in a bucket but once we started cruising around on our backs Milo’s antennae went up. By the time we were playing ‘egg on the plate’, or ‘egg off the plate’ (I can’t remember) Milo was very distressed indeed and letting me know about it. When he was on the plate (a wobbly semi-buoyant mat) the ground moved under him and waves slapped him in the face periodically. When he was off the plate he was dunked completely under the water. Poor little man was clinging to me like a baby koala and climbing me to get as far above the water surface as possible. There was another kid in the class, Lennox, who had just turned one. His demeanour could not have contrasted better with Milo. While on the plate his expression could only be described as bored, he sort of examined his cuticles and reclined languidly, solid as a rock, while his dad tried to get some kind of wave action going; it reminded me a little of Ogre competing in the ‘Trojan Horse’ event of the Greek Games in Revenge of the Nerds (the original). When he was off the plate he re-emerged from beneath the surface with the same bored expression on his face and spat water at his dad in a non-hurried spout.

Mercifully the class was over quickly so I carried my frantic child on one hip and the rest of our ridiculous possessions on my other. Back in the change room I attempted to quickly warm Milo up and rinse some chlorine off him in the shower. Very exercised already about water flying at his face he had none of this plan, screaming and clinging painfully tightly to my shoulder. I got the message quickly and instead moved to quickly dry, affix nappy and dress him in his blue bear suit. Not easy in a change room with a wet floor (and aforementioned wriggliest child on earth). I managed this but then had no idea how to dry and dress myself. After some contorting I managed to dress myself and Milo was starting to calm down as we left the centre.

Back in the car Milo quickly fell asleep after his long ordeal so I had no option but to drive aimlessly around the industrial inner-west of Sydney giving him a chance to unwind a little. As it was lunchtime we managed to execute a perfect McDonald’s drive-through without the child stirring, great McParenting.

After an hour or so we were home and Milo was feeling much better. I cooked him an omelette and we ate it together with our hands and he seemed to have forgiven me for the most part. After a stroll to the post office in the pram it was close to 4 and Milo was becoming cantankerous to I graciously offered him the chance to have a nap.

Milo was very displeased with this offer so we wrestled noisily for about an hour before I had the brain wave of giving him a bottle of formula (should have been parenting 101). Milo attacked the bottle with enthusiasm, a little too much enthusiasm. Coupled with his exercised state, a tummy full of digesting omelette and a flood of warm milk I got to witness my first projectile vomit which hit me with full force mostly in the chin and neck area. Somehow in the confusion quite a lot also ended up on my forehead.

Within moments the bed was stripped, as were we both and Milo was giggling and feeling much better about the world. I thought the best way forward was an old-fashioned hose down in the shower but alas Milo had immediate flash-backs. So for the second time in a day I stood awkwardly nude, half in the shower while my son screamed and tried to launch himself into mid-air away from the water. I conceded quickly and decided an early bath might be the solution.

So we bathed, dressed, gave Milo a little more dinner and played for two hours or so until finally just after 7 Milo conceded defeat and went to sleep after almost 6 hours awake. We shall see what the night holds for us but in the meantime I am determined to get my Game of Thrones tally on the board.

• Number of pairs of sunglasses necessary for swim school – 0
• Number of times Milo splashed the water with his hands willingly – 0
• Estimated number of classes before Milo dunks without yelling – 4
• Number of large Big Mac meals eaten in the car – 1
• Game of Thrones episodes – 1 (aspirational)

Gymbaroo number two today.

Milo warming into it, not the most active but certainly the noisiest. LOVED dancing to the Wiggles, a very concerning development. No Pinky today so my child’s smooch integrity remained intact. The Lord Varys kid was there again. I re-affirm my first instinct; he is SO Lord Varys. Spends most of the session curled on his side inhaling his formula despite the best efforts of gravity, challenging the other gymbaroo-ites with his eyes to attempt to wrest the bottle away from him. Nobody takes this challenge.

Milo loved crawling up and through the dangling padded tube thing, was reasonably non-plussed about the ‘spinny chair’ (which is just an office chair with wheels) and almost injured himself diving head first into a pit of plastic dinosaurs while sucking furiously on the tail of one of said dinosaurs.

Had my first encounter with snotty kid dribbling on a toy and then Milo attempting to also suck on this toy. Today I intervened, the kid looked so gross, but clearly this is another example of parenting up-tightedness that needs to be expunged from our systems. Not today.

Another interesting observation I made today is the parental instinct to be embarrassed and aghast at their 8 month old’s poor behaviour, usually stealing toys from other children or befriending them too aggressively. Milo exhibited both of these poor behaviours today; several times, particularly the stealing thing. Maracas, Tambourines, plastic dinosaurs, the weird plastic accordion looking thing, anything anybody else had (that admittedly he also had). My strategy was simply to hand Milo’s version of these items to the child-in-question’s parent (there were plenty to go around), to be handed back to the theft victim. I noted other parents attempting to prevent the theft, or even reasoning with their children. Is this the way forward with an infant? I don’t know, seems fruitless. Also, Milo hasn’t met too many children his age so it is all a bit of a brain melt for him. Once he got over his initial reluctance he was cruising around the common mat space introducing himself to everybody; Max, Flo, Steve, Patrice. Not Varys. These introductions were usually pretty tactile; little faces at his natural eye-line are pretty exciting and he is a hands-on guy (as they all are). So there is a fair bit of slapping and pincering going on. I noted several parents flying awkwardly across the mat to separate or council their children on this behaviour. Is this really a profitable way forward? I don’t know. Maybe eventually. Not today.

This was the last Gymbaroo for the session (we came in late) and we think we are going to take Milo’s talents across town next session. So, new characters to be discovered. I am debating with Kuepps whether there is any underlying religious cult aspect to this franchise, I will continue my research but my antennae is up.

Driving home we managed to keep Milo awake which was a win. Milo then messily ate peas and tuna for lunch, delicious, before a nice nap. Upon his return to the waking world we both decided we should take our afternoon refreshment at the caf, which we did. Milo enjoyed his bottle while I had my double shot latte.

Toward the end of our relaxing cafe session Milo noticed a pigeon, pecking around on the other side of the outdoor blinds that box in the outdoor area of our local cafe. Milo has encountered pigeons before but he is unsure about them. After pecking for a while the pigeon leapt into the air, flapping its wings in a laboured way as only pigeons can. Milo jumped at the sudden movement and looked at me with an anxious face. The pigeon then pecked its way under the outdoor blind to see what it could find underneath our table. Milo continue to watch intently. Eventually the pigeon again tried to take to the air (3 inches into the air) to move quickly to another croissant crumb. Well, Milo jumped again at the sudden movement which set-off a cacophony of activity. The pigeon excitedly jumped again in response to Milo’s jump but then slapped directly into the transparent blind. The flailing wings and flying feathers panicked Milo further who started growling and barking at the poor beast which in turn was whipped into a frenzy, hopping and slapping into the plastic blind over and over as Milo’s barks become shrieks. I covered Milo’s eyes and mouth so no pigeon dust could get in there while the hapless bird bounced and jerked, eventually finding its way out. Milo’s breathing stabilised quickly but he looked at me with an expression that said “what was that dad? I don’t wish to ever encounter another animal such as that”. So perhaps Milo now has a Hitchcock-esque aversion to birds. Time will tell.

Anyway, this hastened our departure. We took some spent coffee grounds with us, for the kale plants, to conclude our pretentious coffee shop afternoon. There was just time then for a stroll through the park before Kuepps arrived home. Again, Milo reserved his last smile of the afternoon for mum as she got off the bus.

• Number of times through the dangling padded tube thing – 3
• Number of times through the double length orange tunnel – 1
• Number of other children pincered by Milo – 2
• Number of unsolicited smooches endured by Milo – 0
• Number of plastic dinosaurs licked by Milo – 7

This brilliantly conceived and memorable line from the 1997 epic John Woo film ‘Face Off’ in which Nicolas Cage and John Travolta chase versions of themselves and each other in a quite believable yet fantastic race against time and science is so brilliant and so memorable because it cleverly conveys how patient, meticulous and indulgent (evil) Nicolas Cage is as a man, and therefore as a villain. The allure of this film is based on the ‘just over the horizon’ scientific possibilities of full face transplants, voice-box mimicry and even targeted laser chest-hair removal (height and skin-tone matching are not essential to convince Nicolas Cage’s close friends and family that John Travolta is indeed evil Cage) as well as the clever screenplay which allows Cage and Travolta to indulge their full acting range in one film; evil guy and good guy.

Anyway, this line is the exact opposite of Milo’s approach to a peach, or any food. He is a vacuum cleaner. A ‘Hoover’ in yesterday’s parlance. A ‘Dyson’ in today’s. To watch Milo eat a peach, or a nectarine, or a barbeque chicken is one of life’s great pleasures. The process usually involves a shrill battle cry of some form, followed by a full facial attack upon the poor unsuspecting foodstuff. How he generates the destructive force that he does with only two undersized lower tusks is a mystery. This is a noisy and visceral process; nectarine flesh, chicken morsels or omelette particles are flung with ferocity in every direction and at the peak of the fury, the point at which the nectarine stops and Milo’s mouth begins is not easy to discern. Below him is a boiling sea of gleeful kittens, frantically attempting to eat or bury the hail of discarded particles falling upon them.

Milo has eaten enthusiastically from day one, but particularly since he became aware that food could come in non-liquid form. This process of when and how to introduce solid foods, and how this should evolve is a tricky one; and (surprise, surprise) not uniformly agreed upon in the literature. I assure you, my wife is well acquainted with the literature. We started at four months with a gruel type substance, followed by packets and jars and then some morsels of what I would consider ‘food’. But, this process gets a momentum of its own and is hard to slow down once it begins. The tipping point for us was probably offering Milo the aforementioned barbeque chicken, which he inhaled aggressively and then looked at us with accusatory eyes which unmistakably said “where are you hiding the other barbeque chickens?”

Beyond “don’t give them any solids before four months” it is not really clear what you are supposed to do and when, except you must under no circumstances give them honey before 12 months. This would be at best reckless negligence and at worst pre-meditated abuse. The reason for this dictate is the spores of dastardly botulism which can live in the honey. Now, an intestine at one has the necessary bacteria to break these evil spores down but before that they are defenseless. I feel on this point that the honey lobby really needs to do a better job. They need a group of influential, or at least wealthy, ‘botulism sceptics’ to sow the seed of doubt around this science. They are missing out on huge infant honey sales, and this is a key period during which young taste buds can be hooked for life; much like the Commonwealth Dollarmite accounts of the 80s.

Our household would, of course, be immune to these sceptics because Kuepps does not take advice or directives without a full examination of the evidence. This includes sourcing and examining the studies upon which they are made, assessing for efficacy, sample size and reliability; I am quite serious about this. My favourite example, and one of my favourite moments of Kuepps’ pregnancy occurred in our third trimester when we attended our local hospital’s “this is how you have a baby” day (well, two days actually but we wagged the second).

This course necessarily  assumes no knowledge at all and so at times (at most times) is somewhat patronising and always dull. The instructor was particularly insulting of the dads, simply by how little she expected of us. There were classic lines such as “dads you need to chip in and change the occasional nappy, and the whole house will just work better”. So to give us our opportunity to shine at the introduction the dads had to state their child’s due date, articulate whether we would be in the birth centre or the labour ward and ask a specific question that we would like addressed during the day. When it came to me I impressed everybody by knowing the answer to the first two then said we would be interested to learn more about the process of induction, as that may be something we might need to consider. The presenter said with a slight giggle and a wink that sex has been known to bring on labour and then, completely mis-judging my wife, went to move onto the next gentleman so he could wow us with his knowledge of his child’s due date. Kuepps, having none of this, rather forcefully shook her finger at the lady and said (quote) “there are no reliable studies that support that assertion at all”. The poor presenter was literally struck dumb, left a very pregnant pause (so to speak), and again moved to the next father. It was amazing.

So we’re a week in, and now into the heart of the matter. It becomes clear that days without structured outings will be constructed of errands, and today we managed three. We walked in the pram up to the supermarket for a spot of shopping and then to the high street fruit and veg for the good hummus and dried apricots for Milo, Milo dressed in his Petit Bateau jumper which makes him look like a blue stripey wizard.

After a short nap we then loaded up the car and headed to Officeworks and Bunnings (the dream double). Both successful visits. At Officeworks I stopped the car quickly and gestured to the driver of the car adjacent (a dad with two kids in the back) to let him know that he was about to reverse over his pram (no child inside). He nodded courteously but in a sober manner which I read as “thanks fellow dad, but I have a reversing camera on this bad boy, would have seen it”.

We then hustled home, slipped Milo into the third transportation option for the day (pram, car now ergo carrier) and jumped on the bus to see Kuepps’ new office then both head to the doctor to have our various Milo induced skeletal ailments examined; perhaps these ailments should be the subject of a future post.

Day six and on all six Milo’s face has lit up at the sight of his mum. Usually this is the first smile we have seen for an hour or so as he reaches the end of his sleep cycle. His joy is quite lovely to see.

Oh, also kudos to Lali for recommending Covitol cream to cure what was developing into a nasty rash on Milo’s inner thigh. Made him smell like a salted pilchard left to bask in the afternoon sun, but knocked it out in 48 hours. “I know bottoms” says Lali. Yes she certainly does.

• Number of times Milo has fallen asleep in his pram (ever) – 0
• Brussels Sprouts seedlings planted – 2
• Hours spent playing with ‘Hello Fresh’ cardboard box –  3
• Hours spent communicating with Eastern European hobbyists via Ham Radio – 0
• Hours spent researching edible plants of the Australian outback – 0
• Podcasts listened to – 2 (only 2 episodes of ‘Serial’ to go)