we went for a walk today. all of us.

and none of us went to church.

i had a really tough time justifying this behaviour. if we were sick enough not to be at church then we should be home, right?

well, according to the best pediatrician in hong kong and possibly the world, dr thondup, when the babies are sporting snotty snuffly noses as they are now, their immune systems are compromised and they are vulnerable to all sorts of other germs. so keep them away from people. so no church.

but the fresh air, excellent. approved. applauded. best thing for them.

so into the fresh air we ventured.

we went to bowen road, a 20 minute drive from our flat. the crew were pretty listless.

jasper and sela had only had half-hearted naps, and had spent the remainder of their designated naptime rolling and laughing on our bed with sebastian, magnificent charles and myself. i had broken my iron rule of insisting they stay in their room and hopefully fall back to sleep by rationalising that carys, who is the sickest of the three and is off her food, really needed to sleep and not to be woken up by dolby sound crying. (i try to stay away from NEVER/ALWAYS and leave room for provisios/addendums/PMS dictated judgements. saving face is very big in asia. and in this household.)

sebastian had his bike. one thing about kids bikes today, they don’t have the erstwhile "wheelbrakes" located when you pedal backwards. ohhh no, today, brakes are located on the handlebar, and more often than not, too far away from the handlebar to be conveniently accessed. sebastian uses his feet as brakes. i seem to remember that i used to do that as well, even though i was wearing sandals at the time. can you say scabby toes?

hong kong unfortunately has yet to decide what side of the sidewalk to walk on. in most parts of the world, you walk on the right, despite what side the cars drive on. but in hong kong, there seems to be the same number of people that walk on the right hand side of the road as the left. it was a navigational nightmare for poor sebastian. he actually had a head on collusion that was entirely his fault.

i carried sela in the baby bjorn (much to her delight). why did sela get the special position? jasper is too heavy to carry for 45 minutes, and i was hoping that carys would sleep on the road a little (she did). the other two were in the maclaren.

the babies did not attract as much attention as they usually do. this was deliberately planned. we brought lita with us, so while charles and sebastian cycled and walked ahead, lita and i brought up the rear with the babies. two women and three babies made the majority of passersby assume we were carting "just" twins and a singleton. so there were a few "God bless you’s", a few "oh look" and a few age, weight and gender comments, but none of the massive congestion, touching, and questions "do triplets run in your family?" that we usually get. we just kept walking and smiling. the less interest in the babies, the fewer germs transferred to them. and that’s what we were hoping for: no close encounters of the third kind.

sebastian, i love you so much

but i love daddy.

the relationship between sebastian and his (magnificent) dad is beautiful. mutual adoration in action. and respect. sebastian believes he has the best father in the world. it is a lovely relationship to observe, and even though i am an observer, rather than a participant, it is a gratifying relationship to observe because i fostered it.

because in the early days, it wasn’t always that way. the first few times magnificent charles went on business trips and sebastian was old enough to realise his father had been gone for a long time, he ignored his father. cold shoulder, bald head, fleshy thigh and cheek. maybe he took lessons from the cat, because he was very good at ignoring.

i didn’t like that. magnificent charles did and does work really hard and doesn’t travel by choice. being punished by the boy he rushed home to cuddle and being rejected was hurtful for him. i took matters into my own hands.

i started talking up magnificent charles and my willing little pupil listened. and heard how his father loved him so much, loved the way sebastian was so brave, the way he tried new foods, the way he slept so well. we tended to only do the fun things if sebastian’s magnificent daddy was going to be there too. if there was anything positive to endorse, magnificent did it through wifely proxy. we always prayed for daddy when he was gone, and a couple of times i brought out special daddy treats to sebastian while his father was gone.

those factors plus their similarity in body type, personality, athletic prowess, etc equalled for one eventual love fest. sebastian began crawling after daddy, pulling at daddy’s pantlegs, and one day, walking towards daddy. i fed the seeds of his love by unwisely getting sebastian into a frenzy of excitement right around the time his dad was meant to walk in the door. if magnificent’s ETA was 7pm, at 6.40 i would tell sebastian "SOON!" and every five minutes after that i would repeat the promise. and when magnificent did enter, sebastian would charge happily for his dad’s arms.

i did my job thoroughly and well. maybe too well? sometimes as i sit there holding my passport as i try to get into their private country, i think so. but i look at them when they are together and the sheer joy, respect and love on sebastian’s father-cloned face and realise no, i didn’t. i did a good thing.

all because, sebastian, i love you so much. and your magnificent father, too.

circles in my mind and in the exersaucer

WHY?

this commonly asked question comes up when you choose a university simply because it was the one place your boyfriend got accepted, when you decide to hold your wedding in your parent’s hometown, and a host of other situations.

so i shouldn’t be surprised when i ask myself and others pipe in:

WHY DO YOU BLOG?

1) i need to write. writing events down helps me see the bigger picture. writing things down also helps me see what counts and if i have been, heaven help us, overreacting. i have always written. why stop now.

2) i don’t have much of a short term memory. apparently i can blame part of that on my head injury, and probably the other half on genetics. this is an incredible time in my life, and sometimes while you are in the middle of living it, you don’t commit it to memory. it’s gone, like kaiser sauze blowing out a match. i want to remember this. i want to remember the magnifecence of charles, the joy and challenges of tiny children, some of their sweetest habits and activities. words they mispronounced and how i reacted to them. so i write.

3) and i share it because people have asked me to. so many people have supported me in prayer for so many years, and especially our family this past year. they want to hear about our family. i could just put the bare bones: babies awoke 6.45, 6.45, 6.55, 7am. ate (seb) toast and cheerios with partly skimmed milk, babies+ 130ml, 150ml, 140ml. seb wore long sleeve uniform and long pants caught bus at 8.02am.

i mean, how boring are the facts? but when you get our reactions, that’s when you get our family.

4) it’s good practice for the book i want to write. you’re never going to be a better writer if you don’t practise your writing.

SOOOOO, if you write it for you, and not for other people, do you tone down articles that might offend?

not so much. while i am pretty open with my feelings and reactions, i won’t share my thoughts on someone else’s activities/husband/choices. (unless they are a celebrity.) they can do that on their blog.  if i have an event that i would have to tone down for my blog, then it belongs in my diary.

you can’t please everyone all the time. friend paul could have done without the article i did on CD1. another friend of a relative was "disconcerted" by the blog. this isn’t a popularity contest, it is my life.

moving on….

when sebastian was four months old we put him in our newly acquired exersaucer. immediately, sebastian began bouncing and circling around, arms akimbo, legs pushing off the plastic to allow for a greater vertical jump. if he had had hair, it would have blown in the wind. he could stay in there for hours, playing with the toys, and if he wasn’t IN the exersaucer, he was standing against it, his drool etching his initials and a heart into the plastic exersaucer bark. on sebastian’s first overseas flight i was tempted to call and ask if we could bring that predecessor of the exersaucer, the jolly jumper, and hang it in the doorway between business and economy class. sebastian would have been THRILLED. and quiet. in hindsight, i am sure they wish we had taken the jolly jumper on with us.

jasper most resembles sebastian in the jolly jumper. he bounces up and down happily, and if i make a statement

"jasper are you a hungry boy?"

he lowers his head, opens his eyes and mouth really wide and bounces up and down loudly, as if to say

I-CON-CUR! I-CON-CUR!!

jasper can be distracted by the blue plastic (butterfly?) figure that extends out of the exersaucer. jasper will grab the butterfly with both hands, lower his head, open his mouth, and push the butterfly in and commence chewing. sometimes, he will push the butterfly to the side of his mouth and it looks like a huge exclamation point of blue crawling its way up his chin, culminating in a big side pocket of blue chewing tobacco.

sela loves being in the exersaucer when the room is full of people. what better way to see (and be seen by) everyone? she whirrs around, eyebrows dancing, her mouth curved upwards. unless of course, she wanted to be picked up and thought that she was going to be held instead of being plonked into the exersaucer. if that is the scenario, be afraid, be very afraid.

carys doesn’t get the joy out of the exersaucer that her siblings have.  she doesn’t bounce in the exersaucer, she stands in it, because she likes standing. her hands will play with the toys, but she doesn’t move around too much. she occasionally chews on the butterfly, but mainly she stands looking drooly and serious, dreaming of the day she can stand unassisted. for carys, the exersaucer is inspirational, soul food. for jasper, replacement food. for sela, ego feeding.

the sweetest love

parents don’t set out to be competitive. but when you are having a coffee morning with women you have no history with and your group commonality is recent childbirth, what your children have done in their short weeks of existence do tend to be the topic of discussion.

how long did you try to get pregnant, morning sickness, weight gain, labour: pain relief, stitches, and how many hours, baby weight and apgars, and breastfeeding: are you and how is it?

as the weeks pass and the stitches are removed, sleeping and eating patterns, resumption of sex life, and milestones are discussed. you don’t mean it to be a competition, but it can feel like it.

with the triplets, there is no competition. while sebastian’s birth story makes me cry big tears of joy still, the triplet’s birth story is graded INCOMPLETE. i can remember being separated from magnificent charles after they promised he could stay by my side until i was put under. i can remember being asked to count down from 10 and making it to eight. that’s it.

there is no competition. my babies are lowest on the percentiles (although we’re doing okay in weight gain, aren’t we, jasper?) and the last to achieve milestones. carys has conditions, and as much as i can, i am preparing and learning about them.

i get a lot of my information from one of my strongest support groups, an excellent board for mothers of preemies. these women juggle appointments, other children, have also battled the guilt and sorrow that comes with the NICU experience and premature children. many are mothers to "surviving" twins or triplets. i remember cycling with some of these women, rejoicing in our hard fought for, often expensive pregnancies, never dreaming we would belong to the preemie board. and some were strangers to me. but our stories are so familiar. babies born too soon.

while the mothers carry emotional baggage, these babies carry trach’s, nebulisers, medicines, shunts, gromits and medical conditions with them. like a "regular" board, we are different women from different backgrounds, with premature babies and children we love no matter what their condition. unconditional love. of the highest sort. read on and see what i mean.

today, one mother posted us from the out of state hospital where her toddler aged child is getting treatment for her severe brain damage, the result of premature birth. this child cannot walk or breathe independently. she writes:

We are in ****** and things are good. We saw Dr. **** today and he is great. He read "jane’s" CT and EEG results and was amazed that she is such an alert bright child. He expected a child in a vegetative state. Not my "jane"! He actually told me that my daughter was amazing…..

She has lost so much brain tissue because she wasn’t getting any blood and oxygen….I think the only reason he agreed to treat "jane" was because she has a centimeter of mantle around the outer part of her head that is connected with vessels and she has a bit of tissue around her temporal lobes. Therefore, she has potential to improve. Other than this tiny bit of tissue, her head is only full of fluid. That is what shocks Dr **** so much. A child with this little brain should not have the ability to do anything, especially eat by mouth, smile, laugh, move around without restriction, see, hear, interact, etc. She should be in a completely vegetative state. I’m telling you guys, God worked such a miracle to give "jane" the ability to do the things that she should not be able to.

If the dr doesnt have any good results except for the ability to come off of the seizure meds, thats enough for me!!! So tomorrow is the big day….we are feeling very blessed just because we are here and we are able to provide this kind of care for "jane". It would not be possible without the donations, ebay purchases, yard sales, prayers and care that we get from you guys……

I can’t believe I said this today but I was holding "jane" on my lap and we were playing. She has been so happy today and I actually said even if I could, I dont know that I would change her. The only thing I really want is her to be able to breathe.

and that my friends, is unconditional love.

if anyone wants further information on this family’s ebay items, let me know.

tuesdays with bianca

sebastian’s speech therapist moved back to kiwi-land two weeks ago. her name is bianca vowell. with a name like that, what else could she have been? she was predestined to be a speech therapist. and a great one.

the cute but terrorising-on-the-rugby-pitch bianca has enriched sebastian’s life so much. she gave him the tools to speak and express himself.

when bianca came into our lives, sebastian’s vocabulary was under 30 words. apple juice, mummy, daddy, car, cat, dog, baby. nouns.

for months i had been saying to friends and family,

"i wonder if i should get sebastian to a speech therapist."

for the most part, they all demurred, saying that boys were notoriously slower than girls to speak. charles remembered his mother telling him that he was very slow to talk, and then wouldn’t keep quiet once he got started.

but at two and one half, sebastian was getting frustrated with his friends not waiting for his answers, the inability to express what he wanted. definitely time for intervention. i called a few of the audiology clinics, wanting to get his hearing checked, but was told they would not check hearing until the child was three, or in school.

finally, my girlfriend paula, mother to the ringleted annie, one of sebbie’s best friends, suggested i call bianca. the next tuesday, bianca came to our flat with a bag full of toys.

that first day, she went into sebastian’s room and after half an hour came out with the good news that sebastian had no problems with taking information in (comprehension), but he could not express himself.

"i don’t want to seem like an overbearing parent, do you think he needs help?"

bianca smiled, scooped up the barbie, ball, bicycle, and book and said, "he needs help, you definitely did the right thing."

that sentence was a defining moment for me. i had gone against everyone’s opinion, and sought help because i felt he wanted and needed it. and the expert agreed with me. i had done the right thing.

over the next months bianca got sebastian talking. she explained to charles and i ways that we could assist sebastian’s talking. how to re-shape our conversations and questions.

within four weeks of her visits, sebastian was saying bianca’s name.

and then he started tagging verbs to the nouns, and speaking in very basic subject verb object sentences. just a few, but it was music to my ear.

the hearing test revealed nothing that surprised me, sebastian had partial deafness in his right ear. we haven’t been able to explore that issue much further, but we will this year.

we would plan surprises for bianca. for five days sebastian and i practised saying the word "crocodile" just to impress her. sebastian knew the purpose was to please bianca, and was so proud when after blurting out "cwocodi-al" she smiled and gave her typical encouraging words, "good talking, sebastian!"

and one day, a few days after a bianca session, for the first time, sebastian asked his teacher, michelle (sebastian’s beloved She-shew) a question. a question!

and then, bianca told me in early october she was moving back to new zealand, but her interest in sebastian never flagged. and he continued making strides in school. his words are still very difficult to distinguish, but he is not as afraid to speak. oh sebastian, i am so proud of you!

and then it was her last tuesday with us. sebastian hadn’t taken in that she was leaving for good, but i sure had. i was scared. there was talk of her replacement, but bianca had done so much for sebastian. there was no way (without crying) that i could tell her how grateful we were to her, the difference she had made in our precious little boy’s life. she was leaving just as sebastian was really taking off.

i tried, but got a bit teary. i could only whisper, thank you for everything and wish her well. wrote her a letter of reference. and of course i forgot to take a picture of her with sebastian. that upsets me a lot.

i think of bianca often, but particularly last week. lita wanted to put on sebastian’s jacket, but sebastian strangled out the sentence, 

"no, my daddy put it on"

"your daddy is changing his clothes,"

"no he’s not, he’s doing a big poo!"

embarrassing, sure. but still, thank you for everything, bianca.

pavlov’s son

back in those tender, formative teenager years, we had a menagerie of animals. the first dog we added to our collection was bib. yellow fangs, crumbly teeth, matted hair, confused sexuality, putrid breath and impressive selective hearing.

despite the firm warnings and rolled up newspapers being smacked against the wall, bib often broke animal law 101 and crept up on to the sofa sometime after the lights went off.

only my parents really cared, so the rest of us wouldn’t say anything when we passed by the family room and saw bibbers resting away on the sofa. but we would all hang around when mum saw the misdemeanor, because the show was so good.

bib! she would say, in a low firm voice. off the sofa.

bib! she would say, in james earl jones tones announcing that this….is cnn. off the sofa.

at this point, bib might raise an eyebrow. her face was black but she had these cute expressive caramel coloured eyebrows.

my mother might take a step forward and possibly point a finger to the carpet.

bib! now!

and bib would lift her head from the pillow.

and then she would move.

not off the sofa, you understand. but she would move her head around, trying to see behind her, as if she, too, was interested as to whether that rascal bib was getting off the sofa. or not.

her head would stay turned, and then my mother would have to walk around the sofa, where bib was watching so intently she refused to make eye contact or acknowledge my mother.

bib!

at this point my mother would grab bib’s collar and assist her to get to the ground. bib would look up and her eyes would say

oh, you meant me? not the other bib. dreadfully sorry, my error. pip pip! i didn’t hear you.

that deaf card might have worked if in the next room, someone reaching for their jacket hasn’t brushed against the dog chains.

the minute bib heard a mouse’s fart* whisper against the dog chain, she would go beserk. ar-ROO roo, roo roo roo and then run crazily to the front door, only to be told to lie down (and not on the sofa).

nothing wrong with her hearing.

i know a lot of women would say their husband is bib, but in my world, sebastian is my bib.

i can ask him a question about school, whether he is finished his lunch, a request to start cleaning up, a query as to whether he washed his hands after doing his stand up wee wee, you name it, and he keeps pottering about, running around, singing along or looking at his beloved daddy. (pronounced daddeh).

however, if i were to escape into the pantry for a moment’s solitude with a packet of salt and vinegar crisps, seb whisks into the kitchen, all perky. eyes darting to the areas he thinks might hold the booty.

whassadoing, mummy?

having a mummy treat. you had your dessert, mummy is having hers.

wassin want mummy treat too. share.

i am torn. i can plead my rights to have my treats, or i can share, save a couple of grams of fat, and give a lesson. my righteous zinging blood overrides my greed.

well, i haven’t heard you ask nicely.

peas mummy, share cwisps.

well, i will share, because sharing is a nice thing to do with friends or family. Jesus shared with all his friends.

yes. thanttoo.

you’re welcome.

at the smallest indicator of cellophane being crinkled between the hours of 11.45am-7pm (mondays to fridays) and 7am-7pm (weekends) you are virtually guaranteed that sebastian will barrel his way into the kitchen. salivating already his beady little eyes examining your hands as she screetches to a halt infront of you.

whassadoing, mummy?

who does he think he is kidding?

he knows what i am doing. he wouldn’t race if he didn’t.

but, he doesn’t eat on the sofa, so i guess he is ahead of bib.

* just in case i ever want to go home again, i should emphasise that there were NEVER mice in my parent’s home. and that is not just because my mother is a fastidious housekeeper. i mean, she is, BUT, the main reason there were no mice is because IT WAS TOO DARN COLD FOR MICE TO EXIST WAY UP THERE IN YELLOWKNIFE. PULL OUT YOUR ATLAS AND CHECK! YELLOWKNIFE, NWT=VERY COLD!

bafftime

bathing the triplets has helped me shake off some of this blue.

seeing their little creased wriggling bodies is better than prozac.

first it was jasper’s turn in the tub. gone are the days when jasper cried whenever he hit the water. these days, his mouth is open, and his fists make a continual journey from water to mouth, in the hopes that he might get some extra nourishment. (i suppose there are nutrients in wee wee??) he looks at the water a lot, and is obviously confused by the splash and extra challenge of moving his legs. bathing jasper is fun because he is bewildered but thrilled. and those expressions are so evident on his face.

then it was carys’s turn, because she was next closest to the door. (ah, we are nothing if not scientific). figuring out that carys had done a poo, sebastian followed me to the change table and said,

tarys no clothes. tarys frow up.

well, she did earlier today, but now she is naked because it is bath time.

wassin go in baff too.

and boom, my little man started stripping himself of his layers.

quick discussion with magnificent charles, and we let sebs head into the bath with carys. the babies are learning daily ordinary events are made extraordinary when big brother wassin is involved.

tonight, much to carys’ delight, he grabbed the sides of her blue bathtub and swung her side to side, while i nervously told him to be very gentle. carys thought this was the greatest thing. she grinned and laughed. sebastian then poured water on to carys’ tummy, (only her tummy, not her face, mummy).

they had a great time, with sebastian demonstrating his recent swimming accomplishments of holding his face underwater, and then, much to carys’ uncertainty, kicking. while sebastian was showing off his floating abilities, carys accidentally kicked seb in the goolies, prompting him to shriek and say

naughty taris! go!

and it was time for her to get out of the tub so she did go, wrapped in a fluffy cosy towel.

then it was sela’s turn. seb got impatient waiting for his next bathmate (she had done a poo also, hence the delay), and was calling for her by the time she arrived.

i plopped her in the tub and immediately sebastian poured water into sela’s face.

cough cough, blink blink.

sebastian!

mummy, only sela’s tummy?

yes.

alright, tummy.

sebastian again demonstrated his kicking skills and sela was thrilled. she kicked as well and the two of them splashed and squealed, grinning and writhing. he almost knocked her seat off kelter, but all was well. and then sebastian started moving his arms in this experimental dance manner, and said "fweesile"

fweesile. i dont get it. tree? like the Christmas tree? help.

fweesile, sebbie?

fweesile swimming, mummy! not sela. sela too ittle.

ah. of course. fweesile.

so, my clothes are definitely dampened, but my spirits are on the rise.

to phuket or not to phuket

tsunami’s have tired me.

i don’t mean bored, or hardened. i mean wearied. i don’t want to watch television, open a newspaper, or even talk to a lot of people, because the main topic is tsunami.

we have donated money, but money is going to save some lives, not rebuild them. so many people have lost their livelihoods. yes, they are alive, but are now facing a life of poverty. their businesses were their future, their way of preparing a better life for their children. but for so many people, there are no more children, and no more businesses. it is just so sad.

it is no one’s fault, i would feel better if i could channel this anger at someone.

magnificent charles and i have a big decision to make now.

we have a reservation for kamala beach resort in phuket for february 8-15. we received a beseeching email from the owner yesterday saying the villa was still intact, please please come. the world needs to know it is safe to return to phuket. i have seen footage of tourists in phuket, know for a fact there are many divers and vacationers who are sunning themselves on beaches even today.

if we go, do we look callous? like we are saying to the others that died, "who cares, that was one month ago, we’re here and safe and having a great time, pass the tanning oil."

or, by going are we helping the thai economy? 40 per cent of thailand’s revenue comes from tourism.

magnificent charles and i want to do the right thing. we just don’t know what the right thing is, yet.

i went to bangkok yesterday.

as we landed i looked out my window. the tarmac was congested with planes, bringing in the water and supplies needed to prevent further deaths. the other passengers were an interesting mix: those who were meant to be holidaying in phuket and decided to head off to bangkok instead of staying home, thai residents returning home, business people, and the occasional pinched-face flyer.

i saw maybe five of them.

these were people whose hands couldn’t hold a magazine, whose mouths were slightly open, whose food went untouched. some of them pressed their feet to the plane’s floor the entire time, willing it ahead.

these people could be put into three categories: claiming their dead, searching for the lost, coming to touch the living.

because i had no luggage, i made it through c&i quite quickly.

in bangkok, an elevator takes you down from c&i to the arrivals hall.

so i was in perfect view to witness someone who had gone ahead of me in line, a mother, sister, cousin, friend, running down the elevator screaming with open arms to the woman who was scrabbling up the elevator steps. their hug i saw through my tears.

the woman waiting below i imagine was a tsunami survivor. the survivor couldn’t wait to hold the new arrival. as if touching someone familiar who wasn’t there could dilute some of what she witnessed.

i’m having trouble watching any more of the tsunami aftereffects on television. there is no doubt that live on the spot journalism and the internet has helped raise the amazing money that is flowing in from around the world to help the victims and prevent more death.

but it sears at my heart seeing their pain.

is it worse for us because we knew phuket? had stayed there? that we knew the maldives? had stayed there? that barring the tsunami we would have been in phuket in six weeks time for chinese new year?

i don’t think so. regardless of geography, everyone is mourning, feeling subdued, and sickened as the death toll mounts. crying when they hear of the kindnesses shown to tourists by impoverished and mourning locals.

my own 2004 was a maelstorm, a small agony. (Carys at left 18 days old – the worst was yet to come.) we were recipients of generosity and prayers as well. we were shocked to realise that people we had never met were praying for our babies’ survival and were emotionally involved in our family. if only the afflicted in aceh knew that.

through the tsunami of 2004 we learned natural disasters show no favourites as death and destruction hit the rich, the poverty stricken, celebrities and locals, villas and huts, coastline and islands.

and in 2004 we also learned no man is an island.

GRANDPARENT ALERT~

just about all our Christmas cards and accompanying letters have filtered in.

and i have noticed a phenomenon.

once people become grandparents, their Christmas picture alters from the ones of years past. no more pictures of them climbing ruins, in the congo line, walking in the run for the cure marathon. those slice of life photos have been replaced with their grandchildren.

have you noticed this?

and i can say, the grandparents (four this year) that sent pictures of their grandchildren IN NO WAY fall into the category of people you don’t want to be reading about. these are corporate, working-out, travelling types. they have great lives.

sending out pictures of their grandchildren instead of their activities over the past year, does not suggest a loss of identity. i think they believe: look at what we have to love. these children are not only the future, but a focus for love the grandparents have not had the opportunity to offer, or haven’t offered in years. and they want to share what they love.

i can understand grandparents wanting to share their grandchildren to all and sundry. my parents live is a very small CANADIAN (YEAH!) town, and a population of 18,000 does not provide enough admirers of the wee three and kindergarten boy. this means, when frugal blake travels, he always shows pictures of sebastian, carys, sela and jasper to the weary airport security folk before finally showing his own passport photos. (to be fair, i think he skipped that stunt when travelling throughout vietnam, but i will ask.) you have to admire them.

this is no hardship for me. i like seeing the offspring of friends i may no longer be in touch with, but have known since they were the size of the grandchildren now beaming down at me from my fridge. i like looking for resemblances and admiring sweet outfits.

but, to all you excellent, active grandparents out there, PLEASE REALISE YOU ARE STILL OUR ROLE MODELS. WE WANT TO SEE YOU, pictures of your hikes, trips, parties, lives….so an early request for next year….how about a picture of you with the baby? we’d love to see you teaching baby to salsa, read, laugh and bake…just like you taught us when we were lucky enough to be in your homes, worlds and arms.