Meal Times

Our family is at risk of becoming as dysfunctional as the 80s sitcom Married With Children the way we are going. Ok, slight exaggeration but busy times can make us seem like passing ships in the night

So I decided the least we could do was sit down to a meal most evenings together in the good old-fashioned traditional way. It took a while to get used to: (“No, you are not allowed to leave the table and walk around with your food when you feel like it”) but eventually the kids got the hang of it.

Self-designed pizza is an all-time favourite.

Mealtimes at our table are not a lengthy affair. Unless we have pizza or hamburgers it has so far proved impossible to find a meal that goes down well unanimously. For example, our oldest is not fond of meat or potatoes but, oddly, loves cauliflower and broccoli and the twins vice-versa. Therefore, whoever is digging that night’s meal has gutsed it while the other is still sliding mashed spud around their plate moaning and casting evil looks my way. The ‘winner’ then demands their pudding before us adults have even got halfway through our own meal.

There’s something to be said for the “Kids are to be seen and not heard” adage here …

To try and lengthen out mealtimes we introduced talking about our days. This used to be carried out at bedtime but the kids soon realised they could drag it out enabling them to stay up longer. By the time we’d talked about the third day it was too late for any downtime.

So Cade is in charge of choosing the speaker via “Eeny meeny miny mo” and it will go something like this:

Jayla: “Well, my day I went to poo-poo,” (giggles). “And then did a poo-poo.” This being her new favourite word, you can get the drift.

Jai: “Well, my day I went to the supermarket with dad.”

“No, he’s lieing!” accuses Cade loudly. (Jai says the same thing every night.)

Next it lands on me and hubby, suppressing a smirk, rolls his eyes to the heavens. He’s heard my long, drawn-out stories one too many a time and doesn’t appreciate my attention to detail.

Ten minutes later I wrap it up and it’s their dad’s turn. He keeps it brief and then hands the floor over to Cade, who always struggles to remember his day.

“Well what did you write about at school today?” I prompted.

“I wrote ‘I went to Old McDonald’s’.”

“Did you teacher know what that was?”

“Um, I think. But she doesn’t have any kids and you only go there when you have kids.”

“Adults can go there too,” I explained. “But it’s actually just called McDonalds. Old MacDonald is the farmer in the song.

After some thought he looks visibly perturbed by his error. Then: “Oh bother!” he finally exclaimed.

Five Going On Fifteen

Five is the new 15 did you know? I recently bought an ipod but it was snatched from me before I’d barely removed all the (copious amounts of) packaging.

“Everyday I’m shuff-a-ling,” he sings, shuffling off down the hall with his “ear bones” in.

Likewise with mobile phones. A couple of weeks ago I started receiving random text messages.

“Hi Cade,” the number came up unrecognisable.

“Hi Cade, how are you and your mum?” read another five minutes later.

The messages kept coming until one day I replied, feeling a little silly texting a five-year-old. – I had a fair idea who it was.

Then I received one from his mother, who must’ve got a new phone number mine didn’t recognize.

“Sorry, that was LJ!” she apologised.

Cade and LJ are tight - Cade wants to be a policeman when he grows up because LJ does - but I’m not going to let him jump on the texting band wagon. In fact I haven’t even told my children what text messaging is.

No doubt the day will come when his interest is aroused once the first kid in class has a phone but for now they’re content wheeling and dealing swapping Hot Wheels cars in the cloak bay.

It still amazes me how quickly they adopt their own identity – and subsequent status - in the community.

Cade was only several months old when I heard kids at the local shops saying “There’s Cadeyn!” This, it turned out, was a result of bringing him into my mum’s class. But it only increased once he started day care and then kindy to the point, now, as we drive past the school gates after school, year sixes are yelling out “Bye Cadeyn!” 

“Who was that?” I’ll ask as he waves back coolly out the window.

“Oh just my friends,” he’ll reply equally coolly.

His popularity, I decide, must come from his father – I wasn’t even in with the bros when I was the same age as them.

Also like a teenager, and this is the part that drives me nuts, is the answering back. He just has to have the last word and it’s very tempting to sink to that level and join in the game. Is that supposed to start at five? I thought we’d have a few years reprieve before we got the back-chat. Or maybe it’s a late dose (or the dregs) of the four-year-old testosterone surge I’ve read about.

But perhaps unlike 15-year-olds, despite being popular with the girls, he swears he’s never having a girlfriend or getting married because LJ thinks girls are yuck and, therefore, so does he.

# For more information on the testosterone surge mentioned, read the book Raising Boys by Steve Biddulph.

Beach to Basin

It’s never a good idea to take a sleeping pill at 2am when you’ve signed up to run 9km in mere hours.

I’d gone to sleep all right but was woken at midnight by a twin who was upside down and back to front and all disorientated in bed.

After rearranging him I was padding back to my room when I remembered the impending event.

“Don’t switch your mind on, don’t switch your mind on,” I told myself.

Too late. Clammy dread shot through me and I was wired.

It had been eight years since I’d last run the Beach2Basin. Always one to come in nearly last at school cross country, running was never my thing. But I think it’s good to step outside the comfort zone now and again and I’d been proud of my 49-min score. In the years that followed, I’d come up with a last-minute excuse not to do it and hadn’t even run five kilometers, let alone nine (although I’m sure it used to be 9.4!)

Now I was keen to match my PB and interested to see if sitting in an office most of the day, as I did back then, with a run thrown in morning and/or night made one fitter than a mother on her feet all day who no longer exercises religiously.

Hubby signed me up sometime during the week before I had a chance to chicken out - he was probably sick of me being all talk – and I tried not to think about it after that.

So back to the early hours.

Counting sheep has never worked. The horrid sheep would start jumping too fast for me to keep up so, instead I lay there listening to the ‘weather bomb’ and trying every other trick in the book while resisting the urge to take a sleeping pill.

Finally two hour’s later, after watching the clock and counting down the hours with a sense of foreboding till I had to “perform”, I decided it might not hurt to take a quarter, just to knock me out without leaving me dopey the next day.

It didn’t and I was.

I fell asleep just before dawn and awoke late feeling like crap. The kids were already up and hyper with it.

With a thick fog hanging over me, I dragged my slothful self up and slovenly pulled on some running gear before dressing the kids.

I joined the masses at the start line and we were off. The running helped clear the cobwebs and I began to pick up speed.

Gridlocking during the Waimahanga Track slowed things somewhat and everyone came to a standstill waiting to cross the bridge single-file. Soon after I became aware of heavy breathing and a loud jingling noise behind me. It was hot on my heels and slightly disconcerting. After five long minutes of this, a long-bearded Neanderthal-looking fulla wearing a netting shirt with bells and chains lumbered past. Interesting.

It’s always funny passing kids along the way. Not having learnt to pace themselves, they shoot off, only to run out of steam and look up surprised to be passed by geriatrics further down the track.

But I cringe when I spot someone I know up ahead. Do you slink past and hope they haven’t seen you, or call a cheery ‘hello’, rubbing it in that you’re about to leave them in the dust? Then you have to keep up your pace in case they pass you again because then you might just end up passing them later on and you’ll have an involuntary race.

On and on I ran leaving the now-walking, heaving Neanderthal behind. I had to beat 49 minutes, or at least get the same time – and I’d be happy. Nine kilometers was definitely my limit, I decided. I only have one thing to say to people who put themselves through the torture of half-marathons and more – WHY?

I looked at my watch – there was three minutes to go and no way I would make it but then rounded the corner and noticed the finish line had moved closer than where it used to be.

With a burst of speed I went through the flags at 49 minutes to “Go Mummy,” from my small cheering squad. I stopped to greet them, then realised that was not quite the finish line. My body now hating me, I dragged it a little further through a second set of flags as the clock ticked over to 50mins.

Ahhhh well.

The finish line, on the canopy bridge resembled a ‘who’s who at the zoo’ scene but when you’re a red, hot, sweaty mess, gasping for breath with the dregs of an insomnia-induced haze hanging over you, you’re not in the mood to talk. I was keen to go before my muscles went into spasm and my legs gave out.

After hobbling around for the first part of the following week I was already vowing to beat my time next year but, by then, I’ll have a few things sorted - namely training and sleep. Getting the right finish line might help too.