You Get a Car! And You Get a Car...

We all know that Miss E's batsuit is one of her favourite things. I was thinking today that, in her first five months, she has identified a number of other favourite things.

As I thought about Miss E's favourite things, my neurons connected me to Oprah and her favourite things. As Wikipedia carefully explains, "Oprah's Favourite Things" was an annual segment that appeared on The Oprah Winfrey Show from 2002 to 2010... the audience members that were present during the taping of the episode receive items from that year's list for free.

In 2004, every audience member received a brand new car worth approximately $30,000. You get a car! And you get a car! EVERYBODY GETS A CAR!

This made me think... if Miss E was the host of a self-titled, multi-award-winning, nationally syndicated talk show, which had become the highest-rated program of its kind in history, what items would she be giving away in her annual favourite things segment?

If you were lucky enough to be in her audience today, you would receive three things:

1. Oven mitt!

You get a mitt! And you get a mitt! EVERYBODY GETS A MITT!

She loves this oven mitt with a passion. The only thing she loves as much as this mitt is the matching mitt that goes on your other hand.

She loves it when the mitts grab her cheeks.

She loves it when you use it as a puppet and it talks to her.

She loves it when the mitts dance around the kitchen - especially when they "vogue" 90s Madonna style.

Price: It is hard to put a price on this mitt. It has survived Mr. B's bachelor cooking and now resides peacefully in the second drawer down in our kitchen.

Side note: you may be able to see that I am modelling a polar fleece top as well as an oven mitt. Polar fleece is also one of Miss E's favourite things. Her love for polar fleece has been largely bred from familiarity: I have worn polar fleece almost every day since she was born.

2. Galah hand puppet!

You get a galah hand puppet! And you get a galah hand puppet! EVERYBODY GETS A GALAH HAND PUPPET!

Item #2 is actually very closely related to item #1. 

When I saw how much Miss E loved the oven mitt, I thought to myself, "Self, you need to buy this child a hand puppet".

So, off we went today and we found the galah hand puppet at our local op shop. I popped it into the washing machine and the galah hand puppet is as good as new.

After we returned home, we discovered that the galah hand puppet also has a squeaky noise feature. Love it. It has quickly rocketed up the "Miss E's favourite things" list. 

Price: $3. 

3. Night-Night, Baby!

You get Night-Night, Baby! And you get Night-Night, Baby! EVERYBODY GETS NIGHT-NIGHT, BABY!

Sometimes Miss E lies under her playgym and expresses her general dissatisfaction with the world around her. You show her Night-Night, Baby and she loves the world again.

I think she is secretly in love with the baby on the cover.

If she had fine motor skills, the cover of this book would probably be covered with texta love hearts.

If she had fine motor skills, Internet access and a credit card, she'd probably buy the domain: www.ilovenightnightbaby.com.

Night-Night, Baby is not a particularly compelling read. It contains photos of a racially diverse group of babies as they complete their daily routine (e.g. eat, have a bath, and, of course, go to sleep). It lacks a convincing protagonist and a plot. However, Miss E loves it. Maybe it is like reading Who magazine for babies. She likes to know what the other babies are up to.

Price: $6.60 at The Book Depository.

My three key points:

1. Miss E is probably not quite ready for her own, self-titled talk show. We'll re-assess at 12 months.

2. Miss E needs to build stronger relationships with luxury brands so that she has some better stuff to give to her studio audience.

3. Babies really don't care about price when it comes to determining their favourite things.

Henry VIII: King of England and Very Bad Husband - Part 1

Henry VIII is definitely one of the worst husbands in history.

I am currently reading a novel entitled (somewhat confusingly) The Autobiography of Henry VIII and it certainly highlights his failings as a husband.

When Mr. B (definitely not one of the worst husbands in history) and I were happily honeymooning in England last year, I was very excited to visit Hampton Court Palace, often referred to as "the home of Henry VIII". Hampton Court Palace was where I discovered my passion for the historical re-enactment. To the delight of Mr. B, I spent a great deal of our honeymoon hunting down more historical re-enactments for us to enjoy. My secret goal was always for us to be picked from the crowd to actually participate in the re-enactment. Mr. B caught onto this pretty quickly and was always standing by with the camera so that he could photograph my enthusiastic participation.

In fact, when the Icelandic volcano Eyjafjallajökull delayed our return to Australia (thank you Iceland), I made a solo return visit to Hampton Court Palace to further indulge my passion for the historical re-enactment.

I digress.

Henry VIII's behaviour was so outrageous that it makes today's celebrity and royal scandals look as innocent as a baby lying in a pram beside her mum as she updates her blog (shout out to Miss E there).

So, as I read The Autobiography of Henry VIII, I will update you, three key points style, so you can share in my shock at Henry's bad husband behaviour.

Here is the first update:

1. Henry's older brother, Arthur, marries Katherine of Aragon. Sadly, Arthur gets sick and dies at 15.

2. Seven years pass... Henry's Dad kicks the bucket and Henry becomes King of England at 17.

3. Henry marries Katherine of Aragon. Correct. His dead brother's wife.  This was actually pretty nice of him as Katherine's future wasn't looking too bright. However, question marks start to appear on Katherine's ability to give Henry a son and he starts to doubt his decision to marry her (bad husband behaviour right there).

More to come...

Disclaimer: I am reading a novel (based on fact but, still, a novel) and am providing updates from that. I offer my heartfelt apologies to  anyone who has actually studied Tudor history or has any real knowledge on this topic.

Sitting time equals reading time

One thing I have learnt since the birth of Miss E is that a requirement of early parenting is a lot of time spent sitting. Miss E loves to feed during the day and, to do that, I must sit.

Now, I like to sit. I won't complain about it. But when you have to sit for many many hours per day, you need to have something to do.

You can spend some of the time looking at your baby and marvelling at the wonder of new human life but there is only so long you can spend on that.

I have found that a good book is essential to enjoying my sitting time with Miss E.

Three of the books I have read recently while feeding Miss E are:

1. Light a Penny Candle - Maeve Binchy: Ahhh, my old friend Maeve. It is not fashionable to love Maeve, but I do. This one is set in Ireland and London during and after WWII. It is Maeve's debut novel and I loved it. I found myself providing a daily update to Mr. B on the events of Light a Penny Candle. This one also motivated us to take inspiration from post-War London as we raise Miss E - i.e. lots of sardines on toast, listening to the radio and sing-alongs at the piano (note to self: must buy piano).

2. Afterwards - Rosamund Lupton. Oh, I loved this one. I would call it a thriller but it was the beautiful depiction of the relationship between a mother and her children that had me in tears at the end. Disclaimer: It may be "I've been a mum for five months" hormones that caused me to react so strongly to this book. I lent it to my Dad and his response was: "Hmmmmmmmm, it's okay". Right then. I read Afterwards after reading Rosamund Lupton's debut novel - Sister - which I also highly recommend. Both Afterwards and Sister were recommended to me by Amazon after I read reviews for another great debut novel - Before I Go To Sleep. Thank you Amazon, your recommendations were outstanding. And thank you to my local library who supplied all of these books to me for free.

3. Bossypants - Tina Fey. Tina Fey, I love you. My favourite chapter was "A Mother's Prayer for Her Child" which you can read yourself by clicking right here.

So, my three key points on this topic are:

1. Feeding a baby = sitting.

2. Sitting quickly becomes boring without something to do.

3. Find a fun activity that you can do while sitting. Reading is a good one.