It started like any other morning. Weetabix on the walls, potties being emptied all over the bathroom floor and an undercurrent of tantrums simmering away discretely. But we were coping. And then Poppy lost it. Completely lost it because she wanted to take her top off in order to put her big girl's pants on. Now search me, I have no reason why one should have to remove one's top in order to put on a pair of knickers, but in the logic of a two year old, it was making perfect sense. And mummy was just being plain stupid for not following the thread of reasoning. So I left her to it. Top still on, because she couldn't get it off herself, but knickers being thrown around the bedroom in a fit of toddler rage.
Then up came Lily looking for trouble. Again, started off innocently enough. She wanted me to do her hair. We had the usual early morning discourse:
Lily: I just want a slide in
Mummy: You need to tie it back, it's hot, you've got Tae Kwon Do tonight (and besides you look like you've been pulled through a hedge backwards and I can't let you out in public like that on top of the combination of clothes you've picked out for yourself this morning).
(This last bit was of course not said out loud)
Lily: Ok, I'll have bunches.
So I struggle on trying to un-knot the mass of straw that passes for hair on Lily's head. She has beautiful hair and we brush it every day, and wash it regularly, but somehow she still manages to make it look like she's auditioning for the part of Victorian Street Urchin in Oliver.
Bunches duly created, and the sulk sets in:
Lily: I don't want bunches. Bunches look silly!
Mummy (through gritted teeth, I hadn't taken my morning Prozac yet): You asked for bunches, sweetheart, that's what you've got.
...Sulk...
Mummy: I tell you what - we'll plait them and then they won't stick out so much.
She was pleased with this idea and so was I - we were meeting half way and that's always so much better than giving in completely. (Meanwhile Poppy is still next door kicking and screaming with a pair of big girl's pants on her head, having completely forgotten what she was in a strop about in the first place, but keeping the show up just in case I hadn't forgotten).
Plaits in place and Lilly lets rip. I guess I didn't help by saying she looked like Pippi Longstocking. I used to love Pippi Longstocking as a kid and I thought Lily looked gorgeous. But she was having none of it and joined in the chorus with Poppy who had by now joined us and was rolling about my bed, still with her top on, but no sign of her pants.
I know it isn't nice when our parents laugh at our attempts to stamp authority on the world - I remember it well myself. But it was such a funny scene I just had to laugh and left them to it. Pippi Longstocking and Poppy Long-stropping, rolling and moaning about the bed as if I'd just banned Christmas!
Perhaps it is all down to their artistic temperament. You've already seen Lily's handiwork with a pencil, so here is Poppy's latest offering from nursery to brighten up the page. Us artists just have to suffer in a world that doesn't understand...
It is entitled Mary, Mary quite contrary... yea, that would be right!
Dx
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