Merry Christmas!

All set for the nightclub that's about to open in our village...

(Sorry I couldn't control the sound volume better...)

None of that spray-on stuff for us!

(It didn't last very long, though. And the snow outside is almost all gone too, sadly.)

In which Geneva Airport saves my son from saying something inappropriate

The first time I said the word baiser, it was because I didn't know I should really have said baisser. Baisser, said with an "ss" sound, means to lower. The same word said with a "z" means to have sex. Only more crudely. As I found out when C burst into laughter and delightedly pointed out my mistake.

(It just occurred to me that maybe this wasn't the first time I had mispronounced baisser. Oops.)

After this, my mind froze every time I wanted to say something about lowering, simultaneously trying to remember whether to use an s or a z while searching for a way to avoid using the word altogether.

So imagine my surprise when I saw "Un baiser de Genève" plastered on posters all over Geneva airport. The English version said "From Geneva with love"... and while "a fuck from Geneva" could be interpreted to mean the same thing, it didn't seem likely that this was really what the posters were saying.

Turns out baiser also means kiss.

It's a good thing I discovered this before last week, when Téo asked me what a baiser was.

A kiss! I replied, wondering exactly what he'd heard on the playground.

Only, as I realized a few days later, he didn't hear it on the playground. He heard it in class, in a Christmas carol they're singing.

So, phew that I had a choice of explanations. Because while in general I believe in explaining exactly what words mean, I'm not sure his teachers would have appreciated him saying that the carol was instructing everyone to have wet sex.

He wasn't willing to film a re-enactment and xtranormal doesn't include carrots

Lukan: (putting a carrot to his nose) Look, I'm a snowman!

C: Or are you Pinocchio, and you've told too many lies?

Lukan: No, I don't got too many eyes.

Identity

Monday evening, a rush to get to the doctor's office on time after work. It's just a routine check-up, Téo's not due for another 10 days.

You're fully effaced and 3cm dilated.

My mouth drops open in shock. I'm not ready for a baby.

He arrives the next morning anyway.

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Walking down the street, I pass a woman pushing a pram. I feel no connection to her whatsoever.

Even though I too am out with my baby.

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I refuse to buy a nappy bag. The pastel colours, the cutesy cartoon figures, the practical backpack design, I want none of these. I won't let my style be defined by the baby product industry. I will only buy something that fits me. Something that does not scream parent.

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I'm in Rome for the weekend, child-free and with a friend. I'm enjoying the visit back to life before kids: cafés, shopping, a late night at the bar. Then, introducing me to her friends, my friend mentions I have a child. I am annoyed. I want them to see me, just me, and not a mother.

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I'm trying to have a conversation with a friend over lunch, but it's punctuated every second sentence with a repeating stream of admonishments. Use your knife and fork - sit properly at the table - stop annoying your brother - you need to say "excuse me", not just interrupt - don't speak with your mouth full - where's the please.

I hate sounding like a such a mother.

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A colleague has come to our house. I only met her a few weeks before, for a project we are both working on. She doesn't have children.

I am a little uncomfortable over dinner. She has only known me in a professional setting where we seemed to connect... but here I am now, fussing around kids' meals and bedtimes and always with those admonishments. Will she think less of me after seeing me as a mother?

----

The kids want her to be there while they get ready for bed. While we're all reading books, she reaches out and touches my knee.

This is really lovely.

And it's like something leaves me then, a tight wall of resistance just puffs away and along with it the image of motherhood I've constructed and projected based on my own prejudices and fears. I am a mother. I am a person. I am me.

Anatomy

(Do you like this format better than text?)

A true compliment

From my 7-year-old nephew tonight, after he took his first bite of the hamburgers I had made for dinner:

- You know, this is really much better than the hamburgers from McDonald's!

Getting into the season

So, I may owe all my friends multiple emails, I may be years behind in making photo books and videos, and let's not even think about those dirty windows or the dust hiding in various nooks and crannies around the place... but it's only the beginning of December and I'm not doing too badly with Christmasy-type things!

(But... holy crap, it's December, how did that happen?)

Christmas shopping - started!

Advent calendar - made and (to avoid last year's problem) fully loaded!

Oh toilet rolls, what would I do without you?

Christmas tree - bought, successfully brought home (with only a small illegal act involving children under 12 and front seats), and decorated!

Christmasy candle - on table!

Kids' Christmas crafting - displayed!

Wow!

But let's see how long all this stuff hangs around after Christmas before declaring any überness....

Reconsidering my position

The first winter in our house was a snowy one. The first time he had to clear our (long) driveway, C said that if he had to shovel snow three times in one winter, he was getting a snow blower.

A snowblower?! Wasn't that just like a leaf blower? A silly, unnecessary gadget for lazy people?

I may have scoffed.

Fast forward to today. When I shovelled 20 cm of snow off just 12 metres of our LONG driveway - which C had already cleared only last Sunday - so I could get out of our garage and onto the neighbours' driveway - which they had cleared before it was even light this morning - so I could go pick up Lukan from the garderie.

And then I watched the snow continue to fall heavily all afternoon.

I am beginning to better appreciate the merits of a snow-clearing machine.

I have never seen our  front yard so snowy. (This is looking towards the neighbours' side - they've also been planting trees. The snowman was built on Sunday - he's all misshapen because of the new snow that fell last night and today.)