a toy story.

Oh, Buzz.

You joined our family way back when Mr 9 was Mr 3, and you've been his constant companion since then.
You slept with him every night, you comforted him when he was sad or sick, you came with us on every holiday and weekend trip.
Once we left you in the airport shop, remember that? hahaha... and we nearly missed our plane because we couldn't leave you behind!

Good times, Buzz, good times.

Remember the time the piece fell out of your chin? or when your - ahem - crotch split and I had to sew you up? Sorry about that. I was as gentle as I knew how.

I'm sorry about the times I chucked you in the washing machine too, I guess it probably felt a bit like Infinite and Beyond in there, but MY didn't you scrub up well? and you certainly smelled a lot fresher afterwards.
And remember, how Mr 3-9 would wait impatiently for you to come out and then he'd hug you even though you were still a bit wet?
He didn't mind.

Remember how we used to sing "You've Got A Friend In Me" to you in the car? and you never complained when we got the words a bit muddled up.

You've been slept on, sat on, spat on, and spewed on. You've been the best friend my boy ever had.

Today I found you in his wardrobe, jumbled in on top of the shoes, with only an old robot for company.

When I asked him why you were there, he said "Mum, I'm getting a bit old for him. I'm nearly 10, now."

And my heart broke a little, and I hoped you didn't hear that.

So I rescued you from the shoes, and dusted you off, and sat you up in the bookshelf, where you can keep watch over my boy ....

.... as you have for 6 long years now.

the Mirena Edition part 2 -- definitely NOT for boys!

So today was M Day -- I took the huge box containing my new Mirena and toddled off to see my GP.

I was very nervous. Because

a) I don't like anyone but my husband looking at my lady bits (and to tell the truth I'd rather HE turned the lights off as well)

b) just lately my lady bits have had a rough time and I fully expected more of the same.

But it all went surprisingly well.

(Apart from the speculum, of course -- OMG I'm sure that thing is a junior cousin to medieval thumb screws.)

I had a Pap Smear at the same time, which was more uncomfortable than the IUD going in, and I'm having slight cramps (nothing to worry about) and some light spotting (nothing to worry about).

So -- all in all, not the way I'd CHOOSE to spend a half hour of my time, but I've had worse.

Now I just have to wait for the smear results (with fingers crossed)(more about that tomorrow another day.)
and hope that the IUD does its' magic.

when is your mum not your mum?

It's sort of weird, having your adult children read your blog.

Over the last lately, I've written a vibrator review, discussed my menstrual problems, and talked about the Mirena, and put up a post about my husbands' testicles that featured a naked and hairy Burt Reynolds.

And YET, they keep reading.

Yesterday, my 18 year old talked to me about the dog post from a couple of days ago, saying "I had no idea you'd been bullied like that, Mum."
Well, no. Admittedly that was a story that I didn't think would ever see the light of day.

However, I started thinking about parents and their adult kids.
I think it comes as a bit of a surprise to most kids when they realise that Mum and Dad didn't spring miraculously into being at the moment of the childs' birth -- that they were, in fact, people with lives and thoughts and experiences that had nothing at all to do with the said child.

I've been wondering how my kids see me, as a person, rather than as Mum, who used to sing hideous opera-like songs to get them out of bed in the mornings and who gushed over glitter paint and paddle-pop stick art like it was the Mona Lisa.

Do they like me? Do they think my opinions are valid, or are they simply waiting, as my eldest son puts it, for the day a spot opens up in that dodgy Old Peoples' Home he saw on 60 Minutes?

Am I an actual person to them, or still just Mum?

bikie girl

The Princess has re-discovered the leather jacket her dad bought her last year, and has been busily imagining outfits to wear it with.
She's decided it would be awesome to have a black skirt and black boots and black sunglasses to go with her black jacket.....
and then realised she would be a BIT embarrassed to be a bikie girl when she still has training wheels on her bike....


Oh WAIT -- did you hear a thud? that was the sound of Fabio fainting and falling out of his chair as he read this and imagined his Princess as a bikie chick....

a dog story. No happy ending.

I read a post today that I can't stop thinking about. You can see it here, and then this post will make a bit more sense.

When I was a teenager, I was ... well, I'll be kind to myself and say 'plain'.
I grew massive boobs at 14, and they got a lot of attention, but the rest of me was pretty uninspiring.
The boys at school, who were a fairly stupid bunch, used to call me all kinds of things, and I was one of 'those' girls who never got asked to dance and spent the evening dancing with other girls at the disco.

One day, when I was 16, I went swimming at a local waterhole with some friends, and while we were there, a bunch of yokels rocked up.
One of them, Chris, who was a few years older than me, and engaged! to be married!, called me over and asked me if I wanted to go for a walk with him.
This was yokel-speak for 'd'ya wanna shag?'
I said no.
He tried his most winning tactic.
"Oh, come on," he said. "The other guys say you're a real dog but I think you'd be a good root."

Shockingly, I was not convinced by this, and said no again, and turned to walk away, and he got all pissy and called me a few other names which I won't repeat here.
After that, he would always glare at me and mutter about cock-teasers, while I could never look at him without feeling that burn of shame and humiliation.
Dog?
This is the first time I've ever spoken about that publicly. I still feel the shame, 30 years later.

I stalked him on Facebook a few years ago. He's divorced, with a drinking problem. Are you surprised?

I don't get what it is with some boys, that they have to put girls down like that. Obviously, they're shallow, insecure, immature, and all those other things, but knowing that doesn't ever take away the pain and shame of the things they say.

Seasidechik is a beautiful girl. She dresses well, she looks after herself and her family, she's bright, and bubbly, thoughtful, a loving mum, and a fantastic wife.

And today, she's nursing bruises on her soul because of some loud-mouthed gits with not a brain between them. I want to smack their heads together, force them to crawl on their knees over broken glass to apologise to her, make them cry....

... the way they made her cry. Bastards.

the mirena edition (not for boys)

So.

As many of you know, I've been quite unwell lately.
What actually happened was, I felt dreadful, went to the doctor, had some bloodwork done, and the results were appalling -- my haemoglobin was shockingly low and I had to have an iron transfusion (not the funnest ever way to spend a day, I might add)

This is because I was slowly bleeding to death. Every month, I lose in the first couple of hours what a woman could expect to lose over the course of a whole normal period.
It's something I've spoken about before and I sort of accepted that was just how life was, but as it turns out I was just one heavy bleed away from some (probable) VERY SERIOUS complications. Like possible cardiac arrest.

So, once my iron levels semi-stablised, I had to have a D&C -- again, not massive amounts of fun -- and now, in a last ditch effort to ward off a hysterectomy, I'm having a Mirena IUD fitted in about a week and a half.

You get a prescription, and buy the thing from your chemist, then you take it in to your doctor on Appointment Day (which will be the day before my birthday. Wheee.)
So I did what every computer addict would and Googled MIRENA -- and everything I read said "Don't be alarmed by the size of the box!"
When I picked it up today, I had to laugh. I mean, check this puppy OUT!!

It's a good thing I know that's mostly packaging.

a wedding shoot

Do you have a daughter? Quick, go get her now, and have a look at THIS gorgeous wedding shoot.

Here's a sneaky peeky....

Now take a second look -- cos that's Barbie. And a scandalously young looking Ken.

a hairy tale

Fabio, bless his bamboo socks, has been taking the kids to school while I've been recuperating.

My Avon lady, one of the mums at school, gave him a hair product sample for me to try, and his poor bloke brain overloaded.

"Princess!" he asked. "Whose Mum gave me this hair syrup?"

I feel like a stack of pancakes....

D.A.D.

Sometimes, Fabio puts the kids on his lap and lets them 'drive' the car. On very quiet bush roads, of course.

We have a Pajero, and it idles along quite nicely, so there's no speed involved, though the kids certainly think they're flyin along like Brocky, judging by the 'WHEW!" noises as they negotiate a particularly tricky corner.

They LOVE driving. Part of it is the thrill and part of it is spending time with Dad, I'm sure. And I hope they keep those memories all their lives.

I didn't have -- WE didn't have -- that kind of relationship with our dad. I love him but he's a grumpy old curmudgeon, and I can't ever remember him doing stuff with us when we were kids. Not one bedtime story, not one game of backyard cricket, not one special trip to the shops.

He did give my sister a driving lesson one time. Her first driving lesson, I believe. To reverse the car up a slope covered in long, wet grass. Unsurprisingly, he leapt from the car white and shaky and no-one ever got a driving lesson again.

Anyway, like I said, I do love my dad; he's actually one of the funniest people I know when he's in a good mood, and we're all so used to the stuff he says and does that we laugh rather than cry now.

But I'm hugely grateful that my husband loves to spend time with our kids, that he thinks of them as the finest thing he's achieved in his life, and that he shows them every day how much he loves them.

I don't think the role of dads is valued enough any more. Good dads = strong families. Not because mums aren't as important, but because a good dad allows mum to be a mum, instead of trying to be everything to everyone.

I've talked about this before -- more than once, I suspect -- because it's something I feel very strongly about; maybe because my own lack of a strong loving dad affected me hugely for most of my life.

This Sunday, we'll be having our Daddy Appreciation Day, complete with presents and cake and all the trimmings. But every day should be a D.A.D., because good dads rock.