All my friends have nannies

Well, not all of them. But a fair few. The majority, in fact.

And, as always happens when all your friends are jumping off a bridge,I inevitably begin to question my path in life. As those who regularly hang around this neck of the woods know, I gave up a career to stay home with my daughters. And to raise them, too. 

But as I watch my mates pop out babies and then head back to work within months, I must admit I feel a twinge of jealousy. I want what she has, dammit! I want to earn that money, wear those clothes, and have an allocated time to exercise while it's still daylight. I want the buzz that comes with doing a great job at my job. 

And a nanny who does the laundry, and gets up to the night squalls, and knows what's for dinner wouldn't hurt, either. I could join all my friends for their impromptu girls-only-no-kids coffee dates. Heck, Mr Accident and I could go on dates!

Sounds lovely. 

This morning I scolded Peanut for opening the front door. She was letting out the heat, and the cold damp day was washing in around our ankles. If she wanted to watch the rain, she should look out the window! "But Mama, I want to HEAR the rain." So I made a cup of chai tea and grabbed a blanket, and Peanut and I snuggled on the freezing front step, her warming her hands on my mug, as we watched the rain fall into puddles on the path. And I was glad I wasn't at work. And I was glad it was me freezing on that step and not another woman, paid a pittance to love someone else's children. And I wouldn't swap times like that for all the coffee dates in creation. 

Nannies are a godsend for some families. But a nanny 'aint right for me. 

50 things to teach your daughters

Yesterday I was sewing, and while I sew, I think. And curse. And seam rip, and eat half a custard bun, but mostly think.

This particular day, I was considering what a monumental responsibility it is to raise up two daughters to be thriving adults, able to make their way safely and competently in the world outside our home.

And since I like both a solid set of goal posts and a good list, I started to jot down my ideas on what I want my girls to know by the time they leave home. Soon I was doing more writing than sewing, and I had a list as long as my receipt from the sewing shop. Which was, incidentally, what I was writing on.

Now, this list is just my own opinion, forged from my experiences as a daughter and a mother, a Scout and a soldier. Hopefully half the things on here will never be needed, but, then again... what kind of boring old life would that be, hey?

So here's the list:

50 things daughters should know before leaving home

How to:

1) Plan, shop and cook a week of healthy meals 

2) Choose fresh fruit and vegetables

3) Grow a vegetable and flower garden

4) Bake bread from scratch

5) Bake and ice a birthday cake

6) Cook an impressive dinner 

7) Set the table for a dinner party

8) Write thank you notes and conversational letters

9) Touch type

10) Write legibly and neatly

11) Study and take effective notes

12) Use basic spelled sign language

13) Talk confidently in public

14) Read and play music

15) Walk in heels

16) Apply makeup

17) Put together suitable outfits for a formal dinner, and business interview 

18) Balance a basic budget 

19) Understand simple and compound interest

20) Run a hard copy and computer filing system 

21) Develop and follow an exercise routine 

22) Clean a house

23) Correctly wash, dry and iron clothes

24) Mend clothes - buttons, tear and replacing zippers

25) Make a dress

26) Wash basic clothes without a machine 

27) Call the emergency services

28) Identify and use a fire extinguisher and fire blanket

29) How to signal for help in morse code, semaphore and with a flare

30) CPR and First aid

31) Drive a manual

32) Reverse and parallel park

33) Change a tire on a car and a bike

34) Check the oil and fluid in a car

35) Jump start a car

36) Use a road map and a topographical map and compass

37) Find North without a compass, by day and by night 

38) Walk a straight line in the bush or forest

39) Abseil and rock climb

40) Find and purify water 

41) Catch a fish, prepare and eat it

42) Row and sail 

43) Swim

44) Walk long distances 

45) Build a camp fire and use a flint

46) Use a mattock, shovel, hammer, drill, saw, axe and chainsaw 

47) Load, aim, fire, make safe and carry a pistol and rifle

48) Self defence

49) Fill sandbags and build a wall

50) Hold, change and feed a baby

What do you think. Did I miss anything?

{The winner of our giveaway is VANESSA! Contact me via email (theaccidentalhousewife(at)live.com) with your postal address, and I'll send you your prize. Congratulations! 

Also, the LINKLOVE link party will be open all week. Don't forget to add in your housewifely posts!}

Additional images from here and here.

LinkLove Party Time!

It's time for another LinkLove party!

Last time worked absolutely wonderfully. So many people met new blog friends, and so many people are still following along and commenting on each others blogs. Success!

So let's have another, shall we?

Here's how to get your link on the list:

1) Go and pick a "housewifey" post from your own blog.

We decided last time that a housewifey post is anything written about the work that is done in the home. Extra points if it could be improved by the wearing of an apron! So this includes housework, recipes, home organization, pets and small livestock, opinions and views about the same, and any other subject that might be helpful or interesting to women (or men!) who work in the home.

2) Copy the web address of your specific blog post.

Please don't just copy the general address of your blog, otherwise people will get lost when they try to find your post later.

3) Click on the blue "Add your link" button below.

Then follow the instructions. The name you put in the title will appear on the list. Don't worry, if you get it wrong you can delete the link and have another try. (To delete a link you've added, click the red cross next to your link on the list.)

4) Add the button.

It's like a party hat, so everyone knows where to come to join in!

Copy the code in the box below the LinkLove button.


<center><a href="http://the-accidental-housewife.blogspot.com.au/2012/07/linklove-party-time.html"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9A4msbK9I8ASUbvTn_GVTnxDXrv11CWZ5dcWbCIikkXBkI1c16hxkdAUr_C4gMmfg7zGGelis6bo8r-VrO5tJ8thf08GJJOphPknoptNqJQ9_a70yXzTcidVXl5Ur6rWp6F9AV4JO4PQx/s320/linky+button.jpg" /></a></center>

Then either:

• add an HTML widget to your side bar and simply paste in the code, or

• open the edit mode on your post, change to the HTML mode, and then paste the code in. (At the very top or very bottom is easiest!)

5) You're done!

Now head on over and mingle with our other party guests. Leave plenty of comments as a thank you for coming! And if you're interested in what they have to say, why not follow them? It's a great encouragement.

Thank you so much for coming to our party!

Bug vs Mrs Accident - Breakfast

Every morning Bug and I fight a war of wit and will. She enjoys her breakfast, and when she's finished she calls "Mama, befas done. S'cu'me!" (It's very endearing.) She then waits patiently while I fetch a cloth to clean up her attempt at recreating the Battle of the Somme in her weetbix.

And that's when the fun starts.

Bug has two hands and one face (she's pleasingly anatomically normative.) They all need wiping. But I never know where to begin.

Wipe the face first? But then my next move is wiping a hand. She counters by whacking her other messy hand to her face and smearing away all my good work.

Wipe a hand first? But then, while I wipe the other, she shove the clean hand into her bib. Since we use a bib with a muck catcher at the bottom (or, as she sees it, an attached feed trough and food reuse system) the hand comes out arguably worse than when we began. And she's far to wiggly and strong to pin both hands at once.

Remove the bib? No dice. Suspecting such a devilish plot, she has cached a huge wad of half chewed weetbix in her cheek, and she is willing to spit it onto her unprotected stomach at the slightest provocation. Aha! Check mate, woefully inept Mother!

For a while, I pretended to accept her views on post-meal cleanliness and instead tried guerrilla warfare - letting her stick her hands into what ever muck she could find, but just keeping on wiping whatever extremity flailed in my direction. I figured that she would eventually run out of muck, and I would eventually wipe down to clean skin. But it was as about as fun and efficient as walking to London. From Sydney.

I have to step it up. I can't support this inefficiency. In my past life, I was a highly competent student of tactics, but now I am being bested by a toddler. Help me, von Clausewitz!

(Just a thought, water cannon? No? Too far? Just checking...)

War is hell... and then you have to apologise

I assume most people, when they hear that I have been "to war", picture me in some kind of swampy trench, facing the enemy with a fixed bayonet and a cigarette pack stuck in my muddy helmet.

I have never smoked.

Or fixed bayonets in anger.

Or been in a muddy trench in another country.

In fact, the scariest thing I faced in that war zone was an apology...

Stick with me while I explain.

I was a Signaller, in charge of the troop of soldiers who ran the communications for the Battle Group. Since we were the most important consumers of power, I also had control of the generators.

Now the camp where we stayed was pretty flash. I did all my living and office work in heated and air-conditioned armoured containers. I had a rug in my office, a faux leather chair with lumbar support, and a fancy desk from Ikea. The coffee machine was just a short walk down the corridor, and I had a bar fridge under my desk for the troops Cokes. It was about as far from a muddy trench as war was capable of being.

But these modern conveniences came at a price: they were a huge energy drain. Luckily, we had three huge generators to serve the camp. Three, because we were supposed to have one working, one as backup, and one being serviced at any time. Of course, the best laid plans....

The company patrol had left the perimeter as normal that morning. About three minutes after they had left, the generator tech came and told me that they had to shut down all three generators, leaving us (and our radios) without power. This was, obviously, totally unacceptable.  Now the poor lad (he would have been about 19) didn't speak much English, and I don't speak a word of Dutch, but I have absolutely no doubt he understood my views on the matter. (In fact, after our chat, I became known as "the scary Aussie girl".) He couldn't keep the generators running, but he could provide us a tiny backup one while he fixed the primaries.

We had to hook it up to the mains power on the headquarters, which also supplied every light, fridge and kettle in the building.  And, being HQ, there were plenty. Unfortunately, the geni would only provide enough power for the radios, and nothing else. The RSM issued a general announcement that all computers, lights and heaters were to be switched off (this was the dead of an Afghan winter, mind you) and the HQ fell into a hushed, eerie darkness. But the radios worked!

Suddenly, the troops outside the wire ran into trouble. The radios lit up like a christmas tree, and my lads were working flat chat.... until *insert electrical fading noise here...*  the power went dead. We had lost comms. The geni was still working, which meant someone was stealing our power! I was furious.  I raced down the corridor, crashing open doors, looking for the perpetrator.

I found him in the second last room. An unnaturally tall, intensely muscled, Rhodesian born Major, a man who was regarded by the entire Battle Group with a mixture of awe and fear, had just turned on a kettle.  I burst into the room, saw the steaming kettle and threw myself at the power point, all the while  spewing a furious stream of white hot, righteous anger. (I was clearly having a bad day.) He was caught on the back foot, speechless in the face of my onslaught. I suspect that's the first (and only) time that has ever happened.

He looked kind of like this. But bigger. And MUCH scarier. 
Image from here.

As I stood up from the floor, power now flowing to the rightful appliances, I realised what I had just done. Far too scared to stay and face the music I turned tail and fled. And yes, I am not ashamed to admit it, I ran straight to my boss's office and hid behind the door, jabbering to him what an idiot I had been and how I was so very, very sorry.

When my boss heard the news he looked stricken. I had just committed gross insubordination, and to the scariest man in the Battle Group. I was sure the wrath of the gods was about to descend. I would be charged! Disciplined! Sent home! Or, more likely, ripped limb from limb by an angry Rhodesian, if he ever managed to find me...

He found me. It took about thirty seconds. He probably heard me yammering from the hallway.

He strode into the office and called (you'll have to imagine that Rhodesian accent here), "Lieutenant Accidental, come out here!" Time stood still. But not still enough... I crept out, shamefaced, heels together..."Sir."  "Jen, I am sorry about plugging in my kettle. It will not happen again."

Wait... what?

Did he just apologise to me?

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is another lesson on the harsh realities of my war.

Animal crackers

We've been hibernating here. And I'm going slowly mad.

Bug's temperature has come and gone, but her loss was unfortunately Peanut's gain. I've gone from being trapped on the couch under one child, to being trapped on the couch under the other. And we're still watching hours of Playschool a day. I can actually feel my mind, and legs, atrophying.

Poor Peanut asks to do every craft or activity we watch. I agree, but then watch as she valiantly stumbles up from beneath her blanky, trying to make it to the playroom, before getting the shakes and retiring in defeated confusion to the couch. It breaks my heart. But, if Bug's passage through the illness is anything to go by, she will regain her spark by Friday.

So, with limited blog fodder, let's have an update on the Accidental animals!

Panzer's growing like a weed. In fact, she's growing so quickly she's almost onto her third collar, and her cute wrinkly butt pokes out the bottom of her second warm dog coat. If I'm late feeding her breakfast, ribs appear down her side like a minuscule doggy xylophone. Thankfully, her intelligence is growing along with her muscle, and we've finally reached the point where I can tell her off with a stern look and a quiet word, instead acting like an arm flailing, water spraying, growling idiot. Of course, this means I'm burning about 30 000 fewer calories a day.

Pan is also becoming accustomed to her role as a family guardian. She raced to the door barking when the dodgy looking parcel delivery man called, and tried valiantly to protect me from the local groundskeeper. Well, until the leaf blower started... then she was very pleased to have my leg to hide behind. Oh Pan, you big, brave, sooky puppy, you!  

Milly and Tilly have redecorated their chicken apartment. It was a knee-jerk reaction to waking up to frozen water in their feeder. Lucky, they hired in help - me. Frankly, I wouldn't recommend my skills as an insulation contractor. I did an extremely technical and long lasting job, sticking all its shiny, reflective, golden glory up with regulation thumbtacks. It's like a 1970's party in their little house now, I'm amazed that they can get any sleep in there at all! But, while it's a wee bit bright, it's also very snug. I have two very happy chickens.

Speaking of happy, my depressed fish is on the mend! We bought her another little friend (her previous  one only lasted a day) and her mood is very much improved. No longer does she hide her fishy head behind the filter! No longer do her googly eyes swim with sadness! All she needed was some decent company. And really, isn't that true of us all?

And now, ladies and gentlemen, it's (belatedly) time for comment of the week. You'll have to excuse my nepotism, but I'm awarding it to "Anonymous" for their comment on Brave. Oh, wait, did I say Anonymous? I meant "Mr Accident." He snuck on here and left a message, trying to blend in with our commenting style:

Have you heard of the movie Topgun? A delightful tale of adventure, love and it also dabbles in a bit of Military Aviation? Kids should love it! There are even one or two musical numbers throughout the piece!"

Which sounds like nonsense, until you learn that Topgun was the movie we were watching when we first kissed. Oh, Mr A! Such a romantic!

Now, speaking of romance, I'm off to share a bed with a hot toddler, quite possibly a fidgety baby, and hopefully my delightful husband. He'll be the one clinging to the other side of the mattress. Now that's love.
Night all!

Brave. I loved it.

I took Peanut to her first big-girl movie. It was a Mummy-Daughter date of the most awesome kind.

We left Daddy and the baby sister at home, skipped nap time (!) and headed into the city. Medium popcorn, just-in-case bathroom trip before the film, and then my three year old was perched on a giant theater chair and ready to be enchanted.

And she was.

I don't think she moved an inch during the entire film.

I have to admit, I may have cried a little during the opening scenes. Not as a response to anything on screen, but out of joy and relief that there was finally a Disney movie I could take my impressionable daughter to see, without an under dressed, boy-crazy, marriage-chasing princess as the "heroine", or a suitably handsome rescuing Prince in sight. And (I don't want to spoil it for you) the heroine's marriage may be a plot point in the movie, but it's not the end point. Thank goodness.

Merida (the princess) is a wild haired, impudent girl who rides an enormous horse, knows her arrows from her arrowroots, and finds corsetry restrictive. I loved her.

But I especially loved how her relationship with her mother developed throughout the movie, as they each came to realise and appreciate the strengths of the other, and move from a directing mother - directed daughter relationship to one based on mutual  respect and admiration.

I hope that my relationship with my daughters can do the same, but hopefully without the intervention of a scatterbrained witch with a malfunctioning cauldron voice mail. Cause, you know, I like my witch's technology to work. Disney and Pixar have previously done some fantastic father son movies (Finding Nemo, for example) and it's great to see them successfully doing the same for mothers and daughters. Hopefully they will see that the format works, and make many more!

Get your kit sorted, lady!

Most importantly, I want Merida to come to my house and stay here, as a role model for my daughters. The split second this movie is available on DVD, I'm buying it. Tangled (the Rapunzel movie) is the only Disney Princess movie in our house at the moment, and already Peanut is spouting garbage about marriage and handsome princes. It's insidious, and it alarms me, but hopefully Brave will help me fight fire with fire, even if I bought the fire from the same shop!

But until the DVD arrives, Peanut and I will just keep on chatting over what happened ("She roded the horse! That was my favvite bit. She climb the waterfall! Acksually, that was my favvite bit too...") and eating our treats. Yup, because if you want to win the Mummy of the Year award, and spoil a kid who's been an absolute gem while her baby sister's been sick, don't leave anything to chance. After the movie, hit up the lolly shop. Let her pick one of EVERYTHING from the loose lolly bins (grand total, $3.20) and she'll be yours for life. Well, until you suggest it's bath time, anyway.

So, dear reader, if you have the spare cash and a few hours this week, I suggest you hit up the movies and watch Brave. Show the Hollywood studios that they can make good money in kids movies with strong, empowered female leads. And take your girls, so they get inspired. And take your sons, so they learn that strong willed, smart girls with crazy hair and good aim are heroes, too. You'll like it, I promise.

Now help me out, do you have any suggestions for other movies in the same vein, suitable for very young ladies? I'm not a big film buff, and I could use some advice!