Decisions Decisions

Do you think that God speaks to us through TV?
I just finished reading Nora Ephron’s ‘I Feel Bad About My Neck’ and now she’s on Oprah talking about it. Weird hey.
All I’ve been doing lately is reading books about Adoption (sobering) and Child Care (overwhelming), so when I picked up the Ephron at the library and happened to open it on her chapter about parenting (succinct, brilliant), I was sold.

In between deciding whether I should use disposables or cloth nappies (I’m going with cloth, because I love the earth and my baby’s developing genitals…do yourself a favour and read this), breast feed or bottle (obviously breast, but it’s a ‘little’ more complicated with an adopted baby, but will give it a bash), co-sleep or control cry (3 in the bed and the little one said: ‘roll over, roll over’), 100% cotton or adorable polyester, soft-as-a-baby’s-bottom, winter babygrows (unfortunately cotton all the way), to immunise or not to immunise (it's the law but WHY?!) I’ve had a chance to play mommy with our 2 year old neighbour Sihle. After reading the Supernanny book I realised why my attempts at dealing with Japanese kids was a woeful failure from start to finish. I LOVE Supernanny. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, she’s on BBC Prime, she rocks. She walks into a nightmare home where toddlers run rampage and turns things right side up in a week. A week! I LOVE her. I think she should be required to spend a week with every family on the planet. So, I’ve been watching how I naturally get it all wrong, but that when I catch myself and employ her techniques, things definitely go more smoothly. J and I took Sihle to the zoo on Sunday. It was an absolute delight from start to finish. A definite highlight was the chimp who comically caught peanuts in his mouth and spat the shells out with great aplomb. Sihle naturally found this utterly hilarious. When I showed him the video clip a couple of minutes ago he canned himself all over again. The highlight of the day was getting home as some nasty weather rolled in and having him fall asleep in my arms.

Is there anything better in the whole wide world than holding a sleeping child?
Deep peace and relaxation.
Which reminds me: Natalie, my lifelong friend and mommy of 3, gave me some great reassurance by saying that all the books she read flew straight out the window when she held her babies in her arms.

sigh of relief ;)

As for that nasty weather. Quite spectacular! A storm raged for 24 hours and the sea is still pounding away furiously. It's freezing cold and as all my grandparents (I'm lucky enough to have 3 living grandparents) have phoned to tell me, SNOWING. Well, not quite, but a little bit sleety from time to time. Thank heavens for my New York jacket.
So much for our endless summer.