Naughty corner

We've started using a "naughty corner" for very dire offences, such as biting daddy endlessly or kicking Ali on purpose. However, it doesn't seem to be working. Sometimes, Julian will do something "naughty" and then say, "Going to the naughty corner," to which he hops off expectantly and happily (even though nothing goes on there!). Alternatively, today he did something "naughty" - I can't remember what, perhaps almost kicking my pregnant belly - and while I wasn't about to send him to the corner (he needs a warning, after all), he immediately decided to go there, anyway. Don't know what to do about such self-flagellation! Otherwise, he's a happy boy who isn't usually naughty at all - for a two year old, he's very, very well-behaved, indeed.

  

Julian and his cousin Jake

  

And sometimes I'm not!

Doesn't it bug other mums when people expose their sick kids to your child? Today I was at my mother's group, and one child was there with a snack of Cheerios. Julian reached for one, and the other child kindly slobbered over his hand, took a fistful of the cereal, and gave some to Julian. (To which Julian said, "Good sharing!") All would have been delightful, except that this kid's nanny started talking about how said kid had been really, really sick, and said kid was "just starting to get over it." I quickly asked, "So you mean he's sick?" "Oh, he's at the tail end," she said. Um, couldn't she have parted with this vital bit of info before the kid stuck his hand in his mouth and then handed out food to my son? Apparently not. If Julian gets sick in three days - that's his m.o., sick after three days' exposure - there will be hell to pay.

Sometimes I'm happy...

  

Darl

"Good morning, darl," says Julian to me in the mornings, before adding, "Mamma's name is 'darl'."
It's nice that his father refers to me with an endearment so often, leading Julian to think that's my actual name.

Current loves: everything gardening. He is obsessed with hedge-trimming. In a pinch, anything can become a hedge-trimmer: a plastic shovel, a cardboard tube and even mummy's makeup brush.

Lying on my daddy