and to single Dads... Marc has been away for the whole week, I'm completely exhausted. It takes a lot of energy to get ready for work before Philippe wakes up, get him ready, drive to child care, park the car, walk to work, work all day, reverse itinerary, feed Philippe, play toddler games, bathe Philippe, put Philippe to bed, have dinner, clean the house, go to bed, and start again! I bet you're out of breath, just by reading it.
Honestly, single parents are real champions. If you know one, do him or her a favour: offer to babysit for a few hours, they'll love you!
As it was Australia Day long weekend last week, we went up north to visit Marc's family. Everyone was happy to see Philippe and we found out he could speak English as well as French: he kept saying "Doggy" after he met Chloe, Marc's cousin's dog! As I kept repeating "chien" it took me a while to pick it up... Now when I say chien, he says doggy... He must know it's the same !
A cousin looked after Philippe for a whole 24 hours! We drove to (almost) the north-west corner of Tasmania up to Stanley, went to dinner at Wild Cafe in Penguin, slept at a B&B also in Penguin and had a quiet morning with breakfast and a walk around the farm. What a change! I'm ready to do it again!!!
On the last day we had a family picnic in Deloraine, on the way back to Hobart. Philippe had the unluckiest day ever, and by far his worst pain experience so far. A few minutes after we arrived, he was standing a meters away from me. I saw a bee on his hand, which he then put in his mouth! As I screamed and pushed everyone aside, Mars did the same. As Philippe started crying, his mouth wide-opened, the bee flew away, unharmed. And there we are, looking everywhere for the sting on that crimson red screaming baby. Turns out he was only stung on the finger, but still, that hurts like mad!!!! Marc took him for a walk and on the swing to change his mind, and it did the trick. An hour later, Philippe, excited as always, was running down from the toilet block when he suddenly decided to change direction and landed face first, or I should say, mouth first, into the cast iron rail!!! This is NOT good! Can you think how hard he cried and how much blood there was??? I just felt terrible. Both lips were cut and Marc said Philippe also fell on his face from the shock so he was nose bleeding as well!!!! What a day! (Maybe we should go home straight away...) Relax, I'm all stressed out but it wasn't so bad after all. An icy pole (pop sickle in Canada) did the trick: stopped the pain AND the bleeding.
Babies are very resilient. Was Philippe stopped in any way after that? Oh no, I had to catch him 3 times before he was going for a swim in the Meander River that runs by the park. Can I just say we were real happy to get home that night. We had a lovely (supervised) walk on the beach and we all slept like babies. No, that's not true: Marc was up at 4:15 to catch the 6am flight for Perth...
