The Power Struggle

The athlete aka the rugby coach aka my son is back home on a full time basis after an extended stay with his granny. He had been there to help in her time of need with pops being in the spinal injuries unit in Glasgow.
The Hospital visits are not over by a long way, however the early traumas and uncertainties are behind us for the moment. No doubt new worries will replace them in the future but we will cross those bridges as they come.

So with his job done for the moment and perhaps a change of scenery required it all led to the one outcome-Cue the return of the athlete aka the son to his own stomping ground and straight back into his old routines.......well not quite.

The wee one has had the chance to become the number one child, the oldest kid in the house, aye okay the only kid in the house but to her that was not important, what was important was her competition was nowhere to be seen, the wee one in his absence slickly moved into the vacuum that he left when he went on his mission of mercy.

At one point she even had designs on his room as it is a good bit bigger than hers with that vital extra toy space and a wardrobe that would hold at least twice as many clothes as hers, this in turn would mean some new clothes would be required to fill it, in her eyes anyway, and as if to put the cream on the top, there is a swivelling recliner chair...how much fun can a wee one handle with temptations like that right in front of her.

The telly had also became the wee ones, by the fact she had no competition for it during the day or at the weekends, when there are some fine cartoons to be viewed, aye even some Disney films where once the rugby or any sport for that matter would have been top choice!!
The wee one has long since had the ASBO gardener pretty much wrapped around her little finger and too a large extent has his full attention to herself, with very few interruptions to get in the way of her plans and games,  however she now commanded that last five percent of his time, time that the athlete aka my son would normally take up listening to the stories that are regularly recited by the ASBO gardener aka papa, to all who have the time or indeed the will to listen to!!

The fridge over the last couple of months has filled up with her favourite bits and bobs and the cereal cupboard had been transformed from muesli and other adult breakfast cereals to kids cereals like coca anything!
In the bureau, in the sitting room, where the athlete aka my son kept his bits and bobs, or as he liked to call it his man drawer, has also been transformed, and is now a fully fledged wee ones drawer, occupied by hair clasps and bobbles with a few other wee girlie accessories.

Aye the grass never stopped growing in his absence and he now has a power struggle on his hands if he has any desires to be number one kid of the house again. A power struggle that he is in no way assured of winning as the wee one is enjoying her new found status!!
However perhaps just like the grass never stopped growing in his absence neither did he as he took on several roles to make his grannies life that wee bit easier, no longer can he really be classed as a child, after acting with a great deal of dignity and maturity over the last couple of months in the face of adversity, so now seems  as good as anytime for him to step into the world of adult hood and relinquish his throne as the number one kid to the wee one.
By doing this he again would be showing his maturity but better than that it allows him to save face, before he tries to pour a bowl of coco anything in the morning.

Food, Food, Glorious Food!

The wee one has never been a big eater, however she has always eaten a wide variety of different foods, aye some stranger than others for a wee one.

Recently, her try anything once attitude, had her tasting the fine spices of an Indian curry, the bite of a chilli and the fire that is a jalapeno! As I said some stranger than others.
When I was growing up, we never had the choice of flavours we have now as our daily menu choices, that is not to say they were not available, its just that the old fashioned flavours and recipes ruled the day in most houses. It was seen as exotic and even a thing reserved for the holiday abroad if you dared to change the ordinary pot of mince into say a bolognaise! Pizza was something the neighbours told you about after returning from their trip to Italy and a kebab with chilli sauce might as well have been from Mars!!!!

No, if it was not mince and tatties on a Monday and fish on a Friday with a number of various meals that included beans in-between those days, with Sunday reserved for a roast of some sort, it was not my house in a normal week in any given year.

The ASBO gardener aka papa still gets cranky to this day about the menu he has to live with now, as  to him, Pizza is a town in Italy as far as he is concerned, and not only that he lives by the attitude that if the diet was good enough before all the imports of flavour started in his day then it is certainly good enough now!
The good old days he yearns for food wise, were not that bad on reflection, and further we probably had a better understanding of our seasons due to the fact you could only get certain foods at certain times of the year, now of course you can buy strawberries in December!

The last couple of generations are tied to the obesity epidemic that we hear about every other day on the news and see on our streets, aye sadly I am a statistic!

This of course did not start with the introduction of new flavours and the fact that we like to experiment with food, aye those of us who still cook anyway, although according to my eldest cooking ends with a ping that says the microwave is finished! It is linked however to the fact we expect to get what ever taste takes our fancy no matter what the time let alone the season of the year, thus the explosion of fast food joints.

As the ASBO gardener aka papa likes to point out a good stew takes hours to prepare and cook, in that stew is everything your body requires, from the five a day to carbohydrate intake.. good food takes time. Fast food contains very little of what you need but tastes great and we have two generations of proof to back this up.

However while we have two generations of proof to back up our taste buds desires, the ASBO gardener aka papa has the fact that he is eighty something, and the rest of an aging Britain, that had a similar diet to him to rest his case on.
If peer pressure and consumerism are to drive what our taste buds will enjoy in the future we will have some interesting times when it comes to dinner time in the average household.

The wee one and her generation will never know what a seasonal vegetable or piece of fruit is as they can and will be able to buy anything anytime. The wee one will grow up believing that a curry is a traditional Sunday dinner originating in Britain and when people have dinner parties they will talk and laugh about a the old folk that long for a traditional pizza let alone a pot of stew!
The wee one does however give me hope that all is not lost, as she has a wee go at all flavours as I said, that has to include things like stews and porridge when you live with the ASBO gardener aka papa.

So she has a fighting chance of a balanced diet, add to that we now know what two generations of our eating habits have achieved, so it would be an unwise granddad that would allow it to be three generations.
That of course does not mean that the wee one or myself for that matter will never see the inside of a fast food restaurant ever again, no, that would be lurching from one extreme to the other, as a wise granddad I believe that a little bit of everything in moderation does no harm, and lets face it they taste too dam good to give up completely!

Cats and Dogs

After weeks of talks in the household about getting a puppy, the long nights debating the pros and cons of being a two dog family, hours of research about the best breeds to look at, when there is a wee one involved, days looking around the country for a reputable breeder, with dogs at the right price and the right distance away for travel arrangements to run smoothly, the hours looking at comparison sites for the right pet insurance, you know what I mean one that actually pays out if there is a problem, no excuses, no small print, okay no small print is too much to ask, but surely one of the leading insurers offers an honest policy!

Then you have to consider family days out, aye that means making sure the car is suitable, meaning it will transport not only the good people of the house, but two dogs at different stages in their doggy lives, one an elder statesman and the other the young pretender.

That takes you nicely on to having to make a number of allowances, and taking a wee bit more time in all the planning to take into account the old boys needs and how he will feel when the young pretender is in full puppy flow!
So a lot to be considered and actioned, however the one thing I bring from my working life, into my role as a stay at home granddad is my ability to organise and complete a job once started in a decent time frame.

So homework done and time to do a quick check list, the right breed found, the reputable breeder found and not too far away, reasonable price asked for puppies, plan in place for the old boy to ensure peace and quiet when wanted, insurance company and policy found and small print checked, car checked and suitable in the short term....well we were going to replace the car sooner or later anyway, aye that's what I told myself and anyone else willing to listen!
Check list complete all that was left to do was make the purchase, the easy bit!
The wee one had been involved in all of this and had spent many a wee hour looking at photos of dogs and explaining that was definitely the one for her.
The law enforcer aka the wife was the last of the household to be convinced that a second dog was a good idea, however once on board her enthusiasm was matched only by the wee one as they trawled through countless pictures and watched every telly programme that had anything at all to do with dogs!

However I decided to hold off just to make sure the moment would last, after all a dog is for life, a motto that I equally apply to any pet that you take into your family home.
As you can see I am not taking this lightly as all pets require care, love and time, as well as a budget, because there is nothing cheap in this day and age!

So after a suitable period of calm and reflection, a period to allow straight heads and not hearts to make the decision we made our move. The whole family united from the wee one to the ASBO gardener aka papa, all agreed all of one mind.

So today I made the phone call to the reputable breeder, paid our deposit, and we will pick up our new pet in six weeks time, a date the wee one is already marking down to, on the calendar in our kitchen.
As I said you have to be ready for a new pet, so I will spend this weekend buying a new bowl and getting the insurance policy paperwork filled out........oh aye and the cat flap fitted to the back door to allow our new kitten instant access to the garden!!!

Poor Hearing Or A Life Skill?

The ASBO gardener aka papa has suffered for years with poor hearing, although on some occasions you are left to wonder if it is just as bad as he says, I am positive that he has developed an acute case of selective hearing allied to his hearing problem.

Now I am not saying that he has fooled the Doctors for the last thirty years, I am not saying he does not have an affliction, which to be honest must be awful, especially when you are in company and you struggle to follow the conversation direction. No I do not doubt that he has a problem with his ears, however I do sometimes wonder just how severe it really is.

The other day I mentioned to the law enforcer aka the wife, that I had made a cream cake to have as a wee treat with our evening cuppa, now the ASBO gardener aka papa, was not even in the same room that this conversation was taking place in, but some how managed to hear the word cake from the adjoining room and even offered to make the hot drinks to go with it!!!

The ability to be able to tune out all around you and select the bits you want is something that must take years of practice. The same selective hearing, is used in the reverse to the cake story, when the ASBO gardener aka papa simply wants to do something his way, he uses the excuse that he miss heard you, and that he had done the job as asked.
The whole thing is, it is very difficult to argue with someone that can tune you out, and not only that you are in danger of being unreasonable, because there is a chance with a loss of hearing that hey he is telling the truth!

Musing over this wee problem of his ability to hear certain things got me to thinking about my younger days and therefore his and it was during this wee look back in time that I realised he was using this technique then to avoid listening to my mum. He would hear his dinner going on from the shed, but if asked to tackle some job around the house, he somehow would miss hear this to sound like off you go fishing!

Looking back over the last few years in this house it suddenly dawned on me that there were a number of projects that we had undertaken after a great deal of planning, I say planning when it should really be arguing over the detail, only for it to end up as he had first described he would like it to be, despite the fact he had clearly lost the argument in the first place!

So a skill that has had forty years to my knowledge to be fine tuned and played upon and used by a master craftsman in selective hearing was definitely being used, backed up with a now genuine hearing problem, meaning as I said before that you just cant question it.....cunning or what?
Now like all skills in life that we develop over time there is usually a succession to the younger generations within the family unit, almost like evolution, we learn certain skills from our elders that we feel will allow us to gain even the smallest of advantages in life.
This skill has been missed by several generations of family, and the fact that I am just coming to the conclusion that he has been using it for years just shows you how well disguised it was that no other family members have mimicked it...until now.

The wee one is the master craftsman's apprentice!
The wee one has been using this 'skill' for a few weeks now, this I know by using the best and until now the only proven skill inherited by us all, hindsight! The other day I was sowing grass seed and putting sand down to help the process, the wee one likes to help in these matters and indeed she is a good wee gardener. However the use of sand and the explanation given by me for it was obviously screened out by her using her new skill, as was the bit about not using her sand from the sandpit.

The proof of this was there for all to see when I returned from my wee break to continue the jobs in hand, where I had put down sand now stood sand castles and where there was grass to start with...aye stood sand castles! Further evidence as if it were required was put on show later that day when the water pistol was aimed at everything it should not be aimed at including me!!!

Sadly for the young apprentice, her new found 'skill' landed her on the naughty step, perhaps she should have had a companion along side her, something that had not eluded her, as she patted the space beside her and shouted for her papa to join her! You know she does have a wee case!

Another Rare Breed Faces Extinction

I once wrote, that it was not that unusual in this day and age, to be a stay at home granddad looking after a wee one, a diverse household of family members- aye even one with the ASBO gardener aka papa as its senior member- and meeting all the demands that are made running any normal house let alone mine! You know what I mean, the sort of things woman have done for centuries without too many grumbles or complications!

Woman have, as I said for hundreds of years acted as the household banker, problem solver, nurse, cleaner and of course law enforcer, now that was just for the husbands, add in children, work and many other jobs, in truth too many to list, and over those hundreds of years not a granddad to be seen doing any of them.

I made assumptions when I first wrote that a stay at home granddad was not unusual, firstly I assumed that in this day and age of enlightenment we had moved on, evolved and the traditional boundaries that once separated the sexes were no longer. Add to that, the many parents from my era that helping out their children bring up their children by voluntary means or other. Secondly I assumed, that being the case, allied to the fact that many more woman hold down full time jobs now than ever before, meant that the percentage of probability was on my side.

Aye your right.....wrong, wrong and wrong again!! what is it I always say- never assume!!

 

So what led me to question my own situation? Why investigate? Why research, if I indeed was a rare animal, aye possibly even on the endangered list of the animal world?

Well it started off simply enough as most things with me seem to do, I was simply having a wee trawl around for some advise. You would like to think that would be an easy enough job, however as a granddad....... Try asking for advise or look for support to bring up your 3 year old granddaughter and you start to feel very alone.

When you are a parent, single or as part of a couple setting out for the first time, there is no amount of people, professional and lay, around you day and night with advice and help-some more useful and welcome than others! There are books and DVDs handed out like sweeties when wanted or not!

Now push past the fact this is your first outing into parenthood and add on a few years of age, chuck in a couple of kids of your own, and suddenly a large number of people believe you are an expert, the result is, the people and the books they give away disappear quicker, than your memory has forgotten, all the advice you were given years ago, by all well meaning and those paid! Aye there are few if any, advice books or DVDs for a granddad on the shelves of our book shops or libraries!
So where do you go?

Going to your own parents can be done, God willing, even if you have forgotten their advice from first time round, aye the very advice you chose to ignore the first time of asking all those years ago! This time you know it will be delivered with that look of I told you so!
So simply looking for advice was the start of the questioning of my status as a normal being in the parental chain.
That was mild compared to my next clue as I investigated a stay at home granddad, unusual or not?
Over the past few weeks, I have been checking out nursery places and the like for the wee one, and to be honest I could feel the looks I was receiving from a number of people as I entered and left the premises.

This Became more than a feeling, when I turned up at a local event for wee ones, and overheard a wee comment or two, leaving me to conclude that as a granddad, you just look creepy going to a mother and toddler group event or the like - in fact you might as well pull out a bag of sweets, and shout who's first if some of the mothers probing eyes, wee comments and ill at ease looks are read properly.
Sadly this all confirmed my status as a rare, endangered species, a species that has not evolved like I had assumed.

As I trawled the web looking for signs that I was in fact a pretty common species- aye the answer for and to every problem we face today- all I achieved was further backing to the case, that I could appear on the telly one day, with a voice over, appealing for money, before my species becomes extinct!!
So it looks like the stay at home granddad is a species that probably has more use for a support group than a members forum!!

I have decided that the next art day that the wee one and I undertake will involve T-shirt painting, this time of the deliberate variety, the designs to be produced, will be of the simple message variety, like 
I AM WITH GRANDADD and ITS OKAY HE IS MY GRANDADD, so no one is left in any doubt.

Now that just leaves problem solving, that one is easy, I will just swallow my pride and ask the law enforcer aka the wife as she always seems to be one step ahead of me, and if she does not know the answer then I always have the web to trawl.

As we all know the answer to this, and indeed any question, is out there on the web , with several answer options depending on the question, aye you can find all you need to know, about everything you are doing wrong, and what a bad parent you were, or are about to be again, by surfing the web, but you will find only one or two stay at home granddads!!!

Reward Offered?

Well there we have it and another weekend, and not just any weekend but a bank holiday weekend at that, slips through the fingers faster than melting snow off a wall.

Aye, I said snow, well it is British summer time after all! And come to think of it what the hell have the banks done to deserve an extra days holiday! Okay back to the story.
The disappearing weekend.
Where did it disappear to and if anyone finds it should they be given a reward?
Now the fact I say it disappeared, sounds like we did nothing with it and are now full of regret, however the truth as usual is very different.

Now admittedly one or two plans are back in the to do pile due to unforeseen circumstances, and of course the good old Scottish summer weather. These plans are not dead just sleeping and will be given a rude awakening as soon as a weekend becomes free, with the supporting act of Mr Sunshine.

However as you all know when one plan gets put to bed for a wee nap, two or three others, seize the opportunity to be dusted down, joining together with your other ideas and events for the weekend.
So as originally planned we were cross country for our usual visit with a wee twist, to the hospital to see pops, what was the wee twist? well it was our pops seventieth Birthday!

So family members went the extra mile to put on a buffet most caterers would be hard pushed to match, extended family came from far and wide, with us all joining to try our best, to make the day as normal and enjoyable as we could. The wee one the youngest member of the four generations of the family present knows what a party is and set about to make sure, not only was the food enjoyed, but there would be dancing and party behaviour on display from the out set, giving the adults no choice but to get with the programme, forget where we were, and have some fun for a few hours. It worked a treat with the family being joined by one or two others from the ward for some well deserved banter.
The wee one on the way home last seen the hospital exit as her eyes closed into a deep sleep that had an air of satisfaction about it -job done!

So part of the weekend on time and to plan things must be on the up, and for once, about to pan out for the household, aye you got it......no chance.
The weather seen off the second part of our day and showed no remorse for what it had done. The law enforcer aka the wife had invited a couple of work friends or should I just say friends over for a BBQ and some drinks, not a huge party but a wee chance to have a blether, a catch up, a gossip and some banter.

The whole idea was soured by the weather and somehow you loose some of the fun sitting inside with a telly on somewhere in the house as your background, so this plan is now sleeping!
The evening was replaced with.....err a take away and some telly not quite what we had planned, however just the fact the feet were up for a wee break made it reasonably enjoyable for the adults.

However as you can imagine no self respecting wee one will settle for that, all be it the take away went down well, as like her brother aka hurricane Billy who gets excited when he hears the microwave ping, the wee one does like wise when she knows the phone has been used to order food and the door bell goes! So the food being finished, for her was the signal that something more should be on the cards and of course she had replenished her batteries with some high energy food fuel! For the wee one it was like starting the day again from scratch!

The evening would kick off like a boxing match with the bell sounding for round two, as the wee one cajoled the adults out of their happy couch potato, we are stuffed and sleepy slumber with her usual infectious enthusiasm for fun, and all sorts of adventures,  this weekends adventures were to include the big tent made out of a sheet and some towels, with our torches at the ready to explore the vast plains of underneath the beds with all the hidden treasure that had remained undiscovered for many days and aye weeks.

There was further fun abound with make up sets and delight in colouring pens that can change the décor of any house.
That was day one,  day two the weather changed, of course we had nothing planned, so the day was spent at play in the garden with a few wee treats courtesy of the BBQ and the ice cream van for the wee one, and some serious garden work for granddad with of course a few wee treats courtesy of the BBQ and a sneaky chap called beer!

So with all this home entertainment and no timetable to stick to and a number of our plans sleeping how did father time manage to rob us of the weekend? The mystery deepens. The reward should get bigger, perhaps the banks could fund it, after all it is their holiday weekend that has gone missing!

As you can imagine a toddler does not look at the day of the week to decide what should be on the agenda for the day in fact Saturday or Sunday could be any day, However as every adult knows we are conditioned into looking forward to the weekend like a child is for Christmas.
So when it comes and goes so quickly we tend to go into shock and dismay that here we are back to Monday!!

Going through the normal activities of a Monday, bank holiday or not, for a stay at home granddad, somewhat gave me the answer as each job that was lined up for the day slipped and the time marched on, it struck me when we were young we could not wait for events to take place including that of getting older 18 was just ages away and leaving school seemed like it would never happen so time moved slowly and seemed to take an age.

 

Now I am a Grandad I am looking for every minute to last two so I can enjoy the wee one and watch her growing up savouring every moment sadly as everyone knows you don't slow down time this leaves only one solution enjoy each  and everyday as if they are all weekends that way I can trick father time into making my weekends longer....... cant I?
And Finally
For the next few weeks I will only be posting three or four times a week due to my commitments in visiting pops in hospital, I hope you understand and stick with the blog over the coming weeks. I will post daily again as things get easier, thanks for your support, and remember if you like what you read share it, if you don't tell me about it. Happy reading.