Bummer

Sadly, the fog in my brain caused by school holidays - how many times can you hear your children say Mummy in one hour before your ears shrivel and fall off your head? - has not fully dissipated. This is because poor Climber selfishly got a gastro-ish bug and I had to pick him up all headachy and feverish from school on Monday and then have him home for a further 2 days. The good news is that the gastro was restricted to his lower half, which meant (a) no vomiting and (b) not too much revulsion nursing on my part since with a bit of coaching (Flush! Wash your hands!! Don't fart unless you're on the toilet!!!) from me he could pretty much manage it himself. The joys of older children. But I have had more discussions about the state of his bottom and the consistency of it's output than I am really comfortable with. Anyway. Sent him back to school today, he should be right.

In other arse-related news, the Cherub's predilection for performing his famous bum-dance shows no signs of abating. As soon as he is nude he will swing his little hips from side to side with a tremendously pleased expression on his face - which is of course looking back at you over his shoulder. The bum-dance craze has been going for a while now. It started, I think, when he was practising stuff we'd done at tap class; anyway, at that age he hadn't located the hip-moving-neurons so the movement came solely from his shoulders. Very funny. And of course I fell over laughing and called Fixit to come see, which, you know, pretty much guaranteed that the kid would be forever trying to relive that glorious moment. Now that he has got the hip movement going on, he is experimenting with a couple of variations; such as some simultaneous bottom-slapping (thank you George of the Jungle) or attempting it with all 4 limbs on the ground to better display the focus of the exercise.

He is definitely the show-off of the family (don't know where he gets that from) so if he finds something that makes you laugh he will keep at it. Over and over. He doesn't at all mind doing it for other people - lookit my bumdance!! - like for example the very surprised takeaway delivery dude. And of course he has to do it Each And Every Time he gets dressed or undressed, regardless of whether we're in a screaming hurry or not. This morning he went to stick his rear end high in the air, so -school morning- I told him to save it for later. He looked at me all puzzled for a moment, then grabbed a handful of butt-cheek by way of demonstration and informed me, earnestly and slightly indignantly, I can't save my bum because it's sticked on. See? And I think there's something in that for all of us.