Saving up for the therapy bills

One of the fun things about being a parent is abusing your children for your own amusement when they are vulnerable.

What? Don't judge me - those of you who have children have almost certainly done it too and those of you who don't, well you're just missing out on the fun.

The abuse may take the form of putting sunglasses on your baby and taking photos (virtually compulsory that one) or just mocking them gently without them realising it. However if you get the chance to have a really good go at them, you don't pass it up lightly.

First Born is a heavy sleeper. When he is out, he is out. When he was a toddler I always said that once he was properly asleep, you could have dangled him out of the window by his ankles and he wouldn't wake up. I suspect that is still the case but given the size of him now, I would need a lot of assistance with the dangling thing. He is no lightweight.

This morning I went into the boys' room to check on SB who is unwell at the moment (as a side issue, is there anything, ANYTHING in the world more annoying than paying huge amounts of money for Easter holiday activity camp and then STILL having to take the time off work because your child is horking his internal organs into the toilet on an hourly basis? No, I thought not.)

Anyway, SB was wan and slightly pathetic and it looked very much like Mum was not going to work today. FB was asleep, rolled up in his duvet with only his nose, eyes and mop of really-needs-cutting blond hair poking out. I called to him. He didn't even flinch. I shook him. Nothing. I pulled the duvet down below his shoulders. Zero. I chortled to myself. "Who wants broccoli for breakfast?" I said. I lifted FB's arm straight up in the air"Me!" Not a sausage. I snapped the waistband of his pyjamas. Not so much as a flicker. I recruited Horny the stuffed water buffalo to stomp on his head and butt him in the face but to no avail. He was really REALLY asleep and it was genuinely time to be up and about and getting dressed and eating toast (hot with melty butter. I wonder sometimes if he is really my son)

I rolled him over on to his back and contemplated holding his nose closed - if he can't breathe, he'll wake up, right? Then I wondered just how traumatising it would be to startle awake in your bed with your own mother trying to suffocate you and decided that I couldn't afford the therapy bills. (I'm pretty sure that would have woken him though.)

At this point Husband came in to see what was going on. So we decided to play a sort of Jenga-inspired game we call "See how many cuddly toys you can stack on the boy before he wakes up". We pulled his duvet right back and set to work. Water buffalo, dragons, rats, bears, several dogs, Basil (who might be a dog or a rabbit, it's hard to tell 'cos he's flat) and a plush Mario, all were placed carefully on top of our snoozing offspring. He never moved. Husband was just expressing the view that he really ought to go and get the camera when FB finally shifted slightly, causing a minor avalanche of stuffed menagerie. "What's all this stuff doing on me?" he said (remarkably placidly in my opinion). He then crawled out from under the pile and stomped off to the bathroom, shaking his head in wonderment at our frivolity.

Tomorrow morning I am going to try and dress him up without waking him. We have an old Dracula dressing up costume from last Halloween. Maybe I can convince him he's been out stalking the streets by night?