belgianwaffle

Family

You must be joking


Posted in: Family, Princess

When I was little, my father refused to explain jokes to me and this was a source of enormous irritation. I still remember one which I puzzled over for years.

Boy: What’s a feebly father?

Father: There’s no such thing.

Boy: There is, I read it in a book.

Father: What does it say?

Boy: He had a feebly growing down on his chin.

The Princess is now interested in jokes but she hasn’t the faintest clue how they work. Determined not to torture her as her grandfather did me, we tried to explain.

Me: Knock knock.

Mr. Waffle: Who’s there?

Me (thinking furiously): Ummm.

Him: Mr. Amnesia?

Me: Giggle.

Her: Why is that funny?

Me: No, no, it’s not, wait a minute what’s black and white and red all over?

Her (crossly): I don’t know.

Him: That’s more of a riddle really.

Me: Hissing noise.

Her (more crossly): I don’t know.

Me: A newspaper. See, it’s black and white and you read it all over, so it’s read all over.

Her: I see, I see. Let me try.

Us (enthusiastically): Ok.

Her: What’s yellow and doesn’t have any pages?

Us: Umm.

Her (laughing): A cushion.

I am beginning to see real merit in my father’s approach.

Anatomy of an unsuccessful evening


Posted in: Family, Mr. Waffle, Princess, Twins

3 – Number of people who cried before dinner: the Princess because I wouldn’t give her a bowl of cornflakes, Michael because I wouldn’t let him have his party bag from the creche and me because the Princess cannoned in to me while I was sitting on the floor and knocked my head into the cast iron radiator (big bump).

3 – Number of people who actually ate any dinner: me, Mr. Waffle and the Princess (reluctantly), dinner boycotted by the boys (determinedly).

1 – Number of people who sat down triumphantly to a bowl of cornflakes at 8 o’clock.

2 – Number of people who howled hungrily and refused to get into the bath.

1 – Number of people who stayed up on the computer until one in the morning.

1 – Number of people awoken from slumbers in the middle of the night by errant spouse blinding him with bathroom light.

Virtuous in-laws


Posted in: Family, Ireland

Due to careless parenting and poor planning we are only now searching for childcare for the boys in Dublin in September. After phoning about we identified some creches which might be suitable. Mr. Waffle’s parents kindly agreed to go and inspect them as we won’t be back in Dublin until late Summer. This blog post is how I reward them, truly, I am an unworthy daughter-in-law.

As guidance, we gave them the following:

“Kind of things to look for:

Carer to child ratio

Are the carers nice? Are they sitting on the floor with the children?

Do the children seem happy?

Is there an outdoor play area?

Is there plenty of room indoors?

Assume no TV – if TV, particularly on display will be horrified.

Is it clean?

Our current creche does not meet all of these criteria but, you know, we’re shooting for the stars here.”

I had assumed, in a very sexist way, that my mother-in-law would do the inspecting but in fact she and my father-in-law went together. My father-in-law has not been a captain of industry for many years (now retired) without knowing that you must be able to measure performance. When reporting back to us the other evening (orally, written report follows below) he said that he had two satisfactory responses to the question of how to ensure the children were happy. We were quite startled but he was obviously keen to hold these people to SMART targets on behalf of his little grandsons. And I have proof. Highlights from the report follow:

Creche

(Member of the Advisory body for the sector?) eg NCNA? –yes.

How long established? This crèche seems to be up and running for at least 6/7 years. It has an overall capacity of about 45+ children, and is certainly looking to replace kids who will leave the Montessori group this summer.

We spoke with the manager … a young [exotic nationality] lady who has risen up through the ranks since joining in 2001.

The happiness factor: When asked to comment on how the crèche delivers on this key ingredient for the children the manager was adamant that staff quality and commitment is the number 1 factor. The kids we saw certainly seemed to bear this out as we saw them interact in play with their teachers, moving from room to room with supervision…

Staff/children ratios: this varies in a regulated fashion across babies (about 1:3), toddlers (1:5/6) up to Montessori (around 1:10). Staff seemed very conscious of these ratios from all angles (financial, delivering proper care and of course the regulatory dimension (see “other comments” below)

Carers: with one exception, the staff come from outside Ireland (e.g. the Montessori teacher is Czech). We were assured that they all had child-care qualifications from their home countries, which are recognised here.

Outdoor/Indoor facilities: the crèche is in a modern block [lots more useful and informative details but maybe not so fascinating for you gentle reader]. The street outside seems fine with no obvious druggies, winos, weirdos about, unless you count [prominent Irish person] who lives a block away.

TV/other : they do use kiddy DVDs but sparingly. such a use would be on wind-down day (Friday) in the afternoon, when the kids have had a long week at the crèche and can benefit from a little (1 hour limit) audio-visual entertainment

Feeding arrangements (parent-supplied, in-house, catering?): inhouse cooking-we have copy of a typical week’s lunch menu and it covers main meals such as chicken (several guises) tuna, spag bol, etc. the manager [who you will recall is from a far-off land] defined this as “typical Irish food”. Feeding times are beakfast, morning snack, lunch, afternoon snack.

Standard routines for toddlers?

Very much Montessori driven, with skills and general learning in the am, and more group play happenings when the children are a little more tired in the afternoon.

Cleanliness/tidiness : Fine :we looked across rooms, loos, changing areas, external play area, etc

Other comments / miscellaneous musings:

  • Manager seemed cheerful, capable, hands-on and committed to her work
  • D&M would start on September 1 as toddlers and progress within weeks (after their birthdays) to the Montessori section, in line with Dept of Ed guidelines (sound of hollow laughter off)
  • The crèche looks for kids of this level to be toilet-trained, but will help with this if they are not

See, captains of industry are thorough. Do you like all the additional pertinent questions they thought of? Admit it, you would love to have my parents-in-law inspect your child’s creche. I can see a really lucrative sideline developing for them in this field.

Weekend


Posted in: Family

In Belgium, in May, there are a lot of holidays and the weather generally improves – it’s great that way. So this was another holiday weekend. I am exhausted from the extensive programme of entertainment we have undertaken.

On Saturday afternoon we went and got ourselves badged up for the Parcours D’Artistes. All the artists in Saint Gilles, and there are lots, display their works in their homes and open them up to the public over three weekends. The children were all a bit stroppy so we actually didn’t get into any artists’ homes and took ourselves to a tiny playground boasting one slide and some sand. It’s main advantage being that it was across the road from where we had had an only moderately successful coffee break (wailing for crisps, crankiness, etc.)

The park was a success despite its modest attractions because it contained 3 10 year old Brazilian boys. After some initial confusion when they thought that we were Polish (Gin Dobre – there are not so many Belgians in this part of town, as they explained) and we thought that they were Portuguese (there are a lot of Portuguese in this part of town) we communicated successfully in French.

The boys were absolutely lovely to our three children and played with them and chatted to them. I can’t help wondering whether this is a Latin thing – I just can’t imagine three Irish ten year old boys doing the same thing. I was very impressed by the boy who had only arrived in November and already had pretty good French. At first, I had assumed that he had lived here all his life and wasappalled at his level of French and very disapproving of the the local schools.  Now I think that they must be fantastic.

On Sunday morning, we went to a children’s farm where we have often been before. After 5 years, my husband has finally corrected my pronunciation of this place’s name: he tells me that I have been confusing it with a brand of rice. Sigh. Anyhow, for the Brussels weekend of fun they had games and bouncy castles all of which were only accessible by token obtained from a stall with a long queue. It made us very nostalgic for the cash economy.

In the afternoon, the Princess and I did a preliminary scout around artists’ houses while the boys slept. By far the most attractive exhibit as far as she was concerned was a Disney castle. In fact, I think that may, just possibly, not have been part of the exhibition at all. We stayed in this particular place so long (I looked at the photos, sculptures and paintings for cover) that one of the resident artists came in and offered us a drink. We also spent a long time investigating a very elaborate chair which was part of a theatre set. The Princess played with it while the indulgent artist looked on. Saint Gilles is awash with artists and they are a very tolerant bunch.

In an attempt to get full artistic value for the day we then went to a series of performances for children which were in various states of development. Mr. Waffle and I liked the last of these the best by far (cabaret singing duo) but the Princess was adamant that she liked the second the best putting it ahead of the cabaret, the puppet theatre and the clown (slightly weird clown but still a clown). The second piece featured a crucifix with two dolls attached to it stuck into a bed of nails and a woman trying to hang herself in a wardrobe. Mr. Waffle and I found the performance perplexing. Who was the target audience? It was a little disturbing for the under 5s, it seemed to us. I was unsurprised to see the two cast members wandering around afterwards with a baby looking bohemian (not a bad thing just a very expected thing). I am curious as to what they do for money as I really don’t think that that performance can be pulling in a great deal of cash for them.

Then today we went for a walk and a picnic in the forest. Broadly successful though Mr. Waffle got a little tense during the picnic when the children kept falling off the log we had decided to sit on and would only eat ketchup sandwiches. Onward and upwards to miniature trains in the afternoon. This was surprisingly pleasant as, once we had gone around on a train, the grown-ups were allowed to sit in the shade while the children gathered daisies and watched the trains go by.

Back to work tomorrow, thank God, we’re all flattened. No more bank holidays until the start of June. More on that when I’m feeling stronger.

Weekend


Posted in: Family, Ireland, Princess

On Saturday we went to Planckendael again – it’s like a safari park but less glamourous.  I have had it with Planckendael.  The Princess said that she would rather go to the supermarket and conducted herself accordingly throughout the trip.  We paid 50 euros to get in (and the boys were free) and they spent their time looking at frogs in the river and playing in the elaborate playgrounds. “Will we go and see the giraffes?”  “No!”  The Princess mortified me by going into meltdown at the entrance to the cafeteria where she wanted to stay watching television.  She lay on the ground, blocking the door and screeching.  This loud screaming in public is a very recent development and I am desperate to stop it.  We then climbed up a rope yoke which the Princess loved but the boys were scared and had to be carried.  It is hard to walk up a rope surrounded by netting carrying a small boy.  We got down eventually, the Princess did not get down.  There were words.  We lost her at one point and I was terrified.  There were further words.  We instructed her that, in future, if she ever got lost and could not find someone who worked in the establishment, she was to ask a Mummy to help her.  Yes, yes, picture the scene, there you are having a nice time with your family in Flemish and a weeping lost little girl attaches herself to your group – fabulous eh?

On Sunday, we had our upstairs neighbours and some friends around for coffee.  Our upstairs neighbours are lovely Italians.  There are only two of them and every time I go into their flat which is the same dimensions as ours but oh so different, I am convulsed with envy.  They have white furniture (no children, obviously).  She is finishing a PhD in art history and has acquired all kinds of lovely furniture at auctions and flea markets over the years.  It looks lovely in our 19th century building, unlike, say, my self constructed coffee table from Habitat.  Anyhow, over coffee yesterday the talk was all of our return to Dublin (with the occasional digression into how the recent NATO war training exercise went, from my friend C – she who combines defence work and orchestra management in her portfolio of activity – good news, we won).  They were all curious about what our house in Dublin is like and I, with my fondness for histrionics, put my head in my hands and said “hideous, absolutely hideous”.  I had, alas, completely forgotten that the Princess was there and she looked up at me, shocked and tearful and said “But Mummy, you said that our house was lovely.”  Much furious and, I fear, ineffective backpedalling followed.  I could kick myself.

The house isn’t really hideous, it’s just small and in need of some work.  I was talking to the heart surgeon about it last night and she put her finger on the problem: just as all our friends are settling in the houses they are going to be living in for the rest of their lives, we are moving backwards.  That is exactly the problem.  All our friends are moving in to nice big houses and we are going back to a starter home.  It’s not hideous, it’s relatively hideous.  I hope that in 3 or 4 years we’ll be able to move somewhere nicer but, for the moment, we will have to make the best of it.

Meanwhile, the heart surgeon is back at work after a mere three months (she does live in America so this is extraordinary luxury by their standards) and working weekends and nights and so on (as is her doctor husband) with a 3 year old, a two year old and a three month old.  She is expressing four times a day.  She’s also decided to renovate her kitchen.  I can’t quite imagine how tired she must be.  She told me, in tones of great glee, that, as she had a couple of tough procedures today, her husband was going to mind the baby last night and she was decamping to the third floor for a full night’s sleep.

I’ve been keeping a secret


Posted in: Belgium, Family, Ireland, Mr. Waffle, Princess

No, for the umpteenth time, I am not pregnant.

The Christmas before last I said to my husband that we had to decide whether we were going to move back to Ireland or stay in Belgium because, if we were going to stay in Belgium, we had to buy a house. A three bedroomed, second floor flat is not ideal for bringing up three small children. We decided that we would move to Dublin in September 2008. Now, obviously, it didn’t make much sense to tell anyone about this decision in December 2006, so I have been not telling employers, employees and children for a long time. It’s exhausting.

Last week, Mr. Waffle told his employers. On Friday we told the Princess that we are moving back (some of you may consider that this is a radical solution to our difficulties with L). On Monday we told our childminder and our babysitter. And today I formally told my employer and colleagues and now I am telling you.

Mr. Waffle and the Princess are in Dublin this week. In an excess of efficiency they have visited her new school (an Irish language school – please don’t ask). After hearing her father and the headmaster converse in Irish for ten minutes, she ran from the room telling her grandmother that this was “pointless and useless”. I can tell it’s going to go well. What do you think? She’s also got her school uniform, this is more pleasing. It has a tie. There will be photos.
I am very sad to be leaving this great job and my lovely colleagues. I am very sad to be leaving Belgium and my friends here. On balance though, I think we are doing the right thing. We are very fortunate in both having lovely families with whom we get on very well. We want to see more of them and so do our children. I want my children to be Irish not Belgian (though I see that the Princess is testing this enthusiasm by already adopting the nastiest of Dublin accents, she said to me on the phone this afternoon “Oi don’t want to talk to you, Oi don’t loike the phone”). One of the best things about going back was how our friends in Dubin reacted; they all seem to be genuinely delighted. Despite all its shortcomings (and oh they are many), I do like Dublin and I know I will enjoy living there.

For obvious reasons, the move has been very much in my mind since Christmas but I didn’t want to blog about it ar eagla na heagla (see how I’m taking to this Irish thing?) but I have been taking notes and now I’m putting them here. Because I can.

8 January

Ask my mother what she did with all our furniture when we moved from a large detatched Georgian House to a much smaller semi-detatched Edwardian one. Answer: Moved it all and got rid of none. My mother points out that result has been 20 odd years tripping over pieces of furniture and an attic which strikes terror into her heart. On the plus side, she says I can now have the Nelson sideboard, if I want it. Point out that I have more than enough furniture of my own for my tiny house.

9 January

Prepare first spreadsheet.

January 10

Asked the garage whether they would sell us a car with the steering wheel on the wrong side. They were reluctant. They said that it would be expensive and we would have to wait a year. In inimitable Belgian fashion, 6 (yes 6) people behind the reception desk ignored me for some considerable time but finally, to their evident regret, had to relent and pay me some attention.

January 11

Consider for the umpteenth time the amount of our stuff. My mother often says to my sister (to the latter’s intense irritation): Helen, you have too much of this world’s goods. She’s not the only one. Wonder what size is the attic in our house in Dublin. Curse myself for never even having looked in the attic when we bought the house. My sister says to me, “Mummy is delighted that you are coming home”. I am touched until she adds, “she says that maybe finally you will take all of your stuff out of her house”. My father-in-law is also anxious that we should remove all our stuff from his garage (barbecue and large outdoor heater – a wedding gift from the time when they were a sign that you were trendy rather than a sign that you are an eco-terrorist). My mother-in-law has, however, volunteered to mind our antique sewing machine until we have a house large enough to accommodate it. I suspect that my father-in-law is unaware of her kind offer.

14 January

After much humming and hawing decide to travel to Ireland for interview I am most unlikely to get on the basis that, if I did get it and the job came up in September my family would be able to eat every day rather than just every second day. This problem would mostly affect me and Mr. Waffle as the children prefer not to eat anyway.

18 January

Mr. Waffle hands in notice to the creche. The boys will be finishing there at the end of July. I will be a little sad to end our relations with our excellent creche.

21 January

Flight is delayed and arrive, Cinderella like, at friends’ house in Dublin at midnight. My friends are up awaiting my arrival with tea sympathy and advice. I love their house. It is a home from home as I used to live there. In fact, due to the many parties my husband and I held there, many people still think it is ours. Alas, it is not. I have stayed in the spare room many times and always enjoyed an excellent night’s sleep. On this occasion, I do not. Some vagary of their security system means that the overhead light flashes on every two hours and wakes me in considerable alarm. It is distressingly like being with small children.

Interview is, as expected entirely brutal. At the end, I ask about how many people they expect to appoint and they tell me that they give comprehensive feedback. I say I will look forward to that to general laughter from the board. I’d like to think that they were laughing with me but, I doubt it. [Didn’t get the job].

23 January

Princess and I go round to Glam Potter’s house and I reveal to her sum total of our likely income in Ireland for first two years. She is appalled. How will you survive? I am not comforted.

17 March

Having refused to think about or organise anything for the move in two months in the hope that, oh I don’t know, it would organise itself, I am jolted into action by a series of questions from my mother and brother who are visiting over the weekend. The heart surgeon rings from America and asks a series of hard questions as well. I am now worrying actively.

The Dutch Mama asked whom I had told about my plans to return. I explained that we was waiting until the end of April to tell our children, our employers and our employees about our plans and that I was slightly dreading this event. I was comforted her reply:

Dreading?

Sure it will be brilliant.

Employer: I’M LEAVING! (implicit, for something better, didn’t I always say you don’t pay me enough)

Employees: I’M LEAVING! (implicit, for something better, look at what an exciting international life I have)

Children: Guess what? Brilliant news. Mammy has got a great new job in Ireland, and we’re going to live in a house with a garden, and you can have a swing of your very own, and we’ll be able to see granny every single weekend. Won’t it be just great! And we’ll come back on lots of visits too. And we can invite your friends to come and play on your swing. And we’ve found you a lovely school.(I’d leave out the gaelscoil detail for now if I were you).

Life will be way easier for you in Ireland, and lots of fun.

25 April

Mr. Waffle has told work he’s leaving. I’ve told my boss informally and will hand in my notice next week. Tonight we decided to tell herself. At first, she was very excited but then as the implications sank in, she became distinctly apprehensive. “Why can’t we move to a house with a garden in Brussels; Brussels is my home”. This is true, she has never lived anywhere else and we have never given her any reason to believe that we would move somewhere else. That was, perhaps, foolish in retrospect. “Where will I go to school?” “In Dublin.” “What language will they speak in school?” If I had realised that I was going to be asked this quite so early in proceedings, I would have prepared a different answer from “Irish”*. She started to cry. She was scared, she wouldn’t understand and all her friends were here. This was the first time I really, really realised that we are definitely going and I felt like crying myself. I love Brussels. However, we perked her up as best we could and stressed the advantages which are many – well, otherwise, why wouldn’t we stay here? I am afraid for her. Mr. Waffle says, I can’t have it both ways, saying that she’ll be uprooted from all her friends one minute and agonising that she has no friends the next. Actually, he’s wrong, I can.

* There is a reason why we are sending her to an Irish language school and it’s largely and embarrassingly to do with the fact that Ireland isn’t quite the classless society it once was.