Flying solo

Eventually it was going to happen.  With my wife being an air stewardess, eventually I was going to be "left holding the baby" whilst she flew through the skies.  It's not as though I don't know how to look after my daughter, it's just that generally I do it on my own for an afternoon, or an evening, or for twenty minutes whilst she pops to the shops - this time it was a whole weekend.

With the rather rapid realisation that the list of all the jobs I usually save for the weekend were out the window, I mentally pulled together some of the things that would keep me sane, and more importantly keep India entertained.  The worst part about it was the forecast of rain the entire weekend, and I'm not sure that I'm ready to subject myself to a soft play centre on a Saturday afternoon.  

On getting her ready to leave the house for a slightly less entertaining trip to the butchers (while the cat's away, the husband will have steak), it dawned on me that I would actually be able to dress my daughter, without having to worry about whether the shade of tights that I put on her, match the stitching of her dress.  This in itself was a small but significant victory over the weekend to come.

I came to realise quite quickly that this was a great opportunity for me to spend some real one-on-one time with India and regain some of the lost hours of the working week.  I devoted myself to this mantra so much so that I spent half an hour pushing her on the swings in the park, yes, half an hour, my arm turned to jelly and I waited ten minutes to get the feeling back before I could drive the car home.  To be honest hearing her constant giggles for the best part of thirty minutes was well worth it.

Constantly running around after the little people for most of the day can challenge your sanity somewhat.  To counteract this I decided that it would be a fantastic idea to take the opportunity to tick a job off my "normal weekend list" - popping India in her cot; I attempted putting up her book shelf.  I'm pretty sure shelves are supposed to be level with the wall; mine was reminiscent of a ramp.

Moving my attention away from home improvements, and concentrating more on weaning improvements, I thought it a good idea to allow India to be a bit bolder with her self-feeding.  She's pretty keen anyway, normally battling to get hold of the spoon and then within the blink of an eye, catapulting its contents across the kitchen.  I went for the 'no spoon' option with her beef goulash and mash.  She delightfully scooped a great handful and promptly smeared it all over her face, and the floor.

I think what summed up my weekend flying solo most was India's latest vocabulary addition.  On more than one occasion, either when she dropped something, lost something, missed her mouth or fell on her bum, she mumbled "Oh dear".  I'm hoping that it's just a sound that she's picked up rather than a reflection of my parenting skills.  I guess we'll only start to find out once I've had a few more weekends of just the two of us.