Baby talk and cardboard boxes

I have to admit that, although I've had three children, I really don't like babies. (Other people's, that is. My own were fabulous, obviously.) Until they're a few months old, they have to be handled like unexploded bombs in case they projectile vomit in your hair or start a three hour squalling marathon. I adored my own children (still do, actually), but I will never be one of those women who get all squealy over friends' babies. It doesn't go down well to ask, 'Do I have to?' when asked if you want to hold said baby, so I end up with an infant which eyes me suspiciously, while I try to work out the shortest time I can hold it without seeming rude. 

From Dave Engledow's 'World's Best Father' photos

(More photos on his Facebook Page)  

I was never one of those mothers who talked in baby words with a high pitched voice. Why do they do that? I always thought it was ridiculous to say to a little child, 'Oh, look at the bunny,' (and certainly never a 'cutesy, ickle bunny') only to have to say, a couple of years later, 'Actually, it's not a bunny, it's a rabbit.' I felt I would have been deliberately teaching them the wrong thing. My Grandmother disagreed with me, but was put right by my daughter: 'It's not a choo-choo, Nanny. It's a train.' Baby-talk makes me cringe, especially if it's done in a silly voice with added noises. Nothing makes me want to leave a room more than a mother who talks in baby-noises, and then tries to get me involved. (Apologies to my children if you feel you missed out.) 

I like children when they get a bit bigger. Okay, so you then have tantrums to deal with (from the toddler, that is. Although I think I may have had a few myself...). I remember how my children made themselves as rigid as a board if they didn't want to go in the pushchair - I had to push them in the middle to get them to sit down. But at least they started to get interesting. And from that age on, they just got better. By age 10, they were more or less human. 

Actually, the Daughter was up from Cornwall over the weekend, and we had a conversation about childhood and cardboard boxes. (Wow, we sound an interesting family!)  My children were reminiscing about the fun to be had from a huge cardboard box. The best was one from a new washing machine - it spent weeks taking up the best part of the living room. It was decorated with crayons (as was the carpet, we later found), and ended up with windows (cut out by the children using lethally sharp steak-knives) complete with curtains held up with sticky tape. Great fun.

I would love to get dozens of huge boxes, put them in the school hall and let the children loose on them, just to see what they make.