Whiner takes all

One of the nice things about the kids getting older is discovering what they like to do, and are good at (in addition, that is, to making noise and mess, beating each other with any objects in arm’s reach, and following me to the toilet (“Whatchya doooning Mummy?”) whereupon they stand on my feet and offer to help “wiping your big bum, Mummy”).  The Girl loves gymnastics, homemade pesto, and 1990’s House Music.  The Boy loves prawns, hiding in very small air-tight containers, saying “Huh?” at the end of every sentence in the very annoying voice of a very bored teenager, and Michael Jackson (“the poor man who died because he was so lonely he ate all his medicines”).  He also loves Go Fish – or more specifically, winning at Go Fish. 

To every Yin, there is a Yang.  The Girl hates the Boy teasing her about seeing her bum / knickers every time she does a headstand;  she also hates not being allowed to eat the entire bowl of pesto, and my attempts to teach her to dance like a proper raver (“Open your eyes REALLY wide”).  The Boy doesn’t like shell-on prawns (because I made the mistake of telling him they looked like cockroaches), passing out, me calling him Kevin, or my attempts to teach him to dance like MJ (“Keep the glove ON”).

He also does NOT like losing at Go Fish.  I discovered this for the first time yesterday when I made the terrible mistake of actually winning.  It really was a mistake – I had intended to let him win, just as I always let him win, but I kept getting all the right pairs and before I knew it, I’d won the whole lot and he was sitting red-faced and pouty, arms folded, bottom lip sticking out.  He then threw the cards on the floor and stomped off, shouting in his wake that it was my fault I’d won, and if I had shuffled the cards differently, then he would have won.  Two hours later he was still banging on about the injustice of it all, how if I hadn’t set out the cards the way I did I would NEVER have won and, frankly, we was never speaking to me again (“not EVER, huh?”).

I dread to think how he might react when he hears my Big News... I won something!  This is remarkable because I never win anything.  I once won a large box of chocolates when I was about 11, but they arrived on the first day of Lent, just as I’d given up sweets for forty long days, by which stage they’d been eaten by “mice”. Since then, nada.   And then earlier this week, the lovely Helen, font of all wine-knowledge, drew my name out of a hat (actually her brilliant mother did – watch it here) and Ta-Da!  Soon I will  be the proud owner of a very lovely-sounding cashmere scarf (Yes!  Cashmere!  It will be the softest thing the kids have ever rubbed their filthy paws on) AND a copy of Helen’s fantastic wine book.

Except as you know, I am already the proud owner of her book.  So, I’m going to give it away to one of you lot.  Just say hello* in the comments box below, and I will then get the Boy to pick a name from a hat (“what’s the whole point of a hat, huh?”); if  Lady Luck likes the cut of your jib, a copy of the Knackered Mother’s Wine Club will be YOURS**.  

(*Alternatively, feel free to use the comment box to make me feel marginally better about my children's behaviour by telling me the most irritating thing(s) your's have done this week. Note that comments are restricted to a few dozen examples...)

(**Note - You don't actually have to be a mother (or father), knackered or otherwise, to either enter the comp or enjoy the book.)