Knick-knacks, baby crap and Peepee Teepee cones...

Having finally recovered from my quackie duck onesie episode, the broodiness has begun to subside so Hubble has finally agreed to let me out of The Cupboard where I have busied myself stuffing pillows under my jumper and muttering like Gollum about precious wee scrumbums and painting the living room the colour of meconium, under the condition that I stop using the pingu booties as egg cup warmers and quit clucking around like a giant fecking hen.

I am also waiting for the police to inform me that Mothercare has lifted their restraining order and are thankful that I have seen the error of my ways and stopped licking their windows and scaring their pregnant shoppers by dropping to my knees, gently stoking my face with nipple shields and weeping uncontrollably whilst barking all sorts of unsought advice at them like some deranged 'end-of-the-world-is-nigh' sandwich board moon buggy.

Thusly yes, aside from the odd episode whereby I sneak up behind unsuspecting Mumkins and give their newborn's head a damn good sniff in Sainsburys, I'm feeling much better thank you.

So much better in fact that I have gone back to rooting around in my goober schnitzel's bedroom, with the intention of making space for all the squillions of toys and sparkly fun shit that boohound will be gratefully receiving for his 1st birthday next month *gulps at sheer magnitude of occasion, senses familiar gush of broodiness, gets smidge tearful as collates mind montage of poignant moments in the last year accompanied by suitable soundtrack such as The Supremes' 'Baby Love', pulls self together when Hubble mentions The Cupboard and invokes spirit of old iron bollocks, Margaret Thatcher, whilst repeating mantra 'knick knacks on, no harm done; knick knacks off, up chuffing duff.'*.

However, instead of crumbling into a fit of hysteria over a simple piece of cotton (See?! If I wasn't like sooo over the quackie duck onesie and as mentally Zen as Buddha then I couldn't refer to it as a mere piece of cloth now could I? Yep, that's right, these days I'm a double hard bastard) I noticed all the purchases I made when I was pregnant that were either still in their packaging or had been used once and then hurled into the back of the wardrobe in disgust due to its 'doesn't do anything like what it pigging says it does on the tin' ineptitude.

In fact the pile of useless frippery that promises to keep your baby breathing, make them into a mini Stephen Hawkin (without hopefully the Motor Neurone Disease and the voice of a Speak & Spell) and make them happier than teensy wickle piglets in poop, that I assembled, was quite astounding.

Fortunately I have no morals whatsoever and will quite happily sell all these feckless fandangles to overly neurotic, hormonally charged bun bakers on eBay. But for those of you who might be thinking about buying them and are, lets face it, brilliant and probably very beautiful and intelligent for even thinking about reading my blog, here's the shit that Mr Bigass Baby Brand, the porky pie telling pedlar of crud, says you need when I, slightly unhinged poop cleaner of bot, say otherwise:

* Under mattress breathing monitor - they go off ALL the chuffing time making you vomit into your mouth, run like a crazy horse up the stairs, trip up and smack your spam on the landing. But never when your baby has stopped breathing. Because babies like most people, as stupidly inexperienced as they are, tend to just carry on, you know, breathing because it helps them live really and they get that. Clever babies.

They are designed with the sole intention of scaring the bejesus out of you and frankly there's enough to be worried about thank you. Plus you will be standing over your mini potato head for the first few weeks (read: FOREVER) watching them sleep / holding a mirror up to their nostrils / poking them in the face every 25 seconds to make sure they're still alive, so they are needless. And a waste of dosh. Save it and spend it on Gin, much better for calming ones nerves.

* Baby sponges - as rough as a cats anus. Only useful if you want to sand back your baby's bot and give it a lovely French polish. Serves me right for shopping at TheChildCatcher.com

* Pram shoes - Yes they're cute but unless you're giving birth to a foal, your newborn isn't going to be walking and thus necessitate shoes any time soon. However, if you find your lilliputian does exit your womb and suddenly make a run for the door, please give me a call, I would like to exploit you massively and make squillions from your circus freakshow of a child see that.

* Infant Stimulation Mobiles - Bedtime. Traditionally a time for catching zs not, as these bastard contraptions seem to think, for whipping your poobum into a frenzy or encourage them to snort lines of talc or indulge in a scratch mitt rendition of 'big fish little fish cardboard box'. Bedtime is not for raving. GO THE FUCK TO SLEEP.

* Pee-pee Teepee - "A must-have diapering accessory for newborn boys; excellent baby shower gift with guaranteed giggles!" Yes, I nearly died laughing. Putting ice cream cones on my child's penis always reduces me to tears.

* Wipes warmer - if you want your binky bubblebum to grow up like Little Lord Fauntleroy then this is the product for you. Your life will be littered with scweams of: "Mamahhhh! What is this muck you're trying to feed me? READY BREK?! Do I LOOK like a backstreet ruffian? Fetch the Fois Gras immédiatement and tell that simpleton, Sir Poochalot, to bring the moo cow walker around, I feel like a turn about the estate", and the like.

The choice is yours but heed these wise words from, erm, some very clever Mumkin who may or may not write this blog: "A toasty botty wot a coddled crumpet createth." Yeah I know right?! I'm basically the Dalai bloody Lama.

* Steam sterilizer - This honking great space station of a twat takes up nearly one whole length of the kitchen and melts everything in its path into submission. You may as well invite a Dalek to sit on your work top and ask it to lick all the germs from the bottles. Get a microwave one. Or a dishwasher. Or a Dalek...

* Baby cologne - Because babies smell DISGUSTING don't they.

* Swaddling blanket - Upon finding himself out of a job, ousted by the dastardly Ben Shephard, poor Gordon 'Krypton Factor' Burns decided to get his own back by inventing the world's hardest puzzle.

Introducing the Swaddling Blanket - 25 pieces of Velcro that can never and will never meet up to make a fastening and 8 frustrating holes for which no-one knows the purpose (whose baby has 8 limbs? Oh right yes, you Mrs Tarantula, I do apologise. Oh no no noooo I wasn't all suggesting that your baby is a freak...although YOU are for getting it a with a spider, dirty arachnid fiddler).

Well Gordo, you succeeded in your cunning plan, my brain is now but a pile of liquidised turnip. And my wee flipflop is cold. Oh but hang on, there's a proper blanket over there! And looky here! If I wrap it around nutterly butterly...it SWADDLES him! Who knew eh? Who kneeeew!? Genius.*

I could go on but I fear I may sully my reputation *hears shouts of "What reputation? You're a twazzock love!" Meh* by painting myself as a compulsive shopper of total crapola and also wildly offend any of you who may have bought this stuff and found it to be absolutely chuffing wizard. *Bum squeaks uncomfortably in seat*.

The moral of this story boys and girls is to never go shopping when you are hormonal. If you feel like your belly dweller is telling you to buy this stuff because he/she neeeeeds it, back away from the Pee Pee Teepee and reverse out of Boots in the manner of someone who has just detonated a bomb (always a laugh to make the shop assistants brick their undercrackers and create unnecessary panic, narf!), go and find a cake shop, stuff yourself until bilious and then count all the money you didn't just spend on an item to decorate your loft.

Right, I'm off to coerce pudding club dafties on eBay into buying all the doohickeys and floss I just warned you off. *Oh hello Mr Devil, yes, yes I know you're here to take me to hell for my acts of villainous extortion and cashing in on the misfortune of wibbly gestationals but is it ok if I just wait til the auction for the Wipes Warmer ends? Hang on, you don't fancy it do you? You know, in case we hear the pitter-patter of tiny cloven hooves one day? Awww go on, £2.99 'Buy it Now', for the warmest toosh in the underworld. Bargain!*

Gone quackers

I am spent. Having whiled away the last three hours booing like a wounded goat into several plastic storage containers, folding and refolding Boohound's newborn era threads whilst growing intoxicated by the lingering scent of Lenor’s ‘Essence of Sprog’ fabric softener, my face now resembles something between a puffer fish and bum-soothsayer, Jackie Stallone.

For in my naive ignorance of the power of a 0-3 months quacky duck onesie, today I blithely began the business of sorting out Mcmuffin's drawers with the intention of making space for his big boy dungas and summer wardrobe.

It seems bloody unfair by the way that my dunkin' doughnut, a BOY nontheless, has a seasonal collection of clothes whereas I have feck all. I own approximately one cruddy old jumper with spag bol stains for winter and a summer dress with a pigging great rip from a day of denial whereby I tried to stuff my enormous preggers bulk into it. And failed miserably. Then spent the rest of the day crying mahoosive hormonal tears and refusing to go out lest I be subjected to jeers such as: “Oi! Nelly! Pack up your trunk and naff off back to the circus would ya?!” *imaginary cockney rascal clicks heels, links arms with Dick Van Dyke and The Artful Dodger and skips off to the chimes of the Bow Bells through Laaahndaaan Tahhhn. Tsk.*

However, me being jealous that nippy longstocking has more clothes than the entire cast of Sex and the City is not the issue here. The fact that sorting through Boo's just-born togs reduced me to tears and nearly impelled me to rip off Hubble's undercrackers, wrestle him to the floor and demand that he impregnate me immediately, is. Again, nobody warned me about the power of a 0-3 months quackie duck onesie, so I am warning you.

Things is, now that rinky dink is virtually self sufficient (well not in as much that he plants taytos, cultivates Swiss chard and milks his own moo cow), so far as holding his bottle, entertaining himself and probably, if he felt so inclined, cooking a perfect lobster soufflé whilst conducting a shares trade on his Chatterphone and teaching the dog Mandarin, I feel like I am slowly becoming obsolete.

I know this is silly really. I know that I am still called upon to wipe crap from botty wots and scoop Weetabix from chins, walls and pooch’s spam, implement mountain rescue missions for scuppered attempts at bookcase scaling and perform the fish-and-flick manoeuvre for masonry nails, shards of glass and rusty razor blades that Boo has inexplicably discovered under the sofa and stuffed recklessly into his goblet but I miss the hazy, sleep deprived, covered in weird yogurty smelling poop months of total dependency.

Yes, it’s so wonderful that my little fruit bat is thriving, growing-up and becoming his own person but one never quite realises that the time between ejecting them from your twinkle to packing a box of impossibly small rompies, booties and all sorts of other cutesies, ready for the loft, has gone by lickety-split until you’re wailing like a foghorn and blowing your hooter on a teeny weeny quacky duck onesie.

Odd isn’t it? How anyone can miss being relied on completely? Well firstly, I am a bit *read: ALOT* mental. Secondly, all that neediness makes you feel super important. As important as say, oxygen or food or telly – yeah, that’s right, TELLY. Pretty freakin' important then.

Because, as much as you might have been CEO at your company during those heady days of employment, you didn’t have to breastfeed the Accounts Manager every three hours did you? *Oh you did? Er ok, sicko...* And you didn’t have to sing the receptionist to sleep because you were the only one who could or change the intern’s nap-nap whenever they did a monumental turd that stank out the office.*Oh, again, you did? What sort of frickin’ company were you running you mucky reprobate?!*

Anyway, back in those first few months, you were needed. In fact you were actually completely chuffing vital...and now you’re not. Well, not as much. You’re just a bit of a shitty party pooper really Mummy because you perpetually interfere with plug socket play and force boring old lunch down tiddlywink's throat just as he was about to conduct electricity. Bah.

So yes, as fruitloopy as it sounds, I miss being God and controlling everything and being pigging indispensable so now I’m a bit emotional and a smidge power hungry.
And now I want another baby. A tiny one that is basically as incapable as a potato. Oh quacky duck onesie, what have you done?!

Thus, to prevent myself mounting my poor, exhausted and now rather terrified hubble at every given moment and demanding another totally reliant moppet, I have taken to watching Teen Mom on MTV. A natural course of action I’m sure you’ll agree.

This programme, in case you’ve missed it (quite likely really if you're over 13 years old and haven't been grounded), is what doctors should prescribe to prolific procreators who refuse to use contraception and horny adolescents who think that parenthood looks like a reet hoot and no harder than keeping a Tamagotchi alive (which is actually pretty chuffing hard so another comparison may have been more suitable. I mean, why does one need to feed a keyring exactly? Do keys get hungry?).

Whilst I am not a teen and do not have parents that hate me / live in a shoe / sprinkle crystal meth on their Cornflakes / want their grandchild to be called Franchise, Bidet or T-Bone, the daily grind that these young Mumkins face caring for their wee ones in the first throws of parenthood changes very little as time moves on and one supposedly gets older, wiser and less libidinous *yawns at mere thought of rumpy, pulls on pjs with split in the arse and smell faintly of chips, fastens chastity belt securely over the top, swallows key and collapses face first into ungainly heap on unmade bed*. You may even find that you empathise with the mini Mumsies. And suddenly remember why you make Hubble wear eight condoms and shower in spermicide before a round of mattress dancing post-monkeychops' arrival.

Thus, if you’ve yet to start sorting your treacle tart’s too small smalls into ickle bickle piles ready to be stored away, arm yourself against broodiness - take the opportunity whilst your lovely stationary milk dud is sucking on your nip to flick over to Teen Mom.

Now dig out that quackie duck onesie. Go on, give it a good sniff. Can't even FORCE a tear can ya eh?! Even if you jab yourself repeatedly in the eye with a teething spoon you can't quite muster a blubber. And why might that be you hardened embittered old fart? Because the image that is ingrained in your mind of some spotty spud in Juicy Couture looking at her screaming newborn with utter disbelief that it has dookied up its back and created a poop toupee for itself for the 14th time in two hours, has popped up and slapped you in the face. No, really, there's no need to thank me. Thank Teen Mom - the most effective form of birth control since Y-fronts.

So, no more babies for me just yet thank you please. Guess I’d better put the scissors down and back away from the diaphragm then. Unless I want a new MTV series named: ‘I was hornswoggled by a quacky duck onesie into making multiple Boo Boos’ *swells with pride at incredibly succinct and catchy title, lights cigar and considers new career as TV fat cat* made about me.

No, perhaps not. Although I am now considering calling my next child Bidet...