Go on a childcare expedition which involves
1) Walking to the train to catch the train and having to run to catch the train while keeping track of two pre-schoolers.
2) Travel on train with baby and another person whose name you cannot remember. Make the train crowded. Feed baby in public.
3) Miss first bus to Te Papa because it was too crowded to fit on 14 pre-schoolers and 5 adults and 5 pushchairs. Sit in cold windy bus shelters feeding chocolate yoghurt stuff to someone else's kid while your ass (and kidneys) freeze to death.
4) Get evil eye from bus driver all the way from train station to Te Papa.
5) Herd kids round Te Papa. The exhibits were pretty good for pre-schoolers! They liked the shakey house (we were there to see stuff on earthquakes, nature and volcanoes. So Te Papa was perfect for that.)
6) Wait for AGES in the cold windy plaza in front of Te Papa to catch another bus with more evil eyes back to train station.
7) Travel back on train with Own Child asking "Are we there yet?" at each station.
8) Walk back to car and spend a good 10 mins on the side of a busy road trying to work out how all this stuff goes in the car...
9) Have elder son home with you in the afternoon for an extra 1.5 hours.
Baby h was perfect, didn't cry once during the whole trip. And I mean he didn't say anything!!! 'Very interesting' was his approach, and he didn't sleep much cos he didn't want to miss anything.
Stuffed if I know how you could do that kind of thing every day and not become insane/addicted to illegal substances. Go the Early Childhood Teachers, they are heroes.
Posted by Toni at October 14, 2004 04:00 PMI have never understood why kindy/early childhood teachers/creche workers/nannies/at-home-mothers are so under-rated... especially given that it's been acknowleged since classical times that the 1st few years of a child's life shape the adult... bizarre!
Posted by: karen at October 15, 2004 08:01 AM