WOOLLY BOOTS WITH LACES

Socks and shoes have always been an issue with tiny babies. Apart from the ridiculously expensive Baby Gap socks I have never had a baby who managed to keep his or hers on at all. When you are born around Xmas, you don't want to be hanging around barefoot. Until I had Anna, I had persevered with countless lost socks and shoes and frozen toes. When Anna was born Thomas's Danish cousin sent us a pair of home-knitted booties. I put them on her one day without thinking about it and realized that the laces meant they didn't fall off, and therefore the socks also stayed on. Bingo! By the time Anna was six months old, her one pair of booties was pretty scabby but had definitely proved useful. This time round, my mum must have remembered me raving about them because she knitted Amaia five or six pairs. I, too, made her a pair so Amaia has never had cold feet in her life! I'm a bit annoyed at myself for not thinking of this earlier. I guess very few people knit baby clothes now that shop-bought clothes are actually cheaper, but when it comes to shoes I'd definitely recommend these over any of the cheaper shop models that, like the socks, simply fall off. Time for back-to-basics on the baby shoe front!

WHY I'LL BE SHOPPING AT TESCO

Tesco CN54AEG
Originally uploaded by didbygraham

I recently tried to buy a T-shirt for Marcel while out shopping at Govan ASDA. I had no problem finding the baby clothes section, the young childrens' clothes and finally the older children. In fact I could easily have clothed any of my kids up to about 12 years old. Marcel however is in age 13-14 clothes. When I asked for the clothes for older children, I was told that he would need small adult clothes. That made sense so I got him a T-shirt and didn't think another thing about it.
Yesterday, with the weather getting colder, I suggested to Marcel he needed a pair of jeans (he's been in three quarter length trousers all summer). I happened to be in Tesco rather than ASDA. Marcel went to see if they had small adult jeans. Luckily for us, they didn't but I was sent to the kids' department where their clothing went right up to 15. Then it hit me... Of course! Kids' clothes in the UK come without VAT, adult ones don't. Suddenly I realized why ASDA stops kiddie clothing before they even get to high school. Cheeky buggers!

MATERNITY WEAR

I don't usually use the blog to advertise but here's some advice to anyone out there who is thinking of having any babies... Given I am experienced enough to know what I am talking about, I thought I'd mention that in all the years I have spent pregnant I have found there is actually only one comfortable model of maternity trousers on the market in the UK. In general you find you either get loose things that fall down and you miserably spend the whole day pulling back up for fear of exposing your whale-like midriff, or you get tight things that dig into you and make you want to spend the day in your dressing gown. Of course there are hideous jogging bottoms but you feel frumpy enough without donning a shellsuit for six months. So here is a link to your salvation! These are tight enough they don't fall down, soft enough they dig in nowhere, the waist doubles over so you get support for your aching belly and your nagging back. Unless you are due mid-summer, I suggest a couple of pairs of these are a must for anyone wanting to enjoy their pregnancy!

DECEPTIVE TARTAN

I was born a Buchanan as you know so I have always known what Buchanan tartan looks like. If you'd asked me to describe it without showing me a sample I'd have said predominantly red and orange with two shades of green and a wee bit of yellow. Yesterday I decided to colorize a photo of the wedding just for fun. To do that I obviously had to magnify if to 400% and colour in each patch of the kilt individually. I was amazed at how deceptive the overall effect is. Firstly it seems to contain almost no orange at all but has large patches of both bright blue and fuchsia pink. I stand amazed!

AN UNFORESEEN PROBLEM

When Derek so kindly offered to lend Thomas his beautiful Buchanan tartan outfit in its entirety there was one wee problem we missed. Thomas is probably an inch taller, so we knew that wasn't significant. Derek's neck is half a size wider, again no problem there. Waist and chest sizes look similar too. The obvious difference that none of us overlooked were the feet. Derek has the smallest feet I ever encountered in a reasonably tall man - 7ish (41ish) I believe. Thomas is a typical 9 (43). We knew this so Thomas hired some brogues in town for the afternoon. Problem solved...! Or so we thought. What none of us had worked out till half an hour before the ceremony was that kilt socks aren't cotton and lycra blends to fit size 6-10 like normal blokey socks, but are wool... unstretchable one-size wool. That made Derek's socks 2 sizes too small and therefore 3 inches too short. With the heel in his instep Thomas had the additional problem of them constantly falling down! OOPs. Poor Thomas was paranoid about them all afternoon, and now we're desperately hoping he hasn't stretched them beyond future use by Derek too. Though in the scheme of things a wee socky problem is fairly minor.

DANISH DRESS SENSE

This morning Thomas had stuck on Kaj and Andrea for Pudge - a programme he remembered from his own childhood (in particular because Charlotte had kindly zapped the episode of In the Night Garden he had asked to watch because she didn't like the 'Pontipines'). Léon was happy to watch this but I must admit I nearly fell over crying with laughter when I saw the bloke's 70s dress sense - in fact the spotty shirt and yellow hand-knitted tanktop were so appalling, I swear it took me at least 10 minutes to even notice the rather fetching hairdo and beard that accompained the clothing!

SANDALS IN THE SNOW?

sandals
Originally uploaded by glsims99

Since moving half our stuff, or to be more precise 80% or my stuff and 30% of Thomas's to the house, I have been desperately hunting for more appropriate footwear now the colder air and wetter weather is here. On Friday, I found a huge bag of shoes, but was less than pleased to discover neither my brown flat boots which I have been hunting to wear with my denim skirt, nor my black ankle boots, which I tend to wear all winter with all trousers. Today, however, during one of my searches, I was thrilled to find both in a little rucksack in the kitchen. Problem solved...or maybe not. First I tried my black boots, and my poor swollen feet could get in what are usually my comfiest boots, then I squashed my feet into the slightly larger brown boots only to find the zip wouldn't pass either my swollen ankles or legs. Waaaaah! Remind me to have all future babies in the summer! (Only kidding!)
I guess I might be stuck with sandals in the snow this year! Ho hum...

FURRY JEANS?

 

It was 32 degrees celsius in Rome and yet the clothes shop was selling these!? It is too hot for normal jeans let alone furry ones! (And I thought Italians were generally known for their good dress sense ;-) ) What are they thinking about?

FALSE ECONOMY?

Just wee observation about kids' shoes! Have you ever bought any of Barrat's shoes for kids? They tend to be £10 to £15 in comparison to Clarks which charges a whacking great £25+. So you'd think we'd all rush to Barrat's? I have made that mistake 3 times. The pitiful offerings last between 1 and 3 weeks before the sole splits from the top and you have to take them back. Clark's on the other hand last up to a year, remaining totally waterproof. They are tough and resistant. I for one wouldn't go anywhere else for kiddie-proof shoes.

DARWIN, EVOLUTION AND ALL THAT

Is it just me or are we in danger of developing into a species with no legs? I was in London and Denmark over Xmas - ie I was in a few very large airports and more and more children either zoomed past me on the most ridiculous of footwear . I even saw one in ASDA yesterday and she couldn't have been any older than Marcel. Her dad was pushing a trolley and she was holding the side of it being pulled effortlessly around the shop. Give me strength! Am I alone in believing any parent in their right mind should simply stamp their feet like a spoilt three year old when their adolescent requests these and shout 'NO, NO, NO!'? I have nothing against roller blades, skateboards etc - if they want to have fun, let them have fun - but these are just awful - they cruise past you, or worse still I see and adult pushing a large airport trolley loaded down with suitcases and some lazy neanderthal teenager hanging onto the back actually being dragged along on their wheels - We get little enough exercise these days without encouraging kids to be pulled about on a string. And as for walking - have you ever seen a kid actually attempt to walk in these things? - they hunch forward at an awkward back breaking angle, damaging their posture and spinal cord no doubt, and they are so damned heavy that if they actually try to lift their feet off the ground to walk properly, they positively look like Quasimodo is trying to walk to the loo having wet his pants! Anyway Marcel and Charlotte saw these in Stansted and think they are 'cool' - endlessly they beg for a pair - sorry guys - if you are to get some, they won't be coming out of my bank account!