Cabbages are not always good for you

In an outrageous double-cross, Mum and Dad slip away out of the front door, bags packed, headed for a long weekend in Ireland, leaving us in the tender charge of the Angel B and Uncle Jim. They are off to help out at a family "do" at the Silverwoods, with eldest girl Em-J taking her RC Confirmation (which they all do, aged 12). This event is a big rite of passage although not quite as bizarre as the First Holy Communion which has all the school girls aged about 7 in the town, on the same day, dressed in bride's dresses (and all the boys in little groom-suits) and all the parents done up to the nines, trying to out-do the other families with the money spent on clothes, limo's to the church, restaurant dining etc.

In this one, at least, the girls, now 12, mostly wear nice smart new dresses (some still go mad on blancmange dresses in bright pink or cerise, in the "debs" stylee), hair done specially, maybe new shoes etc, and there are also far fewer of the girls, with maybe only three schools getting "done" at once (The one Mum and Dad go to had 30 girls and 50 boys). The families adjourn back to their houses for a bit of a party, with all the frineds, rels and neighbours dropping in.

That's where Mum and Dad came in. Mum was "the catering" so spent 3 days solid buying ingredients and then cooking party food. When she went off shopping with Mrs Silverwood, Dad was babysitter for toddlers M (4) and R (2). Some nice bio-hazard nappies from R, he reports. When Mum was cooking, Dad says he was serial washer-up and spent 3 days at the sink. We suspect this may be a slight exaggeration.

Toddler M is funny at present, as he has that not-quite-correct and expanding vocabulary. It turns out his sweet-tooth and tooth-enamel quality are not a good combination, and the dentist was aghast at his latest visit, at the state of his teeth. Full of cavities, apparently, so he is now on a strict low-sweetie intake regime with special meds to cure abscesses, multiple tooth brushing and mouth-washing etc, to give his baby teeth a chance to see out their natural before being replaced, we hope, by some nice strong pearly-white adult gnashers.

M, though, having not met the word "cavities" mis-heard it as Cabbages and is now convinced he has cabbages in his mouth which need brushing and which hurt more if he eats or drinks sweet stuff. Needless to say, amused grown up like to wind him up in his innocence, by not correcting him. There are, therefore, frequent conversations around "No, you can't have orange juice - it's bad for your cabbages" or "Have milk, instead, it's better for your cabbages"

Bless
More on this soon
Deefski