MIA HIA HIA HIAM

We went to a wedding up in Auckland at the end of March, leaving our children to be looked after by their grandparents...it was the first night I'd had away from Joshka and only the 3rd away from Mia. Actually, it was 2 nights - we took an entire weekend off! Out for breakfast, lunch and dinner and a wedding inbetween. A bit of window shopping and dawdling about - bliss! After the 2nd night though, I felt guily about abandoning my children and I could feel the invisible elastic pulling me back. I did miss them!

When we arrived back to see them, I imagined them running out to meet us (slow motion with sun shining in their hair, eyes twinklingetc), squealing with delight at our return (at last!), but the dog ran out to bark at us and in so doing knocked Josh over onto the concrete floor - tears and more tears and tragic performances that not EVEN the long lost mother could fix. S-i-g-h. Eventually we had smiles and cuddles, which was nice.

And then Mia proudly showed us how she could write her own name! We were all, naturally, extremely impressed. Since then it's been hard to get Mia to draw anything apart from her name. MIA MIA MIA MIA MIA MIA appears everywhere. After 2 weeks 'H' started appearing: MIAH MIAH H HI AIHM etc. Now there's the occasional 'O'. Interestingly Mia seems to feel her name is too short, so her 2nd name is appearing:'Jospehine'in the form of 'MIAHIAHIAHIAM'. I think she just wants her name to be longer than Joshkas.

It's rather like a red Indian MIA-HIA-HIA-HIA...MIAHIAHIAHIA.

I'm rambling.