From sad to worse

Emma woke up today at 6.30. No usual twittering, she just asked "Monkey home?" in a sad little voice.

So at 6.31 and already feeling wobbly I phoned the £1000-a-minute 24 hour railway helpline. A nice-sounding lady gave me the number of Biel/Bienne station.

At 9 I phoned them up. No monkey. Fill in a lost property form on the internet, madame.

At 9.05, with Emma usefully distracted with shelf-emptying, I filled out the form.
Please describe lost item: one light brown, soft cloth monkey, 14cm tall, 8 cm wide (approx). Well loved.

11.30. Emma's nap time. "Monkey?" she said, as I put her in her cot. "He's not here, my love. I'm so sorry." She bursts into uncontrollable sobbing. "Mon-KEY!" I take her out of bed and she clings on to me sobbing and gulping. I stroke her little soft head and tell her she is very brave. Then Gloria starts crying and suddenly we are all at it.

Both girls eventually go to sleep.

2pm Purchase replica Monkey from shop in St Andrews. Should be here by the end of the week.

4pm. Go to friend's house for tea. Glorymouse much more cheerful, but E still a bit subdued.

Bedtime. "Monkey?" says Emma as R gets her into her pyjamas, but it's not really a question. She knows he's gone.

We are never getting guinea pigs.

A sad day

We've just come back from a long weekend in Amsterdam, and I was mentally preparing a very chatty post about it when disaster struck on the way back.

Two stops from home - and we'd been on a train for 8 hours - Emma was grumpy (as I say, we'd been on a train for 8 hours) and I did a casual hunt for Monkey to calm her down.

Let me backtrack a moment: anyone who has ever met Emma has also met Monkey. To most of the questions in Emma's life, Monkey is the answer. Tired? Monkey. Teething? Monkey. He has been her companion at every single bed and nap time since she was born.

I last saw her idly holding Monkey's hand by the train door as people were getting off at Biel/Bienne station. I actually thought to myself "it would be awful if he fell out now." Less than 10 minutes later, it became apparent that he was missing from the train. Did he jump? Did he fall? Was he pushed? Was he enraptured up to the big banana plantation in the sky?

Like idiots, we never got round to buying a duplicate. We saw an identical Monkey in a shop once, and waved it in E's face going "look who it is!" - and she saw through the duplicity straight away. Of course he wasn't Monkey: he was much too fluffy, didn't smell and didn't crackle with 2 years' worth of baby body fluids clogging up fur. (I think he made it to the washing machine only 3 or 4 times, but please: no hygiene lectures. I'm grieving.) I knew the risks of him getting lost were great, so he was never allowed to leave the house unless we were staying overnight.

I cried all the way home. "Mummy crying!" said Emma, which made Mummy cry some more. R explained to her that Monkey had gone on holiday and he was unlikely to be back. As we walked back to our flat, I imagined a large part of her little world falling apart and having to deal with loss for the first time and my heart broke for her. Plus he was a very sweet little toy, a present from the matron on my old ward when I went on maternity leave. A job that I thought I'd go back to, but now won't.

We ate with heavy hearts, dreading the Monkeyless bed time routine. I fed Glorymouse while R put Emma to bed. "Would you like to sleep with doggy/teddy/Sean the Scorpion?" (Sean might actually be a lobster, we're not sure.) One by one, each replacement animal was thrown from the cot. Emma whimpered "Monkey!" two or three times. Then she started playing with a small, plastic lion and chatting to herself. And now she's asleep. No tears, no trauma. At least not for her.

So there you go: adaptable little so-and-so's, kids, more than we give them credit for.

But I haven't given up on Monkey quite yet. I am phoning the station tomorrow, and will keep you posted.

What now?

So now that I'm practically a Swiss citizen, what shall I do now? Pick some Edelweiss? Book a yodelling class? Try one of the rust-coloured anatomical-looking local sausages? (I've managed to avoid this one in particular for the last year and a half. I can stall some more.)

Meanwhile, R has been to the dentist and come back evangelising about oral hygiene.
E.g:
R: "We must start flossing regularly!"
Slady: "Oh."
or
R: "Have you flossed today?"
Slady: "No."
or
R: "Now that I floss regularly, my gums have stopped bleeding!"
Slady: "Oh!"

Is he trying to tell me something?

I've always been avoidant of the dentist. My non-attendance record is four years. I prefer to give my teeth a light dust now and then, and act surprised when they all need extracting. But dental floss? C'mon! It's just a bit of waxy thread, and the temptation to dispose of it by wiping it on a clean surface is very great.

So flossing: is it optional (5 a day), compulsory (giving up smoking) or Compulsory (washing your hands after you go to the loo)?

(It's raining and my mind has wandered.)

Should I stay or should I go?

We're staying.

Although work was calling me back, it wasn't shouting loud enough for me to pay it any attention. Although our lovely house with its lovely garden was whispering tenderly, I know that both are being beautifully looked after by our model tenants. Although I find it very hard not to see friends and family in the flesh, I follow a lot of people's life minutiae via other blogs/emails and sometimes it feels like I'm there in the same sitting room with a cup of tea, putting the world to rights.

Here is the deal. We are in Suisse for at least another year. I am letting my UK nursing registration expire and I have no plans to get a job here. Which means I am officially a full-time mum (as opposed to being on a career break.) We did a lot of thinking about all this, and now that the decision has been made it all feels very good.

I'm very grateful that we don't need two incomes to make ends meet. And though a lie-in would be nice, rolling around the bed with my two gorgeous girls at 6am makes me feel like the luckiest person alive.

Another (excellent) reason to stay: if I fall out of bed the right side, I pretty much land in a bakery with dreamiest, flakiest pain au chocolat in the world.

So that means Switzerlady is here to stay, too. (Though for the record, I did consider Tooting Birdway.)

Sorry I'm late (again.) There is nothing like a 2 year old hammering little fists on the computer keyboard and a constantly ill and screaming Glorymouse for mucking about with one's creative muse.

Besides, I have run out of things to say, possibly for ever. Here is my day: feed baby, dress baby, feed toddler, dress toddler, laundry, cuddle baby, comfort eat, cuddle toddler. laundry, shopping, cook, comfort eat etc etc (Desperate Housewives has finished, during which all the above activities were suspended.) I'm not complaining - OK, yes I am - but I am struggling to get good bloggage out of life at the moment.

I've also been a bit distracted as we wrestle with the question of whether or not to stay in Switzerland. It will be 2 years in August since we moved, and we said we'd give it no more than 2 years initially. There are a lot of factors at play, but expect an announcement by the end of the week. Going back home means no more Switzerlady, obviously - Tootinglady just doesn't have the same je ne sais quoi. But it's been fun, eh?