Writing -- Baby Talk: Birthday preparations

The following article featured in a weekly column on parenting in the Women on Wednesday supplement of The Evening Echo, one of Ireland's leading regional daily newspapers. It appeared in the 28 July 2004 issue.

Where has the last year gone? Our little one will be one at the weekend, and it all seems to have passed in the blink of an eye. And to crown it all off she started to walk just a couple of days ago.

It happened suddenly. She's been standing up herself for quite a while now, but could never quite muster the confidence to take those tentative first steps. Then, out of the blue, she staggered across the floor towards me, for all the world like a drunken pixie, legs desperately trying to catch up with a body already succumbing to the lure of gravity. Her face was a picture: apprehension coupled with unadulterated delight as she realised she was moving under her own steam. And then, just as suddenly, she was down again. She hadn't travelled far, but it was a bona fide unassisted walk.

She couldn't stop giggling, and we were delighted… but also a bit sad! Our baby was a baby no longer. That same day the Tesco Baby Club magazine arrived in the post with the words "Your Toddler" in big, bold letters across the top. Talk about on-the-ball!

She seems to have decided that walking is much more fun than crawling, and gets up all the time now. Gradually she's going further and further and can now traverses the living room in one go. She still walks like a drunken pixie, and falls down a lot, but she's making real progress - especially when the twins aren't trying to "help" her.

Occasionally when she loses her balance it looks like she's set for a painful tumble, but her bum always seems to hit the ground first. It's like the "toast always lands butter-side-down" thing, or the fact that cats always land on their feet. It's uncanny… she can be falling head-first but somehow the bum whips around in time. And there's no better place to land, especially when you're wearing a nappy.

With the birthday imminent we are up the walls preparing for the party. All those jobs I keep putting off have finally caught up with me and now they all need doing before the weekend. Great!

And then there's the food. We were contemplating a barbecue… but this is the Irish summer, and anyway there's too much work on the day with a barbecue. We want to enjoy our little girl's first birthday, so we've opted for stuff we can prepare beforehand and everyone can just help themselves.

One of the most important things, of course, is the birthday cake. My wife likes to make the cakes herself, and I usually chip in with the decorating part. The twins have decided that their little sister would like a pig cake, complete with pink icing, cute little snout, stubby legs and a curly tail… wish us luck!

Whalewatch Ireland

Did you know that West Cork offers some of the best land based whale watching in Europe? This Sunday, 01 August, I'll be heading for the coast with the family in tow for the Irish Whale and Dolphin Group's (IWDG) Whalewatch Ireland open day which starts at Galley Head Lighthouse in West Cork at 2pm. It's free and everybody's welcome, so why not come along and bring the kids to find out more about the fascinating whales and dolphins that frequent our shores?

For more information contact Pádraig Whooley of the IWDG on 023 31911, e-mail padraig.whooley@iwdg.ie or check out the IWDG website.