Extreme Sports

Dom likes to live on the wild side. Today when I had nicely set him up with some safe blocks to play with while I checked my email, he took matters into his own hands. Dominic now has a new, fun way to get the adrenaline rush. He has his own indoor extreme sport to play.

Kitty-baiting.

It seems like a harmless enough way to play with your beloved feline. You find something dangly and wave it around for the cat to pounce at. However, playing this with Austen is fraught with danger. She loves pouncing and scratching too much. After a while she gives up on chasing the dangly thing and goes straight for the hand holding it.

I had barely switched the computer on before I heard giggling. Any Mum knows that a child's happy laughter is always cause to check what they're up to immediately so I spun round only to see that Dom was kneeling in front of the cat while she napped on the bean bag.

Not content to let sleeping cats lie, Dom had grabbed a cable from nearby and was chucking it out to her like a lasso. I was impressed that he had such good dangling skills, and so, it seems, was the cat. She woke up immediately interested in the cable but just batted it half-heartedly with her claws retracted.




"Ah, good," I thought. "She's being gentle and isn't too keen. I'll grab the camera and take some cute photos."



The game continued innocently enough. Austie was purring, Dom was laughing his face off, and gently swishing and draping the cable near the cat. A couple of times she lost interest, so he leant forward and touched her with his fingers. I was amazed - normally it is highly inadvisable to attempt to pat or put your hand anywhere near the cat when she is in 'chase the dangly thing' mode, but she remained placid and obligingly caught the cable.



Dom was thoroughly enjoying the game and dangling the cable increasingly higher in an attempt to get the cat to move up and out of her comfy spot in the bean bag.

Unfortunately, it worked.

For some reason, something snapped and Austie transformed into...



CRAZY POUNCING CAT!

As soon as I caught sight of those frenzied eyes and sharp claws, I swooped in and pulled Dominic out of there. However, this meant I did move my arms in front of Austie when she was in attack mode.

I now have a cat scratch on my arm. Dom also got a little nick on the back of his hand but he didn't even seem to notice - he was too busy giggling hysterically at the sight of the pouncing attack cat.

Of course I must in fact give the cat credit for the extreme and rather uncharacteristic tolerance she shows towards Dominic. Given that he shrieks loudly everytime he sees her, frequently ends up waking her up from naps by stroking her or making noise, and tries to rub his face on her, she is incredibly gracious and good with him. She is great at visiting him when we read books or play in the lounge and she purrs when he strokes her even though it's really somewhat uncoordinated and vigourous patting.

But then I have to say nice things about the cat now. She just jumped up on the keyboard and started smarming me.

Cross Grazing

Matt and I have a new blog for writing reviews of books, TV shows and movies.

crossgrazing.blogspot.com

Please leave a comment on one or both of posts so that I know someone out there is actually reading them. :-)

Here's the obligatory cute Dom photo:

Grandparent poaching

Dominic is a pretty outgoing wee chap and enjoys going out meeting new people however sometimes you can be too charming and get yourself into trouble.

I have become accustomed to Dominic using the gym as an infant-mum swingers session and heading off to clamber over other women in search of cuddles whenever they are sprawled out doing stretches or ab exercises. At his music and movement classes he tends to seek out older gals (that is girls about 2-4 years of age), and somehow they always end up feeding him their food and patting him affectionately on the head like a puppy.

However, today at his Mainly Music group his overly social ways ran him into a bit of a conflict. I recall that as a child I had rather strong views against 'Mummy stealing' as I called it. The mother russling was generally perpetrated by a cousin or friend and was defined as any instance when your mother paid too much attention to another person's kid (where too much attention basically equally any). I saw it as a heinous and inexcusable crime for other kids to get hugged by my mother or given ice blocks that were mine by any just and reasonable thinking.

Apparently for many kids this territorial approach to parents also extends to grandparents.

Today for some reason Dom took it into his head that he was out to capture the heart of anyone in the room over the age of fifty. He could not be detered from his mission. The toys and playtime before the session started proved no distraction, the music held no interest for him and his mum's repeated attempts to carry him back to join the other kids and have fun with the songs like he was supposed to were fruitless.

Any chance Dom got to break free he was off to approach one of the doting grandparents who sat on chairs back against the edges of the room. He would pull himself up on their legs, smile, flap his arms and babble away until they took the hint and picked him up. Rather embarrassingly I was left like a crazy childless woman who had just come along to join in a bunch of kids' action songs. I could only smile on pathetically as I watched Dom get bounced on the knee or held and cooed at my various older folks. After the session ended Dom immediately zoomed off after one of his new substitute grans. I was bombarded with questions and praise for the wee rascal and he was lapping up the attention with a mile-wide grin on his face.

After a while he was put back down and immediately headed off for another lady. Unfortunately this lady's real grandson was around and saw Dominic approaching. Alas the little boy clearly had suspicions and kicked Dom as he came past. Dom burst into tears which surprised me as the kick hadn't actually looked that hard, more of a tap really, but I freaked that maybe it had been the spot where he had his lung surgery scar and he might still be sensitive there. I ran up to comfort Dom but before I reached him, the kid's gran swooped up the crying Dominic. The tears stopped immediately and Dom was soon all smiles again and trying to grab at the lady's glasses.

'He's such a lovely, happy little chap, isn't he?' cooed the lady to me.

I agreed but silently suspected that he may have gone a little Hollywood on the crying. Maybe he should be attending drama rather than music classes?


Would you trust this boy with your Gran?

Sunday afternoon fun

Well, it wasn't the sunniest day of the summer but Dom still enjoyed romping around outside while his parents took shifts hanging up the washing.



A bit of strolling with the lion.



The budding (yes, the lame pun is intended) botanist examines the flowers.



Riding in a laundry basket is the best way to celebrate the completion of hanging out the washing...



...you just need an obliging Dad-mule to pull you around.

Still not convinced that riding in laundry baskets is awesome? Watch the video evidence.

Weekend fun

Matt has blogged some of the photos from Dom's fun ride on the tram but he also got to meet a lovely clydesdale on Saturday. It was a very chilled-out horse and was just roaming about free in Queen Elizabeth's park near the Tram muesum. It didn't even stop chomping grass when a tram went right past it. So cute.





We tempted the horse away from the grass with some yummy carrots and it was happy tro become acquainted with young Dom. It pays to have some carrots in your picnic supplies in case you encounter friendly equines.