College Lake with a Back Carry

In which I do my first walk with the Chap on my back, find a different path to take around College Lake and continue to assuage my nursery-guilt with knitting.

Map: None Used (routes are available at College Lake if you're desperate, but it's very much a case of following signs!)
Distance: 4k
Time: 1 hour

Rating: Easy Walk
This walk was a first for me, because it was the first time I did a walk with the Chap on my back. It's been coming on for a while - I got to the end of Willen Lake and thought "oof, my back", so I've been working up to doing extended walks with the Chap on my back, and this was the first 'proper' walk I've done with him there. It takes a bit of practise to get them up there - I have found it easiest to 'Santa Toss' him over my head rather than scooting him round my side, as he's just got too tall to fit comfortably under my arm. However, I can get him up there without incident now, so long as he isn't wearing anything big like a coat that tend s to get rucked in the back and make the back of the Ergo sit a bit low, but I now know what that feels like, so it can be dealt with.

However, I still wanted to build my confidence, so I went for College Lake. It's an easy walk, it's not a long way or difficult terrain, and it has a visitor centre so nappies and so on can be dealt with.

We started as we start most walks these days - with the two of us walking. We use the reins for this a lot as the Chap can accelerate in an impressive manner - fine of you're in a flat park, but not so good if you're in an area filled with rabbit holes or on a train station or similar.

On leaving the Visitor Centre, turn left and follow the path round. It starts on gravel and then quickly becomes a packed earth path, and the Chap seemed quite happy to toddle along that rather than dashing off into the undergrowth, so I let him off his reins to tootle about in that purposeful manner that toddlers have.

Soon enough, however, he stopped and asked to be carried, so I threw him over my shoulder and into the back carry and we continued forward.

The line of trees soon breaks and you start to get views over the lake. The path splits shortly after this - the orange trail continues on the flat path suitable for prams, but we chose the purple trail bearing right and down a slope. This leads down into a tree-lined dell, and then up again to a narrow path. It's a quieter path and easier if you're wanting to see some birds or other wildlife than the main orange trail.

Also a week of firsts, I have finished my first cardigan for the Chap! I am amazed that it not only looks like a cardigan, but it also appears to be wearable! I put it on him this morning (before I had sewed in all the loose threads) and was also delighted to see that, although a bit big at the moment, it will fit him and appear to be in proportion when he gets big enough for it. I am amazed it actually looks like it's supposed to! It took weeks, however, but I'm really pleased with it. And at least it gave me something to work on while we worked our way through the Lord of The Rings extended box set.

I find knitting terribly comforting. When my sister-in-law asked why I had started knitting, the answer was simple - guilt. I hate putting him in nursery, but I find knitting helps me ignore it.

"Ah-ha," she said, in that knowing way that people with psychology degrees have. "So it's a case of 'I'm leaving you, but I've got you this."". I've thought about it, really, and that's not quite right. It's not about leaving him so I got him something. There's a world of plastic dinosaurs and cars that could fulfil that function. It's something about the effort, the activity. It's not really about the fact you get a cardigan at the end of it, although that is in itself satisfying (and surprising!). It's more about the activity; the performance aspect. If I think about it, even though I enjoy being at work (which is something I never thought I'd say, but that's what having a year's maternity leave lead me to conclude), I still feel that by going to work I am doing something unutterably selfish. It doesn't matter that we can't afford for me not to work - I think it's a case of the Terrible Shoulds. I feel I should be at home looking after him, and therefore any other choice is Doing It Wrong.

You will shortly reconnect with the main trail, and we continued along this until we saw the gate leading off to the left through the fence, marked with a 'permissive footpath' white arrow. As this was somewhere I hadn't been before, I decided to go and have a look and see where it took us.

I really enjoyed this part of the route. It feels a lot quieter than the main path, and takes you along the edge of the nature reserve through the trees. It was also completely deserted apart from a photography crew who were taking promotional pictures for the reserve, who grinned as I went past with my load.

  

In wearing the Chap as I go for walks, I manage to do what I want at the same time as feeling like I'm ticking the 'Proper Parenting' box. It was the same when we went and enjoyed the dinosaurs at the Natural History Museum the other day - I enjoyed the dinosaurs before I had a child, but now I'm not just indulging myself. I'm Being A Parent. In knitting, I perform the role of being his mummy, even if what I'm doing is just sitting on the sofa drinking beer and shouting "Oi love 'ee, Mr Frodo!" at various opportune moments at the TV. Now, obviously this doesn't mean I'm not his mother when I'm doing this, but it seems to me that again, this is a self-indulgent act when what I should be doing is watching him sleep and composing odes to his restful slumber or similar. Left brain knows this is tosh. My left brain understands that one can still be someone's mother as you cry "You were robbed of that Oscar, Mr Serkis, robbed, I say!". So, knitting is a salve to the incoherent babbling of my right brain - I am performing the act of being a mother, therefore it's fine. It doesn't matter that I am knitting because I enjoy it, or I like the challenge - if that wasn't the case, I wouldn't do it. I enjoy it, but it also helps on the occasions when he comes home from nursery knackered, goes straight to bed and I hardly see him. It's either knitting or watching little videos we've made of him and crying. I know which option is provides a more conducive household environment...

The path then leads you back onto the main route, giving you good views over the lake. We continued forward, and then took the first right hand turn. This area is definitely not suitable for prams - there are steps and gates and narrow pathways and it would all be very awkward. I like this route, however, because there have some interesting things to look at along this way. This way has information about the history of College Lake, starting with old machinery left over from the days when it was a chalk quarry and going all the way back to the dinosaurs.

We then took the path leading up and off to the left back to the main route. I also wanted to have a look around the second hand book shop that lurks about the Visitor's Centre - I am indeed one of those people who can never resist the lure of a bookshop. I have a particular fondness for women's advice manuals from pre-1960s. None exist in this bookshop, but I did pick up a nice children's book about an elephant who is pen-friends with a penguin.

Children's books acquired, we then continued back to the Visitor's Centre, then home.

Things I Learnt

• After I changed to the 'santa toss' method of getting the Chap on my back, all my back-carrying problems have been solved!
• I can knit, it seems. My next plan is for something a bit more proper than a beginner's pattern... something that involves a tension square to start off with...
• You can get a number of quite varied walks out of College Lake. When I first went, I was pretty sure it was a straight march around a circuit job, but I am glad to find that there's a good amount of choice. It's also good for building up confidence if you're not used to baby wearing for walking.

Pitstone Common (Ashridge - Circular Walk)

In which the sun comes out and my tree painting friend and I wander around Ashridge on a brief tour of some Significant Trees of Awesomeness, and I am oddly grateful to be back at work.

Map: None used (eek!), although it's on good ol' Explorer 181

Distance: 2 miles (guesstimate)
Time:  45 mins -1 hour

Rating: Easy Walk

This walk wanders through part of the Ashridge Estate, and although I've tried to make it as accurate as possible I would like to place a small health warning on this walk - as my friend had to take me off the path to show me Significant Trees of Awesomeness several times, I may be a bit woolly here and there...

Starting at door the Bridgewater Monument, walk down the left hand side of the road towards the actual Manor house. After - maybe- 200m or so you will see a pond to the woods in your left, and bearing left into the woodland there is a signposted path. This is the one we took.

The path leads around to the left and you join a wide avenue through the trees. My friend seems quite happy to wander off into the woodland in search of exciting trees, which is probably why she paints them so well. I, however, am not so keen to bimble off into the woods without a map. I really like walking through woodland, but as long as I'm with people. If I'm on my own it often feels pretty menacing - probably some old evolutionary hangup I have. Maybe I have ancestors who were menaced by wolves in the woods.

Interestingly enough, I feel a lot happier if I'm in woods with water. Subconsciously I think this may actually have less to do with wolves and more to do with my atrocious sense of direction. To me, woodland looks like woodland looks like woodland, but if you have a river, you always know which direction you came from. It's harder to get lost.

Once you're in the woods having followed this path, you get a wide carriageway looking kind of path, rutted in places with the tracks of 4x4s.

The sun was shining and it was moderately warm, our children were being quiet and everything was pleasant. We had a bit of a moan about the usual things we moan about - people who seem to present that everything is amazing with being a parent, the judgement we perceive from others if we don't seem to be towing the line. It's not that we don't like our children, we do, we think they're great, I just think we're less inclined to wax lyrical about it. I knew this woman and I would get along the day she cocked an invisible shotgun at her son who had been awake 3 times in the night. Mothers rarely do that in public. We're all usually pretending we're brave little soldiers, then going home and crying.

Of course, I am now failing to tow the line by having gone back to work part time. Society seems difficult to know how to deal with us, really. It nods in approval at us for going back to work, and it also nods that we are partly sacrificing our careers for our children, but at the same time there is the sense that society sucks its teeth at us for exactly the same reasons. All I can say is that I think part-time work is best for me. It might not be best for everyone, but oddly - and unexpectedly - I'm really grateful to be back at work. At work, there are rules. The hours I'm supposed to be there are clearly delineated, and the expectations of me are made clear. People tell me what to do, I do it, they don't give me shit. What they don't do is throw 4 different advice books at you, conflicting Health Visitor advice, and no-one spends time posting articles on Facebook about how what I've been doing is wrong.  It is, I must admit, a refreshing change. If the Chap didn't howl every time I dropped him off at nursery, I would be completely satisfied.

In due course, pass a turn off to the right and then take a marked path to the left further on. Continue along this path and (this is where is gets a bit hazy, so forgive me) I think it will eventually lead you left to one of the Significant Tree is Awesomeness much admired by my friend. This was her daughter's Castle Tree, and it sits in the middle of the path along what used to be a boundary line for the old Roman farms that used to exist on Ashridge. Standing next to this tree and looking to the left and right, you can see the bump of the earthwork that indicated the boundary lines. The trees all along it are really old and gnarled, and - so I was told - are all pretty old because, being on the boundary line, were all left to indicate... well, the boundary.

Middle right, the rooty hand clutching at the soil...

We then took at detour off the path to view another Significant Tree - heading right from the Castle Tree, you pick your way through the undergrowth to a huge rooty thing that was festooned with blue rope for swings. It's hard to explain quite how big it was. I was also particularly menaced by the fact it clearly has a five-fingered hand grasping onto the Earth. I am half convinced it uproots itself and night and wanders round the woodland.

Back on the path with the Castle Tree, we followed the path through Pitstone Common until a path marked by a post with a mushroom on it branches off it. This path bears right and I was surprised to find brought us back to the other side of the pond we had gone past about 45 minutes earlier, and lead us back to the car park. It's a nice wander, on the whole, made even more pleasant by sunshine and a spot of putting the world to rights!

Things I Learnt

• The woodland at Ashridge is all pretty new, as the land was farmed for a long time after the Romans stopped. The oldest trees are the ones along the boundary lines.
• My sense of direction, poor at the best of times, completely deserts me in woods.
• For a couple of years I have been a total wazzock with regards to Ashridge, taking the same dull path every time. I am really excited to have been shown other routes and find other things!

Willen Lake (Circular Walk)

In which I find Willen Park in Milton Keynes to be filled with interesting things, enjoy a wander round a pagoda, and conclude that all parenting gurus are best avoided.

Distance: 2.5 miles
Time: 1 hour

Map: None required - just follow the edge of the lake! 

Rating: Easy Walk

Every now and again, someone hands me an essay to mark that makes my heart sink. The students are always pleasant, well meaning, perfectly nice people; they are attentive in class, and have tried hard. Unfortunately, they hand in total bilge. I find myself desperately trying to find something nice to say about their work. You've structured this very well, I might attempt, even though I gave them a piece of paper saying what they should write in each paragraph. You've used a variety of short and long sentences to create interest. Sadly, Milton Keynes brings to mind these sorts of essays. I really like your planning. I find myself wanting to say. You've really tried to do something different here. They've tried, they really have, but the whole place always feels to me as if it is one step away from falling into a J.G. Ballard novel.

This week's walk was in Willen Park. It is based around a lake that has been divided into two sections - the South Lake, for the noisy, excitable youth where you can do things like wakeboarding, outdoor adventuring and submit yourself to some sort of horror that is known as the Willen Park Trim Trail, where you are invited to jauntily do some exercises on brightly coloured outdoor gym equipment. The North Lake is aimed towards the more tranquil  visitor, with a Buddhist temple, Peace Pagoda, labyrinth and bird sanctuary. My plan was to walk all the way around the two parts and to see what I could see from the edge of the lake.

Starting at the South Lake car park (£1.20 for 2 hours, and with the ever important baby change), I made my way to the path at the edge of the lake and turned left, following signs when they cropped up towards North Lake and the Peace Pagoda.

After Wednesday's post about the Daily Mail's contradictory reporting of Gina Ford, I've had some interesting conversations. The one I've found most thought-provoking was a friend who said:

"The very fact that some new mums are so vulnerable and desperate for a manual is why they should be protected from some of the tripe that these baby help books spout forth, especially ones by the dangerous ill informed divorced former nursery nurse who has never had children. Its irony heaped on irony that women who have fought so hard to reclaim maternity back from male doctors who have never experienced childbirth are willing to accept the same one size fits all advice from someone who has never had children! So I'm not going to leave that awful woman alone!"

I've been thinking about this. I knew I wasn't going to follow Gina Ford when a friend read out one of her schedules that dictated that you and your child should be dressed by 8.45, after a feeding session that outlined a strict 10 minutes of left breast followed by 10 minutes of right. Seeing as  we have generally held a 'be dressed by Woman's Hour' policy in our house, I could see following dear Gina would be unfeasible, and I didn't pursue her books further. I didn't even get them out of the library to give them a proper critique as I didn't want her to get the library fees...

But then people started recommending I read Dr Sears' books. After all, there I was, a homebirthing babywearer attempting to breastfeed. But again, the advice makes me feel uncomfortable. The whole focus on the word 'natural', as if to suggest other ways of parenting are unnatural. The urge for you to be 'instinctive' and 'follow your baby's needs' while producing books and websites on how how to follow those instincts...

Both the gentleman who made the comment above and I agreed that most parents, if they are going to use a parenting guru, choose one that agrees with them. I think why I've never followed one (apart from my refusal to read the books) is that I don't seem to fit. I had a homebirth, I enjoy baby wearing, but turfed the child out of our bedroom at 5 months when he started squawking in the night. I tried to breastfeed, but by the end of my second pint I can be heard expounding that formula milk has been one of the greatest liberators of women, along with the washing machine and the contraceptive pill. I thought the ability for my husband to also share in the closeness of feeding a baby was a fantastic thing, and it also meant I could go to sleep. I could follow Dr Sears, but I wouldn't be doing it 'right'. I like a routine, and I like things to be convenient and set by me, but I also don't want my life to be dictated by the routines I set. I want my child to sleep, my God I want him to sleep, but I can't face the controlled crying route. I'm still unnerved by the dark, so the thought of waking up alone and crying out for someone and no-one answering fills me with a cold dread. So Baby-Whisperer stuff, or Gina Ford, again, I wouldn't be doing it 'right'.

But come on, I hear you people cry. No-one is asking you to be a martyr to the gurus. You fillet them for the advice you find works for you, and carry on.



Once you have passed under the road and headed towards North Lake, follow a sign bearing left that leads you towards the Buddhist temple. I went to a few when we lived in China (although this is a Japanese style affair), and was keen to compare. Sadly, however, the door to the shrine was locked, so we enjoyed the Japanese style garden and went on our way.

Upon leaving the Temple grounds, turn left and the white marshmallow of the Peace Pagoda soon hoves into view. Follow the path around and the steps up to the pagoda, flanked by lions and - at this time of year - a row of daffodils soon comes into sight. If you have a pram, there is a pram & wheelchair route up to the pagoda available a little further on.

The pagoda was the highlight of the park for me. I was sorry I couldn't get into the Temple, but there is a real tranquility to the whole area. Decorated with a large golden statue and scenes from the life of Siddhartha, the place had the sort of atmosphere that used to exist around the temples and shrines in China. I don't know how it would feel on a hot Bank Holiday weekend with people all over the place, but with me and a napping Chap, it felt lovely.
Next to the pagoda is the Labyrinth. I was eager as ever to idly bump into the Goblin King and see I was in a position to help him out with those jodhpurs, but sadly there are no walls, men with birds on their heads or Bogs of Eternal Stench - just some lines on the floor and a tree in the middle. It's probably fantastic to send a small child running around on a hot day.

Once you've enjoyed these sights, there's nothing more really to do at North lake beyond walking around the perimeter of the lake and head back towards South Lake, so I did just this.

The Pagoda across North Willen Lake

There are some nice views as you walk, dependent upon you looking in the right direction. If you ignore the noise from the M1 and the roads running alongside the park and concentrate on the Peace Pagoda across the lake, it's very pleasant.

Regardless of the sense of peace and tranquility you may have fostered at the pagoda and temple, it can be easily shattered by some new Government issued declaration on how we're rubbish. Or if it's not the government, it's some other body funding research that shows how we're making a hash of it. Once you have a baby, there's feeding, washing, weaning, nappies, teething, transporting, clothes, pain relief, sleeping, entertainment and education - whatever you choose to do with your baby, I can guarantee someone will post an article on Facebook which will tell you how what you're doing is damaging your child on a fundamental level. Whatever you do, someone has produced a piece of research to tell you that you're doing it wrong.

The path along the top edge of South Lake.

I was coming home on the bus this week, and I was a couple of seats away from a lady who I used to teach who is now in full time care of her grand-daughter. There was I with my organic fruit smoothies and my selection of picture books to entertain my son for the hour's journey. About twenty minutes in, after some wriggling from the granddaughter, I saw the lady reach into her bag, remove a chicken nugget and hand it to the 18 month old. She then followed this by tipping some of her coke into a sippy cup and proffering it to the child, who began gluggling greedily.

I will confess, I was wearing my Judgey Hat when I saw this. I had some Opinions. I pondered socio-economic dynamics and so forth. Anyway, we both got off the bus at our destination, and I helped my former student with her pram. And as we did so, she said to me "God, I couldn't believe I gave her a chicken nugget and the Coke. But I knew we've run out of food cos she's been really hungry, and I didn't want to her to kick off on the bus, and I thought, if anyone says anything, I'll just say, sod you.". I had been sat halfway across the bus when she'd got out the chicken nugget, I hadn't said anything to her about it, but here she was, justifying herself unbidden. And I felt a bit of a swine about my Judgey Hat. If I'd been in the same situation, 20 minutes in to an hour long bus journey and when all I'd had had been chicken nuggets and Coke, I would have handed them over to the Chap too.

Returning along the shore of South Lake

And this is the crux - we are terrified of other people's judgement, but we do it all the time. It's taken me a long time to just be able to say 'We're on formula. We tried to breastfeed but it didn't work." rather than give them the whole industrial-milking-machine, nipples shields, up for an hour and a half each feed speech to prove to them how hard I tried to breastfeed. What the speech was saying wasn't about how breastfeeding didn't work - it was five minutes of me trying to give the message "Don't judge me! I really tried!". I have seen people wince (really, wince. Like I'd poked them with a pin.) when I've said we sometimes watch TV together. I don't mean we're cracking out the Tarantino, I'm not asking my child if he thinks Marcellus Wallace is a bitch, I'm talking In The Night Garden maybe once or twice a week. One of my friends commented the other day that although she, like me, does the whole babywearing, non-controlled crying, mostly let your baby set their own routine thing, that she's worried 'when I talk to naturally-minded baby rearing friends [that] it's only a matter of time before they find out that I'm not longer breastfeeding and I don't use cloth nappies....'.

And this is why we like parenting gurus, because when we do feel judged, we get to outsource our guilt. Don't blame me, we say, blame The Baby Whisperer! From before the child is conceived we are told we are not good enough, and so it is not surprising that these gurus are so popular; they exist not only to shore up our faith in our own parenting, but also to give someone to point to when the rest of the world tells us we're doing it wrong.

Enthusiastic Noodle Boy!

Oddly enough, this whole Doing It Wrong thing was confirmed by a woman looking absolutely horrified as (having left the park and gone to the shopping centre for baby foot-measuring and a spot of lunch) I fed the Chap yaki soba and duck gyoza from my plate in Wagamama. I like this walking baby. He eats with a gusto I have not previously seen, and hoovered up soba like there was no tomorrow. Experiments at dinner later on also suggest that while he rejects many foods proffered on a spoon, he will accept them when offered on chopsticks. Thank goodness for chopstick skills!

Things I Learnt

• Regardless of how cute you think your child may be, nobody looks good eating noodles.
• Milton Keynes has Buddhists.
• I would go to Willen Park again. It's a bit spoilt by the noise of the roads and the views of the cars hurtling past, but they've really tried, and there's lots to see and do. It can't help the fact it's in a city.

Startops End, Marsworth and Tring Reservoirs (Circular Walk)

In which the sun comes out and we enjoy and wander round the (worryingly dry looking) reservoirs, and I wonder if the Chap is really as bad an eater as I think he is.

Distance: 2.5 miles
Time: 1 hour

Rating: Easy Walk

Free from flu and with the sun suddenly shining, we decided to celebrate our recovery with a wander around the reservoirs.

Parking in the reservoirs car park  (£1.50 for 3 hours at time of writing) in the implausibly romantic-sounding Startops End, Marsworth, we started with a cup of tea & a piece of cake at the Bluebell tearooms (nearly £10 for two coffees and two pieces of cake! Is that the price of things these days? I nearly fell over. It's a good thing I've gone back to work if that's the price of cake these days). The Chap refused all offers of cake, but at least consented to eat one of those little caramelised biscuits that come with coffee. It's a pleasant little cafe, and we were quite excited by the bookcase of kilner jars with tea on them - always a good excuse to come back and investigate!

Filled with fat, sugar and caffeine, all three of us walked (yes, even the little one!) back to the car, where we got the sling out and then set off. Mounting the steps up the side of the embankment, we started at Startops End reservoir and followed the path to the right.

The water is still looking really low in the reservoir, which corresponds to current reports that we have a drought going on. The anglers were still out here and there, however, these reservoirs apparently being famous for producing monster bream and other fishy fiends.

Follow the route anti clockwise around the top of the first reservoir - looking to the right you get views of Marsworth, and to the left there's the reservoir and across towards Tring or Pitstone Hill, depending on which way you're looking.

Startops Reservoir with Pitstone Hill in the far distance.

Follow the path round the back of the reservoir, over a small wooden bridge and up a rise and then pop out on Tringford Road. Step over a low crashbarrier to cross the road and follow the path immediately opposite to follow to the left of Tringford Reservoir. This was a lot more full, and apparently is the thing if you're after trout. This reservoir is a lot less obviously elevated and exposed, because shortly after joining the path you go into the line of trees that surrounds it. Bear left, and ignore the path that leads off to the right in a short time, instead heading straight on.

If bird watching is your thing, there are also a number of hides, and there had been a fair few  waistcoated, bearded men with large and expensive cameras around Startops, but they hadn't got as far as Tringford. There were some pretty views from the hides, but no actual birds that we could see.

Tringford Reservoir from the bird hide

I have learnt an interesting thing this week. I went round for lunch with a friend, and  from my point of view watched her son throw food down his neck like all children who aren't my child seem to do. He ate rice cakes, all his own blueberries, then all of the Chap's blueberries, and then a yoghurt. "How marvellous to have a child that eats!" I thought. My own dear offspring consented only to eat marmite rice cakes and yoghurt while turning his nose up at the offer of fruit, cheese or chicken, before performing his usual trick of starting to whinge and flap to be taken out of his chair.

So I was interested when later the same day, the mother of this fruit-eating child posted a question on Facebook about how she was worried about the way her son will only really eat blueberries. Which makes me reconsider my perspective about whether or not I see the Chap's refusal to eat as worse than maybe it is. I'm not saying that having a child who only eats blueberries isn't something I'd wonder about, but at the same time I hadn't seen a child with a problem - I'd seen a child who likes blueberries. Similarly, I wonder if for a while I have been seeing a problem where in fact I have a child who just really, really likes breakfast cereal. In fact, my litany of 'well, my child will only eat...' has now got a bit like the 'what have the Romans ever done for us?' sketch in Life of Brian. 'Well, he'll only eat breakfast cereal. And toast. And sausages. And yoghurt. And apples. And bagels. And noodles. And exactly two  bites of broccoli, but never the whole floret. And fruit smoothie pouches. And red pepper. And individual commercial pies, like apple pies or mince pies. But apart from that, he eats nothing, I tell you. Nothing.'. Ok, so often he'll only eat two bites of something and then throw it on the floor, but things have got a lot easier since we negotiated a sign for 'all gone', which he now uses when he wants to get out of his high chair. It's a lot more preferable to the screaming, howling banshee who used to make an appearance every mealtime.

I have gone in cycles with the Chap's eating. Christmas was particularly bad. I had had visions when we started Baby Led Weaning that it would mean he would, at the age of almost one, be able to sit down and have a piece of turkey, a roast potato and some veg with us. What did he have for Christmas dinner? A shreddie. One. One centimetre square piece of breakfast cereal. Anxiety about the Chap's behaviour at mealtimes has pretty much ruined every meal for the last 6 months. Recently he has seemed to get better, by which I mean he doesn't eat any more, but we can thrust a piece of apple impaled upon a baby fork at him, and he will then wave it around or remove the apple only to try to get in on the tines again. But the whole eating thing is very stressful, particularly when nurseries start reporting what you know back to you; that yes, your son doesn't eat. It's also bad to arrive early to pick your son up to find he is, in characteristic fashion, howling to be removed from his high chair after two bites of toast. Just because he can do the 'all gone' sign and you've told nursery about it doesn't mean he is consistent in his use of it.

In some ways I'm glad it's not just me he does this to.

Weaning - to me, anyway - appears to be The First Great Test of parenting. Do you go for purée or baby led weaning? Do you let them have sugar? Sugar appears to be so dangerous that you might as well strap them down and start injecting them with heroin and be done with it. I reported to a Health Visitor that the Chap had consented to eat a bit of pork pie, and instead of being congratulated on finally getting some sort of protein into him, she sucked her teeth and announced "ooo, it's very high in cholesterol.". I'm afraid I have not been back since.

My anxieties about weaning also feed into nursery. Trying to explain why the Chap going into nursery has prompted such a strong reaction from me, I found myself saying that "the problem is that with him going into nursery is that this is when they find out."

"Find out what?" ChapDad asked

"Find out everything I've been doing wrong." I said. I don't know what it is that I have done wrong, but I am sure there are a lot of people out there with their golden Judgement Cards all ready to produce scores followed by a critical commentary from Len Goodman gratuitously using the word 'fleckle'.

People say that having a baby will find any cracks you have in your relationship and turn them into potholes. Certainly, starting to wean a child will identify all the issues you have around food and crack them wide open. Truly, I feel I am the last person who should have responsibility for feeding this child, because my own anxieties are completely clouding any rational judgement I have around food. True, since slightly before Christmas and the infamous Mugging His Mother Of A Mince Pie Incident, his eating does seem to be slowly, slowly picking up, but there are still days when all he's had are three rice cakes and 20 oz of formula. Whatever happens, though, already in my head he is The Baby Who Will Not Eat. He could eat a whole packet of sausages, a loaf of bread and a bushel of apples every day for a week, but if on the next day he complained he might just have a bit of rice cake because he was feeling a bit full, and I would be there like a shot. "See! See! I told you! Only a rice cake for The Baby Who Doesn't Eat!"

New Mill, Tring

The path leads you away from the reservoir and along the sides of fields inhabited by the occasional horse or pony. We followed the path until Tring flour mill (New Mill on maps) was in sight, and then when the path lead off to the left we followed it instead of following the map's indication of heading straight on.


The concrete path we took along the side of the field looking over towards the mill ended in a white metal fence and a padlocked gate. A path lead off to the left, but we weren't sure if that would get us onto the road, and we knew that we wanted to get onto the road to head back towards Marsworth reservoir. ChapDad asserted that of course he could clamber over the fence while his small, sleeping infant son was strapped to him. I, of course, did what every sympathetic wife would do. I stood back and took pictures.

Once on the road, cross over a turn left along the pavement. In a hundred metres or so, you will see the path you could have taken before you climbed over the gate pop out onto the road. In two places. Feel a bit foolish. Carry on until a path leads off bearing gently right. This was the same path I had taken when I had walked here from the Grand Junction Arms at the end of last year, and we carried on along this path, past some ducks in the reeds and between Marsworth and Startops reservoirs.


When you get to the end of this path, we then headed straight on and bore left along the edge of the Grand Union canal, and then back to the Startops car park.

Things I Learnt

• I am not the only person who gets wound up by their child's eating. Or lack of it.
• My son does not need to worry about his cholesterol as yet. He's one.
• All you need is one sunny morning and suddenly the whole of the 3 counties area seems to decamp to these reservoirs!

Ordnance Survey Map: 181 (Chiltern Hills North)

A slightly Alan Moore themed mini-walk from the Bank of England to the Tate Modern via St Paul's

In which we don't so much do a proper walk/hike but instead take a stroll through London, have a look at the Occupy protest outside St Pauls and play a spot-the-Alan-Moore reference in the places we walk throungh.

Map: Any cheap map of Central London will do. I think ours is a Collins pocket map we bought in Euston or similar at some point.
Distance: 1 mile
Time: 40 mins (includes time for peering about the Occupy site and making pretentious observations in the Tate Modern)

Rating: Easy


I find it difficult to talk about how much I like Alan Moore as I writer, because I like his work so much I tend to go purple in the face and splutter, and so I don't tend to put it in a good light. In my youth, I had read some comics - The Crow, for example, and 300. But I never really understood where the phrase 'graphic novel' came from. Until, however, I picked up a copy of Watchmen at the local library and found myself waving it at my husband with the cry of 'it's a book, a proper book, except its got pictures'! The thing I like about Moore's work is that the characters, whether in Victorian London or pre-First World War Austria or 1980s New York, is that they are all completely realised with complex psychologies and motivations in a way you don't get with many conventional books, let alone the one-dimensionality of a comic. He's really thought about what it is he's doing. I am quite evangelical on the subject.

Starting at Exit 2 of Bank tube station, come up out of the underground (which you can do with ease with your child in a sling. I wouldn't want to try it with a pram, but I know people do manage it). Turn left and admire the 18th Century architectural cake of the Bank of England building. Now, I am almost certain that the Bank of England is featured in From Hell - possibly in relation to its similarity with St George's Church in Bloomsbury - which is why we started the walk here, but I have lent my copy to The Godfather (like all evangelists, I find myself doorstepping people with literature. In the case of From Hell, it's just a  little bit bigger than a pamphlet.) so it's hard for me to check. It's built in what I will politely refer to here as the 'Foxtrot Off' style of architecture, all Neo-classical Corinthian Columns and big old chunks of stone.

Turn away from the Bank of England and cross over Princes' Street at the cross roads, and take the next right down the charmingly named 'Poultry'. Not Poultry Street, not Poultry Way, not Poultry Place - Poultry. No messing around with what used they used to do here, then. And, if nothing else, it gives you space to enjoy a childish giggle at whether or not 'Poultry Retail and Food Outlets'  is a retail and food outlet selling only poultry based products, or if I have found the place Nic's chickens  have been trying to get to every time they break out. All they've been wanting is a little shopping break to the Capital, obviously!

(A vague aside, but many streets in London bear names that suggest their previous usage. Poultry is pretty obvious, and Cheapside is a reference to the markets that were once in the area ('cheap' having mutated in meaning to now mean 'inexpensive', but it used to refer to a market). Not far from both Poultry and Cheapside is the now seemingly innocuous-sounding Grape Lane, but if you wish to read about fruity words & rude activities, I direct you to Wikipedia to enlighten you about its history.)

St Mary-le-Bow, Cheapside
designed by Christopher Wren

Poultry quickly becomes Cheapside, on which you can see St Mary-le-Bow church, which my husband waved a finger at and declared 'surely that's a Hawksmoor, look, it's got a bloody great obelisk on the top'. Later investigation has proved him to sort of be right - St Mary-le-Bow church was designed by Christopher Wren, for whom Hawksmoor worked as an apprentice.

It is definitely my intention to copy the tour of Hawksmoor Churches using the route laid out in Chapter 4 of From Hell. It's on my list of Things To Do, as is walking full the length of the Blackpool Illuminations at some point. Whether or not there are hints of black magic and child sacrifice on both walks as yet remain to be seen.






Not far after St Mary-le-Bow, the road opens up to reveal the massive bulk of St Paul's Cathedral. This is the denouement of the Hawksmoor churches tour in From Hell, and is used symbolically to depict the corruption which is seen to be existing within the very heart of the establishment. It's also a large and impressive church without ponderings as to whether it is or not at the centre of an occult conspiracy. Cross the two roads between you and the Cathedral, and follow the path going down the right hand side of the building.

St Paul's Cathedral

For those interested in the history of St Paul's, you can find a brief summary on the cathedral's website. We didn't go in on this visit, although both me & ChapDad have been there before. I went on one of the jaunts that a friend and I used to do in summers around our sixth form year with her German pen pal. It was only years later I thought what mischief we could have been raising in the capital - illicit drinking, nightclubs, ne'erdowells... what we actually did was wander round museums and take in a show each year. My teenage years were nothing if not rock n roll.

The reason we went on this occasion was to have a look at the Occupy London Protest. Coming round the side of the church we were met with a line of tents a few rows deep, each tent kept off the floor by pallets to keep the occupiers warm overnight. It all seemed quiet and rather tidy. We peered at tents from a distance, although were not lured by the offer of free tea from one of the tents. There were placards out asking for things to help support the camp (gaffer tape, cooked meat, tinned veg & hummus was high on the agenda, it seemed), and it all seemed clean, tidy and not matching with the accusation of the Occupy movement being "nothing but a pack of louts, thieves, and rapists, an unruly mob, fed by Woodstock-era nostalgia and putrid false righteousness". Some stallholder did shout out at our baby about being cute and seeing him later, but I don't think rape or thievery was on his mind when he did so. Maybe they leave the louting and unruliness til later, but The Godmother had said she'd been in the evening and they were all outside their tents strumming tune; as she observed, there's only so much damage one can do with an acoustic guitar.

The quote about 'louts, thieves and rapists' comes from Frank Miller, who, like Alan Moore, also writes comics (most notably Batman: The Dark Night Returns and 300). Alan Moore is not his fan (indeed, Alan Moore is not a fan of Batman, despite the copy of his The Killing Joke Batman story that I have on my shelf. More often than not Moore trots out something similar to the phrase "most of us, if our parents were killed when we were little, would not become a bat-themed costumed vigilante; that’s a bit mental" he uses in this interview on Youtube.). They had quite a bit of spat online and in the papers in December 2011 in which Alan Moore described Miller's work as "unreconstructed misogyny..wildly ahistoric, homophobic and just completely misguided. I think that there has probably been a rather unpleasant sensibility apparent in Frank Miller's work for quite a long time.". Alan Moore, however, supports the Occupy movement, and in the copy of the Occupy Times we got he has written an article entitled On Waiving Rules and Ruling Waves, which in his characteristic style employs paragraphs such as:

 'A wave, like a 300lb gorilla, goes exactly where it wants. If one is bearing down on you then hurriedly-concocted legislation ordering it to cease or orchestrated tabloid disapproval, realistically, aren't really going to make a lot of difference to it. The same goes for pepper spray and water cannons. While these might be temporarily effective in dispelling some localised spillage of dissent or scattering some protesters it should be recalled that people aren't the wave itself but the medium it moves through. Suppressing individuals does nothing to address the much more serious problem of the motivating seismic force behind them, which is historically irresistible and will not be denied'.
The Occupied Times of London, Issue 9, 20th Jan 2012, page 12

Which is all very well and encouraging to the protesters, but smacks a little of Dulce Et Decorum Est to me...

Having kept a wary distance from the tents, and had been a bit reticent to go in any of them (why? I don't know.). One tent, however, did suck me through its door...

Detail from side of the Info Tent
at Occupy London

Honestly, if a small, second hand bookshop were tidily tucked just inside the gates of Hell, I would find myself accidentally falling in 'just to have a look'. Now I think about it, Hell's Own Bookshop would either be a cracking place of banned juiciness or full of foxed copies of Heart of Darkness, Pamela and Domby & Son.

I was rather disappointed by the offerings from Occupy London's info tent. Occupy Wall Street apparently had an astonishing array of books in their library before many of them were allegedly thrown in the bin. Disappointingly, there were a few grey & white misery memoirs, and some pink and mint green covered chick lit, but nothing inspiring. Maybe this would also be the contents of the Bookshop Inside the Gates of Hell - a dispiritingly small selection of nothing much. Pity, really.

Front of the Info Tent at Occupy London

At the front of the tent, next to the legend 'Caring is everyone's business. Our presence here expresses our concern for global economics and social justice' and the picture of Ghandi is the other link to Alan Moore as we stood outside St Paul's - there's a poster for Occupy Oil and bearing the Guy Fawkes mask from V for Vendetta.

(Some quick background - V for Vendetta is set, so the back of my copy says 'set in an imagined future England [when 1998 was the future] that has given itself over to facism', and in it a self-proclaimed but unknown anarchist fights against the establishment. If you've ever seen the Princess Bride, the theory of V is similar to that of the Dread Pirate Roberts - as V wears a mask, you never know who he/she is, and therefore anybody - or everybody- can be V)

Since V for Vendetta was made into a rather dismal 2006 film, Time Warner have been selling the masks which were then picked up by the hacker movement Anonymous, which has pleased Alan Moore but Time Warner have remained quiet about their association with rogue hacktivism. They're still selling the masks, though. It's a nice little money spinner.

Either way, the V mask was being used on the Occupy Oil posters as well as being worn by a number of people wandering round the Occupy site. I've read the book, and I know the theory, but still a person in a mask is a threatening thing, for all your clean and tidy site, your tent libraries and your free paper. That being said, a person in a mask is a threatening thing until they wander over to the Hare Krishna lunch chap, acquire a plate of pasta and then push their masks onto their heads to eat it. Then they're just a load of people eating lunch.

V for... the queue for lunch?

Hare Krishna monk in Adidas trainers

serves lunch to a the Vs

The Occupy encampment

outside the front of St Paul's Cathedral

 Having nosed enough around the Occupy site, we turned our backs on St Paul's and headed across the road to Godliman Street and then onwards to the Millennium Bridge. Just before you go on to the bridge, it's always worth a look back to have another view of St Paul's towering above you. 

That done, we wandered across the Millennium Bridge, pausing in the middle to look across to London and Tower Bridges (a similar view, from a lower viewpoint and with more 'red muck' in the Thames can be found in The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Volume II Chapter 6). As I stopped to take the picture, I heard a father taking the time to educate his son on the finer points of architecture. "You see that building?" he said ."What is it, Daddy?" his son replied. Without hesitation, his father answered"It's glass. It's called The Shard. It's rubbish.". "Yeah." said his son. "It's rubbish.". We have all been told, it seems.

Having crossed the bridge, we then ended our walk in the Turbine Hall at the Tate Modern. As far as I know, this has no link to the works of Alan Moore - we just went there because I like to look at the exhibitions. On show at the time of our visit was FILM by Tacita Dean, which projected 35mm film onto a 13 metre white monolith at the end of the Turbine Hall.

It wasn't really my thing, to be honest. My top three exhibitions in the Turbine Hall so far have been Olaf Eliasson's 2003/4 The Weather Project (a huge sun at one end of the hall and vast mirrors on the ceiling. The hall was made slightly humid, and the yellow lamps in the sun played funny tricks on your eyes that made you see in black and white), Carsten Holler's 2006/7 Slides (fantastic fun for a Christmas trip - timed tickets allowed you to have a go on water-shoot type slides from various floors of the Tate down the Turbine Hall. I'm not sure what it said about art, but it was fun) and Doris Salcedo's 2007/8 Shibboleth (an enormous crack in the floor running the length of the hall). Notable mention should also be given to Louise Bourgeois' Maman, which as a huge and somewhat menacing spider said something about motherhood that was a refreshing change from pastels and cupcakes.

On the whole, it was a nice little wander. We got to see some interesting things, have a bit of a think, and the Chap was entertained by tall buildings. Although it does mean he leans backwards out of his sling at quite an alarming angle.

Things I Learnt

Revolutionary Crossword in the Occupy Times

• We were delighted to discover that the Occupy Times runs a Revolutionary Crossword (16 Down - Month of the Bolshevik Revolution. (7) 20 Across - Untamed feline withholds labour (4, 3, 6)). I love the thought behind that - we're going to smash the system! But first - word puzzles! Why not while away your hours as you wait for the downfall of Western capitalism with a crossword, eh?

• Inspired by the visit to Occupy to read V for Vendetta again, I found myself googling the Violet Carson rose... to find that Violet Carson was the actress who played Ena Sharples in the soap opera Coronation Street. There's a curious Venn Diagram waiting to happen...
• My husband loves a challenge - which is why for dinner the next night I was presented with something he was proudly calling the Occupie:



Yes, that is a bold attempt at
 a V mask rendered in mashed potato













The Grand Junction Arms (Bulborne) to Tring Reservoirs and back.

In which rain stops play at Tring Reservoirs and I retrace my steps, play around with our new camera and list 18 things I learnt this year. Why 18? Whyever not?

Ordnance Survey Map: 181 (Chiltern Hills North)

Distance: 2 miles (?)
Time: Hardly anything

Rating: Easy Walk

Well, it's that time of year where we all start looking back and going 'ooo'. All in all - and to offer up a massive understatement - this has been a busy year. I hope next has a little bit more money and a lot more sleep in it. As the gear-up for Christmas began, I started to do a lot of thinking about this time last year. Mostly, my thoughts have been a deep and sincere gratitude that I am not heavily pregnant, and that I live in an age where acquiring the state of heavy pregnancy is one of choice. There is nothing like having a baby to teach you the joy of contraception.



The Grand Junction Arms, Bulborne



Today's walk wasn't quite what I intended. I had a plan for a circular walk, but it started to rain and, even with a brolly, I was worried about the coldness of the Chap's toes, so I decided to play it safe and head back. It was at least nice to have left the house, seeing as over the past few days I have thrown food into my mouth with gay abandon without too much exercise to counteract it. I don't think I can count Christmas cake as one of my five-a-day, and I'm pretty sure that eating it for breakfast is not wholly to be encouraged.

Cakey Breakfast of Champions dealt with, I started at The Grand Junction Arms in Bulborne, with every intention of stopping at the end of the walk for a cuppa, but seeing as I called the walk off early and they don't open til 12, my cuppa was missed and I opted to go home and prepare the Chap a sausage sandwich instead.

The Grand Junction arms is - unsurprisingly, from the name - right on the towpath of the Grand Union Canal. On towpath with my back to the pub, I turned left and headed along the tarmaced road - this is a fantastic walk if you have a pram. Come the summer I have every intention of starting in Marsworth, walking here for lunch along the canal and then walking back. Today wasn't a day for that, really. All grey and miserable, rather.

On this day last year, I was round my friend's house being fed a large and delicious Thai curry in an attempt to encourage my son to vacate the premises. He wasn't late, you understand, but I felt a few hints wouldn't go amiss; frankly, I'd had enough of him where he was.

So, on the whole, things I have learnt this year:

1) Childbirth is really not as bad as people make it out to be. Or at least, it wasn't for me.

2) Sleep deprivation really is torture- people aren't making that one up.

3) Between the hours of midnight and 5am, and foodstuff available is liable to fall into your mouth.

4) I have reached the point in my life where poor service (notably from the NHS & Ikea this year) not only annoys me, but annoys me to the point of shirty letters. I have become that sort of a Bear.



Protoceratops



5) Whisper this one quietly - for me, I think if I had another baby, I would probably skip the whole farrago with endless industrial milking machines and nipple shields and whathaveyou and just go straight to formula feeding. The people who can do it often seem mystified and I regularly got the response 'oof, when I got going I could have fed the whole street'. To those people, I can only shake like a veteran from 'Nam and intone "You weren't there, man. You weren't there..."

6) I married the right person. This is encouraging to have reconfirmed after 6 years and a baby.

7) Much love to the baby-friendly matinee at The Rex cinema in Berkhamsted, without which I would not have been able to enjoy The King's Speech, Win-Win, Potiche and Jane Eyre (that being said, Win-Win had an amusing trailer, but was best avoided).

8) Spending your Christmas money on a new camera means you will end up playing with the settings and taking extreme close-ups of plastic dinosaurs.

I was very excited by our new camera, actually. I didn't choose it, but it has brilliant automatic focus setting that makes the whole thing a point and press job, which is excellent if you're me and lazy.

Lock 44, The Grand Union Canal.

It's a pleasant, easy walk along the canal - I passed a number of locks which are part of a section I am sure are called The Marsworth Steps, but I can't find any evidence of this online. Anyway, I passed five locks in a really short space of time, which shows it's quite an up bit, even though the walk is pretty flat.

In a short while you reach the junction after which the pub is named - do not take the left hand turn towards Wendover, but instead go straight on over the humpty-backty bridge to head towards Tring Reservoirs.

More things I have learnt this year:

9) Learning my limits, and how to ask for help. It is hard to admit that you are not the Lord God Almighty, particularly if you're an only child. And particularly if you're British - we really do have that whole stiff-upper-lip thing going on. However, there is much to be said for throwing your hands up in the air and saying "Can someone help me with this?" before you hit your limits.

10) It's a really good idea to man up and go to therapy. Really, it's been brilliant. Again with that stiff-upper-lip thing - all this emoting. All this carrying on. One might as well be Californian. I thought you had to be a) mad, b) self-indulgent or c) both to go to therapy, but I was talking tosh. I wish I had gone years ago, it would have saved a lot of trouble.

11) I have revoked the Johnny Depp Clause in my marriage. I had previously asserted that should Johnny Depp turn up in Buckinghamshire and present himself at my door (which of course we all admit is highly likely), I reserved the right to reconsider my choices. Given the option now, however, I don't think I need to. My husband is my Pikachu - I choose him over all others. Where were you at 4am on various February nights this year, Mr Depp? Hmm? Where were you? Not letting me go back to bed for a sleep, I can tell you.

You eventually appear out by Tring Reservoirs, which look bleak and forbidding this time of year. I don't know about water, but should there be exposed mud at this time of year? Shouldn't reservoirs be full this time of year? Whatever it was, there were quite a few mud flats and birds with muddy legs wading through them.

When the path leads, turn left between the two reservoirs and past a group of fisherman, one of whom was complaining loudly that all he had caught today were two bird's nests.

Just as I reached the end of the path and was heading towards the road, it started to rain heavily. I had my umbrella (which I much prefer to faffing round with a rainhood on a pram. I'm not very spatially aware, so by the time I've fitted the damn thing the rain has usually stopped, or the Chap is complaining vociferously), but even so I was worried about the rattly cough the Chap has and the current situation of his cold little toeses, so I chose to turn round and head back, which was a bit disappointing, but I don't want him ill.

Last bit of the things I have learnt this year:

12) When organising a road trip through France, and when planning your first day's driving that you need to remember to include the time it will take you to get to the ferry in your total for driving hours of the day. Also, France, you have many good and noble qualities, but the signage in your towns needs some work. I have a radical proposition for you - how's about putting the signs before you get to the junctions rather than at them? Much easier to get in the right lane then...

13)A good health visitor is worth their weight in gold. Fortunately, we have one who has her head screwed on and has given very sensible advice, particularly about weaning (which was winding me right up).

14) Slings - they're a really good idea. I like walking, and baby carriers let you go wherever you like.

15) Also, sling meets are full of people who are still reading books and come out with sentences such as 'I can fit into my My Little Pony t-shirts again!', and 'I am sure it was reading Meg & Mog as a child that directly resulted in my later becoming a goth'. Such sentences make me happy, so sling meets for the win, I say.
16) There is a rule for life one needs to abide to, and it is this - when one has been out drinking and one hears Bon Jovi's classic, Livin' on a Prayer, you may use it as a litmus paper for whether or not you may return to the bar. If you do not attempt the key change, all is well and you may continue drinking. If you attempt the key change, you have probably had enough and should not accept any more. Finally - and this is very important - if you attempt the key change and think you did it really well, then that is the moment you should have a pint of water and head home to your bed for more water and a vitamin C.

17) Christmas is way more fun when you have toys to play with :)
18) There seems to be no limit to the number of photos you can take of your child. Whatever they do is clearly the cutest thing that has ever been done. All those other people thinking their baby is the best? Deluded fools! They can't smear yoghurt over themselves the way your baby can!

 

So yes, those are the things I learnt this year. There are more, like how to put a nappy on properly, or what to say when you find yourself in a baby group next to a powerfully ugly child, or why proper bras are integral to my self esteem, and what stitches feel like when the don't dissolve, and how to stop a child from choking, and how to stay awake at night when all you want to do is sleep, but these are the ones I've put here, and I don't want to go on all day.

So, the conclusion at the end of almost a year of motherhood? It's all right. It really is fine. I quite like it, although some more sleep would be nice. I'd rather have him than not, certainly. As my husband has been heard to say - he's a good bloke, that baby.

Happy New Year!