Ingrid’s crawling is still a bit unstable – sometimes she slips and lands nose-first on the floor. So frequently, in fact, that I’ve lost count of her falls. But what can I do?

This afternoon she was crawling towards me in a straight line, so intent and so happy because she was about to reach me all on her own… and a few tiny steps before she reached me, her nose hit the floor, and she went from great happiness to great sadness in the blink of an eye. I felt so sorry for her.

Once a year, my news filter for ‘Estonia’ inevitably brings up the annual wife-carrying championship in Sonkajärvi, which Estonians have won every single year since 1998. Two Estonian brothers have dominated the championship since 2000 and one of them holds the record: 55.5 seconds. The track is 253.5 metres of sand, grass and asphalt, and with two dry obstacles and one water obstacle.

This year I found a video of the competition (via AOL Fanhouse):

I was impressed by the effort some of the contestants were putting in. Both the runners and the women they were carrying were clearly taking this pretty seriously. These were athletic guys running hard, and women holding on hard, not beer-bellied men having a bit of fun (although there were some of those, too, given that first prize is the woman’s weight in beer).

Finished re-hemming our two gray woollen blankets. You know, the kind that’s heavy and thick and scratchy and warm, and does many duties apart from covering you when sleeping. I put them on the floor when I assemble IKEA furniture and roll them up to stop Ingrid from rolling out of her cot. Now they’ve got nice new fleece bands to cover their fraying edges.

Lots of splashing in the swimming pool, and then lots of crawling on the floor, and then some crawling on the grass in the park, all of which led to a very tired baby in the evening. Thumb-sucking in the bathtub and asleep in under 5 minutes after I put her in the cot.

Popular toys:

A whisk	A big IKEA bag
Paper recyling	A pumice stone / nail brush

I’ve also put a few more new photos in the gallery.

Cooked dinner. A sweet potato casserole with spinach, mushrooms and coconut cream, served with brown rice. Mmm.

I like to think about things. One of the things I’ve been thinking about is how I want to act as a parent. I’ve been trying to clarify my basic parenting principles.

Thinking about these things helps me make the right decisions. In particular, being clear about the principles is useful in situations where it’s easy get tempted to apply a quick fix in a way that I might later regret.

These principles are about the relationship between the parent and the child. They are not about how I want my child to be or behave, or what I want my child to grow up into, or how to get there – those are separate issues. These are the real fundamentals, “this is fundamentally right, that is fundamentally wrong”.

1. As above, so below. This can be said in many ways… Be an example. If it’s not OK for them to behave in a certain way, it’s not OK for you to behave that way, either. And vice versa: If it’s not OK to treat an adult that way, it’s not OK to treat a child that way.
2. No violence. This is a corollary to #1, but it is important enough to repeat as a separate point. It is never OK to intentionally hurt another person, no matter what good excuses you have.
3. Don’t reduce the baby to an object. Remember that he is an individual. Be careful about proposed “methods” to “fix” things, and think about whether they fit in your relationship.
4. Err on the side of loving. If in doubt, say yes. You cannot spoil a child with too much closeness and love.
5. Needs go before wants. The younger the child, the more needs it has, and the fewer wants. Even things that later become wants (cuddles and closeness) are needs in a baby.
   A baby’s needs go before mum’s wants, but a baby’s wants do not necessarily go before mum’s wants.
6. Don’t confuse your wants with the baby’s. Don’t hurry their development. Few parents err on the side of being too relaxed; far more parents want the baby to sleep on her own, eat on her own, change her own diaper and have a summer job before the baby is a year old.

How do you think about parenting? How do you make your decisions?

Despite legends about London’s raininess, there hasn’t been much rain at all over the past two years or so. Today was the first time in two months when it rained a bit while I was walking home from the nursery with Ingrid. I don’t even pack an umbrella any more. In fact I lived with a dying umbrella for years and only bought a new one this spring, because it seemed like a good idea to have one for when I’m wearing Ingrid.

Ingrid babbles, as babies do. And babies start out with a predictable array of first sounds – the easy ones that arise naturally as the mouth experiments with various positions. Da da da and ba ba ba and um um um and so on.

In some languages the parents have, understandably, happily appropriated those sounds and provided them with meaning: daddy and mummy, or pappa and mamma. But not in Estonian! Estonian mothers have pulled off an incredibly clever trick. They call themselves “ema” or “emme” – but they call dads “isa” or “issi”. Unable to pronounce the s sound, babies are forced to focus all attention on their mothers, and it will be many months, if not years, before they can call their dads.

More work at a pace that just isn’t tenable. Not that the days are long – I’m just trying to squeeze too much work into too few hours. There is no margin – any disturbance has an immediate effect. Now my stomach is reacting to this. After each meal it feels upset. I’m glad this is the last week of this dash.