So that's Chicken Pox done and dusted. Thing One came home from school with it in December 2008 kindly sharing it with Thing Two who erupted in pox two weeks later suffering infinitely worse. Then a few weeks ago I spotted a suspicious red spot on The Toddler. I though nowt of it, It's not that unusual and yet a small insidious voice inside my head, The Doom Imp, gleefully  hissed 'Haha a pox a pox on your house!' Known to speak paranoid bollocks I reserved my judgement and pretended to ignore the little head Imp despite feeling another spot on The Toddlers back that was somewhat related to a blister. Afterall I'm a hermit, where on earth could he have got it?

Alas it was indeed The Pox and pretty soon The Toddler was all out rocking the spots. I must confess the depth of my shallowness was revealed when my heart went squelch like an over ripe fruit at the appearance of them on his perfect little face as I silently bemoaned 'no, his face, not his face!' Yet the worse effected area by far was that which lurked under his nappy. The poor little sod was covered with the rampant pox, even between his teeny arse cheeks which made for a rather harrowing chore of cleaning him after a dump. Convinced that in conjunction with the warm weather the Pox would fester and go skanky (Yes, that is a technical term) we made the rather brave decision to have nappy free time. This had the rather unexpected effect of The Toddler deciding to ruddy well potty train himself, just like that. In the past week he has had a mere two wet accidents and they were that epic he'd obviously merely forgot. Even his night nappies are suspiciously light of a morn despite still feeding throughout the night.

He was admirably perky and indeed somewhat chipper throughout the whole pox ordeal with only one 'poorly' day and one utterly horrendous night. Phew.

So whilst exercising my google-fu, as one does, I came across a rather absurd practice of pox lollipops. Yes, indeed! How grossly bizarre! Now pox parties are an age old happening (not one I'd ever personally partake in) but to buy and have posted lollipops and tissues used by a child with the Pox in an attempt to infect your own child is a tad macabre even to me. I understand that It's often much less severe to have the Pox as a child then as an adult and many parents are relieved to get it out of the way yet I cannot ethically process deliberately infecting a child to something which although oft minor in the grand scheme of things is still rather uncomfortable and indeed can make a child remarkably poorly and awfully miserable.  So the thought of consciously subjecting a child I profess to adore to this is a hard concept to digest. Not to mention the sheer ick factor, I mean really? A lollipop licked by a stranger? Even the voice of doom is positively shuddering at that.

But yes, he caught it by sheer chance from gods knows where and is now plagued with the last few remaining scabs so Hoorah and all that jazz. Phew. Thank fuck that's the Pox over and done with.

Fanpottytastic

Whilst stricken with The Pox of Doom it became apparent that The pesky little buggers deigned it necessary to congregate in a party in his pants. Or should I say nappy. Resorting to somewhat desperate measures to air them so as they wouldn't sweat and fester we took the brave decision to temporarily put him in cotton underpants figuring that carpet puddles were marginally preferential over willy rot.

Only The independent Toddler appears to have had ideas of his own and taken the opportunity to voluntarily and seemingly effortlessly potty train himself. We've not had a Single accident yet (touch wood) however I must confess that I'm not brave enough yet to test this at nap time nor the two times we've been out and obviously he is still also in a nappy at night.

He is doing tremendously well, independently going to his potty whenever he needs to even if engrossed in play, television or breastfeeding. When upstairs he simply stops whatever he is doing, tells us he needs a wee and waits for us to take him to the loo. Clever little sod.

One thing that has come into its own again is our stash of baby leg warmers. He spent the majority of his first summer in just a cloth nappy and leg warmers, a marvellous idea especially when changing nappies all the time. However as he became more adept at mischief we had to change to trousers as he found it wonderfully amusing to take off his nappies and turn the lounge into an adventure world of piss puddles.

However, now that he is in 'big boy pants' they allow him to use the potty with ease without the struggle and frustration of removing pants and trousers each and every time.

He is so enamoured with aforementioned big boy pants that he greeted his grandparents with a pelvic thrust whilst proudly stating 'big boy pants!' Gesturing excitedly at his crotch.

My baby is growing up far too fast. Today is The third day running that he has point blank refused a nap too. This being a tremendously less enchanting development in my eyes.