It has been pointed out to me since I wrote the piece the other day on veteran actors doing children’s TV (by an older viewer tuning in with a toddler) that I missed out the contribution made to In The Night Garden by one Derek Jacobi. Yes, in case you hadn’t noticed, one of our most revered and highly regarded actors is currently gracing CBeebies three times a day to relate the gentle adventures of Iggle Piggle, Upsy Daisy and the Tombliboos to the preschool audience. And very good he is too.

I can kind of understand why somebody as well-spoken and eloquent as Jacobi was chosen to narrate the show, given the media fuss that production company Ragdoll had to weather over the Teletubbies’ inability to speak properly.  Although whenever I watch In The Night Garden – which isn’t nearly as much as it used to be since the child has declared it is “for babies” and only grudgingly tunes in – I can’t help feeling this overriding sense of what could have been going through Jacobi’s noble head at the time.

Kind of like this:  “I’m a Shakespearian actor you know. I’ve won awards for it. I’ve played Hamlet. I received a Bafta for I, Claudius. So let’s see….what can I possibly do now? Hmmmmmm…..I know, I’ll go on TV and sing the Makka Pakka song on a daily basis. Oh, won’t it be such fun, luvvies??” And so on.

Probably just as well he does such a good job of it really, otherwise he would run the risk of sounding really stupid. Er, hang on a second…..

Sarah returned to work this week and I’ve had my first taste of being back on the stay-at-home-dad front. It’s only part-time for the next four weeks thankfully. Mum is here until early December to help me as I recover and, fingers crossed, I’ll be back to better health by then to ensure I can keep the little man happy.

 I’ve been re-acquainted with his usual haunts over the past few days, De Beauvoir Square playground; the two playgrounds at London Fields; Rosemary Gardens and Victoria Park. Although the locations have not changed, the skills with which Oli plays have changed a lot since I last played with him in Delhi. He’s sliding down the slippery dips on his own, playing on roundabouts and swings and running through the parks kicking autumn leaves with a wonton abandon that makes you jealous of toddlers. If you get a chance to see them, the autumn leaves in London Fields at the moment are amazing. There’s a blanket of glistening golden brown covering the green grass stretching from one end of the park to the other.

With the cooler weather and the rain, we’ve spent some time inside so I’ve also been re-acquainted with the likes of Igglepiggle, Upsy Daisy and Makka Pakka among others. I really don’t understand the appeal of In the Night Garden? Oli is hooked though and so are most other kids it seems. The fervour with which he drops everything to scamper up onto the couch when he hears the opening bars of the introductory music is something to behold. You’d think he was a member an evangelical cult being called to hear the latest rant from his divine leader. Maybe the BBC has worked out how to hypnotise our kids, using this show to send subliminal messages via the Ninky Nonk and the ramblings of the Tombliboos? Who am I to argue though, kids in Delhi loved it, my nieces and nephews in Australia love it and now Oli is also a groupie. Perhaps if it was all set to Benny Hill-type music like, this clip form youtube (this is hilarious!), I’d have an easier time getting into it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qZm9h_9pkAc&feature=related

So while Oli is being indoctrinated by a blue man carrying a red blanket and a man who lives in a cave on his own, polishing rocks for a living, I’ve started the search for activities we can do together. We signed up for a music class for 0-3 year olds on Tuesdays starting next week at the Broadway Markets and we now need a swimming class, a playgroup and perhaps a story telling session to see us through the winter months (any suggestions around the N1 area are welcome!). This is the sort of thing I now spend my nights searching for on the internet – swimming lessons, story telling and any other activities I can take Oli too. I’ll begrudgingly take him to a reading of In the Night Garden being held at John Lewis on Oxford St (who are clearly ensconced in the whole indoctrination thing) which is so far removed from my working life that I think I still have a few more weeks if not months before I can switch off the work me and be fully immersed in the stay-at-home-dad me. 

Presenting……the five scariest characters currently on children’s TV:

5) Muno, that one-eyed red thing from Yo Gabba Gabba. It might appear to be cute and chummy but we’re not fooled.

4) The Haa-Hoos from In The Night Garden. They’re giant inflatables with fixed grins that say nothing and do nothing but drift around silently. There has to be some kind of symbolism here. Unless it’s just designed to freak out anybody over the age of five.

3) Daddy Pig from Peppa Pig. Not quite sure why exactly. Maybe it’s the snout, perhaps it’s the fact he boasts a five o’clock shadow George Michael would envy, or maybe it’s just all that grunting after every sentence. Either way he leaves us with a sense of unease.

2) The Piplings from Waybuloo. Big-eyed multi-coloured ‘animals’ who live in a forest, have huge heads disproportionate to their tiny bodies, talk in a weird form of fractured English and have faces so wide that they look as if they were fastened between two cars driving in opposite directions? What’s not to be scared of??????????

1) Pingu. Without a doubt one of the single most terrifying creatures ever to grace children’s TV, heck any TV, there’s something deeply deeply unsettling about the cute little penguin and his family. Maybe it’s that weird blabber which passes for penguin conversation, the sinister way he glides across the ice, the way he flaps his flightless wings by way of expressing himself, the fact they seem to be showing an episode in which he needs to go to the toilet every time we come across it. If you’ll excuse us, we’re going to go and hide…..

…..just because we can. And because we’ve been saying for ages that it would work wonders on In The Night Garden…..

Best Friend recently commented that it was time for Mutual Acquaintance to go back to work. She was starting to contemplate which of the CBeebies presenters she fancied.

It hasn’t yet come to that,* but you have started heckling the TV.

You originally only tuned in because the education geek inside you was curious about the way the world was being presented to pre-schoolers and the methods they were using to get their point across.

But the programme makers must be doing something right as the Star, hitherto completely uninterested in the big screen flickering harmlessly on the wall, was hooked from the very beginning of the very first programme.

This is a mixed blessing. You are now able to do the post breakfast washing up and other acts of housework without fear of molestation. But you are also forced to listen to an awful lot of very energetic people warbling enthusiastically away at what you persist in thinking is an ungodly hour for cheerfulness.

There are some shows you like. In the Night Garden is a surprise hit with you.

When Friend of the Family gave the Star a cuddly Iggle Piggle in his first few months you were forced to get rid of it as it gave your nightmares.

In fact, it has all the surrealism that modern fairy tales lack. Whole episodes are given over to the Tombliboos losing their trousers and needing to find them again, taking their trousers off and needing to put them back on again, getting the wrong trousers on and needing to swap them back again, and remembering to take their trousers off at bedtime. This is about as age appropriate as it gets.

If it weren’t for the slightly too knowing voiceover, very reminiscent of Little Britain and surely a nod to the other core audience of layabout students, you would be completely delighted with it.

However, many of the programmes just annoy you.

You thought at first you might like Squiglet and his magic ability to make his drawings come to life. You thoroughly approve of the way he breaks down his sketches into really short simple steps that small children can follow. And he certainly has a less irritating theme tune than the other resident CBeebies artist, Louie.

But he insists on calling his tools by whimsical names and you can’t help yourself.

‘Get your squiggle sticks!’ he says.

‘… crayons…’ Mummy mutters.

‘And your squiggle pads!’

‘… sketch pads.’

‘Let’s get squiggling!’

‘Oh for goodness sake, isn’t DRAWING interesting enough when you are two?’

And then there’s Big Cook Little Cook.

They are the worst offenders in the lets-make-fairy-tales-fluffy stakes, of course, which automatically earns them a black mark. 

Mostly, though, it’s the moment where, every day, they are walking around looking puzzled because they can’t think of what to cook for the story book character who has wandered into their cafe in search of something to eat.

You find yourself with the uncontrollable urge to shout ‘OH. MY. GOD. WHY DO YOU GO THOUGH THIS PANTOMIME EVERY DAY? HOW CAN YOU POSSIBLY NOT REMEMBER? GET OUT BIG COOK’S BIG COOKERY BOOK! YOU ALWAYS DO! GO STRAIGHT FOR  THE BOOK! STOP WASTING TIME! GET THE BOOK! GET IT NOW!’

Yes, you are aware the repetition is why the little ones like it. No, it doesn’t seem to help.

You also can’t abide the positively sanctimonious way they go about the clearing up. Bet they put the dishwasher on as soon as the cameras are off you think sourly while sullenly scouring the porridge pan, whose contents every day seem cemented on.

And as for their tag line – ‘We’ll cook for everyone!’ – well, let’s just say you take great pleasure in choosing a new person every day who the BBC probably wouldn’t allow in the cafe, starting with Hitler and getting increasingly tasteless from there.

However, the programme you really can’t abide is Balamory. Which is unfortunate because at the moment it is plum in the middle of your scheduled baby opium** session.

One of your issues with the UK is that Brits are seemingly incapable of interacting in society without iron clad rules, nay, laws even, to govern polite behaviour, but at some point sticking to the rules has become more important than adhering to the intent behind them.

Balamory illustrates this tendency perfectly. 

You feel sure that somewhere in the regulations for children’s TV programmes there is a guideline for the proportion of ethnic minorities to be included in every given show. So despite the fact that Balamory is set on some remote Scottish island there are two main characters out of a very limited cast who are black. Yeah right, you tend to think at this point, what a happy multicultural society we are. Every Scottish island has 40% of its population who are non-white.

You would be more tolerant of this whitewashing of reality if the programme makers hadn’t clearly decided they had now met their right on targets for that week and promptly pissed of for lunch.

As a result, there’s a teacher, a couple of small business owners, and a police officer in Balamory*** but the black people get to play the fitness enthusiast and the painter and decorator. The physical and uneducated roles, ye ken?

It’s surprising really that the resident plumber isn’t Polish and the local corner shop run by someone from the Indian subcontinent, with attendant comedy accents.

But instead, how could we possibly we guess, the local grocer is a wheelchair bound woman, although in a rare moment of sanity, she does have her Mum to do the heavy lifting. But where, you would like to know, is the same sex couple who run the hairdressers? If we are actually being broadminded.

And if anyone thinks you are being overly critical, consider that the most intelligent person on the programme – the eccentric inventor – is, of course, male, white and, just to ensure that the status quo is not really challenged in any way, English. Upper class English, to boot.

However, you could weather the sloppy liberal thinking if it weren’t for the storylines. Which are moral pap, and worse, moral pap you don’t agree with.

A week or so ago they were teaching your child that if guests arrive unexpectedly, it is ok to sit there and prepare to eat a large piece of chocolate cake in front of them without offering them so much as a glass of water. That it is polite, as a guest, to demand that the hostess make a present of something she clearly doesn’t want to and, even worse, to blatantly lie.

Because if that cake was homemade, then you are Delia Smith.

Then there was the time that the community insisted that someone who clearly wasn’t capable of it should organise the village disco, passing over more obvious candidates because if they want it, they should be entitled to have it. Preferably yesterday. And to hell with all that nonsense about needing some talent or, heaven forbid, hard work to become successful****.

But most offensive was the day they spent insisting that one of the characters wasn’t allowed to grieve for the death of a pet.

It’s enough to make you fire up the the Russian satellite.

Unfortunately, the time difference means that the only place showing children’s programmes at that time is the American sponsored fundamentalist Christian brainwashing channel.

You are this close to being forced to fall back on books.

 *But since the topic has been brought up then… Mister Maker. It’s the waistcoat.

**Or ‘babypium’ as Starbucks would doubtles call it.

***And surprise surprise but the police officer is a man and the teacher is a woman. Whodathunkit?

****Or perhaps because the most obvious candidate was black. Uppity…

“Somebody’s not in bed! Who’s not in bed? Iggle Piggle’s not in bed!”

Now is it just me, or would this have run differently twenty years ago? I’m pretty sure it would have been:

“Somebody isn’t in bed! Who isn’t in bed? Iggle Piggle isn’t in bed!”

So is this form of speech a Northern thing? I first remember encoutering the “I’ve not” rather than “I haven’t'” form when I had a Northern friend at university. Well okay she was from Coventry, but that counts when it comes to pronouncing important words like “bath”! I started to catch myself using that form and felt very odd, but now I do it all the time. And I’m sure it just wasn’t around when I was young, but is that because I live in the South of England?

Hmm, just pondering!

This program is one of A favourite. The noises and sounds always get my baby full attention! As she gets more energetic, I found the programs ideal in order to get distracted and will eat her meal with less fuss.

The newest serie is available at the bbc iplayer and therefore I do not buy any dvds. Little A does not mind to watch and rewatch some episodes especially the ones when they play with the funny ball (the episode Tombliboo ooo).

In my opinion, bbc has done a great job with the bbc iplayer and you can actually watch the programs whenever you want. So now, in a way, I don’t mind to pay the tv license lol. For people outside the UK, you can view some of the episode on the popular youtube (the video when they all dance always cracks my baby up and she tried to follow them lol)

> Discover other products In the Night Garden accessories at Kiddicare (spend £30 and you will get free delivery).

On Saturday, AB and I toddled off to Dulwich Sports club where the lady RK was hosting one of her now legendary Cricket Picnics, AKA, The Cricknic. Evidently you are supposed to actually watch some cricket as well as stuff your face with wine and cake, but I find you can bluff this bit by watching the other spectators and simply clapping when they do. Of course, you do need to be sure that other other spectators are supporting the same team as you, as misplaced celebration is not really the done thing. Also not really the done thing: bringing your own booze, therefore pulling a bottle of pink cava out of your bag with a flourish and saying “ta da!!!” should be avoided. Also not really the done thing: loudly discussing breastfeeding techniques, complete with actions.

My Cricknic cred safely ruined, I got on with the matter at hand: eating and gossiping. It was then that my friend revealed that she had been at college with a famous person. Oooh, who? I can hear you ask. Jude Law? Gok Kwan? The fat lady off Eastenders? Not quite. She went to college with  Iggle Piggle. And there you have a sentence to divide my readership neatly into two halves (one of you on each side hahahaha. ahem). One half of you are amused or impressed. The other half are wondering if this is a hot new band, maybe a kooky electro trio that you’ve somehow missed, and you’re frantically checking the festival line ups. More fool you if you are, as you should know me well enough by now to know that I am the last person to be aware of any new music, given that my musical appreciation  made it to Girls Aloud and then stopped. If you are in the latter group you probably still have a modicum of cool about you. If you are in the former group, you are a parent, or an aunt/uncle, or you are under 5.

Iggle Piggle, is, of course, as one of  my mum friends put it “A giant blue thing with a blanket”, starring in what is probably the biggest children’s TV success at the moment: In The Night Garden. Said man in his furry blue suit can be found on Cbeebies twice a day, prancing around a pretend garden and then refusing to go to bed. He has a variety of friends who also prance around: a squeaky girl who can pull her dress up at a moment’s notice, via a special lever on her waist (ummm); lots of little pegs in clothes that all live in a tiny house together (some have moustaches); a few stripey dudes, don’t really know what they do; an airship thingy, and a giant poo on a trike. I guess you just have to see it for yourself.

It’s actually quite cute, and does have very beautiful music for a children’s TV show. Unfortunately, my daughter disagrees and has shown no interest in it whatsoever, despite the vast array of merchandising available for her future wearing/playing/causing of parental financial ruin.

Oh, by the way, if you are in neither of the above groups, you are either over 50 or on the social services register. Sorry to be the one to break it to you.

Well I never meant Snow White to be so interested in TV! One day a few weeks ago I switched it on to look at the red button weather forecast and the Tombliboos appeared. Snow White gazed transfixed at the fat furry creatures and clapped her hands in delight. A fan was born.

At the moment her routine at the end of the day is to eat her tea and then watch ITNG to wind down before bed time. As you can see she also rates the TV as a climbing frame.

Good things about In The Night Garden:

• Slow pace. Rather plodding from my perspective, but it’s brilliant for little people not to be overloaded.
• Small cast list. Snow White recognises all the characters and their props such as Iggle Piggle’s blanket.
• Music. Well J would put this on the ‘bad’ list, but I really like it. Each character has their little theme tune and these are developed in various ways. In particular the Tittifers are highly favoured by Snow White.
• Derek Jacobi. Who from the adult world can fail to be amused by hearing him state solemnly ‘Isn’t that a pip!’ ?
• The introduction and ending. That little boat and the stars are enchanting to babies, and the way that everybody goes to bed contentedly is very nice too. The dreaded Tellytubbies would always say ‘noooooooo!’ when told it was time for bed.

Bad things about In The Night Garden:

• Well it is television. Which I generally would prefer to live without.
• Iggle Piggle is an idiot. I’m sorry Snow White, I know you love him, but it must be stated that a creature that ‘can’t see’ Upsy Daisy when she stands in front of him with his blanket on her head is severely lacking in intelligence.
• The Tombliboo bush. AAAAAGH, it takes them forever to get round that place. I don’t know what architect designed it but it’s most inconvenient.

Happy birthday to my wonderful wife, the Lovely Melanie, who is, um, about 17 today, I think.

17-ish, at least.

The weather forecast is horrific, but I hope you manage to have a lovely time anyway today.  The poor thing put her back out yesterday while eating breakfast; she’s OK but still not moving in her usual lithe, panther-like fashion.  Fortunately both our lovely children have been helping out: Millie has been great with picking things up off the floor for her and playing with her sister.

And the aforementioned sister…?  Well, the eBub is as the eBub does.  She’s been helping out in her own inimitable fashion: charming the pants off her own mother yesterday by going into stamping, gasping, bouncing paroxysms of joy at seeing and  – almighty wonder of wonders! – having a go on an In The Night Garden ride in Bexleyheath yesterday.

Surprising what makes small children happy, isn’t it?  A large piece of plastic in the shape of a fictional television character that engages in 120 seconds of lateral movement upon insertion of a coin is the toddler equivalent of grade-A heroin.

Oh, and speaking of Bexleyheath, that reminds me what they were there for: Millie has some new glasses.  Nothing terribly different from the old ones – she’s still quite small to be wearing glasses so there aren’t many choices, as most pairs “swamp” her little face a bit.  The new ones do have a different Little Miss character on them, though: Little Miss Sunshine, I believe it is.

Yet another reason to feel guilty about your child watching TV.  This is from an article in Time.

As most parents of small children will reluctantly admit, nothing can occupy a child quite like television. Unfortunately, the scientific evidence suggests that using the boob tube as a babysitter has its price: the more time babies spend sitting in front of the screen, the more their social, cognitive and language development may suffer. Recent studies show that TV-viewing tends to decrease babies’ likelihood of learning new words, talking, playing and otherwise interacting with others.

A new study published Monday in the Archive of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine adds to that evidence while introducing an intriguing new perspective. Many studies have suggested that television impedes learning by inhibiting youngsters’ ability to interact with others, and according to Dr. Dimitri Christakis, a University of Washington pediatrician, that effect may be compounded when parents get drawn into TV-watching too.

This explains a lot, actually.  Our toddler did not watch TV until she was 2, just like the guidelines say.  Now she watches about an hour a day, a little in the morning while we get dressed, and a little at night as we wind down.  In the Night Garden is an especially wonderful show.

Now that we have the baby, I catch him watching the TV already and have to manuever him around.  And then it hits me, I do not want to leave the room.  Because I want to watch the end of the cartoon.  And I do not want to talk to anyone while I am watching it.

These are crappy cartoons too, as I slowly lose my faith in the Swedish state children’s channel (at least there are no commercials).  But I get hooked, and I get quiet, and my daughter is quiet, and my son is hearing nothing from me or her while he strains to look over his shoulder at the crappy cartoon.

So lately I have just been leaving the room with him, and I start to talk, and my daughter is left alone with the TV, but this is life with two kids in a small apartment, and sacrifices must be made.

I must admit, though, that I often come back in for the wrap up dance of In the Night Garden.  The Swedish voice over is even better than the English, and Igglepiggle and Upsy Daisy and Makka Pakka really get down.

The top toys change from year to year, and there are often major trends in kids toys, but a surprising amount remains the same from year to year, and even generation to generation. This makes sense considering a few factors that will be explored later, but first it is important to discuss how a year’s top toys are determined. While the year’s top toys always have a lot to do with what most appeals to children, it also has a lot to do with what parents want, and think their kids should have.

The Top Toys For Kids Are Timeless
By [http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Michael_Addison]Michael Addison

The top toys change from year to year, and there are often major trends in kids toys, but a surprising amount remains the same from year to year, and even generation to generation. This makes sense considering a few factors that will be explored later, but first it is important to discuss how a year’s top toys are determined. While the year’s top toys always have a lot to do with what most appeals to children, it also has a lot to do with what parents want, and think their kids should have. This means that all the best toys have two things in common: they are both parent, and kid-approved, for several reasons. Toy makers, of course, have learned to take this into account, and try to produce toys that will attract both groups, with a variety of strategies.

There have been many trends in top toys, the most recent of which is probably electronics and video games. Though a lot of recent popular toys fall into this category, there are also a lot of classic kids toys that have remained among the most desired for some time, illustrating that some ideas never grow out of style. Within a year’s top toys, there will always be both inside and outside toys, some specifically geared towards either girls or boys, and others designed to have a more universal appeal. Think of all the types of games and toys that have changed, but in many ways still remained the same from one generation to another. Among the best toys will always be outside entertainment like balls, hula hoops, and, more recently, miniature cars and trucks; your children will probably even still play with some of the same inside toys you enjoyed as a child, such as games, dolls, and arts and crafts.

There are a number of reasons that products become the top toys, which has a lot to do with the kind of things that generally appeal to parents and kids. While there is one specific element especially that seems will bridge this gap, sheer enjoyment, different things catch a kids eye than ultimately decide what gets put in the basket. Parents tend to like toys that are either educational, or increase some physical or mental skill, but price and value is often a concern. Most parents do not might buying a somewhat expensive toy if they feel it is worth the expense. Kids, on the other hand, want what they see around them, on television and at their friends’ houses. This is not to imply that the most popular toys are always those that are the best advertised, but it does play a role. After all, the real test of the year’s best comes after the product leaves the shelf. Do kids love it, or do they play with it for a few days only to leave it in a corner of their rooms? The answer largely determines the factor of word of mouth, which easily overwhelms almost any other factor in determining what toys last the generations, and which fade into obscurity.

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Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Michael_Addison http://EzineArticles.com/?The-Top-Toys-For-Kids-Are-Timeless&id=1539526

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Gustav and Sanet’s little girl, Milea,  turned one on 9 May. We went to her birthday party and also had a proper South African braai – yum yum!

Milea is just so adorable, with her own ways and gestures – calling the birds (and people) with her hand and making that cute little sound. She is very clever and alert.

The theme for the party was “Upsy Daisy” from In the Night Garden – well done with the cake Sanet (and Ouma).

There are car babies and there are babies that hate the car.

Our toddler hated the car, screamed and screamed, though she eventually learned to fall asleep on long rides.  But to take her for a drive to get her to sleep at night?  Unthinkable.

Our new baby would be a car baby, I think.  He has trouble with his late afternoon naps, the world becoming a bit too bright and loud for his tired mind.  And he loves a bumpy ride and constant motion.

Except we have no car.

But we do have a carriage.  And we do have a father who can push the carriage for hours at a time through his neighborhood, around the nearby lake, up the hill to the blue Stalinist housing projects.

I know the benefits – I have plenty of unexpected alone time to ponder them – I am getting in better shape, I can listen to my own music, I get that unexpected alone time.

But I miss my toddler too.  And I walked into two rainstorms the other day.  And the sense that I have to go out every … single … night, well, that is not ideal.

So I was as happy as anyone that the baby fell asleep with Mamma on our big bed in a quiet bedroom this evening while Daddy watched In the Night Garden with the toddler.

But I am all geared up for the baby’s spin around the block tomorrow …

For some of us who have babies or toddlers, or others who have friends with young kids, will know who i’m talking about when I say Iggle Piggle, Makka Pakka and Upsy Daisy! But for some of you who have never heard of it before – Welcome to the world of In The Night Garden. This TV series has slowly taken the babies world by storm. I think it has cute but strange looking characters – speaks strange languages and sometimes has not much of a story line. But the strange thing is – kids love it! including Jayden. He watches the show every morning at 9 am so by now he knows all the songs and loves to dance to the music.

Here’s a video of him singing a little bit of the Iggle Piggle song.

and this is the real Iggle Piggle

What do we want….   EQUAL RIGHTS…

When do we want them….  NOW..

Any parent of a toddler will no doubt have watched In The Night Garden…   And what a children’s program it is. ! ( congrats to the BBC. )

There is a flaw though…..  ( as an adult I ask questions, and perhaps I analyse things too much )….     The Pontipines get a fare mention, as do the other characters, but the poor Wottingers, they seem to be shrouded in mystery !!!  bit part players !!  

Come on BBC give the Wottingers a staring role for a change !!

What do we want …   EQUAL RIGHTS FOR WOTTINGERS

when do we want them….  NOW   !!!

I’m a very happy and proud mummy tonight. I got home from work to the biggest of big hugs from Lilly. And then, to top it all off, she took her first steps!!

Yesterday was the first time she has even walked along with her walker. We were over at Nanna and Grandad’s and Lilly was standing up playing with the straps on her highchair. Suddenly, she just started pushing the highchair down the room while walking behind it!

We took her home and stood her up behind her walker (A Vtech First Steps Baby Walker - one of our better baby purchases) – well, that was it, she was off. Right across the room, then back again. When she came to a dead end, she just calmly turned the walker round and set off again in the oppostite direction. It was unbelievable – just like she’d been doing it for weeks!

Then today, only a day later, she was standing up holding onto the chair in the living room. As Tony and I watched, she turned slightly away from the chair and let go, so she was standing completely on her own (again, the first time she has done this). Then she took one, two, three steps over to the TV cabinet, all by herself!

As you can imagine, she got plenty of cheers, claps and kisses! What a clever little thing she is!!

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When she is not mastering the art of walking, Lilly is currently OBSESSED with Peppa Pig.

She cannot get enough of Peppa, she is transfixed by it on the television and loves anything with Peppa Pig printed on it.

She has a couple of Peppa Pig pyjamas and T Shirts, and I can tell that, if she had a choice, she would live in them. When she has them on, she is always patting her tummy (Peppa!) and saying “aaaaaaaahhhh”. If she sees the Peppa Pig clothes on the washing line, she tries her hardest to get them down to play with them. Today while she was with Nanna, she had her Peppa Pig and Suzy Sheep T Shirt on. I came home to find Lilly in her pyjamas, but clinging for dear life to her Peppa t-shirt… apparently Grandad tried to take it off her, nearly sparking World War 3!

Although Lilly does still enjoy In the Night Garden, and loves playing with her Upsy Daisy and Iggle Piggle toys (she feeds Upsy Daisy and offers her drinks, and makes them kiss each other!) ITNG can’t hold her attention as long as Peppa.

It’s ok though because me and her daddy think Peppa Pig is great too. It’s a lovely family programme. I think Tony and I have watched them all now, but we can still sit through them time and again like Lilly.

Maybe we should get ourselves some Peppa Pig pyjamas, too…

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Talking of Children’s TV, we sometimes have the Bedtime Hour on CBeebies on. It’s from 6-7pm and shows The Night Garden and programmes including 3rd and Bird (very cute).

I know it’s a bit late to jump on the bandwagon, but just for the record, Lilly is not scared of seeing the lovely Cerrie Burnell, who has only one arm.

Ok, she is a bit young to take much notice, but when she is old enough, and she asks why the lady only has one arm, we will tell her.

I hope it will help Lilly, and other children who grow up watching Cerrie, be more openminded about people with disabilities than all those idiots who’ve complained that she shouldn’t be allowed on TV in case she gives children nightmares.

It gives me nightmares thinking what narrow-minded and intolerant children those people must be raising.

As a six month veteran of the CBeebies “Bedtime Hour” it has been strange to me that this previously unknown segment of the television world has attracted so much media attention of late.  It is a daily ritual for many young children between the hours of 6 and 7pm and I have been watching some or all of it with Harry almost every evening for the past six months.  This time of day is a special one for me: not only is it when I get home from work to the comfort of my flat, but it is when I get to have some time with my son before his bedtime.  Although I see him almost every morning before I leave the house, I don’t get a chance to sit and play with him until the evening.  This odd hour can be very restful or quite fraut, depending on Harry’s mood and state of exhaustion and it marks the transition between the end of my day and the start of my evening.  In essence, it is a bubble of family life that seems to exist independently of the rest of the world and the programmes, characters and presenters are all linked inextricably to this bubble so that it seems incongruous when they crop up in the spin of the “real world”.

The first and most well-known crossover from this world to yours was In the Night Garden which has found itself receiving critiques in newspapers and most recently on Charlie Brooker’s Screenwipe.

However, the most recent case of intrusion by the media into our world was about one of the new duo presenting this feast of bedtime entertainment, Cerrie Burnell.  When I look back on TV from my childhood, it is the programmes that I remember most fondly, but the links between them are also important as it is these people who are taking you on this trip, leading you through hours and hours of your formative years.  I fondly remember people like Johnny Ball and Brian Cant as being wonderful presenters of their own shows, but it wasn’t until the era of Philip Schofield that there dedicated presenters to fill in the gaps on these journeys.  I think what you appreciate most as a child watching and learning from adults is being talked to on a level and not as if you are an idiot and all of these presenters achieved that.

Cerrie Burnell

And so we come to Cerrie Burnell.  Irritatingly, she has become a newsworthy subject because of her obvious disability, namely the absence of her right arm, and the supposed shock this has caused amongst parents whose children watch The Bedtime Hour.  One, quoted widely, has said that “I know it would have played on my eldest daughter’s mind and possibly caused sleep problems” and has since stopped the delicate thing from being exposed to such horror every night.  There must, I hope, be only a minority of people with this attitude, but it is not her disability that I have an issue with (although the way in which the stump wiggles can be a little disconcerting at times): it is her style of presentation which grates with me.  I appreciate that she is presenting to the under-six age group and concessions have to be made for their level of education, but it is like she is simple.  She is not helped by her co-star in our nightly escapades, Alex Winters, a man who possesses possibly the widest mouth I have ever seen.  Together, they are ruining the pleasant (if bizarre) interludes once presided over by Chris Jarvis, who had a genuine talent for this type of work, and Pui Fan Lee who, although carried by Chris for the most part, was particularly likeable.  It feels like Cerrie and Alex are trying to compensate for the fact that they are terrible presenters by either Cerrie overdrammatically gesticulating with is using her remaining arm or Alex just smiling inanely like a stoned cheshire cat.

My evenings with Muffin, Makka-Pakka and Lola will never be quite the same as long as this pair are puncturing my bubble.  Bring back Chris and Pui and the crazy toothbrush song!

In the night garden

Kids love it.

Some adults moan about the use of ‘improper language’ encouraging kids to keep up the googoo gaagaa speak (both sides can quote stats, for what it’s worth, I think it’s positive), but you can’t ignore the fact for legions of parents and children, In the night garden has affirmed itself as one of the top kids TV programmes in a very short space of time…

In the Night Garden is best described as; ‘a modern televisual interpretation of a nursery rhyme picture book’. Quite a tall order, but when you consider that this is a staple in the ‘bedtime hour’ on cbeebies (BBC’s dedicated children’s TV channel), it presents itself as the modern day equivalent of a bedtime story. Its about a magical place that exists between waking and sleeping in a child’s imagination.

We even have Knight of the Realm David Jacobi narrating. Perfect pre-bed time fodder.

The whole programme is executed flawlessly. Gentle intro, upbeat story / crazy funtime, and as we start the wind-down, a recap of the story, all the characters slow, and pack themselves off to bed. And then at the end, it’s your turn to go to bed too little one. Genius…

Carry this through into every possible merchandising opportunity going, and we have some very happy creators, and some parents lighter in the wallet.

The BBC / Virgin cynically deleting all shows from store-able hard drives in the build up to Christmas aside (ensuring everyone bought the DVD box set to keep up the bedtime routine), we have a shining example of how to make money from the pre-school market, without being seen to be aggressively marketing to them. After all, none of us want the Daily Mail brigade up in arms calling on tighter government regulations…

Hats off chaps, well done.

Iain Morrison is a senior marketer in the British Tourism Industry. And a massive Pontipinites fan, even though they haven’t got the gravitas to carry an entire episode all on their own…

Our two year old daughter is a big fan of a British kids’ show called “In the Night Garden.” It’s made by the same company behind the Teletubbies. Therefore, the characters are colorful, and slightly freakish.

There is blue, smiley Iggle Piggle, often seen with his red blanket, who looks like a light blue version of Gumby.  He enjoys a more than platonic friendship with Upsy Daisy, who has a triangle shaped skirt and colorful hair.  

I thought our daughter might forget the characters, since they haven’t yet cracked the US market (it’s only a matter of time, I’m sure…).  But she remembers, and often asks me to draw them.  Luckily, our babysitter is a better artist than I am.  She is now well schooled in the art of sketching the Night Garden crowd.

It turns our that our two year old is better at keeping up with her old friends than I am. Last year, I gave a close friend’s daughter in London a personalized picture frame painted by a friend (again, who is a better artist than I am).  It had little pictures of the hospital where she was born, the coffee place where we all went when the girls were babies, our favorite playground, and other reminders of the fun things she did in London with her family, and with us.

They moved to New York last June, and we moved to Atlanta in November. The little girl’s third birthday is coming up, and I have no idea what to get her. While I keep email her mom, and occasionally talk on the phone, the conversations are rushed, filled more with big themes (we moved into a new place; my commute is too long; work is stressful; etc) rather than little details of our daughters’ likes and dislikes.

So I think I should take a cue from my daughter, who commissions sketches of characters she hasn’t seen in months.  She doesn’t need to see them every day to remember them.