Lists and the love of a mother

A departure from my usual blogging self. Normal service will be resumed tomorrow. But today there has been a fortuitous coincidence.

First, I recently signed up for a 30 day improve your blog course. What can I say? It was free. I was supposed to be working. I was bored. I suddenly thought that maybe I ought to actually put some effort in beyond wittering at the few people who come by. I had actually forgotten all about it but the first lesson appeared yesterday and not only did I fail to complete it, I didn't even attempt it. It was all to do with identifying your ambitions for your blog, writing an 'elevator pitch' and working out who you are hoping will read it. That was difficult. I mean do I write for people who are interested in Bosnia? Do I write a Mummy Blog? Do I write for people interested in Bosnia and parenthood and want to read about it in English? That narrows the audience down somewhat. So I decided that I would write for myself and see where I end up. Got sidetracked from writing the elevator pitch - yesterday was a busy day involving far more important things such as escalators, potties (again, it is everlasting and I am still losing the battle) and seeing if I could get the boys to mop the porch before they realised it was a chore and not a game.

For todays lesson I am supposed to write a 'list post'. An important tool apparently. But I quite like doing lists - I'm a mother after all - so I figured I could do that.

Then, just as I was wondering if I could update an old list and be done with it, I was tagged (I didn't know what it meant either) by A Modern Mother and Notes From Inside My Head inviting me to join the modern day Verne voyage to go Around the World in 80 clicks. The idea, in conjunction with Global Voices Online is to get as many Mums from as many countries to write a post listing 5 things that they love about their children, this being a universal question that all mothers, wherever they are from, can respond to. Being about the only Mummy blogging in English from Bosnia, I guess I need to suspend British scepticism and suspicion that this is a chain letter by another name and get to it if Bosnia is to be represented.

But really I can't resist it. 2 for the price of 1. Besides, I read some of the other posts from other participating mothers and there are some really great ones. So, here goes:

1. Getting me back into baking. Cakes, biscuits, puddings. I never cooked them when I was a career girl. Now we don't stop. And even given the amount of copious cake eating that I've achieved over the past few years (particularly as cakes are bad for children and therefore tired Mummys must step in to ensure it doesn't go stale) I'm still a size smaller than in my career girl days because the kids don't stop running around, so neither do I.

2. The inability of Lukey to pronounce his own name. Instead he talks about Ookey. I do go a bit gooey every time I hear it and will be sad when he works out how to say it properly.

3. Providing me with the ability to say "because I said so" and for that to be the end of the conversation! Power. I have it. They may not respect it, but for that short moment I'm the boss and I said so. So there.

4. Making me see the world all over again. Especially seeing things that I have seen so often that I've forgotten how great they are and asking the questions that challenge the basics. I still don't know why Orangina makes you burp and not fart, whether ticks can swim or what worms do when they are not in the ground - but I'd like to.

5. Last, but by no means least, it is the way they can give an all over body hug, which includes arms, legs, head and any other part of their body they can manage to wrap around me. I'll never feel as loved and needed again. Everything that I do for them, give them, create for them is repaid in spades in that moment.

Mission accomplished. Normal Service will be resumed tomorrow. All that remains is to tag some others. So BloominMavelous and Alice - take it away.