Last time we talked I was headed to the gym, right? Well I didn’t quite get there! I haven’t had time to go to the gym or play soft rugby as planned. Instead I have been doing household chores during my free time. It has been a week now without a house help.

Last time I saw her was last Sunday but one. She wasn’t coming to church with us as usual. Instead, she was going visit her mum, who lives off Waiyaki Way in Kangemi, roughly a 20 minutes drive from Limuru where we live. Now, I don’t know her mum, or whether she lives in Kangemi or not but I take her word for it and let her go. By evening she hasn’t come and her phone is off. Then I check my phone and there is an unread message. It is her, saying she’ll be coming the next day – Monday. I find this weird but giving her the benefit of doubt, I call her on Monday afternoon to find out if she has reached the house yet. She says no and that she’s not in a position to come as she fell off a motorbike earlier in the day. She almost lost four of her teeth in the accident she tells me, but she has not gone to the hospital yet, which I found even more weird because falling off a moving motorbike is a big deal! I send her some cash though. She informs me that she plans to stay at her mum’s until she heals completely.

Since then attempts to make her come back have been futile.  I even tried to reason with her to come and recuperate in my house but she’ll hear none of it. I explained to her that she doesn’t have to do anything, only what she can but at least to stay so that when the kids come from school in the evening they find someone home.  But now, she won’t even answer my calls. I will stop now because going on and on about my house help is making me sound like a jilted lover. However, if this seemingly ridiculous story is true then I am sorry for her. Really. But I am also sorry that I find her attitude mean and when she comes back, she better be coming to pick her stuff.

So for the past week, it has been just us – the girls, hubby and me. The best thing about not having help around the house is that is that you get to be re-acquainted with your kitchen re-discover your children and appreciate what they are capable of.

Take this day when I got home at half past five in the evening thinking I’ll find the kids playing outside after being dropped by the school van. Instead as I approach the house, there is no sign of my kids but their little school shoes are sprawled outside the front door. I open the door and find that they came in, washed their hands and are now them preparing their own snack. As the elder one was laying the table, the younger was applying peanut butter on her slice of bread while eating some of it (the peanut butter, not the bread) :). This moment literally took my breath away. I called papa and told him you won’t believe what I found our kids doing. How they have grown!

First of all, no one had shown them where we hide the keys (I was hoping I’d get to the house before them). They had observed that the house keys are hidden at a particular place. It was Kajune who found the keys they later told me, and because they are a bunch of them, Bunny showed her the right key. Ask me when she found out that. I mean, it’s not like any of them had ever had to open the door for themselves before.

As a parent, watching your kids grow is amazing…even unbelievable!  The truth is that whether they your children are 5 or 55, you will always look at them and remember that helpless infant you held on your arms, that adorable feeling you felt when they circled their little hands around your finger. You will remember their gummy grin when they were three months old and could barely sit. But babies grow, pretty fast. Every day they are turning into little people and learning to do things by themselves. Of course, they are learning mostly by watching you!

• Don’t worry that children never listen to you, worry that they are always watching you.- Robert Fulgham

When I look at my girls, I still see them as babies, but I dare not underestimate them. You only have to listen to children to appreciate how much they know or how fast they are learning new things. And because children are created that way, they are naturally very inquisitive. My girls enjoy asking their dad or I, tricky questions and watch as we grapple to find they right words to explain. Like the day Bunny asked me ‘What is distance?’

“Mummy, Come!”

That was Kajune, on Saturday morning. She’s calling me from the sitting room where they are having a mid morning snack with her sister. The mid morning snack at their request, is raw carrots and milk (of course milk is my idea) I am in the kitchen, starting to prepare lunch.

“Baby, you should say ; Mummy, please come. ” I correct her (partly am buying time so I can finish peeling this potato am peeling).

“Please come mummy, she says.”

“Yes baby.”

Wearing that inquisitive look, she asks “What are carrots made from?” 🙂

• People think am cool. No one is cooler than my two girls. – Barrack Obama