Farewell then, 2009. Next year the girls hit double figures and turn 10, the age at which children generally (so we’re told) stop putting marshmallows up their noses.

I’m not sure if I’m feeling relieved or nostalgic right now.

Ha!

That 2005 version of me was an idiot. Nowadays I’m far more realistic about the scale of the task we face. If you want a picture of the future, George Orwell might have told me, imagine a small foot stamping deliberately on its sister’s foot – forever.

Last week’s case in point came from Lauren, just as I was getting out of the shower.

“Daddy, Hannah said I have breasts!”

I went into their bedroom to find them both inspecting each other’s naked chests. (This was, I should point out, after some 30 minutes of “getting dressed”.) I told them to stop being silly and get ready but instead they chose to have a discussion on the differences between:

1. breasts
2. boobies
3. nipples
4. willies

I have to admit it was all rather fascinating, even if I got a bit lost in the detail: I’m pretty clear on the difference between boobies and willies, less clear on boobies v. breasts. In any case, the consensus after a few minutes of robust debate seemed to be that they both have (or sort-of have) items 1-3, but definitely not item 4.

“Don’t we, Daddy?” said Hannah. “Don’t we?”

The path of least resistance beckoned. “Yes, girls. Now get dressed.”

“Aha!” cried Hannah, turning to Lauren with a triumphant finger in the air. “You breast my case!”

The Happy Adventures of Hannah and Lauren from Mark Whitaker on Vimeo

This morning, as they were getting dressed, they wanted to know about mammals. No, actually, that’s a lie: Hannah wanted to shave her arms because they’re “all hairy” and we sort of managed to divert the issue by talking about mammals. I told them all mammals have hair all over their bodies.

“What, even pigs?”

Yes, I said, even pigs.

“Even whales?”

Even whales. (Please don’t correct me if I’m wrong: I’m a parent, not a zoologist. Remember the primary aim here was not to educate, it was to prevent shaving.)

“Even monkeys?” And so on.

I asked them if they knew the two other things that all mammals have in common. They ummed and ahhed for a bit. Nicola hinted it had something to do with babies.

“They all like babies?” said Lauren.

No, we said. Think about what they give birth to…

“Kittens?” said Hannah.

I think at this point we gave them the live young vs. eggs thing as a freebie. (It was getting close to school time.) This just left the milk thing.

“Think about the little piglets we saw at the farm,” I suggested.

“It’s got something to do with boobies…” hinted Nicola.

“And babies…” I added.

“Oh, I know,” said Hannah with a confident nod, “babies don’t have boobies!”

“And neither do piglets!” chimed Lauren.

Genius.

The King awoke one morning to the sound of great commotion coming from the drawing room beneath his bedchamber.

“Oh bother,” thought the King, “whatever can be the matter?” And without further ado he swung his legs out of the bed, slid them into his royal slippers and reached for his royal dressing gown.

On entering the drawing room the King was confronted with the most distressing of scenes. The Queen was sat between the two Princesses, both of whom were a-wailing and a-howling as if the sky had just fallen down. The poor Queen was trying to calm them with kind words, but seemingly to no avail. “Things break, my darlings,” she was explaining to her daughters as the King entered the scene, “things always break.”

“Now then!” announced the King gruffly (for there was little that pleased the King less than being roused from his slumber by the silliness of his Princesses), “what in heaven can have caused such a terrible hullabaloo?”

“Oh Papa,” cried one of the Princesses, whose name was Lauren, “our shoes, Papa!” She was scarce able to speak through a face that was a veritable mask of misery and mucus. “Look at our shoes!”

The King cast his glance in the direction of Princess Lauren’s outstretched finger and there he beheld two pairs of little dancing shoes, each shoe in the most wretched state of disrepair. He crouched down to inspect them at closer quarters.

“And pray what,” he inquired at length, “has turned your little Highnesses’ royal shoes to such sorry, ruined articles, as might be found in any of the paupers’ houses down in the village?”

There was a pause and then the other Princess, whose name was Hannah, said quietly, “Dancing, Papa. Too much dancing.”

The King thought for a moment. As a ruler he was feared throughout his Kingdom, but he had rather a soft spot for his little Princesses, and he had to admit, their dancing did always seem to fill his heart with the lightest and warmest of feelings.

“Tell me,” he said to the Queen, “does not the merchant in the village, Mr Tesco, sell dancing shoes?”

“I believe he does, my dear,” replied the Queen, but behind her the two little Princesses were nodding so vigorously that the King could tell at once that the answer was beyond doubt.

“And please, Papa,” said Princess Hannah, “I believe that Mr Disney in the centre of Trafford also sells the most beautiful dancing shoes!”

“Yes,” chimed her sister, “at eight ducats a pair!”

“Eight ducats?!” exclaimed the King. “Do you believe me to be made of money? Perhaps you fancy that, when I turn the tap in my bathroom of a morning, it is not water that flows forth from it but ducats!”

The Princesses went rather quiet again. “Well my dear,” said the Queen, “you are the King.”

“Very well,” sighed the King, “so be it. Have one of the servants ride down to the village and inquire at the premises of Mr Tesco and Mr Disney about new dancing shoes.”

But his pronouncement was not met with the joy the King had expected. Indeed, he had rarely in life seen a threesome of more downcast faces.

“But my dear,” said the Queen, “we have no servants.”

“No servants?!” roared the King. “What madness is this? I am the King!”

The Queen responded with an embarrassed shrug.

“Very well,” said the King, “in that case fetch my valet, Richards. He will not receive the news at all well, but Richards will have to ride down to the village to fetch the shoes.”

“Richards does not exist, my dear,” said the Queen, scarcely meeting his eye. “He is a mere figment of your imagination.”

The King looked about him in sheer astonishment. He was beginning to wonder if he had indeed been woken up at all this morning, or whether he was in fact still in his warm feather bed in the grip of some horrendous night fright. He rubbed his eyes and pinched himself firmly on his royal rump, but alas, none of it seemed to alter the situation. At length he groaned in despair.

“I can see I have no choice,” he grumbled. “Princesses, dress yourselves promptly. I shall ride you into the village myself, to the premises of Mr Tesco and, if need be, Mr Disney.”

And there was great rejoicing.

Lauren: Daddy, from now on my name is Nerual! [pronounced to rhyme with Beryl]
Me: OK Nerual.
Lauren: And your name is Kram!
Me: OK.

[Perfectly timed pause]

Hannah: You can just call me Hannah.

Two conversations overheard this morning. First, Before:

Lauren (on toy mobile phone): Hi, is that Hannah?
Hannah (also on toy mobile phone, about 1 foot away): Yes
Lauren: Are you a nurse as well?
Hannah: Yeah, I am actually.
Lauren: Good, ’cause I need your help. I’m having a baby!
Hannah: OK. When’s it due?
[Thud of Lauren hitting the floor]
Lauren: RIGHT NOW!!

And then, After:

Hannah: There you go, there’s your little baby.
Lauren: Is it a boy or a girl?
Hannah: Er… well, it’s just a baby really.

I’m beginning to doubt this postmistress’s obstetric qualifications.

For the record, the first tooth to come out was Lauren’s bottom right one, on 1 June 2007 – aged 6 years, 9 months and 23 days.

All of this is pure theoretical physics, of course. I’m not convinced we’ve ever seen Zoom in our house, let alone A1. Hearing Hannah and Lauren talk about Z26 is like listening to Stephen Hawking on black holes: it all sounds very clever but you can’t quite imagine what it would actually look like.

I can only suppose it would be a bit like “VOOM” in The Cat In The Hat Comes Back: a tremendous release of energy, a blinding flash of light, and a fraction of a second later two girls would be standing there in their school uniforms, hair combed, shoes done up, coats on.

I can’t deny it sounds attractive, but their current method (lying on back, singing, reading, waving legs in air) probably causes less structural damage.

So far they have only learnt one note: that piercing one you get when you blow too hard with all holes uncovered.

Shriek! Shriek! Shriek-shriek-shriek!

Mike Oldfield this ain’t. I am approaching the point of despair.

A word from the wise: if your children ever come into posession of recorders, buy ear muffs or leave home.

1. Slow
2. Wide
3. Fast
4. Smart
5. Zoom

Rather than defining each one precisely the girls offered rather scattered titbits of information, a bit like one of those logic puzzles where you get mismatching information about a range of items and have to work out the rest. What I now know is the following:

• Wide is really slow, y’know, a bit dawdle-donkey, like with messing about and stuff.
• Slow is just lying on the floor daydreaming.
• Zoom is the fastest, where you just get dressed and no talking.
• Smart is faster than Fast but you’re allowed a bit of talking.
• Fast is what they normally do. (Note: I would never have chosen the word “fast” to describe it.)
• If you want to go to disco dancing after school on a Friday you have to do Zoom or Smart.
• This morning Lauren did Zoom but there is some disagreement over whether Hannah did Zoom or Smart.
• I definitely heard both of them talking.
• The whole system therefore appears dangerously corrupt.

Don’t tell them, but they’re going disco dancing anyway. It buys us a whole hour of peace and quiet.

In the meantime, here’s a montage of photos of their latest obsession, Jenga. They discovered it while we were visiting friends on a rainy Sunday afternoon last week and have been hooked ever since. (They also fell in love with Scrabble, but being less of a physical sport I didn’t take any photos of that.)

Hannah: Daddy, you know when you’re a grandad…
Lauren (interrupting): Will you be a grandad or a grandpa?
Me: Oh… a grandpa I think.
Hannah: Why?
Me: Well, in my family we’ve always had grandpas and in Mummy’s family they’ve had grandads. So I’d like to be a grandpa.
[pause]
Lauren: What about our husbands?
Hannah: Yeah, will they be grandpas or grandads?
Me (after a short think): They can be whatever they want to be, girls.

We never did get to hear what Hannah started to ask me. As ever, I’m left thinking that a bit of forward planning is commendable, but all things in moderation.

“One elephant, two elephant, three elephant…”
“No, that’s seconds. Minutes is like, one……… two……… three………”
“Oh yeah, that’s right.”

They were clocking roughly 3 seconds per minute.

“Do you know what car insurance is, Hannah?” asked Nicola.

“Yeah!” chirped Lauren’s voice from the toilet. The family reconvened at the open door to the smallest room to hear more. “And it’s not the only kind of insurance,” Lauren continued, beginning to count off on her fingers. “There’s pet insurance… life insurance…”

“Home insurance!” chimed Hannah.

“Yeah, home insurance…”

“How do you know all this, girls?” I asked, feeling somewhat impressed.

“Well, you know at Tesco’s, near the till, yeah?” said Lauren. “They’ve got all those leaflets, and there’s pet insurance, life insurance…”

“Home insurance!”

“Yeah, home insurance… and… there’s one you’ve forgotten, Hannah!”

Short comedy pause.

“Peg insurance!”

Whereupon Lauren laughed so much she fell off the toilet.

Hannah and Lauren are having an unexpected day off today due to a burst water main at school. We’ve also brought one of their class mates home with us, so I’m working upstairs while the three girls play in the living room.

I just went to check on them and, of course, they are watching Grease. Their friend bounded across the room and grabbed my hand.

“Mark! Mark!” she shouted, “Isn’t it right that you need to have sex to have a baby?”

Hannah and Lauren looked on with wide-eyed curiosity.

“Erm… what… well…” I explained.

“My mummy told me,” she continued. “I know what having sex is, but don’t worry, I won’t tell them.”

I have now escaped to the spare room upstairs where I’m sitting with the door closed, typing this and planning my next move. Frankly, I’m terrified. They’re only six! This is all Travolta’s fault. Would sex have reared its ugly head if they’d been watching Wallace and Gromit? Of course not.

Oh hell, someone’s coming up the stairs. Perhaps I can climb out of the window and make my escape? Help!!

Nicola, on the other hand, is taking it all in her stride, assuring me that she went to see it at the age of 6 with her grandmother and it all goes over your head at that age.

I suspect I’m just “being a dad” on this one. Do any readers have any Grease-related personal stories they can share which might calm my troubled mind?

The second was in the car on our way home from school via the park. It’s a lovely hot day and Hannah and Lauren had been running rings round me playing tag. From the back seat, Hannah’s voice piped up: “When I’m hot, this booby hurts… but when I’m cold, this booby hurts.” They both cackled about it for ages, and Hannah now refers to the left and right sides of her chest as “hot booby” and “cold booby” respectively.

Today, obviously, it’s hot booby that’s causing her the most discomfort.

To be fair, though, they were pretty attentive and most of the distractions came from football-related questions. Here are just a few that I was called upon to resolve using my expert football knowledge.

Q: Why are lots of the football players little children?
A: It’s only the grown-ups that are footballers. The little boys just come on at the start to sing for a bit then they go off again.

Q: Why is that man holding his heart? Is he poorly?
A: No, he’s singing his national anthem so it’s a bit like he’s saluting.

Q: Why is that goalkeeper running around and playing football and not staying in the goal?
A: That isn’t the goalkeeper, he’s called the referee.

Q: What’s a referee?
A: He’s like the teacher. He makes sure that everybody’s playing nicely.

Q: Is England the ones in white or the ones in yellow and blue and red?
A: Neither, England play tomorrow. This is Poland in white and Ecuador in yellow.

Q: Are Brazil playing?
A: No, just Poland and Ecuador.

Q: What was the goalkeeper holding up then?
A: He’s the referee, sweetheart. It was a yellow card, which means somebody’s been naughty, like tripping someone up. If you get two yellow cards then you have to go off. Or if you’re really really really naughty he shows you the red card and you’ve got to go off straight away.

Q: Do we want Poland to win or the other ones?
A: We don’t mind really. But hey, who will we want to win tomorrow??
Q: Brazil?
A: No, England! [slightly peevishly - we must have been through this a million times now]

Q [about 10 minutes later]: Is there an orange card?
A: No, just red and yellow.
Q: So what happens if someone’s really really naughty?
A: They get the red card and they have to go off.
Q: I thought the red card was for really really really naughty?
A [after long thoughtful pause]: There’s just red and yellow, Hannah.

Q: Why does the goalkeeper wear those big gloves?
A: Because he’s the only one who’s allowed to touch the ball with his hands. [This rash assertion was successfully challenged during a subsequent throw-in.]
Q: So the rest can’t touch it with their hands?
A: No, otherwise they’ll get a yellow card. [Is it yellow or red? I'm past caring.]
Q: What if they touch it with their legs?
A: That’s fine, legs are OK. And heads, and chests. In fact they can touch it with any part of their body except their arms and hands.
Q: Any part?
A: Except their arms and hands.
[There is sniggering]
Q: Even their widgies?
A: No, I think that might hurt. Just watch.

Q: Daddy, what’s the off-side rule?
A: Oh look, girls, bed time!

OK, I made up the last one but I swear the rest are genuine. 2 matches down, only 62 to go…