Music

I've mentioned before how my days have changed from looking after girls to looking after boys. Suddenly its all tractors and construction workers, whereas it used to be doing hair and Sylvanian families. Its not the only thing that's changed though. I'm watching new TV shows (now its all 'Thomas the Tank Engine' and no 'Peppa Pig', we're watching a lot of 'Hi-5' as well, which is so hysterical). But, the thing that I've really noticed is the songs. I've got a whole heap of new songs to learn and/or perform. My last Little One was a bit funny about songs. She liked singing when I first got there, but after about a month, she wouldn't let anyone sing anymore. Then, she would let us sing, but only certain songs. So, I was allowed to sing 'I want a home amongst the gum trees', and occasionally, 'Please don't call me a koala bear,' but most other songs were banned on the rationale that, 'That's bad singing, Jenny'. Ironically, she would let me sing ABBA (which her sister was always playing on the iPod), when I was intentionally singing it appallingly badly. Apart from these songs, we were allowed to sing one of the songs from her older sister's holy communion, 'Happy in the Presence of the Lord', a couple of songs about rainbows (usually 'Red and Yellow and Pink and Blue,' but I was occasionally allowed to spice it up with 'Rainbow Connection' or 'Somewhere Over the Rainbow') and a song about the days of the week. Her elder sister liked me to sing, 'Blue Moon', because she liked the 'quavery voice' I did (vibrato) on the long notes, but the Little One hated it and would cover her ears and yell, 'No, Jenny, no!'
My new boys love music. There was one morning when I first got there, and I was left with Baby Brother, who was crying up a storm, and I didn't know what to do with him. On a whim, I started singing, 'Fields of Gold' for him, and he immediately stopped crying, looked up at me with big eyes and grinned. You think, 'Wow, if only all audiences would react to me like that...' He loves a good sing along, and he's particularly fond of 'Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes...' because of the bit where I have to go from touching my knees to touching my toes. Whenever I stand up again, he's always got a big grin on his face. I think he likes the way my hair bounces about. Either that, or he just thinks I look like a fool.
His older brother, Little Man, also loves a good song. He's got some songs that he sings with his mum, 'Shake, shake my sillies out...' which I don't know yet. We've been talking a lot about crocodiles recently, so I started singing, 'Never Smile at a Crocodile,' for him. He thought it was fantastic. Pity I could only remember the first line. But then I remembered that amazing thing called the internet, and that fabulous invention, YouTube. So, I told Little Man I'd find the song for him on my laptop. He was enthralled:

He adores it. He makes me play it over and over and over again, and adds in commentary. 'There they go in their boat.' 'There goes the crocodile.' 'He's not happy'. 'He's very scared, isn't he?' etc. etc. etc. Today he asked me for a dinosaur song. I was in the middle of saying I didn't know a dinosaur song, when I thought, 'I'll just type dinosaur song into google and see what comes up.' I just clicked on the first thing I saw, praying it wasn't some sort of parody or filled with bad language or naked women or some such. Thankfully, it was all G-rated, and again, he was delighted:

Again, we watched it over and over and over, doing roars when the dinosaurs did them, singing along to the words, pretending to play the guitar etc. Then, his mum asked if he wanted to show my the 'funny duck song'. So, we looked it up again, and came up with this gem:

Which is truly bizarre, but also kind of hilarious at the same time.
So, this is the beginnings of my new soundtrack for this household. I'm sure it will be added to in the next little while. I'm also becoming very adept at Hi-5's 'Backyard Adventurers'. So Australian, they even have a hills hoist in the background.