Reasons to have children

'Izzy's been playing quite a funny game today,' Becky told me, when I arrived at the nursery.

'Oh god, she's not going round snapping your bra straps again, is she?'

'No, no,' Becky said.

Izzy had instead been urging her nursery mates to pick up two hula hoops each and hold them in front of their chests. 'These are our special protective bras,' she said. 'You have to have them in front of your boobs to protect them.' She couldn't convince all her friends to do it. Young Tara correctly said she didn't need a bra. But Izzy herself walked round with the hoops for a good part of one playtime at least.

I have no idea if this stemmed from the time Izzy was watching me feed Rosie, and Rosie, having finished, grabbed my chest with untrimmed nails, making me yelp 'Yow, Rosie, yow!' Izzy howled with laughter and unsympathetically urged her to repeat the act. 'Say "yow, Rosie, yow, mummy, say it again!"' 

I dread to think what the nursery girls don't repeat to us.