Iggle Piggle

As a parent, bestowed on you is a super-power, and no, I’m not talking about breastfeeding (joke) I’m talking about the power to make dreams come true.

In the heads of our little bambinos are hopes and dreams, these dreams transcend age, the dreams may vary, but the dreaming itself does not. The dream might be for a specific toy, to meet santa claus or to receive a visit from the tooth fairy. We have the power to make a lot of these dreams come true.

Last weekend Erin had a dream. She can’t speak, but for a few choice words (mum, dad, no….mostly no actually…). I knew she had a dream when out of these select words popped out two very clear words “iggle piggle” …and then three words “iggle piggle piggle”. For those of you who don’t know who iggle piggle is, he is a character from a relatively new but popular children’s programme called ‘In the Night Garden’. It would seem that my eighteen month old had taken a shine to one of the main characters, a blue boy (man?) brandishing a red blanky with his own little theme tune (”yes, my name is iggle piggle, iggle piggle, iggle piggle piggle…..”). It became apparent that Erin was trying to sing the song when she was saying “iggle piggle piggle”.

Erin’s dream manifested over the weekend. We watched the programme, she muttered “iggle piggle” constantly and shouted “wow” when we showed her the little blue man on the cbeebies website. The dream was clear and we new what we had to do.
Half an hour of iggle piggle in the evening was not enough. We needed our very own iggle piggle. There was only one thing for it…

Erin & Iggle Piggle

We jumped in the car and headed to the place where all parents can go to make dreams happen. Toys R Us. Would it be too perfect for this story for there to have been only one lonely iggle piggle left, because that was exactly what stared at us as we hurried into the toy-super-warehouse. I grabbed iggle piggle and clutched him to my chest….I can do this dream-maker thing, I handed over my card and in return I got the last iggle piggle, now I know what it’s like to be a parent in that christmas eve dash looking for THE present…..THE only present that can make Christmas Day the truly magical event we strive for.

We returned home victorious and presented Erin with our trophy. Erin whooped and her little face lit up as I squeezed iggle’s belly and his theme tune rang out.

It’s pretty easy to see how children end up spoiled. The dream-making process is addictive, in an adrenalin junkie kind of way. I’ll need to make sure that one fix doesn’t lead to another and another and a bigger-nother!