storbarnsförälder

Accumulate all the points you can. Be liberal when awarding your own points, but deny other mothers all the points you can get. I have no idea whether fathers also do this points thing - circumstantial evidence strongly suggests not.

Baby rolls over:
At birth: 3 points
Younger than anyone else in your mommy-group: 5 points
At exactly the time your parenting book claims it ought to: 3 points
Later than those: -3 points
Late enough that the paediatrician gets interested: +5 points
Late enough that it's a sign of a really rare condition: +5 points

Baby crawls:
At birth: 3 points
Younger than anyone else in your mommy-group: 5 points
At exactly the time your parenting book claims it ought to: 3 points
Later than those: -3 points
Late enough that the paediatrician gets interested: +5 points
Late enough that it's a sign of a really rare condition: +5 points
Not at all: +10 points
Not at all because s/he's dyslexic: +15 points
In an "unusual" way (hands and feet, bum-shuffling, upside-down, only when wearing full diving gear including oxygen): 4 points

Baby cruises:
It's not cruising, it's walking, it's just that s/he's holding on: 15 points
Only when holding an adults hands so that the adult develops serious back problems: 5 points
Really early: 1 point
Really late: 1 point
Exactly when the book says it should: 1 point

Baby walks:
Before 6 months: 25 points (and a tranquiliser gun)
Before 9 months: 15 points
Before 12 months: 10 points
Bang on 12 months: 5 points
Between 12-24 months: 1 point

Baby talks:
Parents can understand baby before one year: 1 point
Grandparents can understand baby before one year: 5 points
Baby's university lecturers can understand baby before one year: 10 points
Not until really really late but has first complex compound sentence instead of first word: 5 points

Baby grows teeth:
20 points, as teeth appear, unless born with teeth, in which case, add an extra 4 points

Baby potty-trains:
Before 6 months: 200 points for maternal dedication and self-delusion. It's mother-training, not baby-training at that stage.
Before 9 months: 100 points
Before 12 points: 50 months
Before its peers: 5 points
Never: -30 points

Baby learns to swim:
From birth, but what's the point, since babies are so top-heavy their heads won't stay above water? 0 points.

It occurred to me that this is an imprecise art, and needs some widely-recognised standard. I therefore propose the following points system by which pregnancy can be measured:

1. Conception:
   1. Accidental: -5 points
   2. On first attempt: 0 points
   3. Per year trying: 1 point
   4. Resorting to IVF: 10 points
2. Hyperemesis:
   1. Self-diagnosed: 1 point
   2. Really diagnosed: 2 points
   3. Requiring hospitalisation: 5 points
3. SPD: 5 points
4. Acne: -5 points (especially if it shows in the first new baby photos. Have you no sense of style?!)
5. Labour and birth:
   1. Per hour of labour: 1/4 point (false and spurious labour don't count)
   2. Normal delivery, no intervention: 4 points
   3. With venteuse or forceps, no pain relief: 3 points
   4. With venteuse or forceps, lots of pain relief: 2 points
   5. Catheter: -2 points for yukkiness
   6. With no intervention other than pain relief: 1 point
   7. Induction: 1 point
   8. Also, with induction: 1 point for each additional tube going into the arms
   9. Elective c-section: 1 point
   10. Emergency c-section: 5 points
   11. Home birth: 5 points
   12. Unplanned home birth, with ambulances going wee-waa wee-waa and arriving too late while you deliver the baby yourself on the bathroom floor and wrap it in freshly laundered towels: 10 points (plus all the natural delivery points you can pick up, and the labour time ones)
   13. Also, special bonus points: 1 point per pint of blood lost

Now, I hope that clears things up. We should in future be able to get all the competing sorted out nice and quickly, and get on to more interesting things like going "googoogooGOO!" at the dribblers.