Eyebrows, Predictions, and Baby Bumps

I walked into the Year 5 classroom to teach French one Tuesday afternoon. 

“Do you have a baby in there?” A child asked without any filter. 

I looked down at my rather round stomach and gave it a little tap, hoping I could suck it in a few centimetres. 

“Well, it certainly isn’t a big breakfast.”

“Oh, good because we were all talking about how pregnant you looked when you walked in.” 

“Do you know what you’re having Miss?”

“A baby, last time I checked but seeing how my first is more monster than baby, who knows.”

“You need to see Nora’s mum. She can tell you what you are having.”

I quickly scanned my brain to think which year group Nora was in. There is only one Nora in the school, and everyone knows who she is. She joined us part way through the year with a thick Irish accent. She was the only six-year-old I had ever met who had eyebrows semi permanently tattooed on to her forehead in thick black ink. Interestingly her hair was blonde, so I questioned the ability of her beautician. She swore more than any adult and often dropped the C-bomb when she didn’t like something her teacher said. Saying all of that, we all thought she was hilarious. 

At the end of the day, I thought I will make a beeline for Nora’s mum. She is quite easy to spot in the playground with huge beehive black hair, gold hoop earrings and matching mother and daughter eyebrows with a tan which gives Donald Trump a run for his money. 

“Hi, Nora’s mum, I have been told you are the woman in the know when it comes to predicting if I’m having a boy or a girl.” 

She walked over to me, looked me up and down and with her quick tongue whipped out her response. “A boy. Yes, a boy. A big one at that.”

“How do you know that?” I asked amazed with the confidence of her convictions. 

“Boys make your face swell up, so you look fatter than you usually do, Miss.”

She turned and walked away with Nora skipping by her side.

A month later I did have a boy. A big one at that. 9lb13oz. Safe to say, he didn’t have a tan like hers but did have a lovely glow. I later found out it was jaundice, and he is now pale as a pint of milk. 

The lesson?

In teaching, you never know where the next piece of advice will come from, even if it’s from a six-year-old with a bold fashion sense and a mother with very strong opinions.