Tips from Oliver, Part One in a Series

I took Sophie, Henry and Oliver to the nursery yesterday, to buy some potting soil for our vegetable garden. The boys climbed into the car, Henry in the front seat with me, and Oliver in the back with Sophie.

Oliver leaned over and gave Sophie a resounding kiss on the cheek.

Sophie smells weird, like lavender. She needs to smell like something different, he said.


What do you mean? I asked.


I think she needs to smell like a normal girl, like what normal girls wear. Like Daisy and Emma.


But lavender smells good!


Yeah, but it smells sort of like what a baby's clean butt should smell like. Not a teenager.


I handed him a small roll-on fragrance thingy that I had in my purse, some kind of ginger essence from Origins.

Yeah, that's good, he said, after rolling it on Sophie's neck. He leaned in to smell her and said, Yeah, that's good. She smells like a normal girl now.