Grace has Monkey, her well loved, well protected (by us) soft toy monkey. He is just the right size for cuddling while sleeping. He is also one of the very few reasons that Grace will wake up in the middle of the night calling, “Where’s monkey?!?” when she has misplaced him in her bed or dropped him out of it.

A long time ago, when we realised how important Monkey is to her, we went hunting for a backup. We didn’t find any more monkeys at that stage, but we did find a pink pig which we thought might work. Oinky the pig came home with us, but has never had the star power that Monkey does – at the end of the day, Grace wants to sleep with Monkey, only Monkey.

But don’t fear, Oinky’s tale has a happy ending – Oinky has found his place as Eli’s sleep companion.