What a difference a day makes

"You look like you could do with a hug love".

The words filtered down through the fog of my brain and I realised that the woman was talking to me. I smiled weakly and looked down at Kate and stroked her hair.

"Don't worry, I have been there and my girl is 43 now. She'll be right." The woman looped a fluffy scarf around her neck and smiled a warm smile at me as she walked out of the doors of the Emergency Department at the hospital.

As I considered her words I realised that if she, a stranger, could tell from my face that I was so worried then what must poor Kate be thinking as she looked to me for reassurance. As I sat down on the red vinyl chairs and looked in dismay at the television screen announcing that the wait to be seen would be five hours I gave myself a stern talking to. While it was just Kate and I here then I needed to look positive and happy and calming for her. I smiled and held her hand and chatted to her. She lay, quietly watching me, with unfocused eyes. I couldn't see the spark of light that is usually there, the mischief and inquisition and laughter. I pushed all these thoughts away and played 'Boo' from the side of the buggy.

The wait wasn't that long in the end, the assessment nurse gave me some Dioralyte to give Kate from a syringe, 5mls every 10 minutes, and soon Mr C arrived quickly followed by a doctor from Pediatrics. We were told that Kate had mild dehydration and that she would be admitted to the ward. We arrived on the ward at 7pm and continued to give her a drink for the syringe every ten minutes. Within an hour she was angry at us and it was so good to see. She had been so still and so quiet I barely recognised her and that is what scared me half to death. To see her sitting up and yelling at us was a fantastic thing.

She lay in the cot, and every time I stood up and reached for the syringe she would spit her dummy out in preparation and start making urgent little noises. Give it to me now, now, now, now. My clever little girl.

By 11pm it was decided that we could go home and eventually we found our way out of the hospital and got home in the early hours of the morning. Not much sleep was had by any of us but it was good to be home.

Today we gave her small amounts of milk all day and she started to crawl and then pull herself up. She started getting into everything and for once I was happy not completely frustrated. She smiled and laughed and pooped all we rejoiced in each and every little thing because minute by minute our little girl reappeared before my eyes.

Today is a good day.

Complete and utter chaos.

It has been a long couple of weeks, a break in Torquay with family has been followed by a week of solo parenting as well as working. The Kate got ill on Thursday with a vomiting bug and Piran developed a cough and cold on Friday. I have not had a decent nights sleep in weeks and I feel like I am running on empty. Blah de blah blah blah.

It is coming up to that time of the month again too. I can tell as I have an overwhelming urge to kill everyone.

Poor Kate is so ill though and it is so hard. Most of the milk we give her comes back and I am sick of the sound of the washing machine and I have run out of clean trousers. Even just after three days she looks so different, thin and tired all of the time. Suddenly grown up, our baby has disappeared. I know it is more to do with the fact she is ill but I look at her and I can hardly recognise her all of a sudden. She hasn't stood up for days and she is quiet. Occasionally she has even fallen asleep next to me, or even on me which is so unheard of. Most of the time she is miserable and just fights us all the way though. Will not be held and comforted even though she is crying and unhappy.

I am exhausted and going round in circles. Anyway, suffice to say things are a little fraught round here. In the midst of this all there were big changes for me as I decided that it wasn't working back at work and so I handed in my notice this week. With lots of solo parenting during the week this year with Mr C traveling a lot for work we made a decision that I would be better off at home. I have a freelance job lined up once a week which I am so excited about and I have lots of plans and schemes that I will start to get to grips with once I have some free time.

My biggest project over the next month while I work out my notice is our front room. As I mentioned earlier this year I want to concentrate on making our home somewhere that works for us and this is the first step. I will blog along the way I am sure.

Happy Weekend everyone. I hope that things settle down round here and I am back blogging more frequently soon.

Make it Monday: Inspiration

Firstly, an apology. Life got in the way and I completely forgot to draw my button winner from this giveaway on my button lampshades post. I have consulted the random number generator gods and of the eight entries number 4 was the winner. Congratulations Chris, I will arrange to send my buttons your way shortly.

I have had no free time for making anything than beds and dinners recently. Usually I just look at all the things that I don't have time to make on Pinterest and dream of a time when I will get a chance. But my favourite is when one idea meets another idea and sparks something off in my brain.

These are the ideas that I pin to my inspiration board. I am itching to get going with an idea that I have had that mixes this online stencil generator that makes a stencil from any photo with this silhouette canvas. Watch this space for that one.

Happy making.

Bonding

One of the real breakthrough moments for me in my journey with postnatal depression over the past few months was when I realised that Kate and the depression were two very separate things. Yes, the fact that Kate had colic, and was a difficult, angry, feisty little baby was hard, and didn't help but even if she had been quiet and placid and sleepy I would have still felt the same. More sleep would have made a bit of a difference but the anxiety and roller coster style ups and downs would have still been there.

After I had Piran it took me a long time to bond with him in the way I had expected to immediately. I have always put that down to the scare of him being in Special Care just hours after birth and the fact that I held back, didn't want to love him until I knew he would be okay. I know I have written about this before but somewhere along the line I fell deeply in love with my little boy and suddenly I understood what everyone else had been going on about.

Then we had Kate. And yes, I felt happy and elated when I had her, and walking out of the hospital on the same day was just amazing. Then I got home and realised that I had no idea how to look after a newborn baby even though she was my second as for the first week with Piran most of it was handled by the SCBU nurses. Then she started crying and didn't really stop until she was nearly five months old.

I am not sure how we made it through that time. I know for sure that it wasn't easy and that we are still getting over it. I was so focussed on getting through each day and trying to make our baby girl as happy as I could that I didn't realise for a long time that I didn't yet have those feelings. I would have done anything for her from the minute that she was born but it never seemed natural.

I was up in the night with Kate two days ago and as I stood in her room, holding her, rocking her, murmuring into her ear with her hair tickling my nose as I placed tiny soft kisses on her cheek I suddenly felt it. That point deep in my belly that makes me feel like hugging her and holding her all the time. Pride and love and bubbles in my stomach that feel like they burst when I hear her laugh. So much love I am not sure what to do with it.

I wonder now if this is just my way. That I am a slow burner when it comes to these things. Now that it has happened twice I am not so concerned at all. In a way this delayed reaction helped me get through the last few months. I have trouble hearing Kate cry at all these days but in the beginning I had to listen to it for hours on end. I have always been happy to leave my children with their dad, or grandparents or at nursery and walk away and have me time. Perhaps this delayed reaction really helped with that (and in turn helped me keep my sanity).

Or perhaps it is just as I have suspected that I am not really a baby person at all. Obviously I liked my babies but now she is nine months old and can interact with us, shout and laugh and clap and follow me it is nothing short of amazing. I always say that I don't want to wish her baby days away but actually I suspect I really do! I am fairly sure that this is my last baby, and if my theory is correct, and babies are not my thing then I shouldn't be getting broody round any newborn babies any time soon.

Mind you, if you see me looking wistfully at toddlers can you remind me how much I really love sleep?

Letters to my children

I am unable to add tags to these posts but it is important to me that they can be found so please just ignore this post!

Piran: Two and a half

Kate: Nine months

Nine months- the pictures

I am still unable to add the pictures to my nine months letter to Kate so here they are instead.

Bedtime stories

Disclosure: This is a Sponsored post. I have been paid to include some links but the content is my own and I really would love some suggestions for stories.

Before I had children there were things that I associated with being a parent that I imagined in an idyllic, rose-tinted sort of way. Family meals around the table, days out at the seaside and reading bedtime stories were all on that list. Now I am a parent the reality of food being thrown around, tantrums, arguments over walking or not walking and overtired children has totally bought me back to reality, but I still try to hang on to the reading bedtime stories to my children.

However, as I mentioned recently Piran is not the sit down and listen type when it comes to bedtime stories. Our current favourite is Shoe Baby and he loves to join in and we do actions and jump and shout “WHO TOOK MY SHOE?”

It isn’t really something I considered when we were looking for childrens bedroom furniture but his bed needs to take a lot of jumping on and off and pretending to be giants. The one we have is just a toddler sized one that I picked up second hand but Piran is tall and with all of the animals that he insists on taking to bed each night it gets pretty crowded indeed. Soon we will need to look for a single size, but the room is tiny and if we want to fit anything else in the room we will need to be clever with the space. Thinking about childrens beds I guess something like the Noah Cabin Bedstead from Feather and Black looks fantastic but I would worry about him being up high.

For now though I am just enjoying squeezing onto his small bed and having fun at story time. Getting him excited at bedtime seems counter intuitive but it is just so much fun. We would absolutely love some recommendations of good books for two and a half year olds that get you involved like this. He loves anything that is repeated throughout the book, and stories with rhythm and rhyme are always a winner.

Please leave a comment with any books that you can recommend for us.

Magazines, meals out and cinema tickets

Disclosure: This is a Sponsored Post - I have been paid to include links but the content is all my own.


I must admit that when it comes to food shopping I tend to go for whichever supermarket is closest. I am a creature of habit and even going to a different branch of my usual supermarket do to the food shopping freaks me out. I just can't find anything and so I have to go up and down the aisles looking for what I need and ending up buying a lot of stuff that I don't.

The local Tesco in Lewes is like a second home to me these days. I know where everything is and I can whizz in and out with very little bother at all. Mind you, even when I just pop in for a couple items I still manage to spend twenty pounds without realising it. Everything just seems so expensive these days and it all adds up so I am pleased that at Tesco at least we can use our clubcard and get something back. We also both commute a fair way so we get through quite a lot of petrol each month so all the points definitely add up. In the past I used to save up my vouchers and spend them all at Christmas but then I heard about Clubcard Deals.

Now I use my vouchers and exchange them for all sorts of things. Being on maternity leave has meant that some of the things that we liked to enjoy had to be stopped and thanks to my pile of vouchers that I have squirreled away we have still been able to treat ourselves occasionally. Especially when on holiday we were able to use vouchers on days out and having a few nice meals out and about. I love that the vouchers can be used in a lot of family friendly restaurants. A £10 clubcard voucher gets me a £40 restaurant token and that is just right for our family of four.

Every year we use the vouchers to renew Mr C’s Gardeners World magazine and I have given quite a few gift subscriptions using our vouchers too. Which is a great present for the parent that has everything. In fact there are loads of gift options for all members of the family.

And then, if I have any left over to spend I get myself some cinema vouchers. I then hide these away to be used by me and me alone on the very rare occasion that I have child free time to see a film of my choice. And because the ticket is free I have more money for popcorn!

Make it Monday: Planning not making

Today was my first Monday back at work and I feel tired and worn out and a little sad that I have not had any time to make anything this week.

However, I have spent this evening commenting on some blog posts and pinning all the wonderful things that I have seen in the last week that I want to make, or have inspired me to make something so I thought I could just do a quick round up instead.

I found these paper flying fish, super simple and a perfect distraction for Piran on a cold (wet, snowy) afternoon.

I love this new baby toy made from an upcycled jumper (or cardigan) by Make Do Mum. Her baby is the next one I know that is due, so I will have to make this for someone else!

I still have my twig wreath that I used at Christmas and I love the idea of wreath with felt flowers, it will be perfect to brighten the house in preparation for Spring.

It is my Dad's birthday next week and I have been seriously lacking in inspiration for a present for him, cursing my plan to make everybody's presents this year. However Tara has come to the rescue with this LOVE picture. Now I just need to get planning and snapping.

Finally I pinned two quilts. I am totally in love and awe of M is for Make's Amazing Technicolour Dream Quilt made from Loulouthi flannel no less. It is completely beautiful and must be the best thing to snuggle up under. Then there is a Selvedge Mini quilt. I cannot get enough of anything made from selvedge and this is rainbow coloured and has clever crosses as part of the pattern as well. It really is a thing of beauty.

What are you making this week? I would love to hear what you are up to.

Review: WOW toys

We were sent some WOW toys for Piran and Kate to play with and review. WOW toys pride themselves on creating super cute, super tough toys for your little ones to love …and all with no batteries required! We were sent three items in total, two for Piran and a bath toy for Kate to play with.

George's Dragon Tale
Received hot on the heels of Piran's new obsession with the Cbeebies programme Mike the Knight this was an immediate winner with Piran. A cute dragon, a knight, a chariot with a catapult and a boulder for launching (or the knight's football as Piran calls it) make for great fun, imaginative play. Piran thinks that it is great and I like the fact that it is quite small so is the perfect toy for taking out and about to keep him entertained if needed.

The Wet 'n' Wobblies
We were sent this set of bath toys to play with. The bright colours were an instant hit with Kate and Piran loves all the pouring and squirting options. The vibrating octopus is funny in the bath, and we like to use the smallest one to pretend that it is raining on Piran and Kate's heads. For me though I find that the set is quite big and takes up a lot of room in our small bathroom. Also, two of the three main toys are not easily emptied of water and we have had black mould instances with other toys when water has not completely been emptied at the end of bath time. I do try and make sure that this happens but it is a bit of a pain when trying to wre

Nine months

I can't get this post to publish properly with all the pictures I want to use so I'll try add them at a later date.



Dear Kate,

Today you are nine months old. Nine months. I am blown away by how big that sounds. It feels like you have always been here, always been part of this family but I feel that I have missed you growing out of your baby stage, I was just so busy managing to look after our family. All traces of newborn have disappeared and you are now a cheeky, adventurous baby girl. Your eyes have stayed blue and your hair has got lighter, much more like Piran's. You still have lovely curls though, and your slightly crazy quiff hairdo has calmed down somewhat. You have amazing eyelashes that are long and ready curled. You are right on track with clothes, just moving into the 9-12 month things you got for Christmas. This week we bought you your first pair of 'proper' shoes. A size 2F.

You have always loved to be on your feet but somewhere around 7.5 months you got the hang of commando crawling, dragging yourself along the floor to get what you wanted. It only took a couple weeks for you to start looking up, and grabbing and pulling on furniture. In the past three weeks you have learned to crawl on hands and knees and you are very fast. You spend all your time pulling yourself to your feet on the furniture and now you are beginning to cruise around. I try not to compare you to your brother too much but at this age he was still happily sat on his bottom just shouting at the world. I am in no way prepared for the chaos you create now you are on the move.

You are much quieter than Piran was, and that makes the times that you do speak and make noises at me even more noteworthy and special. It is probably being around your brother all day as he barely lets me get a word in edgeways let alone you. You have a laugh and a smile that are reserved just for him, you seem to find him utterly hilarious. You love it when we sing to you. You can be distracted by the television but not for long. You love to try and climb up Daddy and me, or anything else you can get your hands on. You love it when I hold your hands and you stand up and do some dancing.

We are slowly convincing you that you don't need milk during the night and it seems to be going okay so far. No matter what we try you are an early riser, waking between 5.30-6.30 most days, full of smiles and shouts and ready for action. If you want picking up you put your arms up and wave them around and wiggle your bottom and legs. You do the same when you are excited about something. You love swimming and being in the bath, particularly with Piran. You have an obsession with trying to drink water from the bath sponge.

You just have two teeth at the front at the bottom of your mouth. We don't see them very often, unless you are hollering. You still holler quite a bit mind you. Recently you can cry if I am around until I pick you up, no one else will do. It is nice to be wanted if I am honest, you have always been so independent even at such a young age. You are very particular, you want room temperature milk and you want your space while you are drinking, you do not like to be held at all. You are good at naps and quite happily drop off in your cot if we catch the timing right. You are enjoying trying all sorts of foods and you are definitely a fan of fruit in all shapes and forms.

You seem to love your brother very much and he loves you too. I am amazed when I see the two of you playing together, it makes everything completely worth it. You wrestle and tickle each other, and strangely you always seem to win by climbing onto him. Occasionally he gets fed up with you, when he is trying to play a game, or have a snack and you will not leave him alone. It might be an idea to stop eating his puzzles too. You love that you can follow him round now and he complains at times but I know he loves it too.

It has not all been plain sailing. Some days I feel that I will never understand you. You cry like you want comfort but refuse to be held. Sometimes if I do a silly dance you will cheer up, other times I find that I just have to leave you work it all out by yourself. I am always there though, waiting for the moment that you seem a little happier and a little more like having me around. I will always be there, I can promise you that. Things have changed a bit around here and you are now spending time at nursery and with Nanny and Grandad. Piran is always with you though and that is what reassures me every time that I go away.

We have a lot to look forward to, the weather will warm up and we will teach you to walk. Then there will be summer with picnics and parks and swimming and playing. Football with Piran and tents and water and spending time in the garden. We can build sandcastles and bury Daddy in the sand. I don't want to wish this part of your life away but there are so many things that I am looking forward to doing with you and that is an adventure that I cannot wait to start.

I love you baby girl. Always.

Love Mum x

Two and a half

Dear Piran,

On Wednesday you turned two and a half. I am sorry this letter is a couple days late, it has been a very busy week and I am still trying to catch up. We have just come back from staying at Grandma and Grandad's house for two weeks where you were entertained and spoilt rotten all day long. You had a blast. You really love Grandma and particularly Grandad Derek who you did not leave alone from the moment that you woke until the moment you went to bed. I can still hear "Derek, Derek, Derek, Derek, DEREK, GRANDAD, Grandad Derek, Derek, Derek" ringing in my ears. You were in charge of giving him his pills and helping him eat his porridge every morning. You were very good at the last part.

I looked at you yesterday and you suddenly seemed so big. You still talk constantly and your vocabulary grows every single day. You are a little parrot repeating everything we say. You chatter all day long, or sing songs to yourself, or Kate. If I am lucky you will let me join in. Sometimes I try and you shout STOP MUMMY. I love it when we dance together. Suddenly the things you say show how much your imagination is growing and developing everty day. I walked in on you using your toy animals to be Grandma and Grandad and chatting to each other yesterday. It was so funny.

You are in your bed now and after months of trying we have finally got you to stay in your own room all night long. You are not necessarily pleased about this at all times but most nights you will ask for pyjamas and milk, then when that has been drunk tell us that you are going to bed now. I have to put you in bed, and pull up your covers and make sure that you have: Your penguin night light, your Bubba, the two singing mice, the stuffed dolphin you got when you met Father Christmas, Derek the sock dragon, and any other items you may have picked up that day, or on the way to bed. Last night it was a monkey with a cape. It can get a bit crowded in your bed at times.

You do not often have the patience for me to read you a story, but I took you to see a puppet show of a book called Shoe Baby and since then it has become a favourite, so much so that I can repeat most of it from memory and you join in at all the right places. You also love The Snail and the Whale and Monkey Puzzle. You like to sing and you are starting to remember more and more of songs, Twinkle, Twinkle is still a favourite, but you also like Tiny Tim the turtle and Incy Wincy Spider. You love to cook and bake and want to do everything yourself these days. Everything. It can be a little testing at times!

You are quite cautious still but recently you went off by yourself at the soft play and went round and round all by yourself for ages. You call a slide a swing, and you love the slides but the swings are not your favourite at all. You love animals and you seem to go to the zoo with Nanny and Grandad almost every week. If we ask you what you have done at 'work' (nursery) you will always say played with cars. You love puzzles and would do them all day long if Kate didn't keep coming along and trying to eat them all up. This week it is all about running. You come to me and say "I BRUM Mummy, yes?" with this amazing questioning look on your face and your head tilted to the side. And when I say yes off you whizz. You are amazing at swimming now, you love going to the pool with Daddy every Saturday for your lesson and each week your Dad comes back full of stories for me and sounding so proud of you.

You do have your moments though. You hate getting dressed or undressed. Trying to get you to leave the house takes negotiation skills I didn't know I possessed. Some times nothing works and we have a battle on our hands with you kicking and wriggling and screaming. I hate those moments so much, I get so frustrated. I know you are just testing boundaries but some days I just want to scream back. You tell me every time you go to the toilet but still do not want to sit on a potty or toilet so we are still using nappies. We struggled so long with your sleeping I hope that we have cracked it now but it really took its toll on your dad and me.

You love your sister a lot and now she is at nursery with you you are very proud of her and will apparently tell anyone that listens that she is your sister. She is moving now and can crawl after you at quite a speed which I think you love. You try to get her to play things that she is too small for but it will not be too long before she is on her feet and chasing after you properly. I am looking forward to the summer so much, and seeing you both play together is one of the most amazing parts of my day.

You are a lovely boy and we are so very lucky that you are our little boy. We love you so much, and constantly wander around amazed that we made this small crazy wonderful person. I cannot capture you and how much you change and develop each day in these letters but I hope that I catch the essence of who you are and who we are as a family so that we can look back and remember together.

I love you little boy.

Mum x

The Gallery: Me right now

So, for the gallery this week you had to take a picture of you and what you were doing when you read Tara's gallery prompt post this week.

It was Friday night. I had driven back from Cornwall on my own with two children for the first time ever. My carefully planned journey including a stop at Heather's house for dinner had fallen apart when I got stuck in a traffic jam due to a lorry fire on the A303 and had to take a detour and head straight home. The second half of the journey was mostly hell on a stick and when I finally reached home at 6.30pm with two children having cried for the last 45 minutes I could have happily joined them. The house was dark, Mr C was traveling back from Germany and there were no parking spaces near the house. I couldn't get the children in and then park as I can't leave them in the house alone and so I parked at the top of the close and tried to get them out. I discovered that Piran had trashed his shoes so I managed to get them on enough for him to walk. Piran was crying for cuddles I had to carry Kate. He decided to manage this by hanging onto my trouser legs. Kate was crying and as I was getting her out of the car Piran fell over in the mud. I picked him up, set him on his feet and dusted him off, slung Kate under my arm and held his hand.  There are no street lights where we live and Piran hates the dark without a torch. They were both weeping and wailing and it was suddenly very obvious that Kate had had a monster poo. We got into the house and I just dropped to the floor in the hallway, trying to cuddle Piran to stop him crying and deal with the poo explosion in Kate's nappy (and clothes).

Then Mr C walked in.

I believe I practically shouted "Thank God for that". I was frankly amazed that I managed that sentence without the F word.

Two hours and two large glasses of wine later I took some time to read through some blogs in my reader on my phone. I read Tara's post and then took this picture. I think I look particularly fetching in my pyjama bottoms and striped top. I was just relived that I still had my wits about me and that I had survived the ordeal!