beckity

It's all so hectic. And I knew it would be, it's just even more than I thought. Even more love, even more frustration, even more to do, even less time. Full time work, which stops at 5pm, to be taken over by full life work. Music and dance lessons, gardening and cooking to do, reminders of scout camps and sports days to act on, running groups and yoga classes in my lunch break, lists and lists and lists. I have always struggled with letting things go, the move to write a blog was another way of recording life as it flashes by, like the photos. Ironic that I don't even have time for this. But today I thought to myself, 'I want to remember. I need to write it down' so here we are. I want to remember the laughter that comes from an 8 year old, a 5 year old and an almost 1 year old during dinner, when the 8 year old tells a joke, that the 5 year old gets and finds funny. The sound when the baby joins in, enchanted by the happiness surrounding her, completes the ...

Louise was fifteen weeks old on Friday. She was due twelve weeks ago, with a cesearean planned for thirteen weeks ago, but that would have been boring. Fifteen weeks ago on Friday, I was working my last day before maternity leave. I was working from home because the previous day I’d left the office at lunchtime and gone to the hospital with contractions. I couldn’t get comfy and moved from Pilates ball to standing desk without being able to concentrate on my work. The rest of my team was in Estonia, at an event that I’d been working on for months. I gave up trying to clear my few outstanding items and told an intern on my way out that I needed to get checked out at the hospital. The midwife examined me and told me I was all closed up - the contractions were quite regular and close together but she said they were only practising. She told me to go home and rest. So I did. In the night, I was woken by period-like cramps on and off. Since I had only ever experienced ...

17 February 2018 The baby is three months old. When we booked our week in the mountains she had not even made her appearance yet. We couldn’t get her plane ticket because she didn’t have a name yet. The idea of a holiday with a baby seemed so simple. Then she arrived, three weeks early and raring to go. We became reacquainted with sleepless nights  and relived the same breastfeeding trials issues we had had with her sisters. I expressed milk every three hours day and night for eight weeks until she had learned to latch and extract milk on her own. A holiday with a baby started to seem like folly, but there was no going back. We returned from our week in the mountains this morning and I am full of wonder for our little baby bundle. She did herself proud and it showed me that if you dare, you can be pleasantly surprised. Every time I geared myself up for another first, reasoning with myself that if it was a huge failure, at least we tried, she got on with it. I went skiing, so ...