25/07/2010 by stupidgirl_no1.

I’m having a nice weekend.  We had no plans so declared it was a weekend of nothing.  It has been most nice, just spending time with my favourite boys.  We have managed to do quite a few chores, I cut the grass and Bryan cooked 29 meals for Owen and baked some bread, for example.  Had some of the bread as it came out of the oven with some home made raspberry jam one of the solicitors from my work gave me - was heavenly!  Bryan and I also managed to get a little drunk on Friday night with some wine left over from a function at work, and last night we had fajitas and Corona - the perfect dinner partners!  Mostly we’ve been playing with Owen, he’s really got that crawling thing down to a T, he’s even been working on the climbing of stairs (no video as yet, its really all hands on the baby thing!).  *30th July - video now available, just click here.*

He can kind of say “Dada”, “Yes”, “Hiya” and he sometimes does a “Ta” when you give him something or take something away from him.  He understands more words than he can say, the smile if you mention “Petite Filous” at the end of a meal is quite lovely.  Even today - he’s not quite himself this weekend, so its good we didn’t have many plans.  He’s teething at the moment - now got 2 on the top to match the 2 on the bottom - but he’s also got a cold.  Not sure if its those 2 things that are adding to his usual pooping problems but he seems to be in even more discomfort than normal - and now his ears seem to be hurting too so he doesn’t want to eat as the ears and teeth must make eating quite uncomfortable.  Luckily we’re still managing to persuade him but its quite exhausting trying to keep him cheery and willing right through a meal.  Poor wee toot!  At least he slept in the last 2 mornings so I was able to sleep past 7am for a change, not by much but that’s fair enough! 

Talking of the teething - he’s been really cute the last few days wanting to see my teeth, obviously trying to work out what’s going on in his mouth.  He likes to feel them and and flick his fingers over them, really quite funny, when not sore!!

Owen even has an admirer, an older girl at nursery called Hannah who rushes over to give him a bosie every morning when I drop him off.  Of course we have to be careful as he is already bethrothed to the lovely Lydia - and she’s much nearer his age anyway!  Just a shame she lives in England, way south, and we’ve only met her and her Mum online!

Of course Owen’s 9 months old so Dad thought it was time he started taking a turn at driving us all to work/nursery in the morning.

Yesterday we all went out in the car, to the excitement that is the supermarket.  Owen is quite happy to sit in the trolley’s seat and look at everything going by..  Well, most of the way round - we have to carry him some of it when Bryan takes a while with his shopping but that’s not too much of a chore really!  I had almost put a changing mat on the shopping list as the second hand one I got from Freecycle has started to split at the seams, but I thought we could just make do rather than spending money.  Anyway walking through the baby section in Tesco, what do we see?  A Finding Nemo changing mat!  It’s fate!  This is the finishing touch to the Nemo themed nursery!  So yes, I may have put something non-essential in the trolley.  Oops.  But he loves it so who cares about the expense?!  The only downside is that its now even harder to get him to lay on his back and keep still so we can change him!

Talking of Disney, since Owen was born I’ve now entered 2 competitions to win a family holiday to Florida/Orlando/DISNEY!!!  I can imagine there will be many more over the next few years but I will state now that by hook or by crook we will go one day.  Bryan’s passport ran out the year we were married and now, 7 years later, we’ve finally renewed it - so that’s the first step!  Owen does now have a savings account as I mentioned we were planning a while ago, and his Child Benefit is going into it each month, and will continue to do so for as long as we can afford to do that.  We also put any monetary presents he is given in there - even when its just a wee amount, like one day this week when a lovely man gave him £1 on the bus for being so well behaved!!  We’ll do what we can to save up so the 3 of us can go when Owen’s about 5, and can appreciate it.  Of course if I win it before that we’ll happily go sooner!!  I’ve wanted to go to Disney World for as long as I can remember.  Have realised now that it will be even more magical to go with my own child so I’m glad I’ve waited this long to go.  Bryan did take me to Disneyland Paris when he worked for Disney Store and got a discount but that’s just not the same.  We did have a cool time but it didn’t stop me wanting to go to Disney World!

Anyway, that’s the weekend nearly over so I’d better shut up about my weekend!  Hope you had a nice one too.

Posted in Baby!, General waffle | 2 Comments »

07/07/2010 by stupidgirl_no1.

As promised, some time ago sorry!

Well the boy has obviously been growing up!  He now weighes 1.5 stone and is nearly into 1 year clothes!  He has been wearing 9-12 months clothes for quite some time so I guess its not surprising but he is still only 8.5 months old, bless the wee lump!

I’ve started buying clothes for him.  We’ve been really lucky and been given a lot of hand me downs and presents so far so we’ve not actually needed to buy him any clothes.  We did buy him a couple of things but now we’re going to have to buy everything as the hand me downs are drying up!  Knew this would happen as he gets older and sizes last longer - at least we get the chance to get our money’s worth out of stuff from now on apparently.  Anyway I’m taking advantage of any vouchers and special offers I can - is a fun challenge to see what barguins I can get!

So what have we been up to?  Well before I went back to work we used to go to Kids & Co every Tuesday morning (babies play, Mummies gossip!) and Mainly Music every Wednesday morning (singing and dancing and having a fab time!).  Both groups were at our local church, neither was very religious but it was nice to feel part of the community and to see the same lovely folk each week.  In the modern way, I added as many as possible on Facebook so we can keep in touch now I’m back at work.  The last couple of weeks I was able to take Owen to Jo Jingles which started up in our area.  This is another music group but instead of all singing and dancing together each child sits on its own mat and gets given various things to play with. 

Owen loved both music classes and I’ve always sung to him quite a bit - hence him learning how to clap his hands!
Video here if the embedded version doesn’t work!

We went to a Bookstart Rhymetime in our local Library and Owen got his first Library Card.  Proud Librarian Mummy!  Not that I’ve let him borrow any books yet as he tends to suck them lots and so I only let him do it to his own books.

Other than that our days were made up of going for walks, doctors check ups, and visits from friends.  Lunches out were managed occassionally although any leaving the house seemed like a huge mission back then!  What to take?  What would Owen do?  Would we get home safely?  Quite funny looking back on it now when I jump on a bus with him every day to get home from nursery!

We had a family holiday - well a long weekend in Edinburgh.  My lovely friend Jennie let us use her flat to stay in so we had a fridge and cooker which made it easier with Owen.  We bought a travel cot so he slept in that in our room, he’s such a good sleeper it wasn’t a problem all sharing a room again.  Other than I had a cough so risked disturbing him!  I got some medicine on the way down from the Minor Ailments Service at the local pharmacists so that helped!  Of course that was mid May and its the cough I’m still suffering from!  Was lovely to catch up with our Hillside buddies, and I took Owen into my old work to show him off.

An amazing thing happened on Friday 28th May - Nicole and I actually had an evening together, just the two of us, with no husbands and no babies.  Much as we love them it was nice to have some girlie time together, just the 2 of us.  We couldn’t remember the last time it had happened but hopefully it will happen again soon - ooh must see about arranging that!  We spent some time getting “prettified” and then went out for dinner.  It was a really lovely night - and we did scrub up nice!

I’ve already blogged about going back to work.  Its still going well, with Owen still loving nursery so that’s cool.  My trip to Brighton was great, the conference was really good and the night out was awesome.  My usual “posse” was quite depleted at the conference so I did that networking thing and made some new friends which was good.  I may have also been snapped by the official photographer drinking Champers before noon with James!  Check out my cool bag though!  @Jaffne made me it, she’s so cool!  You can see some of her craftiness here.

The night out with Twitter folks was really good, apparently after speaking to folk for about 3 years you do know them quite well, even if you’ve never met them.  I have some utterly awesome friends, just a shame Brighton is so far away!  A couple of them that I was looking forward to meeting didn’t make it but one special chap I didn’t think was coming did so that was fab.  You know who you are folks! 

And yes, I went on the Carousel - twice - once with a Law Librarian Carousel-Virgin and once with 2 Twitter chums.  Hurrah!

So yeah, life is good!  Hope yours is too?!

Posted in Baby!, body issues, Trips out, General waffle | 3 Comments »

25/06/2010 by stupidgirl_no1.

Well this is the end of my first full week on my own in the office and I think I’m just about settled into my new routine.  Owen is certainly settled into his as its his second full week at nursery.  He seems to love it there, on his 7th full day he didn’t cry one teardrop all day - so that’s a good sign.  There was one morning this week when I took him in and he immediately held his hands out to Angela.  That was quite hard for me as its usually me or Daddy that he wants but it does make it much easier to leave him with her knowing that he’s happy with her.  The girls that work at the nursery all seem lovely and I think Owen’s really enjoying all the “new” toys and meeting the other children there.

Yesterday I was told what a contented wee boy he is and that he’s so easy to settle for his naps, apparently some wee ones kick and scream but he just lays down and goes to sleep with the occassional gurgle to himself!  He’s the same at home so I’m not surprised really.

Nursery is working out better than I had hoped.  The first day he came home with his report card:

I noticed that he’d had porridge for a morning snack - as well as I’d given it to him for breakfast! (Perhaps this is why he only ate half his lunch that day!)  I asked about this and some kids don’t have time to have breakfast before they leave so this is an option for them all.  I had been sending him in with his formula for 10am before his nap, so now I’ve swapped around.  I give him his bottle before we leave the house then he has porridge at nursery.  Its a lot less hassle for me, and will save us a bit of money!  Saves the nursery making up his formula and keeping his bottle seperate as well so better all round I think.  Owen still seems happy so that’s the main thing!

As for me, I’m settling back into work fine.  Spent most of this week trying to get things back to “how I like them” and working out the Childcare Voucher Scheme which my work were kind enough to agree to.  Bryan’s work has agreed to set one up too so that’s fab.  Basically we can have up to £243 a month each in vouchers, tax and NICS free.  We loose that much in our salary (salary sacrifice) but it will save us over £2,000 a year in deductions and will save each workplace about £300 a year in their contributions to NICS for us as well.  So its a win/win situation really!  Just a bit of a faff to set up!  There are companies that can do it all for you but you have to pay them a fee obviously and as each of our workplaces only have 1 employee that qualifies for the scheme it makes more sense to do it ourselves in house.  The other bonus is that our nursery takes credit cards, so once they’ve had the £486 in vouchers I can pay the rest of the month’s bill on our visa and get points for it!  And we all know that points make prizes!

Anyway that’s the man here to fix my boiler so hopefully he’ll be done soon and I can get to work!  I now have a bus pass as our new routine is: all get in car in morning and Bryan drives us to the nursery, he drops off Owen and I and drives off to work.  I then get Owen settled and walk down to my work (although when its bad weather I will jump on a bus).  After work finishes at 4pm I then walk back to nursery to get Owen (again have bus option) and then we both get on a bus and go home.  We can then get him fed, and sometimes bathed, before Daddy gets home.  We then have a bit of time to play before its bottle and bed at 7pm for the wee man.  By the time we’ve had dinner and done our chores that’s pretty much bed time for us too but we sometimes fit in a film, or Bryan plays xbox and I amuse myself online.

If I prepare stuff the night before it means that I only actually need to get up 15 minutes before I used to in order to get Owen and I ready in the morning.  Bryan gets up 15 minutes earlier than he used to as well so that I have some time just before we leave to straighten my hair and try and look presentable!  So pleased I got Owen into the routine that he has to stay in his cot until 7.30 even when he wakes up early, it gives me time to have a shower and my breakfast.  Then once I get him up I can concentrate on him until I get my 15 minutes before leaving.

I love it when a plan comes together!  Oh and what happened on my first day in the office?  There was a CPD and there was some leftovers so I had to “dispose of them”.  I’ve got a hard life, me!

Posted in Baby!, General waffle | 1 Comment »

05/06/2010 by stupidgirl_no1.

Gosh.  Well.  Yesterday was Owen and I’s last day home alone on maternity leave.  Bryan is off work next week and on Monday Owen starts nursery part time.  Every day next week he will be at nursery for 1.5 hours.  We will still go to our toddler group on Tuesday morning and music group on Wednesday morning but they will be our last visits to either. 

This last week we’ve had various visitors for one last visit before I go back to work and we’ve just tried to enjoy ourselves as much as possible. 

We’ve had a lovely 7.5 months together, it really has been fab.  I’m so glad Bryan and I were able to save enough money up before I needed to go on maternity leave so that I could take the full 9 months that one is entitled to Statutory Maternity Pay.  We really are lucky in this country to have that opportunity.

Then on Wednesday afternoon I will fly off to Brighton for the BIALL conference that runs Thursday morning - Saturday lunchtime.  Quite jammy to work it that my first day “back at work” is at a conference but it is something I have been to most years since I got into law librarianship.  I thought it would be a good way to get my head back in gear - and after being away from Owen for that long putting him into nursery full time on Monday 14th June shouldn’t seem like such a big thing!

Bryan will actually be alone with Owen from Wednesday night till Sunday night as I am making the most of work paying for my flights and having an extra night in Brighton.  Thanks to my parents and one of my aunts giving me money for my birthday I didn’t even have to pay for the hotel that night!  On Saturday night I will be on a night out with various lovely people that I talk to on Twitter and I just can’t wait to meet them all!  I may worry a bit about the fact its called @BrightonPissUp and I’m very out of practice with drinking but hey, I’m willing to give it a go!! 

Once I come home I have the Monday as annual leave, partly so I’m available if anything goes wrong with Owen’s first full day at nursery and partly so I can do laundry and clean the house after leaving my 4 boys alone for 4 whole days!  Then I will be back in the office on Tuesday 15th June trying to remember what I have to do at that “work” thing…!

I keep getting asked if I’m just going back part time so I can spend time with Owen but unfortunately I will be going back full time.  The nature of my job, and the fact we need my full salary, prevent me doing anything else.  The good news is that my hours have always been 9.30-1 and 2-4, plus covering any events the Society is having so it should work out quite well with having a wee one anyway.

I used to get a lift with Bryan to and fro work and just be there extra time as he works 9-5 but now I will get a lift in with him, and the bus home.  If he drops Owen and I at nursery I can go in and get him settled and then get to my work for 9.30, then when I get finished at 4 I can go collect Owen and we can get the bus home.  Hopefully we will get him fed and bathed by the time Daddy gets home so they can have some time together before Owen’s 7pm bedtime.

Unfortunately this adds the cost of a bus pass to the cost of nursery so we will be rather skint for the next 4.5 years until Owen goes to school!  But at least we know he will be getting a varied programme, balanced diet and lots of other wee ones to play with each day.  Think he’ll have a whale of a time at nursery!  It’s really nice as they give you a wee report of his day each night so we know what he’s been up to, what he particularly enjoyed, and what he’s had to eat.

To mark the end of the era of my maternity leave Owen yesterday managed to pull himself up to standing position with only the aid of a coffee table.  He’s growing so fast and developing so many new skills, it really is amazing.  As usual I caught it on camera and added it to my Flickr page, which I have still been updating most days even when not blogging.
Link to video.

Posted in Baby!, Trips out, General waffle | 1 Comment »

27/03/2010 by stupidgirl_no1.

Over a month since my last blog entry, shocking.  I really am very sorry, but these baby things sure do keep you busy.  And now I’ve stopped breastfeeding I have far less time sat down next to my laptop.  Am working on teaching him to hold his bottle himself but he has most of them in his high chair with proper food so that won’t help much anyway!

Anyway my plan to get back on track is to blog a few times in the next week, or so, on different topics to bring us up to date - and then to try and blog a bit more regularly after that! 

So coming up we will have the following topics:

• Owen’s health and development update
• What we’ve been up to since I last blogged
• Our holiday to stay with my parents

And I’m still planning on blogging the birth, really should do that before it all blurs in my mind!

In the meantime I must away and make use of Owen’s nap time to try and get further through my Christmas thank you letters, as they are another thing on my To Do list.  Really want to get them done before my birthday next week just in case anyone is silly enough to give me a present and add to my to do list!!!!  Hee hee!

I have still been putting photos and videos on my Flickr page most days so you can watch the boy grow but here’s a selection to keep you going in the meantime:

Posted in General waffle | 2 Comments »

31/01/2010 by stupidgirl_no1.

Well I just realised that at 2.50pm today Owen turned 15 - weeks obviously!  Hard to believe he’s been ours for that long but then at the same time I am now feeling a bit more confident as this Mummy-ing thing!  There have been quite a few “first”s since my last post - his first wee chuckle, first (and second the next day!) time going to a birthday party, first go on a bouncy castle, first attendance at a wee person’s music group, first trip to town shopping, first feed in public, first afternoon with his four cousins, first swing ride in a park, first look at a book and his first turning of a page himself.  The last thing obviously made his Librarian Mummy very proud!

Meanwhile I’ve had my first night out with a whole glass of wine, and another night I had my first beer since June 2008 when I gave up drinking and we started trying for a baby.  This is all due to the wonder of Owen now having his own bedtime.  I feed him at 7.30 and then we put him to bed and he tends to be asleep by 8.30 or 9 at the latest, so we have some time to ourselves.  He sleeps until at least 3 as a rule so its safe for me to have a wee drinkie once he goes to bed - woohoo!  The night I was out at Gill’s I was enjoying myself chatting to the girls so much that I didn’t get home until about 2am - and then Owen was awake an hour later!  That was hard, but worth it!  Nice to have some grown up chat for a change.

As for weight, Owen is now healthily over 15lbs and filling his 3-6 month clothes nicely.  On our shopping trip I chose him two outfits which are the first clothes I’ve chosen myself!  Everything else he’s worn has been hand downs or gifts - well except for the Manchester United clothes and the Mamas and Papas jacket that Daddy chose!  I am down to 10 stone 11 so only half a stone to loose before I get back to my pre pregnant weight - hurrah!  I’ve already past my pre trying weight as I was about 11 stone when we decided to try for a baby, got down to 10 stone 4 before I got pregnant and put on 3 stone!

Owen can now support his own head so we can now put him in his Bumbo seat, or the in door bouncer.  Its lovely that he can sit up supported and play with toys and as he can now grasp things he is enjoying playing with things - everything fascinates him and needs inspected.  It’s so cute watching him with new things, or with his favourite talking Winnie The Pooh teddy which he just loves.

As I reported with his hip he now only wears his splint at night so that’s lovely as we get much nicer cuddles during the day, much closer!  His blocked tear duct seems to have cleared up so we’re not having to clean it and cream it twice a day, the down side is that when he cries we get real tears - which makes Mummy’s heart ache!!  We’ve still not managed to breast feed the “normal” way but we’re still happy using the breast shields, it doesn’t bother me anymore, I’ve just accepted that we use them and that’s that.  It does mean I’m constantly sterilising them and the machine is constantly on but such is life!  I also can’t just be lazy and stay in bed to feed him during the night, we have to come downstairs and get a shield from the steriliser - and it does leak sometimes so we couldn’t feed in bed anyway.  Never mind, small price to pay and it means I get to check email, Facebook and Twitter whilst the wee one fills his boots!  This is also why it was a big thing for me to finally feed in public, its a bit difficult to be as discrete when using shields, but it is possible!

At Lucas’ birthday party our wee guy started crying quite a lot and we were thinking he was teething but he’s only had a couple of crying bouts in total so I think it may have been his colic, or just that he was too warm or something.  Sometimes it’s hard to tell with babies.  He does like to chew or suck things but then babies like to investigate things in their mouths so it might not mean he’s teething - that will come soon enough I’m sure!

And that, I think, is that!

Posted in Baby!, body issues, Trips out, General waffle | 1 Comment »

06/01/2010 by stupidgirl_no1.

Nope, haven’t blogged for a while, again, sorry!  Don’t know what I fill my days with…. Oh yeah, there’s a baby in the house!!

So Owen was born and loads of people very kindly sent lovely presents - actually various Twitter friends sent presents before he even got here.  Then it was Christmas and the tree at ours had tons of pressies for him under it, then Boxing Day we went to my parents’ for lunch and there was another tree load for him there!  The following day Bryan’s Dad came for dinner with even more presents. 

But now its boring old January so the excitement should be over, right?  Wrong!

As I mentioned before we did the nursery with a Little Mermaid theme when we decorated it in November 2008 but if we had a boy, which obviously we have had, we would change it to Finding Nemo or Pirates of the Carribean.  So I have been working at changing it over, ready for him moving in there when he’s 6 months old and too old to sleep in his moses basket by our bed any more.  Granny and Grandad Gunn bought him Finding Nemo curtains and a lightshade for Christmas to help with this.  Also I had some frames made up, for some of the Nemo posters we had in the attic from Bryan’s time at the Disney store, to match the nursery furniture. 

Anyway I mentioned on Twitter that I was needing a name plaque for his door so Sianz one of my wonderfully artistic friends there offered to make him one.  I had no idea what she was going to make as much of her art I’ve been admiring is done on post it notes.  Well yesterday the ARTwork turned up in the post and as you can see it is most fabulous!

Owen gives his first object d’art a critical look and shows off that he can now grasp things

The funny thing was that once Bryan got home he turned it upside down, unable to contain himself any longer.  You see OWEN upside down is NEMO.  You’d think we had planned that, being quite major Disney lovers and all that….  Not sure how long ago it occurred to Bryan but he was waiting for me to notice.  I’m a bit slow apparently!

Anyway getting that present reminded Owen about Santa and his reindeer and how he brings lots of presents.  So he donned a present he hadn’t had the chance to wear at Christmas (as it was waiting at my parents house so we didn’t get it until Boxing Day and then I insisted on washing it before he was allowed to wear it as all good Mummies apparently do).  He argued that there is still snow so there is still a chance that Santa and his sleigh are still doing the rounds, and he’s just too cute to argue with.  So here is him sleeping hopefully in his Rudolph babygrow (thanks Lindsey!)…

It turns out that baby knows best as low and behold the postman brought another parcel for him this morning!  I got very excited on seeing it was from the lovely lady who made my wedding dress…many years ago!  She had already sent us one of her special cushions which is in pride of place in his nursery but this is a special personalised baby cushion, which he loves as you can see…

Whilst I’m here I should give an update on the wee guy’s progress.  He is now 10 weeks old and growing steadily.  Last night he did the most awesome thing of sleeping from 11pm to 9am - so long I had to get up and express milk part way through!!  So nice to get a decent sleep though, especially for Bryan as he has that work thing that I’ve heard some people do (maternity leave and smug non working due to end 15th June).

As well as the gorgeous smiles you can see demonstrated above he and Mummy play the sticking our tongue out at each other game.  He also sometimes “talks”, which I’ve been trying to catch on film but its quite hard..

He is getting to grips with grasping things (couldn’t resist the pun, sorry!) and when grasping a finger from each of Daddy’s hands in each of his hands he can actually sit up!  Not for very long but he does really pull himself, even though he’s still wearing his splint.  As for that, well as I reported his next appointment is coming up and hopefully after that he’ll only need to wear it overnight. And soon this whole thing should be over!

As for us, well we’re fine, thanks for asking!  Its a steep learning curve being parents with lots of new things to cope with all the time, but I think we’re doing okay.  I put on 3 stone being pregnant but only have 9.5 pounds left to loose.  All my maternity clothes have been bagged up ready for giving back, passing on etc.  And no, I don’t need to keep them for “the next one” as we are more than happy with what we’ve got thank you very much.

As well as seeing family at Christmas we spent Hogmanay with Ray, Nicole and Lucas.  It was lovely to say goodbye all together to the year both couples became families.  The boys came out of their beds briefly at midnight (not that Owen woke up!) and we had a group hug, which was very special.  We didn’t get a photo of all of us together but did get family shots.

Bryan has some new camera equipment to play with - his Christmas present to himself.  As its for doing portraits and Owen hasn’t fully mastered posing yet, I have to “model” for him but he has taken some lovely photos as a result.
 

As with all my photos in this blog post you can click on this photo to get to our Flickr pages and see other photos, Bryan’s Flickr posts go for quality rather than quantity whereas I like to chronicle Owen’s development, even if my photos and videos aren’t very professional looking!  I may not blog regularly but I do post photos on my Flickr so interested people can see Owen grow up!

We have of course got some snow and so I will leave you with this pic I took before it got so deep, and frozen.

Posted in Baby!, body issues, General waffle | 1 Comment »

10/10/2009 by stupidgirl_no1.

At last I feel ready to pronounce the nursery ready and to share photos with the world!  Obviously there is still no sign of baby coming out, and he/she won’t use the nursery for the first wee while anyway as will be in the moses basket in our room that I blogged about before.  But now I can say the nursery is ready I think I’ll feel more ready for baby to come, so maybe that will start things happening!

I have put together a set of photos on Flickr with notes for those who are really interested in all the details!  Just click on that link bitty in last sentence!  For the lazy ones - here’s a photo for you! 

Once we know if its a boy or a girl I can change the theme if necessary.  Little Mermaid is a bit too girly so Ariel will have to go if its a boy and be replaced with Stitch or Finding Nemo or Pirates of the Carribean.  Blue walls will work for all these so its fine (as was planned when we decorated, see previous blog entry).  Once we know we can get curtains and a lightshade to match in, at the moment there’s just a blind and a glass lightshade, the latter is very pretty but I don’t think its appropriate for a baby’s room - would be scared of hitting it and glass shattering all over baby - although I’ve hit it several times and its never broken yet!!

Anyway its nice to feel prepared.  Although there’s still things on my “to do list” so if baby doesn’t come tonight its no big thing!!  Just a bit spooky that one of my Twitter friends and my cousin Lynne have both said to me today that they think baby’s coming at 4am!!  Will soon see, and might have an early night just in case!  Would be just typical as Bryan’s Dad goes to Thailand tomorrow so we’d be just too late for him to meet new grandchild, until his return!  He phoned earlier to see if I was producing before he flies off, I do hate to disappoint - even if it is his fifth grandchild so not quite as exciting for him!!

I’m sure baby will come when he/she is good and ready.  I’m taking it as a compliment that he/she is comfortable where they are!

Posted in Baby!, General waffle | 1 Comment »

05/10/2009 by stupidgirl_no1.

Wow, Monday 5th October, here you are.  I remember when we did the pregnancy test in January thinking that 9 months was a jolly long time but that’s it gone already.  The first 12 weeks were horrendously slow as we couldn’t tell anyone and were just praying we’d make it to that first scan, so many wee babies are lost in the first 12 weeks, its a worrying time.  Then finally we got the scan, told everyone and time marched on.  I didn’t keep well for the first 16 weeks so it was a huge relief when that was over too.  And now here we are, 40 weeks pregnant and ready to pop at any time!!  Exciting - and scary!

My hospital bag has been packed for several weeks as a girl I know gave birth unexpectedly early, she was due last Thursday but her baby is already 9 weeks old!  A lovely couple I met through Freecycle gave us a Moses Basket as their wee one hardly slept in it so it is made up and ready for us to come home as well.  Actually the same couple gave us a car seat so its in the car ready too.

Unfortunately Bryan seems to have a tummy bug so hardly slept last night and is actually off work sick today (unheard of for him!).  He has suggested baby stays where it is for today as he’s really not up to being the strong supportive one so will see what happens!!  First babies are usually late anyway so very unlikely anything will happen today!  Have had various suggestions to get things started but will hold off those for now - fresh pineapple (I believe you need to eat about 7 whole ones for this to work though!), long walks, scrubbing the floor, raspberry tea or the various hot options: bath, curry and sex!

In the meantime, what else have I been up to?  Hmmm, well sitting on the sofa rubbing the bump and stroking the cats has been most time filling! 

On Friday I had a lovely visit from Allison and Jake.  Allison was wanting to see the nursery but Jake seemed more interested in our Wall-E remote control toy, bless him!  Was nice to have a good natter - and she has kindly agreed to feed the cats if we end up stuck in hospital for too long, nice to know someone has a key just in case!

Saturday’s highlight was a visit from Nicole, Ray and Lucas.  The wee guy’s growing up so fast, its great to see him quite regularly and see how he’s getting on and what new skills he has now!  Had a good natter with his folks too, might not see them again until they visit us THREE in hospital - strange thought!!!

Yesterday we went to the cinema and saw the new Pixar movie Up.  Thanks to Sky for the free preview tickets, I do like their new customer Perks scheme!  It had been questioned if I could sit still and upright for the length of a movie but I managed really rather well - I thought if I could do it for anything it would be for Disney!!  I wouldn’t say this was their best work but it is a lovely movie, just had such sad overtones right through which isn’t their normal way.  Bryan was disappointed that the main dog character seemed to have been copied from Dexter’s Laboratory cartoon (episode 37: Dexter’s Lab: A Story).  Anyway, was well worth a watch! 

Posted in Baby!, General waffle | 1 Comment »

02/10/2009 by stupidgirl_no1.

Okay so yesterday was a good day.  I’m not really doing much now as its time to wait for baby to come and I’m a bit too bumpular to move far.  My uni pal Vicky had arranged to come and visit yesterday and I had arranged for a delivery from Donald Russell.  Both of these were lovely things I was looking forward to - Vicky as she is great company and the meat as I’m really missing blue/rare steaks and Bryan has promised me one when I get out of hospital with baby.  Donald Russell does lovely, lovely meat so this will be the perfect reward for that whole labour/birth thing I apparently have to go through!  You aren’t supposed to eat pink meat whilst pregnant you see, so I have had to have meat cooked on which is a travesty to me!

So the meat arrived and about 5 minutes later Vicky did too.  As my delivery was here we were then free to go out for lunch so after “morning coffee” and a lovely homemade rock bun that Vicky had brought with her we wandered down to Raspberry Cheesecake for lunch out - and a wee cake…!

When we got back there was a card from UPS saying I missed a delivery but it was at a neighbour’s so once Vicky left I wandered over and collected my parcel - another pressie for baby bump!  This time it was a baby listening monitor which I had ordered from a website that I do surveys for and get points in return.  Points make prizes and hence we now have a lovely Tomy baby monitor that cost us nothing, hurrah!

I then had a lovely evening with my hubby on the sofa, chatting and eating lovely dinner and watching tv.  He had been offered a job during the day so we were discussing that and I was all proud at him impressing someone enough that they would try and poach him from his current firm - and yes, he has told his boss, and this post won’t get him in trouble - cause he’s a good and loyal employee and likes to be honest with folk. 

At about 9.40pm we were watching an episode of Two and A Half Men that featured waffles and I expressed a desire for waffles.  We don’t have a waffle iron so that was out but Bryan offered to make me pancakes as the next best thing.  I exclaimed that I couldn’t possibly after the lovely lentils and lamb dinner he’d given me so he suggested I asked the good people of Twitter.  There was unanimous support for this motion so he was sent to the kitchen forthwith!  I had been told early on in pregnancy that I would get away with one irrational request for naughty food item at whatever time of the day and night and Bryan reminded me that I hadn’t used it yet and as it was only 4 days till baby was due I was running out of time!

Some time later (well the mixture needs to rest before cooking) I was served gorgeous pancakes, 1 at a time so they were each nice and hot, with banana and honey from the Isle of Man.  Yummy!  Spoilt little girl ahoy!

So that was - lovely visit from Vicky and home made rock buns; promise of gorgeous steaks; lunch out and choccie cake; free baby monitor; nice dinner and quality time with hubby; proud feeling of hubby being offered a job; AND pancakes!!  Now that’s what I call a good day of being spoilt!  Anyone would think it had been my birthday rather than my Mum’s yesterday!!

Posted in Baby!, Trips out, General waffle | 1 Comment »