Top banana

It's the Easter holidays. Hooray! Now I just need to find a way of entertaining my team for two weeks.

I have a few ideas. I initially started writing this blog to share the places I had found to take my little ones for a good cuppa and a tasty bit of cake. I admit, there was a significant amount of self interest, I like tea and cake (and coffee and sandwiches and sausage rolls and chips). Today, I realised I have been merely tinkering. I have discovered the ultimate site! And just in time to give me some inspiration for Easter activities.

I was minding my own business, listening to my local BBC radio station and I heard a very friendly sounding chap telling me about his latest achievement. He had designed a web site to give mums, dads, granny's and grandpa's the low down on the best places to take their littleys. It can tell you which parks have toilets and parking. Which are free and which are costly. It sounds like this chap and his wife have visited hundreds of different places to bring us this wonderful bank of information.

I am thrilled that it is out there. At the moment, he is just writing about Leicestershire and Rutland, but is expanding into the rest of the Midlands. What a fabulous idea.

Not only can I share the site with you.....www.grandpasnet.com
But, I can also share the link so you can listen to the interview too, if you click here.

The site is charming. There is a page dedicated to gifts for grandpa and there's even a joke section. It includes my favourite joke in the world.

Q. What's orange and sounds like a parrot?

A. A carrot.

Genius!

We need a site like this for the whole of the country. Do you think I could volunteer to do some research?

Baby-next-the-Sea

When you need a bit of a lift, what do you do? Glass of wine? Chocolate? Ring your mum? How about a spot of meditation by memory?
When I was working full time, I used to go out on a Sunday afternoon to somewhere pretty, like a National Trust property or to the park or to the seaside. Then, when I went to bed that night with that 'Sunday Night Going To School The Next Day' feeling, I could look back on my day and relive it and get that sense of calm and happiness all over again. I could use the memories again when I was at work. If I had a particularly knotty problem or just wanted a break, I would think about the beach in Cornwall or the gardens at Hardwick Hall in Derbyshire. For some reason, it worked particularly well when I was in the ladies loo. Not very glamorous, but, a quiet, undisturbed moment.

This meditation by memory is something that my mum passed on to me. It is a wonderful and simple technique and I am very grateful. You would often find us both on a Sunday afternoon or on holiday drinking in the view and saving it for a rainy day. I think we might have looked a little bit special. Special needs too. But it takes all sorts.

The other nice part about this little trick is going out and collecting the memories. Now we have an excellent reason for going out on a Sunday for tea and cake or for spending that extra five minutes on the beach.

I have been collecting memories this weekend.

Baby and daddy and I went to one of my favourite places, Wells-next-the-Sea in north Norfolk. The weather was beautiful and so were our surroundings. It was a chance to absorb some more fabulous views.

This is a flavour of my weekend and a look at some of my memories.

Wells-next-the-Sea is a beautiful Norfolk village, with a yellow sandy beach and a never ending line of brightly coloured beach huts. It has a little harbour, quirky shops, lovely cafes and relaxing pubs. Oh, and some of the finest fish and chips I have ever tasted. It is perfect. The only downside was our discovery that pushing a pushchair on sand is nigh on impossible.

This raspberry Victoria sponge was so delicious and such a wonderful yellow colour, we ate it all. It was courtesy of the Mermaids Purse. They have good cake!

We had a few minutes of grown up time while the baby slept in his pushchair. We used the time wisely and drank an expensive glass of Champagne. We were the only people in The Crown. It was four o'clock in the afternoon. Wonderfully decadent.

To round the weekend off, we stopped off for an enormous Sunday lunch on the way home. Fabulous veg, succulent beef, cauliflower cheese AND cabbage with pancetta hiding under the meat. Yum. Thank you to the Orange Tree in Thornham.

This weekend has given me some really super memories. I can save them and get them out to look back on when I need a little bit of calm and tranquillity. And, I have got the pictures to hand to remind me about it whenever I look at my blog. Bonus.

I can recommend meditation by memory, it gives added value to every trip.

A wobble.

I thought I was handling my imminent return to work really well. I did get a bit twitchy at Christmas, but decided the way to proceed was to enjoy the time I had and make sure I made the most of it.

I have.

Me and the little one have been to meet new mums and babies, we have been to new places including Norfolk and the Lake District, have done lots of singing and dancing and had lots of lovely times with Daddy and big brother and all the grandmas and Grandads. So far so good.

Then, I watched Stella (Sky 1). It's a lovely programme, about a mum of three, with the delightful Ruth Jones. We watched the last episode last night, which had some surprises and some wonderful moments. But, at the end (spoiler alert) Stella's son leaves to go and live in Canada. And that set me off! My baby will still be living in the same house as me and so will his dad and brother, but for some reason it struck a chord. Cue blubbing. I did a professional job too, no snuffles, but full on snot filled, red nosed, waterworks.

What I was most upset about was not having that time with the baby when we are just 'being', playing or singing or going shopping and the smiles he gives me and the gurgling he does. It's not like he isn't going to be able to do that anymore, I will see it all the time, but I just won't see it all day. I am having to deal with the concept that when I go back to work, he isn't going to disappear, I will just see him less, so need to enjoy that time instead.
It is a bit like I am grieving for that time now, so hopefully when it happens I will be almost over it.

At least I am in touch with my feelings - we have regular 1-2-1 time together - and I can let them out rather than bottling them up and waiting for the explosion.

When I had my first son, I went back to work when he was five months old. With his baby brother, I have got a month more and that is great. With number one son, I wanted to get back to work and start using my brain again and be with grown ups. This time I am using my brain (after a fashion) with my blog and I have spent quite a lot of time with adults. But, I have started to remember that going to work did give me that sense of who I am. That I am not just a mum and that I have other purposes. I am a working woman with friends who likes shopping and running and reading and drinking! And a mum.
I love my job, it gives me huge satisfaction. It is what I always wanted to do. I didn't really want children. Not for a long time. Now I have both and love them both, I just have to find that balance. And I think me working will mean I am happier in the long run, which has to be good for my family. And I hope I can be a good role model to my children. Firstly, showing them that working is a great thing and you can enjoy having a challenging job and secondly, that women work and are equal in society and in the workplace.

All of this hard thinking came about thanks to another mummy's blog. Atwentysomethingmum was writing about feeling like being more than just a mum and it helped me to look again at my feelings and reframe them and start to deal with them. And it has really helped. I started blogging to write about jolly stuff, like cake and coffee, but ultimately it has helped me deal with a really difficult niggle. For that I am hugely grateful.

http://atwentysomethingmum.blogspot.co.uk/2012/03/person-behind-parent-label.html?m=1

It's the little things...

I keep hearing how mums don't want expensive presents for Mothers Day, Maybe it's because of the credit crunch, but apparently, they would rather have a lie-in or a handmade gift. Now, I would never turn down a designer handbag or a pair of diamond earrings, but I have to agree.

I wanted to give the Grandmas something unique and so I have been having a lovely time with my boys doing some hand printing. It is extraordinarily difficult to do hand prints, when the five month old in question refuses to unclench his fist and when he does, proceeds to suck his paint covered thumb. Fortunately, I had used baby friendly paint, but, blimey, I started to worry after seeing a little black tongue in his mouth. Eek. The finished results were lovely though. And, it is much easier to do hand painting with an eight year old.

Simple but very effective. That's all we need for Mothers Day isn't it?

This is my first year being the mum of two boys. It has been a logistical feat to organise seeing every Granny, Grandma and Great Grandma and ensuring they all had a card and a little something. We managed it, but I was so concerned about making it all special, I started to whitter about it all. Whittering about the restaurant and the presents and the timings and remembering everything - whittering so much I was in danger of spoiling it.

We had a carvery lunch with most of the family. By the time we all arrived and had a drink, we were advised we only had the table for a certain amount of time and that time was running out. Normally, this is isn't a problem, we don't usually have starters or pudding so we are pretty quick, but I had been looking forward to warm gooey chocolate brownie or unctuous cheesecake to celebrate Mothers Day. We were out of time though so went for coffee at my mums. This was great, we got chance to play pass-the-baby and be a little more relaxed. But I did really want a pudding (I didn't stamp my foot, but my bottom lip did quiver just a little bit.)

After we got home, I sorted out the baby and had a cup of tea.... when I went back to the kitchen there was a box waiting for me.

Inside the box was a piece of cheesecake. Unknown to me, baby's daddy had run to the pub down the road to get me a pudding.  

As I mentioned before, I wouldn't have turned down a handbag or diamonds, but actually, forget all of that, a slice of cheesecake and some handprints were the best presents I could have had. It's not the recession that can make a smaller gift the best, it's the thought that goes with it and the love.

Bad good hair day

I went to have my hair done today.....ahhhhhhhh, lovely.
Granny and Grandpa came too so they could push the baby around while my roots were dealt with and locks shorn. Talk about luxury. My stylist and I talked about sci-fi television (True Blood and Grimm), he complemented me the gorgeousness of my baby, then I ate a Birds cheese and ham roll and read Marie Claire. Seriously, all I needed was an chilled glass of Champagne and it could have hit the heady heights of perfection.

But, there was one seriously dark cloud hanging over my otherwise blissful afternoon.

I had forgotten my phone!

How is it possible that a microchip surrounded by a bit of plastic can make or break my mood. I am old enough (but look far to young according to my hairdresser) to remember not bothering with a mobile. I barely used it when I had one. What happened? How can I feel insecure just because I have left my phone on the sofa? It's like an addiction.

I actually don't have the answer. But, a big part of it has been down to the baby. My phone has been my baby-feeding friend. It is small enough to fit in the palm of my hand while I have baby on my knee. In order to occupy myself during long feeds, I started looking at Twitter, then Facebook, then blogs and then I started writing my own blog and then tweeting myself (a monster 24 tweets so far, but bear with me!) The act of feeding a baby is as old as time - now enhanced by cutting edge technology. And don't they make a good team.

But I do worry when I don't have my phone. I don't feel as safe driving around on my own with the baby without it. It's not as though I am going to darkest Peru without any way of contacting the rest of civilisation is it? I was only going a few miles to the hairdressers. I must have looked a bit frazzled as my mum actually lent me her phone. It wasn't the same, but it seemed to quell the little flutters of panic when I remembered I didn't have my mobile. And, to add insult to neurosis, I had been looking forward to a little blog time - on my phone.

According to Grazia this week (what else?), I am not alone in my phone obsession - apparently, there is a phobia relating to fear of losing your mobile phone. It's called nomophobia.

I think I have got it.

As Joni Mitchell sang, 'you dont know what you've got til it's gone'. Well that's how I felt - I had the no-phone blues - and I got them bad.

Feed me!

I am sooo hungry!

I am still feeding my five month old and he is a hungry boy. There are points in the day where I feel like I could eat a house. Or maybe two. With a bungalow for pudding. It is a strange sensation. The emptiness comes on really quickly and I need to eat fast. The problem is what to eat. I have to resist the urge to shovel handfuls of chocolate into my mouth, so I need to ensure I have a selection of healthy snacks to hand at all times. My kitchen, car and handbag have got a ridiculous amount of mouth sized morsels. I hadn't realised how bad it was until I looked around me when I got into the car....

It looks a lot, but, I also make sure I have a sweet in the car so my big boy can have one when I pick him up from school (he only gets one mind you, it's one rule for him and one enormous pile of sugar for me).

I am only going to be able to feed the baby for another month before I need to wean him and move to bottle feeding. I need to make sure I am not going to carry on with this sort of diet so I will have to monitor my cake, chocolate and sweet intake. I don't want to get used to eating this much. There may be a bit of a dilemma too as my non-breastfeeding self wants to eat more savoury goodies; crisps, slices of ham, cheese, bread, olives, pretzels.

It sounds like I have a serious problem, but I tend to only have one mouthful at a time and I do manage to control the super-hunger when it comes on. I read somewhere that sometimes when you feel hungry, you might just be thirsty, so I make sure I am fully hydrated and then go for apple and grapes before I dive head first into a bag of white chocolate mice. In my pre-pregnancy days, if I had a treat or naughty nibble, I would only have a little bit. My top drawer at work always had half a bag of crisps in it or an open bag of Haribo, or a bar of chocolate with one chunk missing or, most likely, a packet of biscuits with the top one missing. My kitchen is very similar. I fancy sweet treats and so I buy them, people know I like chocolate and buy it for me and I buy it for my big boy and my biggest boy, so we end up with the international sugar mountain which gets eaten at the rate of one mouthful per night.

Just to reassure you (and myself) this is what we shared as a quick snack this afternoon.

In amongst this desperate need for sweet things, another of my recent cravings has been for steamed spinach. I have been eating towering green mountains of it.

Cravings....now, when did I last have cravings.... Urm..... Hello....

Bucket list...

In two months I am going back to work.

As you can imagine, this is a bit of a wrench, so in order to feel like I am making the most of that time, I thought I would write a maternity leave 'bucket list'.

A common-or-garden bucket list is a list of things to do before you 'kick the bucket' or pop your clogs - Morgan Freeman and Jack Nicholson starred in a film about two old duffers who escape from hospital and go on a road trip to do everything on their bucket lists. They were terminally ill though. I don't intend to kick the bucket and my imminent return to work is not on a par with death, but this is helping me get my mind around the whole thing. And it gives me a chance to write a really good list - I like a list!

Now I sit down to think about what I want to do, I am slowly realising that I have done quite a lot already. I have mastered feeding a baby again, and changing him and putting the buggy up and down. When I had mastered these pretty essential tasks, I joined some baby groups. This may sound fairly run-of-the-mill, but even as a relatively confident person, I found it a bit daunting. Walking in to a room full of mums and dads is intimidating. They all seem to know each other and I am the new kid to be inspected. At one point, I was hanging around outside a community centre, waiting for a friend to go into the toddler group with. When she turned up she pointed out that I run a team of people in my real life, so I should be ok going in to have coffee and cake with a group of mums. Oh my, if only that were the case. But, I went through the door and have conquered that particular wobble now and I feel really proud of myself. Looking back, I don't know what I was worrying about. His dad and I have taken the baby swimming. Now I want us all to go. Maybe we can go on holiday to one of those swanky family water parks in a Europe were there a loads of slides. Mmmm, maybe we need to win the lottery first. I have learnt a bit of baby sign language. By a bit, I have learnt three signs, but it is a start. I have done lots of exercises with the baby and lots of 'Tummy Time'. I didn't encounter Tummy Time with the last one, so that's another box to tick. I have taken the baby to Cornwall and to Norfolk and managed to get him to sleep in a travel cot. I have even started using Twitter and I am writing a blog!

I feel as if we have achieved quite a lot, but I want to see what else is out there. I feel like this is the last time I will have a big block of time to spend with my children before I retire and I want to do new things with my boys. Not go abseiling or that kind of thing just yet, but enough so that when I go back to work, I can look back on what we did and it will keep me going until I get home or until the weekend or until we go on holiday.

Maybe, I just need to keep doing what I am doing. Meeting up with my friends and family, spending time taking my big boy swimming and taking my little boy to watch, drinking wine and eating take away with my biggest boy, planning our holiday to a water park, watching the buds burst....

Oh no.

This is going to turn out like a chicky-flicky-rom-commy-soppy-happy-ever-after blog where I realise that all I really need is right in front of me and I just needed to see how lucky I really am. Forget the bucket list, pass the sick bucket.

(Look, I am writing this in tiny writing and saying it really, really quietly, and despite the bit inside me which cringes at all that soppy stuff....I suppose it's true, isn't it?)