New Age Teenage Mum

As Joshua is in nursery now and I dont get to spend as much time with him, I decided that today I would treat us both to lunch. We went to the local watering hole where he was so well behaved and made a mockery of my complaints that at home he can be hard work and very demanding.

At the table next to us were an elderly couple whom for some reason Joshua could not take his eyes off. He seemed to delight in staring intensely at them. Undetered by his gawking the couple engaged me in conversation about his age, whether he was crawling and the stages that their grandchildren were at.

After we had finished our lunch (Joshua insisted on sharing mine) and bid the elderley couple a pleasant day we went to the bar to pay the bill. I realised I had left the wooden spoon behind that had our bill number on. As I returned to the table to collect it I overheard the couple talking about me.

"What a lovely young lady" they said. "Not like the usual teenage mums you see these days".
I walked away quietly confused. I didnt know whether to laugh or cry. I didnt realise I looked so young.

Have I produced a southerner?

I think there may have been a mix up at the hospital and I have ended up with the wrong son. Why have I come to this conclusion some 9 months down the line I hear you ask?

Well, I made lobby for Joshua's lunch today. For those of you that dont know Lobby is a traditional northern dish served in my home town. Its made from carrots, potatoes, peas and corned beef. Sounds disgusting and doesnt look much better I know but trust me it is very delicious. If you dont believe me ask George. He's from foreign parts and he loves the stuff, a nice winter warmer. Now I know its not winter but its an easy dinner, cheap and tastes good. Being full of goodness and made from home grown vegetables I was sure it would be a winner with Joshua.

He hungrily tucked in to the first spoonful but the second and third took some extreme persuading. After the fourth mouthful he refused my home cooked meal. I am traumatised. How can my my son, from my northern genes not like Lobby. I am hoping its down to the fact he isnt very well, has a cold and is teething and therefore not that hungry. If not perhaps my baby got swapped and I have ended up with a southern baby, either that or having been down South for the past 11 years there is something in the air that has caused this north to south switch

Today feels more like a rainy day

Today I returned to work after 9 months of maternity leave to be met with a 2 hour meeting, followed by introductions to new members of staff, a further 30 minute meeting, booked in staff appraisals for my team and been handed a bunch of CV's to assess.

Added to this when I logged into Outlook this evening I was astonished to see 30 emails already in my inbox. I have only been back at work for 3 hours!

Furthermore when I dropped Joshua off at nursery this morning he cried, refused to have his morning nap, had a fall and banged his head and fell asleep in the car on the way home which as I have already explained can sometimes mean he will refuse the offer of a nice sleep in his cot as being the hardcore little boy he is, thinks 20 minutes consitutes adequate sleep for a 9 month old.

In addition to this, he has a cold which has just come on this afternoon, is teething and completely out of sorts. After a dose of calpol, some bonjela and some snuffle babe, George and I prayed this tearful little boy would go straight to sleep. Thankfully our prayers were answered. I am however expecting the midnight caller to appear as the last time Joshua was ill we spent many an hour for a few nights cuddling him and trying him to go back to sleep with as little crying as possible.

I hope in a few weeks time, things will settle down for all of us and the sun will reappear.

Aqua aerobics‏

As I typed my previous post, I received an email from the local childrens centre regarding the aqua aerobics class during summer. The email reads:

"Due to a miscommunication the antenatal and postnatal aqua will not be running throughout the summer but will restart again in September.
Sorry for any incontinence caused"

This email itself almost made me wet myself.

Squash Squash and more Squash

Since moving to the countryside our domestic duties have accidentally become more clearly defined.
George tends to the garden, I tend to our son, George plants vegetables, I plant flowers. George washes the car, I wash the clothes. George leaves the toilet seat up, I leave it down. George empties the bins, I empty his wallet and so on. Our relationship works in perfect harmony.

Many months ago we embarked upon a new venture of growing our own vegetables, I was in my element making purees for Joshua as part of weaning him onto solids. Butternut Squash was definitely a favourite.
Over-excited I asked George to plant many a squash seed to accommodate Joshua's appetite and enjoyment of this vegetable. Reluctantly and against his better judgement George built a special structure to house purely Butternut Squash. With the recent mixture of sunshine and rain the Squash seemed to have taken over and we now have an abundance of them.

I haven't had the heart to tell George that in such a short space of time Joshua has progressed to other foods and his interest in Squash has somewhat waned. Perhaps we may have to donate some to the schools' harvest festival or I will need to produce some very appetising recipes that include Butternut Squash to keep George happy during the autumn months. Suggestions?

Taster Day Test

I cannot believe the past nine months have gone by so quickly and that the time has come for me to return to work and Joshua is to attend nursery.

George and I took him for his first taster session today. It’s a lovely nursery on a little farm with pigs, donkeys, goats, ducks and horses. George and I were blown away when we saw the place and met with the members of staff. We were sold instantly. That’s not to say we couldn’t wait to put Joshua into nursery, far from it. I am on the one hand pleased to be going back to work especially in light of my significant promotion and payrise, however I am so saddened that I will be away from my baby.

We arrived at the nursery and my stomach was churning, I felt like I was sitting an exam. I was extremely nervous and anxious about leaving Joshua for the next 3 hours. You see, he has never been left in the care of anyone else other than George and I, so for us this was such a big step. We handed him over to one of the nursery teachers, gave him a quick kiss and told him we would be back soon.

Before I embarrassed myself enormously by snatching back our gorgeous boy, George and I quickly exited the nursery and headed into the car park where the tears cascaded down my face.

We drove away in silence, our thoughts and feelings identical.
How could we leave our little boy behind?

Not knowing what to do with ourselves, we went to the coffee shop near where I work and managed to down 4 cups of coffee each then sat staring into the distance, our conversation very subdued.

At 11am we took off at speed back to the nursery to collect Joshua. We weren’t due back till 11.30am but could not contain our excitement that we were to be reunited with our little boy. Apparently the teachers said Joshua had been very good considering he didn’t have a nap and it was his first time being left with strangers. They have however advised me that the next few times we leave him it will probably be worse as he will know he is being left. This worries me as next time I won’t have George there for support.

I know in my heart that being at nursery is going to be so important in building Joshua’s confidence and independence and in a few weeks it will be routine for him. In the meantime however I will be the one having the sleepless nights wondering if he will be ok each time I drop him off for the day. Desperate for the time to come for me to collect him, swoop him up in my arms and give him a huge big kiss and cuddle.

Unfit to be a parent

George and I took Joshua into town today for a change of scenery. We knew this to be a risky business as it’s further than the local villages and should he fall asleep in the car, he may refuse to have a nap later on which would prove to be a difficult and long afternoon. As there were two of us to look after him should this occur we decided to take the risk and deal with the consequences later.

We meandered round a couple of shops, had lunch, shared some private jokes in the coffee shop and were heading back to the car when we were all startled by a rather loud woman who was yelling. We turned round, even Joshua spun his head so fast to look at where this obscene voice was coming from.

The rather obnoxious woman was pushing a little baby in a pram and screaming at what we can only believe to be, her other child.

“You are just so naughty and horrid” yelled the woman. “I don’t want a screaming child holding onto my pram, get off, get off, you are not holding onto my pram, go away”. This went on for at least ten minutes with the woman verbally abusing her young child.

The last straw before I was about to intervene was the woman screeching at this poor child “why are you acting like such a div, lying on the floor, I ought to slap you in the face, you stupid stupid child”.

George, Joshua and I were so disturbed that we walked away so quickly and before putting Joshua into the car both George and I gave him a huge hug and a kiss and told him how much we loved him. We didn’t care how hard work Joshua was going to be when we got home, under no circumstances would we ever treat a child in the manner we had seen from this dreadful woman. I often wonder if I am a good Mummy but never feel that I am unfit to be a parent. Can the woman we saw today honestly feel the same?

A boxers nose

Joshua is nearly 9 months old and has shown no signs of being able to crawl. In fact he detests “tummy time”. He has however found a way of being able to grab hold of his cot bumper to move himself around.

Several mornings now I have wandered into his nursery (a little earlier than I would like i.e 5am) to find him whimpering, lying face down, lodged vertical across the cot, with both feet stuck between the bars and nose pressed flat into the other side so that he somewhat resembles a boxer dog.

Someone once told me “ooh it does get easier when they become mobile”, perhaps they meant something else entirely?

A Whole New World

When Joshua gets upset for whatever reason, it can often be very difficult to calm him down. I am sure he often forgets why he is crying; this then causes him to cry more and more and on and on this can go for sometime.

However I have recently discovered that singing Aladdin’s “A Whole New World” in my dulcet northern tones, can appease an aggrieved baby.
The problem is I only know one verse, which I have to sing over and over again until Joshua stops crying.

I think I need to search the internet for A Whole New Verse before my comforting tactics begin to fail.

First Bump

I had been asked by Tara, one of my best friends, to bridesmaid at her wedding. Honoured I accepted. In June, George, Joshua and I packed up all we needed for the one night stay (a full car load apparently) and headed to the venue. I had been asked to arrive early to help arrange table decorations, place cards etc.

George took Joshua to the Hotel we were staying in so that he could have his afternoon nap before the ceremony and George could unpack our suitcase.
Upon arrival at the Hotel and having ascended the 4 flights of stairs carrying Joshua, the suitcase, bag of toys and baby things, George was already somewhat stressed.

George decided to sit Joshua on a very nice conservatory style sofa that I was later advised tilted backwards. The nice lady on reception knocked on the door to bring George a highchair so that he would be able to give Joshua his lunch. George went over to answer the door and as he turned back he saw Joshua plummet from the sofa to the ground below face first.

Completely unaware of what had been going on as I had been busy with the Bride to be, I called George to ask if the Hotel was nice and if they were both ok. In a stereotypical womanly voice George replied “fine”. Call it female intuition or maternal instinct I knew all was not well. I was then advised of Joshua’s accident. Absolutely mortified that my precious little baby had fallen, bruised his face and had an ice pack stuck to his cheek for the past half an hour all I wanted to was rush to his aid.

When I asked if he was ok, George proudly answered “yes he is ok and he held onto his feet the whole time he was falling, it was amazing. Lucky the floor was carpeted though huh?”

Lucky, lucky I said to myself, you are lucky I am not there to tape your feet to your hands and throw you out of our 4th floor window and see how you land.

I decided not to give George a hard time when we met up later, as whilst this may be Joshua's first bump it wont be his last I am sure. I know George would have been giving himself a talking to the whole afternoon and feeling pretty dreadful about the whole incident. A warning for the future nonetheless!!

Baby Babble

George and I have recently had a conversation about the importance of speech and word repetition so that Joshua will hopefully catch on and we can smile proudly when he says Mama or Dada.
When George arrived home from work one evening and Joshua was safely tucked up in bed, like the dutiful housewife I asked George how his day had been.

His face dropped as he revealed he had had a terrible day, work had been so busy and to top it all off he was sorry he was late home but there had been a Bang Bang on the motorway.

I think George is perhaps taking this baby language class a step too far.

Car Park Catastrophe

Joshua and I went to the supermarket to collect something for dinner. I checked the car park for the “parent and child” spaces but there were none free. Thinking of where best to park the car, I put it right next to the trolley bay thinking hardly anyone would park near us as no-one wants to risk their car getting scrapped by people mindlessly pushing their trolleys into the bay then letting go and walking away before they ensure their trolley is secure.

We happily went into the store, not our usual one I might add, and headed quickly back to the car as a light shower of rain began to fall. As I proceeded to open the passenger side of our small two door car, I realised that I was unable to open the door wide enough to be able to lift Jack (who was already sitting in the car seat) into the car. Some stupid idiot in a massive 4x4 had parked so close to our car that my attempts were futile. The rain began to pour down heavily and I try as I may I could not get Joshua into the car.

Frustrated and drenched, I wheeled Joshua into the trolley bay only to be met by one of the trolley boys. Having to make a very quick assumption as to whether or not I could trust this man for 2 minutes to look after Joshua whilst I moved the car out of the parking space, I decided as he was wearing the supermarkets uniform, should anything happen to Joshua I would sue and therefore asked would he mind making sure that the pram did not roll out of the bay and into the path of another vehicle.

Having finally loaded a sodden Joshua into the car, thanking the trolley boy, I was so wound up and close to tears. I could not believe that the 4x4 driver had found the need to park so close to my little Polo and cause me so much aggravation.

I delved deep into my handbag, tore a piece of paper from my diary and scribbled a rather rude note to the driver of the 4x4 informing them exactly what I thought of them and their tank.

I don’t know what has happened to me since giving birth; I would never have got so wound up beforehand. I think it’s my protective maternal streak showing through.

For everything else there is Mastercard

Sometime ago, my Yummy Mummy friend Bridget asked me if I fancied a trip out to the department store in a local town as she had been given vouchers to get her nails done. At the time we were going through a “no-nap in my cot thank you” phase with Joshua so the car journey would give me some peace and quiet and Joshua would get some much needed day time sleep.

Upon arrival at the shopping centre, Bridget and I wheeled two sleeping babies into a café so we could have some lunch before she went off for beauty treatment and I could look round the shops. Her son awoke and she fed and changed him with no fuss. Joshua woke only as we were leaving. We headed into the department store and Joshua began to cry, realising he should have been fed about half an hour ago, Bridget advised me that there was a really nice changing and feeding room upstairs in the store. I pushed the pram into the room and took out Joshua’s bottle and emptied one of the pre-made milk cartons into it. Joshua at this point liked his milk warm but the carton hadn’t kept any heat since we had been walking around. Worried he would refuse to feed, I stuck the bottle under the hand dryer in the hope he would heat up the milk to the appropriate temperature. All I succeeded in doing was heating the plastic and burning my fingers. Joshua would have to try cold milk for a change.

After a few gulps of the cold milk, Joshua began to go red in the face and I realised he was probably emptying his bowels. This in itself was going to be a disaster as a) he would not finish his milk with a dirty nappy and b) he would probably not finish his milk now the “flow” had been interrupted.

Confused as to what to do, I grabbed his changing mat, unfolded the changing table and placed a hungry and sodden Joshua onto the mat. As I removed his nappy and reached up for the roll of toilet tissue, Joshua proceeded to wee, his aim in my direction, just like the advert for Mastercard. I quickly grabbed for the roll and patted myself and Joshua dry. I lifted the dirty nappy from his bottom, turned to place it into the nappy bin only to turn back and see Joshua hadn’t quite finished and more and more baby poo was running all over the change mat. I looked up to tear more toilet tissue from the roll, only to realise it had finished. Great! I had a changing mat full of poo, a wet baby and a soaking wet blouse. With the few baby wipes I had left in the bag, I wiped us both down and then realised that George was the last person to have used the nappy bag. There was no change of clothes for Joshua. Joshua spent the car journey home wrapped in a dirty muslin cloth. Needless to say George and I had words when he arrived home from work that evening.

Captain Hook

One fine day, Joshua and I decided to walk the mile and a half long trip to the grocery shop in our neighbouring village. Admiring the million pound house on our journey along with the horses and cows in the field, we were both quite cheerful.

Approaching the shop I noticed that a lady with a buggy, closely followed by an elderly lady with a shopping trolley on wheels, both had to step off the pavement and into the path of oncoming traffic as a White Van driver had parked his van across the pavement blocking any chance we had of getting to the shop door.

Joshua and I had to wait five minutes before we were able to safely scoot around the van and onto the pavement to ensure we were not crushed by one of the many trucks, tractors or cars that frequently travel this very busy main road.

Upon entering the shop, the friendly assistant wished me a good morning. Not amused by our near acquaintance with death I loudly asked who had stupidly parked their van across the pavement causing every pedestrian to risk their lives stepping into the road, hoping that the culprit would hear me.

The assistant of foreign nationality muttered something (possibly he had not understood what I had been talking about) and walked off to the man who had just unloaded several boxes of fresh eggs. They both chuckled to themselves as they peered in my direction. Usually a calm and trouble avoiding person prior to becoming a Mummy, a red mist descended and I marched over to the shop assistant and Egg delivery man and totally lost the plot. I screamed “its not funny you know, old people and people with babies, infact anyone walking on the pavement cannot get past your stupid white van as you are parked illegally, its just outrageous”. At this point I was fuming!

The Egg delivery man turned to me, flushed face, and said he would go outside and move it.

I responded with a simple “Good” and stormed off to pay for my milk.

I was totally amazed when I walked outside and the Egg Delivery Man had actually moved his van. He appeared highly embarrassed that I had made an example of him in a busy shop and apologised profusely. I thanked him and as I looked down I noticed where his left hand should have been was a hook. My face drained and I tell you by hook or by crook, had I seen his weapon before my outburst I would have paid for my groceries and left without a peep.

Stories

As I have not posted for a while and now have the time and experiences to share, I thought I would post a few stories that have happened in our lives since Joshua has arrived. Whilst they are all posted on the same day these events have occured over the last 8 and a half months.

A wonderful life

Well I have realised that I started this blog in 2007 and since then have done nothing with it. Let me tell you what I have been up to since my first post.

George and I moved into our idyllic little cottage in Kent, spent a few months painting and decorating, checking out the local area and had lots of fun visiting the local watering holes.

In January 2008, we decided the time had come to embark upon our career as parents and armed with my copy of "Zeta West's guide to getting pregnant" borrowed from my friend Elsie Button, we began the detox she recommended. No alcohol, do dairy, no tobacco, just plain NO FUN really. By February 2008 the seed had been planted and in 9 months I was to become a mummy for the first time.

Our beautiful son Joshua was born in October of that year. After having many sleepless nights, many days pacing the streets to get him to go to sleep we have all finally settled down into a routine.

To believe that we have a gorgeous (albeit challenging) little boy who is now 8 and a haf months old, we have realised that we have a wonderful life and have lots more to share