Another day, another to do list

As per usual, I have spent the weekend and end of my week mostly getting stuff done. 

I had a ridiculously productive Monday last week and this week I am hoping to repeat the same.  I has mentioned in one of my previous posts that some of the things holding me back from achieving other things were actually purchasing things.  We have now purchased a wardrobe for my son, a radiator cover and some blinds for our lounge.  I know these seem so boring but I am super excited for every single one of them to be ready and in place in the house! 

The wardrobe arrived last week and although I have partially put it together I haven't had the time to finish it off! Every time I get started, my son wakes up and I have to drop everything! The radiator cover is due mid-October and the blinds are due in the next two weeks.  The radiator cover will be in our entry way as you walk into the house and will be like a makeshift shelf for a vintage style phone I intend to buy, something rather like this in a similar colour: 

Then above the cover I have decided we will then have a vintage baby photo wall in round or oval frames.  I have been trawling the charity shops here to see if I could find anything and as of yet, nothing has turned up but I am hopeful.  I have a porthole mirror which I will put up with the photos and I would also like to add some kind of abstract art to the selection which incorporates the colours of the space of black, white and mint green.  Instead of painting some hooks as well, I have found this from IKEA which has pegs in the perfect colour, although I do wish they weren't so big (please excuse the side profile).  This will go close to the floor just below our dado rail for my son's coats and hoodies so they're no longer piled up in his car seat and also so that when he is a little older, he can hang his own coats up: 

In our lounge, we have had tired old net curtains given to us kindly by my mother-in-law for privacy but they are dirty, dusty and covered in paint.  I am not a fan of net curtains at all so the sooner they can be replaced the better and that day comes closer and closer every day as our blinds are currently being manufactured!  I bought bottom-up blinds from a company called Tuiss.  The blinds are made to measure as the bay window we're having them in is an odd size and I don't want to have such gappy window dressings.  I had always planned for bottom up blinds over venetians as they would block less light and also it would mean the top of the windows could be left uncovered as I only intend to close the blinds 3/4s of the way up the window.  

The wardrobe, well you already know about that space and once it's done I will send a picture, then I will have to keep you updated on the progress of the little den which will sit in front of it.  

Other than that, I have been planning my son's first birthday.  Born so close to Christmas it makes for difficult planning but he is totally worth it and I'm not sure whether I'm going too OTT but I want to see his surprised face everywhere we go.  I won't say too much right now but my son loves the outdoors and in particular nature so his birthday will be tree themed.  That is as vague as I can keep it for now, I know he obviously can't read so would never find out but I would rather share the specifics after the fact.  Busy busy busy and this is a whole new week!

~AB~

"Dating" other mummies reflections

It seems that when you have had a baby, you feel under so much pressure to make mummy friends yet... when everyone starts going back to work everything goes silent. 

Maybe it is just me but being the first out of my group of mums to go back aside from the fact I have Mondays free with just me and my son (Tuesdays and Wednesdays we do classes) I do not have the time to see anyone anymore.  My time, as you can see from my distinct lack of blog posts is very precious and my list of things to do is ever increasing and the length of time my extremely mobile son now sleeps is decreasing.  That's not to say I don't want to make time to meet my new found mummy friends but it's not just me that has to make the effort to meet up.  I know that sounds immature but to me it really does work both ways.  

Historically out of my friends, I have always been the one to organise things.  When it came to celebrating our 30th birthday year of which 5 of the 8 of us were to turn 30, my friend and I arranged a "posh" venue for us to have ridiculously priced drinks once a month for a year.  This sounds totally achievable right? Except that after the first month, people stopped coming out for whatever reason or another and it became increasingly more difficult to cater to everyone.  This felt like a complete waste of my time especially as I made a point of sending out a list of revised dates every month which noone seemed to remember despite agreeing to the dates.  Needless to say, when I fell pregnant and then became too big to travel around comfortably and see everyone, the outings stopped and noone started them up again.  To date, we all meet up separately and there are friends I haven't seen since my son was a month old (he is almost 9 months now).  

I know this sounds rant-y but if you can see things from my point of view, I don't have time to waste anymore.  If people don't want to make the effort then why should I when the time could be spent ironing or eating or sleeping or most importantly, spending time with my son.  I have never prioritised drinking or even my social life over my wellbeing and I don't see why I should now with or without my son.  

So anyway, whilst I'm glad I finally managed to make friends after all the time I thought I wouldn't I won't be rushing to arrange a play date any time soon.  My son now gets to play with other babies every Thursday and although it would be nice to see my mum friends, it will not be to the detriment of other elements of my life/baby balance.  Have you found this situation? Would you consider it worth having temporary friends just to conform/give your baby playmates temporarily? If your kids are older, are you still in touch with your mum friends? 

~AB~

I know, I know

I haven't blogged for over a week, a fact I am well aware of but it seems my work mind has taken over and also we have a million deadlines at home (obviously self inflicted) to meet!

We have decided our son will be moving into his own room at the start of next month.  This brings a whole new bunch of jobs but also once it actually happens will probably (hopefully) be a huge weight off of both me and my husband.  This move means we need to make space and put the cot into the nursery and try and find a position for the baby monitor where my now mobile son cannot get to it. We then need to move back into our room (we have all been sleeping in the guest room) but we need to get a new mattress except our room mattress is bigger than the guest room so no we can't just swap them over and I need to clear out my wardrobe shelf so I can actually use my wardrobe.  I know the whole mattress thing could have been done earlier but who has money lying around for things like that?! 

I also have wanted for a long time to create a reading and playing nook in my son's room which I was hoping to do before he moved in but again, I need to buy him a wardrobe and bookshelf. The nook will hopefully include a wardrobe on top with a bookshelf on the bottom, there would be net curtains and sheets draping the ceiling above the space in front of the wardrobe and some fairy lights of some kind.  I did consider marquee lights which I had mentioned is on my to do list in an earlier post but I have discovered I am a little obsessive with named and monogrammed things so I didn't want my son to be bombarded with his own name!  The nook should feel like a massive tent/den and should be a nice little hidden space for my son to play and read and if he so wishes to nap as well as I intend to cover the whole of the floor space in the nook with cushions. 

I will have to post a picture when this finally gets done (in the next two weeks fingers crossed) but in other news, the study is finished and just needs a clear out of stuff that isn't supposed to be in there and then to be populated with stuff that is! Some of the artwork is also ready and waiting to be put up so this weekend will be a productive one hopefully, then that's one more thing off of my to do list! Here is the finished corkboard in all its glory...

One job down a million more to go!

~AB~

Every cloud

Dare I say it, two days in the working world were not as difficult as I expected!  

The difficulty however with starting a new role when returning from maternity leave is that people try to ease you in gently and this neither distracts you from the fact you have left your son or keeps you busy.  As I had been informed though, because I am used to multitasking all day without thinking about it, being organised in the work place is a walk in the park.  

I don't want to get too cocky too soon as inevitably I will make a mistake due to lack of sleep but I am already starting to reap the benefits of working and as is my son.  I feel like I can actually still function as an adult despite only a couple of days earlier while making my husband a cup of tea I had put the tea bag canister on the drainer but left the cupboard open where it belonged to remind me to put it away.  I'm ashamed to say it took a good 5 minutes to find it hiding in plain sight.  My son on the other hand has become even more sociable and this weekend... crawled for the first time.  His crawling is more a dragging of one of his legs but small victories and it also means he won't be so frustrated trying to walk to things when he can't as he now has a comfortable medium.  

Absence has definitely made the heart grow fonder and I have enjoyed the weekend bonding with my son so without trying to sound like I'm reassuring myself, I genuinely think this new change has been good for the both of us.  Here's hoping things continue this way and maybe if I'm lucky one day my husband might be able to join us part time too. 

My D-Day

The day has finally arrived that I return to the working world.  As I wave goodbye to the maternity leave which ended way too soon I'd like to reflect on how I spent my return to work eve: 

• Washing clothes and everyone's bedsheets
• Dusting 
• Painting two walls of the study 
• Cleaning the kitchen
• Hoovering 
• Sorting my son's clothes and vacuum bagging the stuff he can't fit into anymore
• Sorting out my nails as they were turning into claws 
• Beautifying myself 
• Cuddles with my son who has been asleep since he got back from nursery 
• Crying 
• Not napping 

It has been a ridiculously busy day for me unhindered by the cries of my unwell baby boy and although part of me has enjoyed it, I'm annoyed I didn't make time for that nap so I'm fresh and relatively rested for my first day back. 

I cried the whole way back from dropping off my son this morning feeling sorry for myself that I am deserting my son (harsh and definitely not true) and that I'm an unfit mother - you can see the way my brain works.  I'm not going to toot my own horn but I know for a fact that that's not true either and I'm being way to hard on myself.  I can write this but I cannot reassure myself this as my heart is breaking faster than I can put it back together.

As I sit here, still crying and feeling sorry for myself I think about how many women have gone through this heartache before me, was it so difficult for my mum to send my sister and I off? And for her mum before her? And then her mum? 

Like I've said before, I know sometimes my son and I get bored of each other but I wouldn't change things for the world.  I will truly miss spending all day long with him, 5 days a week (the weekends are daddy time), watching his little face while he's sleeping, cuddles in bed for mid morning nap time, playing and chatting while I change his nappy and clothes, his face when he really loves something I'm feeding him, kissing the back of his head when he's sitting on my lap and we're watching nursery rhymes or reading, playing peekaboo and seeing him craning his neck to try to find me...  I could go on and on and yet these are moments only I will remember as my son unfortunately will continue to forget them as he gets older.  Motherhood is a cruel game but also the best club to be a member of especially when you do remember moments like those I have just mentioned.  Despite all of the tears and sadness, I'm so lucky to be a mummy to the best little boy in the world, my heart is so full of love for him and hopefully absence will make the heart grow fonder.  That being said, any fonder and my heart would explode! 

Ok, I think I'm done now.  Off to finish of the rest of my to do list before my very early bedtime. 

~AB~

A big bubble of happy

The weekend just gone was the last bank holiday weekend in the UK till Christmas which is both sad and exciting as this year has flown by so quickly.

I have always believed in the thought process that if you surround yourself with happy people and try to maintain happy thoughts that you truly will live a happy life.  I have always found mindfulness when it comes to happiness a particularly difficult emotion to hold on to as I am always too busy remembering something I did wrong or something that I wished I could change.  I know I have said before that I really am grateful for my life as it is in this moment and I wouldn't change anything about it but I still find myself lingering on memories which threaten to remove all traces of happiness because even in my mind I blow them out of proportion.

There is always that one person though that puts a downer on everything.  I sometimes think that amongst my friends, that person is me and maybe I am being harsh but it's what I mostly know to be true.  In my life, I definitely have at least one person who really does blow things out of proportion.  Usually I can keep my calm (sort of) but this week I have found them particularly draining.  My hormones have been all over the place and having my son in nursery has not helped.  Having my guard down and listening to someone drivel on about all of their misfortune (from years ago) and of the things I could do to improve myself did not make for easy listening and it really is hard to stay present and in the moment when you have such a distraction.   Thankfully though, as exhausting as my week has been and as difficult as it was enduring someone so obviously unhappy with their lives I got to spend my entire long weekend with my boys before I start back at work next week.

Despite the fact the weather was so rubbish this weekend and my son having a viral infection, the three of us got to spend some serious quality time together and I would like to think my son appreciated our time.  I just wish it wasn't the end of my maternity leave so soon! 

~AB~