It's all I've ever wanted....
Been watching a bit of fun TV the past few weeks, mainly the reality stuff to keep an eye on the British public at large. One thing that strikes me that from the Apprentice to You've Not Got Talent, those taking part claim that to win would be:
All I've Ever Wanted
Which is odd, when you look at past winners of these shows, be them singers, dancers, business people, oddballs, fame wannabees it doesn't always end up for the best. Most satellite channels have shows showing whatever happened to so-and-so and after achieving their 15 minutes they vanish into the ether. Is that All That They Ever Wanted??
So it got me thinking, what have I ever wanted....??? Well for a while it was for Bolton to stay in the Premier League, but now that has been achieved I have to ever want something else. I certainly don't see me parading on any kind of TV show as I know full well I don't have any talent whatsoever in anything, hence me being unemployed!
However, the only thing I've ever wanted for a little while is some decent night's sleep and that is as likely as me becoming the next Apprentice.
At the moment I'm feeling Gordon Brown like. I've landed the position of my dreams and it turns out that I'm not very good at it and have got people complaining bitterly. OK, I've only got one very small complainer - but it's enough to make me feel unworthy. Sleep and I are drifting further and further apart and it would appear that it's all my fault. I've discovered that Baby Pumpkin isn't putting on any weight and I've probably been unintentionally starving her. So I'm trying to get her back onto the path of baby growth and feed her up, but it's not working and what's more we're both getting frustrated, tired and miserable with each other. And the more that happens the less likely she will be to put on weight and to sleep.
So the bat signal has been raised and my mum is coming to visit from Cumbria for a few days. My pride has taken one heck of a beating, I feel useless and disappointed that I've struggled with Pumpkin, however we're both stubborn and it's not getting either of us anywhere.
After all, All I've Ever Wanted is for my baby Pumpkin to be happy so if it means swallowing my pride and asking for help, it's a small price to pay.
Labels: Help, Reality TV, Weight
Jobs for the Girl
I've officially been out of work for over six months now. Where does the time go??!! Whoosh there it went. As mentioned I had a dull, dull role in the marketing department of a large organisation in Manchester. I'm guessing that I wasn't very good at marketing as I'm now longer employed!! It's a kind of strange place to be in people I meet assume I must be on maternity leave, and sometimes when people ask for my occupation such as when my insurance claim was made, or even when I registered Baby Pumpkin's birth I feel embarrassed to say that I don't work.
Much has been debated about women's role in society and I know women fought hard for the recognition in the workplace and I do feel bad that I'm somehow letting down those who wanted women to be more than just homemakers. Also my parents contributed to my university education as you don't need a degree to do the ironing, so I feel that I'm also letting them down too. The thing is at the moment I can't ever see me wanting a job!! I'm not at all wildy ambitious, office politics just bores the pants off me and I'm not steely or determined enough to climb that greasy pole and smash that glass ceiling. How about that for cliche ahoy!!
Many of my baby friends are returning to work soon, so perhaps that will make me feel different when my peer group aren't available to meet. A number of them say they have to return to work due to financial commitments, and I'm lucky that my payout has let me defer a straight return to work (Especially as I don't have a job to return to!!) A big factor also, is that a lot of the girls have a very strong and close support network of family on hand to cover childcare duties. Looking into work options, once Baby Pumpkin is in full time nursery at a cost of £160 per week, there isn't much left from a monthly pay cheque particularly once petrol and carparking costs are factored in. So that is my feeble justification for not getting back to the rat race!!
So this got me thinking about jobs I could do to suit my new circumstances and I came up with the following:
- Postperson - Delivering the post whilst pushing Baby Pumpkin in her pram - no good when I get puncutres though.
- Ironing - Doing busy people's ironing whilst watching Baby Pumpkin and daytime TV in the comfort of my own home, downside I HATE ironing and not very good at it I have more creases when I finish!
- Midwife - Delivering baby Pumpkin was the proudest moment of my life and sharing that with others must be very rewarding. Only I go faint at the sight of blood and can't stand needles, plus would be distraught for the families who face bad news. I'm too emotional
- Car washer - Weirdly I love washing cars, especially with my superdooper Karacher Power Washer, I was v. disappointed when pregnant I couldn't reach to clean my car. If people bring their car to me I will wash it and then they can drive away all shiny. However, that would mean people hanging around my house waiting, don't think I'd like the idea of that, would have to tidy up all the time.
- Cleaner - I LOVE looking in people's homes so what better way than to clean them at the same time, with Baby Pumpkin in her carrier on my front I can clean away and keep her entertained. Hmmm, but with my clumsiness I would probably break something expensive and Pumpkin would bound to cry all day meaning I wouldn't actually get much done.
- Baby Massage Teacher - Baby Pumpkin and I attend a weekly session where the teacher is a wonderfully calm and sweet lady. She demonstrates the techniques on a doll whereas I could demonstrate on Pumpkin!! Who would probably cry all the time and make me look like a rubbish massage teacher. Plus the session I attend is free so I wouldn't make any money!
So after reviewing my options, it would appear that my job options are sticking to what I do best and that would be... Nothing! My shameful but wonderful life will continue for the time being!
Labels: childcare, jobs
Here comes the Sun...
Well would you believe it... The sun has been shining and it's been hot hot hot!!
I couldn't wait to rush Baby Pumpkin out in the sunshine, however as a December baby she was in for a real shock. Particularly as we'd gone from complete cold to blazing hot in the space of 5 hours!!! She's really been shocked by the sunshine but it's meant that I've been able to put her into cute summer dresses and bare legs. Not leggings, vests and snowsuits!!!
The nice weather has also meant plenty of visits out with Baby Pumpkin in the pram and slathered up with factor 40. We've been out to stay with friends from baby club, and other babies. My friend Sarah in Adlington invited us other for lunch with her baby son Alex and then for a walk along the tow path. I enjoy pushing Pumpkin in her pram and this is the rather embarrasing thing...
I've got a very fancy pram it's called a Bugaboo
http://www.bugaboo.com and it's often seen in celebrity circles. I'm usually not one for designer labels particularly on babies but what do you know... I took the Bug to Mothercare to find a pram that would fit in the car and only the Bugaboo would fit, yes the most expensive one in the shop. However thanks for the joys of E-bay I managed to track down a shop in Prestwich near Manchester for less. My friend Sarah was ashamed of me and my fancy pram and spent teasing me about being suckered in by the marketing spin. Anyways, who had the last laugh on our walk...
As Sarah insisted on walking in the sunshine I had to walk on the shady side of the path, I couldn't argue she's bigger than me and would easily push me into the canal!!! As I'm in the shubbery I hear a big POP!! Then my pram sinks to the ground... A puncture and sure enough there is a huge branch sticking out the wheel which is like a bike tyre with a rubber innertube. I'm left to fight the injured Bugaboo with the flat tyres and complaining Baby Pumkin inside.
I then learn that according to the OED, the definition of Bugaboo is Rubbish:
Bugaboo in its real sense (from the OED):
1. A fancied object of terror; a bogy; a bugbear.
2. Loud or empty talk, nonsense, rubbish
Or as referred to in my house now. The Buggered-Boo.
No Sleep till Bedtime
Sleep, alas I remember it well...
I used to love sleep I could do loads of it my bed was my favouite place in the world. I had been known in the past to come home after a cak week at work and go to bed at 9pm and wake up on the Saturday at 9am and still feel like I could sleep some more.
All this changed when Baby Pumpkin arrived on the scene. Everyone tells you that you will be tired when baby arrives, but no-one explained the bone aching, sick feeling, tear inducing tirednes that happens. Looking at the clock and willing it to be a reasonable time to be up when pacing the floor at 4am. The times I've had to cling onto the cupboards in the kitchen as a wave of tired dizziness washes over me. I feel like I've had a constant hangover for the last 4 months.
Well what to do about the lack of sleep.... Pray that Baby Pumkin will one night reach the elusive "sleep through the night!" which hasn't happened yet ever.
When you have a new baby, sleep seems to become the key thing everyone wants to know, are you getting enough, is baby "good"?? And when I raise my dry eyeballs with bags of luggage underneath and admit through gritted teeth "no, the baby does not sleep". Then you get "The Look." The one that says, ah well you must be doing it wrong. Baby is manipulating you, you're a slave to them. Can a four month old have the rational thought process to manipulate me?? Is my sweet gorgeous baby girl, just yanking my chain of an evening??
I'm trying to do things right. I've read the sleep books and trawled the internet been told by everyone's nan, next door neighbour or stranger in the supermarket. And I know the theory. You make sure baby is fed, washed, warm, happy, burped and awake and then you give your bundle a hug and a kiss and put them into their cot, awake where they will settle sleep till 7am the following morning with just 10 minutes of minimal fussing time.
Funny these experts don't take into account the warm, fed, washed, burped baby who just wants to scream for hours on end. So I break all the rules, I pick up, I sing to her, I pace the floor anything to settle her and get her off to a restful slumber allowing me to slink into my wonderful bed and snooze. I know where every squeeky floorboard is from Pumpkin's cot to my bed and have worked out an elaborate path to dodge them, however no matter how convinced I am that baby Pumkin is asleep the second my head touches the pillow the screaming starts again. At the moment it's being put down to the "four month wobbles" growth spurts, teething, developmental changes disrupts any kind of sleep pattern, which is all very well if there was a sleep pattern in the first place!!
I even broke the cardinal rule of sleeping with baby Pumpkin in my bed with me so I could feed her and sleep at the same time, whenever I mentioned this to my midwife/health visitor they would tut and tell me about approved procedure and scare me by quoting scary statistics regarding the amount of babies who had been accidently killed by co-sleeping parents. So I ordered a very comfy rocking chair and now do my night feeds sat rocking away through the small hours, if nothing else it makes me feel sleepy!!
My latest attempt is playing Mozart as Pumpkin gets bathed, changed and fed to calm and relax her. Can't say I'm much of a Mozart fan myself but I do recognise a number of tracks, mainly from TV adverts, I'm such a culture vulture!! My mum has the perfect solution, put baby onto formula milk it makes babies sleep for hours. Apparently I was a formula milk fed baby and I slept 10 hours from 3 weeks. "It's specially designed for babies" says mum... So the stuff I'm giving her isn't??! I'm stubborn, I want to do the best for Pumpkin so I'm perservering and one day she might sleep through, if I relax and don't think about it.... When she's a teenager I'll be trying to force her out of her bed. If only!!!
Labels: babies, mozart, sleep
Time to Say Goodbye
Sad news today.
A good friend Anna e-mailed me to say that she'd suffered a miscarriage on Tuesday and lost the baby boy she was expecting. She was 18 weeks pregnant - almost halfway.
It's dreadful news for Anna, she already has a gorgeous 2 year old daughter and she was very excited about the new addition to the family.
It brought me back to thinking about my loss last year, and I remember the total shock and grief I felt. A friend asked me last week if I ever think about that baby, and yes I do sometimes. Especially when baby Pumkin was born, I had a small moment thinking about the baby that didn't survive, would that one have been another girl or a boy to even things out. But now when I see my beautiful, healthy, delightful baby I can only feel joy. Perhaps the loss of my other baby helped ensure Pumpkin arrived safe and well and just a week overdue.
I sent my condolences to Anna, and this week I deleted the text messages I received following my loss I read them from time to time. However, the time has come now to say goodbye to poor baby who didn't make it and concentrate all my attention and energy to my gorgeous girl.
The Secret Life of Peter Crouch
I entered the 21st century yesterday thanks to the world of the interweb. You see what with my parents being here and visiting grandparents I haven't had time to do
THE BIG SHOP
The Big Shop takes place every Saturday at the supermarket, I write up a list stick Baby Pumkin in the car and head off for whichever shop is giving me money off vouchers at the time. However, The Big Shop is getting more awkward with Baby Pumpkin as she is no longer contented just to sit in her trolley seat and sleep. She's awake and complaining that The Big Shop is dull. Then I hear the tuts and sighs from everyone else doing their Big Shop. It's a palava and they don't want someone's screaming sproglet adding more faff to the experience.
So on Tuesday I embraced the world of The Big Shop on the interweb and it was bloomin painful. I like to think that I'm good at the Interweb, I get a lot of practice but it was just so overly complicated and confusing, and that was just to register as then I couldn't find my list of items that I had previous bought in store. This list saves you typing everything again, it would be good if it was there!!! However, I thought at least I don't have to worry about a screaming Baby Pumpkin, tuts, packing and lugging everything to the car. And if Baby Pumpkin decides she's hungry I don't have to display myself to the entire supermarket cafe to feed her. Why do they wait till you're in the most public place to decide that they're hungry???!!!
Anyways I did my list, booked my delivery slot for the following day and received a £10 discount for my first order. Sadly the delivery charge of £4.25 took care of most of that. Still, the way that petrol prices are rising I might soon be in profit.
So yesterday I sat and waited for my delivery between the hours of 3-5pm and suprisingly yesterday was gorgeous so I felt most resentful waiting in the house, but didn't dare go anywhere in case my food on wheels arrived. At 4.30pm there was a knock on the door and there was Peter Crouch stood on my door step. I could tell it was Peter Crouch, as my eye level was at his bellybutton, and I was stood on a step. He was gigantic at least 7 foot tall and must have weighed 9 stones wet through.
Peter was wonderful, he explained my bill to me (as it was my first ever delivery) and then went to his van and brought out 4 big plastic boxes containing my groceries. I thought his 5 foot long arms would snap off as he picked up the boxes but he cheerily carried them through the house in to my kitchen stooping through all the doorframes to avoid serious concussion. I asked Peter what I was meant to do with the giant plastic boxes, and he said he could leave them and he would collect them another time. Hmmmm, in my tiny house I'd have to store them on the roof. So Peter and I set about unpacking the boxes and putting things away and discussing the shopping. Imagine that!! A fella helping in the kitchen, and a highly paid professional footballer at that!! Once Peter and I were finished with the shopping he asked me to sign his pad as proof of delivery, I thought I should be the one asking for his autograph!! He gave me one of those electronic blurberry thingys which I hate using as it makes your signature all pixely like it's been done by a 4 year old using their mouth.
So am I won over by the 21st century shopping marlarkey?? Certainly if Peter comes again and helps me cook my dinner too!!!
Labels: internet shopping, Peter Crouch, supermarket
A big Ad-Venture
One of the main features of my new lifestyle are the trips to the baby club. There I've made some new friends amongst the new mums who are great to chat, gossip, moan and laugh with. Not only do we meet at the club we've also arranged some extra trips out. Mainly involving food - hmm what does that tell us new mums are very hungry??
At baby club on Monday during the tucking into Crumpets, Tash produced an "invitation". She recently had some portraits of her son taken by a photographic company called "Venture" and she was delighted with the results. Now, I'm not sure how this next bit has come about, but basically she has invited us all to her house where there will be a person from Venture present to tell us about the service they provide and give us a special discount voucher. I guess this is the modern day version of Tupperware parties!!
Now, naturally I think my baby is the most gorgeous child to ever tread the earth and I have been thinking about getting some nice photos. Whilst I did get a digital camera for christmas and have taken about 1000000000 photos of Baby Pumkin the majority of them are a bit rubbish!! She's moved, or it's all a bit blurry, she isn't looking at the camera etc etc. I think it's fair to say I'm no David Bailey.
So I took a peak at the company website
http://www.thisisventure.co.uk and there are examples of their work. It's all very contemporary, arty, un-posed, black and white images. A far cry from the original baby portraits on big sheepskin rugs!! I showed the site to a friend who knows a bit out of photography and he was a bit scathing saying, "yes everything looks good black and white and over exposed!" Anyways, Tash is so pleased with the results of her session that she's ordered tons of prints including a ginormous canvass spending almost £1,000!!
Wowzers!! I can't imagine spending that much on photos of Pumpkin and certainly don't have any space for giant canvasses in my tiny house (which I'm still trying to sell). So I might go along to Tash's place anyhow, as she said she would get some crumpets in and we can just have a gossip.
Labels: photography, portraits, venture
