the making of motherhood

The value of naptime...

2010-09-23T21:49:00.001+01:00

...at the moment, is pretty low. Isaac suddenly had issues going to sleep in the day, and while those are now slightly improved, he'll only sleep properly if he's on my lap. Again. Sadly this means the tasks I'm able to accomplish are limited. I've not tried him in the sling for a while but I'm not sure he'll like it much (he went off it a while ago).

People were making comments like, "Hopefully he'll have a nice long sleep this afternoon, since he's been awake for so long. Then you can have a sleep too!"

These comments are pretty unhelpful when he'll only sleep on me. Yeah, I might be able to get a nap like that, admittedly. But do they not realise the immense amount of STUFF I have to do around the house - that I leave and leave coz I don't have the time or whatever and then it just gets hideous and terrible to deal with, and makes me more depressed and is harder to face...


That's not my kitchen.. but it could be. Well, I just tidied mine somewhat so the whole messy thing doesn't have the same wow factor. (Photo: Rob Thurman)

...so of course, I have to do it eventually, when I get the chance!

Housework seems to be the bane of my life at the moment.

It doesn't help that I'm the only one doing it, really. SJ's doing the 'from home' bit without the precursory 'working' bit, but aside from helping out a bit with Isaac, it's all me. And I feel annoyed if he offers to help too much because he should be finding a job! Dammit!

Makes me tired, is all.

Yeah, I've been staying up too late, but that's mostly because I've been getting no time to myself at all, and once Isaac's in bed I'm just so desperate to have a bit of time to myself that I stay up an hour or two - sometimes three - after putting him to bed. So now that he's started waking up in the night again, I can't carry on with that; I have no energy left. I feel like I've been awake for days, and today that's not that surprising since I barely slept since 3:30am and got up at 7 - after going to sleep at about 1am! Coz of course it was the one night SJ and I decided to stay up and have a bit of us time.

That was a bit pants too, duno why. Nice enough, but I think I'm just too tired to even enjoy it, I just sort of expected the things that were to happen and almost felt no emotion as they did happen... plus I was worrying about some guy who was on my mind, which definitely doesn't help!

Yeah, it's tiring being a mother at the moment... guess it's the making of it.

Flowery Dress - the making of (Part 3)

2010-09-19T21:46:00.001+01:00

Here we are at the 3rd instalment of the flowery dress. In the previous post, I'd just finished gathering the skirt, so next is sewing it onto the bodice.

Sewing the skirt and bodice together.

This is always an annoying process because there's so much material, plus you can't see what you're doing properly, plus I'm trying to gather the skirt at the same time so I'm trying not to catch lower folds of the skirt which is amazingly easy to do...

Once I've sewn the bodice and skirt together, I tidy up that seam by folding in the raw edges and seaming this edge.

...and that's pretty much it! The skirt was definitely the easiest and quickest bit! I can't remember if I wrote (in the first post) about the rest of the skirt goings on, but all I did was cut out two large rectangles, using the frill edge of the original item as the bottom of the skirt.

Anyway, here it is....

This is by FAR the best angle, which shows it to be fairly well fitting. It isn't really. Though it looks rather nice here! =)

Frillyness =) I don't generally like frills but these aren't too bad! (Can you spot the problem with the bodice?)

I love the way it gathers at the back. Sorry about the lame photos by the way... it was dark at the time, and SJ doesn't take great photos! Here's one of his... and this one actually shows the whole thing, in which you realise that it really doesn't work.

See how it fails!?! Yes this is a bad photo, taken from middle-ish height, but even so, you can see the issues. For a start, it's actually now too tight over my boobs (from trying to make it more fitted to fix the back problem, but also because the material has apparently absolutely NO give whatsoever). The belt - well I'm sure it could be at a better height, it just looks all wrong, although that could just be because the bodice makes me look like a whale! The skirt is the wrong shape for this sort of dress. There's a big loose bit under my boobs. And I could go on.

The best bit by far is the back of the dress. It's gorgeous. Sadly I have no good photos of it on! I will try and get some. The lace-up back just looks lovely, it gathers really nicely, and the belt tie finishes it off well. I lurrrrrve the back. I'll be doing lace-up backs again!

So, you can tell my future project... fix it so that the front is as good as the back! Basically what I needed to do was make the bodice fitted. I was trying to create the gathered back with a wide dress when all I really needed to do was have it a little loose around the waist with more skirt gather at the back that at the front.

Thankfully I need to move on to the dress this test one was intended for, though! Lucy's dress. Poor Juicy, I haven't even started her dress, and I promised it to her in July! So... I guess I'm going to do a fitted bodice for her. The rest of the dress I'll probably keep the same. Although I might just use a zip rather than a lace-up back coz it's easier and coz she's only little yet and prob shouldn't be showing off her skin so much!

I think if I'd done all these things on her dress it would have looked fine because she's only young and doesn't have the massive BOOOBS that I have, so I think it would have looked ok! But never mind.

The good thing about her dress is that it's going to be made out of THIS: =D

So obviously hers is going to be much better already!

Things I learned from making this dress:

+ Use material with some give for the bodice. This material didn't stretch at all, meaning that it was either too unfitted or too tight!
+ Cut skirt in a quarter circle or trapezoid to make it spin out better
+ Try it on with no clothes underneath when fitting!
+ Check bobbin often - it ran out and I didn't notice for about a quarter of the skirt circumference. That's a long way.
+ Mini seams are fab!
+ Pins are sharp... (cut myself twice! - not including the scratches gained from trying on the bodice with pins in it, eeek hehe)
+ The bodice probably needs to be small at the top and wide at the waist for the pull-to-back design to work
+ A lace up back only works on a fitted bodice! (This was my design flaw...)
+ Check exactly where I want the belt before cutting the fabric, and if not sure, leave plenty of space to decide!

So there we go. Hope you enjoyed my project! Look out for Lucy's Polka Dot Dress soon!

Flowery Dress - the making of (Part 2)

2010-09-19T20:03:00.001+01:00

Only after finishing the bodice did I realise that the design flaw that I thought would be a design flaw was indeed a design flaw.

Oh well. I sort of fixed it. Although in doing so it meant the rest didn't work.

Read and enjoy!

Making the ties for the lace-up back

It took SO long to turn these the right way out!

Pinning down the back of the bodice to make the gap for the lace-up part

Pinning the ties in place - this bit was quite awkward!

Checking it looks ok with the outer piece of fabric in place!

I think they look pretty cool...

Here I was trying to pin it so that it was sew-able...

Sewing the holes on. This was quite tricky and involved sewing a bit, removing a pin, attempting to hold in place, then sewing a bit more, and so on!

After sewing the holes on, I tidied up the inside by folding in the material and sewing to make a neat seam. (As you can see I used several rows of stitching to make the loop holes secure enough to pull on.)

All neat and tidy

Doing side number 2.

As it will look when sewn

Once I'd done the loop holes for both sides, I sewed the centre parts together to join the bodice up, and tidied up the edges by folding them inwards as before. There's probably a better way of doing this but it was the easiest thing I could think of!

So that is the inside I'm sewing there...

The bodice completed. All ready and waiting for the skirt.

Next, sewing the skirt pieces together. Did this with a mini hem - where you fold over the raw edges and sew, then fold over again and sew, et voila, a tidy, tiny hem.

I wanted the bodice to be longer at the back so here's the fold where I'm going to sew on the skirt.

I changed my mind about how I was going to hem the bit under the belt, which called for an emergency hem. Looks fine though, and of course you can't see it under the belt!

So, the issue with the bodice as mentioned at the start was that, when the belt gathered the dress at the back, the bottom of the lace-up part sort of stuck out. I realised this a bit too late, but not much I could do by then... I decided to fix it by pulling in the bodice to make it somewhat fitted, rather than being a loose design that was gathered at the back. This sort of worked, but makes the dress look rather frumpy and needs serious fixing really!

Pulling in the sides to attempt to make the bodice fitted!

Gathering the skirt. I later realised that for a better swing skirt, you shouldn't use a rectangle but instead a quarter circle for each part of the skirt... never mind!

At 20 or so photos, I think it's time to make this into another separate post... see you there!

Time For Change

2010-09-09T18:57:00.005+01:00

I've always been a self-help sort of person. If I have a problem, sooner or later I want to fix it. Myself, of course. None of this going to counsellors, doctors or others (however beneficial they may be).

I don't know when I started pigging out on stuff (I'm pretty sure it was at about 6 weeks after having Isaac when I was just suddenly terribly terribly tired all the time) but it got to the point where I was just eating all the time, and having chocolate, biscuits, cake and all sorts of horribly bad things! And of course eating bad things all the time and sitting around all the time that I'm not out walking Isaac meant that I was feeling pretty bad all the time.

Time to fix that.

My fixing up starts with ditching snacking on chocolate, which I was doing all the time! And yes, I managed to take that photo without eating one! (Took conscious thought, though...)

The big boxes of Milk Tray being on offer for ages at something like £3.25 hasn't helped...

In this effort I'm also trying to get off my chair a bit more. Of course, having a baby around means that there is loads to do, so it wasn't particularly difficult to find something that needed doing! I decided a tidy up of the conservatory was a good plan. Tidying is something that gives me great pleasure, because I love a tidy home - but it's usually messy - so when I do get around to tidying a room up it looks great and there's lot to show for my efforts!

So now the conservatory is all tidy and the tumble dryer which we gained from storage (since apparently it still works) is in it's own little corner. The dining table is all clean and we can eat there again! (...Mostly the reasons for not being able to were to do with dress stuff being all over the place...)

Oh yes, the dress is finished... I'll blog about that when I remember!

Isaac's been a bit grumpy today. Think he might be teething.

He's still gorgeous, though.

Playing with Mrs Duck this morning.

Isaac's Christening Cake

2010-09-03T20:20:00.003+01:00

The original plan was for our old friend JN to do the cake. She did our wedding cake, and on our wedding day, in conversation about whether to save the top tier for our first child's Christening, she said, "Oh don't worry, I'll make you a cake for then too!"

Then we found out she couldn't come to the Christening, meaning she couldn't make the cake. They live quite far away, so was fairy snuff I suppose.

What to do? Well, I wasn't too worried about having anything fancy, and nor did I want to spend a fortune on a cake, so I started a hunt for something that would fit.

Turns out M&S had the solution.

Well, I had the idea of getting a plain cake and then decorating it myself. Combining price and simplicity... that was the plan, anyway!

I found some plain white cakes in Tesco and Asda online, but they didn't have them in store. Annoyingly. It also didn't say how big the ones in Tesco were, and the Asda one seemed too small, so I wasn't even sure that they'd be ok. At the time, I was vaguely thinking of providing a cake big enough for 60 people!! I soon gave that idea up!

So, a while later and stuck in town with a flat battery and little time to spare, I dashed into M&S to see if they had anything. The answer? Yes. The cost? £24!

*groan*

So... tad expensive, but a fairly good size I suppose. And by this point I'd been looking for quite a while and there wasn't much time left, so I was just glad to have found one!

So then I needed to think of something to decorate it with. Then, while looking for a cake tin, I discovered our wedding cake flowers that I'd completely forgotten we had! Perfect =)


The wedding cake flowers in place

So then a way to fix them on was needed. Icing sugar, of course...

Scrum yum icing

The icing holding the roses in place.

Of course the rogue icing decided to go off centre but hey ho, looks ok! There were blobs under both the roses too. Then thought I'd better do something with the left over icing, and we had some ginger biscuits in the house...

Why waste the extra icing?

Practising my icing writing. (Yes, I know, I took this photo before all the above...)

On the cake itself. Not bad.

Oh yeah, the icing was this really, really expensive stuff.

Not really. £1.14. =)

Et voila.

If you come on Sunday you might be able to have a bit!

Flowery Dress - the making of (Part 1)

2010-08-27T21:26:00.003+01:00

Hi everyone!

As happens often these days, it's been a fair long time no post. I haven't been up to nothing though. I've actually been doing more sewing. Yaya. I promised my ickle sister Lucy that I would make her a dress for her birthday. Well, her birthday was 12th of July and as of yet I've not put a single stitch into her dress... but with good reason! Being rather skint at the moment, I can't afford to waste the lovely black polka-dot fabric that I bought for her dress, and since I'm making a design of my own, I figured it would be a good idea to make a test dress. Otherwise known here on in as my flowery dress. Made from great charity-shop-bought material which once upon a time lived a better life as a duvet cover. But don't tell.

So anyway. I'm making this test dress to my measurements so that it won't go to waste, but also because I can then test it on myself as I go. As yet the design seems fine, but then, I've only done the bodice and straps so far, and you can't go far wrong with some straight straps on a shapeless bodice! It's the next bit - the lace up back - that will tell me whether or not my design is a complete loada trash... ;)

Check out the flowery goodness.

As you can tell from the fabric, this dress is going to be somewhat farmhousey, country-wifey. Whether this is a good or bad look on me, I'm yet to find out...

This is going to be a descriptive 'making of', but if any of you want the measurements for the pattern then just drop me a message.

So firstly... mark and cut out the fabric. I couldn't even do this bit right.

You can't tell from here, but my rectangles weren't very, well, rectangular. I mean, it's hard with such huge rectangles! But really, I should have taken more time over it, and as a result I had to sort of re-trim the bodice once the top was sewn together. But it was ok because the waist was a little too low anyway.

Because I'm weird, I started out by making the belt. Oh yes, the overall design for this dress is a rectangular bodice and gathered skirt, pulled in at the waist with a belt. The top bit of the bodice at the back is lace-up to allow room for boobie growth. Useful for both my little sis and my own (post-pregnancy & now breast feeding) fluctuating chest!

So yeah... Technically simple but, having never made an adult dress before, I'm having to double and triple check everything in theory so that it will work in practice!

So anyway. Belt. First I cut out a length of fabric to the desired width and then pressed it.

Check out our £5 iron! Booyah!

It's actually great.

This is the centre piece of the belt (total of 3 pieces). As you can see, I folded the fabric so that it would be sewed onto the base of the bodice, just around the front. Then the other sections of the belt will be free-flowing so you can gather and tie it at the back.

Next: sewing the end sections of the belt. These were long rectangles. I sewed them into tubes inside out, and then righted them and pressed them.

Simple zig-zag stitch secured with a straight stitch gone over itself a few times.


It was some blog where I read the safety-pin way of turning things right way out. Works quite well.

Pressed, with the seam put slightly to side so that it won't be seen from the front.

Then I had to sew the end parts of the belt to the centre part. I wasn't entirely sure how to do this so that I could still sew the centre piece onto the base of the bodice, and ended up doing it in a manner which means I'll only be able to sew most of the main section on the machine, and will have to sew the ends by hand.

A side section of the belt pinned on top of the centre piece

As it will look from the front

Pinned as I was going to sew it (in the middle of sewing I altered this to hide the raw edge - silly me

As I actually sewed it!

The photo above shows how I sewed the bit which needed to be seamed into the bodice... obviously I cant get the machine in the very corner though!

Only after sewing an edge bit of the belt onto the centre piece did I realised that I hadn't seamed the end! But the way I wanted to do it was actually easier the right way round than it was inside out, so I ended up doing both like this.

I like pointy edges on belts.

Straps next. Just smaller bits of fabric sewn inside out and then turned and pressed.

It looks like some sort of strange caterpillar when turning it the right way out.

Next is checking the length and then pinning on the straps...

I tacked these on because it was just too much hassle to try and hold while sewing in the machine!

Pressed these before sewing, too, of course. Yawn. I like the photo though. So it's in.

Sewing along a well pencilled line. Actually did it pretty straight, too (for once!) =)

And this is what it looks like all sewn together. Un-pressed in this photo. Looks sort of baloony here.

Once the bodice is finished being sewn there was no way I'd be able to get back 'in' to fix the straps if they ever came off so I made sure they were well and truly on!

All sewn and pressed and ready for the more complicated things!

Well that's as far as I've got for now. Look forward to the next instalment in a while.

Isaac and his cuteness

2010-08-16T11:45:00.001+01:00

Yeah, sometimes I can't get over how cute kids can look. Here's mine, learning to play the piano at 10 weeks old...!

He's in flat keys already, of course...

I hate flash, but the photo is cute!

Of course, kids are most cute when asleep... ;-)

Ah, I love my babby.

Two Years and Counting

2010-07-16T22:48:00.002+01:00

Last Monday saw our 2nd wedding anniversary... two whole years of being married to my mister man, and I'm proud to say we have a lot to show for it! A house of our own, in a town that we love, and a gorgeous little boy.

We weren't able to do anything on Monday but last night went out for a meal - just us! SJ's mum babysat for us and we had a lovely few hours to ourselves out a the indian. There are two in our town and we normally go to the large popular one, so decided to go to the other for a change of scene. It was very lovely and had a very smart colour scheme of red, black and white...

Check out the funky mirror, too.

The portions were much more normal than the larger indian and so I actually ate all mine plus a pudding, instead of leaving half of it! Despite this, though, SJ still managed to overeat! Honestly...

I like pictures.

I like dressing up too.

Getting all dressed up always makes me want to take photos...

I like improvising with my hair. I'm not very good at hair really - particularly my own! - but I thought this wasn't half bad. And apparently the light in the hall is pretty.

I was given this necklace by my mum for passing my GCSEs. Haven't worn it in a long time, but last night I felt the outfit needed diamonds.

They're not real of course, but they're pretty.

I love light, don't you?

Rearranging

2010-07-12T18:07:00.000+01:00

Today we pretty much decided that Isaac hates his little carry cot thing that is currently his bed. He'd only ever sleep in it if you put him in v e r y s l o w l y a n d c a r e f u l l y after he fell asleep somewhere else - usually in my arms! Of course this means that he spends most nights in our bed, which although lovely, means that none of us sleep very well. Not that we sleep that well anyway as we are (or rather, I am) constantly getting up to feed him, but you know what I mean.

It occurred to me sometime in the night that actually we could probably fit the proper cot in our room, and since it's much more like our bed, he might actually like it enough to fall asleep in! When we first moved here I thought we'd never be able to fit a cot in there as well as a double bed and a chest of drawers, but rather surprisingly it works quite well and the room feels (if anything) bigger than it did with a thin table bearing a carry cot!

Please excuse the mess. I will tidy that up later - I got somewhat distracted by sorting out this:

Yes, since moving the cot, we now have a spare room - for the time being! My hubby has just started up his own business, Icthus Web Design (currently under construction - go here for his blog) and wanted a little office space... and now he's got one =D Hopefully it'll help him get more work done as well.

So all in all, the swap around worked really well. I can say this because Isaac has just drifted off to sleep in his cot! Admittedly I did have to sit in the room until he was asleep, but to be fair to him he's never had to sleep away from me before so I didn't mind. Hopefully I won't have to do that for too long, since he definitely seems to like his cot. I expect the familiar room helps too.

Of course, I couldn't resist making a little something to string over the cot to keep Isaac occupied. Ahh the usefulness of string!

Lol yeah it looks rather pants in that photo.... well he likes it anyway!

Rubbish cot, though... so rickety and not really very safe... I want to replace that as soon as I can. It was his gran's when she was little, I believe!

It feels a bit odd being downstairs on my own. Isaac's asleep in our bedroom and SJ's in his 'office', so I'm all alone. Oooo. I suppose this is something I should get used to again (after all, it's just like when SJ was working). It's not exactly unpleasant to have some time to myself, either!!

Friday Favourites

2010-07-09T22:30:00.003+01:00

I feel like I'm stealing the name here, but I wanted to start a 'favourites' listing, and it's friday, and, well, they go together well. However, one of this week's favourites actually has their own 'friday favourites' on there... hmm, great minds think alike I suppose! I did, however, steal the idea for the purdy presentation. Consider it flattery ;-)

But anyway. Here we go.

It's official: blogger images SUCK. Can't do ANYthing with 'em. Thank goodness I can (sort of) do HTML!

Have a good weekend!

Baby gyms of the coat hanger kind

2010-07-08T18:15:00.000+01:00

Ah, how rubbish I am at remembering to post a blog! Mind you, having a baby doesn't exactly promote activity. At least, not activity of the non-baby-related kind. Ho hum.

Yes, I've barely touched the piano since Isaac was born. That makes me sad. One more thing to try and remember to do, and when something doesn't count as 'useful' (i.e. related to housework, baby things or shopping) it easily gets forgotten at the moment.

On a brighter note - who needs expensive baby gyms?

Red dress - the making of

2010-07-06T12:50:00.001+01:00

After the announcement of the birth of my cousin's daughter Z, I decided this was a perfect opportunity to try making something. Y'know, something proper. After all, my poor neglected sewing machine has only done mundane jobs such as turning up jeans and darning socks as yet! To be fair, though, I only got it at Christmas, and even if I had thought about making Isaac something before he was born, the massive belly would've rather scuppered plans, I feel.

This isn't a tutorial - most definitely not! - but does show how I put this dress together and might help anyone wanting to try out the pattern. Speaking of which, the pattern is a freebie from the fab Made By Rae - do check out her blog! I happened upon her pattern when searching for 'baby dress pattern' or something along those lines. It's a great pattern in that it's easy for newbies, because it has no fastenings, buttons, or anything else like that which I would totally screw up.

All the fun stuff after the break.
I did some wardrobe scrounging for this dress, and pulled out a red holiday club shirt which I was never ever going to wear again (it was one of the ones I packed in my hospital bag to wear in labour, which shows you how much I cared about it! Of course it never got used because of the caesarean), and the other one was a rather nice but a bit frumpy white long sleeved top that I did like but never wore due to the fact that I hate long sleeves.

Drawing out the pattern and cutting up the material was actually one of the hardest parts, because it was so stretchy. It took me several goes to get that bit done alone!

So. First instruction after that: "With right sides together, sew the two skirt pieces together along the
9” sides with a 1/2” seam." Easy peasy. Haha - here I made my first mistake. I only sewed one seam. No idea why! Thankfully this was no problem at all and easily fixed later!

Second instruction: "Using a long stitch, sew around top edge of skirt 1/4” away from the
edge. Gather skirt."

Now, the thing about following someone's tutorial is that everyone interprets instructions differently. I thought this was telling me to sew the two skirt pieces together, when, looking back on it, I think it's actually telling me to hand sew a long stitch in order to gather the skirt! I instead sewed the two pieces together and then gathered the skirt using pins. Ah well, still works! The main reason I interpreted this wrong, I think, is because the tutorial only uses one layer of material for the skirt, and I was using a lining.

The gathered skirt (with only one side seam, oops)

So anyway, moving on...

"With right sides together, sew bodice front to lining front on top edge. Clip seams at curves [what does this mean?!], turn inside out, press."

The difficult thing here was not understanding the instructions, but managing to sew a nice curve on the shoulder straps. Mainly because the machine kept EATING my material! Gah, so annoying! I managed to do it eventually, by giving myself a slightly larger seam than I started out doing, and pulling the material taut through the entire process. As you can see in the photo below, I had to start the stitch miles away from the edge so that it wouldn't eat it up. This process was repeated for the back of the bodice.

Below is the finished (and slightly wonky) seam! Not too bad considering, though. I think this was actually the second one, which would explain why it looks remarkably tidy!

Next instruction... "With right sides together, sew front to back bodice. Turn right side
out, press." Ooh I can do this one!

Easy =D

Yeah, I ended up hand finishing this part because I couldn't sew securely to the edges. Does everyone else have this problem, or is it just me who can't sew right to the edge of something?!

Next there was a bit about piping, but I wasn't doing that part. Then: "Turn skirt inside out. Line up top of skirt with bottom of bodice (right sides should be facing). Gather skirt so that side seams match on bodice and skirt. Pin together; sew just outside of gathered seam." Oky doky. Took me a minute to figure out which bits had to face where but I got there in the end!

I thought that sewing this part would be really difficult because of the gathering, but it really wasn't. One bit wasn't quite straight, but aside from that it looked pretty good. Here's what it looked like from the inside afterwards:

Final instruction: "Sew bias tape over bottom edge of skirt."

Oh. Wait. I'm not doing that. So... here I realised that I now had to come up with some super-genius way of hemming the bottom of the skirt, which I really should have done right at the very beginning!!

I decided the only way I could do it and have it look nice on both sides was a double turned hem. Easy enough to pin up, and would create a very nice red and white look.

After several days of umming and arring (which only amounts to about an hour really. Lol) I finally plucked up the courage to sew! You see, the thread was going to be well and truly on show (even if I'd used red thread, any mistakes would be easy to see), and I was worried about messing it up after all that work! (It was about 3 weeks by this point!! Oh the joy of having to work during naptimes and having so many other things on the go...)

I gave a blanket stitch a quick try, but as I thought, the hem was far to wide to look good. So I took the plunge and chose a triple zig-zag stitch. I really was taking deep breaths at this point! Then, after all that worrying, the machine chose this point to break the thread! Thankfully I could pick up where I left off and more or less cover up the problem. In doing this, I was sewing by hand rather than with the pedal, and this apparently causes the machine to drop stitches left, right and centre! I thought I was going to have to unpick it all! Thankfully when I went back to the foot pedal it stopped messing up and I managed to finish it. And it looks rather nice, if I may say so!

Those photos actually makes it look like there were no botches - sadly this wasn't the case. But at least they aren't too noticeable!

Et voila, one completed dress =D

I really wanted to see it on a baby, so of course....

I won't mention that that is actually my son! ...yeah, I feel bad. I promise I won't cross-dress you again (too much) Isaac! As you can see, it's actually quite small on him - but then it is supposed to be a newborn size, and he's 2 months and huge! So at least that means that it'll fit Z for a little while yet. Yay!

Sewing, washing, sleeping...

2010-07-03T19:35:00.001+01:00

Well, the dress is coming along, but not entirely finished. Just got the bottom seam to do, and I really wasn't sure how to do it. Because of the pattern being slightly different to what I was doing, I should have done the bottom seam before everything else, not after! But oh well, I think I can make it look okay. I'm going to be sad to give this dress away! I couldn't really make another to give away though, this one's taken me far too long already - Z's already nearly 3 weeks old, so goodness, it'd better fit her!

Yes, I did just nick that photo from a header image I had lying around, heh...

Isaac has still got his adorable-yet-annoying baby habit of not wanting to be put down half the time. I bought a great sling for this very purpose; however things like sewing cannot be done very easily with a baby on your front!

This very minute he's trying desperately to wake up from his slumber, which is rather annoying since I need to do the washing up! However, he also needs his nappy doing, so I suppose I should take advantage of the situation. It gets me great at one-handed typing, if nothing else...

SJ's gone off to watch the footy at the church hall; we decided to give it a miss this time around. I'm not even watching the match at home, oh dear! I suppose I'll watch the highlights at some point... Which reminds me, I've still not watched the last two episodes of Dr Who - and I was thinking about going to bed soon as well... Only got 6 days left to watch that though, so I really mustn't forget!

Right, well I'm going to attempt the worst and try to put down my little munchkin man so that I can wash up. And if that fails then I'll just have to watch Dr Who instead! =)

Quick post - new header

2010-07-02T23:06:00.003+01:00

So. New header thingy. I did it myself, go me. I also made that dress, which definitely equals 'go me'! It's the first piece of clothing I've ever made. =D

More blogging will follow regarding that, plus other crafty thingy-ma-bobs. Showing that I have at least being doing something in the time between this post and the last one! Babies take up so much time!

Righteo, that really is all I was going to say. Goodnight all!

What A Week

2010-05-17T15:30:00.003+01:00

Well, what a week. So much has happened... but first - I'd like you all to meet my new son!

His name is Isaac James, and he's the most gorgeous little squidgie pie ever. Well, ok, not little at all - 10lb 11oz... so quite large really! Also, he looks really scrunched up in that photo...

I'm a bit brain frazzled at the moment, don't think I have the energy to write about the week's events just yet... not sure if I will indeed at all. However, we're home, we're happy, and we're so very proud!

This is what's happening.

2010-05-05T22:34:00.004+01:00

Well, I said I'd update so I suppose I should... although after so many people asking me I'm not really sure I want to spout it off again! Of course, they're all lovely thoughtful people who care about me, so it's all lovely, but it doesn't half get tiring telling loads of people the same information over and over.

Anyhoo, in brief: going into hospital tomorrow evening and then having a caesarean the following day. Probably morning but they don't know for certain since it depends on whether there are any emergency ones at the time, as they obviously take precedence. The reason I'm going in the day before is because they starve you before the op, and obviously that can get complicated for an insulin-dependent diabetic...

Yeah, you know I don't want a caesarean. But I also want - no, need - to do what I possibly can to help the baby... if it's going to be dangerous to give birth naturally then really, whatever I think or want, I've actually got no choice against my motherly instinct!!

The good thing about having a c/s on friday is that I will no longer be huge. Boy am I looking forward to that. Roughly speaking, my tummy is about as big as a big 42-week pregnant woman. At nearly 38 weeks, I really shouldn't be that large!

And of course the most exciting thing of all is that we're going to meet our baby!

(Photo: link)

I'm really not looking forward to being in hospital, but at least I'll have company the whole time! (Assuming all is well with the baby. Unlike the poor little gal in that photo.) Recently I keep wondering what it'll look like. Even more than what sex it is... I can't wait to meet my baby!!

One more day to go.

Bump Update

2010-05-03T19:59:00.002+01:00

Bump size update... just one new pic this time. Probably the last one I'll do now that we've changed the bedroom round and I can't get in front of the mirror like I did before anymore. That said, I expect there'll be lots of token photos on the day...

So here it is, put against the previous pic for reference.

(33 weeks) (36 1/2 weeks)

Can't believe that in just a few days I'll have a baby. Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhh!!

LH dropped some cloth nappies round for us today. WOW are there a lot of them! I don't think we'll struggle there! So lovely of her. She said she'd probably like them back for if she has another baby but for now they're ours, yay :)

Hospital appointment tomorrow, 10am. We should be finding out what's happening and if they are decided on a c/s then presumably set a day and time. Trying not to worry about it! Trying. Wonder if I'll sleep tonight.

C to the S

2010-05-01T18:57:00.016+01:00

Just realised I've not posted the latest baby news yet...

We went to the hospital on monday expecting the usual scan and clinic stuff, and I was armed to ask about whether they would want to induce or not - since the midwives had been hinting for ages but the consultants had not said anything about it. Of course, armed with a question which was probably going to have an answer of "38 weeks", I expected to be told at that visit anyway. Didn't quite expect what I was told, though.

It was a bit of a pooey visit to begin with - waiting around for ages since it was a late appointment and it's always busier later on, and I was getting so hot and claustrophobic too. We had, as usual, forgotten to take books to read, so I found myself counting the pregnant women (10, 9 of which were bigger than me - so boo sucks to those weirdos who are rude enough to tell me I look huge...) So yeah, by the time we went in to the scan room we were already fed up!

The first thing I noticed about the scan was that the visibility was terrible. Apparently that was due to all the water in my skin, which would make sense, although I didn't think it was all over, just at the bottom (I have a lovely malleable lump there, mmm yum). It was weird though, like looking through a fog. So the lady tries to do the usual measurements, repeating them to get them as accurate as possible.

Now, I don't know what they reckon the data tells them about the baby's weight, but last time they guessed the weight it was 6.6lbs or something. So that would have been quite large for that point. Well, the measurements had been going slowly up and up, but this time was something else... a massive leap for the heavens, and almost off the chart! (This is the stomach measurement, of course.) It measured at 400mm circumference. To put this in perspective, this would be over the 95th percentile if I was at 42 weeks - and I was only 36 1/2!! So, quite large then! I don't know if this means that the baby is now many many more pounds than their estimate or what - I need to ask them that when we go on Tuesday.

My usual consultant was away (typical) so we had a different one who seemed pretty nice. He looked at the measurements and stuff, then asked us how much we'd been told about the birth process, how it's done and what happens [for diabetics]. We answered, "Nothing. Nothing at all!" He said in disbelief, "really?!"... glad it wasn't just me who felt we should have been told this sort of thing long before now!

Anyway he then pretty much dived in to tell us just how huge the baby was looking, and how it was probably verging on being pretty dangerous to try and give birth naturally. He felt that a caesarean was necessary, and probably before the end of next week (marking 38 weeks). He asked, "Does that make you feel relieved or disappointed?"

I can't write down how I felt. Quite a bit of shock - it was a sudden freak measurement, after all - and yes, very disappointed. More so because I realised at that point that as a diabetic, if I had a c/s for my first baby, I'd probably never experience natural birth. Never. Now, I don't know about you, ladies, but for me that's something I'd just grown up expecting - sort of dreading, but dying to know what it was all about at the same time! Writing this nearly a week later, I have got used to the idea and a large part of me doesn't want them to change their mind again - but I'm pretty certain this is simply because I want to know for sure what's happening, I'm tired of being in limbo. Yes, I'm tired of being pregnant too, but not so much that I want to be cut open!

I was so upset. I cried half the way home, I wasn't even sure why. I felt a bit like part of me, part of my womanhood, had been taken away. I was on the verge of tears for a couple of days afterwards. The worst part was that the doctor had explained how he was mainly worried about shoulder dystocia - and, knowing exactly what that is and how horrible it can be, I felt like I had no choice but to agree with a c/s for the baby's safety and my own.

A big part of me wants to go into labour naturally, or at least have labour induced and 'have a go' at delivering naturally first. But I sort of feel, if they're going to cut me open anyway, maybe they should just get on and do it; I'll be tired enough after a c/s alone, never mind if I'd tried to push it out first!

Speaking of such things, I did actually have some contractions the other day. Thursday evening, about 35 mins apart, but for a fair while. I'm pretty sure they went on through the night too, because I kept waking up all the time (more frequent than usual!). Sadly by the next morning they had decided to fade away. Ah well, can but hope.

Back to the c/s... what I mostly wanted to know was why so many people felt it was helpful to say to me pretty much anything along the lines of, "Ah well, as long as the baby is ok then it doesn't matter how it comes out!"

Well, actually, yes it does, thank you very much.

Sleep on a bed of dreams

2010-04-29T18:28:00.005+01:00

Guess what? We finally have a bed! Shock horror! That said, sleeping on a mattress on the floor is hardly the worst thing in the world, but it was getting to the point where heaving myself up each morning was a bit annoying; oh the joys of weighing nearly two stone more than usual…

Of course the reason we’d been without a bed for so long was that we needed to get the rest of SJ’s stuff out of storage, and of course he’d been putting it off for yonks. I’d been on at him to phone the people up at half term (March?), so he finally does so right near the end. This would have been ok if it hadn’t been perfectly timed with the van needing to go into the garage. Ok, so slight delay there. So we went anyway, to see what we could pick up in the car. A fair bit, it turned out, but not everything, obviously.

So, two months later, and we were still waiting on the van. Yep, it was still back and forth to the garage! The work ended up taking three times as long as they reckoned it would! But then finally it was finished and we could get the rest of the storage stuff, which turned out to be about seven large boxes (mostly books), several appliances (all of which we left for the furniture scheme to take) and the bed frame. I don't know why I was surprised that it's actually a really nice bed! It's cast iron with a decent design, and isn't cheap and tacky either. (What am I saying about SJ's usual things?! hehe) Turns out he got it for £50 from an old work friend, which explains why it's a good quality bed.

Of course, it's never that easy...We were quite prepared to have mattress issues, since our mattress is a king size (mmmmm) and the bed is a double. I measured it, and yes there was a slight overhang, but it would be ok. Then putting the mattress on the bed, we find out it's actually too LONG! Since when were mattresses ever different lengths? Since now, I suppose. Anyway, it just about squeeeeeeeeezed onto the bed, but really it doesn't fit properly. Now, though, I don't know which we'd replace, since the mattress is really quite a good one (not a single uncomfy night after sleeping just on it on the floor for about 18 months) but I like the bed too...

Knowing what we're like, though, and having no spare money at the moment, I can see us easily keeping a badly-fitted mattress for years and years!

Oh boy but it is so lovely to just be able to swing sideways out of bed. I say 'just'... nothing is that easy any more, it's still a bit of a heave!

So tired!

2010-04-14T11:00:00.003+01:00

Soooo tired.

Just all the time, now. Not entirely sure if this is from being bigger than I should be or just what happens by this stage! If I want to get anywhere into the evening I've got to lie down/nap in the afternoon, or I'm out by 8pm. I'm actually starting to enjoy these little breaks in the day to be honest... liking my bed a little bit too much at the moment I think! Of course there are days when a rest just doesn't happen, and then I get way to tired and grumpy and wishing I wasn't pregnant! If I look after myself it's not too bad though, so it's funny to get to that stage quite so often when the next day I can feel fine.

Dontcha just love the way babies look when they're asleep?

The most annoying change this week has been this joyful all-over-body rash. It started really gradually last monday and was keeping me awake by thursday. It's driving me up the wall! It's worst when my skin is warm, so even if I'm feeling really cold in bed I still have to just have the sheet over me; I keep giving in by about 5am and waking up hot and itching beyond belief. The consultant at the hospital gave me something for it on monday but so far that seems to have done virtually nothing, grr. It's definitely getting worse and I really want it to go away but have the bad feeling it'll stay til the baby's born... up to six weeks away, bleugh!

Speaking of the hospital, I had the check-up scan on monday, and the consultant couldn't see anything wrong with the baby which is good. I did notice she was only checking one possibility (I'm sure I read that it could be several things causing it, but hey ho...) but since it's so likely that it's the diabetes I don't think I believe there's anything wrong with the baby. It was, as usual, lovely to see the baby on the scan, although still no peek at the sex.. ;) not that I want to know really, it's just bizarre to have had so many scans and not found out, but then I suppose it's fairly easy to avoid that spot when scanning.

The measurements are still off the scale for the tummy - and the head seems to have finally grown a bit, although the way the charts work it could easily just mean that it just grew slower/later on that most babies. On the scan it was really easy to see the fat around the tummy this time, lines of white, looked quite bizarre.

The estimated weight is 6.64 lbs... quite big really! Plus all the extra fluid... no wonder I'm feeling huge.

Bump Photos

2010-04-01T12:45:00.002+01:00

I've been attempting to remember to take some bump photos throughout the pregnancy. I've got 5, so not entirely successful, but better than nothing! The first one isn't terribly good (Simon took it) and the other ones are all mirror photos so not brill either! You get the general idea though ;)

8 1/2 weeks 18 weeks

23 1/2 weeks 28 1/2 weeks

Just under 33 weeks (today)

So as you can see I'm now pretty big! Looking back at the early pic it looks all wrong, as though I couldn't possibly be that thin lol... It's strange what you get used to! Of course the size could be larger than it should be because of the polyhydramnios but who knows.

I will definitely not miss a lot of things about being pregnant. Thinking about getting up repeatedly in the night to feed a hungry baby seems comparable bliss against being unable to lie on my back (apparently the ONLY way I can get back to sleep if I wake up at all), waking up for 2 hours every single night, and having a lot of aches and pains. At least waking up to feed the baby I'll be doing something useful and won't be tossing and turning for hours. And of course I'll have company, which will help.

I'm going to try and take a couple more photos before the baby is born. It's nearly 33 weeks, which technically means 7 to go, but I get the impression they tend to induce at 38, which makes about 5 left to go. And if the polyhydramnios gets worse they might want to induce even earlier - or it can cause early labour anyway. So all in all, not long to go.

Exciting!

Polyhydramnios and Other Interesting Terms...

2010-03-30T20:01:00.004+01:00

I looked up this whole excess fluid thing a bit more. Because it really does feel to me like I'm bigger than I should be. Today I feel even tighter than yesterday. Up to about 4 or 5 days ago I felt big, yes, but nothing uncomfy. Then in the last few days I've felt like my tummy has suddenly just got really tight. It felt stretched and large before, yes, but it never felt so tight and uncomfy as it does now. So when they said 'excess fluid', I thought, yeah, that makes sense...

The trouble with it being my first pregnancy is that I don't know what feels normal and what doesn't!

One thing they didn't explain was why this is quite common in pregnant diabetics. Of course, reading the reason, it makes perfect sense - raised sugar levels cause the baby to urinate more frequently, thus increasing the amount of fluid. (Wikipedia tells you a bit more about it.) Apparently having excess fluid increases your chances of premature labour, which again makes perfect sense, coz your body is gonna think it's a lot more pregnant than it actually is! A bit like with multiples.

I'm not sure how the condition is exactly related to sugar levels. i.e. I've felt extra big and tight yesterday and today, yet my levels have been perfect! And they weren't any worse than 'usual' in the few days before that, either.. so perhaps it's just to do with an overall sugar intake that the baby has... I'm not sure.

Hopefully the scan in 2 weeks will show that it is just diabetes causing this problem - and not any of the worse problems, such as the baby's chest not having developed properly. Hey, with any luck it'll go down again (something I read implied that it can change quite quickly, although I don't know how much truth there is in that) and be normal!

Of course, if I did go in to labour early, that would at least mean that I wouldn't need to be induced. I keep expecting them to just give me an inducement date ( - and I'll be like, "erm, now why exactly do you want to induce me? Diabetes alone is not an answer!") but as yet it hasn't happened.. probably a bit early I guess. I tell my baby that it can come as early as it likes, as long as it's healthy! Trust me, the way my tummy feels at the moment, I wouldn't complain about it coming early! Inducing does of course lead to higher risks of needing a cesarean - the last thing I want. So yeah, if this excess fluid thing keeps up, induction would make sense - but labour beginning early would be much more preferable.

Hey, at least diabetics can have babies, eh?

Stuff, Things and Pickle

2010-03-29T23:40:00.003+01:00

Haven't posted in a while. And these days, the times when I haven't posted for a bit are not coz nothing's happened... it's coz too much has happened.

We went to the hospital today. They still think the baby has a fat tummy! Or, in other words, they're concerned it's getting a bit too big. Stupid diabetes. I can cope with it doing stuff to me, but to the baby is a different thing entirely. Also, there's now a lot of fluid apparently. At first when the lady doing the scan said this, she made me really worried... I mean, I was reasoning with myself that it'd probably be nothing anyway, that the baby would be fine at this stage, but I still nearly cried when I went to the toilets! Shows how it affects you emotionally... Anyway, later on the consultant and midwife explained that it could be a cause of something problematic, or it could be a "common symptom in diabetic mothers" - implying that if it was the latter, it wasn't actually much of a problem. I have to say I was pretty relieved. I've got the stage now where I don't care if they have to do stuff to me as long as the baby's ok! Of course, I still believe strongly that often there is intervention where there doesn't need to be - and it's clear that intervention leads to more intervention, too.

The midwives today implied that they induce at 38 weeks. That means only SIX weeks to go!!! Scary. Somehow six is much worse/better than eight, coz eight sort of still feels like two months, whereas six feels like just over one. Somehow.

I'm having a scan with the consultant in two weeks time, to check this extra fluid thing. Hoping and praying that it's all going to be ok.

I've been thinking about the latest One Born Every Minute programme... where a mother with twins loses one baby and the second is at death's door for months, then another mother with triplets has two big healthy bouncing babies and the other one is ill. The first mother - she's grateful for her fighting baby and is just happy that she's 'made it this far'. The second - well, she's walking along with her partner, they're each holding a big bouncy baby (twice as much as the normal mother gets!), and all the way through I just got the feeling that they were rather ungrateful.

This is not to say that losing a baby is ever easy. (Neither of the ill children die, by the way.) But they have two fabulous kids, and they seem so ungrateful of these two in a way. The mother with twins, however, seems so unbelieveably grateful that she's still got one - and this is when her surviving baby is the smallest most ill thing you could ever see.

So anyway. Thinking about all this and about getting all worried at the hospital, just makes me think - 'you might not have been able to have kids at all!' There is always someone worse off than you... At the hospital in the scan waiting room, I overheard a lady crying. It made me think... yes, she could have just found out she's lost her baby. I mean, perhaps not, but it's not that unlikely.

There is so much that we must be grateful for.

Unfortunately, these things never come on their own, do they? Everything always comes at once! Coz Simon doesn't know if he's going back to work yet. He's got his meeting tomorrow, and one suspects they'll let him know by letter, so it's probably several days wait yet.

If he doesn't go back to work, I'm not sure what we'll do. I mean, I know, somehow, that everything is going to be ok. I know that God is looking after us, and I truly believe that we will be ok, that things will work out. I know he's got us in the palm of his hand. He's shown us before and he'll show us again, just how good he is at looking after us and our stupid problems.

"Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?" (Matthew 6:25-27)

Not me. I just hope hope hope that we'll be able to look after the baby well enough. More to the point, I hope that I manage to breastfeed ok! Free baby food for at least six months, oh yes. (Free contraception, too, but they tell you not to rely upon it!)

But the baby will be fine. I know if we need anything for the baby, people will give us things. People are so generous - you just have to ask, to reach out. To lose your pride. And for a baby? Well, if they knew you truly needed something I know there are many who would give of themselves or their money until they could give no more.

Never underestimate true generosity. Watch It's a Wonderful Life if you disagree with me, maybe!

But we somehow coped in Brighton, in that daft little flat, with barely any money and few friends. So being here - home again - makes it easier to believe we can do it again.

Simon thinks he might look into childminding with me if he doesn't go back. It wouldn't be the worst choice by any means - although I don't know whether I'd want to work with him all the time, haha!

I'm not complaining. Not really. I know we'll cope with whatever we have to, and that we'll be fine. I know that. Here, despite having few really close friends, I know we have a lot of love surrounding us.

Online, on digital, and on... wait, this isn't radio.

2010-03-23T14:06:00.002Z

There are definitely some advantages to online social networking. I mean, aside from the obvious - that it helps you keep updated with people you don't see often (particularly if you're like me and have an aversion to phoning people), it's free (on top of an internet bill anyway), it's 'instant', etc etc.

But it's also very useful if you're shy or a bit lame at talking to people (like me). I mean, I'm fine with people I've known for ages, or in groups (where the conversation tends to flow much more easily), or with really talkative people, or those people who can just keep thinking up really interesting subject topics for ages or that I've got lots in common with. But anyone vaguely quiet or with little in common to me, and I really struggle!

Here's where the internet is brilliant. There's no pressure to keep a conversation going, for a start. You can have a brilliantly interesting conversation over several days. I love it. So it really opens up conversation for geeks like me!

A great example is my cousin. I've never really talked to her much whenever we've visited her family, she's quite quiet, and I never ever knew if we really had anything in common. But on facebook, we started commenting on each others posts and things like that. And then that leads to feeling like we know each other better, which opens more conversation... And we're both pregnant, so we definitely have something in common now! It's really lovely though, because I've always felt bad for not starting conversations in the past, but have never been able to think of a decent subject, so it's never happened.

So that makes me happy =)

It's funny how having pregnant people to talk to makes you feel better. Not that pregnancy is terrible or anything, but it's the sort of condition where it's pretty easy to slip into thinking you're the only one - a bit like when you're ill at home alone or something. So having other pregnant people to talk to is nice. And people who have little children, too. Suddenly I'm one of their crowd, and seem to fit in like I was born there. Weird.

The bizarre thing about that, though, is that I don't feel 'old' or 'unusual' when I'm with single, much younger or much older friends. I thought I would do! I'm sort of expecting that to come about a little after the baby's born - after all, my young single or flingy friends will all be childless, houseless, almost responsibility-less. I'll be the married one (that was weird anyway when it happened) with a kid!!

I think I worry that I'm suddenly going to feel old once I have a baby. I don't really see why, I mean, kids make you feel younger if anything, surely! But even so I can see myself being more separated from my younger friends especially. I hope I'm just worrying about nothing, I hope that I stay feeling a part of them. After all, it's not like we go clubbing or wild drinking or anything, we just do nice calm things like going for coffee or watching films or visiting each others' houses. Nothing that's unsuitable for a baby =)

There are some people in Stretton that take their kids to the pub. From when they're tiny. I mean, when they're tiny tiny, it's almost okay, coz they don't know where they are and they don't pick up language or really understand anything at that age. But when they get older... they really shouldn't be there. Yet some people take them anyway. It seems to be the ones who've had kids young, and think they can just carry on with their wild lifestyle. Don't know how they can do it, it's so irresponsible, it's their little kid that they're ruining. *shrug* Of course, there are exceptions to the rule, but that seems to be people who've just had the same lifestyle their whole lives and it seems natural that their kids go to the pub with them. At least pubs are non smoking places now; it's not so bad then.

Lol, that paragraph sounds so snooty and upper class. Whoops. I guess I just love kids too much!

I really should go put the washing oot now.

Penguins

2010-03-20T14:27:00.004Z

I'm sure I've got the waddle.

Perhaps only some of the time, but I'm pretty sure it's there! Walking to Elev8 last night I noticed my steps seem to be that bit shorter and wider apart... lol. Whoopee. Ah well, guess there's not much time left... and I'm certainly walking as little as possible at the moment!

It's really bad, I should be keeping fit, but it's just so tiring!

We've got Sam round this weekend. I find him tiring too... but mostly because he has to be doing what he wants, there's no way of doing anything else really without suffering a massive paddy (often involving throwing/destruction of furniture and various household items). He was better a couple of years ago, we could take him out more and at least have a nice day visiting somewhere even if we could only spend ten minutes in a shop instead of half an hour (now we're lucky if we get in any shops at all). I mean, he was still quite particular about what he wanted to do, but he was also more open to ideas, and because he could still fit in his pushchair, was easy to take around places. He used to be perfectly happy riding around for hours - as long as we were moving! That said, he still enjoys that sort of thing, but now it's a wheelchair if anything, and that is so dreadfully heavy and bulky and annoying to take around that we virtually never even bring it over, let alone use it. Why can't they make pushchairs for older kids eh?!

The trend of videos that he watches now (or should I say mostly rewinds and fasts forward) has thankfully moved on to Disney - success! - from Thomas the Tank Engine, which I have to say was beginning to grate a little... thank goodness he only watches Bod at Grannies, coz that drove me mad the first time he ever put it on!

I'm going to watch the next episode of One Born Every Minute in a bit. It's a really good watch, entertaining and informative at the same time. It's pretty funny to see some mums making a massive massive fuss (the one in particular was a first-time mum of 19 or something) and others hardly making a sound... hopefully I'll be the latter! Well, I'm pretty sure I will be the latter, coz I'm quite tough and don't complain much, but that doesn't mean in any way that it won't hurt an awful lot!!

I really want to know which way my baby's lying at the moment. It feels like it's sideways.

To like or not to like

2010-03-19T12:42:00.005Z

I'm feeling a lot better today. I was soooo tired at the point of writing yesterday, and my tummy was just hurting. After a lie down for an hour it was much better though... damn gravity! To be honest I think I'd rather like it if I could spend the entire remaining pregnancy in bed, but sadly that wouldn't really work, I'd get really bored! Just anaesthetise me for the rest of the time, maybe?

Yeah, maybe not then. I do like being pregnant, it's just very tiring now! I know yesterday I put that I was 30 weeks but if we're counting along with the hospital (est. due date 21st May) then technically I'm now 31 weeks. I'd love to go along with that except that I still think that they're wrong!

Also I love how the NHS website works out that my due date is 27th May. If that is more like it, which is more likely since my cycle is 32 days, then that makes it even more likely that they'll want to induce me. Sorta sucks. Of course, I'd like the baby to come sooner rather than later (who wouldn't?) but inducing has bad press and also extends the labour and makes it harder. Yay.

I do find it very weird how I'm going to the hospital every month, and yet still feel like they hardly tell me anything. I mean, aren't you supposed to have a birth plan for a start? And they haven't discussed anything about the birth with me at all. Perhaps it's coz those people won't actually be there for the birth (thank you Lord!!), but even so, it seems a bit weird. Perhaps I'm supposed to discuss it all with my midwife, but I've only seen her twice ever (once right at the start and last month when the hospital asked her to come do mid-month bloods) and neither time has she mentioned anything. And yes, you've guessed it, I'm too chicken to actually ask. Well, how do you start that conversation then?! "I was wondering how the birth will happen..." "Well, you'll push and it'll come out..."

Yeah, great confidence booster.

I really should ask about the antenatal classes. Apparently the hospital do them for free - but has anyone told me about them? No! I only found out from Claire who happened to ask me if I was going to do any classes. Well, I'd like to, if only so I feel slightly less in the dark about how things are 'supposed' to happen. It's not that I'm actually nervous about the birth itself (except the usual worries about the baby being ok), I just feel like there's a huge lack of communication... and I'm not even the worst person I know for asking questions!

But I'd definitely do hospital ones, coz others are something like £150. Yeah, ouch. Sorry - not that rich, actually!

The baby's room is coming along well. We have a cot - annoyingly not the really nice wooden mothercare one, but in fact Simon's old rickety green one - but it'll have to do. Might have to make a bar guard though, I'm sure those bars are too wide apart. Anyway, yeah, we have a cot. After getting the Health in Pregnancy grant we went shopping and got some other essentials. First, blue blankets (not because we think its a boy, but because it's a nice blue, and I like blue. All right?!), breast pump and bottles so that Simon/grandparents can feed him/her occasionally and to hopefully give me a bit of freedom! The bottles have more breast-shaped teats which are definitely going to be better for any switching between types of feeding; I've always thought the common style teats are a weird shape to be honest. We also got a 'gift pack' of safety things, i.e. plug socket covers, cupboard locks, etc. Those are mostly for childminding but will of course be helpful once our baby grows a bit! We got some muslin squares because they're useful and I like them. I'm sure we got some other stuff too but I can't think of them right now... oh yes. Baby monitor. We got the cheapest one they had (£20 or so I think) and it works fine. It's got a built in night light which is a nice touch, and the receiver can be portable or mains powered. All fine and dandy. And we got a changing mat as well - a big essential!

As well as all that, we're looking for a wardrobe to put in the room, and with the remaining £70 of the grant and £10 of our own will probably get this one from Ikea - even though it's huge! It's cheaper and bigger than any others I've found and you can never have too much storage, really. It will fit in the room just fine (yes it's half the length of the room, but hey ho) and... well I'm always one for thinking of the future - I'm sure we'll move to a bigger house at some point so it'll some in handy then too! Of course, I've also thought about if we don't move - you can still fit a bed in the room with quite an area of space still free, so I'm happy with that.

Of course we've bought other stuff as the months have moved along, but none of those are specific to the baby's room - a cute highchair from argos that was the cheapest I've ever seen (about £17 I think) but portable, foldable and great quality! Don't see any problems there really! We also bought a stairgate aaaages ago - obviously with childminding in mind at the time - as it was on offer and had tons of great reviews. We got a double pushchair off a friend for £55 a while back too - very useful if I need to have a mindee in a pram as well as our own baby, plus a single pram/pushchair thing off another friend that my mum paid a tenner for.

Hmm, writing about stuff helps; perhaps I'll do it more often. I'm sure I'm likely to feel more cut off from society, not less, as I get bigger and more willing to stay housebound! Oh baby hurry up!

Yeah....

2010-03-18T16:40:00.002Z

Yeah, I thought I'd want to write tons about this stuff, but turns out complaining to people is much more effective!

I'm now 30 weeks. Yep, thirty, that means only ten (or less) to go!

It's not like I haven't had anything to write about. I mean, I'm huge now, there's no pretending I'm not pregnant, my belly looks on the brink of popping and I'm wondering how much longer I can last! It's fine when I'm feeling healthy, but the last two weeks I've been sick proper, which hasn't exactly been a walk in the park. On Monday I thought I might have to go into hospital to get a drip or some such thing because I couldn't keep any food down and was just low all the time. Thankfully I managed to get a few sugar tablets in me in between throwing up, and apparently they work ever so slightly faster than my vomiting episodes were happening. So, two bugs and lots of bed rest later, I'm feeling a bit pooped.

It is at this point that I'm really glad I'm not working. That would be mega annoying. I mean, I've been glad all through really, but now I'm getting SO tired and am just thankful that even my minor commitments are easy to get out of! Of course I would be taking maternity leave at some point, but I'm sure I would have thought, "oh I'll be fine, I won't need leave until at least week 35" or something...

One thing I hadn't banked on was just how darned uncomfy the kicking of the baby would be! I mean, I knew that I'd feel it a lot, but it’s just, well, annoying.

Yes, most of me wants this baby out now! I wonder if many people feel like this at this stage? I know 10 weeks isn’t that long out of 9 months, but think about it… 10 weeks… that’s a long time when you’re sick to the stomach (lol) already.

All this process of making a baby is mostly getting me down coz I’ve been ill, I think. And because of being pregnant it’s taking me longer than normal to recover. Being hit by fatigue isn’t exactly… helpful.

I’m alright at dealing with vomiting really. It’s the endless days of nausea that I can’t stand. If I’m actually vomiting then I’m usually feeling too ill to do anything, so lying in bed and sleeping is all I want to do anyway. It’s when it gets past that and you feel like you will go mad if you don’t eat a big meal soon or actually go downstairs and face the world!

When I update this next I should write about my silly doctor guy. He has big ears.

The Test

2009-09-20T16:04:00.005+01:00

The first thing I wanted to do was write about this.

So, I've been feeling a bit odd for a week or so, feeling nauseous, having tender boobs (never had that before), being REALLY moody, and generally feeling quite unusual. So yesterday I decided it was about time to use the last pregnancy test I had in the cupboard.

It was right after my mum had popped by to visit me - and the funny thing was that I nearly told her how I felt, but then stopped myself since I thought it'd be silly to get any hopes up if I was wrong about it. But then shortly after she went, I did the test... and it was two of those silly little pink lines. Within about a minute or perhaps even less.. no doubt there then, it would seem! I was, well, I didn't know what to think, but it was quite unreal. I've been wanting to have babies since I was about 6 (don't ask why), and only recently had decided with my husband that we were probably going to wait a couple of years before starting a family.

So anyway, there I was all on my own in the house, not wanting to tell anyone before Simon but he wasn't home til half 10. It was about 8pm. I felt this sort of sick-but-excited feeling in my stomach that didn't really go away. So I decided to text EB. I knew SJ wouldn't mind me telling her first, and anyway I didn't feel it necessary to even mention it later on. So I texted her: (WARNING - full text conversation ahead!)

Me: "Hey, I need to tell you something, I'm gona text it to u but I want u to be on your own coz NO ONE else can know yet...lol...so can u let me know when u are pls?Xxx"

EB: "Ok, i'm at A's at the mo but won't be home til late. I can send him out the room if you want or wud u prefer 2 say another time? E x"

Me: "Yeah that would be ok, as long as u don't say anythin to him after obviously lol.. Xx"

EB: "I'm alone! Now i duno whether 2 b worried or excited... E xxx"

Me: "Cheers hun. Sorry to be so secertive... Not told anyone yet, and sj's at work.. was feelin a bit weird lately, n just took a pregnancy test [my last, incidentally, so I can't retest!] ...but ANYWAY, result = positive. Um, eek?! Xxx"

EBB: "=O yay!Wow i duno wat 2 say! That's really exciting! So u haven't told SJ yet? How do u feel? have u any idea how many weeks? E xxx"

Me: "Really exciting? Really scary!! I'd just decided to wait a couple of years as well! cant tell si til he gets home at half 10, wouldnt wana tel over the phone. Must've been the time a few weeks ago i guess. So anythin around 3 wks preg i guess. I have a sort of sick feeling in my stomach, like shock i guess! But i really did feel like i was preg, totally unlike that other time. eg i've never had tender boobs b4. Also tiny tiny bit of blood yest when my P was due, then nothing more. So now i feel weird coz dont wana tell anyone except sj n u until i've had a blood test. And i'm all on my own. weird. =/ xx"

EB: "Aww i bet this next hour is gona go slowly! But yea i'd def wait til he gets back, not on the phone. He/she could end up sharing my birthday! (11th May) Hehe. E xxx"

Me: "More like june prob lol. Oh i feel so weird now, i can tell it's coz i just wana tell someone! i nrealy mentioned to my mum earlier that i thought i might be preg but theought i shouldn't in the end coz i hadn't done the test. but now, well now i just wana know for certain!! i'm trying to distract myself by playing WoW and having the tv on but it's not really working! also slightly worries coz my sugar levels (I'm diabetic) have been really mental the last few days. Xx"

EB: "How soon will u be able 2 have a test?Yea i guess that is worrying, is it common 4 bein preg 2 affect it? E x"

Me: "A site says that just by being diabetic 'you are at a higher risk of losing your baby or having a baby with a congenital abnormality'. So it's very rubbish. And all stuff i've read says make sure your diabetes is really well controlled b4 gettin preg and mine was ok but a bit up and down. gonna have to wait til at least mon for a doc test but might see if co-op sells test so i can test again. but usually a positive test is correct lol... eek eek eek. Xx"

EB: "I'm sure the Dr wil give u more info n stuf. N God knowns wat He's doin! I'm sure they wil sell test. Wat u think sj will say? E xxx"

Me: "Dunno, think he'll be happy but i know he decided the same, that we weren't gonna have kids for a couple of years. So i dunno really lol. But at least it means i don't have to worry about decidin anymore lol! Xx!

EB: "Haha yeah that's true. N at least u have a house n he has a job so it's not a bad time even if u had wanted 2 wait a bit. E x"

Me: "Yeah I know, it's all fine, and i'm sure i'm gonna love it. just feels odd at the mo coz is all so new... and wana tell simon! plus feel really young lol...Xxx"

EB: "I think you'll get used to the idea pretty quickly, n i know u'l love it! U don't have 2 long 2 wait now, he'l be home soon, hope he's not late lol. El x"

....etc etc. You get the idea!

So SJ got back shortly after that. I, for some reason, couldn't actually SAY it to him.. so i just said 'i want to show you something' and showed him the test. He said he thought it might be that! (He 'just had a hunch') But i'd already previously told him my period was late and about my breasts being tender so I wasn't surprised that he'd caught on! But anyway, then i just cried on him! I think it was all the emotion after not being able to release it onto anyone properly. Then we had snacks in front of the tv and then I went to bed and he came to bed soon after.

I have to say though, it was the worst night of sleep i've had in a long time! Took me ages to get to sleep, then i woke up around 4 or 5am, felt really weird/sick and then after that just drifted in and out of sleep, amongst random dreams of babies and relatives.

This morning (sunday), I felt MUCH better. SJ had had to go to work but that was ok. I think it was coz i'd actually told some people! Then at church I was debating telling SG (in the end i didn't, not sure why, think i'm going to wait til i'm a few more weeks gone, would hate him to get his hopes up too much!). After church I bumped into my Dad, who'd popped in to the parish centre after going to co-op. So I told him then and there. He said, "well i'm delighted! i'm going to be a grandad! i knew that's what you'd probably tell me after you said i've got something to tell you.." and he hugged me and it was all nice!

Oh yeah, before church i was talking to HG and she said i looked tired, i said i slept really badly and she seemed to be enquiring more so i just said 'i'll tell you later'. Then later on, at the bring and share meal, she said, 'so what's this thing you were going to tell me? is it what i think it is?' - of course, i had no idea what she thought it was, and said so! but she guessed straight away anyway. (She later said i 'had the look'.)

So after not intending to tell her i did! but i don't mind. I think she can keep it to herself.

Sadly my mum is in London today so i can't tell her. She's getting back pretty late so i think it's going to have to wait til tomorrow. Not entirely sure how I can see her without giving things away, unless i go visit (which i hate doing without a lift coz it's a half hour walk and up a big hill... what a lazy lump I am!).

So anyway that's where I'm at right now. Alone in a house yet again (most people at the family's house are out and other friends are busy)... thankfully SJ will be home fairly soon, in about an hour.

One thing I've noticed about how i'm feeling is that my tummy, which on my period usually gets a bit funny and makes me go to the loo quite often, is actually still being like that, despite not being on my period (technically). So that's a bit odd, and makes me wonder what causes that particular symptom. Also I keep getting aches at the sides of my belly, sort of just inside where the front bits of my hips are (where I'd guess my ovaries to be, i suppose). And mostly on the right hand side. So i'm not quite sure what that's about. It's hard to tell but it also feels a bit like the very lowest bit of my tummy is slightly different. I mean, if I'm pregnant then obviously the insides are different already, but I wouldn't expect to be able to feel a difference yet!