Hi!

Yep, I'm still here, trying to get my act together to start posting again. I've been slowly building up the urge for a redesign, maybe even finding my own web hosting rather than blogger, then I may actually start posting again.

Quick update on life here. I have a new job as a Speech Therapy Technical Instructor. Only part time unfortunately so I'm still doing 1 shift a week on my old job. I love the new job though, really good fun, it's a great team and I feel like I'm really helping people. There's also a lot of cutting and sticking, playing on the computer and making pretty things involved so it's right up my street.

B is a star, she's nearly 21 months now, she really knows her own mind and she's got a very stubborn streak so we have quite a lot of tantrums. She's not very good at talking, in fact you could say she's rubbish, she has a few words which we understand, but we have to translate a lot. For example, "ot" (hot) could mean hot, or oven, or cup, or drink, or food depending on the situation. She certainly keeps us guessing. We're hoping when she gets better at speaking the tantrum will subside a little. I was rubbish at speaking till I was quite old so we aren't too worried. Her favourite word at the moment is "ditzth" which she uses to refer to anything she doesn't have a word for (so that's almost everything then). We constantly hear "Oooh ditzth" her tone of voice is brilliant, she sounds constantly amazed by everything.

On the crafting front I'm certainly getting my mojo back. Helped greatly by the fact that someone goes to bed without any arguments at night now. I got really into my cross-stitch again for a while (the Indian I've been doing for years has had a lot of attention, still not done though). I've also been busy knitting a cardigan, my first knitted item of clothing since I was about 7. I'm crocheting a gorgeous ripple afghan, which is about 3/4 done and I've just started some cushions to match it as the afghan has got a bit too big to cart around now.

I haven't got photos of any of these crafty endeavours, so I'll have to leave you with a picture of the gorgeous girl instead.



Hopefully I'll be back again soon.

I'm a bad blogger. 2 months without an update!

I really admire all the Mums who manage to write blogs, make stuff, and bring up small children. I can't ever imagine it happening here. If we could persuade her to nap, then I might be able to blog, but she gets by on 2 x 45 minute power naps per day, and that's on a good day.

I am managing to keep up with other blogs, and I'm trying to comment more often too... when Bryher isn't trying to eat the keyboard anyway.
I must have made the comment karma fairy happy too because I was lucky enough to win a blog giveaway celebrating Sew-Eco's 200th post. The lovely Ruby has come to live with us.

At the moment she is making friends with Looby, the doll I knitted for Bryher. Ruby's label says that she likes to sit with other toys and watch the world go by, which is good as they will be kept out of chewing distance for a while. Bryher does play with other toys I've made her, other more chewable toys, but Ruby & Looby are a bit special, and not suitable for small mouths. They are spending their days in the living room, sitting on the little rocking chair which my Grandad made for me. The rocking chair which makes Bryher squeal with laughter whenever we let her play on it.

I tried to get a nice picture of Bryher with her "off-limits" toys, but the only time she's still is when she's about to drop with exhaustion.

Bryher turned 8 months old on Thursday.
I can't get over how quickly she is learning and changing. In this past week she has learnt to clap, sit herself up, and crawl, although to be fair it's a bit of a commando crawl/drag at the moment, even so it's still forwards and purposeful, it's just a bit slower... thankfully! She's also started grunting at us in reply to things, so we have conversations in "Cave-Girl". She still hasn't mastered rolling from front to back though which is supposed to be the first movement milestone.

Unfortunately 8 months means it's also time for me to go back to work. My first shift is on Thursday. It'll be the first time I'll have left her for more than a couple of hours.
I'm going to miss my little Goblin Goon more than I care to think about.

My little girl is 6 months old today.

It's gone so fast!

I've not posted much over the past few months as I'm trying to make the most of every minute I have with her. She's such a happy, pleasant little girl. She has her whingy hour at night when she's tired, but don't we all? Generally she's a joy to be around.
I'm still saying this even though she woke me at 3:45 this morning and has survived on 4 power naps all day! Nights like that are thankfully rare and since Christmas she's usually slept from 7pm to 6am with a couple of nice long naps during the day.

Helping to wrap the Christmas presents.

She hasn't stopped fidgetting yet. She won't stay laid on her back for long now, it makes dressing and nappy changes infinitely more interesting. If you put her down she rolls straight onto her front, unfortunately she hasn't learned to roll onto her back yet so we have to keep helping her when her back starts to hurt. 3 times I had to get out of the shower the other day to help her out. Apparently it's far easier for babies to roll front to back and normally learn that about now, rolling back to front is normally learnt at about 7 months, but she's contrary... like her parents.
She's obviously desperate to be on the move, I think she'll be an early crawler.

Investigating my yarn stash.

She has a fantastic giggle. She loves me singing and dancing her around.
She finds the cats both fascinating, and hilarious, this is understandable. I pity them when she can crawl.
Less understandable is the fact that she also find cups fascinating and hilarious. Strange girl.

We've just started to wean her. She doesn't seem overly impressed. So far she's pulled faces at everything she's tasted, and some foods (broccolli and yoghurt) have resulted in whole body shudders. She might not like the foods, but at least she had a good attempt at digesting the weaning information a few weeks ago, so she should understand what's in store.

"What? You mean I'm not meant to be eating the leaflet?"

Happy Half Birthday little girl!

We had a great night at a friends house in Ormskirk yesterday. I miss our friends in Ormskirk so much, but it's nice that even with Bryher around now we can go to people's houses, put her in a room at 7pm and not have to worry about her until about 11pm.
It's also great catching up with friends... and I had risotto... and for the first time ever I enjoyed eating rice!

Writing how good Bryher is has jinxed it though as for the first time in weeks she's woken before 11pm. Curse her teeth. Pass the Calpol.

Well that puts a stop to todays post anyway.

Night night.

Teeth.
Aren't they fun... or not.
Bryher cried for half an hour this morning. She's normally so happy in the morning so I knew something was wrong. I tried all the usual remedies but nothing was working. Then she grabbed my hand and put it in her mouth. Rather than suckling like she normally would she started chomping down on my fingers... Ahh teeth!
A dose of calpol and 15 minutes later she's happy again.

So the fun starts. She's been showing signs fo teething for a while, red cheeks, chewing on anything. the last couple of days I've noticed she's constantly had a toy or her fingers in her mouth, but this morning were the first signs of being in pain. Hopefully it'll pass quickly.

Later we went for a walk to buy some bonjela. It's bitter cold out and the fresh air knockd her out so she slept for an hour after we got home. She woke up in a very good mood so to kkeep her happy I put her in the carry pouch. We spent the afternoon dancing round the kitchen and making cookies.

She's getting an early education in baking and music. I have to get her liking my (eclectic) music taste before her Dad gets her all to himself and she learns to like his music choices. He says my music taste is dreadful... he may have a point, but I like it anyway. So far Bryher seems to like Nina Simone and Louis Armstrong, they have lots of songs about "baby" which have to be sung to her, resulting in lots of grins and wiggles. Teenage Fanclub is quite popular too. In fact I've come to the conclusion that many musicians are very broody as so many of them write songs about babies.

Yesterday I was going to write about how colourful my garden is looking for mid-November. I even took pictures, there were so many things in bloom. Not only my passion flower and nasturtiums, but also poppies, geraniums and several other things I don't know the names of.

But then I decided to make my life a little easier and save that post for today.

At 6:30am this morning Bryher decided she was bored of being asleep. I'm not a morning person so if it's before 7am I try to persuade her with a few cuddles and a little rocking that bed is the best place. But this morning she was having none of it.
We came downstairs to a very cold house and a frosty looking world.

All the flowers in the garden are looking decidedly limp now.


I freely admit that I cheated. I couldn't get a photo of both the pretty sky and the frosty hills so I took 2 and merged them.

Just a quick catch up photo post because the girl is stirring which means it's time for me to go to bed.

We had a bad night last night and I've been shattered today. But inbetween bouts of napping and cuddling I've managed to do some baking. Chocolate shortbread biscuits and chocolate brownies. I had made a lot more biscuits, but Porl is a big fan of shortbread. I'm a big fan of brownies, but it's a bit too sickly sweet to eat more than a few.

I ended up doing most of the baking with Bryher in her pouch on my front. She's still not well and it's making her miserable. Being in the pouch while I dance around to music is about the only way to keep her quiet. She seems to like Nina Simone and Louis Armstrong.

Also here's the finished ipod sock I mentioned. It's a bit baggy, nothing to do with the pattern, just my knitting skills. I might try making another to my own pattern.

The problem with blogging everyday is it makes me realise how boring my life is. I'm enjoying my life. Being at home all day with Porl and Bryher is great fun. But it doesn't make for the most riveting posts. Especially when they're both ill. No pictures either, it's looked very Wuthering Heights outside today. Certainly not photo taking weather.

Today has been spent mostly cuddling a little girl who's very wheezy and pretty miserable. She's slept a lot, mostly in my arms.

During the few moments when I've had both hands free I've been working on making an advent calendar using Jenny's pattern. I've been hunting round for a decent advent calendar. We don't normally have one as I hate the idea of the standard chocolate ones. The chocolate tastes horrible for a start, plus the pictures are rubbish, and they're just generally tacky. But now that Bryher is here I think I should get one. She won't remember it but it might take me a few years to get Porl into the spirit of Christmas.

Not that he's a Scrooge. He just hates the commercialisation and tackiness of Christmas. So do I, I just haven't convinced him yet that decorations, Christmas Carols and all the rest of the razzmatazz can be tasteful and fun.

Anyway, back to the advent calendar. When I was younger we had a great one with a few lines of a poem behind each door. I loved it so much that Mum saved it and ironed all the doors shut so I got to use it for a few years in a row... or was she just being thrifty?

Jenny's advent calendar is great as it's far prettier than the square fabric advent calendars you get in the shops, and I can put whatever I like in the envelopes.
Maybe the prospect of Ferrero Roches each morning will get Porl in the Christmas spirit.

We decided to try Bryher in the cot tonight instead of her carrycot. We've been meaning to do it for a while, the carrycot is fine in length, but getting a bit too narrow.

She seems to appreciate the extra space.
Sorry for the terrible picture quality but I didn't want to wake her by turning on the lights.

Today has been a day of sitting around lazing. Bryher's cold has developed, we went to the doctors this morning and she has a slight chest infection. She was still smiley and chatting this morning but then spent most of the afternoon either sleeping on me or crying.

In other news, my Dad has been given a date today for his heart operation. Next Tuesday is his birthday, but he has to go into the hospital for pre-op tests. What a great birthday present! As long as everything is okay he will have the operation on the 19th.

My parents have been coming up to visit us every week but I've told them they shouldn't see us until we're 100% better. It's not worth the risk.

Today seems to have flown by. I did spend a lot of it making stew & dumplings (1 vege, 1 meat version). I'm almost recovered from the flu thing but Porl has caught it now so he was let off cooking duty and I made us comfort food. I suspect Bryher has it too, she's snuffly, coughing a lot and isn't quite as cheery as normal. SH'es still cheery though. Being cheery isn't good though as she makes a strange croaking frog sound when she's excited. This can make her cough at the best of times so it's even worse with a sore throat.

When not tending to the sick... actually I'm not very good at tending to the sick, but I am good at giving out cuddles... and I finished my ipod sock. Unfortunately it's too dark to take photos. That could be an advantage though as the big gaps where the needle joins were might not be so noticeable. I'll take pictures tomorrow when it's light.

Hi, still here, honest. My life at the moment seems to revolve around work, and getting ready for the blips arrival and I didn't really want to bore everyone with the little day to day details this involves. So just one update instead, and I haven't a clue when the next will be.

Blip and myself are both doing well. We're 24 weeks and 5 days today. We had another visit to see the midwife today to check me out and listen to the heartbeat again. No problems with either of us. Blip seems to have inherited its fathers twitchy leg (for those who don't know Porl he has a habit of playing an imaginary drum kit if he has to sit for very long). The Blip also seems to be constantly fidgeting and kicking, which is a lovely reassuring sensation, except when I'm trying to go to sleep.
If only I could swaddle it now.

I'm getting quite big, well I feel quite big, but people have said I'm still relatively small for 5 months. That's fine by me, hopefully blip is using up some of the surplus weight I had before getting pregnant. Also I'm guessing that while my bump stays small I'm likely to have more energy, and I've got lots still to do (decorating etc.) so I need energy.
Not that the bump isn't getting a bit unwieldy. I keep walking into things, and I have think first before bending over. I suspect in a few weeks I'll be having to get the guys I look after to fasten my shoe laces instead of me fastening theirs.

As well as seeing the midwife today we also had a visit to see an anaesthetist. When I had my 20 week anomaly scan they told me the placenta was low, hopefully it's nothing to worry about, the midwife described it as "like drawing a dot on a balloon", so as I get bigger the placenta should move. I'm not concerned, especially as all my medically qualified friends have shrugged it off as nothing to worry about, I'm just looking forward to having an extra scan at 36 weeks.
But if the placenta doesn't move, then it means I may have no option but to have a c-section (which I really really really don't want.) This slight chance of surgery made the hospital think a little more carefully about my possible latex allergy, hence the trip today to see the anaesthetist.
I had RAST (general allergy) tests and latex allergy tests done a few years ago because of my job. I never saw the results but I was told the RAST tests were very high, (I'm allergic to lots of things, no surprise there.) The latex tests were apparently inconclusive, but it was probably best to avoid it.
Great, it meant I get to wear funky blue or purple gloves at work, but it didn't actually tell me whether I was allergic to latex, which makes me look a bit of a fool when talking to doctors about the possible implications of surgery. "I think I'm allergy to latex." "Have you ever had a reaction?" "Erm... no, but I had some tests done which didn't say much but the hospital told me to wear special gloves."
Thankfully I managed to get copies of the old test results and it turns out I am allergic to latex, but only slightly. At least I know now, and the hospital can get to work writing "LATEX ALLERGY" all over my notes.

The anaesthetist did wind me up a little by telling me I would be having surgery. I tried pointing out I was only seeing him as a precaution, he disagreed, and I decided to ignore him as he'd only just met me and only spent 2 minutes reading my notes. Porl spotted the look in my eyes and we had the "surgery, last resort" conversation as soon as we left the room.

So that's about it. I've got another week and a half of proper work, then I start doing part time hours to use up my annual leave. That means the clearout / decorating / re-organising will start in earnest. I've already Freecycled a few boxes of junk. Emmaus will get the bigger things like the bed and wardrobe, because they have a van and strong men who are probably used to carrying things up and downstairs. Once they are gone Dad will have space to start building our new built in wardrobes, and Mum and I can paint.

Now though I'm exhausted from all this typing so it's time for my nightly dose of Gaviscon, and off to bed.

What's the chances of me updating again before this baby arrives?

Still pottering along, life is still good, but I'm still finding it hard to get the motivation to update (sorry Ormskirk lurkers, I'd make sure you knew if there was any interesting news.)
I've been trying to redesign the site a bit, especially as I realised that my "about" page is terribly out of date (I haven't worked for that phone company for over a year now, and I'm 29) but even getting motivated to do this seems hard, and I've not published anything yet. I'm hoping a redesign will make me happier with the site and I'll want to write often.

I have been doing some things though. The other weekend I went along to a members day at the spinning guild and had a great day getting to grips with my wheel. With some advice from Ali I managed to spin a fair amount without the yarn breaking all the time. I think one of my problems was confidence, but also since I've got home I've realised the sofa is too low and I can't keep the wheel spinning, so a change of chair and everything seems to be working. When I've spun some more and tried out plying I'll take some pictures.
The next day I went off to the G-Mex to the knitting and stitching show. I managed to restrain myself and only bought a set of coloured Susan Bates crochet hooks. I can't resist pretty colours. I saw quite a lot of yarn I wanted to buy, but they only seems to have 1 hank of each left, so next time I know to go on the Friday instead of the Sunday.

The Blip is doing well, I've definitely got a bump now and I've been feeling it moving for about 2 weeks, very early for a first time Mum apparently, but that sensation is definitely not indigestion.
We had an appointment with the Midwife a couple of weeks ago and got to hear Blips heartbeat. Porl keeps walking round the house making the "woog woog woog" sound.
I however have read that it can probably hear us now so I've taken to singing more... Porl is not impressed :)

The les fun bits are that my energy levels are beyond erratic. Some days I feel great, others days I'm fit to drop 2 hours after getting up. I find the gibberish I talk when I'm tired very amusing though, Porl just tells me to go to bed. I just wish he'd ban me from cooking when I'm tired, I never want to tackle anything more challenging than toast, but I must have burnt about half a loaf of bread so far.

I've also started having problems with my back too. I knew it was bound to happen, I've a dodgy back anyway, but I thought I'd be okay for a few more months. I've had some very restless nights and by tea time yesterday every movement hurt. I've booked a doctors appointment and I'm going to beg for physio. Last time I had physio it took 14 weeks for an appointment (well it would have if work hadn't helped me queue jump,) so if I ask now I might get some before the end of my pregnancy. I'm doing the exercises I was given last time, but my body has changed so much these past few weeks that I'm worried I might be doing more harm than good. Also some of the exercises will become physically impossible as I get bigger.

We've also been making plans for the nursery (sorry, having a nursery seems so grown up.) We're going to swap the bedrooms around so that we are in the biggest room. This means the baby won't have to live with things like amps and boxes of material, it also means I'll have space in our room for a dedicated craft corner. There's a lot of sorting and decorating to be done first but I'm so excited! If I wasn't banned from lifting things I'd have been getting stuck into it already.

Apparently last week was National De-Lurking Week. In honour of this I feel it is only right to de-lurk from my own blog.

Life here is pottering along quietly and on the whole well. I had my first scan on Thursday, the little Blip is definitely a baby (the hospital even labelled the scan picture for me... just in case I wasn't sure.) Blip is doing well, it's now 7cm long from bum to head, which means I'm 13 weeks pregnant, and due on the 19th July, a week later than I thought.
This means that Blip is due to appear on exactly the same day my niece was due to appear last year... not that she did. Also the midwife told me that if Blip hasn't appeared 12 days after my due date they'll induce me... which would mean I'd be spending my 30th birthday giving birth.
I can't decide whether that would be good or bad. A baby will be The Best birthday present, there'd be lots of drugs available, (for me at least), but I suspect I'll not be handing out invites and party hats may be banned.

Here's the piccie anyway.

I couldn't believe how big a relief it was to get the scan done and to see the little heartbeat. I've been having a few problems, nothing too bad, but enough to make me worry, and to have the doctor/midwife/boss/family/everyone telling me to slow down. That's easy to say, but I've been feeling so lethargic that if I slow down much more I'll become indistinguishable from the sofa. Another thing which wasn't helping my panicky state of mind was that other than being exhausted I've had no other pregnancy side effects for about 3 weeks. The queasiness passed after about 2-3 weeks of suffering, and for 3 weeks except for being tired, and having an occasional stomach pain I felt fine, I didn't feel pregnant. Most normal people would be happy about that, but until the scan it was just something else to worry about.
Thankfully I hadn't been having bad dreams... until the night before the scan, and then it was so silly it didn't worry me anyway. I dreamt that I'd miscarried, nothing unusual for a pregnant woman there, but I wonder how many pregnant women dream that their miscarried child is made from some odd rubbery material with a magnetic backing?... probably only crafters.

On the crafting front there's been very very little going on. I've been feeling so lethargic that I just haven't had the energy or enthusiasm for anything. If I'm not in work you can usually find me sat on the sofa, watching some brain-destroying rubbish on telly while working away on my "Frederick the Literate" cross-stitch. The cross-stitch is coming on well, over half done now, but I can feel the telly making me stupider by the day.
My crafting mojo better return soon or I might end up watching Jeremy Kyle!

Hello!

Sorry for the apparent disappearance from the face of the earth, especially after all the lovely comments everyone left. I seem to have spent the past few weeks either working, sleeping, or in the den I've created on my sofa with a warm blanket, a good novel, (or baby related info), rubbish TV, occasionally some beads, and sometimes a cat or two.

So far I'm thinking myself quite lucky that I've not really had morning sickness. Tea-time and middle of the night queasiness, but nothing in the morning. I've also discovered that lashings of ginger ale and the odd ginger biscuit work wonders too. Although I've managed to keep the sickness at bay so far, I haven't managed to do the same with all the bugs going round. I seem to have had a constant cold for the past 4 weeks, it came to a head this week when it finally kicked off my asthma so I've had to have a couple of days off work. I'm feeling mostly better, still exhausted, and most of the time my brain feels like it's been replaced by mushy peas, but I'm back in work tomorrow, and just trying to focus on the fact I have 3.5 more shifts before I get a week off. It'll be a hectic week though as I've done absolutely nothing Christmas related, so they'll be shopping, decorating, visiting, and maybe some baking to do too... or maybe not.

I did have other things I wanted to say, but unfortunately my brain has wandered again, and the mushy peas are back, the rest will have to wait, though hopefully not as long.

I quickly want to say how grateful I am about how generous people are being, from particular friends who keep finding un-needed baby things for us. To how my parents are doing wonderful refurbishment jobs on 35 year old baby things which were used not only for me and my older brother, but also the numerous children my Mum looked after when she was a child minder. I always thought they were a bit nuts not getting rid of things like our cot and high chair, as well as all the toys we had, but now I think they were very savvy.

Shall I do the Good News or the Bad News first?

I'll get the bad news out of the way.

My neighbour died last Friday morning. I'm relieved for her families sake that it was relatively quick, when my Grandparents were ill it dragged on for months/years and it took its toll on even the toughest members of the family. It's still hard to deal with though. There are quite a lot of questions about her care that need answering, I hope things are sorted out quickly so that her family can move forward with their lives.

Now for the Good News.

The circle of life continues.
I'm pregnant!
I've never really kept track of my dates, but as we have been trying for a couple of months I've been good and written them down. Of course once I'd written them down I instantly forgot them.
I've been feeling a little queasy, but I've been upset, and I do tend to feel queasy when I'm stressed or upset. I've also had a sore stomach and boobs, but that's normal PMT for me.
On Saturday night I had a tough night at work. I didn't get much sleep, but did have a lot of time to think. I was getting cheesed off with these ongoing period pains, then something clicked in my brain. I did a bit of googling, and realised that instead of PMT it could be a sign of pregnancy. When I got home Sunday morning I dug out my bit of paper and realised I was 11 days late. *gulp*
Porl was still asleep when I got home, and I'd had no sleep so I went straight to bed. I woke up at about midday, told Porl my suspicions, then dissapeared off to Sheffield for the night as it was my Dads birthday, leaving Porl to pace the house and drink lots of rum. I broke the news to my family later in the afternoon, then on Monday I did a pregnancy test which my sister-in-law had which confirmed everything.

So that's the good news. I've been to see the doctor today, he didn't even bother doing another test, but gave me lots more information to read, and worked out that "Blob" (which is what is currently looks like) should be due about 11th July.