motherhood Archives - A Baby on Board blog

The One Where We Finally Caught Covid

Gillian — Thu, 17 Mar 2022 11:57:44 +0000

Yes, We Finally Caught Covid… Like the majority of primary school-aged children in the UK, and their parents, we spent the most of January isolating at home after we all caught Covid 19. This was due to the HUGE amount of cases that were around at that point. Everyone we knew had it. But I suspect it was also due to tempting fate with the amount of ‘I’m amazed we haven’t caught Covid yet!’ conversations we had with other parents at pick-up, drop-off and over What’s App. Nearly two years into the global pandemic, though, it felt like we’d escaped Covid for so long. Our luck had to run out at some point, right? (You can read about our lockdown experiences in parenting in a pandemic). When Covid Caught Up With Us (Finally) And then it did! At the start of the year there were so many positive cases all around us that we were all testing every day before school, just in case. But it was still a bit of a strange shock when the first test actually turned positive (it really was!) Especially as our first Covid-catcher had no symptoms at that point. And of course the rest of us followed soon after, like dominoes. Me first, because as as a mum, it feels kind of inevitable, doesn’t it? When you’re constantly that close to the infected child and they’re coughing deep into your soul. Followed by the second child and then a whole week later, my husband. However, we felt like we’d been really lucky to have avoided it for so long, all be in really good health, had a relatively unaffected Christmas, and were up-to-date with our vaccinations at that point. Our Omicron Symptoms The Covid-19 variant we caught was of course, Omicrom, which at that point was / is the dominant strain in the UK. As both us adults had been vaccinated and boostered before Christmas I’d naively assumed that we wouldn’t get ill and the children would be asymptomatic. But yes, that wasn’t the case. It really wasn’t the ‘mild cold’ that people had mentioned. Especially not for the children. In terms of Omicrom symptoms, the adults: In terms of Omicron symptoms, the kids: They are both absolutely fine now, thank goodness. Feeling ill and dealing with ill kids and coping with the dreaded homeschooling was not the one (we avoided until everyone was feeling better). We went through a LOT of Calpol. I filled in the NHS Track & Track forms for what felt like forever. How Long We Tested Positive With Omicron For At this point (January 2022) the regulations about self-isolating for ten days were still in place. However, from day 5 onwards if you had two negative tests in a row then you could leave isolation early. However, this turned out to be one of the worst things as it gave me such false hope that we’d have two negative tests on day five and six and be out ASAP. I naively assumed that this would happen! But obviously it didn’t, and we all still tested positive way beyond that. Anecdotally, I don’t think many people I’ve heard of tested negative that early. Of the girls, neither of them tested negative so they did the full ten days. I tested negative on day 7 and 8. Leaving the house was a relief! What Helped When We Caught Covid Hope everyone’s OK x. Once you’ve read this post on when we caught Covid, read:

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The Emotional Rollercoaster Of Sending Your Children To School

Gillian — Wed, 08 Sep 2021 13:19:52 +0000

Oh, The Emotional Rollercoaster Of Sending Your Children To School… Are you sending your children to school for the first time this month? It’s really emotional, isn’t it? As in, feeling-all-the-feelings, emotional-rollercoaster type of emotions. Whichever ones they are. I spied our school’s new Reception starters in the playground this week, and even that made me feel teary, right off the back of being happy to drop off my happy-to-be-dropped-off older two. The new starters looked so impossibly tiny in their uniforms, surrounded by all the parents. It’s an often-mentioned and mildly irritating cliche everyone tells you that the days are long but the years are short, But it seems like one minute you’re eternally awake at 5am after a long night of no sleep when everyone cried, including you, trying desperately to think of things to do, the day stretching endlessly ahead of you. Then the next minute, you’re at the school gate with a sob in your chest, wondering exactly where the past four-and-a-bit years went. Sending My Last Baby To School It only seems like only five minutes since it was me dropping off my wasn’t-she-just-born youngest, and trying not to cry, like a baby, until I was on the way home. She was ready! I was ready! She has since completely blossomed from going to school. It was just really hard. And weird (read about it in my post on what I wish I’d known about my child starting school). I’m now in the strange position of mentally preparing for sending my eldest off to secondary school, in just two years! I know it will go so quickly. Hold me, I’m not ready. Wasn’t she just born?! (yes). How is she nearly as tall as me? The Brilliant Things About School As hard – or as easy – as it can be to take the step though, sending your children to school expands their horizons and fills their heads with multitudes of wonderful things. Like learning to read, which is magical (apart from when it involves them reading your own messages). And you get to pick them up at the end of the day and it’s kind of like Christmas. Especially when as a mum school gives you the wonderful gift of daytime time. Along with hot tea. Which can be totally transformative. Even a few years on, I find it hard to believe that after so many years of cramming all my work and everything else into the few nursery days we had, along with evenings and weekends, I actually have time now, to do work, and anything else I want to do, during the day (although the 3pm pick-up comes round so quickly). My One Piece Of Advice About School… If I was to offer you one piece of advice about school – apart from it will all be OK! – it would be to always put uniform in the washing machine immediately, as if you leave it in the washing basket it will inevitably still be there on Monday morning. As I have found out, many times. Hope everyone’s OK. If you are sending your children to school for the first time, read these posts: 21 things I’ve learned from the first term of primary school What not to do when your child starts school Everything I hate about the school run School uniform hacks Follow me on Pinterest, I’m Gill_Crawshaw

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When your parenting skills don’t quite add up

Gillian — Thu, 19 Oct 2017 04:00:01 +0000

An innocent school email sent an icy clawfinger of fear into my heart this week; there’s a maths breakfast taking place, do parents want to come? In a word, NO. No way, I’m busy, I’m washing my hair, I’m running for the hills as we speak. Contending with the school run is enough but now THIS? Why, why whyyyyyyy (OK, that’s many words but who’s counting?). I’m being a bit of a drama lama, but it’s fair to say that maths was my mortal enemy at school. I had a mental block against it, a virtual barrier big enough to rival the wall on Game of Thrones. As a creative and writerly child on the other side of the academic divide – and due in part to the uninspiring 80s curriculum and terrible teachers – maths made no sense to me from Infants right through to the bitter end when I was finally able to ditch it for A Levels. But it’s in the past, right? Well, I still wake up gasping for breath after anxiety dreams about failing my maths GCSE and having to re-sit it. I didn’t, I passed no problem, but the fear still lingers, tangibly, many decades on, somewhere in the murky depths of my subconcious. Obviously, as a mum I’d walk to the ends of the earth for my children, barefoot, on hot coals, apart from maybe during those moments when they spill yoghurt on the carpet, so of course I will go along to the maths workshop (there’s breakfast! Who in their right mind would say no to that?) And clearly, primary maths is a BREEZE *side eye* but when we hit the tricky stuff I’ll be pushing them in the direction of their dad, shouting ‘You do the math(s)!’. A related question, has anyone ever, ever in the history of the world used trigonometry in everyday life past GCSE? What is the point? I digress. This realisation that I will be a no help for any maths homework has made me calculate the other gaps in my parenting skillset. Other things I’m terrible at include: Being naturally enthusiastic and energetic first thing in the morning, especially on those days when I’ve had nearly six years of broken sleep Anything involving going outside when it’s cold, getting muddy or where there’s a potential to get my hair wet…I know motherhood is supposed to involve being at one with mud and rolling in leaves down mountains while waving ferns and wholeheartedly embracing the great outdoors, but you know Having patience past 9pm, or from the hours of 2am-4am. But then thinking about it we always give ourselves a hard time as parents, don’t we? We never remember the things we are good at, for which no-one else would ever be a substitute. And there are millions and millions of things, from the basic feeding-sleeping-keeping-them-alive to all the others, like being a human climbing frame to telling great stories with all the voices and holding a mean kitchen disco and giving of a million hugs and unconditional love to being a maker-uper of the silly songs that soundtrack your life. Oh, and a constant fetcher of snacks. Top of my parenting ‘to do’ list is to make sure I don’t pass on any of my own numbers-based neuroses on to either of my children. Which is working, as E seems to love maths at the moment, the wonderful weirdo, so let’s hope that continues. And I also figure that you can’t be good at everything. There’s always Google, the almighty CBeebies, Percentage Calculator and calculators on phones. And, and, there’s also the best and most useful parenting skill of all – winging it. For everything else, to paraphrase Busted, That’s What They Go to School For. More posts…everything you’ll obsess about in the first year of school and everything I’ve learned from primary school so far

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How Find Local Playgroups And Love Them: A Ten Point Plan

Gillian — Thu, 21 Sep 2017 04:02:00 +0000

How to Find Local Playgroups You Love: A Ten Point Plan Here’s how to find local playgroups you love…but first, where do you stand on playgroup? Like the park, teething and absolutely no sleep it’s one of the recurring features of early parenting life that’s as old as time. And one that parents seem to love or hate. Playgroups: Love Them Or Hate Them? It’s also the marmite of the baby and toddler world. You really do either love it or hate it. Or hate and love it. Or hate it while still dragging everyone along anyway in the hope of a hot cup of tea and that holy grail of stay-at-home-mumlife, some adult conversation that’s not the ASOS delivery man. I’m not talking about baby yoga, or Gymboree, or baby fern wafting and weaving, or any of the lovely and sedate baby groups you pay through the nose for and go along to for you, where you basically spend two seconds doing an activity and the rest feeding or talking dramatically about your labour, again. Our Experiences Of Playgroups, Good And Bad I’m talking playgroup proper, as in church hall and singing and a couple of toys (I just typed ‘church hell’ – Freudian?!). My first experience of playgroup as a parent was a couple of months in. I accidentally went to the wrong room at a community centre while looking for labour chat at lovely, quiet baby yoga. I walked into the local playgroup instead. My eyes widened. There were loads of exhausted parents lining the walls sneaking peeks at their phones while toddlers ran around manically, throwing brightly coloured plastic things and screaming. I was horrified. It looked so…brutal..so primal! I gasped. Was that what it was really like? Surely MY lovely baby would never be like that? I backed away and tried to block it out. A year and a half later we’d just moved house and despite only moving a little bit down the hill, it was a different area and I didn’t know anyone. Newly pregnant, I felt isolated and alone, and had a super-active toddler bouncing off the walls wanting to be entertained, adding to my guilty and hormonal woes. Deciding playgroup was the way forward, I found one online that was vaguely local and went along. Firstly, the door opened and everyone stared at us, like a film. Once inside, no-one talked to us. The toys were awful and thrown about. I was too pregnant for tea. I felt like everyone was friends apart from us. We both hated it. E went in for a danger nap on the bus in the time I needed to work. I came home and cried (told you I was hormonal). But we persisted and got there in the end. Why Should You Take Your Child To Playgroup? Why? It’s a time-kill and a time-fill. They are cheap. They keep everyone busy and gets everyone out of the house. There are other children and other adults, which is a lifeline when you’re deep in the depths of SAHM-world. And everyone needs a lifetime supply of small child-made crafts you can’t ever throw away. We now go to a couple each week that we really love / like in varying degrees that are warm and welcoming and well-run. Like most of parenting it seems like such a small thing, but it can be a big one. Firstly, How to Find A Local Playgroup Near You: Look online – look on messageboards such as Mumsnet, or local Facebook groups Ask other mums Ask at your child’s nursery or doctor’s surgery Look on church hall message boards at websites (they often take place here) Look for ones organised by places such as the NCT (who also hold NCT classes). Here’s How To Love Playgroups: Once you’ve found playgroups, here;s how to see if you like them AND make yourself love them. So here’s how to win at playgroup, a ten point plan: Make yourself actually go: This is half the battle. When you don’t know anyone, it can seem too intimidating to rock up to an unknown place full of people you’ve never met and a baby you’re only just getting to know. The big effort is getting out of the house (espeically when it takes so long to leave the house with small children). But you’ll never know how bad – or good – it is if you don’t try. Kiss a lot of playgroup frogs to find your playgroup prince: To find one you like, you might have to go to some you don’t like. We did actually go back to our first local playgroup. It didn’t get better. We also found another one that was pretty terrible. Until we actually found ones we really liked, where we still go. Judge it on the food choices: I half-jest, but we now go to toast playgroup and biscuit playgroup, named for…well, you’ve guessed it. It’s a big draw when you’re two and your mum won’t let you have white bread at home. Why isn’t there pizza and prosecco playgroup? That should totally be a thing. Also, judge it on the tea. Anywhere with ‘adult’ biscuits is on to a winner. Realise it’s less intimidating than you think: Often, it can seem like you know no-one and everyone knows everyone. But I think a lot of the time people aren’t talking to anyone, they’re being dragged around by their child who wants to be pushed around on the bike on the other side of the room. Again. Take one for the team: If your child likes it, that’s 90% of the battle. Does it keep them occupied? Most importantly, does it exhaust them enough for that all-important post-playgroup nap? Don’t judge the parents, too quickly: A lot of the anti-playgroup sentiment I read is that people who go aren’t mums like you. But they are full of mums, like you. No-one’s going to wear leather-look leggings, a flowered maxi dress […]

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Help! What happened to my taste in music?

Gillian — Fri, 23 Jun 2017 04:30:20 +0000

Last week a friend sent me an email, offering a spare gig ticket she had. Which was lovely… …but I had NO IDEA who the artist in question was. None. I had to look up their current hit on Spotify, but even then, I was clueless. I had never heard of them, let alone heard them and had an opinion on whether I liked them or not. What happened to my taste in music? Where did it go? We recently googled the Glastonbury line-up as I had no idea who was playing (still not much of a clue, now). After suffering two years wading around the festival knee-deep in mud in my teens, I now love watching Glastonbury from the comfort of my sofa. In fact it’s my favourite thing to snooze to over the summer. But I can guarantee I’ll spend much of the weekend saying ‘Who?’ I’m pretty sure I couldn’t name many, if any, of the current artists in the current Top 40. Is the Top 40 even a thing? Aren’t these things you’re supposed to just instinctively know? I know one of the signs of getting old is your musical taste, well, maturing, but seriously, how has this happened? I reckon this one is 100% on having children. Let’s look at the evidence: Before babies: I used to listen to music all the time, from the office stereo through to gigs and pubs and always, always had my headphones on (forgetting my headphones was enough to ruin my whole commute) Post-babies: I don’t really go out anymore, especially not to gigs (mainly due to the fear of this). And I never have headphones in even within ten feet of my child (mainly due to fear of this, clearly, because I should be too busy enthusiastically mouthing the words of nursery rhymes at them instead, especially when they are an oblivious newborn). Even when they’re in bed, all I want to listen to is the blissful sound of silence. But, but, we always have music on in the background in the day (thanks Alexa! You make listening to music really easy when my hands are full of the joys of toddler-grappling). The big difference is now, I don’t pick any of it. It’s my children doing the DJing. The big difference is now, I don’t pick any of it. It’s my children doing the DJing. So here are my top five music choices currently beinglistened to, as dictated by my children: TV theme tunes: Coming in at number five, we have children’s TV theme tunes. Catchier than a cold at an epic teenage snogging contest. TV theme tunes are the eternal parenting earworm. Paw Patrol, Topsy and Tim, My Pet and Me (My pet, my pet and meeeeee. sorry / not sorry). While not something you’d fire up on Spotify, you hear them frequently. And hear them once, never get rid of them. Film soundtracks: I LOVE film soundtracks as they are as entertaining as watching the film with none of the screen-time guilt. Film soundtracks are a mum’s best friend and should be a secret weapon in the parenting arsenal. Frozen, Star Wars, Muppets, Trolls, all great soundtracks. But once you’re in the grip of that particular soundtrack, it’s all you hear. Forever. The occasional current hit: Me before children: ‘My children will listen to my music choices and they will learn to love them!’ Me after: ‘ Haha.’ However, I can sneak a newish-to-them song in at a rate of about one a year. A recent example of this is Ed Sheeran’s Shape of You. although a recent occasion when my five-year-old was singing ‘The cluuuuuuub isn’t the best place to find a lover’ in the aisles of our local Co-op did make me question my parenting strategies somewhat. Our house currently dances to the beat of the ‘Oh, Jeremy Corbyn chant’ and I sang my daughter to sleep with it. Does that count? Power pop and dodgy disco: We listen to a lot of Katy Perry, Taylor Swift, all the predictable and saccharine usuals. And *then* there’s the really, really dreadful ones. Remember Blue? No, not the boy band but *that* song by Eiffel 65 that was played at every single student disco everywhere. Did you know they ALSO released music that wasn’t Blue Da Ba Deee? Yep, we’ve heard their entire back catalogue. Then there’s Gangnam Style….oh Gangnam Style. Has over 60 million views on YouTube, most of them from our house. The Moana Soundtrack: What can I say, expect…Coming in at number one with an entry all of its own is our current favourite. I don’t mean to sound like a broken record about film soundtracks, but this is the one. More infectious than a small child with chicken pox, this bad boy has it all. Rousing, big numbers. Heartfelt, emotional solos. It’s pretty fresh for us as we’ve only listened to it eleventy billion times. Yet. But, embarrassingly, I think I actually do love it as much as the children. YOU’RE WELCOME. However, a bonus track. We’re ALWAYS singing. My children haven’t yet realised that I can’t, in fact, sing. Finding not one but two people to do harmonies with you is an unexpectedly brilliant side effect of parenting that no-one tells you about in NCT (and one of the great things about saying bye bye to the baby days). No, you’re the one getting funny looks in the shop. No, YOU’RE welcome.

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24 things I don’t have time for as a mum (and three things I do)

Gillian — Thu, 20 Apr 2017 04:30:52 +0000

They say the days are long but the years are short when they are a parent, but what they DON’T say is that despite some days actually being longer than time itself, you never have time for anything. (Who are they exactly, and why are they always saying these annoying things?) The myth of the ‘busy mum’ is an advertisers dream; I actually read an article the other day about ‘mothers who are addicted to being busy.’ Who are these people and how is that even a thing?! But despite all my disdain for this concept, it is indeed true that I do never seem to have any time or any hands-free time to get things done, because both of mine are busy juggling life and work and jobs and baby wrangling and toddler grappling and snack fetching all at once. So I’ll cut to the chase and keep this short; here’s 24 things I don’t have time for (in terms of both physical time and patience). And to balance things out, three things I always do: Sleep…just kidding! I always have time for that, it’s just there’s never any time for it People who get more sleep than me and moan about it. People who say ‘cherish every minute’ when they’re small and you’re so so very tired Haircuts. Not because of the childcare juggle or terrible haircut possibility, but the risk that the hairdresser will make small talk and ruin the potential for 60 blissfully uninterrupted minutes of nothingness apart from trying not to stare at your oddly shaped cape face in the mirror Parental judgement from all angles. YES Netflix, we are still watching Peppa Pig Buffering, especially on Netflix during crucial moments in the Peppa-marathon Terrible parenting advice. Especially from TV channels Leaving the house, on time Replying to texts: I don’t want to reply immediately or I’ll seem too keen. Anything I don’t reply to immediately gets forgotten about since baby brain and months of mega tiredness borrowed my short and long term memory. It’s the eternal bad mum memory mobile catch 22 Replying to emails: See above, and my inbox Small talk Me time General elections. I’m with Brenda on this one Going to bed early. Because the post-bedtime evening time is so deliciously precious it would be a crying shame to waste it. And because there’s always time for ‘one more pointless scroll through the entire internet’ and oh, wait, someone’s awake again This Life without a washing machine. Ours broke the Thursday before Easter meaning it couldn’t be fixed for four days. Our house resembled a washing wasteland while outside was the perfect mix of sunny and windy, taunting me with the washing-drying potential Queueing – I now spend my time in any queue wound up like a spring, waiting for one of my children to get bored or run off. Pleeease go quickly… Waiting for things, especially not in queues Waiting for TV that’s not on demand. I have about an hour, post-bedtime, to watch one thing before I fall asleep. We’re currently obsessed with Designated Survivor, a Netflix show that’s now cruelly only on once a week. I’m finding this very hard to deal with Waiting for children’s TV that’s not on demand. A difficult concept to explain because most of it is and also because I clearly can’t deal with it, see 16 Ironing. Who has time for that? I have so much time for iron-free school uniform. Mainly because I’m not even 100% sure where the iron is Waiting for Victoria Station to have step free access. By the time they install a lift, our pram days will be past us Waiting till lunchtime. Is it a second breakfast if you eat at 11.30? Who knows! How quickly time goes. Like this. Hold your babies tightly because the years really are short, it is heartbreakingly true. Things I do have time for as a mum: Waiting, child free. I had to go for a routine blood test recently, one that I’d put off for a year but felt obliged to go to after yet another sinisterly threatening letter from the doctors. Somehow, I managed to wrangle this child-free. I got there and was number 98 in a queue with a waiting time of about two hours. OH BRILLIANT I thought huffily, but then…OH WAIT. I sat down and relaxed. I looked at my phone without fear of judgement. I looked again, I stretched out my legs luxuriously. The clock ticked by slowly. It was great Hairdressers who don’t talk. I struck gold at my last appointment. I played hairdresser roulette and won. I’m scared to go back now; I’ll clearly never be that lucky again Sleep, at any time. Even standing up. More posts…six parenting skills I have yet to master..and brilliant benefits of being the second-born

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Six parenting skills I have yet to master

Gillian — Thu, 13 Apr 2017 08:24:13 +0000

Parenting, to coin a phrase from Liam Neeson in Taken, requires a very particular set of skills, ones you hone over your long parenting career. And although it’s less about hunting down the baddies at gunpoint and more about snack fetching and toddler grappling, the skill syllabus for mum life is constantly changing. As soon as you become an expert swaddler it’s instantly all about weaning. You might have sleep down, finally, but those learnings are no use when it comes to negotiating everyone out of the sweet aisle unharmed. Six years ago this month I found out I was pregnant for the first time. Six years! Which means we are now a long way down the parenting path and nout of the baby days and have started primary school and everything. Which seems like ages and I’ve learned a lot, quickly – considering I was pretty clueless about most things when they handed the baby over – but some days, it seems like I still know nothing (some days it’s still slightly surreal that these two children are actually mine). In terms of parenting skills, there are still so many things I have yet to master… The (good) group photo: What’s the secret to getting everyone to look good at once in photos? It’s tricky and obviously gets trickier the more children you add into the mix. There’s usually a half-second of shot potential before it all goes wrong. Even on the best photos, someone always has their eyes shut or is hurtling out of shot. Usually me. The chances of getting all four of us in one are non-existent. I’d get a D in my Family Photography GCSE (but an A* for strategic use of the crop tool). Solo bedtime, for two: Two and a half years in I’m still clueless about how anyone does solo bedtime for two. How do you do it? No seriously, how do you do it? Luckily I don’t have to do it often, but having two children who go to sleep at about the same time and both need someone with them until they are fast asleep makes it tricky as there’s only one of me. Unless a sleepy freak of nature happens, everyone decamps to our bed with books and we hope for the best. Which means there is a high risk of me falling asleep with them too and then waking up with a jolt and a Topsy and Tim attached to my head. The stealth retreat: Although I know have secret ninja parenting skills somewhere, some of them are yet to materialise. The stealth retreat out of the toddler bed, room and down the landing without waking her up is one I still need to hone (despite practising it every single night). She can be more asleep than a stone yet still instinctively know I’m even contemplating leaving. And to keep me on my toes as I sneak out, different floorboards creek every single time. I often have to go back and back and there are many failed attempts to leave. I recently ate my dinner lying down, underneath her, on her bed and she’s two-and-a-half. For anyone who’s beating themselves up over ‘my baby will only nap on me’ dilemmas. Being an instinctively wise person: Obviously, the more you do the more you know, but all the older generation of mums I know are so wise and know everything about everything. When do you just know these things? Does all this knowledge just appear? This week we all had holiday ice lollies for breakfast which was fun until the empty-stomach-sugar-rush hit. When will I learn? Parenting enthusiastically on a hangover: I used to function as a proper person with hangovers, mainly because I was hungover all the time. I had it down to a fine art, fine-tuned with maximum Fanta, carbs and a little bit of self-pity. But now it doesn’t get much better than this, even after about half a wine and despite downing ten pints of water. ‘Shall we have a nap?’ I can be heard to suggest before spend the day doing ‘quiet’ activities while texting horror face emojis to everyone I know. Luckily nights out are now a selective affair (defo no FOMO over here). Being a Pinterest mum: Being a ‘Pinterest Mum’ is shorthand for mums who create picture-perfect crafts and cooked creations with their children. It’s the pinnacle of all smugly beautiful-looking crafty photos you see on Pinterest. If I had a glue gun for every time I saw someone apologetically say ‘I’m not a Pinterest Mum…’ while talking about their less-than-perfect crafts…but here’s the thing. Hearing that makes me really sad. We do a lot of crafts and artwork in our house because of a) my children love it and b) it keeps everyone occupied. It’s never perfect and nor would I expect it to be, because children are children and don’t always colour in the lines or stick in the right section. Gloriously wonky creations are what it’s all about. I often get the paints out reluctantly and then spend all day getting them out of the sofa cushions, but it’s the thought that counts. I don’t think the ‘Pinterest Mum,’ is a skill that actually exists outside of glossy lifestyle photography. And if does, then I don’t want to learn it. I guess the point of this post is that even if you think you know something, there’s always something about which you know nothing. And the need for parenting skills change so quickly it’s impossible to keep up. In short NO-ONE EVER KNOWS FULLY WHAT THEY ARE DOING. So don’t worry. We’re all just winging it, to the blissful best of our abilities. More posts…things they DON’T tell you in NCT classes…if baby milestone cards were made for mums and to all the less-than-perfect parents

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20 Tips For Second Time Mums

Gillian — Fri, 24 Mar 2017 10:26:32 +0000

Here Are 20 Tips For Second Time Mums Here are 20 tips for second time mums…What is the best and most useful advice for second-time mums, and mums of two? It struck me after writing advice for my friend the first-time mum that second-time mums probably need it more; especially when the main type of comment you get when you are pregnant for the second time is ‘YOU’LL have your hands full, won’t you?’ Accompanied by the head tilt and the teeth-tsk. Which is always great, isn’t it? So helpful. Especially as it comes at a time when you’re pregnant and exhausted and have a baby on board and a most likely a toddler in tow and are coping with tantrums and potty training and everything else as well as growing a baby and you just want to have a nap but can’t because as a second-time pregnant woman as there’s a child to keep alive and snacks to fetch and things to carry so many things to do and you can’t quite imagine what it’s going to be like with two children when you’re only just about holding it together with one. So with even the Duchess of Cambridge – who has a whole palace of help – admitting being a mum of two is hard, here are 20 tips for second-time mums: 20 Tips: Advice For Second Time Mums Devise a shower strategy: There’s nothing worse than trying and failing to have a shower all day because you are constantly baby wrangling with both hands to make you feel, well, rubbish. This is where you need a fail-safe shower strategy. Have one before your partner goes to work. Have one in the evening but get dressed as soon as you can in the morning. Bring the toddler toys in to the bathroom while the baby is in a bouncy chair. Whatever works; devise a strategy that’ll set you up for the day and not leave you answering the door at lunchtime in your dressing gown. Not like that ever happened to me…*side eye*. 2. Make sure you allow yourself time to recover. You might feel great after the birth (or you might not) but you still need to take it easy even though there’s an older child to consider. Accept all the help you can! 3. Childcare is a good weapon to have in your arsenal, The older child will be entertained by someone who’s not a knackered new mum and you’ll get some quality time alone with the baby. We kept up our usual two nursery days even when I went on maternity leave and it worked, well 4. And don’t feel guilty about deploying it. It helps everyone! 5. Playdates are where it’s at All that time spent sitting in coffee shops when you have your first child? Won’t happen second-time round or if they do, they will be much less peaceful when you have two to contend with. So playdates are where it all happens – either at your own or other people’s houses as it means you can still sit around and feed / look after the baby while the older child plays. And drink loads of tea. 6. Find a playgroup One you don’t hate and actually make an effort to go, every week, as soon as you can, unlike me. It gets everyone out of the house and is entertainment for the older child that is not soft play horrors. 7. Leave the house every day And on that note, in spite of this try to leave the house at least once a day, preferably as soon as you can in the morning to avoid everyone having a dull day meltdown at home. If you don’t have a reason to leave the house, make one up (like all of these). Or just go and run around in the garden for ten minutes. 8. The do-nothing naptime Two simultaneously napping children is the holy grail. Embrace it if it happens and do absolutely nothing. If child 1 has recently dropped the nap it might seem like a long long day. Use the old nap time instead to have ‘quiet time’ to give yourself a bit of a break. Or let them watch TV (it’s OK). 9. TV is OK. Embrace CBeebies And yes, TV is OK. Find some non-annoying TV programmes / channels without adverts, such as CBeebies. 10. Don’t count the hours of sleep you didn’t get. You’ll never get it back. There are much less opportunities to ‘sleep when the baby sleeps’ second time as usually the toddler will wake up just as the baby sleeps, it’s the law. Having realistic expectations around baby sleep helps, too (it also helps if you had a bad sleeper first time). Go to bed when they do at least once a week. 11. Do what works for you We had a SnuzPod co-sleeper cot and ended up mainly with all of us co-sleeping just because it was the way we all got more sleep (P.S. if you’re upsizing your bed, go for the super king! We only went for the king which I still regret). 12. Encourage independence in your older child Teach the older child where the healthy snacks *cough* biscuit tin *cough* is kept is so they can help themselves when you have your hands full. 13. Slings are a complete godsend Especially for naps in the sling so you have your hands free to do everything else for the toddler. 14. Let it go, let it go Remember all that time you spent obsessing about everything first time? Yeah, it won’t happen with the second. The Wonder Weeks app was practically my bible first time round yet I barely opened it the second (mainly because I knew babies are developmentally grizzly most of the time). I absolutely loved the baby days second-time mainly because I was much more relaxed about everything. 15. Don’t expect your two children to play together For a long while. It might take years, […]

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12 Pieces Of Advice For New Mums You NEED To Know

Gillian — Wed, 01 Mar 2017 04:50:59 +0000

Here Are 12 Pieces Of Advice For New Mums To Know Aka What I Wish People Had Told Me When I Had A Baby! Here are 12 pieces of advice for new mums…aka what I wish people had told me when I had a baby. Because a couple of my friends are having babies, which is lovely in the way it always is when your friends have babies (Look, it’s a new baby! All of the new baby excitement and loveliness! That new baby smell!). But it also means there’s none of the mind-melding brain-fog of ecstatic sleeplessness overlayed by the irrational fear that a bird is going to fly in through the window and take the baby hostage*, along with the never-ending ride on the hair-raising postnatal emotional rollercoaster, with happy joy followed with the deep panic that you have no idea what you’re doing and are going to break them and why am I crying again?!. For you, at least. This is me as a new mum (brain fogged up to the max with all the windows shut. Also looking and feeling tired, but blissfully happy, clueless, terrified, happy, clueless about what I’m feeling again. And look, tiny baby!). Thinking Back To The Baby Days: First Time Mum Tips I Wish I’d Known Thinking about people having new babies and looking back on the early days of new motherhood is funny as my – youngest – baby is growing up at such a rapid rate that I’m pretty sure she has her driving test next week, so there’s a lot of distance between us and that time. So I’ve not been the panicked new mum for quite some time, but in light of my friends having babies, I’ve been thinking about advice for new mums, the first time mum tips and advice you’d give your friends about the early baby days. (In theory! No-one wants unwanted parenting advice – especially as you spend a lot of time in that duel state of rejecting any unwanted parenting advice and, oh wait, desperately Googling everything). So what advice would you give your best friends about the early baby days? Here’s twelve thoughts that stick out from me: Here Are 12 First Time Mum Tips No-one knows what they’re doing. This is the best piece of advice for new mums. As it’s true! Especially not at first. Or much later on, to be fair. With the benefit of all the hindsight it is easy to look back and see how I was clueless about many things to do with babies. But it wasn’t just me and it’s not just you. Everyone’s winging it. Some people are just better at hiding it than others. Day three is THE WORST. Day three is the hormonal comedown, where the midwives tell you that you might feel a bit tearful. However, in reality you feel like the bottom has dropped out of your world and the lights have been switched off. It does get better, though. It all gets better. It’s OK to feel however you feel about childbirth, However it was and however that is. I had two vaguely similar births (here and here). But after the first I felt shellshocked and after the second I felt like a superhero. It helps to talk about it, mainly over wine with your NCT friends for years and years after. It’s so important to talk about childbirth. Be your own worst critic. You will be, anyway. The media is full of all the divisive motherhood debates on which you must pick a side and be desperately offended by and judgemental of anyone else who does the opposite thing, be it breast vs bottle, co-sleeping vs cot, stay at home vs not. But in reality, most mums don’t care about the things other mums do (if they are anything like me they are more worried about getting away with yesterday’s jeans again, how many packs of emergency baby wipes will fit in the nice small bag or why you accidentally bought the ‘tropical’ dry shampoo and your hair vaguely smells like a pina colada). But you will judge yourself more harshly on all of these choices than almost anyone else will. So make sure you make ones you are happy with. But celebrate your good acts, too. Even if on some days the only thing to celebrate is getting dressed. it will still seem like a mum milestone. Please take this piece of advice for new mums. Ignore all the people who tell you to ignore the housework. *You* ignore it – but get someone else to do it. Sitting in an untidy house can really get you down. You probably won’t drop the baby. Or break them by changing them. Even though, you know, it feels like it. Front fastening babygros are key here. From now on you’re never alone. Relish those single loo trips while all the visitors are around to hold the baby. But despite this it can get pretty lonely as some days you don’t speak to any grown-ups all day apart from the ASOS delivery man, who in return will tell you his entire life story every single time you see him. Babies are brilliant but don’t really have the best bedside chat until they get older (and then they never stop talking which is still brilliant but a special kind of exhausting and brilliant). Go outside. Even if it takes forever to leave the house, fresh air makes everything better. It’s OK to be a less-than-perfect mum. And I bet you are doing a much better job than you think. Most of parenting can be summed up by this question and answer ‘Is it just me?’ About everything, from breastfeeding struggles to the nightsweats to teething to baby sleep to baby brain. And the good news is the answer is ‘it’s not just you.’ About everything. Honestly. You don’t have to do up every popper on the babygro. Especially not in the middle of the night. Or when you’re […]

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The going rate for the tooth fairy, and other questions

Gillian — Fri, 10 Feb 2017 04:13:45 +0000

A question I found myself Googling just before Christmas: what’s the going rate for the tooth fairy? Along with when should children’s baby teeth start to fall out? And is four too early to lose teeth? (And the answers: see below, from around now and it’s early but fine, apparently!) Motherhood is full of surprises. Like the transformative ability to function as a normal person on next-to-no sleep. And how you develop no shame about singing, loudly, in public, surrounded by other people. When previously it was only ever something you’d do on the tail end of a night out and after sampling at least half of the bar. But E’s first tooth falling out, without much warning, during her school play, six weeks shy of her fifth birthday, is right up there in my motherhood surprise hall of fame. I blame Topsy and Tim (as always). I’m pretty sure we watched an episode where they went to the dentist – Tim, naturally, was scared – and the dentist told them that their teeth would fall out when they were ‘older’ (which I figured was about six). I parked the whole wobbly tooth thing in a brain compartment marked ‘do not think about for a couple of years.’ The tooth surprise announcement seemed to tap in to a deep teeth-related pool of mum-anxiety I had, based on the classic teeth-falling-out anxiety dreams through to the worry that we’d not quite tried hard enough on all those toothbrush chases. But turns out it was just a normal baby tooth falling out, at an early-but-normal age. And she was absolutely fine about it (and completely thrilled by the idea of the tooth fairy paying a visit). It’s funny how everything comes full circle so quickly, isn’t it? It doesn’t seem like a few minutes since my tiny baby started teething. Looking back this was one of the many baby things I obsessed about, from cutting the first tooth to the last tooth (I still stand by this – ten things that are worse than teething). So what’s the going rate for the tooth fairy? Opinions I gathered ranged from 2op through to actual paper money (there’s 20 of those little guys! Seems a slippery slope to bankruptcy). What does the tooth fairy do in your house? In the end we went for a happy medium of £1 and a tiny written note. We = the tooth fairy, of course. More posts…post-natal depletion (do you have it?) and things they don’t tell you in NCT classes

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