This Year's Birthday

Hello, it's been a while and we have a lot of catching up to do!

I'm now 37 weeks pregnant and on maternity leave. The last few weeks have been spent frantically trying to make space in the house for another child. There have been countless trips to the tips, to charity shops, much selling on eBay and Gumtree, a fair bit of belly aching about being hoarders and regretting it now... Endless sorting out of rooms and old possessions, some of which was unsettling but mostly liberating. And then there's the decorating... Yes I've been rather busy, in fact I can't seem to stop and just relax - I feel like there's so much to do, even though we're actually nearly there.

Also during this time I turned the grand old age of 38. I needed a more sedate birthday this year and managed to spread it out over a few days, spending one afternoon having afternoon tea and making Soft Pots with friends (click here to learn more about soft pots, because they're fab!) and then another having a family picnic at a miniture railway - which my little boy loved of course.

Dinner with an old foe

I am a firm believer in surrounding yourself with the right people, and gently removing people from your life who don’t support you, cause you pain, drain you, turn you into a raving lunatic who wants to explode at the mere mention of their name… I believe in forgiveness, but I also believe you have to let those people go for the sake of your health.

But how do you do that when said person is the wife of one of your husband’s closest friends, and who has ingratiated herself into your circle of friends? That’s the part I’m struggling with.

I had a rant about the person in question here.

I wish her no harm, in fact I wish her well. Genuinely. But I don’t want her in my life. There have been too many lies. Too many times she has driven me half insane with her behaviour. And believe me, I have tried for years to make things work; to find common ground, to focus on the good, to understand her and put myself in her shoes. Literally years. But I can’t do anymore. When I see her on a regular basis it turns me into someone I don’t like, I dwell on things she does, I moan about her, I bitch behind her back. It eats me up. It poisons me.

The Introverted Mummy

I've been struggling with how to write this post for a while. It's a tricky one to verbalise.

You see I’ve always known I was an introvert, but I kind of expected myself to behave differently as a mother, to force myself to behave how a mother "should" behave and just not be introverted somehow. I struggled and it had a knock on effect on my confidence.

Nursery - the first few weeks

So yes, Taters has now officially started nursery. And what with speech delay issues and his general clinginess I was really rather worried. The nursery has been utterly amazing though at helping him settle in and because of them he’s really enjoying going. I’m thrilled to bits.

A Weekend in Sunny Scarborough

We took Taters on his first proper trip to the seaside at the weekend, to Scarborough to be precise. I love Scarborough, generations of my family have gone on holiday there and I spent many summers there as a child. I remember the Tree Walk through Peasholm park, all the fairy lights strung in lines between the trees, the loud bangs of the navel battles with the model boats on the boating lake, riding on the miniature steam train, fish and chips covered in salt and vinegar on the harbour, dodging the waves that crash onto the pavement near the north bay, the bright flashing lights of the arcades. 

Escaping the Shit Vortex

How I plan to get out of here by Suzanne Crawford

So we’ve established that right now I have some lovely big old challenges heading my way in the future.  Or to put it bluntly, I’m facing financial ruin.

I try to keep strong, but it is a fight to keep positive when it feels like you’re living in a shit vortex! Yes, once that vortex is spinning it keeps pulling more and more shit towards it, and you can’t seem to catch a break. Welcome to my life right now!

The shit magnet strikes again

The Inland Revenue

I think the universe has it in for me. Seriously.

I’ll try to sum it up in a nutshell.  My husband works for the family business, the family business is struggling – I don’t know how it can possibly survive current events but you never know. We have a substantial amount of money tied up in the business and if the business goes, so does the money. So it’s more than just my husband’s job that’s at stake, to cut to the chase it’s also our home…

With my job unlikely to continue beyond March next year, we’ve been going out of our minds with worry, imagining all the doom and gloom scenarios, tearing our hair out and generally feeling like the world is coming to an end.

Money money money...

I have to make a gallant effort to clear my overdraft this month. After the miscarriage I went through a “fuck it” attitude to spending money and spent money I didn’t have. I couldn’t even tell you what I spent it on, I seem to have nothing to show for it. Yet I’m still trying to claw it back. So this month should be fun, can I live on £30 a week? I’m about to find out. If I can, then I can clear my overdraft in one month and that would be great, then I can go back to living on my usual pittance in July.

Another Goodbye

Reunited

Last week was my Aunty’s funeral. It was a bittersweet death, and not at all unexpected, she’d suffered from Alzheimer’s since she had a stroke in 2010 and had been in decline ever since. She also lost her husband unexpectedly last October and I don't think she wanted to live anymore, not like that anyway. It was hard to see someone I greatly admired reduced from the strong, independent woman I knew, to a silent and frail, disheveled old lady. Alzheimer's is a cold, harsh illness.

To move or not to move?

Sugar Free Baking – Attempt 2

Mmmmn, lumpy......

Yes, following the disaster that was my sugar free gingerbread men, I picked myself up and decided to try my hand at sugar free buns instead. Once again honey was my sugar-alternative of choice, and once again the results were, well, not all that I would hope for. The mixture itself looked more like greasy porridge and whereas with normal buns part of the joy is helping yourself to left over mixture, I just couldn’t bring myself to even try it!

It's a new dawn, it's a new day, it's a new life...

I’ve been finding myself obsessing over things lately; having another baby, moving houses. I can’t seem to stay in the moment, I’ve got myself convinced that if I only had this, this and that everything then life would be grand. Except it would it? Really?

Up Yours 2012!

Well, Christmas has been and gone and I must say I’m rather relieved it’s over. And if that makes me sound like some kind of Scrooge then I really don’t care, I’ve had enough of the pressure to be jolly and if I have to read one more Facebook update about how magical and ‘just simply wonderful’ it all is, I think I may even throw up.

The Working Mother's Dilemma

Then

Scratching around to find work to do when you know management are looking to make cuts, well, it’s not the ideal situation to find yourself in. And I’ve been there for the last year. I’ve tried hard to make myself useful and find a way to make a difference, while at the same time trying not to make it too obvious I had very little to do, and it’s been so tricky. I’ve run the gauntlet of emotions, fear of being made redundant, frustration at finding myself unable to make an impact, anger at being ignored, feeling deceitful about pretending to look busy, then paranoid people were pointing the finger and trying to catch me out. It made me lose self respect and turn on myself, blaming myself for not being dynamic enough and not rising to the challenge. It's been time to go for a long time, but finding a decently paid part time job is no easy feat right now and so I've been plugging away, taking on whatever project I could, volunteering for everything going and trying to look busy when I'm not.

The Significance of Insignificance

I’m becoming more and more aware of the fact that I’m an overly positive person; I try ridiculously hard to find the best in people, I do my best to be ultra nice to people and make everyone happy, I live and breathe to please everyone else. And I seem to have myself convinced that the world is a better place and human beings are much nicer creatures than is actually true.

And tonight, for one night only...

Four days late… four days late. That’s just not playing fair! A lot can go through your head in four days. I was beginning to get excited, the little day dreams had cautiously started, I might have even patted my belly in a maternal way. Boo! Just boo!

The Return of the Nerves

I am actually sitting here shaking with nerves. Why? Because I have a driving lesson in half an hour. I’m trying to tell myself how ridiculous this is but my body seems determined to force the fear on me anyway, no matter what my head tells it. I can’t believe I still get this way, I’ve had over 20 lessons now and I can actually handle a car just fine – I can get up and down the gears, I don’t stall consistently at junctions anymore, I live in what has to be one of the hilliest areas of the country, so while hill starts are tricky, I’m not totally freaked out by them, I know what I’m doing on a roundabout now… so what on earth am I scared of? I think I’m panicking just out of habit. I’ve become like one of Pavlov’s dogs, only my reaction is to descend into panic the moment I hear the words, “Driving lesson!” There is no longer a justifiable reason to react that way.

Rock of Ages - Still Rolling...

It was our wedding anniversary at the weekend and so we left Taters with his grandparents and took a trip out to the cinema. Just being in the cinema is a treat in itself since it’s not something we indulge in too often these days, but the film we saw, Rock of Ages, my god I loved it!

Itchy feet

What is it about me that can’t stay in one place for more than five years? I’ve been in my current home 6 years now and the urge to move has been gathering strength for some time now. My theory is that people evolve every five years or so, 30 years of age is a different place to 25, just as 35 feels different to 30. When I moved here I was 29, newly wed and child free. I maybe should have been but actually wasn’t even thinking about children, I just presumed I’d stay young forever, naturally. So what suited me then isn’t such a good fit now.

Time management for the lazy wife

Like most mums I often feel rather overstretched (hehe, this sounds like the beginning of an advert!) After a day spent either at work or caring for Taters, once his bath is out of the way and I’ve finally managed to convince him to go to sleep (often a lengthy process) there isn’t much time left for anything else.  Once tea is prepared and eaten and the house is tidied, chores are completed: there’s little time and energy left for anything other than a  slump in front of the TV, perhaps a bath and then bed.