A milestone

I was lucky enough to make some really good friends through Mother's Group.  Unfortunately we don't get to join the group regularly because of work but it's nice to know that I do have a support network if I need it.

One of the mama's mentioned a while ago that her sister had just found out that she had breast cancer.  I can't remember exactly how old she was but I'm sure she was only in her 30's - very young.  She was married with two small children.  She had a lumpectomy and was going through chemotherapy at that point but things weren't looking too good and unfortunately last week I found out that she had had lost her battle and had passed away.

I didn't even know this woman but my heart broke as soon as I read the message and tears welled up in my eyes.  It's such a horrible disease.  Years ago it seemed rare to know somebody who had cancer, but these days I can fill my hands counting the number of people that I know personally who have or have had cancer and it's scary.

For every heart breaking story you hear of somebody losing their battle though, thankfully through new treatment options and better diagnosis and awareness, these days you often hear an encouraging number of stories about tenacious survivors and I am proud to say that my mama is one of them.

Last week represented the third year since my mum's diagnosis with breast cancer. She had an appointment with her oncologist and was so pleased to report that she is still in remission.  He mentioned that with the type of cancer she had, if it was to return to another part of the body it would likely be within the first two years after diagnosis.  The risk of a return drops significantly after this point.  So we've reached a new milestone.  A very happy milestone indeed!  One that makes my heart burst with relief and joy.

I can still vividly remember mum telling me that she had cancer and the awful anxious feeling that washed over me and I could barely breathe.  I felt like I was choking.  Even now as I type this my throat is constricted in exactly the same way.  I can remember seeing her naked for the first time after losing both breasts as I helped to wash her, how vulnerable she looked and how hard it was not to cry in front of her.  And I can remember watching her hair fall to the ground as my dad shaved it off for her after she started chemo.

Along with these awful memories however, I am blessed to have had so many more wonderful memories with my mum since that time.  And so with the passing of one, and with the progressing of another, either way, today I am reminded to be thankful for all the blessings in my life.

Half way

Yesterday was the shortest day of the year which means that officially the days are going to start getting longer from here and I'm so happy about that.  The cold and the dark always bring me down and so during the colder months I start to lose my motivation for just about everything.  It's that little bit harder to get up in the morning and get myself ready for the day and I go to bed at a ridiculously early time at night because I just feel exhausted.  I'm in hibernation mode and I can't wait for the spring so that I can get back to my usual self.  I can't believe that we area already half way through the year.

I have no idea how the past three weeks passed me by so quickly but we've had a lot on our plate.

This is what's been going on:

***

The Queens Birthday long weekend came but it basically rained (poured actually) the whole time so we couldn't get out and about.  It was a nice excuse to stay at home with no specific agenda of things to do.  I'm a planner so I like to have everything mapped out, but this weekend I just switched off and went with the flow which meant staying in pyjamas until noon, watching movies on the couch, playing and reading lots of books with Ella, eating home cooked meals and just relaxing.  I should switch off more often I think.

***

Ella got her first cold which turned everything upside down.  It wasn't a really bad cold but she was miserable in general and wasn't sleeping well at all, which meant that Tim and I didn't get much sleep either.  During that time I seemed to grow an extra limb as she was always grabbing onto my leg and wanting to be picked up.  It was hard to get things done around the house but I relished her clinginess and need for hugs because Little Miss Independent isn't usually the snuggly type.

***

Sometimes when I am in a familiar place I don't actually take much notice of the things around me.  When Tim mentioned that there was some mould on our window from condensation I was surprised (and a little disgusted) as I'd never noticed it.  It forced me to take a good look around the rest of the house and I am not proud to say that it was actually pretty filthy.  I try to keep things tidy each day but it's hard to find the time to do a really good clean around the place.  The more I looked, the more dust and piles of papers I finally saw around the house and the more determined I was to do a good and proper clean. We took Ella to Tim's mum for the day so that I could concentrate just on getting everything done.  I was a woman on a mission and was ruthless. I cleaned the whole place top to bottom, scrubbed the floors, the skirting boards, washed the walls, filed all the papers that were piling up on the table, did a proper vacuum and moved all of the furniture out of the way so I could get to every corner, nothing was safe.  I was so proud when it was all done and felt so good about it.  But boy was I sore the next day!

Oh, so that's what my dining table looks like without three months worth
of mail and piles of paperwork all over it...

***

I've jumped on the Fifty Shades of Grey bandwagon.  After reading and hearing so much about it I thought I had to buy the book.  Ella and I went up to the shops one day, she got a new Giggle and Hoot book and mummy came home with an erotic novel!

Girlfriends reassured me that I wouldn't be sorry.  One friend's husband even commented that it   definitely did things for his sex life after his wife read it and was sure that in the next few months he'd be hearing a message from us to say that our little family would be expanding!

I am not a big reader.  I love the thought of it but rarely do I actually finish a book.  I get half way through, get bored, read the last page and then that's it.  There are probably at least 6 books on our bookshelf currently that I have started to read and haven't finished.  I've been trying to find the time to read this one though and spent a lot of the long weekend curled on the couch with it in my hands.  Sure, it's raunchy but I just can't seem to get into it.  I mean really, this girl is a virgin, hooks up with a guy who is into all sorts of kinky stuff and has a room dedicated inflicting pleasure and pain on his submissive but this doesn't scare her off.  She loses her virginity to him and has several orgasms on her first time in the process.  That sure wasn't like my first time!  Plus if the guy I was planning on losing my virginity to had a room full of whips, paddles and stretching tables I'd run a mile the other way.  

Maybe I should just see it for what it is, a little entertainment, rather than analyse it too much.  I am still turning the pages though and it hasn't ended up with those other half read books on the shelf at this stage.

***

We went to a wedding last weekend for a friend of Tim's.  Unfortunately it was teaming with rain the whole day but their spirits weren't dampened.  It reminded me of our wedding.  It poured the whole week before our wedding but miraculously it was sunny on the actual day, but then poured again the following day.  Somebody must have been watching out for us.  It reminded me again of how important marriage is and so I spooned Tim a little closer that night and have been trying really hard to make a conscious effort to connect with him.  It's hard when you work and have a little one, to concentrate on spending quality time with your partner but it's so important.

They had a photo booth at the wedding so we had fun taking silly pictures together.

***

The babies from my Mother's Group are all nearing the big '1' so we had a first birthday party for them all.  I was tasked with making the cake and somehow managed to find the time to do it between a day off work, a root canal and the wedding.  It was so nice to see the babies interact.  Since we can't make it to the weekly get together's because I'm back at work now it was nice for Ella to see all her little friends again.

That about sums it up.  It doesn't sound like much when I write it down but the last few weeks has been full!  Here's to a relaxing weekend and family time, and the days getting longer...and me getting my mojo back.

Ella...10 months old

This is you at 10 months Ella.  You are into everything you can get your hands on!  Pulling everything out of the drawers, pulling all the washing out of the basket, yanking the ironing piles onto the floor.  Everything but playing with your toys!

You scoot around on the furniture to get a better view of everything and are so curious of the world around you.  You have mastered standing on your own for a good 20 seconds at a time which I think is very impressive...and so do you!  When you do this you have a glimmer in your eye and a huge grin on your face as if this is the coolest thing to do ever.  I think you will be walking by the time you are one.

Nanny sings to you all the time.  All the old nursery rhymes that even I don't remember.  You love music and whenever you hear it you bob up and down happily.  You are also learning lots of hand actions to go with the nursery rhymes and songs.  We sing "Five little ducks" and you try to put your fingers up the way that we do to count the little ducks - you have mastered one and two.  I am trying to teach you to put up your finger when we say "How old are you going to be" but you always put two fingers up.  At least you'll be right next year!

This morning we brought you into bed with us because your bedroom was quite cold.  You lay contentedly next to me on the pillow having a bottle.  When you finished you looked me straight in the eyes, and then proceeded to projectile vomit it all over my face and into my mouth!  And it was strange, because it didn't really phase me.  I guess having kids desensitises you these kinds of things and it's true, once you have children you know the true meaning of unconditional love.  Even with the taste of sour milk in my mouth I thought you looked so cute lying on the pillow.

Straightening Out

I got my hair chemically straightened today!  Wahoo!  Big deal you are probably thinking but this is a major thing for me.

You see, I have wild hair.  You probably wouldn't think so from looking at photos of me because I actually straighten it with a GHD all the time.  To see me a la natural is not common - I actually resemble one of the Jackson 5 back in their heyday and give Foxy Brown a good run for her money too.

My dad has straight hair, mum's is slightly curly, but somehow when they got together and created my brother and I, a weird throw back gene gave us hair as kinky as Lady Gaga and Marilyn Manson put together.

I didn't get teased much at school, I made friends easily, but the one thing I did occasionally get teased about was my hair.  My nickname?  Toaster.  Why?  Because apparently I put a knife in the toaster and got electrocuted and that's what made my hair go fuzzy.  I pretty much just used to laugh this off and didn't let it get to me too much but there were times when I felt self conscious just like any teenager.  Looking back though, I had it easy, there were plenty of other kids who had it worse than I did.

I have straightened my hair with irons for years and years because it is just so much easier to manage.  On the odd occasion that people see me with my 'fro on, they always comment that they would love to have my hair and how cool it is.  But to me, this could not be further to the truth.  The minute my hair gets wet, it morphs into tiny kinky ringlety curls.  When it dries and I brush it, it expands and I start to look like fairy floss on a stick.  I can't just wash my hair in the morning and go.  I either have to tame it down as much as I can or straighten it and then tie it up.  Most of the time you will see me with a boring pony tail or bun but it's just so much easier.  Anything else is just too hard to manage and too time consuming.  And now that I have Ella, I don't have an hour each day, or every couple of days to straighten my hair after I wash it.

Tim and I had a holiday to Fiji a few years ago.  It was beautiful.  We went to a remote island where there was nothing to do but swim, snorkel, eat, drink or go and get massages from the spa at a ridiculously cheap price.  One day after I had become really sunburned I decided to treat myself to the Sun Soother massage.  1.5 hours of pure bliss.  I had been swimming prior so my hair was curly at the time but I had turned it into a big bun so that it wouldn't get out of control.

I lay on the massage bed and settled in.  All was going well for about the first hour or so and then the masseuse, a friendly Fijian girl, took the hair band out of my hair and began to massage my scalp.  It was nice to begin with but all I could think of was how knotty my hair was going to be when she finished.  Then she just kept going for another half hour or so.  I dreaded to think what was happening to my hair and as usual I just lay there and didn't say a word (I hate making people feel bad and hate confrontation of any kind so I don't stand up for myself as much as I should).  I couldn't relax.

The Fijian girl tapped me politely on the should and said that the massage was over.  She left the room and as soon as I heard the door close I jumped up to the mirror to see what my poor hair looked like.  It was worse than I thought.  I couldn't even tie it in a bun or tame it down.  It was beyond knotty, it was matted!

I ran back to our little hut where Tim was relaxing reading a book and he burst out laughing as soon as he saw me.  He also told me how well I fit in with the locals!  Not what I wanted to hear.  I couldn't even get my fingers through my hair to loosen the knots.  This was not good.

I panicked and jumped into the shower.  Even after a full bottle of conditioner I couldn't brush it out.  I started crying.  Tim had to jump in with me to help me try to brush my hair.  I was certain that I was going to have to cut all my hair off it was so bad.  But after an hour (I kid you not - it was about an hour!) we eventually managed to tame the hair back down.  

But this is the reason why I am SO excited to have had my hair chemically straightened.  Now I can have a shower, wash my hair and just walk out the door.  No more Foxy Brown.  No more blow drying or having to straighten it with the GHD for an hour.  I have reclaimed hours each week and you have no idea how good it feels.

Exhibit A:  Me after returning from the spa.  Tim HAD to get a photo but you can see the tears in my eyes.  
The length of my hair was half way down my back so this gives you an idea of how tangled and matted up it was.  Lucky I can laugh now about it but at the time it was not funny!

The sleep in

At 6:23am this morning the conversation in our bedroom went like this:

Tim:    Do you want me to get Ella up and take her downstairs so you can have a bit of a sleep in?

Me:    Yes please!  I was up a lot last night with her so a sleep in would be amazing.  Do you know what to do?

Tim:    Change her nappy and give her a bottle.

Me:    And then?

Tim:    We wait for you!

I chuckled.  This was going to be the shortest sleep in ever.  I can't even really sleep in these days but I was just looking forward to lying in bed in the peace and quiet for a while.

Bless his heart, Tim is a great dad.  He knows how to put a smile on Ella's face and can entertain her like no one else.  She loves him to death and vice versa.  In the evening when she hears the key in the door and knows Dada is home she throws whatever she is playing with aside immediately and crawls like a bolt of lightning to the door and scrambles up his legs for a cuddle.  It's the cutest thing ever.

But in terms of Dada knowing what actually needs to be done throughout the day and when, he has no idea!

I love this photo of these two when Ella was only a week old.