30 Apr 2013

Photo Shoot

Yesterday we had photo's for Mother's Day.  My lovely Mum saw a deal on Facebook and thought of us.  I was thinking no, I do not want the way I look at the moment to be captured on digital film never to ruin or disintegrate but then I thought, get the f over yourself and just go and do it.  I regret not having photo's after Mushroom was born and didn't want to look back in another six months and think why didn't I just get the damn photos, so I kindly took my Mum up on her offer and she booked it all in.  

I couldn't magically lose 30kg in a week but I could make some general exterior modifications to hair and make up which would make me more photogenic. Turns out I lost a few kilos at the hairdresser anyway when I decided to cut inches off my hair instead of the mere centimetres that I had intended to but that's a whole other post.  I was at the hairdresser for four hours.  My hair was shorter and so were the zero's on the end of the bill.  Far.  Out. Seriously.  I will do another post.  

After agonising for days over what to wear (ok it was about 5 minutes) I promptly got on Facebook and asked peeps what they thought I should wear.  The responses were varied and if anything I just got even more confused!  Black, white, bright colours, neutral, inside, outside... what the?  I was leaning more towards outside as it's lovely and sunny here lately but that meant wearing slimming black was out.  Not that there's anything wrong with black, it just wasn't the 'vibe' I wanted for an afternoon out in the sunshine photo shoot.  

Staring blankly at my unsuitable wardrobe proved too much and I turned to my lovely boyfriend for some fashion critique.  I don't know why I thought that would work because despite numerous fashion parades down the hallway in a number of different outfits, I couldn't get much more than a "Yeah, that's alright babe" or "That's nice I guess" out of the Juffin.  Lovely.  And no help whatsoever.  He did however ask me "where's that dress that I like?  You know the one" Um no, I don't.  I didn't think you noticed any of my dresses enough to like one specifically.  After pulling out all the dresses I own we found it.

(Side note, what is it with men and clothes?!  The dialogue was ridiculous, it was all 'nah, not that one, you know the one, with the thing, and there's that colour here and it's sorta long but sorta short and it has that... whatever you look really pretty in it.'  Really, that's it?  That's all I have to work with?!  It's comforting to know that I look really pretty in it.  That one dress out of all the dresses I own, and there are a few, that I look pretty in this ONE dress.  Anyway we found it, thanks to his awesome description and helpful direction.  I think my tongue may become firmly lodged in my cheek forever.) 

The dress is pretty bright and I'm not sure if it was right because

  1. It's not a white t-shirt.  Nevermind that I'm a not a white t-shirt with jeans kind of gal, lots of people suggested white t-shirts, but white t-shirts and I just don't mix.  I always end up spilling food on my chest and look even more rotund.  Not that I'd be eating food right before having my photo taken to spill food on the white t-shirt but you know what I mean.  I mean I don't even own a white t-shirt;    
  2. It's very busy with a crazy pattern, lots of butterflies and swirls, and heaps of different colours.  It may detract away from my blinding beauty and Mushroom's amazing cuteness;
  3. My boobs look huge in it.  But my boobs look huge in everything these days so that's neither here nor there.  To be honest I just needed a 3 so my 1 and 2 didn't look so stupid.   

So I wore it, the bright patterned strapless dress that doesn't look too awful and I teamed it with a super sunny orange cardy and my boy wore an orange cloth nappy and a white singlet.  Whilst we were a little matchy matchy I think we looked cute.  The photographer said she loved our orange so fingers crossed it photographs well.

I've spent this whole post talking about how I couldn't decide what to wear and not about the shoot itself but I think it went pretty well!  I made the Mushroom have a big sleep before hand so he wasn't cranky.  I did this by driving around at sleep time until he fell asleep and then I went through the subway drive through, got some lunch and hung out in the car eating it at Mum's instead of trying to transfer him to the cot.  I got to eat some lunch and Mushroom got a big sleep.  It was a win win, extreme measures and all that.  I needn't have worried that he wasn't going to behave anyway, he was a superstar.  A real Zoolander in the making.  He smiled, sat up by himself for whole minutes at a time, and looked right at the camera and hammed it up.  What a cutie!  It was a short mini shoot down by the river so all over in half an hour, which was perfect for a six month old and a woman who hates having her photo taken.

They should be done by Friday, fingers crossed that they turn out ok!

The dress

29 Apr 2013

Six Months

I have not abandoned my blog!  I'm still here!  We've just had a crazy month last month and amongst other things, I've been trying to be a better housewife... it's a work in progress.  I made the bed this morning.  No shit.  Wonders will never cease.

Big cheese!  
We made it to six months on the 22nd and I cannot even believe that we made it this far!  I know everyone says it, but where did the time go?  I feel a bit silly about some of my earlier posts now.  I should have just been enjoying my little baby boy instead of worrying about every little thing.  I guess it's easy to say in hindsight and I probably wouldn't have listened to myself anyway so that's my grain of salt I guess!  I'm definitely making up for it now (insert smiley face here).  

The Mushroom has developed in leaps and bounds in only a few short weeks.  He can now roll across the room in record speed and loves tricking me by hiding under the coffee table! In the last few days he has started to pull himself up to a sitting position and enjoys sitting here and playing with his toes from this whole new angle.   

Flooring it 
Added to the rocking and rolling is now commando crawling arm over arm across the floor.  I'm well aware that my house is nowhere near baby proofed but I think we're both in a little bit of denial about the whole thing.  The Juffin seems to think a simple "No, don't touch" will work....  He is as deluded as I am.  I'm only realising now that this baby will eventually grow up into a real live boy and it's kinda doing my head in... 

Other milestones include babbling away with lots of new sounds like Dadadadddddad and Mumumumumum but not in reference to us, just in general.  I was so excited thinking that he was naming us but he wasn't.  At all.  Just having his Chatty McChat time.  It's quite obvious that he takes after me as he squawks away to whomever will listen, the cookie monster, his mobile above his bed, the floor... He's also squealing and screeching alot and then gauging our reaction.  Attention seeking so and so.  The boy is definitely getting loud!  

Loving the sweet potato and vegie spaghetti
Mushroom started having big boy food in earnest a week or two ago, before this he had only tried some rice cereal sporadically and random some fruit pieces.  When he started putting the spoon into his own mouth, we decided to do the three meals a day. We are trying BLW but we do spoon some food into his mouth as weetbix are a little hard to eat by hand!  Unsurprisingly, the Mushroom loves his food.  His meals look a little bit like this: weetbix with banana or peaches for breakfast, greek yoghurt with cous cous and pumpkin or vegie sticks with hummus for lunch and he's tried lots of different things for dinner like: spaghetti bolognese, sweet potato cubes, lamb madras, broccoli spears, hummus, beans, and shepherds pie (which we didn't like much!) Basically he'll have a toned down version of our dinner but with steamed vegetables.  He absolutely loves fruit but I'm trying to make sure he doesn't get too much.  Greek yoghurt is also a favourite.  I make sure he has lots of cooled boiled water with every meal as there have been incidents of 'blocking up' if you get my meaning... poor little Mushroom's face goes so red when he's straining!  

No teeth as yet but lots of ear pulling, and night wakings so may not be far away. As we're still breastfeeding, I'm in no hurry for teeth to appear! 
Lil poser!  

Our days are varied and I try to keep it fun and interesting for him which can be a challenge!  He likes to sit on the bench in his bumbo whilst I'm baking/cooking, banging on pots and pans and wielding a wooden spoon like a sword.  He loves singing and dancing, and I have the radio on all day so if a song takes our fancy we'll have a little dance around.  I have made fold the nappies into a game (this includes spreading the nappy out over his face whilst he squeals with delight push folded nappies over) and we're getting lots more laughs now. The Jolly Jumper is a favourite but I try to make sure he doesn't spend too much time in it.  We try to get out for a walk most days but sometimes it just doesn't happen!  On Thursdays we meet up with our friends at Riverway or the shops and it's nice to get out of the house.  Friday's are swimming lessons in the morning and usually out for the day visiting people, and doing some shopping.  Swimming lessons are a favourite and I'm so glad that we started so early. 

At six months Mushroom weighed 7.3kg and was 67cm in length.  He's wearing mostly 00 but like adult clothes, some of these are a little big but 000 definitely too small!  I went through a phase of dressing him in shorts and t-shirts but then realised that I wanted him to look like a baby for a bit longer and we're back to onesies and singlets with a nappy.  I just want him to stay small forever, sob....  there's no way I would have said that six months ago!!  


26 Apr 2013

Baby Brain

When will it end? I keep doing this one stupid thing over and over again and it's driving me nuts!  It involves a bucket, a tap and a huge dose of forgetfulness.

I have a giant old pickle bucket that I use for my nappy bucket.  It sits in the sink in the laundry.  Every morning I tip the contents into the washing machine and do my nappy wash.  I then put a lidful of napisan in the bucket and fill it up with warm water.  It's a pretty big bucket, so I turn on the tap and go and hang some washing out or go and wash my hands or wander off and do something else for a minute or two.

Except it isn't a minute or two.  It's like ten.  Then I think to myself, what's that running water noise and I realise that I've left the tap running.

And the bucket is overflowing.

Again.

When will the forgetfulness baby brain stupidity end?  Honestly?  You'd think every time I refill that bucket I would say to myself, don't walk away this time, or remember to turn the tap off but it doesn't happen.

Please bear in mind that this doesn't happen everyday, or even every week, but it's happened enough for me to be worried about my mental state.

I figured if I wrote about it, it might make it easier to remember next time....  

The bucket in question.
Footnote: Yes, there is a Womble over my laundry sink.  He makes me happy whilst I'm doing my least favourite household chore, washing. I'm a true child of the 80's.

24 Apr 2013

Update

Just thought I'd let everyone know that my holy moley turned out to be nothing at all.

Phew.

Now I have half a mole on my face.

Awesome.

Not.

15 Apr 2013

Rockin

We've had some pretty crap sleeping happening again lately but I'm not going to go into it as it's the same old story... on a more positive note, I have yet to lose my mind and my clever little Mushroom has started to rock.  No, not like 'Oh yeah Mushroom rocks' like rocking back and forth.  On all fours.  You know, what babies do in preparation to crawl.

Wait, what?! Crawling!!  I'm freaking out!  Where the hell did the last six months go?  I'm not ready for crawling.  My house isn't ready for crawling.  My baby cannot be ready for crawling already!

I should have seen it coming as over the Easter weekend my brother (shout out!) mentioned that the Mushroom was trying to crawl.  Being a young man with no children, I dismissed his comment, Mushroom is way too small to be crawling I thought to myself, he won't be crawling for ages!  Sorry brother.

What I couldn't ignore was that the Mushroom was getting particularly dextrous with his 'circle work' and rolly polyness.  Crossing the room in seconds and pushing up more frequently with a baby's version of the push up. He was stretching more, turning more, growing more confident and exploring his surroundings.  I started to get more wary of things on the floor.  Coffee cups, stray pens, shoes... nothing is safe.  I even witnessed some floor licking on several occasions.  Ewww. (Note to self, clean more!)

We have tiles so the little guy was not getting much traction on his play mat as it kept sliding around.  It was only one day after a sleep I discovered that my boy had a new found skill.   Apparently the cot is the perfect environment for baby gymnastics.  I walked in there the other day and there he was gurgling it up, smiling at me and rocking back and forth on all fours.

Despite my best attempts to capture the moment on film I had been unsuccessful until today.  So here it is.  My Mushroom being awesome.

And my photography being shithouse.




Ok.  I'm well aware that it doesn't look that impressive judging by the photo's.  But it is.  My little boy is growing up too fast.  

14 Apr 2013

Perfect

People are always asking how old the Mushroom is and I always respond in kind, ie x amount of weeks or
5.5 months, 6 months on the 22nd blah blah blah.  You know, something to that effect.

That's when things get weird.  I have received the following responses:

"Really?  He's so small."

"Really? He's a big boy."

"Oh my goodness, he's so tiny."

"Oh my goodness, he's so big."

"Oh my goodness, x (insert their child's name here) was only half his size at that age.."

"Oh my goodness, he must love his food!"

I'm also getting the "Gosh, he looks like his father, gosh he looks like his mother, gosh, I don't know who he looks like" repeatedly.

Golly gosh and oh my goodness!  I don't care who he looks like, or how big or small he is.  In my eyes, my boy is perfect.  That's all there is to it.

Mr Perfect 


11 Apr 2013

Holy Moley

I had to have a mole checked out on Monday.  It was a weird looking thing on the left side of my face, down near my ear.  I didn't know it existed until I had the Mushroom and it started to grow.  A bit like my arse.  

Not that my arse didn't exist before Mushroom.  It did.  Now it's just growing bigger.  Like the mole was.  Nevermind.

Anyway, no less than 3 people mentioned it to me over the last few weeks so on Monday I went to my good ol GP who took one look at it and said, let's do a biopsy.

Eeekkk!

So back again on Tuesday to have my face cut open and a bit of the holy moley sent away.

Hooray for school holidays so my Mum could watch the Mushroom but boo for local anaesthetic in the face.  Ouchies.  You'd think after being in labour for a whole day, having an epidural, and then a cesarean, a tiny little needle in the side of my face would be no big deal.

It wasn't really.  But it stung.  And  I was a bit scared.  I must admit.  I now have to wear a patch on my face over the sutures so I look like I'm just trying to hide a big pimple or something.

I call to get my results this afternoon.  Fingers crossed it's nothing!

My patch 

First tantrum?

Mushroom has discovered my keys.  He likes to try and lift them off me when I get him out of the car and carry him into the house.  He's very good at it, and most of the time I just let him take them. However, they're not really an appropriate chew toy and they get all drooly and gross.  Not to mention totes unhygienic.  As a result of this I have started to hide the keys from him before I get him out of the car, down the top, that sort of thing, and we have avoided confrontation.  Until Sunday.

Mushroom is in his bumbo with the keys.  Not sure how he got the keys, why he has the keys, but have the keys he does.  It goes a little like this:

Chew
Arggghhh ach ach ach mmmmmmmmmmm
Yell
Chew
Yell
Wave keys around with force and nearly take one's eye out
Bang keys repeatedly on bumbo, yelling and hitting
Chew chew chew
Mega drool

It's reaching the danger zone with frustration and eye pokage levels increasing with every second.  Juffin moves in.  Before I can warn him, he says taaaa and takes the keys off of Mushroom.

For a moment there is silence.  The look on Mushroom's face is priceless.  Then all hell breaks loose.

Mushroom scrunches up his little face and goes ballistic.  He arches his back, his face goes beetroot.  There is screaming, tears, fist banging and arms waving.  I have to duck my head into the pantry as I start laughing at how quickly he turned from happy to psychopath.  Stunned at the reaction, Juffin hands the keys back and it's like a switch was flipped.  Smiles, and grins for Daddy now.  There are still bloody tears on his face.

My little Mushroom knows exactly what's going on.  Turd.  I fear for the future.  I really do.

Don't be fooled. Underneath lies a demon!

9 Apr 2013

Solids

Here's some photos of our recent introduction to adult food.

Mmm pumpkin!  (I didn't red eye this one.. whoops!)
Orange tastes good

Mmm beans!  

Mmm beans dipped in hummus!   

Yes.  The Mushroom loves hummus!  Go figure.

Over the next week or so we will commence baby led weaning in earnest.

Yay for food, but oh my goodness, the mess!  I'm loving this stage.  I'm also loving that Juffin is on clean up duty.  Good man :-)  

3 Apr 2013

Worry Wart

I worry alot.  About stupid shit mostly.  But other important stuff as well.  Like money, and eating too much chocolate, and do we have enough milk in the fridge to make coffee?  You know, that sort of thing.  Now that I'm a parent, the worrying has increased ten fold.  But that was to be expected.

So when we decided to go away for the long Easter weekend and stay with my brother, for free, I got a little worried.  Ok.  I started freaking out.  So much so that I tried to invent reasons not to go, even though I was desperate to get out of here, even if only for a weekend.  I didn't voice any of these ridiculous things out loud  I just kept them inside, festering, like I'm wont to do.  I know.  I'm an idiot.

Stupid reasons were as follows:  I hate disposable nappies, so we can't go because I don't want to use disposable nappies; my arms are really short and I can't get the Mushroom out of the portacot; the Mushroom won't sleep and will cry and cry and cry and it will be awful and my brother will hate us; we can't really afford to go away; I don't want to ask anyone to water the plants; I like my bed; my brother is a vegetarian and we like eating bacon for breakfast.

See.  I told you they were ridiculous reasons.

Despite my incessant worrying that it was going to be bloody awful, we survived Easter weekend away.  With a baby.  And it was wonderful.  Huzzah!

The legitimate things that I was worried about were the car ride as Mushroom is prone to mega meltdowns in the car, and the sleeping thing. I didn't want to be away, a guest in someone else's home, and have a screaming child who wouldn't sleep.  And spending money on frivolous stuff when we still have one car off the road.  I got so worried about the whole stupid thing that I barely slept the week before.  On Thursday I started wondering if Juffin would still get paid on Friday being Good Friday and sometimes shit just doesn't work on Good Friday.  I was tempted to go into the bank and take out our savings just in case.    But guess what? He did get paid!  Huzzah.  And guess what else?  The Mushroom did sleep in the car, mega huzzah! Annnnddd, yep, you guessed it, the Mushroom slept just fine in the portacot, and I could get him out despite T-Rex arms so huzzah's for Africa!

The Easter Mushroom!
We swam, we ate the worst fish and chips ever, I had a few sneaky beverages, and we ventured to the Tablelands and bought chocolate and coffee and ate ice cream.  It was awesome.  All that worry for absolutely nothing.

Yes.  Obviously I'm an idiot.

I'm now feeling a little bit more confident about our trip to Brisbane in a month's time, just not too sure about the whole flying thing.  Or the fact that our flight is at 7pm.  Shite!