Of March.
It’s been a funny old month, thus far. The time I’ve not spent on this organisation/spring clean kick, I’ve mostly been trying to stop. To stop worrying; to stop cleaning; to stop moving, even. Having had persistent back-ache for about five weeks, I’ve accepted the fact that pregnancy for me is fine, provided I know my limits and I take serious, early, repetitive note. So, no long walks, no prolonged standing, minimal lifting and plenty of rest. Which sounds delightful if you can factor in the presence of full-time staff. In the real world, perhaps less-so, but still, I seem to be finding the happy medium, just about, and keeping things afloat.
I always used to think that the whole idea of pregnant people starting to nest and whatnot was probably a load of old horseshit, until I was pregnant with the small girl, when suddenly those cobwebs on the ceiling took on world-ending importance in the middle of the night and so on. This time around, it’s a little bit different in that much of the time I would otherwise have spent lamenting said cobwebs is now devoted to retrieving various garden implements from the hedge, or attempting to stop painty fingers from grabbing soft furnishings, but still, the instinct is there, nonetheless.
We now have a tidy airing cupboard for the first time in, oh, probably ever. All it took to achieve this was the realisation that space, in this case, is not the infinite place they make it out to be in Physics lectures. So, out go the old towels which can’t even remember what colour they used to be (they have now moved on in the karmic chain, to enjoy a new incarnation as wet wipes and dishcloths), out go the ancient pillow cases which were once white, out go the four zillion double quilt covers for which we have no earthly use, given that that still leaves us three doubles just in case, and hey presto! or something less trite: an airing cupboard which doesn’t bit when you open the door.
It’s also been a bit of a month for flux. The small girl has moved from her cot into a bed, in part because she said she wanted a bed of her own, and in part because encouraging that seemed like a good idea, given that the cot will hopefully see further use in the not-too-distant future courtesy of our impending arrival, and a nice gap between occupants seemed a good idea.
So, away went the cot, and in came the single bed, which is very lovely apart from the fact that its arrival caused us to realise that the small girl’s bedroom is only 6′ 5″ across, and most beds are just a couple of inches bigger than that… Which is tedious, in so many ways, not the least of which is that the only solution we could find was to jack the bed up past the skirting board to where the walls are a little wider, meaning the small girl needs a stool to get into bed. It doesn’t make for a very pleasant fall if you happen to tumble out in the night, either; so far, parental fail count: five. Five. Five times she has fallen out of bed in coming up to a fortnight. We can’t fit a straightforward rail, either, because Morpheus appears to have declared a bit of a fatwa about this whole bed situation, and this means that the fittings just don’t. Fit, that is. A trip to Ikea has helped in that we now have decent linen and a quilt the girl loves – feathers, properly snuggly, and a crocodile cycling amongst the stars were always going to be a good combination – but I am wishing that I had a spare £150 so that I could just buy an extendable bed, nice and low, which would fit the space without its tiny occupant needing an oxygen tent.
The small girl, whose name I am considering using these days if only because a nick-name seems a bit trite, really (anyone any thoughts on this? Do you blog and share? Or do you stick with no names?), has also had two days of going to bed without having a last-thing feed. She is two years and nearly ten months, and until the last few weeks has been feeding three times a day, or so: morning, naptime and then at bedtime too. As the naps have begun to taper off, the bedtimes seem to be following suit. The mornings are still going strong, for now at least. I have such mixed feelings about it, predictably. Part of me is ready for her to stop feeding – she is going to be three this summer, she seems so much more grown-up in the last few months, and I can see that she no longer needs it as she once did, although the need for the emotional connection is obviously still there – and I am twenty weeks into my second pregnancy, which has meant some discomfort from time to time… But at the same time, I still find myself saddened by the thought of this part of our relationship coming to an end. It’s been a joy, genuinely, and has given me such a powerful way to comfort, nourish and interact with her, for which I shall always be grateful.
And in amongst all this has been the usual roundelay of cooking, the odd bit of crafty whatsits (felted eggs, which were tremendous fun, and a couple of knitted cowls), the development of dreadlocks (yes, dreadlocks, again, despite my earlier attempt not going the way I’d hoped), and some fairly major landmarks for us in terms of our garden work. All of which, I find, might be fodder for another post, another day. (I want to get back to writing a bit more regularly, if only to get things down, rather than revolving them around in my head, or boring Quercus to tears with The Many Reasons Why I Need That Other Sling For This Baby). For now, curry is calling me, and it’s got a bloody loud voice.