What do you DO all day?

I just read a blog detailing what a particular stay at home mum does with her time. It made me feel a bit guilty to be honest. Because...she DUSTS! And reads EIGHT stories a day! And cooks nutritious meals every day for her toddler from scratch. And she has a little bubba as well.

Holy cow.

So here's how a typical "stay at home" day goes for me (and I use the term loosely because I rarely stay at home for the whole day).

I wake up when Cate wakes up. On a ripper day, this is at 7am or later. Most days it's somewhere closer to 6am. We 'snuggle' in my bed for a while (except there's not much snuggling...there's lots more 'crawling over mum whilst she tries to desperately grab a few extra moments of sleep'. Oh and there's 'playing with the portable phone' which Justin says is bad and some mornings there's even 'smashing the alarm clock into Mum's face or into the wall'. Yup, you read that right).

After 'snuggle' time, it's 'getting up and getting organised' time. This involves changing Cate's drenched night nappy, tidying Cate's room, tidying my room, putting the first load of washing on and hand washing the bottles. I always feel better once these things are done as the house usually looks semi-normal by this stage. Cate reaquaints herself with her toys, books and walker during this time...she also pulls out drawers, players with the knob on the dryer and usually does her first poo of the day.

Then I have internet time and Cate joins me...usually the only time of day she will play happily with the upstairs toys whilst I get net time. Today I let her climb up and down the stairs whilst I checked facebook. This is latest skill and she's getting very good at it, but I'm not sure it's the type of skill I'll be bragging about at Mother's Group any time soon ("Guess what? My 14 month old can climb the stairs ALL BY HERSELF! Hold the calls to Child Protection Services please!").

Breakfast time for us both, Cate eats toast solo these days which is a welcome relief as me feeding her Weetbix used to take half an hour. After breakfast I put on washing load number two, take out the rubbish, run the dishwasher and try to ignore the floors (on the days I can no longer ignore the floors, I sweep and vaccum. Actual washing of the kitchen floor takes place once every two months maybe, if the floor is lucky).

Then we play. I get down on the floor with Cate and we read and play with some toys, tickle and cuddle and even play chasey some days. My latest trick has been whizzy dizzies to the Glee soundtrack followed by wild dancing from mother and daughter (this morning, the dancing got too wild and Cate threw up. Note to self: go easy of the whizzy dizzies after the morning bottle. Der). This play time lasts for maybe ten mins tops. I know. See why I was feeling so slack as compared with super mum mentioned above?

We hang the washing out and Cate explores the garden. Then it's time for the one TV show I think it okay...In The Night Garden. Cate watches for maybe five minutes on a good day...then she scrambles around the floor with the walker whilst I spend my time screaming out things like "Look at the Tombliboos!". I am quickly developing a freaky amount of love for those crazy little Tombliboos and my hatred of the Pontypines os becoming overwhleming. I need to stop, turn off the TV and back away.

Nap time is at 9.30am sharp. Ha, poor sucker I'm only up to describing the first 3.5hours of my day!!!!

On a good day Cate sleeps for two hours. I shower BY MYSELF (amazing!), dress, surf the net, read, make phone calls and, when I am having people over (and ONLY then), I may quickly wipe the bathrooms and clean the toilets. I used to be anal about the state of my house, now I am very much in the "close enough is good enough camp". So sue me!

On a bad day, Cate won't nap at all. I then have to share my shower and usually, all I feel like doing is napping myself (which I will do if I have had a bad night with Cate and she's napping herself. May as well suck it up as I don't think it will be happening if we manage to produce baby number two!).

After nap time is when we usually have our adventure. Cate and I leave the house pretty much every single day. I go crazy if I am at home with her, inside, all day. So we go to my mum's, my sister's, mother's group, my girlfriend's or we just go for a walk, to the park or off to do the food shopping. Outside is Cate's favourite place right now but I struggle (read as "can't be bothered fighting anymore") to get her to wear a hat so it's got to be shaded space. This cuts out a lot of places!

By 5pm we're usually back home and it's the dinner time dance. Cate has been off her food lately so this can be a struggle. Most days I end up giving her a selection of things to try for herself which makes an unholy mess...but at least she eats something this way.

Then it's bath and bed. I could stretch this sucker out for longer but I'm done! (and I haven't even mentioned taking the washing off the line, folding it and putting it away, nor have I gone anywhere near cooking dinner or socialising with my hubby once he walks in exhausted from his day).

I don't do too badly I know that. But I am not Cate's ultimate slave either...she fits in with ME and what I am doing (most of the time). Yes, I have to make concessions for her and yes, I do spend some time specifically 'teaching' her... but most days, we just get by living life. Not a perfect mother then...but a happy mum for sure. And you know what? I've got happy girl to prove that I'm not doing so badly...dirty floor and all ;)

And May They Live Happily Ever After...

We have just returned from the Wedding of the Year *sighs happily*. Wonderul, wonderful!

My good friend Brent married his lovely bride Harley under a stunning tree in the grounds of a winery in country Victoria. The sun was shining, there was a gorgeous breeze and the bride and groom both looked absolutely beautiful. There were tears, laughter (and so many freaking flies it wasn't funny)...best bit of all was the wonderful celebating and catching up we were able to do with a very beloved circle of friends.

So we talked, drank, danced and partied until the wee small hours. Justin and I left the after party at about 1am and wandered back to the oh-so-sexy Milawa caravan park, me with my shoes in hand as my feet couldn't take any more. We tucked ourselves up under sleeping bags and fell asleep to the sound of rain pounding on the tin cabin roof (the rain arrived almost as soon as we were tucked up in bed - timing!). Pretty awesome way to finish off an unbelievably good night.

The best bit though was coming home to our gorgeous Bean. She had stayed with our besties and they had done a wonderful job of looking after her. Cate slept like a champion, ate like a trooper and, from all reports, was happy as a clam without us. Made me feel very happy that we had left her with the right people! (Of course, as soon as I showed up, Miss Cate became clingy and sooky and has been that way all afternoon. I wonder if the Hobbs' would mind if we dropped her back to their place for the night?!).

Congratulations to our beautiful friends Brent and Harley and thank you for throwing such a great party to celebrate your getting hitched. May you live happily ever after!

PS That's the bride and groom up top (der) and a pic of me with hy usually goegous hubby. Please excuse that hideous thing on his face...thank God MOvember is nearly over!!!

I think I can, I think I can...

Okay I just got creeped out by my Little Bean. I actually thought she was walking up behind me and it's kinda freaked me out (she's a crawler. Dedicated crawler, but a crawler all the same). Anyways, she wasn't stalking up behind me on her feet, but she was stalking up behind me on her knees. Clever little minxy.

The last two days have seen Cate become completely addicted to her walker (a crappo cheapy one from Coles that's doing the job beautifully I might say). As in, she wakes up in the morning, squawks for it and hardly lets it out of her sight for the rest of the day. A big time love affair with the walker. It is a cute as hell watching her stomp around the place and this has got me thinking that it won't be long until she actually does it for real...sans walker and all.

Go, go, go Catie girl!!!!

Romance

So tonight we had some romance *happy sigh*. Just like I missed sleep, it would appear I missed romance too!

Over the last few months I have been proof reading a good friend's thesis. As a thank you he gave me a fair amount of cash to be spent explicitly on romantic dinners with my hubby. This is the first weekend in forever we've had the whole weekend to ourselves and this morning I decided tonight was the night. A quick call to our friends down the road who agreed to host our sleeping bub, a reservation at our favourite local restaurant and we were ready to go.

Cate went down without a peep at our mates' house and we walked to the restaurant from their house (yup, we live in a small town - it has its perks!). And it just 'worked' for us tonight. We had heaps of things to discuss. We were tripping over ourselves to share stories which was fantastic - there was so much to say. We spent a large amount of time discussing what our yet-to-be-conceived baby will be named (*blushes*) and we caught up on what each other had been doing during the last few weeks. But best of all was the conversation I shared with my husband about what happened today.

Today Cate said her very first word IN CONTEXT. Not just babble, not a random 'mumma' whilst pointing at the grass but an actual real word. Any guesses?

She looked at her daddy, pointed and said 'Dadda'. (cue AWWWWWWWWWWWWs right about now).

Listening to Justin recall this incredible event with tears in his eyes almost brought me to my knees. It would appear my husband thinks being a father is the very best thing that has ever happened to him.

So we toasted each other with some very nice wine, enjoyed a delicious meal and wandered back holding hands in the rainy dark to collect our soundly sleeping baby.

Definitely a romantic evening tonight.

Dirty Looks

So here's some news.

We want to have another baby. And not just in the 'we're thinking about another baby in the future' kinda way but rather in the 'we're actually going to try and have this baby sooner rather than later' kinda way. Very exciting, a little bit scary and, of course because this is us, a little bit frustrating too.

Wouldn't it be wonderful if we were one of those couples who says 'hey we want to have another baby' and BAM! Pregnant. That seems like science fiction to me. I would have loved to have been one of those women who was soooo fertile after having baby number one, that baby number two cropped up as an unexpected surprise. Alas, this was not meant to be.

So I weaned Cate at 8 months, waited ten weeks for my period to return and have had two rather good cycles since then (at 38 and 36 days respectively). I've had a smear test and a general health check up and three appointments back with our fertility specialist. Good news is she's really positive we can fall pregnant without the fuss it took to get pregnant with Cate. We so desperately hope this is true. But having been where we've been in the past, we're not betting on it...just in case.

So I'm sparing you the nitty gritty details that involve me getting intimate with 'the probe' in Dr Kate's office and parting with lots of good money to do so. But what I will tell you is that as I waited for my 7.40am appointment this morning I received a lot of dirty looks.

Here's why. I was in a fertility specialist's waiting room crammed with couples and I was there with....my darling daughter. And she was being unbelievably cute. And, having been one of 'those' couples sitting on those couches, I know how much it can hurt to have what you so desperately want sitting right there in front of you. Hence the dirty looks.

The thing is, having been there done that, I can honestly say I never threw a dirty look at a couple with a child. Swear it. I had my share of tantrums and break downs and there were many tears but throwing a dirty look at a beautiful baby? Nope.

Perhaps I'm over-analysing though...perhaps they were just upset my child was rubbing raspberry and white chocolate muffin into the carpet?! (I know, I know Mother of the Year here we come. This is verses Mother Who Wants Peace At Any Price).

So dirty looks aside (and trust me, I send those couples my prayers that they get their dream sooner rather than later), here we go on the Journey to Number Two. May it be short and successful. That's the prayer I'm sending up for us.

Got to admit it's getting better...

So over the last two weeks sleep has started featuring in our lives again. Thank God. We missed you sleep!!!

Yes it would appear that Catherine Anne has finally learnt to self settle (to an extent) and the horrific all night tossing / turning / crying / shhhhing / patting marathons have fortunately become a thing of the past (I dread writing this. It will be just my luck that as soon as I crow about it, she'll regress. God help me).

During the bad patch I tried lots of different ways to get Cate to sleep. Top three favourites were 1) Giving her a bottle 2) Giving her a dummy and 3) Putting her in bed with us. The problem was that slowly each method stopped working. Plus, the books said those things were bad, bad, bad.

I read a few different books, talked to lots of different mums and researched on the net. All about sleep. Yup, I was obsessed. In the end, the book that started making the most sense to me was 'Save Our Sleep' by Tizzie Hall. I'd held out for a long time when it came to this book - it just didn't sound like it was for me. Three weeks of next to no sleep and I'm desperate enough to try anything.

So this is how bedtime works for us now. Cate goes down to sleep for the night at 7pm. She has the same story in her cot every night and we use the same sleep cue sentences every night too. We still give her a bottle in her cot - against the advice of...well...just about every book I've ever come across - and nine times out of ten, she goes to sleep without a peep. Most nights she wakes at least once, if not twice at some stage. Now I let her cry it out. Again, most night this takes her under five minutes before she is sound asleep again. Progress.

Most mornings she wakes at 5am-ish and I give her another bottle in bed. This usually means she sleeps til 7, 7.30, 8 or even 9am. SWEEEET. This morning she slept right through the 5am wake up call and din't call out for a bottle until 7am. So she slept right through from 10pm - 7am no wake ups at all. This is one happy mummy.

I'm not so good at sticking to the routines suggest by Tizzie Hall - my times get thrown out every day. But I am sticking to the 7pm bedtime as much as possible and I am sticking to the 'cry it out at night' theory and both are working for us right now. And that, my friends, is a little piece of heaven right there!

Bad Night

So today's post is a follow on from last night's post. And although last night wasn't 'bad' in terms of the really, really, REALLY bad nights I was experiencing a few weeks ago with my little darling, it was bad enough.

I guess it started at 7pm. Cate went down without a peep (bless) and I proceeded to do a happy dance celebrating the fact that I could finally have five minutes to myself. Any mum knows what I mean - night time bedtime = mummy's down time. If she's lucky! Anyways even though I am sleep deprived, no, I did not rush immediately to bed because I wanted to enjoy said down time. Instead I spent the next three hours dicking around on the net. Productive I know.

Finally head to bed at 10pm. Settle down with my semi-decent book (have been struggling to find decent reading material lately) and enjoy a lovely hour long, uninterupted read. Bliss. Cate slept soundly next door, Justin huffed and snuffled next to me but life was pretty good.

I switch off the light at 11pm and, despite the snores, snuffles and phlem-y noises being emitted from the husband laying next to me, I managed to drift off fairly quickly into a deep sleep.

I know, this all sounds rather excellent so far.

11.14pm: Cate wakes. Lie still for five mins willing her back to sleep. Five minutes is a long time when you're trying to sleep and your baby is crying!

11.19pm: Get up to Cate. She is very sooky. Won't even take a bottle (shock horror!) and rejects the dummy (no surprises there). Looks like it's the old 'take her out of the cot for cuddles time' routine. I sit on the couch in the dark patting and shhhh-ing until she falls back asleep. I know this is a bitching post but it was actually kinda nice.

11.43pm: Back into bed. Husband's snotty snores are packing a punch. Very difficult to recapture blissful beautiful sleep of only a few minutes ago...

12.23am: Cate wakes. WTF?! This never happens. Leave her to cry...

12.28am: Still crying. I can feel my cracking it pants coming out...

12.29am: I collect Cate from her cot and do the unthinkable...put her in our bed (this is a habit we have worked very hard to break). The little minx screamed louder!!! Grrrrrrr. Husband is now awake (and I'm feeling so spiteful I think 'good') and Cate is howling. I don't know what she wants, I'm tired, cranky and very frustrated. This is not one of my better mummy moments as I yell at Cate, demanding to know what she wants (Nice. All class that one. Yelling at the 13 month old). I end up on the couch, shh-ing and patting again. Then into the cot for more of the same.

1.13am: I crawl back into bed only to be met by that horrid, gurgling noise that now signals husband is sleeping semi-peacefully. I know I simply cannot get back to sleep listening to this for a third time. I do a wonderful wifely cracking the poo-poos session, fling myself out of the bed, grab my pillows and ajorn to the upstairs matress. I try to slam the stafely gates on my way up to illustrate my upset but alas! Those suckers don't slam. Humph!

Roughly 2.13am (Left the bloody clock downstairs didn't I?): I fall asleep. Thank GOD.

Could have been 6am?: Justin wakes me to say goodbye as he head off to work. I am not in my best 'send hubby off to work' mood. I grunt, roll over and promptly fall back asleep.

6.15am: Cate wakes for the joy. Happy, happy, joy, joy.

6.16am: See her little face. Fall in love again. Try to get over myself. Bring her into my bed for a morning bottle and snuggle routine.

6.40am: Start our day...hoping hubby is far less snotty when he gets home tonight, poor Love. xxx

The Land of Snot and Sniffles

I have again been like a deer in the headlights when it comes to this blog. It's lurking in the back of my mind all week but every time I go to write I freeze...nothing to say, nothing to say!!! But I want to keep at it and I don't want this blog to stall, perhaps if I keep going I'll eventually hit my stride? Here's hoping anyways.

The title of this week's post refers to the fact that Justin, Cate and I all have hayfever right now. Sucks to be a member of this household!

Justin has suffered from hayfever for the last few years, although it tends to come and go. None of the 'going' part this time though. He's snotty, sneezy and has now added coughing to the mix...plus his sinuses are blocked. Oh yeah. It's fun living here right now! He's downing Zertek, making sweet, sweet love to his decongestant nasal spray (not literally peoples!) and we had to make a special trip to the supermarket to buy the extra large boxes of tissues.

Worse is that my beautiful baby has it too :( Boo Hoo! Poor Catie has been struck down by weeping eyes, a wicked case of the snots and also has her daddy's sneezing attacks (which she finds hilarious...although I find it significantly less so seeing as the sneezing means mega snots which usually get wiped across her face and into her hair before I can reach her with a tissue. I'm sure she's going to love this particular story when she's older!).

To combat the hayfever this afternoon Cate and I spent some time playing on the upstairs balcony. No grass! I let her splash around with her beach buckets and some water and her bath toys and she happily entertained herself for nearly an hour. Daddy spent this time sleeping off the snots and sniffles and I spent this time sucking up some of the sun's rays and delighting in my daughter. so I guess this post has a happy ending after all!

Am I ready to laugh about this yet?

Okay, some background (bear with me, I will try to set the scene as quickly as I can).

One of my very close family friends is horse mad and celebrated her 21st last night. All she wanted for her birthday was a rearing unicorn cake. This was because, as a child, she had always wanted said rearing unicorm cake and never received it. Instead, she got a sqaure cake, iced green with a plastic horse jammed on top. Not quite the same.

So for her very special birthday my husband and I set up an elborate gag with her mum, Vicki. We ordered a unicorn cake (sadly not rearing but it would appear this physically cannot be done!) in secret and told her my husband, Justin, would be making her cake. Vicki and I made the 'gag' cake - a sqaure cake, iced green and decorated by Justin with plastic horses on top - haha. The plan was for the green cake to be presented after the speeches then, after the birthday girl registered her disappointment, the real, gorgeous unicorn cake would be carried out.

Still with me?

So last night we were excitedly getting ready for the party. Green gag cake ready to go: check. Stunning unicorn cake delivered by professional cake maker: check. Birthday girl hidden away in her bedroom at her house: check. Justin and I just needed to drive each cake the km up the road to hide them at the birthday girl's house / party venue. We load Cate into the car, Justin sits in the passenger seat with the green cake on his lap, the unicorn cake is waiting on our bench. Off we go.

Five minutes later we return to our house to collect stunning unicorn cake. Except...the front door is open. Uh oh. I didn't give it much thought as I ran inside and sprinted upstairs to fetch something insignificant. Moments later I hear Justin stutter "Jesus Christ". My heart sinks, tummy flips and I race for the stairs...half way down I see it.

Our black lab had entered the house during our five minute absence and had EATEN HALF OF THE FREAKING PERFECT UNICORN CAKE!!!!!!

Cue hysterical hyperventilating topped with a feeling that I was about to vomit and faint at the same time. Mass hysteria. Oh my freaking GOD.

Long story short: we called Vicki down for emergency cake repairs. This involved Justin and Vicki cutting away all the dog spit affected areas, clearing off the black dog hair, stuffing that cake with cheap tea cake and covering the lot with ready to roll white icing. I couldn't look and was hiding with Cate in her bedroom. She was hysterically screaming (could obviously sense my upset) and I wanted to. We made a great pair.

Fortunately, the original gag was carried off wonderfully when the time came. The green gag trick worked its magic and when the slightly mauled unicorn cake was presented the birthday girl screamed with delight. People swore to me you could hardly tell it had been mauled by a dog...I am yet to be convinced.

Many champagnes later though my care factor was considerably less!

Today the birthday girl and her mum came for a visit and a laugh about the whole situation. I'm just not sure if I'm there yet!!!!

That's the birthday girl up the top by the way with her semi-perfect unicorn cake and her gag green cake. If you look closely at the unicorn cake you can see the repair job. Thank God the freaking dog didn't decide to eat the unicorn's face or we would have been screwed!

Hello, is anybody out there?

I have no idea what I am doing here.

Well, I know what I would like to be doing, I have it all mapped out in my head how this is supposed to turn out, but I am still very much finding my way in the world of blogging and remain, largely, clueless as to how this whole blogging thing works.

But I am going to give it a crack anyways. Even though it's not a very pretty blog (don't know how to change that), even though no one will read this (because I can't work out how to share it or direct friends / family to it), even though I have nothing of note to say right now (in fact I have been completely drawing blanks ever since I set this sucker up yesterday. Couldn't think of a thing to write. Nadda. Weird).

See, rambling already. But I did warn you in my blog's very name!

So how did I come across blogs? I belong to an on-line community and lots of women within the community had little 'visit my blog' tags at the bottom of their signatures (another thing I am yet to work out). So I clicked away and found some fantastic stories and some great women and I was hooked - I loved reading about their goings on. Most of all I loved the sense of humour I found in so many blogs.

The other night I found a blog that made me laugh out loud numerous times. It wasn't a pretty sight - there was actually spittle on my computer screen, but man, this woman can write. Definitely inspired me to finally give it a go...so here I am.

So, hi.

Hopefully soon I wil work out more about blogging - am dying to post piccies (that's the next little learning challenge). So until then...

ETA Looky what I worked out!!! Yay! Progress! That's my beautiful little bean / mad little sleep thief ;)