Friday, June 19, 2009

Time to earn a living

I need to go and turn on the oven, wash bottles, get some washing on, change my clothes etc etc so i'll keep this short.

Just after we got back from Portugal, i found out i'd been ousted from my restaurant review column. Some weirdy, beardy (hope none of you has excessive facial hair) author who i'd interviewed 3 yrs ago when i kicked off the column has managed to get in there whilst i've been on maternity leave, and has stolen my gig. I suppose that's what happens when you go off to have a baby, but i'm mighty p'd off. He doesn't know anything about food and that really, really winds me up. He's just in it for the free meals and booze and to satisfy his big, fat ego! He writes far too many words all about himself really.

The Editor made the decision without even telling the Features Ed. As far as I knew, i was going back and had already written 3 pieces for them. They'd even given me a date to file again!!! I suppose I should check out my rights but as a freelancer, it's not great to rock the boat I suppose. I'm SO mad though!

As it happens, it would be hard to go back to it. It's impossible eating with B - who spends all the time trying to be anywhere but sitting quietly. I also can't afford childcare to spend time writing as it doesn't pay enough. I could have done it in my evenings, but they're so short as I'm always running around getting ready for bed as i know B will be up in the early hours...Perhaps i'll try to go back to writing in the future...

Sooooo, as I need to earn a few quid, i'm going to try hosting a P.ampered Che.f party. If it goes well and if I like it then i'm thinking of selling it. I can also offer my cooking skills on the side and sell lessons and/or catering. It's new to me although lots of my mates have bought PC stuff. I know it's more established in the US - what do you girls know about it?

I've my first party on Monday.

Really must go and do some chores now. I was out with some girlfriends drinking last night - it was great to be back in the real world for a bit - and i'm paying for it today. I wouldn't change my life for all the tea in China - or even all the chocolate in the Green & Black's factory - but sometimes it's nice to get out for some "me" time.

Many congrats to lovely Meredith on her new arrival.

I'm also really happy to report that my friend who lost her 23 and 24 week old twins last year (this month in fact) is pg (16 weeks) with a singleton. I'm so, so happy for her and have everything crossed. (She had IVF3 to get there)

Saturday, June 06, 2009

Its been too, too long since I posted properly. I've had the odd whinge and moan and a few show-off pics of my little boy but no real meaty stuff.

I think it's time for an update. Barney turned 7 months on 1st June. 7 months!! Amazing and I'm still pinching myself every day and night.

He's crawling, and has been for a couple of weeks or more. He was going backwards, but now can get where he wants to, which is pretty scary as we're not nearly as child proof as we should be. By all accounts he's a bit young for such mobility but as he's quite small and light as well as pretty strong, there's just no stopping him.
(Since i wrote this, he has progressed to pulling himself up on his knees and sometimes even onto his feet. He's so strong. I think the reason he's so busy is that he's so inquisitive. He just has to find out what the sticker on the wall feels like or what Mummy's computer tastes like. Today he wriggled out of the booster seat he was strapped into in a cafe that refused to let us in with the buggy, so he could stare and grin at a cute lady eating her breakfast at the table behind us!)
Here he is trying to crawl onto a table on holiday

He's also babbling - ba-ba, da-da, ga-ga - and making burbling noises.

The overnight sleep still eludes him (and us) and every time we try to get tough and leave him to cry, he pulls off a cold or (this week) a tooth (first tooth!!) so we bottle out of it and go to him at night. The tooth is so cute. A tiny tip of pearly white which has produced much unhappiness as it cut through his gums. (Make that two. The second one came through a few days later and is just as cute. Not so cute when he bit my boob when he was feeding though.

He's eating three meals a day (bless) and nothing has made me so happy as when he ate a whole pot of my chicken and apricot casserole.
It felt like the hugest success ever. He has good and bad meals - perhaps the teething pains - but is also not much of a milk drinker. I have to really work at it. I'm still breast feeding, but very few times a day as he's far more interested in the world around him than staring at my chest (unlike his father) so it's impossible to get him to BF by day. (We're now nearly done with BF-ing. I've been cutting down and this week, he's barely interested in feeding from me as he has a terrible cold and it's too much trouble. I'm really down about it. I think it's the cocktail of hormones receding finally but it's making me so sad.

I know i'm darned lucky to have (a) had him and (b) got to BF at all but i'm unlikely to have any more babies - there, i've said it. At 40 and a 1/2 with 5 IVF's under my belt to have Barney, i do need to be realistic about my chances of managing a second success. This will be my only chance to do this and i'm not ready to stop. Not sure i ever will be. Still, this is about him and he's doing ok on the bottle, so that's that really.

On the whole issue of a second child, i'm starting to turn my head to the issue. Do we try again? Can we afford to? Do we try to adopt - which was always going to be our plan. Also an issue of money - not only to pay for inter-country adoption (as we'd be lucky to find a baby in the UK) but to move so we have room for more of us. We're squeezed in as it is. We're not in great shape financially - well, we are ok but there's not a lot coming in at the minute. It's no time to spend huge money.

I'm thinking we might pop back to wonder clinic to see if they'd even let me try again or if they think we could try to use our frosty. It's not like I can give it a year or so and see what happens. We'll never get the surprise miracle that p's me off when others recount tales of x and y who adopted/had ivf success/gave up and "amazingly discovered y was pg!!!" Severe M factor don't work that way. We've just graduated from simple infertility only to have to redo the year again.

I hoped i'd never feel like this. When I got so lucky I thought i'd be grateful with my lot. A part of me worries i've had all my luck to have a healthy child (please G-d) at close to 40. Am i tempting fate in trying again at perhaps 41? Who knows?

He's the sunniest smiliest baby and engages people wherever we go. I'm sure everyone feels this way about their little ones.

I think this post is long enough. I'll post again with an update of where i am professionally - short preview is "nowhere".

xx