Pots and pans!

I have learned a valuable lesson over the last month or two. I can buy Grace the most beautiful doll or the cutest toy but it is always something that an adult finds completely bland that will attract her attention the most. Examples include the following:

• Empty Pampers boxes are a favourite! She pushes them around the floor. Puts objects / toys in them and pulls them back out again and so on. Such fun from cardboard
• The remote control for the DVD player - to Grace it is a mobile phone which she babbles into held against her little ear
• A kitchen chair - where do I start! Crawl under it, try to climb onto it, push it around the kitchen floor like it is an activiy walker :)
• Pots and pans - oh dear - my least favourite of Graces objects to play with and explore! The noise of the banging goes through me! But Grace loves it as you can see in the video below :)

So as the say, the best things in life are free. There is no need to spend crazy money on toys to educate children - there is enough stimulation and exploration to be found in the simple household things that we take for granted :) x

One small step for man, one giant leap for little Grace!

This is definitely Grace's favourite activity at present! She loves strolling behind her activity walker. And her confidence is growing every day. It is very funny when she gets stuck after walking into a corner - she'll swing and lug the walker around until it is on the right path again :) It has taken her a couple of weeks to get the hang of it. For a while she crawled behind it and pushed it along - we wondered if she'd ever get on her feet!

I could watch her strolling around the house all day - soon she will no longer need the assistance of the walker, soon she will no longer roll or crawl either. Soon she will walk. And as much as I look forward to it, I also fear it. It will mean that another part of her baby days have ended.  But she will always be her mummy's baby girl - even when she is a stroppy teenager or an elegant career woman with her own family. She will always be my baby girl. x

Boo! It's a little witch :)

Today Grace will be going to a Hallow'een party at creche. As I dressed her this morning she knew that these clothes were different. She loved the feeling of the witches dress and adored her witches hat. I wish I could have captured her grin when I lifted her up to the mirror to show herself wearing her costume and hat.

When I took her into her playroom at creche it was fantastic. They have the little room brilliantly decorated for hallow'een with bats and spiders and pumpkins etc. And the babies were so cute! And they were all looking at each other in awe thinking how cool and different they each looked. Very, very sweet. So, I'm looking forward to collecting Grace from creche later today to see some photographs from her first hallow'een party : )

It's thirsty work being a little witch!

Baby Kisses

A big, wet, open mouthed kiss - the best! Bless her little cotton socks. She has recently discovered kisses. Her little sticky hands pull my face close to hers and I see a little tongue poke out...here it comes....the softest most delicious, most loving kiss in the world. It is incredible in its softness. It reflects the absolute innocence of this little soul - my angel. I hope my memory stores the feel of these baby kisses forever x

Reminiscing on the day Grace was born

Its' a strange thing, but lately I've been thinking a lot about the day Grace was born. This could be because several of my close friends have recently given birth to their first babies and I'm beginning to feel all broody again.

When I was pregnant, I asked my sister (who has three beautiful children) what labour and birth was like and she said to me that no one could adequately describe the physical or emotional feelings of the day you give birth...it was something that had to be experienced. How true that is.

I woke at 7:30am on Sunday 26th September 2010 with stomach pains (I was 7 days overdue). My body then decided to rid itself of all undesirable products :) After 20 minutes of this I went back to bed...but not for long! Ten minutes later I was back in the bathroom being violently sick. My husband woke up and knew that something was up. He fetched my sister who had stayed with us for the weekend. The three of us knew that it was time to go to the hospital but I was paralysed with sickness and did not want to leave the security of my bedroom. Eventually, they talked me around and my sister dressed me while my husband packed the bags into the car. My poor sister - I should explain that normally I try to maintain a decent appearance (I normally wouldn't leave the house without hair and makeup done!). Knowing this, Louise tried to run a brush through my hair but with that a contraction kicked in and I slapped the brush away - I still feel bad about that. Finally, I made it downstairs and into the car. The journey only takes 15 minutes but it was unbearable - I had a constant feeling that I had to go to the toilet and my whole body ached with every movement from the car. Eventually, we made it to the hospital. I rushed straight into the toilets again and I was sick everywhere. On assessment at 9:30am, they found that I was 4 1/2 to 5cm dilated. When my hubby had phoned through to the hospital earlier in the morning I'd told him to mention that I would be requesting an epidural on admission. In the assessment room, I heard him say to the midwife that I wanted an epidural. She dismissed it and said "Sure, we'll see what happens". He was brilliant and adamantly told her that I wanted an epidural straight away. My hero! As they brought me to the labour ward I was told that the anesthetist would not be available as they had two emergencies in theatre. I was devastated. I wanted to be alone in the labour ward and went into the en suite bathroom and closed the door. My poor husband - he felt at such a loss. At 11:15am he opened the door and said "Leona, the anesthetist is here. She has come to see you before she goes home". I couldn't believe it. And so I had my epidural...and then there was bliss! At 12:00pm I was 7cm and at 1:05pm I was fully dilated. I could feel the urge to push. The midwife told me to go with the flow and the baby would start to make its own way down with the force of the contractions. Suddenly, nearly 90 minutes later, (and this is all a bit blurry to me) there were three midwifes in the room all staring at the monitor. Although, they didn't say anything to me at the time, my baby was distressed and her heart rate was falling. Within a minute we were joined by a consultant, a pediatrician, and two more midwives. And at 2:56pm she was here! My darling baby girl, weighing in at 10lbs on the button was finally here!

The things that I remember most about first seeing you:

·         You had a full head of beautiful dark hair

·         You had lovely full lips (the midwife called you Angelina Jolie!)

·         You were very long! (57.5cm)

·         When I looked at your daddy, the tears were rolling down his face (at last, you were here!)

It all seemed so surreal - when I looked at you, I just could not believe that you had lived in me for 9 months...that it was you who had the little hiccups in my tummy; that it was you who kicked all night long when mummy tried to sleep; that it was you that we had dreamed of for the last 9 months and longer! You were here. And we loved you. And we knew that everything we did from that time on would be for you and our family.

....The nicest feeling - waking up in hospital the next morning from my sleep and seeing you lying in your cot beside me - God had sent a little piece of heaven down to earth just for me. x

Baby's first shoes

It was a horrible wet, windy September morning, just 8 days before her first birthday, when I decided that she must get her first pair of shoes. Grace is not walking yet, however she is cruising around the furniture like a real expert :) Now that the weather has changed, her wardrobe also needs to change. The summer clothes have been stored away and have been replaced with jumpers, warm dresses, tights etc And every outfit has the obligatory baby headband or baby hair clip from http://www.prettybabyhair.co.uk/ to match. All that seemed to be missing from the wardrobe was shoes!

As we opened the door to Clark's shoe shop in Letterkenny I noticed the pretty pink and purple selection of tiny shoes straight away - oh they are so cute! And so much choice! In the end I settled for a beautiful pair of purple ankle shoes - which will hopefully match most outfits in her wardrobe until it is time to buy her walking shoes. Grace is fascinated by these new additions to her feet. She is excited by them. This morning she found them on the floor and kissed them - very cute indeed...and so another little female develops her love for new shoes :)

 

I guess that shopping for Grace's shoes is going to be as much fun as shopping for shoes for myself - well, almost as much fun ;)

Mad about a girl. x

So there's this girl....She's stolen every piece of my heart. I totally fell head over heels...The best part is, she calls me 'mummy'. x