A morning off

This morning I went to Oxford to meet up with a prospective client. He had emailed last week, after being given our details by someone I used to work with (as in so many areas, while you do need to know things, it’s also incredibly useful to know someone, as well), to see if I could come and have a chat.

I wasn’t about to say no to the possibility of lots (or even some) work, but my first instinct was to take Eleanor with me, and bring Chris or my mum to push her round/sit in a cafe with her while I was in the actual meeting. That’s what I would have done three years ago. There is no way that I would have considered going as far as Oxford, or even Cheltenham, without Rosemary when she was 5 weeks old. Because I was a new mum and panicked about everything. I didn’t let anyone else take Rosemary out in her buggy without me until she was six months, so I would hardly have gone off gallivantingworking for half a day.

But… I realised, last week, that I didn’t technically need to bring Eleanor along. She takes a bottle with no problem and tends to have some formula every day. I’d be able to feed her in the morning, then again when I got back. It’s even possible she wouldn’t need any more in between. And then I realised that I was a lot more laid back this time round – we often leave Eleanor alone when she’s sleeping (with the baby monitor on), we will let her cry for a bit (while getting the warm water for a nappy change, in her buggy while putting Rosemary’s coat on, etc.) rather than picking her up the very second she opens her mouth – and that I’d probably be OK to leave her for the 6.5 hours that I would be gone from the house.

And I was OK. In fact, I really enjoyed it. It was a beautiful day, which probably helped. I played my new DS game on the way there and read my book on the way back. I had a latte and pain au chocolate in the morning and a brie, tomato and basil baguette and bottle of coke on the way back. I eavesdropped on conversations on the train – such fun. I walked through an area of Oxford I love, where I used to live and where I would love to live again some day. I wore make-up and smart clothes – well, actually, I wore the same clothes I wear all the time, because they’re comfortable and, well, they fit. Oh yes, and the meeting went very well and looks like it should lead to a fair bit of work in the coming months.

On the way back, I had a bit of a revelation. It struck me that I could actually cope with going out to work. I’m very happy doing what I’m doing, of course, and working from home works really well for us. But occasionally I’ll leaf through the Guardian or Bookseller job pages and might light on a job that would actually be perfect for me. And then I think there’s no point in even considering it, because I couldn’t possibly work away from home. That’s not who I am. But, you know, maybe that could be me. If the right job came up.

Of course, the right job would need to pay something in the region of £100,000, so that Chris could be a stay-at-home dad and a really nice house, allow me to work flexitime, so I wouldn’t miss breakfast and dinner with my girls, allow me time off in the school holidays, so I could spend lots of time with my girls, be located within a 45-minute public transport commute (or somewhere we would happily move to), and be something that would engage and challenge me and allow me to use my creativity and not make me to take orders from too many people…

But the important thing is that I know I could do it. Even more important (and fortunate) is that I don’t have to.

What about you? Could you do it? Do you already? Have you become more laid back with your second child? Would you like to go out to work and have your partner stay at home?

Big sister

Rosemary has been rather neglected over here at Wahm-bam towers, what with pregnancy, birth and teeny tiny baby. Not to mention the backlog of reviews gradually appearing. Of course, she’s not being neglected at home. Though, mostly that’s thanks to the fact that she is at nursery school or playgroup for much of the time – three mornings and two full days.

So, I wanted to sing her praises for a bit, as a big sister to Eleanor, but also as a three-year-old girl, who is growing up and finding her space in the world.

The first few days of being a big sister were a little difficult for everyone. Rosemary was ill with a stomach bug. She didn’t really feel ill and had her usual boundless energy, but was stuck at home until she could manage 48 hours diarrhoea-free. And there was a new tiny person invading her space. One that she had  been looking forward to for so long and whose arrival she greeted with ‘Oh, isn’t she cute. I love you Eleanor.’

The problems were much less to do with Rosemary and more to do with our being all panicked and paranoid. Rosemary was being bombarded by shouts of ‘Don’t touch her head!’ ‘Be gentle!’ ‘That’s Eleanor’s changing mat. Leave it alone!’ ‘Get out of her crib!’ ‘Be careful!’ and, understandably, she found this a little difficult and was tending towards doing the things she was shouted at about more, rather than less. Hmm. Why would that be? A quick peek at my Babyworld ante-natal club, showed that everyone else with elder siblings was having the same problem, and also told us what to do, thanks to a few people who were on baby number three or four.

Once we started doing a few things differently, Rosemary became the adoring big sister she was naturally inclined to be. We made sure she got special one-on-one attention whenever possible. We got her helping with things like nappy changing. We allowed her to use Eleanor’s changing mat for her ‘exercises’ as long as she put it back when she finished with it (and she independently took on the job of putting it away if we ever left it out). We allowed her to sometimes have a bit of cotton wool for herself, as long as she asked first. For a while, she had the responsibility of sitting in the crib (when it was on the floor, of course), to warm it up before Eleanor was put in. These few little things made all the difference. Well, and our calming down a bit and not worrying that Eleanor was going to explode whenever Rosemary touched her!

Rosemary is now very good with Eleanor. She is always asking ‘Can I see her?’ which translates as ‘Can I see her eyes?’ Eleanor adores her and probably gives her more grins than anyone else. If we’re changing her nappy, Rosemary will frequently come and help or watch and she’ll lie next to her and sing or chat to her to keep her happy. When she goes to the RSPCA shop to get a treat on the way home sometimes, she almost always finds something for Eleanor, as well, or even instead of for herself. When she sees the adverts on TV, she points out all the toys that Eleanor might like. And when out and about she asks everyone (including random strangers) if they want to see ‘her baby’, who is ‘very cute’, or ‘really lovely’.

And she’s coming on in leaps and bounds in other ways, too. At the start of last week, she had had three dry nappies in a row and so was given the choice to try sleeping without a nappy. She chose to, though was a little concerned about it. And she’s been dry at night ever since.

She’s recently started drawing faces. When we travelled down to Wales on the train last weekend, she was drawing them in the condensation on the window. She’s even turning sad faces into happy faces by adding up lines. She’s also getting better at colouring inside the lines.

She’s recognising loads of letters and knows lots of words that those letters start with. She’s recognising more and more words and generally showing a good interest in reading.

She’s counting really well and has mostly got out of the weird habit of missing out number 13. She’s even managing some simple addition and subtraction.

So, here’s to my big girl, who I love to bits, even more so than before I had another little girl. Rosemary, you are wonderful and I love you very much.

 

So… Do you want to tell about your children’s recent milestones? Or how they are with their siblings, if they have any?

Looking for an advent calendar?

Are you looking for an advent calendar? No, I don’t mean a branded cardboard thing, full of teeth-rotting chocolate (mmm, chocoloate), but a nice reusable one that can form the basis of a family Christmas tradition. Well, go check out the advent calendar reviews at the Great Toy Guide.

John Lewis fashion

This is a sponsored post.

John Lewis recently (well in September – I’m a bit late) re-launched their fashion website and Anna Loftin from Cohn & Wolfe sent me a £25 voucher for the store.

Being a mum who enjoys buying clothes for her children more than for herself, I immediately went to the site and ordered a dress and some tights for Rosemary. Gorgeous, gorgeous clothes! There are some outrageously expensive clothes on there – baby girls’ dresses for £50 and more – but most of the John Lewis clothes themselves are very reasonably priced and comparable to Next, where I get a lot of Rosemary’s clothes. And, if I wasn’t having to watch our outgoings, I would love to be let loose on the women’s clothing with a credit card. Oh, so very much. There is some truly beautiful stuff on there. If I win the lottery this weekend, I will most certainly splash out!

Where do you buy your children’s clothes? Are your children generally more stylishly dressed than you, like mine are?

Do you back up your files?

This is a sponsored post.

How often, if ever do you back up your files? Do you have hundreds of photos and videos of your children stored in only one place? What would you do if you lost them? My gran lost a whole biscuit-tin-full of photos when she moved house. All her wedding photos and lots of photos of my dad and his brother and sister when they were children. She is still very upset about losing these, especially since my grandad and my father are both no longer with us. But, in this day and age, we really have no excuse for losing photos. Because they’re all digital. Yet, I never really thought about backing ours up. A bunch of them are uploaded to Flickr as well. Some of them are on Facebook. And a fair few of the videos are on You-Tube. But there are others that are only on one of the computers, some on two of the computers and some on all three. Gah!

This is where something like Norton Online Backup can be really useful. It allows up to five household computers to be automatically backed up. So, you can set it up to back up the photos folder on all your computers, for example. And all your photos will be accessible in the same place. Or, if you work from home, you could use it to back up current work projects and ensure you have an off-site backup, in case of fire or flood or the like. It’s fairly easy to use and works in the background, so you can pretty much forget about it once it’s set up. You should make sure you check which folders it’s going to back up, though, as the defaults could put you over the 25 gb limit.

I haven’t tried out any other online backup services, so can’t compare. If you’re looking for an online backup service, you will probably be able to find a number of them for different prices and offering different levels of service. Norton’s costs £49.99 a year for 25 gb of storage and you can add more gb if you need them. Norton is one of the big anti-virus companies, so a brand you can trust. I think £49.99 sounds like a bit much, but I haven’t compared it to others, so it might be the going rate or a good deal. I would definitely make sure you look around at the different options available but, if you do choose Norton’s, it works well and is relatively hassle-free to set up and certainly to maintain.

Thanks to Matt Churchill from Edelman for letting me try this out and also to Lucy Davies from Edelman, too.

What would you back up? Would it be your children’s pictures, your half-written novels, or your accounts? Have you ever lost data for good?