10 days later..... don't read if you don't want the gory details....

Well I imagine that by the radio silence, and the twitter/FB updates its pretty obvious that things have progressed. I did decide to go ahead with the induction on monday, my blood pressure was slightly raised which, whilst not disturbing, gave me the trigger to go ahead, as Paul and I had decided that if there were any medical issues we wouldn't hesitate in going forward with the induction.

Lets face it, things were never goign to be easy on the basis that I had had absolutely NO signs baby was coming, and, as one midwife put it "some people are born to carry babies, others to deliver them - you clearly fit into the former!)

After all other non-invasive attempts failed they tried 3 doses of one method, which didn't bring on contractions but still caused me to have painful cramps during Monday through to early hours of Wed. We spent a lot of monday and some of Tues walking about, hanging around, hoping..... Tues night was difficult and it meant that by Wed morning I was pretty knackered even before anything had happened.

Sorry if this too much info but then they broke my waters - which they had to do with me on gas and air as I wasn't getting anywhere and it was v painful. We'd been watching Midsomer murders and the experience of gas and air turned it into a bit of a kaliedescope of John nettles, plus for some random reason I had huey lewis and the news singing in my head. I was trying to tell Paul that Midsomer was much better with gas and air but couldn't get the words out for giggling.

Sadly the water breaking ALSO didn't work, so a few hours later they put me on a drip which kick starts the contractions - big time. That HURT but a few hours later I was still getting nowhere. at this point they offered me a C section - in all honesty I woudl have happily done it myself with plastic cutlery from the hospital canteen at that point! Things improved vastly from that point on - they whisked me in, spinal injection thingy, Paul kitted out in a silly hat and our beautiful baby boy was safely prised out of his warm comfy home into the wide world at 00.38hrs on 3rd Dec - 16 days overdue.

Benjamin (Ben) Noah Ellis - he was 7lbs 2oz and bloody perfect in every way :-).

I'd like to say that the story ends there - but ..... all went fine, by 5am Paul went home for some kip, 8am i had texted the world our news, had tea and toast and at 10am was wheeled down to the post natal ward. As I was moved into a bay, I had serious cramp, and I had what i now know to be a postpartum haemmorage. Scariest moment of my life so far. I could feel my face go pale white, I started to shake violently and sweat as about 10 medical people surrounded me prodding me, jabbign in needles like they were sticking cocktail sticks into pineapple and cheese and basically trying to sort me out, They stabilised me and we went straight back upstairs to surgery where they put me under a general anasthetic and sorted me out. I had to have 3 units of blood put back in (have since checked and you generally have about 12 units in your body. Probably shouldn't have googled that!).

ANYWAY....anough fo the gory stuff, everyone has their labour tale, that's mine. the important bit is Ben is here, he is gorgeous and beautiful and paul and I are knackered but coping, Its been a week of firsts - first nappy change, first feeding challenge, first night of no sleep, first night of fairly decent sleep, first trip outside, first trip into town, first hour away from him at the hairdresser.... the list goes on! I'd love to write more but I am nodding off tyoing this so will stop for now and hopefully come back soon with pictures and boasting :-)

well I put it off, but it wasn't particularly easy as they were pretty insistent that we consider our options. It seems to be more of a logistical issue given that they expect to be busy by the end of the week and "don't want me to regret not having the induction earlier this week". Well as far as I am concerned, its surely difficult for them to plan these things anyway, and if I were to become a risk medically I assume I would go up the priority list than a "normal booked in" induction. So once I established that they were ok with me medically we left the hospital. That said, it still took a good 4 hours for them to do that, which i think may all be part of their master plan - in that you hang around for such a long time you end up thinking, well hell I may as well have the bloody induction and get on with it seeing as I am here.

I have to go in every day for monitoring which will drag, so can see that there is a chance I crack tomorrow. I've been having the odd cramp but truly nothing to write home about and nothing that makes me feel hopeful this will happen naturally any time soon. This is so annoying, if it was purely up to me I know I would want to keep waiting a good few more days, but its not just me, its Paul, my parents, his parents, everyone else waiting and waiting..... and I'm starting to feel seriously pressured.

The ongoing saga of a baby not willing to enter this world...

Ey up.
Well its 4am on Sunday 29th nov. Or to be more precise in terms of this baby 40 +12.
This means its eviction day in theory as 12 days late is the date they induce in Cheltenham. So I have to call the hospital in 5 hours time, however our intention is to refuse the induction unless there are medical problems to give me a few more days to try and do this without kicking it off unnaturally.

I'm not sure what this will mean, I think they will get me to go in to be checked over but then again they may just leave me to it for a few more days. Ideally I'd like at least till Tuesday, the only problem is poor Paul not knowing whether to go into work or just give it up for 2 weeks now, I think the uncertainity each day has really been doing his head in, - know how he feels!

now I have toothache and earache. I think there is every chance this is all psychosomatic and I am simply feeling sorry for myself :-(

baby its grim outside

I cannot blame this little one for not wanting to come out at the moment, its really grim out here with the wind and the rain. I'd stay in if I had the choice! Had some reflexology today which wasn't comfortable (it wasn't meant to be!) in the aim of encouraging some movement, but so far no impact. Went to the pub for tea and a glass of wine as consolation.

i take that back

Joe was spot on. thank goodness my faith is restored.

maybe its just me...

but nearly all the x-factor singers seemed to be singing flat this evening?

Exciting news!

No, not that I've had a baby..... I won something :-)
For the past month i've not been sleeping well, any reader of this blog will have worked this out from the random entries. So I have been filling my time by knitting, watching crap tv, playing on the internet and entering competitions online. and today i got an email to tell me I;d won a delia smith cookbook! Yay! small steps.....

how about this for a pregnancy/labour soundtrack?

Sitting Waiting Wishing – Jack Johnson
Patience – Take That
Counting Down The Days – Natalie Imbruglia
No Good Advice – Girls Aloud
Dignity –Deacon Blue
Not Ready To Make Nice – Dixie Chicks
Grounds For Divorce - Elbow
Hold My Hand – Hootie And The Blowfish
Jump Around – House Of Pain
Labour Of Love – Hue And Cry
King Of Pain – Sting
Harder To Breathe – Maroon 5
Everybody Hurts - REM
High – James Blunt
You Give Me Something – James Morrison
Can’t Stop Now - Keane
One Day In Your Life – Anastasia
Speed Of Sound – Coldplay
Its Only Natural – Crowded House
Things Can Only Get Better – D:Ream
The Power Of Love – Huey Lewis And The News
Strong Enough – Sheryl Crow
Baby Can I Hold You – Tracey Chapman
What Took You So Long – Emma Bunton
He Looks Like Spencer Tracey Now – Deacon Blue
Saving The Best For Last – Marc Cohn
I Get The Sweetest Feeling – Jackie Wilson
Hallelujah – Rufus Wainwright

expected delivery

Damn the weather was grim last night. So much rain and wind, made more exciting by the house having quite a few skylights so you get the full impact of the rain noise. A bit like camping but much warmer and cosier and no fear of leaks or of getting soaked going to the loo.

We stayed in (obviously, its not like we now go clubbing on a friday night), and watched the LOOOOONG film the Island, which wasn't too bad to be honest. Entertaining but way too long and took the suspension of disbelief a little too far in some of the chase scenes. The living room was nice and cosy and warm and we were only missing one thing...... a fireplace. Oh to have a lovely woodburner on a night like last night....

Ours is on order but there's an understandable backlog. Assuming it does arrive in the next few weeks we have it booked in to be installed (along with some heavy duty fireplace reconstruction) early December. Given the other delivery that we have expected in the next few weeks this is a logical delay, as I had feared me staving off contractions whilst the builders installed the thing in the living room at the same time. But then again I WANT MY WOODBURNER NOW!

Is it wrong that I am more impatient about the woodburner than the arrival of my first born? Does that make me a bad mother already. Oh no, this doesn't bode well does it :-(

another night another few hours watching early hours TV with sign language. I think Holby City is greatly improved with the addition of the little person waving their arms in the air on the bottom right of the screen.

So... we're now into single figure days before this little one arrives. Assuming they do actually arrive and don't become a medical miracle and remain in me until their 18th birthday. I still can't get my head around it, and am quite happy for it to remain within for a week or so longer. I guess if I had been suffering massively from pregnancy problems I;d be whining about wanting it out like all the other mums to be whose posts I read in the early hours on Babycentre, but as it is my body has been fairly kind and, despite the beached whale effect, swollen ankles, no sleep and constant wee-ing, I think I actually prefer this little one inside me where it can keep nice and quiet and not cry and expect me to do anything more than eat lots and keep it warm. It's the great unknown that terrifies me. Going from a job where I knew exactly what I was doing and was bloody good at (well I thought so anyway!) to the job of a mum where I know jack shit and there is a guarantee of regular failure, frustration, tears and tantrums - I'm beginning to wonder what on earth possessed me to consider this was a good idea!

Don't get me wrong, at the end of the day I do have faith in myself and mother nature - its all just a little scary and close now!

another late night post

Its 1am, and I'm not surprised to be awake as I spent most of today asleep. I guess you just have to go with the flow at the moment and take the opportunities of sleep whenever they arise, shame though as it was a weekend and it would have been nice to actually spend some time with Paul, but I just couldn't keep my eyes open. Probably a relief for him not to have me about nagging too much anyway, he's been brilliant at looking after me, cooking, cleaning and washing up, but I'm still nagging away!

In my few waking hours I've been reading Mark Radcliffe's book "Thank you for the Days" which I nicked from my sister. I finished it today and was really sad it came to an end as it is the first book I have managed to stick out for a fair while and thoroughly enjoyed it. Similar to his current sidekick Stuart Maconie, he writes as he speaks and I really admire his down to earth, dry wit. The next book for me is Falling and Laughing, the restoration of Edwyn Collins. Having listened to Edwyn and his wife being interviewed by Simon Mayo, I'm really keen to read the full story. Will let you know how that goes...

today's google horoscope...

"Something big is brewing and it could impact your weekend routine. You might even feel tired and under the weather, but it's important to consider the source of your current malaise. Taking good care of yourself now can help you handle the stresses ahead."

yikes.....

11 days to B... day

11 days. Oh my god we're counting days now, not months or weeks . aaaaaaaarrrggh. But all ok, an it will be late so really its not 11 days.... honest :-)

Dreamgirls

How can the same Eddie Murphy who doe such a brilliant job in Dreamgirls be the same actor in Norbit? Talk about Ying and Yang.

1st November

It's november. That means I'm having a baby..... THIS MONTH!! (unless it is seeeeeeriously lazy). I think we're probably as prepared physically as we can be, one of the benefits of having had lots of time off that I hadn't planned. We picked up the pram yesterday and practised strapping in the car seat yesterday. Nursery is pretty much done, and bags are packed. I have just over 2 more weeks until the due date so am prepared for a month's wait because, whilst we may be prepared with the practicalities, I'm still not overly sure I'm prepared for a little baby to enter our world.

I'm up now because I think the little one has hiccups so is keeping me awake, along with the fact that I need a wee all the time and lie in bed thinking about ice cubes. Itchy stomach and swollen feet are also a joy to appreciate. but I know that this is me getting off lightly compared to many so whilst I whinge, I am also grateful.

It's hard to to be completely engrossed in the baby/pregnancy thing and remember that for everyone else life continues as normal. For us, everything stops/starts mid November and every decision seems based around baby monitors, clothing etc etc. So apologies if my tweets/posts/FB status's are dull dull dull. I hope to get my full personality back in 18 years :-)

time off for good behaviour

Blood pressure better so am in midwife's good books. Seems like the world is due a baby in cheltenham in November as they are seriously busy, just hope they don't all want to give birth on the same day as me as we may be in the corridors of Cheltenham General!


No news on the woodburner delivery so it's entirely possible we will be having our fireplace knocked out at the same time as having a newborn child in the house, Hey ho - people have dealt with a lot more commotion with a newborn I'm sure.

My early hours online competition entry obsession continues, just you wait and see.... I'll impress you with my pointless and unnecessary winnings before the year is out :-)

another 4am post

well U decided a week or so ago to make the most of my insomnia time by watching DVD's and entering crappy competitions on the internet. It seemed a sensible way to while the sleepless hours before this baby arrives, and assuming I don't manage to carry on when it comes, at least there is a chance I will win something from my MANY entries this month. I'll let you know!

my blood pressure has been monitored over the past few days as it is a little high (although it always has been) - and today I was threatened with being made to go in for monitoring if it remained high. I tried to stay nice and calm before my appointment, not easy when you go to the wrong surgery and have to then drive half way across town! But luckily it had come down so I got released without charge temporarily, just haev to make sure I don't get any swelling or headaches.

herein lies the bump....

blood pressure up a little so I'm under watch by the midwives but nothing too major....

just haven't met you yet....

I'm not the biggest Michael Buble fan. I like his music, in fact, had him as the first dance at our wedding but that was simply because I liked the song rather than him in particular. however I have to admit I really like his current song " I just haven't met you yet". Its such an upbeat song. Being single had is moments but generally it was a bit crap, and, without wanting to get too soppy, the sentiment of the song is a great one which really applied to me.

Took P bloody ages to turn up, but he was worth the wait :-)

Well after a day of me worrying Millie is back and seems much more content, despite not being overly impressed with her stitches. She now happily curled up on the top of the sofa and is much much brighter.

As for me, well I have a clear (ish) day ahead, and had a much better nights sleep so feel 100% more human. Have been surfing the web, reading reviews of last nights Question Time, wacthing Helicopter Heroes and updating Facebook - does that make me a well balanced human being or a bit of a nutter?

Right, better go write a list of objectives for the day. You can take the HR Manager out of the workplace but.....

Millie with attitude

Millie has to go in for an operation today, she has problems with her thyroid gland which luckily have been caught early but require either a tablet a day or an op. given that she is only about 12, an op seems the better options as hopefully with luck she'll be about for a fair few years yet and at about £1 a tablet that cost racks up, the other motivaor is that after 2 weeks of trying to get her to eat the bloody tablets I would be a nercous wreck if I thought I had to do this every day for the rest of her life!

For the first week or so I managed to hide it in soft food she was delighted with the new diet, as it is much more interesting than the dried stuff she normally gets. Jess was over the moon as she got the interesting food without the tablet (she has put on weight over the past 2 weeks!). but very quickly she sussed out the plan and started to eat round the pill, and then not eat at all. Either due to the tablets or the illness she has been throwing up, and not eating, so I went to plan B which was hiding it in cream, salmon paste, anything basically that she might be interested in eating, But this also failed, So for the past few days we have had to hold her down and force the pill onto her. easier said than done, and a harsh lesson in parenting guilt for the both of us - although I'm hoping any child of mine won't leave me covered in scratches and bleeding quite so much!

At one point this evening on the 3rd attempt we thought we'd cracked it, with her having swallowed the pill and been released to go sulk. she meandered across the kitchen and after a fair few seconds she spat the pill across the room in such a derisory manner that Paul and I just pissed ourselves laughing at her attitude!

I'm obvioulsy nervous about her having the op later on today (probably part of the reason I am awake - as well as lying in bed obsessing about ice-cubes) but I hope that it works ok and she is back to her normal self - with attitude maintained of course, but her appetite also back......

another 2am post

I have absolutely no desire to say anything nice about my former boss and his decision to turn me into a lady of leisure, however one thing I am saying to myself regularly is "thank god I am not working". Obviously my preference would have been to have chosen to finish work and start maternity leave slightly earlier, with the ability to return to my paid employment in 12 months time. But I guess that option was jsut not destined to be. whatever the case, I am glad that, given it is 2am on a monday morning, I am not sitting here knowing that I have to get up in 5 hours to go to work and worry about being capable of logical thought and speech.

I don't feel I have suffered from the "pregnancy brain" that many people seem to expect from an up the duff person, however this inability to get a full nights sleep is something I am struggling with. I know this is only the start and that it is practice for the nights when I have a screaming child etc etc, but I long for the day I sleep all through the night, and can lie on my stomach again.

I had intended to finish work on the 23rd so I would have had another 2 weeks left. I may well have coped as I think you probably do just get on with it when you have to, but as it is, I can lie in tomorrow or I can sleep on the sofa in the afternoon - thank god!

anyway, back to other stuff. well we spent a lovely weekend here at home. went to the Literature festival, saw Alan Davies and Chris Evans, both of whom were plugging their books and were very entertaining. Also went to Westonbirt along with half the population in Gloucestershire. I love this time of year when it can be sunny but also crisp and cold. Just wish I had enough energy to go for some long walks :-)

Yesterday I pointed out to P when driving that there was a cute caterpillar on the car windscreen. Before I could get the next words out of my mouth he instinctively pressed the windscreen wiper and it smudged it across the windscreen.

To be fair I know he did it to nudge it off as a reflex action but I was so mad at him..... These maternal instinct hormones are hard work.

His catholic guilt is also pretty hard work too though, so I didn't stay mad for too long as he'll beat himself up for long enough. Obviously I am now calling him "caterpillar-killer" though.

my counter says 38 days till the little one is due. yikes

struggling once again to sleep, hey ho. Have resorted to watching High School Musical and blogging to pass the time without spending money in the internet!

We've returned from a lovely couple of days in wales, the sun was shining away on Monday, and we checked out the beach and a few shops. Then yesterday the weather was horrendous, although in true Brit form we carried on regardless. We were really lucky that the rain had stopped when we reached the beach so we had a quick wander, but then had to resort to tea shops in the afternoon, but lets face it my size doesn't really enable much active tourism anyway.

I'm trying to enjoy this time as an unemployed layabout. Only problem is I seem to have gone a bit backwards in this pregnancy to the early days where I felt sick and tired a lot. This is mainly only during the night, when I can't sleep properly but feel really queasy. I can't complain too much though as everything else seems ok. i have a fair bit of heartburn, and seem to have developed a craving for ice cubes. But other than that all is ok.

Well after a long period of no blogging i feel we're entering a (short) phase of excessive blogging which will then grind to a halt mid-November and only restart with short snippets of child-boasting ("so advanced......!").
Today I had expected to be housebound as the plasterers were due back to finish what they started yesterday, except they have cancelled and are coming tomorrow. dammit, that's my structure to the week completely thrown! Hey ho. I have a visitor this morning so am baking some cakes now and may then pop into town this afternoon to fill my time. I am enjoying this time off but it is very weird too, feels like school holidays but no-one else is allowed out to play.

I did pop to the hospital yesterday and all was well, I guess I'm allowed at least one moment of paranoia this pregnancy, hopefully all will continue to be fine. Have finished my second piece of knitting paraphernalia, with the successful completion of the first hat. It doesn't go with the scarf I knitted but thats because I don't want to get too cocky just yet. am now working on a pink hat so I have options for baby gender. To be fair the hat, whilst allegedly for a 0-3 month old, looks huge so not sure how useful it will be but I am damn proud of myself, although Paul is wondering what happened to the cool wife he married 12 months ago.....

the midwife told me to rest on the sofa for at least an hour in the morning and afternoon so Jess is delighted at the company for that time. Most of the rest of the time her and Millie and not impressed at my being at home all day as it throws their "lets sleep on the bed all day until one of them comes home to feed us" routine. They wander around the house a little like stroppy teenagers whose mum has woken them up trying to hoover their room. Bless em... their peace will be even more shattered soon.

parenting seems to be simply another word for worry. I'm a pretty laid back person, so have taken this pregnancy with my usual approach to life and have not really worried unnecessarily with the long list of things that I'm seemingly supposed to freak out. Reading the websites and magazines as I have a tendency to do, it seems that it would be possible to completely wind yourself up over this whole process, freaking out about what you should/shouldn't do, what could/couldn't happen etc etc. the lady doing my 20 week scan started the discussion with "please tell me you haven't been researching on the internet have you..." which I thought was quite telling. In these days of information, sometimes knowing too much can be a bad thing.

The problem is that no matter how chilled I am, there is always something to niggle me, and despite my natural optimism that things will turn out ok, and if they won't there's not much I can do about it, I have spent the last 24 hours worrying about the fact that my baby is not moving about as much as I'd like. I blame my mate Emma who was worrying about her baby the other day, and got me thinking too much. I'm sure there probably hasn't been too much change, and that the fact that I have more time to think about it it more the issue that an actual change in movement pattern, but its hard to know, and it what is keeping me awake at 5.30am this morning hence the timing of this post. I guess this is what midwives are for, so perhaps will give mine a bell tomorrow just to put my mind at rest.

Blimey I have another 18 years of this....

It's been a tough couple of weeks really. We'd pretty much told ourselves that come sept we'd get sorted on the baby front, so we we all prepared to go out and buy prams etc when I get a call from my dear boss putting me at risk of redundancy. I apprceciate that I'm not alone in having to face this, and that I have, in fact, put plenty of people through this myself in the past, but to be fair, there are good ways and bad ways to handle this kind of situation..... that's as much as I can say to be honest given the need to be tactful and discreet.

But hey ho, things are now pretty much resolved, I am a lady of leisure slightly earlier than planned and have spent the last day or two getting my head around this fact. My main aim now is to keep well, and start to accept the reality that I'm about to become a mum.... yikes!

Ey up. well we've been on our jollies, and we're home again :-( boo hiss.
It was a lovely week and we had a nice time firstly relaxing in the yurt and then exploring Granada. We were wondering if we had made a cock up with the weather planning as it was 43 degrees at times but apparently this is not the norm, which was highlighted by the forest fires raging not too far away in Almeria.

The Alhambra was a pretty spectacular place and we took the obligatory hundreds of photos, although I have to admit just hanging round the yurt was probably the most fun part for me - slacker that I am these days.

so it's back to work for this week, although I have next Thurs pm and Friday off as we are off to the Hague/Amsterdam/Utrecht for a couple of days - trying to get the travel in before life as we know it ends.... Utrecht has a famous inhabitant which I am keen to check out, and luckily Paul has agreed to indulge me.

The little one has started to make his/her presence felt with the odd flutter/kick - along with a constant nagging back pain. Off to see an osteopath tomorrow to try and nip it in the bud as I'm only 24 weeks tomorrow. Lets hope they know their onions.

sponsored by andrex

hello, long time no write properly. sorry about that.

Life is ok, apart from sniffling regularly due to hayfever (or swine flu). Work has been madly busy, and social stuff wasn't too relaxing, although a lot of fun, with 2 weddigns in a row, then a trip to London to see Take That This weekend has been positively chilled out with no real plans. Went for a walk earlir whihc probably didn't help the old hayfever but it was about time I got off my lardy arse and did some exercise. Sally ran the London 10K today (in 66 minutes no less!) and I should have joined her had it not been for the 5 months pregnant factor, so not only am I very proud of her, but I am feeling a little slack.

I also went and spent LOTS of money on maternity clothes having got to the realiseation that I am off on holiday next week and "didn't have a thing to wear" - honest!

So, this time next week I will be happily sat round a pool sipping on a Pimms - well theres no alcohol in that is there......??? (I know, I know, it'll be a Lilt I promise), staying here for 4 nights and then on to Granada to check out the Alhambra and other such delights. Can't bloody wait.

Pregnancy watch time - baby ellis is doing fine, starting to make his/her presence known by the odd "popping" feeling in my tum. The 20 week scan showed the head is attached to the body which is always a bonus. as Paul so tactfully put it the other day "bloody hell you have got fat" - although to be fair he says a lot of nice things too. It's very odd and I have moments of feeling a bit unattractive but overall its all good.

jam and calm

had a lovely day yesterday at the wedding, the bride looked gorgeous, the grooms speech made nearly all the women in the room well up and the food was fabulous.

today was spent catching up with friends, checking out the garden vedge, making jam, baking biscuits and falling asleep on the sofa.

sundays

love'em

not an easy week by any stretch of the imagination. Lovely weekend last weekend with great weather and the chance to catch up with family and friends in our lovely sun trap garden. But then it was back to work on Monday with the doom and gloom of redundancies and the massive workload associated with that.
Not helped by a last minute demand to fly to to another country for a meeting, and a deeply unpleasant conversation which led me to consider resigning. Luckily (unfortunately) my up-duffed situation prevents that option so I was forced to calm down (after losing the plot with my ever-patient husband) and get on with life. In the middle of all this was a fun (if late) evening out watching Russell Howard in Brum.
It's now 4am on saturday and I am awake and shattered. so shattered I can't sleep which isn't ideal as I have a neeeeeeed for more sleep and have a wedding to go to in 10 hours. hey ho

Just realised I'd not posted this - Its definitely a baby, although it seems to have a gap between its head and body. hopefully that will get sorted in the next few months..... :-)

all going well, feeling fine, which is a good thing as work is busy and stressful, but thats part of the joys of being in my role I guess. house is still wonderful, enjoying lots of home grown strawberries and gooseberries at the moment, and looking forward to the potatoes, carrots, onions, courgettes etc.

new table and chairs

 


in our new kitchen in our new house.... oo oo oo oo

went shopping last weekend researching, and this weekend we actually bought! One lovely 7 foot long kitchen table, 6 lovely chunky oak chairs, one lovely wardrobe, one matching chest of drawers and 2 bedside tables.

Ooooh bedside tables. for the past 10 years I have used some wooden boxes that my cousin's wife gave me from a shop display.

I have finally reached grown-up-ness.

I'm on dial up, god its slow! but I thought it was time for a little update. House is still fab, garden is coming along, the slugs annihilated my courgettes but I saved a few and we have now resorted to blue pellets (we tried it the nice way..... now for the tough line).

Work is particularly difficult at the moment, so an extra day bank holiday is a great relief, and to top it off, its a birthday too :-)

We spent Fri-Sunday camping with friends near Symonds Yat, in lovely weather. Sat the boys and Tanya went climbing and we spent time watching them then found a pub when we got bored (having stumbled our way down the track and had to ask a lovely gentleman to help five month pregnant Amy down the slope). Sunday we faffed about for a while then went for a walk, ending up in the pub again.

Today we have pent time in the garden, went to a little street fete and then I came home and feel asleep for a fair few hours. My knackerdness is not unjustified, in that whilst the weekend wasn't overly strenuous I think I may have overdone it. I think most people now know but for the record I'm 15 weeks pregnant, getting fatter by the day and due November 17th. Not making it overly known at work due to the current challenges, but it is getting hard to hide the bump!

life is about to get very different!

on the move

we're packed... we'll fairly well packed, completely surrounded by boxes and absolutely knackered. We exchanged contracts today and complete tomorrow. Then there'll be no phone line for 11 days..... aaaargh how am I going to cope.

Normal service to be resumed at some point.....

new beginnings...

we;; its a time for out with the odl and in with the new. We still haven't exchanged but things are all set for exchanging on Tues and completing on Wed (so fingers crossed all the way). After a couple of days of swearing about the buyers and their slack solicitor, we finally got some movement,although their cheque isn't cleared until Tues hence the delay. all of which meant that our money had to be paid via CHAPS at additional cost which is really annoying as we have been ready to pay it for weeks and been asking how to get it done. Given that it is coming from 3 accounts that has meant 3 charges which we didn't need to incur (plus a bit of stress when i couldn't find my bank card!) but I guess its s drop in the ocean of moving charges.

So we've been packing, wrapping, clearing and laughing at the utter crap we have accumulated over the years.

I will be sad leaving this house as it has been a great place to live, but I am really excited about the next step in life and can't wait to set up a home that is ours, and start the next chapter.

house frustrations

the people buying our house are arses.

that is my highly considered thoughts on the situation. They have kept us hanging around now for over 2 weeks, are trying to drag it out even longer and are not even answering the phonecalls of their own solicitor or our estate agent.

I don't think this is a fundamental problem, jsut them being idiots about the moving date (for F***S sake they are not even moving, their son is packing a bag and walking round the corner!!!). but at present I am planning on taking all the lighbulbs and curtain rails and if I could remove the radiators I would.

Tossers.

(I feel a little better now :-) )

Watched Michael Mcintyre's DVD on Friday night, bloody funny. the guy is great at just pointing out things in day to day life that are ridiculous. Not rude, or offensive, or sexist (much!) - just funny! He made me laugh talking about the futility of being shown to your seat when you have a buffet breakfast in hotels, that drives me nuts. The other one that stuck out was the fact that you only EVER wake up a woman from her lie in for one of 2 things, the death of a celebrity or if its snowing. Paul seemed to agree with that one....

 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 

 
 
 

Emma and Marks wedding

 
 
 
 

Lovely day for a wedding yesterday, the sun was shining, the groom didn't look too nervous, the bride looked absolutely stunning and everyone had a great day. Today I am bloody knackered!

american idol

I tend to watch american idol on a sat morning and often listen to the first few minutes of the song and then fast forward. But I have to say, I've noticed that the 2 people I can't seem to press the fast forward on are Danny and Kris. Maybe that's the point....

so close I can smell it....

we're pretty close to signing the contract, just need to know that our buyer has a mortgage. he'd better bloody have it sorted since he's had the longest time to sort it out. grrr.

can't see us being in by easter which is a shame as I'd love the long weekend to get the place in shape but at this rate I will be dragging paul around the shops looking at the easter bargains and packing.

I achieved loads this morning, cleared out the shed and boxed things up, mowed the lawn, chatted with the neighbour and then hit the shops with Liz. Now I am absolutely SHATTERED and need to lie on the sofa. Overachieving in the morning is clearly not a good option.

still no date but, as paul says its only one month gone. but we've got no plans this weekend so it's going to be a day of sorting things in the shed and the roof. at least we will feel like we are doing something worthwhile. also going to see the house again at 12 so we can do some measuring and check out the results of the survey.

i love weekends :-)

oops

I just made a BIG cock up but hopefully will get away with it. :-(

roll on the weekend

its only Wednesday but I am truly hanging on for the weekend, not for any particular reason as we have nothing planned. Actually that IS the reason, after a couple of busy weekends I am really excited about the prospect of having no plans at all, having a long lie in and basically answering to no-one. Depending on the state of house-things we may start to "sort" some stuff, but in all honesty, that may be avoided too! :-)

delegate or abdicate

I'm not a brilliant boss, but I'm told I'm pretty good. I am a little soft perhaps, and maybe don't push people along as much as I could, preferring to beleive they have their own ability to motivte themselves unless I am proved wrong. I've not had an amazing year in this new job, circumstances have meant that I haven't achieved anywhere near what i would have liked to had the role been what it was intended to be. instead of a big fish in a little pond I'm now a small fish in a bloody swimming pool and that is naturally frustrating. But I guess what i'm really hating is having a boss here in the UK. I had expected to be the "boss" and I'm not always the best employee - being a stubborn old cow at times.

Today was a classic example of why i hate not being the boss, in that I was "delegated" a task that had been sat with my boss for nearly 2 weeks, and I now have less than 2 days to do it. to me, thats not delegation, but abdication. if I ever do that to anyone, shoot me.

cycling...

spent yesterday on a bike on the Tissington Trail in the Peaks. Good company and lots of fresh air remind you what life is all about. It was seriously blustery but the sun kind-of shone and we ended up in a nice cafe with bacon sandwiches - yum.

Bailed on the last section and joined the walkers up the hill rather than walk, but we probably ended up cycling about 13 miles which isn't bad for a slacker like me.

Got home late and lay on sofa shattered!

Today was a day with Paul's family celebrating his parents 40th wedding anniversary. We've very lucky to have such great roles models for marriage in both out sets of parents. They are very different in how their marriages work and in their dynamics, but they are both great partnerships in their own way, and 40 years is something to seriously celebrate.

shattered

Met up with some sagga-ites in the Peaks today and did a little cycling. It was brilliant to see people again, met Ben and Charlie for the first time, caught up on the gossip, got some fresh air and exercise and basically had a bloody good day. Home late, have sat on sofa and will be heading off to bed after finishing this entry, I'm pooped.

Progress...?

Well things are SLOWLY ticking along with the house, mortgage offers in, surveys taking place etc etc. we had the guy over to survey our place, which took 6 whole minutes. Wow now there's a job I want!

I'm driving paul up the wall with my over-optimism in terms of dates etc. The slowly slowly man is desperately trying to temper my enthusiasm as always, and, as always, I ignore him :-)

american idol

I LOVE it.... my predictions....
Alexis, Alison, Danny, Jasmine... maybe Megan


goodnight all, I;m drunk..... x

things are moving along with the house-purchase, lots of form filling, photocopying, rummaging through boxes of crap to find old paperwork. One of P's colleagues got gazumped on their purchase which is always a worry, but there's nowt you can do about that sort of thing just hope it doesn't happen to us. given that the person buying our property is buying it for his son, and the property we are buying is empty, if all goes well we could be in there without too much delay. It would be great, as I'm chomping at the bit to get in.

5 years and 2 days!

jsut realised i've been writing this blog for exactly 5 years (and 2 days). Not bad for a non completer-finisher.....

Offer accepted!

Blimey O Reilly we’re bought a house! Well, not quite but we’ve had an offer accepted. So it seems that all our efforts of trooping round houses every evening and weekend for the past couple fo weeks have paid off and we were able to feel confident that the one we saw on our fuirst day of house-hunting was not a knee-jerk response to desperation but a valid positive response to a lovely home.

After our fairly smooth wedding planning period I was still really concerned that the house-hunting might be the real sticking point with our polarised approaches to life in general coming out. In reality it wasn’t half as bad as expected, with the fact that, in the end, we have surprisingly similar taste in what we like and don’t like, and ultimately both felt very strongly about the house we have found.

What the process has emphasised is our different approaches to things (life in general perhaps?) – in that I get really excited really quickly, rush ahead with major excitement and then almost as quickly die down and lose enthusiasm. Paul, starts at the other end of the scale, with an apparent lack of enthusiasm (he’d obviously describe it as cautious positivity) and then works his way up. When we meet in the middle it works fine , but if we time it wrong I have passed the middle point and given up just at the point he’s getting going. I think even paul would admit that he actually enjoyed the hosue-hunting process a lot more than he expected to, although we were both getting a little weary further down the line.

So now it’s the roundabout of mortgages, HIP’s, surveys, etc etc. given my nature I’m obviously keen to start buying woodburners, french dressers and curtains. For some reason Paul is saying no…….

 

It's Emma's hen night in a couple of weeks. I made my friends do it therefore the pleasure is passed on! This ones in Cardiff, which is fine, Quad-biking, which is also fine; comedy club in evening; again, fine. NOT fine is the "famous women" fancy dress theme. For goodness sake, the ladies I will be joining that evening score an average size 8. I'll double that size and add on some more for good measure. Whilst they can look cute and sexy dressed as Lara Croft and Wonder Woman, I'll be leaning towards Barbara Cartland or Vicky Pollard (or the only gay in the village).

Anyway, after a bit of harrumphing I went with the positive attitude approach and decided to go in feet first and ordered one of these!

It arrived yesterday, Paul nearly wet himself with laughter when I tried it on.

Should make for a fun night (please note I don't intend to wear it quad-biking....)

aah this takes  me back

I'm still struggling

this damn rash keeps coming back and its driving me nuts.

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrggggggghhhhhhhh

well we sold our house in a pretty impressive 6 days.  Brilliant!  That said, we then came to the stark realisation that we had to get our rear ends in gear and find a place for us to buy.  Yikes!

so we took last Thursday off and spent the day trooping round houses and checking out peoples dodgy decor.  House hunting is a great way to remind yourself that one man's meat is another man's poison.  And also to help me put my decorating mistakes in context and realise that, whilst I have made some errors of judgement over the years, I do fundamentally own a certain level of taste compared to many a home-owner.   Then there was the house which had not be touched in 30 years, which seemed more like a museum or a tribute to the 1970's than somewhere you could actually set up home.  The owner also didn't believe in putting the heating on so the delightful 70's wallpaper was set off nicely by the smell of damp socks.  Yum.

We've seen some grim places and some lovely places, but so far not put in any offers.  One house has ticked our fancy but we are planning on checking out a few more this week just to see how it sits amongst the others.

we'll keep you posted! 

yikes...

so we got an offer, not a bad one actually, certainly not a cheeky one, but we're pushing it to see if we can get a little more.  and frantically searching for a House ourselves now.  We keep swinging between ostentatious frivolity, which would see us mortgaged up to our eyeballs for the rest of time, and frugal sensibleness which means less rooms/smaller garden/flock wallpaper but the ability to give up work sometime before the end of this century.

ah decisions decisions.

we have Thursday off to do some actual real house-hunting as opposed to the virtual stuff.

Girl in need of Kirsty and Phil....

Paul HATES Location Location Location.  Me, I love it.  Especially when Kirsty is pregnant cos she holds no prisoners when her hormones are a-raging.  We could really do with them now, although that plan is somewhat scuppered by Paul's visceral reaction.   I can imagine their insightful comments on our relationship as I stamp my feet and sulk when I don't get my own way, as Paul tries patiently to remind me that we can't afford the £500K barn conversion with a turret and a roll top bath.

As you may have guessed, we put the house on the market this week.  The guy came round Tues and took some photos, it was in the paper and on the website on Thurs and Sat morning we had a call that we had a viewing in the afternoon. 

Project Panic. 

Out went the chilled out plans of relaxing, shopping and a little lying on the sofa, and in came plans of scrubbing, shifting and generally hiding things in the loft.  It took most of the day but by god the house looks nice.  Why haven't we kept it like this for the past 3 years?  The cats were completely freaked out by the rare introduction of the hoover to the carpet, and we hid most of our OTT DVD collection in the loft (retaining key ones such as the Goonies for emergency viewing).  The final trick was moving a load of stuff to mum and dad's garage (serves them right for being in Vietnam!)

So after 2 viewings we were optimistic (in Paul's case - terrified) that there may actually be some movement in the housing market and therefore had to re-plan our Sunday to include checking out some houses for ourselves.  Cue me dragging Paul round Cheltenham and outskirts checking out the exteriors of houses to try and establish what does and doesn't get us excited in house terms.  Exhausting, but worthwhile.

One of the viewers came back this afternoon for a second look, strangely keen on establishing the number of socket points in each room.  Its a classic case of mummy and daddy buying a house for their 20ish year old "youth" son, who, whilst not completely conforming to the ASBO stereotype, had difficulty showing  a great deal of enthusiasm for the whole process.  Possibly based on the fact that his parents live about 2 streets away so he would be expecting to return home for tea and washing anyway.  I struggle to feel comfortable to sell my house to this kind of cliche, but frankly my morals can be twisted when it comes to cold hard cash.  Still, as Paul is frequently reminding me, the fat lady ain't yet sung, and even if we get an offer it's bound to be a cheeky low one.  Then comes the hard decisions, bargaining and panic that we need to make our own decisions on where we live.

Looks like the days of weekends watching back-to-back episodes of House may be put on hold for a while, as I deal with the other House-related challenges.

so apparently my forehead was too close to the top of the page for those picky people at the passport office.  Hmm, looks like theres space enough for me, but seemingly a few millimetres of ginger barnett could make the difference between a safer United Kingdom and an illiegal immigant frenzy.  

So I had to re-do the pictures. 

Whilst being very blotchy.  

.... Not impressed.

Luckily my face isn't usually massively impacted, so with a D-list celebrity dose of foundation firmly planted on my visage I trekked over to Morrisons to redo said picture.  I look pretty much the same, yet less impressed with life.  Hey ho, I will remember the day the photo got taken fo rthe next 10 years anyway.

really really sore hands now.  pants pants pants

Blotchy

Can't remember last time I got blotchy, Paul insists he's never seen it so it can't be for a few years.  As per usuual , I;ve not idea what caused it, only that whilst sat in the cinema last night (Slumdog Millionaire - great film) I started to feel a little itchy and had that doomed feeling.  sure enough, on greater inspection at home the blotches had started and by this morning I was well and truly covered in red wheals all over.  I'm doped up on anti-histamene and feeling sorry for myself.  Still it usually only lasts a couple of days....

 I got 98 emails at work today.  If I discard 10 of those which I could have replied immediately with a "yes", "no" or "sod off" comment, 8 or so were immediately deleted as pointless, but the remainder all required work, effort and reponses.  Thats about 80 emails, thats 1 every six minutes.

bloody ridiculous.

this time last year...

I had pretty much dreaded this month, January is never a particularly positive month, despite all the declarations of new starts, good intentions and resolutions etc.  But even worse was the knowledge that January 2008 was pretty much the best month of my life so far, in that it was carefree, fun and spent in New Zealand!  Comparing that to the humdrum January of 2009 was never going to be easy.  That said, it's not been as hard as I'd anticipated.  I'd had visions of sitting at my desk all month thinking "this time last month....." but actually I've been too busy to think about anything other than work whilst at work, and the moments of recollection have been positive, simply remembering what a great time we had and appreciating the fact that we had the chance to do something so wonderful.

So, on that note I take the opportunity to indulge myself a little this evening, remembering back to this day last year where we were on Day 1 of the 3 day Routeburn crossing.  This 32K tramp over 3 days was a big challenge for me, mentally as well as physically.  I don't do walking, and carrying a rucksack full of my gear was far too reminiscent of my Duke of Edinburgh days to be a pleasant option.  But in reality it was a brilliant experience, knackering but exhilarating with stunning scenery, killer inclines, good company, and in all a real memory to treasure.  The views genuinely took my breath away and to be so far away from the real world made the experience really special.  I was so proud of myself at the end, and still can't quite believe that Paul persuaded me to do it.  In fact, one day I'd like to go back and do a few more of the Great Walks - just don't tell Paul.  

 

photo-phobia

Ah the curse of marriage - not the being married bit I hasten to add, but the need to change your name on every bit of documentation etc etc. I know I know I could keep my old name, but I'm not that way inclined and, frankly, I think it would be more hassle to spend the next 30 years explaining that I'm NOT Mrs Ellis. So, that said, I've covered most bases but needed to find a suitable gap in my travelling window to change the old passport details. And this is it, i think I need to go over to the US first week of march so I have a month in which to get my passport to the lovely people in Cardiff, or wherever it is, and hope they pull their finger out and get it sorted asap. The bad bit is needing a new photo. One that will haunt me for the next 10 years every time I travel - creating hilarity with my husband and probably the lady at the check in desk too. So I thought I'd share that pleasure with those of you in Blog-world too.... enjoy .......

Politics at work

I don't like to blog about the job, given that I'm in HR and am well aware of the implications of dissing your company online .  That said, life in my job is 85% good,  I love being back in the company, like the challenges and like the people I manage and work closely with - however the experience of being "bought" by another company, and being shoe-horned into their culture, organisational structure (and I use the world "structure" loosely) and basically having my original remit completely rehashed is starting to hack me off.  I guess 15% annoyed is a pretty good percentage, and its certainly not putting me off the place, but I do despair of the politics that I seem to have been parachuted into.  I'm not a political manoevering kind of person. I just get on with the job and I'm damn well not going to change either.  just wish some others were the same.  hey ho, at least its friday adn I have a curry and glass of wine waiting for me to finish this blogpost - cheers Husband!

Oh boy I sooooo want one of these, after playing with one last night,  It;s brilliant, and my geography is completely pants.  I have employees all over Europe, Africa and the various countries which used to make up the USSR so my crap geographical knowledge is so bad it's actually seriously embarrassing.  I have a map on my wall and one on my desk so that when a manager calls about an employee in Gabon or Cabinda I can at least try and work out which continent it is on,  But if I had one of these globes I might actually learn stuff.  How cool would that be.  What do you think my chances are for getting it on expenses.....?

Work christmas do went well, Hatherley manor hotel actually looked very nice once all the tables and decorations were laid out.  We looked at it for our wedding last year and, whsilt it was nice, we felt it lacked a little character, especially for the ceremony/photos, but the room for the main reception would have been lovely.  Glad we went where we did.

Anyway, the night was pretty successful, I drank but didn't get too drunk and managed to maintain my composure!  Band was excellent so did a bit of dancing and then piled home about half twelve.

It's 10.48 and I am still in bed, can't remember when I had such a ridiculously-long lie in but its great, only slight concern is that, probably due to all the shouting, I have a really sore throat, and you know what that usually leads to with me...... voice-loss central.  So I have been gargling with soluble asprin, and trying to get Paul to name that song.  He's not as enthusiastic as he should be.

work party tonight, late Christmas one.  I WILL NOT GET DRUNK.  can't have another Sunday like last week, too much to do.  One benefit from last weekend was it inspired me to clean that toilet. Nothing like looking at the thing in close quarters to make you realised some scrubbing is required!

In other news, this has been a week of Vet's visits.  We took Millie and Jess last Saturday for a check up, with the usual double action miaowing all the way there and back.  Both were pretty much fine but Jess has 2 teeth that had rotted so we needed to take her back in to get that fixed - Cue guilty parent syndrome where you wonder how long she had had this and feel terrible that you didn't notice before.  So Monday night was "find the litter tray in the roof" and "hide the food" antics, in an attempt to prepare her for the anaesthetic.  Millie was the most interested in the litter tray so that wasn't a success and both were apoplectic with hunger by the morning, practically marching the bedroom with "feed me" placards .  Paul took Jess in the morning and I moped about at work worrying about her until getting the call that all had gone well and she could be picked up at 5pm.

She returned home and was OK, though very shaky and bemused.  Not at all happy and kept trying to run away from either of us but struggled to get her legs to do what they were told.  She needed soft food so again, Millie won out as a side product and the both of them have had a great time over the last few days eating Salmon Sheba (god that stuff stinks).

By the next day Jess was back to her usual self and the op seems to have been a success, although I have to take her back in a hour or so for a check up which is NOT going to go down well....

My guilt was eased by buying Jess a cute basket and heated pad which goes in it.  In typical Jess style she steadfastly refused to use it at first, then started to, but only when we were out of the room (leaping out of it as soon as we appeared, with a nonchalance of "me? in the basket?  don't be so stupid!).  but shes getting the hang of it and seems to now be quite taken with it.  But the guilt factor is catching so now I have to buy one for Millie so it doesn't look like I am favouring Jess.  I want to get one of those ones that hangs off the radiator which I think Millie would love.  Paul thinks that she'd pull the radiator off the wall.. Cheeky sod.

I'm hanging...

and thats not from a tree.  went to sax's 30th last night at this place and am suffering big time today.  I have to say the place itself is absolutely gorgeous, a lovely old house with a modern bit attached with lovely pool, gym and treatment rooms. Only problem was that the pool was closed for maintenance (they had told sax this - but only after she'd organised the party there), the outdoor hot tub closed at 4pm so I couldn't use it and my treatment booking had been "lost" in a computer glitch.  They did squeeze me in a small facial which i have to say was lovely, and due to the pool closure we got a room for the night at a damn good price - so in all a good experience.  The room for the party was a perfect size and setting, and the outside area really was lovely.  There was WAY too much wine consumed and I have spent the best part of the day lying on the sofa or going abck to bed.  It's 6.30pm and I'm starting to feel human again.  Ouch

wedding talk

spent the evening with friends catching up on the gossip,  Listening to Emma talk about her wedding plans I would have thought i'd be slightly missing all our pre-wedding excitement.  But I'm not really. I enjoyed arranging it, but glad my life is about other stuff now.  We have other topics to argue about!

nearly lost my engagement ring.  It's so cold my hands have shrunk and it must have slipped off whilst I rummaged in my handbag earlier.  When I realised I only had my wedding ring on I felt sick to the bottom of my stomach.  Luckily I found it fairly quickly.

Whew

ooo looooook, I'm famous. (well not really)

be warned

Beware the dangers of taking your husband's surname. Should have checked the net first....

One good thing about working between christmas and new year is the fact that I don't think I'll be hit by the big post-christmas blues that often hits after 2 weeks off. I was worried that it would be tough after Xmas because I would be remembering the wonderful month we had last year in New Zealand, but so far its just been good memories and not too depressing. After such a busy and positive year it would be hard to look back and be miserable about it. It is strange to think that a year ago we were here abseiling 100 metres down into a cave. Fantastic!

happy new year!

Wow, first sober new year since I realised how much fun alcohol can be! I enjoyed it in a strangely sober way! Work was fine, felt much better although didn't each much and stomach still ached from cramping all night, but was a whole lot better than the day before. We headed over to Dave and Eleanors early evening and had a nice meal, caught up on the gossip and put the world to rights.

There was a lot of champagne flowing due to Eleanor's news of being pregnant. I'd offered to drive as I still don't really feel up to alcohol so Paul made the most of it!

He's feeling a little tender now, as I am sure is most of the adult population. I feel quite smug!
We're off to the races this afternoon, it's damn cold!