reflection

To Stop Time

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I love a good short story.  Getting lost in a good book is one thing, of course, but a well-crafted short story is a gem.  One in particular I remember from my high school years is about a watch that will stop time for all eternity if you click a button, but nobody ever chooses to stop it.  There’s always something to look forward to.

But.

There ARE bits of my life that I want to make sure I remember forever, that I want to etch in my brain and my memory and my soul for all eternity.  

Like Sunday morning.  

I was too sick to go anywhere so we were stuck at home.  We asked Siri to play some music – Coco, maybe, or Mamma Mia! – and the girls started dancing.  Dancing in our cramped and messy living room.  Dancing to the music and as their souls dictated.  E, with her moves very much from the heart, turned to me and motioned for me to pick her up and dance, and so I did.  We did.  The joy on her face and in her body, her smile that lights up the world and stuns my soul, holding her tight and swinging around as she held on and bubbled over with the delight of it, THIS was one of my almost-time-stopping-worthy moments.

Even though life is really hard right now, with all sorts of outer stressors on top of parenting three young children and the tired have I mentioned the tired the tired is sometimes so overwhelming it is breathtaking but even though we are just, only just, coping in many areas of our lives, this is a really beautiful time.

We have three girls who are all emerging as the next reveal of themselves.  Does that make sense?  S is learning and practising all these new skills, like the alphabet song, and asking if we want to hear Baa Baa Black Sheep before launching into the first few lines, and saying so many words and animal sounds, and walking around with a skirt or bandanna or quilt over her face and only occasionally walking into a wall, and trying to dress herself by putting everything imaginable over her legs, and climbing onto the bed and pretending to sleep on my side, and climbing into her cot, and climbing out of her cot, and putting on shoes and socks and taking them off.

E is practising ballet, and speaking her own mind, and doing pretend play where I am the baby and she will kiss me goodbye as she goes off to work then I’m the doctor and need to put a bandaid on her broken leg, and pretending to swim around our backyard sea as a mermaid, and getting dressed “all my by-self”, and only wearing undies unless she’s at home, and recognising more and more letters and telling me which number is which and making me a cup of tea by pressing the button on the kettle and choosing a tea bag and putting it in a cup for me then, if necessary, using her muscles to lift the 3L milk bottle out of the fridge.

C is reading, reading so well that I suddenly have to be careful if she comes in when I am working, and still talking talking talking all the time, and building breathtaking cubbies (thanks, Bluey!), and loving her weekly maths challenge folders, and showing me her developing skills in Irish dancing, and loving chess, and building small things with even smaller building blocks that I keep finding one of in random places on the floor, and being very attached to a particular toy for a few days before becoming obsessed with a different toy, and laying out her pyjamas on her bed once she is dressed in the morning.

They are all at a stage where they can play together.  Or play independently.  I mean, play independently within our family rules, like using scissors for approved paper only, and … actually, that’s the only one I can think of that really works.  “Stay out of mummy and daddy’s bedroom”, “Only use nail polish if mummy says it’s ok and then you must use a towel and then stay in the bathroom for a few minutes for the polish to dry is anybody listening oh never mind”, “Clean up after yourself”, “NO PINS”, “Doors are not for playing”, and “No jumping from the sofa to the – too late” are all rules that are apparently just there “for funsies”.  

It is chaotic, gloriously chaotic.  It is hard work.  It is so heartwarmingly delightful as well as maddeningly infuriating, like having a little one sleeping in bed with you and hearing them giggle in their sleep right before kicking you in the face.  Absolutely wonderful, making my heart sing and want to stop time but also, what will it be like when…?  

A Year Ago, When We Became Five

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Well, hi. It has been a long time. A very, very Long Time. And while I could go on about how things have changed, and all the things – both big and small – that have changed and happened since my last post, I won’t. I’ll get to that. You know, [waves hand] later.

What has really been on my mind lately has been a year ago. A year ago, our little family of five all met. Our littlest bub had just been born, and her big sisters came to meet her in the hospital the next day. For one chaotic and delightful and nerve-wracking half hour, we were all together in my little part of the hospital ward.

The photos from that brief visit show the chaos. C was standing by, sucking a yoghurt pouch, obviously quietly delighted and loving her newest sister, but also possibly a bit peeved that no-one was letting her actually hold the new baby. E flung herself backwards on the bed and nearly fell off the bed multiple times and tried to pull out all the cables and push all the buttons that are present in a hospital bed setting. And Glenn, who was trying so hard to be a good husband and good new dad and good established dad and make it out of there with the same children he went in with all in one piece.

But for all the chaos, and the first real need for parental octopus tentacles to prevent all the accidents that almost happened, my memory of this day makes my heart swell with happiness and love.

And it’s mostly because of E.

She was so little, really. Just 18 months. Still in the hardly-any-hair, maybe she’s a boy? stage. Hardly able to say anything much. And because she was so little and such a baby still, I hadn’t been able to talk with her in the months leading up to this time about what was going on. What was about to happen. What this big tummy meant.

Because she was so young, I had also worried about what having a third baby would do to our second baby. She was such a calm baby, such a good sleeper and eater, and I worried that changing things would change her. Middle child and all that.

I worried, because I had no idea what she would be like with another small child, let alone a baby. She’d been going to daycare for months by then but did she even know what a baby was? I had no idea. How would she react? I had no idea. How would I present her sister, very much loved, just as she was herself, just as her big sister was, and convey that they are all from us and all loved, equally and fully, by us? I had no idea.

But what happened in the hospital that day, happened, and could not have been planned or wished or orchestrated. E came around the bed, wide-eyed, pointed to the baby and said, slowly and with wonder, “Bebeh”, with her whole face lighting up. And all my worries vanished. 

I mean, they were replaced with a thousand more. Some rather pressing, like, will E fall off this bed or make me cough or pull a cord or remove the catheter bag. Some more what-if, like, will they fall over each other playing, or hit each other in the face before they learn gentle hands, or throw wooden blocks at each other when frustrated. Some more for me as their mum, like, will I be attending to one while the other runs to where they shouldn’t and then a car— or will I sow resentment by unwittingly favouring one child in some way over another, or will I have an accident with a carrier again while trying to keep another child safe… The list goes for an eternity, it seems.

But the joys – they are each treasured, and unexpected, and so delightful. 

Like the way S will break into a whole-body smile when she sees one of her sisters. Like the way E will look at me worriedly and say “Oh no, baby S crying” when she hears a nap-time cry. Like the way C will show S how to build a blocks tower. Or S will crawl speedily along the grass to play ball with the big girls. Or E will wrestle and snuggle while I’m feeding S and produce chuckles like I’ve never heard. Or C will read a book to S when I’m making a cup of tea in the morning. Or S will have a bath with either big sister and be so overjoyed all she can do is kick and splash for minutes on end to the point that the older one can’t take any more water in the face. E and S in the pram, facing opposite directions but holding hands. E stroking S’s hair and saying, “I luh you baby S”. 

There are more, and more, and more.  I will go on and on, but not now. Now is for remembering the day a year ago, when sisters met and made my heart sing.

Saturday Morning Art Time

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We’ve had so many changes lately. Just since the start of the year, there has been C no longer at daycare, C starting school, lunches and baking and sickness and pickups and drop-offs and dinners and uniforms and homework and new friends and old friends in new contexts. This last week I have added to the upheaval by insisting on changing up the sleeping arrangements which has meant clearing space here in order to have space to move furniture out of that room to there and other things moving down to the garage just for now. A lot of change. 

And I have 3 very sensitive girls. 

One way my girls destress is through watching shows on ABC Kids, which works well until E decides she’s tired of an episode or a show and takes control and changes things. Or the internet stops working. Total and utter devastation.

Another way my girls destress is art. Colouring in. Painting. Making pictures. Drawing. Colouring the easel (or table or tiles or walls).

After school tends to be a screen time snack time veg out session. Sometimes there is homework or dancing or ice painting too. Saturdays I was just letting roll along, until last week. We needed nappy liners and milk, so I took the girls to the shops.

It was horrible.

I can’t remember any particulars, just that it was horrible. Once we were home, and things had calmed down somewhat and children who nap were napping, I realised that C’s behaviour was a sign of needing time out. That, I can accommodate.

I suggested Saturday morning become an Art-Time Time-Out and she was delighted. 

This weekend was our first Saturday Morning Art Time session. C drew fairies all morning, while telling me allllllll about fairies in general and these fairies in particular and their names and how they were all related and then cutting them out, very carefully, with her scissors.

E joined in with her new washable paints. Mostly by painting her body and tablecloth and high chair, followed by a bath. 

I had much happier girls. We had a much more relaxed and calm Saturday. I found out little snippets of other things that had happened at school, new signs she had learnt, a new song, games she played, that she has evolved in her art style just in the last few weeks, that she seems to like names that start with ‘L’. All of the fairies have names that start with ‘L’. 

So it is decided. As much as possible, we won’t be doing mundane things like shopping on weekends. Instead, art.

I’m always up for new ideas, too. Do you have a way that helps your school kid destress on the weekend? Do you have a favourite art activity to do with young children? I’d love to hear about it in the comments!

In other news, WordPress kept reminding me about adding a payment or donation button. Last week, I finally sorted it out. If you would like to send some funds my way, thank you! Every little bit really, really helps. I’ll probably have different text for different contexts but we’ll see how creative or apt I can remain. Ha. 

Help fund our art supplies – thank you!

A Comparison of Sleep

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Things that make me laugh: an inexhaustive list.

My husband impersonating one of our girls.

C doing a funny walk.

E telling me she hasn’t played in the sandpit at daycare when I now have sand all over the parts of me that just gave her a cuddle when picking her up.

S chuckling as we tickle her tummy.

A bush turkey putting its head down trying to be inconspicuous while running away from us.

Me doing a weekend of baking for lunchboxes and the freezer and then C telling me how delicious everything is and could she please have a ham and cheese sandwich for lunch tomorrow.

People asking me if my girls are different from each other.

I mean, really. That one really gets a belly laugh. They could not be more different. I could write this whole blog, a post every day, on how different they are.

For example, sleep. Sleep is rather on the brain right now as we are in the midst of clearing space to move furniture to change the sleeping arrangements. And E is apparently in the process of dropping her nap. And S is definitely maturing in her napping.

So, without doing a blow-by-blow, here are some thoughts on how my girls differ in terms of sleep.

C. Terrible sleeper as a baby and toddler. I know she DID sleep because I have photographic proof, but there is very little memory of it. Most of my recollections of her aged 3-14 months are surrounding sleep. Please sleep. Why don’t you sleep. The guide says you should be asleep now. Awake now. HOW ARE YOU STILL AWAKE?!?! Ahem. Feeding to sleep. Patting to sleep that only worked a little so back to feeding to sleep. The energy I burned trying to rock her to sleep. The bliss, the relief, that I still feel like it was this week, when she dropped her nap altogether the weekend before she turned 2 so then went to sleep at night without drama or fussing or hours and hours of feeding and chatting and stories and music and feeding and patting and feeding.

E. Beautiful sleeper. Slept, without me having to cajole her or do anything except put her down, exactly when the guide said she should. Would start screaming if she needed to be asleep and I was holding her. Handsies (and occasionally, footsies) to fall asleep. Overnight wakes easily resettled with a dummy or, once or twice a night, a bottle. Things get tricky (mummy gets frustrated and cross and bewildered) when a nap is being dropped and my usually-easy sleeper suddenly resists and stuffs around and is quite happy but also awake when perhaps they should be asleep.

S. I think of her now as my possum baby. Very much driven by awake times instead of clock times. Only now, at 6 months, is she settling into a predictable pattern with a shorter nap in the morning and a longer nap at lunchtime and not usually an afternoon nap. And, for a few months now, has slept most nights for about 12 hours, from after her bath (sometimes with a bottle, sometimes not) until 5 or 6am. It. Is. Bliss. I’m not stuffing around with those naps. This is a baby who sleeps when she needs to sleep, who settles fairly easily if put down when tired but not overtired, who can resettle herself in longer naps and overnight. I know it may not last, and I am hoping hoping hoping that it doesn’t change too much when the sleeping arrangements are given an overhaul in the next few days, but I am astounded and delighted and amazed that I have a baby who does this. 

Buy me a coffee

She’s Only One

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Is it possible? Surely not. E turns two in less than two weeks. This small person, who takes up so much space in our lives and our hearts, who is showing so much development and growth on new levels every day, who is so capable of so so much – she’s only one.

This small person, who loves drawing and painting but not so much on paper, who will maybe draw a little bit on a scrap of paper before scrunching it up and, preferably, dipping it in any nearby spilled water before sliding it to the floor then dropping all the pencils to the floor while saying ‘uh-oh’ as she watches each one hit the floor. Who will tell me each colour as she chooses it, or asks for it, or hands me the pot or the tube saying ‘blue, lid, o? Peeeeese’ with fists up and out and elbows in. Who consistently goes straight to mixing blue and red then tells me, when I ask, that her favourite colour is pur-pur. 

This small person, who is turning babble and nonsense syllables into understandable sentences. Who has evolved from the very sincere, very dramatic, totally unintelligible streams of sound. Who will now say ‘nigh nigh, wub youuuuu’ or ‘she you layer, love you’ and totally and utterly melt my heart. Who will go to the step ladder and hold its side and say, with a Please Face to rival Bluey, ‘mih?’ (mix), hoping that I will consent to some baking. Who will be dancing at the kitchen entrance, be asked to take C’s water bottle to her, have it handed to her from the freezer, and toddle – that particular toddler movement that is faster than a walk but not quite a run – look down at the bottle in her hands and exclaim ‘ooh, fweezy col!’ Who will spend a good 10 minutes of a post-school-drop-off walk singing out ‘daddyyyyy…. Where are youuuu?’ Or tell me, pointing at daddy’s sofa, ‘daddy were’ (daddy work). Or go to where she thinks I am, exclaim ‘huh!’ when I’m not there and then call ‘mummy…. Where ARE you???’

This small person, who will see that daddy has snacks in the kitchen and she will run away down the hallway to the bedroom while saying, almost to herself, ‘co’ (cot’), coming back to a slightly mystified daddy to put on that Please Face again for some chippies please as she has just put her dummy in the cot, where it belongs. A pant of excitement, ‘dadyou’ (thank you), and toddling off with her cracker or chip or blueberry to sit on one of the child-sized chairs to eat her prize. Who will hand you her finished yoghurt pouch saying ‘hinny’ (finished’) or just go to the kitchen and put it in the bin herself. Who will amaze her daycare teachers by clearing her plate and cup after eating. Who will ask, repeatedly, day after day after day, for ‘ah, ah, oooh?’ Which is, of course, an ice cube? And she will often make sure she has her bowl (‘bo’) for us to fill with ice cubes.

This small person, who will climb onto our bed, or remove a lid, or reach something we thought was out of reach, and exclaim ‘I did it!’ Who will be in the bath and lean out and point to toys and when I get it wrong will say ‘no-no’ and keep pointing to what she wants without getting frustrated until I get it right and she nods excitedly and takes it saying thank you. Who will be holding something and say ‘ready, deddy, gooooo’ and you just have to be aware that she is about to throw and she can really throw and although she often throws down the hallway she sometimes just throws a plastic play picnic plate across the living room to clock you on the nose. 

This small person, who loves loves loves singing and dancing. Who will hear the start of the Encanto! soundtrack and seize up in excitement, shake her hands in front, and sing and dance along to the music. Who will scream GOOOOOOOOOOO!! like a banshee at the same point, every time, in Let It Go. Who will sing, in tune, the last word or two in most of the songs from a handful of Disney movies. Who will sing the last word or two or three of every phrase in her favourite tv show tunes.

This small person, who knows her way around an iPad. Who will say, with that killer Please Face, Bluey? to ask if she can watch shows. Who will ask to get out of the cot when it is still too early for anything, give me a cuddle, ask to get down, pick up the iPad from the chair, try to pull my charging cord from my phone but allow me to do that so I can plug it in to the iPad then unlock it and launch ABC Kids. Who is only allowed to use an iPad for ABC Kids and can pause an episode and press the X to exit that episode and press the arrow to go back to a different selection of shows. Who apparently has favourite episodes of certain shows, and regularly picks (saying the correct name) ‘Dark’ for Bing, ‘Rain’ for Bluey, ‘The Dentist’ for Peppa Pig. Who is actually only allowed to use it for ABC Kids but has been known to leave that app and launch all sorts of other apps including, her favourite, the Music app when she sees the Bluey icon up there but will get upset because she actually really wants to keep watching Bluey and not just listen to the music. Who has been known to get the split screen happening. Who will quite confidently get onto the YouTube app and start scrolling through Cocomelon and Wiggles and Laurie Berkner and Super Simple Songs and Frozen and Frozen II and Moana and Encanto! 

This small person, who mostly likes to just wear a nappy because the weather is hot, but can take off that nappy and say ‘toi, lee?’ and then goes through all the steps of going to the toilet before running away from any fresh nappy, squeak-laughing with mischief all the way. Who can half get her own clothes off and on. Who gets herself in and out of the bath with ease, whether or not it’s what she actually wants. (I know. Toddlers.) Who replies with utter mischief and cheekiness. Hm? Whaaaat?! Lear-lee! (Really!)

This small person. She’s only one. 

Early Starts and New Starts

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There have been so many starts. Consequently, so much of the stuff of our life has been missed here. 

Like C finishing preschool and 4 years of childcare and going to prep transition mornings and finding out her big school class and teachers and starting to get uniforms. Like E moving from kisses being sometimes a little peck but sometimes ‘wahwah’ to always a little peck, moving up to the toddler room and now to pre-kindy, knowing all the actions to songs, singing the last word or two at the end of every phrase in songs from Frozen and Frozen II and Encanto! and Moana. Like S being fascinated by her hands and rolling both ways and revealing herself to be a definite redhead and smelling deliciously of burnt biscuit. Like the huge event of me taking girls to church, for the first time in 3 years, so that people keep getting confused about which girl is which as E is the age most people last saw C.

Like, Christmas. The joy of making things for everyone. The spiritual calm that comes with going to church in the lead up to Christmas so that the day is not just about getting things and eating food and hoping girls sleep on Christmas Eve so that mischief can happen.

Like, New Year’s Eve. Glenn only playing one concert so being home in time for us to be together at midnight for the first time in 5 years. But also C staying up painting with glitter glue so that she could watch the fireworks and running down the hallway shouting I’m so excited!!! then being rather disappointed at the skimpy view available from her bedroom. And E going to sleep relatively easily but then having a very unsettled night because of those 4 teeth still working their way through and then the bonus of loud, very loud, louder than they’ve ever been here, fireworks startling her and keeping her awake. And S, who normally sleeps through once she’s had a feed after her bath, waking at 10:30 and just not going back to sleep until well after midnight. What a fun start to the year.

And, why? Why have there been so many starts but no completions? Mostly E. Partly me.

E has taken to waking early. A couple of times in the last few months she has woken after 6 but usually she is awake before 5:30. Sometimes – like this morning, yay – way before 5. This morning she was awake just after 3, then S woke and wouldn’t resettle (teething, groan) and E kept looking out for her then was just… awake. And just after 4am C woke and wanted to come into our bed and suddenly the whole family is awake and there are yelps of you’re touching my leg and screams because someone is in the (perceived) wrong spot. Eventually, every morning, E gets to a point where she gets my iPad and hands it to me so I can set up ABC Kids and she watches shows and scrolls to other shows and occasionally leaves the app and gets into stocks or mail and will say ‘uh ohhhh’ repeatedly until I fix it and take her back to shows.

And I have been keeping my sanity through all this crazy time by making things. Staying up very very late and making things. Crochet. Craft. Sewing. I love it. I love creating something, especially if it is made from something that would have otherwise been discarded. Especially if it is made with love for someone I love. It is great for my sanity and self esteem. It is less great for the sleep or writing. But, new year and new plans… we’ll see. Here goes!

And, if you are keen to support me in making things do check out my sites:

Redbubble: annagraphica.redbubble.com

Madeit: madeit.com.au/cassiannacraft

Instagram: @annalikesmaking and @cassiannacraft

In a Rare Spell of Calm

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These days are hard, you know? As I write this I am enjoying a rare spell of calm: big girls are watching ABC Kids on my iPad and not getting in each other’s way, I’m brewing a cup of tea and have just had the most delightful cuddle coo and smile session with my littlest. I am also permanently tired, yesterday finished at 11pm(ish), there was a toddler feed just after midnight, today started at 4:10am, I have a good whack of baby vomit on my shoulder and toddler snot on my skirt and smears of peanut butter here and there and very little patience for the rude behaviour that my biggest girl is exhibiting I think in anticipatory nerves about big school next year. Yikes. 

There has been so much in our life in the last few months. Much of it medical, some of it wonderful and some… not so wonderful. But it all makes a life, all makes our life. 

There has been Covid and associated hospitalisation and worry and never-ending coughing and rivers of snot. There has been the birth of our new baby, still very new, still amazement in my head that she is here and we are now a family of 5 but also that feeling that she was always meant to be here and now she is. There has been post-surgical infection with hospitalisation and worry and intense pain and weeks and weeks of nurse visits and reinfection and more pain and more antibiotics and being attached to a machine that flashes and buzzes and cannot get wet. There has been brain fog, intense brain fog that wasn’t really apparent until it started to lift. The sort that had me finally filling in the enrolment form for C for next year and stopping at the very first item – Name – and not being able to work out which name to put there. The sort that has me unable to do the simplest of crochet rounds. I no longer take for granted the ability to think things through and remember to respond to people and do more than one thing in a day.

I’m hoping that our medical life can go back to normal now. I’m hoping I don’t have to be at the doctor again until the 4 month checkup at Christmas. I’m hoping I can have more space to enjoy this time, hard as it is. 

Space to enjoy and marvel at the new life that has joined us. Such a new person, with hair and eyes and nose and chin and cheeks and amazing fingers and soft skin. Space to enjoy snuggles with a little bundle, plump tummy with relaxed floppy arms and legs bent, heavy head falling into my shoulder. The warmth of a little baby, so new and delicate, needing to be close. Space to discover little things like eyelashes and eyebrows and hair and eyes and fingernails and toenails and elbows and dimples and facial expressions.

Space to enjoy and delight in her big sisters being big sisters, stroking her hair and replacing a dummy and holding her hand and getting down on the floor with her in tummy time and feeding her a bottle and being excited to see her in the mornings and after daycare. 

Space to enjoy and be present in play. Taking all the girls outside or to the park, baby asleep in the carrier, big girls running around and dancing and scooting and walking along walls and picking leaves to give me ‘money’ or make me a ‘cake’ and doing ring-a-ring-a-rosie and removing sandals before standing on prickles then looking at me with a wobbly lip of betrayal. 

Even though today has been tough, I am sitting here writing while the baby sleeps in her bassinet nearby and the big girls are playing calmly together with blocks and I have tears in my eyes, happy tears that this is my life. How lucky am I?!

One Year Ago

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[Trigger Warning: infant trauma]

I haven’t been able to write for a while. The stuff of our life was just too much for a bit. I’m hoping to get back into it, but I couldn’t let today pass without writing something.

One year ago, I had an accident with E. She was 2 months old, just shy of 9 weeks. I was out walking with her in a carrier, down a street in which I used to live, and tripped. I fell on her, breaking her femur.

When it happened I was sure I must have damaged her grossly and irreparably, that she would have damaged organs and broken ribs and internal bleeding. And because she was so little, it was so hard at the hospital to work out the extent of the damage. No way to know what was sore, where to check first. But the staff – what felt like a huge cohort of staff but was actually probably more than usual but not the dozens my emotional memory remembers – the staff were wonderful. Calm and thorough and reassuring. In our emergency bed area, E was checked over thoroughly and I was asked questions and they narrowed it down to a broken leg. Which still leaves me gobsmacked, that what felt like the whole of me including excess pregnancy weight fell on a tiny baby and all that happened was a broken leg. A very fixable injury. I stayed with her in the hospital from the Monday until the Thursday morning when she underwent non-invasive surgery to have a double leg hip spica cast put on. It stayed on for just under 4 weeks and now we just have checkups every 6 months. That’s it.

And, as we moved through the horror and fog and new reality of those few days, we came to realise that although it was horrible that it had happened to such a tiny and helpless baby, it was much better for it to have happened to her at that stage of development instead of later. She was still in the sleepy newborn stage so I wasn’t battling naps or trying to tire her out so she would sleep. She hadn’t started walking or crawling or even rolling so there was nothing to try to control there. She was still so little that hoiking her around with the cast on wasn’t such an effort.

So, there was much that turned out for the best. The best, considering the initial moment that began the whole thing and was an accident and unavoidable but still something we would rather not have had to go through.

But, my goodness. So much in my head of the memories of that time and the horror and the panic and the pain and the relief. 

The relief that I had delayed her 6 week checkup due to a lockdown and she’d had it at 8 weeks instead, so she was still up-to-date with her vaccinations but we also had a recent weight for her.

The relief and gratitude we felt that, unlike C as a baby, E took a dummy and she took formula in a bottle and she didn’t need to be held or fed or rocked to sleep and she was much more of an on-schedule baby.

The relief and gratitude we felt for the kindness of the staff. Volunteers like the one who came around calmly with a Medicare form and only asked for Glenn’s name and date of birth and then took care of all the rest. Or the daily parade of volunteers offering to be with E if I needed a break when the last thing I wanted to do was leave her but they were so kind nonetheless. The nurse who took care of C in the emergency department, making sure she was fed and entertained and cared for. The succession of emergency department staff asking if I was ok and should I have an X-ray myself, actually? The different women who had to ask me on subsequent days how I was, or what happened, seeing my uncontrollable tears and put an arm around me and helped me feel like a person who had had a terrible accident and not just an auxiliary person attached to a baby in traction. The night nurses who didn’t wake me when E needed a feed but fed her themselves from the stash of expressed breastmilk or formula.

The confusion – which persists – as to how I fell on my right side but somehow still managed to break E’s right leg. The horror and panic and relief, all mixed in and simultaneous and hasn’t gone away yet, when the triage nurse asked about E’s head, had I protected it, held it as I fell, landed on it or did it hit the ground, what sort of surface was it that we landed on.

The physical pain, like the sting of hand sanitiser being my first indicator that I too had fallen, or, hours later, finding the mud all down my side where I’d taken the fall, or growing numb in my forearm as I held E still for nearly 4 hours while everything was sorted out like finding traction weights small enough.

The panic, like wondering what number to call to make a hospital appointment in an emergency. Or forgetting E’s date of birth or middle names.

The horror of putting a newborn in such pain. A shaky cup of tea that I nearly spilled all over myself as Glenn took C to the Starlight Room and the staff applied a nerve block to E and I was finally alone with myself for the first time all day and the enormity of what had happened kicked in: I went for a walk and nearly killed my newborn.

And then, how to tell people? ‘Nothing to worry about’… no. ‘Everyone’s ok’… no. Not really. ‘Please don’t worry, but’… Everything I tried was hard and wrong.

The saddest memory I have though is not being able to hold her. She was already a snuggly baby, and the natural instinct when a child is hurt is to hold them, but there was none of that. At most, we could hold her hand, but the traction and then the cast made anything else difficult. And I longed to hold her close to me, feel that heavy weight of a sleeping newborn and heal us both.

We both healed, of course. I had marks on my hands for a time where the scabs had been but I can no longer see them. Because E was a baby, all her body was doing was growing and building so she was cast-free within a month and then doing all the normal baby things. The last few months she has started climbing everything she can, and has started walking in the last few weeks. It’s amazing what can happen in a year.

Remember the Positive

/ annamurray / Leave a comment

This week has been tough. And I mean, really, really, really, tough. But when I was thinking about how tough it has been, a little voice popped into my head with ‘oh but there was also -‘ so I want to remember those things too, preferably more than the other, less positive things.

Out with the tough things. I always prefer bad news first. (Although, there wasn’t really any bad news.)

We are back to screeching baby. Not AS much in the wee small hours but that is largely because I made her a quiet activity box. It took all of my Tuesday evening. And she does play with it, just mostly by picking it up and looking up into it and flapping the flaps. (I know she will work it out a bit more over time so Second Time Mum me isn’t too disheartened.)

Screeching baby is also occurring frequently at food times. Right into my ears. She is very very loud. I am not ok. It is easier if I give her food to feed herself but she is also a fan of dropping something just for fun and then watching where it falls and I’m just not that much a fan of cleaning.

C has been continuing to need me to be with her while she falls asleep. I am ok with this – and I know I will miss it when she tells me she doesn’t need me anymore – but only up to a point. That point is about 8pm. Wednesday she didn’t fall asleep until 9pm, Thursday somewhere around 9:15. Tonight, after I was in my starting-to-get-frustrated zone especially knowing she was so down on her sleep, I resorted to patting her bottom like I did when she was a baby and toddler while singing the rainbow chameleon song. Asleep 8:15, but I was so spent it felt like 9:15 at least.

Of course, when one or both girls requires my attention for hours at night, it cuts into my Me Time. And I need my Me Time. Not just to check social media or to watch a show, but to do my craft or crochet or write. I really feel it when I don’t get to be Anna at all and have to be Mummy until exhausted and spent.

However, there were some definite delights this week.

This morning, E crawled (and she is speedy) from the play zone at one end of our place, past the books and the sofa shortcut and blocks table and tempting cords and kitchen, all the way down the hallway and into C’s room and onto her bed to wake her up. Thankfully C was happy to see her.

Riding on daddy’s shoulders has become E’s new favourite thing to do. And when up there she often does little two-tone sing-song sighs that I remember C doing as well. A sign of contentment that makes my heart happy.

Wednesday was the Australia Day public holiday. Although we’re not happy with our national day being this date, we took it as an opportunity to educate our girls in some of our culture. We did wattle paintings. We did a southern cross painting. Breakfast was like a camping big breakfast: sausage, grilled mushrooms with cheese, egg on a redback. C had her first fairy bread. We had lamingtons with jam and cream. We had sausage rolls with coleslaw and sweet potato fries for dinner. 

C has been wanting the lullaby from Frozen 2 in the evenings so guess what I’ve been learning… but so has she. And it turns out she has a great memory for melody and lyrics.

The girls had their first proper bath together. Total chaos with splashing and laughter on repeat. It was only marred by E getting her scream on because she was obviously very tired and needing to be in bed but also loving splashing in a bath with C. 

After teething for months (it felt) with one bottom tooth popping up unexpectedly early on and four top teeth playing peekaboo, all four top teeth are through. Phew.

Perhaps the highlight of my week was E starting to clap properly. C started this at 7 months and although I think I’ve been fairly good in not comparing them, this was starting to worry me. E would put her hands together but then move them up and down, or take them apart and hit the table. Until yesterday, when real and proper clapping started. I am SO relieved. And E is obviously pretty happy with herself too.

The last exciting thing is we are starting to plan E’s first birthday party. I love planning parties and working out cake and decorations and snacks and the theme and invitations. Plus, a first birthday is such an achievement. It feels especially so with E.

The best game we have been playing this week has been what I think of as Construction/Destruction. C loves to build amazing towers with blocks. E is in the pull everything apart stage. So we race. C and I try to build up as fast as we can and E pulls the blocks off and then apart. It is crazy and chaotic but loads of fun.

So here’s to a quieter weekend with easier sleep but still some fun chaos. Please.

Sisters

/ annamurray / Leave a comment

Having a second child is such a gamble. Will they get on? Will they fight? Will they support each other? Will they play together nicely? 

From the moment we told C she was going to be a big sister, I haven’t had to worry too much. Her reaction was along the lines of ‘yeah, I knew this was going to happen’ and pretending to play (beautifully) with her imaginary little sister for the next few months until her actual real life little sister came home from the hospital. And that was next level beautiful.

One of my most treasured memories of that first morning at home is having the bassinet next to the dining table, E probably sleeping inside it, C sitting on her chair ‘reading’ Goldilocks to her, very quietly, while the adults all flurried around them. 

Yes, there are times – some days many more than others – when I worry, really worry, about how they are getting on and if we’ll be having an accident or an injured baby or hair pulling or head kicks or something swallowed. 

But then there are other times, and I delight in them and their sisterhood.

Like when C asks if she can please feed E. And does, often far more successfully than I do. She makes sure to alternate food with water. She reciprocates raspberries when E gets happy and starts blowing them. C picks up the dropped spoons and cups and toys, over and over. E has started to do things to make C laugh, like dribbling out water instead of swallowing it and then chuckling.

Or when C sings Twinkle, or Baa Baa Black Sheep, or Wheels on the Bus. And E has started singing back to her or us which is making our musician souls so happy.

Or when I wake up in the morning to giggles and squeak laughs, finding C playing while E is still in the cot. Peekaboo is the best, and passing a squishy mango around, or hanging a sparkly monkey by its tail on the cot rails.

Or when C does a fake sneeze and E starts belly laughing. Repeat for 10+ minutes. (This has been the funniest thing all year for us. It was a new laugh for E, full-bodied and uncontrolled and finding these fake sneezes the funniest thing ever in her life so far.)

And there are other, smaller things. C saying that, actually, E is her best friend. E perking up when she hears C coming up the stairs. C telling me she is loving, really loving, having E doing full days at daycare now. E looking adoringly at C as she sucks down a feed. C getting excited to have a bath with E. E throwing each bath toy in the bath to C and both of them giggling as the fun of bubbles is discovered.

I know there are likely tough teenage years ahead. And it’s not always easy now, especially as E is still fascinated by C’s hair and each is likely to kick the other in the head accidentally. But there is so much in the way they are together that fills me with such joy and delight. I love the way they are being sisters to each other.