Live In The Now: June

Pink blossoms on a blue background with the slogan 'live in the now'

Wow. I’m amazed that it has been a whole month since I put up my first Live In The Now post. For those that missed my May ramblings, the premise is that you try and take a monthly snapshot of your life, and capture some of the details that you don’t take the time to record in photograph albums or baby books. It’s something that the excellent Scribbling Mum started, and if you haven’t checked her blog out I’d urge you to do so.

Anyway, it has been one of those weeks. DorkyDad is travelling, and within five minutes of him getting in a taxi to the airport I’d managed to drop a two-litre carton of milk on the kitchen floor. DorkySon was supposed to be getting a haircut – something that has previously been no problem – but on this occasion he had a meltdown and refused to let anyone near him. In the queue at the bank, DorkySon stuck his fingers so far down his own throat that he threw up all over himself. And today we walked past a toy shop without going in and buying a new truck and so I was rewarded with twenty minutes of screaming around the supermarket, before DorkySon slammed his legs against the checkout counter with such strength that he flipped his pushchair right over and ended up staring at the ceiling. The shock of that, finally, made him shush.

Phew. I feel like the gin and tonic I am sitting sipping has been well earned. Continue reading

Imperfect Parenting

Child with toy on head surrounded by colourful plastic balls.

When DorkySon was about six months old, we started taking him to swimming lessons, and I remember being awed by the number of mothers who showed up at the pool every week with perfectly painted toenails, immaculate bikini lines, and tummies that had returned to pre-baby muscle tone.

Jeez, I thought, where do they find the time to do that? I thought of my own days, which were still flying by in a haze of feeds and laundry and naps. Some days I found time to smear a bit of moisturiser on my cheeks, but that was about the extent of my personal grooming.

In truth though, it had little to do with the demands of DorkySon. Even before his arrival, when I had oodles of spare time, I didn’t have pedicures. I had never been the kind of person who could organise her life to the extent where it felt like I ‘had it all’. Something always had to slip. Continue reading