Endings and beginnings

I have had a recurring nightmare for a couple of weeks now. It involves coming back to our house after leaving it free for our Estate Agent to show around potential buyers, and finding everything still impeccably immaculate, EXCEPT for an ENORMOUS pair of maternity knickers slap bang in the middle of the floor.

There is actually nothing too dream-like or implausible about this nightmare. We have had several viewings a day for ten days. I have been almost OCD in my cleaning up; “Oh, Ramona? You want a TOY, you say? Like to play with? Ah. Okay. Here is a tractor. Have fun.” *5 minutes later* “Right, er, you finished with that?” *Tidies away*

AND Ramona loves to drape my underwear around her cute self. She will appear with my giant pants on her head, bras hung over her neck. She could easily have diligently found and placed a pair in perfect view, ready to greet any potential buyers.

Muddy cuddles for Ramona during Tim’s game of rugby

However. It didn’t happen. And you know what? We got an offer and our house is off the market!! WOOHOOO. Good bye, Big-Knickers-in-Public-View-Dream.

I am thrilled that it could all be wrapped up before the womb-baby makes an appearance in April, with a moving out date of late July. We will miss our home hugely, we have made every single nook and cranny our own. And we love Camberwell. It’s people, cafes, parks, and especially the weekly car boot sale. (Just LOOK at this retro French bottle I got last week for FIFTY PEE!!!)

The ducks! The snow!

We will be pretty forlorn to finally close our freshly painted door on this place.

And then,  I had my last day at work last week. I took up my first role with Oxfam almost six years ago, would you believe it, quickly finding myself enveloped in a kind crowd of kindred, hopeful spirits. It was a quiet farewell, thriftily sneaking some scrummy posh M and S cakes into the pub and then out for Dim Sum. Gone are my days of channelling Whitney in seedy Soho karaoke bars. (Jokes, those days will never be over, just on pause while this womb-baby battles with my achey pelvis, too-stretchy ligaments and weary brain!)

Gosh, you know, I could write a book called What Not to Say Outloud. At the start of my last team meeting someone asked “Are you sad to be leaving?” – in response I blurted out “Noooo, not at all.” I had to quickly backtrack as it isn’t that I am HAPPY to be off, it is just that, despite LOVING my job utterly, I feel ready, completely ready, for this next stage.

Some of the beautiful tulips giving to me by my colleagues in my new bottle. Overly excited about my new bottle? Probably, yep.

Beginnings

Often when something ends, a spark of something new commences elsewhere. My grand finale at work obviously means that this week is my first of my maternity leave, and now I have just a few weeks left until I am a mother of two.

We spent Sunday, Mother’s Day, at an Active Birth Workshop led by a wonderful friend. We shipped Ramona off to our other dear chums up the hill, they have a tribe of kids whom she is in love with and a cat to boot (as in “as well” rather than “one you can kick”.)

It was so brilliant having a day for Tim and I to really focus on this new little soul we are bringing into the world, and to talk through the birth we would like rather than just assuming blithely that we would rest on decisions made 2 and a half years ago.

We are planning a water birth at home, with lots of relaxing and hypno shizzle, and also probably an orgasm. (Yeah, it TOTALLY can happen, I saw a video of it, yeah.)

I really recommend, if you are pregnant, taking a day out to do something with Janet Balaskas or one of her trainers. There is so much incredible info about hormones, relaxation methods, pelvis movements to delve into. It will leave you even more certain that our bodies are perfectly formed to give birth to our babies. Spending some time reflecting on this sure belief I have in my body was brilliant.

I am spending this first week in Gloucestershire with my sister’s gorgeous family. Ramona is in her complete element having cousins on hand for constant playing and snuggling.

And then back to London where I am going to loll around all day, doing yoga, allowing my neo-cortex to retreat and let my inner cave woman appear ready to embrace the wilds of childbirth. So if I blog some complete nonsense (me?? Blogging nonsense??!!) over the next wee while, blame nature.

This is a featured post, because I love cake!