It's Sunny! It's Sunny! It's Sunny! IT'S SUNNY!!!!!!! After the last three days of sitting under a grey Cork sky while the rest of Ireland basked in the first glorious rays of summer (I saw that sunburnt man on the late late show last night!) The sun has finally arrived in Cork City and the surrounding area (apparently it was already in North Cork and West Cork and it's just us urbanites that God hates so much)
Either way, I refuse to waste what could be our only day of partially cloudy skies with temps above 18 and NO RAIN TO BE SEEN sitting indoors on a computer. Check ya later Alligaters!
Saturday, May 30, 2009
Thursday, May 28, 2009
Double Trouble...
I don't know how I'm going to do it. As I look around myself at the never ending mountain of chores and my tiny housekeeping assistant whose main skill seems to be creating chaos wherever she steps foot, I am slightly scared for the future.
Today is not turning out to be a great day. It turns out that cleaning bathrooms and unclogging drains with a toddler in tow do not make for light work. When I wasn't busy keeping razors and cleaning fluids out of reach of the snot princess, I was chasing her down to remove coins from her mouth (god knows where she finds the things but she does) and pick bits of mangled toilet roll out of the just hoovered carpets. She found a roll of the stuff and had it half destroyed in the time it took me to waddle across the room after her.
I am considering giving up on feeding her indoors at all and simply throwing food at her in the back yard as I feel as though I spend half my life wiping out that bloody high chair and the other half picking oatmeal and peanut butter out of the Snot Queen's various crevices whilst she screams the house down.
Our floors have accumulated a constant cover of grass clippings and dirt as she insists on bringing half the garden indoors with her on her clothes after every outdoor excursion making sweeping the floors an excercise in futility which I stupidly plug away at anyway. Add to that the fact that she is ridiculously tired and crying at the drop of a hat but refusing to go down for a nap and you could say that it's been a difficult afternoon.
How the hell am I going to manage two?
Today is not turning out to be a great day. It turns out that cleaning bathrooms and unclogging drains with a toddler in tow do not make for light work. When I wasn't busy keeping razors and cleaning fluids out of reach of the snot princess, I was chasing her down to remove coins from her mouth (god knows where she finds the things but she does) and pick bits of mangled toilet roll out of the just hoovered carpets. She found a roll of the stuff and had it half destroyed in the time it took me to waddle across the room after her.
I am considering giving up on feeding her indoors at all and simply throwing food at her in the back yard as I feel as though I spend half my life wiping out that bloody high chair and the other half picking oatmeal and peanut butter out of the Snot Queen's various crevices whilst she screams the house down.
Our floors have accumulated a constant cover of grass clippings and dirt as she insists on bringing half the garden indoors with her on her clothes after every outdoor excursion making sweeping the floors an excercise in futility which I stupidly plug away at anyway. Add to that the fact that she is ridiculously tired and crying at the drop of a hat but refusing to go down for a nap and you could say that it's been a difficult afternoon.
How the hell am I going to manage two?
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Because They're Worth It...
It's not that easy to paint a toddler. In fact, if I'm perfectly honest, it's downright impossible to get the results you desire when your canvas won't stop wriggling and squirming and trying to see what's going on!
The idea was brilliant, A shot from behind of the snot queen with the P.A.C.U.B (Protest Against Child Unfriendly Budget) logo printed on her nappy and "I'm Worth it" written on her back. Simple, right? WRONG. Apparently, the snot queen has no desire to be mama's blank canvas in the fight against child related budget cuts... Which brings me nicely to the point of this blog.
PACUB MADE THE COVER OF THE IRISH INDEPENDENT!!! Yes, that's right, thanks to everyone who joined the facebook campaign, signed the online and paper petitions, distributed posters, sent their nappies and protest letters to Leinster House and in general spread the word, our voices are being heard. You can read the full text of the article here.
Now, for an interesting fact to ponder whilst you read about the governments plan to take our children's money (we must ALL tighten our belts you know!)
Did you know that the starting salary for a TD is just over €95,000? Don't worry though, only a handful are on such a paltry wage. The majority make quite a bit more with the average TD salary being somewhere in the neighborhood of €122,000 per annum. And did I mention the daily expense accounts of about €300 per day? Now, assuming that's only on week days, that comes to about €78,000 a year which when added to their wages makes for a princely sum of €200,000 per TD (there are 166 at present in the Dail) per year. Oh, and this is before you work in the free phones and paid for mobile bills, travel expenses, money for staff and office expenditures etc...
That's quite a lot when you consider that the average Irish family income is €40,000. One fifth of a TD's earnings.
Apparently, they think their worth it...
Now, I'm off to put the snot queen down for her nap. In the end, I went with painting the bump instead. Much less wriggly, for the moment anyway!
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
I am sitting here watching the snot queen coat herself in yoghurt. For someone who hates having her hair washed, she seems pretty darned determined to rub as much fruit and yoghurt into it as humanly possible.
If I was a reeeeaaallllly good mother, I would stop her little hands from mashing breakfast all over herself and maybe take the bowl away from her.
Meanwhile, the dishes somebody else said he'd do last night are still sitting on the kitchen counter next to the sink.
If I were a reeeeeeeaaaalllly good girlfriend, I would get up and do them myself.
What I am though is pregnant past the point of reason and in desperate need of a) a good night's sleep and b) a holiday from being "needed." Therefore, the snot queen can dump the whole bowl over her head if she so pleases so long as she stays happily occupied thus giving me a partial break and the dishes can wait for someone else to do them.
I'm no martyr.
If I was a reeeeaaallllly good mother, I would stop her little hands from mashing breakfast all over herself and maybe take the bowl away from her.
Meanwhile, the dishes somebody else said he'd do last night are still sitting on the kitchen counter next to the sink.
If I were a reeeeeeeaaaalllly good girlfriend, I would get up and do them myself.
What I am though is pregnant past the point of reason and in desperate need of a) a good night's sleep and b) a holiday from being "needed." Therefore, the snot queen can dump the whole bowl over her head if she so pleases so long as she stays happily occupied thus giving me a partial break and the dishes can wait for someone else to do them.
I'm no martyr.
Sunday, May 24, 2009
Swept Away...
Is it weird to be jealous of someone for getting an internal examination? To answer my own question if it was being asked by anyone else, "EW!!!! YES! And more then slightly creepy as well!"
However, as I read through the posts of the other "mums 2 be" on rollercoaster, I can't help but be just a teensy bit envious of all the women there whose doctors are only too happy to don the rubber gloves and get stuck into their work. Not only are these women able to be told if their cervix is "ripe" or "favourable," if they are far enough gone, they can even get the doc to give them a "sweep" to encourage things along!
So not fair!!!!
My doc, who has been with me through 2 pregnancies now (this being my second) has never shown any interest in my nether regions and doesn't seem likely to suddenly develope any desire to get to know them in the near future either.
Up until now, this has been fine with me, and to be perfectly honest, I don't really want her going there either. It's gone on too long now. We've long since set the barriers of our doctor/patient relationship and they end at the waistband of my pants. In my mind, for her to give me an internal would be something akin to having a few too many at the Christmas party and falling into bed with your really nice "I like you but not in THAT sort of way..." coworker. It would just be too weird.
I also don't fancy the idea of some anonymous gp who knows that this is the ONLY reason I'm going to them and who knows that there is no future for us beyond this one "encounter." As it's a little late in the game for wining and dining potential candidates, I suppose I'll simply have to remain in the dark about the state of my nether regions.
It seems that my cervix, much like my front walkway, will have to remain unswept.
However, as I read through the posts of the other "mums 2 be" on rollercoaster, I can't help but be just a teensy bit envious of all the women there whose doctors are only too happy to don the rubber gloves and get stuck into their work. Not only are these women able to be told if their cervix is "ripe" or "favourable," if they are far enough gone, they can even get the doc to give them a "sweep" to encourage things along!
So not fair!!!!
My doc, who has been with me through 2 pregnancies now (this being my second) has never shown any interest in my nether regions and doesn't seem likely to suddenly develope any desire to get to know them in the near future either.
Up until now, this has been fine with me, and to be perfectly honest, I don't really want her going there either. It's gone on too long now. We've long since set the barriers of our doctor/patient relationship and they end at the waistband of my pants. In my mind, for her to give me an internal would be something akin to having a few too many at the Christmas party and falling into bed with your really nice "I like you but not in THAT sort of way..." coworker. It would just be too weird.
I also don't fancy the idea of some anonymous gp who knows that this is the ONLY reason I'm going to them and who knows that there is no future for us beyond this one "encounter." As it's a little late in the game for wining and dining potential candidates, I suppose I'll simply have to remain in the dark about the state of my nether regions.
It seems that my cervix, much like my front walkway, will have to remain unswept.
Friday, May 22, 2009
Recipe for disaster...
Okay, that's it. I do not want to be the only one who knows this recipe. It is evil and sinful and waaaaaay too easy to make. so I am sharing it with you all so that you too can devour half a pan to yourselves.
Newfoundland Sinkers (Slightly altered to fit Irish Ingredients)
1 bar of baking chocolate chopped up
3/4 can of evaporated milk
1 and 1/3 cups of coconut
1 and 1/2 cups of crushed up digestive biscuits
1/4 cup melted butter
1 tsp vanilla
Bung it all into a bowl. Stir it up. Spread it into a square pan (9 x 9 maybe?) Bake at 180 or gas mark 7/8 until it starts to brown and take out of oven immediately. Place in fridge to cool (pan and all) when cooled, cut into squares and enjoy. Enjoy them until you realize that you've devoured half the pan within an hour and are panicking at what will happen when you run out. then when you do run out, you will immediately start thinking if you have all the ingredients for a new batch and if not will plan a special trip to the shops for the ingredients. It's a vicious circle. Don't let me run it alone.
Have a good night! Am off to bed to think loads of baby having thoughts! xoxoxox
Newfoundland Sinkers (Slightly altered to fit Irish Ingredients)
1 bar of baking chocolate chopped up
3/4 can of evaporated milk
1 and 1/3 cups of coconut
1 and 1/2 cups of crushed up digestive biscuits
1/4 cup melted butter
1 tsp vanilla
Bung it all into a bowl. Stir it up. Spread it into a square pan (9 x 9 maybe?) Bake at 180 or gas mark 7/8 until it starts to brown and take out of oven immediately. Place in fridge to cool (pan and all) when cooled, cut into squares and enjoy. Enjoy them until you realize that you've devoured half the pan within an hour and are panicking at what will happen when you run out. then when you do run out, you will immediately start thinking if you have all the ingredients for a new batch and if not will plan a special trip to the shops for the ingredients. It's a vicious circle. Don't let me run it alone.
Have a good night! Am off to bed to think loads of baby having thoughts! xoxoxox
Result!
Okay, not to jinx anything, but it's looking like tiny baba may be making an appearance sometime in the very near future...
I had my gp appointment today and after the usual pee in tiny cup/check blood pressure/ get weighed routine, I hopped up on the table to listen to the heartbeat and have the doctor (who by the way is the styliest doctor EVER!) check the baby's position.
The snot Queen busied herself opening drawers and pulling out random bits of medical paraphernalia.
After a bit of prodding and loads of "hmmm - ing" my gp smiled and turned to write something in her chart. As she did, she muttered those magic words "The baby's engaging. Looks like he or she will be arriving sooner rather then later!"
For those of you not in the pregnant know, engagement is when the babs head goes deep into the pelvis and gets set for the final descent. While it can happen ages before labour starts and it is technically possible for the baby to disengage and then re engage blah blah blah... in general, it's a pretty good sign that things are getting moving. Which is great news to my extremely pregnant self.
This latest bit of news was just the push I needed to go home and prepare my "birthing room" formerly known as the second sitting room. Three hours, several trips up and down the stairs with various items of furniture (the men did the carrying, I did the dictating) and a few miles of plastic sheeting laid on the floor and we are one step closer to baby birthing bliss.
The sheets are in the dryer along with several oh so tiny sleepers and onesies and the newborn nappies have been laid out to wait for their new owner.
Alright baby, we're ready when you are...
I had my gp appointment today and after the usual pee in tiny cup/check blood pressure/ get weighed routine, I hopped up on the table to listen to the heartbeat and have the doctor (who by the way is the styliest doctor EVER!) check the baby's position.
The snot Queen busied herself opening drawers and pulling out random bits of medical paraphernalia.
After a bit of prodding and loads of "hmmm - ing" my gp smiled and turned to write something in her chart. As she did, she muttered those magic words "The baby's engaging. Looks like he or she will be arriving sooner rather then later!"
For those of you not in the pregnant know, engagement is when the babs head goes deep into the pelvis and gets set for the final descent. While it can happen ages before labour starts and it is technically possible for the baby to disengage and then re engage blah blah blah... in general, it's a pretty good sign that things are getting moving. Which is great news to my extremely pregnant self.
This latest bit of news was just the push I needed to go home and prepare my "birthing room" formerly known as the second sitting room. Three hours, several trips up and down the stairs with various items of furniture (the men did the carrying, I did the dictating) and a few miles of plastic sheeting laid on the floor and we are one step closer to baby birthing bliss.
The sheets are in the dryer along with several oh so tiny sleepers and onesies and the newborn nappies have been laid out to wait for their new owner.
Alright baby, we're ready when you are...
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