So what else do you do? #motivationalmonday

This week has been an all round rubbish week that has left me feeling like, out of all the ‘roles’ i have in my life, im seem to not be doing any of them well. *sigh*

This week I had an interview, it was at the place i work for a job that i had about 2 years ago and then lost through the delightful NHS cutbacks and is now being offered again…its a long story, a long, boring and miserable story that i won’t bore you with. But the interview was this week and it wasn’t the nicest experience ive ever had i have to say, runs up close to root canal or another such painful event.

My interview was delayed by over an hour and then during my presentation prep a fire alarm joined in and banged around in my head for half of the time. Nerves jangled somewhat i stumbled through a presentation based on a practically impossible scenario and then was asked a bunch of questions. A few of which i did sort of okay on i think and some i totally BOMBED. You know, in the, ‘shall i just get my coat’ bomb.

But there was one question that just irritated me….and continues to which is why im moaning about it here. I was asked what extra CPD (thats continuous professional development) i had done in the past two years. Extra, as in, extra to the standard stuff we have to do to maintain professional registration. I answered with a few things then she looked at me, i think with a little sneer (though i may have imagined that) and said ‘and what else have you done?’

hmmmmm…just let me think a bloody minute. I dont know…maybe..raise five kids, turn up for every single shift i’m supposed to regardless of sleepless nights, vomiting bugs, stressed out husbands, broken cars, car accidents or snow with a bloody smile on my face. THANK YOU VERY MUCH!

Of course i know she wasn’t asking me about what else i do outside of work. But it may be a mad crazy thought but your life outside of work can effect your ability to throw huge amounts of commitment and time at your work. Its a tricky balance for all us working mums i guess.

It was the only question that actually upset me, how funny is that. Even the ones that resulted in a ‘nothing happenin’ here’ look on my face as mortifying as that was..i can shake that off. But what pisses me off is that some people don’t realise that actually just showing up with your game face on takes all you have on some days and sometimes that is just all you can give.

I wanted to shout the above tirade in her face and see what happened but of course i didnt.

and i didnt get the job.

cherry on top  😉

So in a bid to lighten up this post and because what follows demonstrates a little bit of ‘what else i do’

Here come the girls ….two of my bunch. Just hanging out with the girls while we get frozen by the spring 😉

This is a little bit of what else I have done.

 

She is telling me in that bottom picture ‘ there are no monsters here mummy’ – just in case you were wondering!

My giveaway this week is another lovely sunshine box of goodies from LUSH. You don’t have to leave a comment this week if you don’t fancy it but if you do that would be nice. Remember to come back next week and check who snagged the prize!

Jane Greenfield you win the Rob Cowen signed book please get in touch! Congratulations!
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excuse me but is that sterile? #motivational monday

A little while ago a friend of mine posted a question on facebook asking for some advice on how long you should sterilise baby bottles and feeding equipment. She had numerous responses, those sort of questions do on facebook don’t they? I thought id ask the lovely parent bloggers on twitter what they would all do or had done and they all said about 12 months or until the baby could move around and pick stuff up.

My response went down with a little bit of a shock for some people. See, after our first baby we didn’t sterilise anything. AT ALL.

My babies have all been breastfed but we have always given bottles as well, usually of expressed milk or formula. Generally once a day in order to give me a bit of rest. My OH would do the late evening feed with a bottle and then mama would be getting a little bit extra kip and do the night time feeds, which (chipping into baby nurse mode)  is always one of the best feeds to stick with as your hormone levels are higher at this time of day (which..ahem is sort of unfair if you ask me).

But thats digressing..

….so we usually would only have one or two bottles a day and the hand breast pump to use daily.

At the end of the day all of the things were washed in hot soapy water with a bottle brush and then put in the dishwasher…and thats what we did…with every single baby.

Now I realise that, that might sound radical and scary to some who are worried about bacteria, infections, high temps BUT we didnt make the decision to do this based on entirely no thought.

If you have been here before you may know that I have been a staff nurse on a large Neonatal unit for a number of years (thats sick and premature babies) and for our pre-term babies who aren’t old enough to suckle we ask their mama’s to express milk for them, which is stored and given to them as they need it.

We dont sterilise the expressing sets we give to the mums. They are taught good hand washing and how to wash the sets effectively with detergent. But that is all. This process has always been sanctioned by a micro-biologist (just in case you wanted to know!). Also I donated expressed milk to our local milk bank ( just call me Daisy) and they also did not recommend sterilising. Again just hot soapy water and a thorough clean.That milk is obviously pasteurised before it is used but it is screened for bugs before that process.

This reason and also a conversation i had with a friend who is a phd in microbiology who said something along the lines of ‘it is totally laughable that ten minutes in a steamer can be deemed as sterilised!’ made me re-evaluate why we were actually sterilising our stuff.

So we stopped and got a little bit of time back, which is really important in our house and we have had 5 very healthy, thriving babies. Four of which have never had anything that has been sterilised.

Thats my theory, i wouldn’t have said it was that radical, i think the response i got on facebook seemed to suggest that it was maybe a little. Im not saying that we shouldn’t recommend that parents sterilise for young babies but its important to realise that a steriliser doesn’t actually ‘clean’ a bottle!

Funnily enough though a friend of mine who has moved to Australia chipped to the little conversation on fb saying that there they don’t recommend sterilising either. So it would seem that im not altogether alone…

🙂

What do you think? what did you do? What will you do?

and just because here is a seriously cute little babba…

 

GIVEAWAY TIME!!

This week as its a baby theme I am doing a giveaway of one of these fabulous Lamaze developmental play toys. We had one of these for my last baby and she loved it. So if you would like to win one of these cute little toys for your little one, please fill in the rafflecopter and away you go!

the winner of the fabulous Cakedays book by the Hummingbird bakery is Gemma from Helloitsgemma. Congratulations! Give me a shout!

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The art of skimming stones… #motivationalmonday

 

A week ago we went down to Nymans House to be part of a group of bloggers who have a real interest in giving our kids a passion for being outside. Enjoying nature, being kids, being wild. Tapping into that childhood that we had, freely available without the fears and distractions that exist now. The fear of strangers, the traffic, the dangers. The distractions of the screens….the  s-c-r-e-e-ns. It just gets into everything doesn’t it. So early as well, you can check out babies less than a year old doing the Apple swipe on mummy or Daddy’s phone. They just pick it up so quickly and it becomes part of the norm for them. Plugged in before they are 12 months. Is a natural childhood possible anymore? It is scary stuff!

As we were chatting about the boundaries that our kids face now and by contrast how easy it was for us as kids to get out into the wild. Made me think about how easy it was for me as a kid, we lived in front of a large wood and used to disappear all day and our parents would ring a bell to get us all back. That would never happen for my children where we live now. N-E-V-E-R and that is sad and it is a loss to their childhood and to us as well as parents. What parent wouldn’t want their kids to be out of the house, exploring the wild all day and not tearing each other apart inside and arguing over who goes on the wii

hands up?? 😉

The nice folk at National Trust had put on some seriously cool activities for the kids. In the afternoon they got to hang out with gnarly outdoors man and musician Rob Cowen. A guy who has a real passion for re-discovering nature and connecting with the outdoors. He showed the kids how to build a den, which they all got really enthusiastic about and lined up ready for a lie down in once it was put together…along with all of the adults as well!

Ever meet one of those people whose passion for a subject just draws people in? Rob is one of those guys. He cares enough about getting re-connected with simplicity of having an adventure in the outdoors that he has written a book called Skimming Stones – a book inspiring us to have an adventure, get out into the wild…and for the practical ones out there it is a full on ‘how to’ book. Things like how to build a den, make a kite, forage for food, catch a fish..and no its not saying trot down to your local outdoors store and buy a shed load of north face equipment..it is mostly things that you can find and use in the wild. Minimal spend to your pocket, maximum benefit to your soul.

We have been inspired to try and work through the 12 sections in the book, there is even talk of starting up a skimming stones blog! Getting our kids to work through the 12 challenges and coming back to share how it went and what we got from it. Which im thinking is going to be a whole lot more than a fish…!

Go on, google the book and see what comes up, it has been reviewed by some heavyweights in the media with massive positive feedback. I have yet to have a proper read of it as my OH (who is a bit of a mountain guy it has to be said) has had his head in it, even planning some ‘den’ building activities already!

So head on over to project wild thing and take the pledge to get outside as much as you spend on screens! Then jump into the rafflecopter this week for my giveaway which is, I am thrilled to say is a SIGNED copy of the book Skimming Stones. You’ll notice on the rafflecopter that you can get 10 extra entries for liking the Rob’s facebook page and following him on twitter. So please make sure to do those ones!!

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in your eyes #motivationalmonday

My second daughter wears glasses. She was diagnosed with astigmatism just before the end of her reception year in school. It was picked up through a routine school nurse check that happened at the beginning of the year. I have no idea why it took the best part of a year to find out but then there’s nothing like the slow turning wheels of the NHS. 😉

Anyhow she had to be referred for tests at the local children hospital and I obviously went with her this time, whereas the school checks had been done without either me or her dad present. The initial test, reading the shapes, with both her eyes uncovered she rocked it..all the way down to the little house, square and circle..even i struggled to make them out.

Then the nurse covered what we now know as her unaffected eye and i watched her struggle with the first couple of lines and then give up. I felt gutted for her, gutted that she couldn’t see, gutted that we hadn’t noticed and gutted what this meant for her in the future.

I remember spluttering my excuses out to the nurse, ‘we have never noticed anything!’ “she doesn’t ever do anything that would make you think she can’t see!’ To which, the nurse, probably well used to this sort of pleading parental guilt coming her way just smiled at me and said ‘ wait and see what the Doctor says’

It turned out that her vision in one eye is so good that she was totally over-compensating with that eye and so that is why we had noticed nothing. *phew* 😉

She now wears glasses all the time and she has been incredible about wearing them, which given the sort of  um…..independent character she has….is pretty remarkable that she has toed the line. But her eyes, with her glasses on, now have the same ability and she can read all the way down to the tiniest symbols with both eyes.

Her older sister was pretty jealous of her glasses and wanted to see if she needed them too…she even has a pair of fashion ones and i think, still yearns after the pretty glasses her sister has. We even had quite a lot of pouting and ‘its NOT FAIR!” type comments from her when her sister first got the glasses. Last week on half term we were talking about my niece who doesn’t need glasses but is wearing fashion ones all the time and my daughter who doesn’t wear glasses was nodding in agreement with how lovely they are and pretty and trendy…etc etc..

So I asked my daughter who wears glasses ‘do you think wearing glasses is fun?’

she thought for a while and said ‘No because i have to be careful and not break them and i loose them all the time and people can hurt me if they bump into me!’

Funny how just a little different perspective can change your attitude…

isnt it?

 

i have another LUSH product box to giveaway this week! Just follow the rafflecopter below. Last weeks winner was Cheryll Hastie! Congratulations please contact me!

 

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Oh its a jolly holiday…

The winter makes me wish for a holiday. Especially this month. February is a difficult month i think as the weather seems to never know what to do. We have had warm, sunny days when the daffodils are out and acting all spring like and then its baltic freezing winds that cut through you like a knife. I can just do without it.

So i start thinking holidays….hmmmm…warm…sunshine, flip flops, vest tops and that lingering smell of suncream.

This time of year we start talking about our holiday plans..holidaying with 5 kids isnt exactly easy or cheap but its nice to get away and try and have a break..(although break isnt always how it feels!). For me, its a balancing act. We need to keep it within a reasonable budget but sitting on a beach in summer wearing your jumper and a rain mac is not my idea of a summer break. Which largely rules out this country. I know that the kids don’t need the heat though, they just dont feel the cold in the same way. But then they aren’t spending two hours paddling, ankle deep in an outdoor pool with a swift breeze blowing round your swimming costumed self.

Opt for outside this country and you are looking a LONG drive or flying and that just bumps up your price. Oh yeah you can fly on those super cheap fares but we ALL know that they never stay super cheap. Adding taxes for standing in the airport, food on the plane even going to the loo on the plane. It all gets pretty steep!!

So what do you do and where do you go? What has worked well for you and your family in the past or where are you planning this year?

 

This week I am lucky enough to have another LUSH cosmetics giveaway.

The winner of last weeks treat box from the lovely LUSH is: Anna Emslie. Congratulations! Please get in touch!

So this week it is another box of their shiny, happy goodness could be winging its way to you, maybe as a little mother’s day gift or just a treat. Just fill in the rafflecopter below!. Thanks so much and don’t forget to check out the lovely ladies I am linking up with this week!

 

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