Birth-6 weeks

Happy New year! I'm only nearly 3 weeks late but I've been busy cuddling this little one too much, running after a preschooler or catching up on house work!

Just thought I'd do a quick round up of our first few weeks...

Sam's arrival 8 days early was something I was very grateful for, and as he was born the day James' parents were heading off on their 3 week holiday they were glad that we were out of the hospital with an hour to spare before they had to leave for the airport! They would have been gutted to have missed that excited phone call, and first newborn cuddle. Thank goodness for parents too as Mum came to ours at 2am that morning I went into labour to look after Alex, they then took him to Wales for the day as it was my Grandad's 70th birthday. Alex was very excited when he found out the news that he was a big brother to a little boy and apparently was so well behaved all day-as he fell asleep on the way back he wasn't too interested in Sam the first night and just wanted his bed.

Sam was the spitting image of his brother at first, and followed Alex's lead in not sleeping much unless it was on one of us, we did end up co-sleeping a few nights too, which I hated as was so worried he would get smothered in some way.

I am beast feeding but this came with many struggles, about 3/4 days in I was in agony, cut and so sore, the pain was excruciating! But I put immense pressure on myself and bit and screamed through the pain, until James eventually couldn't take any more of my crying and whining about it and bought me a pump (A Phillips hand held one). This saved my sanity, I think I would have given up shortly after otherwise as it made me feel so down and like I couldn't give Sam my best for him. He now has supplements of between 1-3 formula feeds too, which at first I felt guilty about but now I don't care, I know my supply wasn't great with Alex either. Despite the feeding issues the first few weeks Sam barely lost any birth weight unlike Alex. This last week feeding has been going great and I haven't used the pump and only 1 or 2 bottles a day-which is great as I was getting fed up of sterilising all the time! Not sure why we put so much pressure upon ourselves about how we feed our baby-can't believe it is still such a taboo subject!

Christmas and New Year went by with a bit of a blur, but it was quite nice as we got a job lot of our visiting done in one hit and and other peoples houses (we actually still haven't had too many visitors at our place at all). We had Christmas and Boxing day at my parent's house, unfortunately James had to work a shift between 2-6 so that was a bit strange to not see him-didn't quite feel like Christmas. My Dad's parents and sister joined us for the Boxing day dinner and the next day we went up to my Mum's brother's house to see all of her family. The day after James' parents got back and we shared our Christmas presents then-so another chaotic afternoon! New years we were again at my parents house for a low key meal and evening playing games-I could have done with being at home by 11 in all honesty!

James had a whole month off work (apart from the odd shift at his second job and checking in on his Dad's work whilst they were away) so I was dreading the 7th of January when I would be left with both boys for the full day, but it actually went really well, I even managed time to make a home made pudding and dinner (that hasn't been so likely since)! I find the evenings the hardest between 4-7pm as Sam always needs feeding/fussing over at precisely the time I need to start dinner or save something from boiling over of burning to a crisp-meals have been interesting and needless to say we have eaten out more the last 6 weeks than we have all year I think! The preschool run wasn't as bad as expected, I thought I'd never get out the house with all of us decent enough to go out by 8.30 but somehow I have made it happen (just about), although the first day back I was very nearly late to pick Alex up (enjoying a 3 year old free shopping afternoon, lost track of time, buses changed route/times...oops, lots of panicking and a phone call to my brother to see if he could be back up for me).

I have his 6 week health visitor check up on Monday so will be interested to see how much he weighs now as haven't had him weighed since the last midwife check up! He seems to have suddenly filled out and grown in length, I have just had to put the first lot of clothes away already-a sad moment for many Mum's I am sure!

Bring on 2012!

2011 hasn't been the best of years, and I can't say I am sad to see the back of it!

It started bad during the spring when my work hours got cut ( I was only contracted to 7 hours in the first place) so this affected our shopping money a LOT. It's amazing how 3 hours a week less adds up to such a big amount towards the end of the month.

Then we had to re-mortgage, payments went up loads, just what we needed!

After months of my partner looking for a family sized car as we had a small one that although was cheap to run just wasn't practical in the long run, anyway he found a focus for a great price, mint condition, with so few miles on. It was great and just what we needed...10 days later a 75 year old lady who had never had an accident in her life wrote it off in her micra...

This meant no holiday in Cornwall as we had no car (when I say holiday I mean long weekend with the in laws so was a freebie near enough too as that's all we could afford).

We had no car until late Oct so had 4 months with no car which really took it's toll.

The planned 3 day trip to Swanage with my mum and youngest brother and my son also turned out to be a disaster, second afternoon mum's car broke down (really badly) luckily we were staying with my grandparents, so could take Alex back, but we then had to leave early in the morning to be towed back in a large tow truck for 4 hours...

My Dad owns and runs his restaurant which has just been an awful year going through 3 chefs and not having one at the moment at the busiest time of year. I really feel for both my parents and hope that things work out for them as it is putting so much strain on them.

But at least we all still have our health and each other, as friends and friends of friends have had really heart breaking years.

I honestly don't think I could have got through this year without my little man, he has grown up so, so much this year and has really turned into a little boy compared to the toddler he was a year ago.

So here is to 2012, I'm not one for New Years resolutions, but there are a few things that I really hope I do, do this year.

• Focus on the positive not always the negative 
• Really look into making money out of craft, and start, make and finish things on my every growing list of ideas. 
• Play with Alex more/make more time for him
• Do housework before browsing the internet 
• Make more time for my partner

Happy New Year to you all, here's hoping it's a happy and healthy one!