Birthday!

It was my 29th birthday this week! I've been feeling a little sorry for myself since D couldn't get the day off work and we couldn't even go out in the evening with Amelia being so tiny. Plus D wasn't feeling very well. I won't lie, it was a rough day, but I really appreciated everything that D did to make it special for me.

I go out to a breastfeeding peer support group (BAPS! Breastfeeding advice and peer support) on a Tuesday, so Ben, Amelia and I went there as usual. Amelia had screamed literally all morning from the moment D left to the moment we went out, so I decided to take Ben in the little pushchair and Amelia in the mei tei. She doesn't usually like being in any sling or carrier for long, but she was so exhausted from crying for 3 hours that she just fell asleep. Poor kid. It worked though, and I felt better carrying her than chucking her in the double buggy when she was upset.

As I've only been going for 4 weeks or so, there aren't many people at BAPS that I know well yet, so it was a bit weird being all 'it's my birthday!!!' inside but no one knowing. Two of the ladies from church were there, and I couldn't resist telling one of them! Then I immediately regretted it because it obviously sounded like I was trying to get attention (which I was). Oh well, she loves me, she won't judge :)

BAPS is brilliant because they have so many toys and lots of space for Ben to run around, which he doesn't get at home unless it's dry enough for the garden. They have a soft play area too, and indoor slides, a giant doll's house, beautiful wooden kitchen equipment, an indoor sandpit.... Basically we walk in the door and I don't see Ben until the end of the two hours. It makes him happy and I get to enjoy Amelia and also chat to some grown ups for couple of hours a week: everybody wins. I had a good experience this week too, I was chatting to a lady who's having trouble breastfeeding her week-old baby and I think I helped her. She gave up breastfeeding after a couple of days with her first child but really wants to try to overcome the difficulties and succeed this time. They have proper breastfeeding counsellors present, so I was just chatting to her while she got settled and waited for someone to be available. I'd really like to be a breastfeeding counsellor when Amelia gets older- I had such a hard experience with Ben that I know I could be very understanding of the emotional mess you can get into when breastfeeding isn't going well. I would love to be able to help other mums and babies.

Afterwards we came home and had lunch, then nap time. Now I'm not going to lie- this is often a horrendous part of the day. It is so hard to get enough time without my attention on Amelia to get Ben settled enough to go to sleep. Eventually we managed it and after a while Amelia had a sleep too, so I got about 20 mins overlap to rest myself. Then when Ben got up we had some time alone together, which is always a lovely part of the day. D got home and we put the kids to bed, also a good part of the day.

Then hooray! It actually started to feel like my birthday! We had a lovely Indian takeaway, then I opened my presents! D got me some really beautiful jewellery with Swarovski crystals and mother of pearl, I'll have to get some pictures. I've started reading the Skulduggery Pleasant books and D got me the second one of those, and an exciting new board game. I got Lindor from Ben and some Hotel Chocolat from Amelia too. I'm so spoiled!

Next D turned down the lights and came through with my sneaky surprise birthday cake: a key lime pie! My favourite :) He put candles in it, very craftily using ones we had already and putting '30-1' lol. As if I need reminding!

It was a weird birthday and hard work, but thanks D for being so lovely! The little touches meant so much. However, I still demand that you take a day off in lieu of my birthday and wait on me hand and foot ALL day :D