Sugar free

I admit it, I'm an addict. The clock has barely struck 8 before I need my first hit of the white powder, but no longer! Starting this week, I'm doing something about it. I'm going cold turkey. I'm giving up sugar.

Since Alice was born, I've increasingly relied on high energy foods that are easy to grab. Biscuits, cake, sweets and chocolate don't last long in our house. Once a packet is open, it's usually empty by the end of the day. Even as I'm eating, I'm planning what I can eat next. I'm fed up with relying on food to give me a boost, and the energy boosts and dips are doing nothing for my mood, so I've decided to do something about it.

So, here is my plan:

• Naturally occurring sugars are fine - I can still eat fruit and have dairy produce. I'm just cutting out refined sugars. I say 'just'. I'm amazed at how many innocuous seeming foods have added sugar. Even the bran flakes that I usually feel so virtuous having for breakfast contain an extraordinary amount of added sugar.
• Make other easy to eat foods to help me through cravings. I have trawled through this blog, amongst others for sugar free recipes and have a stock of lovely biscuits, cake and even some savoury flapjacks ready and waiting.
• I will start on the 27th July (tomorrow - when every diet begins...) and finish on the 27th August.

I expect it to be a difficult experience, but I need to get control back, especially as Alice is beginning to notice if I'm eating something different from what she has. Hopefully, this time next month I'll be clean!

Garden update

I am a novice gardener but the alchemy of turning tiny little seeds into nourishing vegetables has always interested me. As I mentioned in an earlier blog post, we turned the pond we inherited with the house into a vegetable patch and with a bit of reading up and a lot of enthusiasm, I began planting. As the weeds grew and the hot weather required frequent watering, I started to lose some of the positivity I had started out with. Some of the little plants I had planted from the seed trays withered and died, and very few of the seeds I had planted directly in the soil seemed to be coming up. The final straw came when the only plants that had been growing well, the radishes, turned out to be infested with wriggling maggots in otherwise beautiful red roots. I chalked it all up to experience, but couldn't help feeling disappointed.

However, Mother Nature is gracious. Yesterday I discovered the most amazing thing.
The most beautiful courgette I have ever seen. I seems like such a miracle that this has managed to grow despite the fact that its home is a weed ridden, cat poo infested, shady ex-pond. Bullied by a rampant potato plant, tormented by a well meaning but woefully inexperienced gardener and rarely getting so much as a drop of water, somehow this hardy little vegetable has fought its way through. It isn't the only one. I have also discovered that my carrots have a smudge of orange coloured root appearing at the base of their rather excessive greenery and even the beans, whose leaves had been chomped by caterpillars until they looked like green doilies, have manage to produce 3 reasonable sized pods.
To seasoned gardeners and allotment growers, this meagre little crop must seem laughable, but I am delighted. There can be nothing more satisfying than eating produce you have grown yourself. I think I'm hooked.

Attitudes to NIP

While I was browsing on the Internet today, I came across a forum post about GMTV featuring yet another breastfeeding debate, this time about nursing in public. Apparently, some celebrity has decided to switch to formula because they feel embarrassed to breastfeed in public. GMTV were inviting people to write in with their responses. Immediately, I started composing an email in my head countering the negative attitudes that seem to dominate 'discussions' like this. Then I stopped myself. For starters, I don't watch GMTV. I don't even have a television. I am clearly not the intended audience for this sort of feature. More importantly, even if my opinions by some miracle were aired, what good would it do? I am not eloquent enough to change entrenched viewpoints. 'Disgusted' of Tunbridge Wells will remain disgusted. The new, timid mum watching is likely to hear the negative over the positive anyway.

I don't believe that these sort of features help promote NIP. They aren't designed to. They're there to get people talking. Or shouting. The most powerful thing we can do is continue to nurse our babies wherever we are, whenever they need it. When children grow up understanding that babies' milk comes from mothers, not just bottles, they will expect their own children to feed that way. Pregnant women will have seen other mothers nursing in public, and will expect to do the same. The sight will be just another feature of daily life with no need for staring or tutting. Discussing attitudes is not the most powerful way to support nursing in public, nursing in public is! We need to normalise something that should already be normal.

Attached but apart

I am very comfortable with the attached style of parenting we have adopted. It seemed to come naturally. It just felt right to hold my baby close most of the time, to pick her up or nurse her as soon as she cried. I am most comfortable when I am holding my baby because I know that is where she is most comfortable too.

It seems, however, that this is starting to change. My baby has unaccountably become 10 months old and seems to be on the cusp of becoming a toddler. Seemingly overnight she has become more confident to explore her surroundings, shakily standing on her own two feet figuratively as well as literally. Letting her go from me isn't coming as naturally as it should. This weekend she went out in a huge Silvercross pram from the 1970s. She held on to the sides with a huge grin on her face knowing she was going to have some fun. I watched as my mother-in-law pushed the pram out of the gate and off on a walk and wondered if I had made the right choice. I'd decided to let them go without me. To many people this might seem to be a very small incident, but this was the first time Alice has been in the care of anyone other than me or her daddy. As I watched her beaming face from the window, I knew I'd made the right choice. She is ready to go a little further from me, and however difficult that is for me, I need to let her.

Forty minutes later, my baby returned with her proud grandmother. There had been no tears and she'd soon fallen asleep. Proof, if I needed it, that she had been happy with the arrangement. I know this is only going to continue, and hopefully I will start to find it easier as she moves away from me. I don't want to restrict her development by keeping her with me when she can thrive on her own. It comforts me to think that the physical closeness we fostered at the beginning will continue as an emotional bond as she gains greater independence.

Guide to where I will and won't breastfeed

Here's a list of some of the places I have fed my hungry little girl.

• In a school staffroom
• Coventry Cathedral
• At the dinner table while eating Christmas dinner
• My brother-in -law's wedding
• In the supermarket
• The London Underground (Northern and Victoria Lines)
• On the Fosse Way while leaning over Alice's carseat (I wasn't driving!)
• In a studio getting my hair and make-up done for a photoshoot
• On a beach
• In the bath
• On a swing

Here's a list of places I will not feed my baby:

• In a public toilet
• Under a blanket

How to have a cheap baby

I found an old document I'd written before I was pregnant listing all the things I thought I'd need for our new addition. I made it using a range of information to try and make a budget. At the time, I was bombarded with check-lists on the Internet, in books and in magazines all telling me about the 'essentials'. Turns out, a lot of those essentials aren't really that essential.

These are a few things I either bought, or discovered weren't really necessary for bringing up a happy baby.

Travel System
Admittedly, we bought this second hand from some friends, so we spent far less than we could have done. We foolishly decided to buy the car-seat to go with the pram/pushchair part, and ended up with an insanely heavy seat that we never put on the base. After two months, Alice was pretty clear that she didn't like being wheeled about one bit, and I was fed up of being unable to go in places I wanted to without knocking over displays or running over people's feet. The pushchair was banished to the garage, and my mei tai became the new, and very much improved form of transport.

Disposable Nappies
A conservative estimate of 6 nappies a day at 15p a nappy works out at £27 a month or £328.50 a year. Then there's the cost of disposable wipes. I made the swap to cloth after about a month, and wish I had sooner. My stash has cost me about £200, which made me wince, but will see through Alice and hopefully another sibling too. If I'd bought second hand or a different brand, I could easily have spent less than this. Even with costs of washing, the costs are nowhere near that of disposables.

Baby bath
What wrong with bathing at the same time as your baby? Saves water too.

Outfits for newborns
I could barely dress myself in the first month. Plain babygros and vests were all I wanted to use.

Moses basket/cot/baby sleeping bags/travel cot
Thankfully I received a cot and Moses basket as hand me downs, but bought new mattresses. We managed a full two weeks of dutifully popping her in and out of the basket at night until we joined the dark side and began co-sleeping. Cheap, and in my humble opinion, the very best place for a baby to sleep.

Breastpump/bottles
I know these are an essential for many mothers, but I had no idea it was even possible to feed a baby without ever giving them a bottle. I blame the dolls I had as a child that always came complete with bottle! I tried and failed to get Alice to take one before stopping to think why I was even trying. I'm in no desperate hurry to go out in the evenings, and I'm a stay at home mum. Straight from the tap is all she needs.

If I had wanted to formula feed, I'm told that one box lasts about a week, and each box is about £7. That's £365 a year!

Dummies
Another thing I seemed to believe came as part of the set. Alice was a very sucky baby and I was warned that she was using me as a 'human dummy', but she wouldn't take to any of the many types of dummy we bought her. I am hugely relieved now as I'm sure all that sucking helped my supply and I don't have to worry about stopping her using one. I've since realised that dummies are there to imitate a breast, I wasn't imitating a dummy.

Toys
Now obviously I want some toys for my baby, but I've had to think very carefully about each one. More often than not she's happier playing with the box it comes in. A toy marketed as encouraging physical or mental development has far less positive effect than a willing pair of hands or a range of interesting household objects.

Mobiles
What could be more soothing than mummy or daddy's arms?

Weaning stuff
Baby led weaning means none of the jars, Tupperware, ice-cube sized pots or hand blenders needed for traditional weaning. She just eats food that's cooled from my plate. All we need is a place for her to sit, and a lot of cloths to clean up with.

Baby shoes
I really don't get these. When she's walking, she'll wear some, but until then, socks are just fine in this climate.


Wipe warmers, baby walkers, playpens and changing tables... I really could go on and on. Parents want the best for their children, and it is easy for companies to prey on this by making out their products are vital for a happy well-developed child. It's worth taking a step back and thinking about whether our children really need the things we're told they need.

Mmm is the new Shh

I dread car journeys with Alice. They tend to start well. She's in a rear facing group 1 seat and can see clearly out the back window, so she's entertained by watching the world whizz by and she soon drops off. The problems come when she wakes up. This is what happened at the weekend. She screamed so hard her lips went blue and she began to foam at the mouth. She wouldn't even look at me as I held her hands, stroked her head, shushed and sang at her. As soon as he could, her daddy pulled the car into a lay-by. I got her out and tried to latch her on, but even that wouldn't soothe her. We took her for a little walk outside, but the noise of the cars scared her even more. Finally, we decided to get her back into her seat and just continue our journey. As we started off again, I made a last ditch attempt and hummed at her in a low tone. Instantly, her cry became a whimper and soon stopped altogether. Her stiff little limbs relaxed and she started to smile and look at me again. I have absolutely no explanation for it, but I've used it several times since then and it works like a dream. As with all these little tricks, I've no idea if the effect will last, but I'm grateful for it while it does!