Bringing the Outside In....

So, a lot of my blog has been about the outdoors..the environments I've lived in. But now, 36 weeks pregnant I have the urge to home-make and organise. Here are two photos morning and evening of part of our kitchen where I have been thinking out the interior with my husband. Note the beautiful mother's day card and flowers...thanks boys. Our kitchen was looking big and bare and tiled before the arrival of our new dresser which has made us feel like we have a new room at a fraction of the cost! The bulbs on the left of the dresser are from valentine's day so I will need to find them new homes in the garden soon. The pine table is simply covered with wipeable cloth and my pine chairs were painted with Annie Sloan chalk paint in "Provence" colour. They have also been sanded and waxed by myself. This is thanks to J'adore La Maison shop in Wickham who presented me with a £20 voucher after I won a raffle at the Taste of Wickham festival over a year ago. So, while I'm not doing the heavy gardening and big travel/exploration I favour in life at the moment I am enjoying playing "Country Living" with our new (ish) home (ok. we've been here nearly a year and a half now but things take time and money!) and bringing the beautiful outside of spring indoors. There are Nelson Sweetpeas and Dianthus sprouting in my propagator above the washing machine and a guest room now finished with the staircase painted in varying shades of green gloss. Will add more photos soon...depending on how the rest of my organising goes of course!

Family Additions!

Welcome back to my long-neglected blog. This is a photograph of a family of ladybirds that had starting hibernating in the corner of my ensuite bathroom window! I had to relocate them with Isaac's help to a snug corner of my potting shed. This was harder than first thought as they warmed up and starting flying away before we could put them in a container for transport. Isaac, being only 2 found this really interesting. So, for those on my social networks that do not yet know I am expecting baby no. 3 and am 23 weeks pregnant. If you would like to be one of the first to know if I'm having a boy or a girl then you will have to send me a sensible (!) comment about my blog to this post (not facebook!). I will preview all comments. You might need to register with blogger first...I don't know. It can't be that hard surely? x

Day 5 #30DaysWild

It is not too hard around here to do a #30DaysWild challenge with two small boys. Even by a car park they can find a tree for entertainment without even needing to go to a playground. This Sweet Chestnut tree seems to have been managed or coppiced providing a perfect game zone. This is Jamie in the centre.

Ducklings and Cygnets in the rain

About a month ago we had a fantastic rainy day starting off with toddlers at The Meon hall in Meonstoke. Caught up with a couple of friends we met 2 years ago through Liz who lives there. We'd missed the snack but had time to play and make caterpillars out of egg boxes. A lady we met called Sian helped us to hatch a plan to duck watch in the rain. Have you heard of the North Pond at Bishop's Waltham? Sometimes it is dry but at the moment it is full of water and there are ducklings. Best of all, unlike Petersfield Heath Pond there is a railed footbridge making it less likely kids will go straight in the water or be pecked by Canada Geese. With a little bit of sat-naving we parked near the town centre and walked round to the pond with some food. Not only ducklings but also cootlings and cygnets. The boys were over the moon!

Today is day 2 of

This is a challenge set by the Wildlife Trusts to get us all into nature. Although I'm a naturalist there is nothing better than a blog challenge to explore new areas or think up new activities. Yesterday I made lemon balm tea as my wild activity. Today I hope to look at worms in our wormery with Isaac as it is blowing a hooly and raining outside.

May bank holiday

We have had a wonderful, quiet weekend getting our veg. beds underway. Samuel has been busy with a rotavator. One afternoon last week I let the boys help me plant Charlotte and Annabelle potatoes and Ambassador peas. Amazingly they are good at using their little tools without managing to hit each other at the moment. The weather has not been amazing but today we managed to cycle to West Walk play area from our house. Isaac was on Samuel's bike seat and Jamie was on his balance bike as we took a footpath/dirt track rather than the main road. We visited a charity garden show at Durley yesterday and bought some plants and plant supports including Heuchera's that I'm looking forward to planting out as soon as I can. We had a very windy walk at Hill Head on Saturday and have just been pottering about at home, cooking from scratch and enjoying our new cat Cuddles.

The Cat House.

This our new pet Cuddles the cat who we have adopted. Our house finally feels
like a home!

Oakview Cottage

How much time has passed from that last beautiful sunny photograph. A lifetime of change in such a short time. A 5 month baby turned toddler. A 2 year old turned into conversationalist and deep thinking 4 year old And we found our house but now I'm looking back to what my home is. It is the first time, I think in my whole life I'm having a break from pets (even as a student I had pet fish) but after my last hand-raised bantam died things have changed. The above photograph was taken 2 weeks ago we went on a beautiful sunny snowdrop walk in Warnford  with the boys.

End of the summer. So, where next?

It is mid-September already. Jamie is a confident little pre-schooler. Isaac is a smiley 5 month old watching people around him, shouting with pleasure. These are the sunflowers that I planted with Jamie in the veg. patch from the seed voucher I won earlier in the year. Also you can just make out a Dahlia that I transferred from our old house which has now been sold. That is a strange thing. Money in the bank and no next  house jumping out at us from the selection. It is so nice renting here at Little Mead as it is rural and quiet and still connected with people. I still have bouts of missing the island though: the small distances between island towns and villages, the undisturbed wildlife, the always-present sea to escape to on a hot day. We could go back there this weekend but Samuel is not motivated to. I don't mind as Tuppence the chicken is literally on her last legs and I want to look after her. I also have some questions to answer for Baby Hampshire so that a few of my words will be published.

In my meadow...

I am getting back into writing again. I have written a brief entry in a diary about our daily goings on every day since Isaac was born on 28th March and he is now 10 weeks old. Counting blessings. It is raining outside but we have a roof over our heads and Isaac is such an easy-to-settle happy little thing. His worst time of the day is in the evening getting to bed but on some nights he is settled and happy by 9.15.

Hambledon: 3 weeks in a magical play wonderland

Yesterday (Friday) we have been living at our new rented house in Hambledon for three weeks. Today is the first proper thawing of the snow blanket that has carpeted the area for the week and made last weekend absolutely magical: a great introduction to the snow for Jamie who had never experienced it before.

Things can change but for the better

Jamie with his Dad at Xmas Dancing Tots 2012, Quay Arts, Newport, Isle of Wight.

The house we were going to rent got taken off the market so we now have a better option to work on: a 3 bedroom semi in the village of Hambledon which has a garden and a paddock for the chickens, at least for the short time in the next year or so. It's Sunday and Samuel is just escaping from work at 5.30p.m. This will at least be in the South Downs where we decided it would be a nice place to live. I'm researching the area more. In Hambledon on a clear day there are places where you can see the Isle of Wight! That will keep my connection to the sea then! As I write this Jamie is watching "beebies" for a good hour or so having had some houmous and bread for tea. We went to the Advent Carol service together at Newtown earlier and also visited Sainsburies which had a charity santa earlier. I'm going to knit for a  bit until Samuel phones to tell me what he is doing trying to make it back to the island.

Apple, Tower, Seal, Pear....

Lovely words our little darling can say. Shame he is still teething and in bed early having had the runs. He has been so cute playing with other toddlers: Harry, Joshua and Alice then at nursery.Here is a photo of them playing together a few months ago. A couple of weeks ago Jamie spent the whole morning laughing at Joshua's house in Medham.

A family in transit

We are back from a great holiday in La Gomera, Canary Islands, Spain where we are photographed. Jamie is now 18 months old and has changed a lot since the holiday. He is able to pronounce words better and has bonded with my old ragdoll which he calls "daisy" like "upsy daisy" in the night garden children's programme. He no longer cries when I leave him at nursery and is still playing when I return. We are in transit because we think it is no longer a good option for Samuel to commute daily to the island, especially when Sue, our neighbour who shares lifts is leaving her job so I would have to get up at 5.30am with Jamie for Samuel to get ready to catch the ferry. I've done it this week and I'm exhausted by this time and  Jamie is having meltdowns in the evening. To consider doing this with another child seems crazy if that is what we choose to do. Samuel could of course get a scooter and make his own way or we could move nearer to the boat but he resents missing out on seeing Jamie in the morning and early evening.

Back into the present moment

Jamie has been asleep now on the sofa for at least 40 minutes and I have just renewed my caravan ads online. I could make some small neat ad cards and then put one in Sainsburies and places like Shanklin and Sandown. I have decided that the first posters I've made have not been working and maybe I need to be more contactable e.g. use my mobile more consistently rather than just giving my home number. The house is tidyish. I'm a bit tired but not too badly.

How hard is it to get into the habit of blogging with a toddler even when you love writing?Quite hard!

Newtown Creek on a Sunset Walk with Jamie Summer 2011

GoodBye Newtown Community Warden! And so with a year of facebook brief updates and scribblings in my diary the year with Jamie the baby has flown and within that year he has learnt to walk and been a proper cute little "mummy's boy" though he is well-bonded with Samuel too. I decided to hand in my notice. The decision took some agonising but I felt even before Jamie that I was in need of change. I had a favourite nursery in mind but there was no promise even at this nursery for regular hours of care and so I am a "stay at home mum" but now I own a caravan on the neighbouring holiday park so I hope to have an additional occupation too through cleaning and letting it out to holiday-makers.

Little Boat...My Island on the big blue sea. This is written on a baby grow worn by my little 11 week old son and he is worn it every other day for most of his life. And that is where I am with my life here, riding the waves with the baby..looking out over the peaks and being plunged into the troughs. Jamie Albert Brunet: 05.12.2011 is lying on my lap asleep. He is smiling, feeding, crying, burping, growing and my day just slots around him. We are living the dream and the nightmare of living in rural coastal Wight. The dream was walking around Thorness bay with Monica (25) and Baby Alice (15 weeks) with our rugged pushchairs in the still sunshine last week. The nightmare has been not knowing when Samuel gets back from work and him doing very long e.g 16 hour days at worst us being in our bed ready to sleep before he has found the ferry back and one night missing the taxis so we had to wake up and collect him. I am munching apricots...to breastfeed him good nutrition and have just chatted to my pregnant friend Estelle who I might meet up with next week.

It is two days before my first baby's estimated birthday.....

Frost and sunshine this morning. 7 chickens currently happy in the pen after being cleaned out yesterday. Golden leaves slowly floating off the trees at the back of the house. Our downstairs of our home practically finished...after 3 years...almost an anti-climax of DIY effort after all that Samuel and myself have put into it. However, this year I have been more "designer" and "project manager" rather than hands-on.

It is a waning moon. A bulb-planting time. A time to breath deeply and relax and a time for letting go so that next month we can re-plenish our energy and care for new life.

Poetry Please!

My Haiku Poem from May 2009:

Freshwater Rockpools

Glistening Oarweed

Hiding Reddish Anemones

Finding crabs with awe