little

Little by little…

~ Fridgesays ~ 30 Comments

A Tanzanian proverb that filled by cup.

Today I want to talk about celebrating. I learnt this from a online entrepreneur who I follow on social media called Lana; she does youtube clips, blogs, master classes and all sorts of delightful enriching and motivating things. I may even be like her when I grow up (although I think she might be the same age as me, plus I do have plans to be a Mermaid). She celebrates anything and everything and lately I have discovered the joy of  celebrating in other people accomplishments. As a British citizen it is by nature that I am meant to be ‘pleased’ for others but not really show it, kick others down where possible and as a women there is also this catty nature of not raise each other up.

Not on my watch.

This week my heart broke for the talented blogger Wendy who is responsible for the fabulous site Naptime natter, as her son was rushed into hospital extremely ill and with doctors not really able to tell her what it was (although thank heavens it wasn’t Meningitis). Through Instagram she shared her worries, thoughts and it gave me and others an opportunity to send her some much needed love. (The blogging community rocks at times), however today (22.02.18) the photograph we had all been waiting for was released – they are home safely. Hurray for medical expertise, the power of positive thinking and her child being a little warrior.  I do not know her, but I felt relieved. I commented that I’d be celebrating this weekend and I blooming well will did. I opted for a cocktail and toasted her families triumph. I then toasted and was/am grateful for my own families health. Celebrating makes you feel good. Celebrating for others is also super fun. My last Champagne toast was for a friends birthday (even though she wasn’t really celebrating herself or with me), in the week little dude bought a beautiful piece of work home – we celebrated, this time with a more appropriate child friendly hot chocolate (with whipped cream), later that week we celebrated again with a pizza party thanks to a sticker regarding his improvements in reading. *note to self: not all my celebrations are food motivated.

Life is too short and like the quote states – too little, to wait for my next birthday, invite to a party or even Christmas. The journey is more joyful with little moments of celebration and recognition as you go…a little celebration makes for a life of parties. That’s the kind of life I’m interesting in living.

Interested in the party lifestyle? Time for some homework: this week I urge you to celebrate as many times as possible. When your child read’s well, blow up some balloons that you’ve got stashed in the draw. When a friend tells you they have a promotion – toast that! When you get some social media comments that make you smile, dance. Seriously, spontaneous dance parties in my kitchen are very common and a bonus is you can burn calories that you can then use later in celebration of something else. (Oops the good things back again)

Its often the little moments, the little wins and the little memories that stay with you. Create some fun this week and comment below with your antics (I can then use these as an excuse to further rejoice in).

Little can be wise

~ Fridgesays ~ 31 Comments

Quote by me; seriously I just made a quote because I couldn’t find one that was what I was looking for (wish I could do this with my bank balance).

What was meant to be a moment to teach my son became one of the most magical learning moments in my universe. It all revolves around the glory that is white chocolate – now Nestle, before you sue me, make sure you read to the end where we all live happily ever after and the Milkybar is our favourite white chocolate.

My son is four years wise and obsessed with going to the shops after Nursery for a treat. Recently he has been falling asleep in the car before we can make it to the shops and has a break down on our drive way when he realises there is no going back. However, this week he said he would just ‘close’ one eye and like a miracle we made it to the petrol station. As we entered and he was overwhelmed by the colourful packets and choice, I gave him one instruction “you can pick whatever you like, but only one item”

He headed for the Milkybar because frankly white chocolate is the goddess of all chocolates and Ive bought him up to have standards (mainly in chocolate – snot, he just wipes on his sleeve). I looked at the bar version and also the buttons. I noticed that despite both being the same price the buttons were 5g bigger in size. I got down on his level (which in heels is like extreme yoga) and explained that there was more chocolate in the button bag and it was the same amount of pennies…he didn’t care. He held on tightly to the bar. We mooched around the shop and I once again tried to explain that the buttons were ‘ better value’, although I’m still not sure why they were the same price? Obviously, being four and my son (stubbornness is genetic in our family unit) he thanked me for my advice and declined to take it.

We made our way to the till and I was still jabbering about the buttons. We paid, left and made our way to the car. For some reason in petrol stations I like to hold his hand so tightly that the blood drains from his tiny fingers, which is ridiculous as every moving vehicle is doing less than 2 mph…anyway, with seatbelt in place I slightly tore the bar open for him and handed it to him. I then said something about the buttons again and he said “STOP. Mummy in the shop you asked me what I wanted, you said I could pick one thing that I wanted – this is what I wanted”

…the world stopped. The guilt filled my lungs and made it hard to breath and at the same time I was engulfed in the over familiar parental guilt that we all feel (most days). I had been so consumed in my intention to teach him about making ‘good’ choices, I’d completely ruined the process of his choice making. The treat of going to the shops (and making it there awake) was ruined by me ear bashing him about 5g of flipping buttons!!! Although deep in my soul I know that quantity and chocolate are extremely important, I knew in that instant that he was right. We spent the rest of the car journey with me empowering his decision; we talked about colour, texture and the all so important taste, we talked about the packet and how not all chocolate is brown. I made sure he knew that I thought his decision was fabulous. 

He then obviously feel asleep and I had a moment of wonder and beauty. That little dude stuck to his guns, he was polite and assertive. He made a decision and in doing so taught me a valuable lesson.

He is little but he is wise.



 

My boobs are not small, they are low fat.

~ Fridgesays ~ 45 Comments

Quote from an unknown petite chest, fab perspective lady.

Today my inspiration is all about boobs and my boob journey. I just got into bed and had an epiphany about life (as you do), so I began to type it out. It may be useful for breast feeding mums, but actually I’m hoping you’ll see it’s not about boobs at all.

When I was twenty-two years old I remember walking out of the doors of our local shopping centre with my Mum and I began the sentence with ‘when my boobs stop growing…’ she then interrupted and broke the news that they were done growing and what I had was all that was coming my way. I obviously knew this deep down but I guess the Disney princess in me was hoping for a extra handful, plus my Mum has more than her fare share so I was clutching on for some of her genes. Turns out I’m my Dads daughter and match his moob size.

Life went on and I learned about wonder bras and perfected scaffolding techniques that meant I now have a back up industry should I ever need a new career.

Then just when I was at my lowest they let me down by being amazing. After we came home from the hospital without our new bundle I was told that due to my emergency caesarean, stress and how long it had been I was unlikely to get any breast milk through. Mr F took me ‘home’ not to our house (too many baby items ready and waiting that I couldn’t bare to look at) but to my Parents. He surrounded us with love and my bestie came to stay over night. In the morning I woke and cried at the realisation that the nightmare we was living wasn’t a dream but our new reality. It was during this emotional outpour that my boobs exploded with milk. Useless milk that was too late, that meant my body didn’t know what my mind did…the baby had died, it didn’t need to be fed and I certainly didn’t need reminding. It was another stab and firm reminder that my body wasn’t my own. Luckily, it soon dried up and I have to say months after I was pretty proud that my fried eggs had it in them to produce milk. They worked.

Four years later we decided to ‘not try to try’ and have a baby. During this pregnancy it was worse, denial was my only hope of sanity as any interaction with the reality of ‘this could happen again’ was too much for my heart to cope with. I read nothing, I only went to appointments that I absolutely needed to and I worked as close to my due date as possible. Then I had my planned Caesarian (I already had the sunroof , why not use it?) and with a tug and a pull a healthy baby boy. With this came a new game plan: Get him home. In the UK this means approximately 3 days of monitoring and a lot of wee to produce for midwives that like to measure it by the pint. I have never drunk so much water in my life to satisfy there wee desires. My milk didn’t kick in straight away so we fed him with a little cup and some formula, I also breast fed – it began straight after he was placed on me for skin to skin contact and he literally sniffed by breast and attached himself; his Dad always gets good value at an all you can eat buffet, so I wasn’t that surprised. Did I know what I was doing? Hadn’t a fucking clue. If it hurt – I pulled him away, if it felt nice I let him stay until he had got bored. Now before we get into breast feeding Vs bottle formula, I couldn’t give a scooby doo, I had mission ‘Get him home’ everything else was irrelevant. I kept Midwife’s away by telling them what they wanted to hear, I kept my curtains closed and counting the sleeps down one by one. I even gave the scary cow machines a go (keep the Midwife’s happy) and expressed pretty much nothing. We continued to cup feed and I knew my boobs could do it.

We managed to get little dude home and then the next mission began: Keep him healthy for the next eighty odd years. Generally I breast fed and Daddy gave him one bottle a day. I kept the formula because it served three purposes – bonding for Daddy, a break for me and it also released some new mum guilt that I was producing by the bucket load of ‘if I’m not producing enough then at least he is getting something’, this is where the breast feeding journey should end but life’s a b*tch and just when you figure things out a new born likes to screw things up – he rejected my right breast. Apparently this is to do with me being left handed and how I was holding him, I then expressed the right, fed from the left and Daddy did his one evening formula…until I lost my sanity, expressing wasn’t for me, it felt totally unnatural and dull. It took over lives as I had to be near the express machine for every other feed which meant our house became my prison.

I then read an article about mums of twins who feed each baby on each breast (not sure how triplets do this?) and thought ‘screw you right express boob, I’ll just feed from the left’. And so until we introduced food this is what I did. The right boob dried up, he only drank from the left side of the bar and had one Daddy formula before bed.

Now to relate my boobs to life. I think if you over complicate things (breast feeding) then you’re likely to fail. I honestly didn’t know how to attach a child to my nipple – he did it himself. I went with the flow and made it work for me. I also scaffold those bad boys like Amazon packaging – the gift inside isn’t always as big as the box it comes it, so don’t be fooled by how people package their life, social media tells a lot of ‘amazon boxes’ and people like to post only the best of themselves, it doesn’t mean they are better than you or have anything worked out. I truly believe we are just winging it, day by day.

The human body is amazing. Seriously I made 2 tiny humans with 2 basic ingredients and a shed load of percentages against me. I’ve probabaly insulted my boobs more times than reality TV stars have told the truth and they fed my son regardless. I think we need to start loving ourselves and especially what we perceive as our flaws way more to be happy, healthy humans. Life (much like a new born) likes to throw a curve ball every now and then and we like to get stressed, frustrated and angry – when really we need to take a step back, breathe and may be a little like Dory and look for another direction to swim in.

So a toast, to boobs, moobs and the miracle of life! We can make it work, overcome anything thats put in our path, which I think its something seriously worth toasting. Stay blessed and if like me you have low fat boobs be grateful they are healthy.