WORKING FROM HOME WITH A BABY

Well, it's not the easiest thing, let's be honest. A month before Sylvie was born I was all "Yeah, I'm not having any primary-coloured-plastic-noise-making crap in the house" and when she hit four months I found myself texting my friend asking if her Jumperoo was going spare.. Give me all the baby entertainment options you've got for an extra ten minutes of getting things done!

Work is getting busier now and will continue to be a real juggle until the end of September/Mid October when it'll get a bit lighter again. So far there have been a few nights working later than I'd like and also a good few moments of 'oh shit I didn't do that' and dragging the laptop back out in front of the tv on an evening.

What's still working well for us, even though it can be restrictive at times, is having a routine for Sylvie. She wakes up and has a bottle, I'll work and do the school run before her porridge feed at half ten, then I have a bigger window where she'll usually have a longer nap until a milk feed mid-afternoon and I'll work until the school pick up. I do enjoy her being around while I'm working, and most days we'll get out in the buggy and I've also been enjoying seeing friends during the week and taking more time for myself and 'breathing space', otherwise the Monday-Friday work week at home starts to feel very intense.

Sylvie, this week, has started rolling around - oh. the. joys. We were hoping this time would come a little further down the line and all of a sudden I'm having to strap her into a buggy/secure her in the baby bouncer before I can even nip to the loo - now I feel I'm looking forward to her sitting up so she can be propped up with toys and things to play with properly.

I do feel working at home with Sylvieboo is going to get harder as she gets more mobile and even more vocal - I think it'll very much be a changing situation over the next few months. The next step for us is really planning out the Summer holiday stretch while Vivienne's off too. I feel quite strongly that I take some full days off to see the girls properly - I've asked V to make a list of things she'd like to tick off during her Summer break for us to work through, and plan on having on lots of down time in the garden and crafting/baking at home too. It may be time to enlist the help of a little childcare here and there now!

SUMMER'S HERE + WE LOVE THE LAKES

Oh the Lake District is just heaven isn't it? I realised about a week or so before that I had a full free weekend after a Thursday wedding and suggested we four went to my Grandma's caravan in the Lakes for the weekend to do a whole lot of not very much. The sun shone and it was just bliss. On the first day we took a few hours' walk (Viv did pretty well and baby was in the carrier) and then got the boat back across the other half of Derwentwater, went for food, played Boggle, put the kids to bed, drank wine.. On the second day we went a bit further, ate more food.. sunbathed on the grass.. 

Viv's old enough now that we feel comfortable with her playing at the top of the hill at the play area and she just came back to 'check in' every so often. I remember playing in the same places, paddling in the same rivers and exploring the same patches of woodland so it's really special to see her enjoying the simpler things and not just asking to watch things on YouTube.. I definitely hope to get back for a simple trip away before the weather gets colder again this year. Summer feels close enough that we can just about touch it..

WELCOME TO THE WORLD SYLVIE INGRID

Instead of having a Christening or a Naming Day for Sylvie, we decided to have a 'Welcome to the World' party instead. We invited our nearest and dearest, hired a caterer (best decision ever), bought too many cases of prosecco, put up a bouncy castle for the kids and made a playlist. We didn't feel anything else would suit us or be appropriate, but we did still nominate some special people in our lives to be 'godparents' to Sylvie as she grows up - our friends, my sister and her boyfriend.

It was totally unfussy which suited all of us just fine, and even though at one point the heavens opened and people had to hold the gazebo down in the wind (!) it was just a lovely chilled out way to spend the day. Obviously it ended in a dance-party until the small hours in the kitchen once the kids were in bed.. it's always the perfect way to end the day. We really are luck to have the best people around us.

TRAVELLING WITH A BABY - WHAT TO PACK

In April the four of us survived our first family holiday. I was working in Majorca so we decided to turn it into an excuse for our first proper trip away as our larger gang. I LOVE a good list, especially when it's an old-school list that I can strike things off with a pen as I go. After trawling through forums and articles online in the weeks before I came up with a list that I felt really covered everything; and, you know what, I think I did pretty well (if I do say so myself..)

Sylvie was three and a half months when we travelled, and she's exclusively bottle fed which meant extra planning had to go into formula, equipment, sterilisation and working out in advance exactly how we'd have the 'baby station' set up in our hotel room while we were away. We also had to consider what travel system we wanted to take, and how she'd sleep while away from home. Her being in a little routine for the first few months did help so we went away feeling like it was possible to get there in one piece and be able to set up a similar environment for her over there too.

Firstly, be prepared that getting you plus 'the stuff' over there is a full body work out in itself, and there was *a lot* to take (I genuinely thought we'd be able to get over there lighter than this, but we used 95% of what we took, the only things we didn't use were a few outfits). 

We decided to take the pram top instead of just the buggy top as Sylvie is still little enough that it's recommended that she lies completely flat when she sleeps during the day and we felt more comfortable with her in the pram for this. It also provided her with more shade and we just angled her throughout the day so that she was never in direct sunlight.

We also packed the Sleepyhead baby bed, which we put inside a travel cot while we were there. It also comes in its own travel bag which is handy. I think we could have gotten away without it (she doesn't sleep with it any more) but we wanted her bed to feel the same for her so hopefully she'd carry on sleeping - which she did. I also packed extra elasticated covers for it so they were easier to change and keep it clean and she often dribbles where her head goes.

One of the best purchases I made ahead of holiday was for the self-sterilising MAM bottles. We took our Tommee Tippee bottles and Milton tablets too but these MAM bottles were amazing and Sylvie took to them really well. We sterilised them at mealtimes in a microwave in the restaurant and it was so, so easy.

Another amazing tip I found in a forum is to pre-order baby formula and have it delivered to Boots at the airport, through security in the lounge. This was a total game changer and meant we didn't need to worry about space and weight in our cases with 10 days worth of milk. We also took 8 bottles of the ready made 200ml bottles in the baby bag which they just scanned through without any problems.

So, here's the boring bit. The actual list. Obviously some of it is personal to Sylvie but it was generally quite comprehensive for a bottle fed baby too; we used everything here over the ten days, so, for us, everything on this list was worth it! 

• Sleepyhead in its travel bag, with spare cot covers
• Comforter and a small toy (spot piggy above!)
• Baby 'GroBag' sleeping bag
• 7 x sleepsuits
• 5 x vests
• 6 x outfits
• Cardigan x 2
• Hooded sleepsuit for travel
• Summer hat x 2
• Nappies (we packed enough for the entire trip)
• Wipes and nappy sacks
• Bottle brush (we bought washing up liquid there)
• Milton sterilising tablets (we borrowed a basin from reception)
• Swim ring
• Milk powder (we packed one in case there were problems collecting formula from the airport)
• Buggy with buggy top and pram top
• Lightweight blanket
• Muslin cloths x 10
• Travel wash
• EHIC card for the baby
• Sun cream
• MAM self-sterilising bottles
• Sudocreme
• Socks x 4
• Swimming wetsuit and swim nappies
• Hooded towel
• Baby sling/carrier (this was a life-saver. When the buggy goes in the hold under the plane and you're out at the other end carrying your own bag and the baby bag, carrying the baby *on* you frees you up and makes everything so much easier. Also when we were getting through the airport on the way home, we loaded up the pram with smaller bags so they were easier to push and I carried the baby)
• Formula (collected at airport)
• In the baby changing bag we packed - 5 x Tommee Tippee bottles, 6 dummies with caps, 4 x muslin cloths, wipes, nappies, 3 x sleepsuits, 2 x vests, Baby Calpol, disposible changing mats and 8 x 200ml ready made formula bottles.

TARTING UP THE HOUSE

Despite our political persuasion most of our house has ended up blue. We've lived surrounded by magnolia for nearly two years and I suddenly got the itch to just get the house sorted, decorated and generally a bit more tarted up. I waited for a La Redoute sale and ordered the rug that everyone on my instagram seems to have, above, for the living room. We painted our bedroom a slightly teal-y mid/dark blue (not too dark because our bedroom is pretty small), framed a million pictures for a bit of a gallery wall above the bed, framed some black and white pictures for the downstairs loo, which was already a dark grey, and while we were on holiday my Grandad painted our hallway, up the stairs and the landing. All in all it's still a bit rough around the edges but we're getting there! I'd love to finish my office but it's really not a priority, especially with work getting busier. Maybe this house sprucing comes in bursts of 'when I can be bothered'. If only we could hire a tidier as well as a cleaner to keep it looking half decent..!