Flying Solo

Tonight is my first night looking after Ruby all on my own, as her daddy is away overnight with work.

It makes me realise how lucky I am to have a partner who is so involved with her, and with me in helping to take care of her.

I am absolutely KNACKERED....

Snapshots that keep it real...

I was thinking about the image we present to the world when it come to being a mum. I feel enormous pressure to have a perfect baby that never cries, and happily coos and gurgles through any social occasion. I kind of feel like a failure if I can't live up to this. I also think there is a bit of a conspiracy amongst some mums to try and project to the world that their little one is a perfect baby and that all is well with the world. I am not a perfect mother and this whole new role has definitely not come easily to me. I thought I would go all earth mother-y as soon as my baby entered the world, despite not being a particularly "baby" person before her arrival. What I have found is that I am DEFINATELY no earth mother and have often really really struggled, despite loving her to bits and liking her infinitely more than any other baby I have ever met!

And then I thought about photos I have collected to document Ruby's first few months in this world. It occurred to me that I only have two photos of her crying.

TWO

And one of these was taken by my Mum! And yet crying is such a huge part of her day and her way of communicating, so it occurred to me as strange that I have not documented this. I have bought into trying to project to the world that she is a perfect baby without even realising it!

So in the interests of keeping it real…… here’s the pictures the world has never seen. A normal baby….. shock horror!!




There! That wasn't so bad, was it?

Something AMAZING just happened....

I am very bad a leaving Ruby to cry. I know the advice is to leave them sometimes to cry it out, but I'm not so good at following the advice. I do things for an easy life too much, and it feels easier to pick up a crying baby who has not yet reached meltdown point.....

But as I was making this blog, I was 5 mins away from finishing, so I decided to leave her to cry. And guess what? she cried for 5 mins, then went to sleep.

SHE CRIED IT OUT...... that has NEVER happened before!!

This is a seems like a small victory, but I can't tell you how HUGE this is.

Its also good karma for this newly created blog!

An introduction...

Ok. Lets get the basics out the way.

My name is Karen. I am Ruby’s Mama.

I have another blog, where I write about all things creative. When I am not being Ruby’s Mama, I am an artist. I like to try and keep my identities as a mummy and an artist as separate as possible, but I was increasingly finding there was a crossover of this in my creative blog. I was also itching to write more personal entries, but that blog didn’t feel like the place.

Hence, this blog was born.

This blog is going to be entirely related to all things mama and baby. If that bores you or scares you, look away now. But let it be known that this blog isn’t going to be all “coochie coo” and full of “motherhood is wonderful” crap. OK, I can’t guarantee that this blog won’t have an air of that from time to time, but my aim is to document my journey into motherhood, warts and all. I haven’t found the journey so far the easiest, and so I’m not going to spare the grim details, for the sake of being honest and candid, something I’m not sure everyone is when it comes to telling their story of their journey.

Welcome to my blog, and I hope you enjoy the journey...