What did I learn yesterday 24th September?

1)  Sushi with asleep baby works, Croque monsieur with awake baby does not.

by roboppy on flickr

I don’t normally take the baby out at lunchtime as we go for a walk in the afternoon but yesterday I had to take him to the baby clinic. Since we were in town and I was starving I thought I’d risk going somewhere for a sit down lunch by myself.  Then the process of weighing up the restaurant options starts. The main criteria in choosing a place for me are as follows:

1. no stairs so I can wheel the buggy in
2. not too busy/noisy in case he does sleep
3. space between tables so I can park the buggy
4. a relatively private table in case I need to breastfeed
5. quick service in case I need to leave because he is crying
6. a toilet with baby changing facilities

You’ll notice I haven’t mentioned what kind of food they serve.  As if that matters in a choice of lunch destination… Food has become fuel rather than a pleasure to be lingered over but that’s a whole other post.

I weighed my options and settled for a place called Cafe Rouge in Putney.  It was an unmitigated disaster.  The baby was wide awake, wanted my full attention and to be out of his buggy. I had picked a relatively discreet table which unfortunately, had the downside of meaning that the waiting staff virtually ignored me and it took them 20 minutes to come and take my order.  Time is of the essence,  people!!  The baby then decided he was hungry so I had to breastfeed him. Nowadays I am pretty ok with doing this in public but I rarely do it when I am on my own.  I’ve noticed that it does make some people uncomfortable which is strange as it is not as if you can see anything on display. Straight after his feed I noticed an interesting expression on the baby’s face and sure enough an almighty gurgling sound happened.  He needed his nappy changed, just as my food finally arrived. Oh well, off to the baby changing unit.

Except there wasn’t one.

I had to change him on his mat balanced on a toilet. Not only potentially unhygienic but he was in danger of rolling off at any second. Wouldn’t take much to put one of those stowaway tables that folds into the wall up, would it?

Get back to the table and attempt to eat my rapidly cooling Croque Monsieur while balancing wriggly baby with one arm.  I had picked Croque Monsieur not only because I like it but because I thought it would be easy to eat one handed. Wrong.  I couldn’t cut it with just a fork and so resorted to hacking away at it and stuffing any vaguely bitesized pieces into my mouth as fast as possible. In the end I gave up, bundled the wriggly, complainy one into the buggy and left.

What do you know, two minutes later he was fast asleep. I, on the other hand, was sweating, covered in baby drool and melted cheese, and still hungry

2)  Baby was on a voyage of discovery

All of a sudden yesterday he became super aware of his surroundings.  In the morning whilst sitting with us in bed he discovered his feet and kept staring at them with a slightly troubled expression. In the afternoon I took him into the garden and showed him the trees and bushes in which he seemed genuinely interested.  Later, I walked him past the bathroom mirror whereupon he caught sight of himself and giggled away.  I’d love to know what is going on in his head when he looks in the mirror. Does he think it’s another baby? Does he think there are two mes?

I find his voyage of discovery absolutely fascinating.  What an amazing thing the human mind is. This is where the real fun starts.

What have I learnt so far on September 21st?

Thought I’d give myself an extra post today as it’s my first day….

1) How to set up a blog.

I have to admit it was very easy using wordpress. I am impressed.

2) You can eat sushi in peace when you have a baby.

picture by Zeetz Jones

Go to the Hare & Tortoise and order the bill along with the food. This will give you enough time to eat before he wakes up because the buggy has stopped moving. It also means you can make a quick getaway if he starts to yell.

3) that I am not very convincing when I say it’s fine if my husband goes out with his mates.

Let me set some context….my husband leaves the house around 8.30am and is home around 6.30pm if I’m lucky. He works…. I get that, I can vaguely remember what that’s like. Every day I am dying for him to get home so I can a) get some help and b) talk to someone who is over the age of 3 months.
In the last week or so he has told me that he will be away for work twice in the next couple of weeks. They are both overnight trips which will also probably mean he’ll be home late the day after because of flights. This means 4 evenings of dealing with baby on my own. But it’s work….I get that.
Except this morning he casually mentions that he wants to remind me his boss is taking him out for dinner tomorrow night. Fine…..5 evenings now….but I can handle it. And one final thing, his mates want to go out to a posh private members club with him and would that be ok? 6 evenings…..meh, can be done but let me explain why I’m irritated:

a) when he asks me he looks at me like I might tear his head off and enjoy chewing on his internal organs. Fair enough I might but at least, pretend that I am a normal, rationale human being.
b) when I mentioned a few days ago that my uni friends were coming down to london for a visit he said “that’s nice, maybe you can hang out with them” MAYBE?????? The correct response should have been “Great, I will look after the baby so you can hang out with them and get a break for once’
c) his mother is coming back to visit next week and he will be away so I will have to entertain her.

So that is why I am not very convincing when I say it’s fine if he goes out with his mates..

4) baby smiles can make even the most grumpy mum happy…