Pregnancy files - 29 weeks

I swear, my belly is a mosh pit at times.

With just one very crazed little human running up and down and jumping and surfing the crowd of itself.

Now I know where all the Waitrose Baby Butter has gone

Waitrose sells out as women buy baby butter for facial moisturiser! *

I'm intrigued and want to try it (not necessarily on my face!) as their vanilla coconut massage oil is divine, and M and I have used it for massage for a couple of years. It's especially lovely on tired feet. But my local Waitrose is consistently sold out.

Enter ebay. There are pots and pots of the stuff for sale, exorbitantly priced as only ebay sellers know how to price in-demand items. Add in postage, and eager bidders, and you could easily pay £10 for what should cost you £2.49.

*NB, not made of real babies...

Little Chico *

That already, at 28 weeks and four days in utero, my baby is a chocoholic.

Don't give me any science about sugar or caffeine, this baby kicks like a donkey after I eat chocolate and I choose to interpret that as 'More Mummy, more!'

(*Chicos are actually kind of gross and probably very politically incorrect, but they are part of the Australian experience. Think chocolate jelly babies.)

Fox files

Our garden is a bit of a wildlife haven, it seems. We have a regular squirrel visitor, and another squirrel who gets beaten up by the other if they happen to visit at the same time. M thinks it's the fruit trees (apple, pear and plum) that attract them. I *cough* also left some nuts out once, but we won't mention that.

The overgrown nature of our garden - we have a strip at the back that we have left for years to go wild - has also attracted foxes, most notably a young pair of siblings, who were cubs when we first saw them rolling around together in the grass early one morning. A few mornings ago, I was surprised to see a large bright pink rubber bone in the middle of what we loosely call our lawn. I figured someone had accidentally thrown it into our garden. The next day it was closer to the house, with extra teethmarks, so we knew the foxes had been playing with it.

Today, M and I finished clearing out the shed, one of the many jobs M has set us in preparation for becoming parents in November. Seriously, we do not have a non-working weekend planned until mid-October, when I've told him I will be too pregnant to do anything (while attempting to drown out his mother's reminiscences about going into labour while she was working in the fields in Italy...) Rooting around in a shed that's full of spiders isn't nearly so daunting in England, where none of the little beasties are poisonous. Man, this country is so tame compared to Australia.

When he went beside the shed to clear what I hadn't even realised was a paved area (that's how overgrown it was) and stood in the cool darkness under the fig tree, he found a little den with more toys in it! A dog's ball, and some kind of plastic soldier toy. The foxes have been pilfering and storing their loot in our garden.

And I really am glad that they chose us. There's something very special about coming downstairs just after dawn (not a regular occurrence for me at the moment, but newborn baby here we come) and seeing rust-coloured beasts bounding around our garden, or hiding in the grass. We might be living in the country. And when, later in the day, the squirrel pops his cheeky head in and tries to get inside the house, then sits on a small concrete seat M made under the pear tree to nibble at fallen fruit, or seed pods, I feel very lucky to live here.

(btw, the paint colour in the nursery? Love it. It was just an initial 'that isn't identical to the swatch' reaction.)

Nursery painting

Um, that colour is way more blue on the walls than in the tin. M doesn't particularly like it. I am determined, however, to love it. Pictures to come.

Doesn't fresh paint make a room look so clean!

MIL wisdom

M's mother said last night that you absolutely cannot dress a baby girl in blue. And omg red must never be seen on babies. Apparently my choice, as we're not finding out the sex before the birth, comes down to pale yellow or pale yellow. Or, as I like to think of it, 'the colour of pus'.

Podlet, you are going to be shocking your grandmother with my choice of clothing for you.

Progress

(nursery-wise)

Today we cleaned and half-painted the spare room aka nursery. Sugarsoaped walls, cupboard and windowframes, painted the ceiling and wall above the picture rail white.

This is the colour I've chosen for the walls. I wanted a pale gum leaf colour, but of course very pale grey-green just looks grey and M vetoed it. So we have Woodland Pearl. It's pretty close, and of course the real colour is not exactly the same as the internet version.

Next weekend, we add the colour!