Georgiezine

So, it's a home day today. The kid is probably bored to death with how I babysit him. I read, a bit, to him. We play with blocks and saucepans. And then when I want to watch dvds/read/use the internet, I pretty much let him go free or play him in a jumper, with or without the distraction of abc content or music. When I took him for a walk, he fell asleep almost straight away, so isn't necessarily aware of my efforts at fresh hair. He's had his fun times of knocking down towers of blocks and throwing things into the bath and dipping his fingers into cups of water and is now alternating between yelling for fun and yelling for attention. He's soooooo cute. Mr Right and I have been enjoying our discovery of BORED TO DEATH, a Brooklyn filmed short series plotted by the writer Jonathan Ames and a tribute to the film noir narratives of Raymond Chandler. I love it-the acting, location shots, plots and guest stars. It's very droll and pithy, I particularly liked the therapis...

Oh, he's a delight. Books belong on the floor-he can stand up and deliberately grab each book, gaze at it's book cover and then discard it on the floor (perhaps preparing to be a book cover critiquer, like our friend Mozza?) He's developing a wider range of expressions-there is his food tasting expression (eyes closed, as if he's bitten a sour piece of lemon), his curious grimace (a crooked smile, where he drags his bottom teeth to the side) and a playful hide and seek smile he plays with his audience. Right now he is crawling around the kitchen floor, after losing interest in his tambourine. He slides the shower screen door open and shut, and puts everything in his mouth (which is why I need to clean the kitchen floor more frequently now). Although not walking, he scoots up and down our couch, holding on confidently, and can turn on our television quite confidently from our remote. Toys aren't quite as interesting as standing and practising walking, however he has ...

Visited Jacqui & Paul yesterday to get ideas about safe cycling with a baby. The Kid is still too young for it, but now I have an idea about what gear I need to buy, what age he should be and how to do it safely. Choice magazine had a article on kids bike and trailers and there is a Dept of Transport page, Cycle Instead Journey Planner which is useful. It's also forcing me to get to know the west end of the city better and learn the side streets. I think I could even split my journey between cycling and the free city tram, to make it a bit speedier compared to my current free bus/walk home.

Lu is certainly growing. New things we notice about him: When he wants to feed he licks his lips, smacks them, rolls his tongue around, does imitations of eating When he is sleepy, he yawns lightly, changes his body motions from alert to jerky, pretends to fight sleep but happily lets himself get cuddled When he is happy, he chats and enjoys playing with soft toys that dangle from the toy bar, he does pretend boxing Bowel motions can be preceded by long hours of vocalisation-grunts and groans, sometimes squawks, that he will sleep through. An actual bowel motion will result in him being blissed. After feeds, he closes his eyes, flops his arms and looks happy with his mouth closed. Smiles are starting-first practiced from wind, he can now smile-about being fed, about being played with. He is gaining strength-he rests an arm on my arm, looks around out of the sling, uses his legs to try and topple his toy bar, kicks around on the change table, enjoys tummy time. His heari...

The baby dominates my life. Each day I wonder how I will go feed to feed; my world has come down very much to managing a few hours at once: feeding, feeding myself, contemplating whether to do anything else, attempting to get him to sleep, attempting to sleep myself. I tend to mooch around at home until noon then head out; getting out of the house and walking is my saviour. Monday & Tuesday though the rain was intense, and I got caught out badly on Tuesday in the Botanical Gardens. They look so wonderful with rain glistening, but I was fretful about the logistics of dragging a folded pram onto a bus whilst clutching a baby under one arm. Almost impossible and it is embarrassing how inaccessible public transport is if you have wheels. Developing some insight into the world for people with disabilities. Lu however was completely fine with, sat in my arms, wrapped up in a muslin with his eyes wide open, looking up at me, unpeturbed by sounds of thunder. He is so good. Weekend coming u...

Today A and I attended a combined first birthday party for 3 children. Seb is the son of A's friends and I also know Estelle, the daughter of other friends. She shares Lu's birthday, so that is cool and is a robust cherubic blonde, who leaned over and wanted to touch Lu. (Right now he's a bit unsettled and it will be all we can do to get him through to his next feeding timeslot, because he doesn't want to sleep, or be put down). The party was quite good-it was held in park in Brompton, which is a neighbourhood I like. The different cottages, townhouses, council homes and courtyard homes give it an eclectic flavour, reminding me of inner west neighbourhoods like Rozelle. It's not too homogenous and thanks to people like Jacqui and Paul, there are lots of neighbourhood decorations: mosaics, bike paths, painted stobie poles, that show the character of the residents. I fed Lu inside a party attendee's house, which bordered the park. It was a narrow modern 2 story ...

It is hard, waiting. It is hard because you worry that until the baby is born, he isn't safe yet. Until he has been born and taken his first breath and cried, you won't feel safe. I was reading today someone else's labour story-for second child and how they had to wait "a few minutes" to hear baby cry, whilst the paediatrician resuscitated it. The baby's agpar score was critical initially and it was 5 minutes before it was satisfactory. Five long minutes. The fear feelings were compounded by reading of Lily Allen's stillbirth, at 6 months. Every parents fear, and you do feel as though once you make it out of first trimester, you are safe. Yet I knew too, that it is a long journey-my colleague lost her child at 30 weeks. Against that, it is natural to want to deliver the baby as soon as possible. On the other hand, this baby is kicking and breatheing happily. I've had two CTGs over the past 3 days, both good. He isn't even incredibly overdue-for a f...

Waiting in different ways today. Waiting for my husband to arrive-we are going out to drinks to celebrate the 1st anniversary of a science? institution in a former? treasury building (suspect I know where and what this is better than my husband does?) Waiting for the baby to arrive-am mostly happy to be waiting, but naturally a baby that has been safely delivered is what one wants now. Rain has arrived, again, interrupting the days of warmth. Which, whilst I like, can too quickly make you fear that you are in for a long hot excessive heat crisis summer.

I think I've written about my current inability to enjoy attending theatre. It dates from about 2003, when I saw a terrorism themed play by Stephen Sewell at the Festival Centre and hasn't improved much since then, though I did enjoy a performance I saw at the Fringe about Dads. On Saturday night I joined 3 friends to see RUBY BRUISE at the Waterside Workers Theatre at Port Adelaide. To some extent I enjoyed it more, as a "complete" theatrical performance than SASKIA FALLS-it was well designed, the 4 actors were good, they effectively performed all their theatrical "tricks". But the play itself was kind of pointless, left us all with a so what feeling. It was interesting to read, on the same day, an interview with a performance artist in REVIEW, who was asked to explain the difference between performance art and theatre. Theatre is fake, she said, completely artificial, whilst performance art is Real! Whilst I sometimes cringe at performance art, the det...

I made a fortuitous call to Rachel on Saturday afternoon, and scored an invite to join her and Adam at the Semaphore Workers Club that evening, where Dave Graney was playing as part of the Semaphore Music Festival. As spring weather had finally started, it was good going out in the evening, though no less of a battle to try and work out what to wear besides blue jeans (managed black pants, red top, striped short sleeved jacket). I love the workers club, have written of it before-an old villa with bay window overlooking the beach, large terraced garden at front, huge room with 2 pool tables, memorabilia laden walls and now there are refurbished bathrooms which are fabulous! We met up with 2 guys, who initially I assumed to be a couple, due to them both being decently dressed, and over 40 with no obvious wedding bands/wife references (told my husband this, and he sadly agreed that neat men, of a certain age, get cliched). Anyway, they were both fun to meet and talk to, so the 5 of us c...

I took this photo over 5 years ago, back when I was still a 20 something. How much wisdom and life experience I have gained since then! Anyway, it's a mural of the community health centre at The Parks, which unfortunately is slated for closure to assist with State Budget cuts/revenue raising. I am praying this decision gets overturned-it is so apparent that the eastern suburbs are well serviced with parks and recreational centres/pools (albeit council ones) and the western suburbs have less recreational spaces. Plus the Parks is kind of daggy but cool, it has a social/cultural heritage that is worth keeping, 70s era murals and all. My friends do roller derby training there; a work colleague said her twin sister met her husband there at the swimming pool; it has a community health centre providing outreach to community members, many of whom are the CALD clients that health policy makers otherwise find difficult to engage with (because they don't voluntarily attend doctors/screen...

I had a fun sunday. Mum was looking after the boys and arranged to visit me at 11am. This of course meant I had to get up and do all the visible housekeeping tasks to make my home look photographic ready (which is the only standard of cleanliness that meets Mum's standard). But at least I got to enjoy the benefits too, with my lounge room looking colourful and clean; my fridge emptied of rotting vegetables, clean sheets on my bed and folded in my linen cupboard and i even made a tasty vegetable frittata for brunch. When my guests arrived, it was Ash that led the discussion, starting by questioning me about whether I smoked! (My downstairs neighbour does and the smell taints the downstairs stairwell entry). He is so against smoking, like his older brothers. Then he and Gus set themselves up in the kitchen and made chocolate and banana milkshakes, these being the joy of my pregnancy (AND they haven't led to any excessive weightgain). Whilst in the kitchen Ash noticed photos of Ne...

I have less than 7 weeks until my due date for the baby. Sometimes I get nervous: there is always a chance the birth doesn't go well, there are complications; or the birth goes well but my baby may have other complications. Generally though I don't think of that. I have, as much as possible, been thinking and assuming that this is all normal, healthy, routine, easy. Physically I feel fairly well, the baby bump looks healthy enough in size now, I'm managing to still walk to and from home (when the weather isn't terrible-which it mostly is). The baby has it's head down-which is good, but may not be anterior (the most comfortable position to carry a baby in and the final position required for exit-babies in the posterior position can take up to an extra 2 hours to deliver, whilst waiting for them to turn around). The other thing is avoiding worry. Occasionally I worry about money (mortgage, cost of houses etc), but mostly I don''t. I haven't really given en...

I had a compliment today. Someone I deal with said I sound completely organised and "on to it" at work and she couldn't believe I am getting married in only 4 days. So I have officially decided to embrace this wedding thing and make sure I enjoy my remaining days and cancel whatever can be put off. Things are going well, things are getting exciting. I am staying at a nice hotel on Friday night that I've been wanting to check out and meeting my friends at the Exeter beforehand for a token "last taste of freedom" drink. Here is what NOT to watch before you get married: Series finale of THIS LIFE (Miles shags Anna the night before his wedding and realises he knows very little about his fiancee; Milly biffs Rachel at the reception) Mad Men-Pete cheats on his fiancee, Don Draper cheats on his wife repeatedly Picked up my rings from the jeweller on Saturday, my 10 year old nephew accompanied me but seemed very nonplussed . He did provide some narrative o...

My sister is having a third baby. She has Ned and Gus already. Ned is 6 and Gus is almost five. After we dropped Ned off at school, I asked him for babies names. My suggestion of callling the baby after me, "Georgie" got lots of giggles but apparently only suitable for a girl. His idea for a boy was "Ned" and he suggested we refer to them as "school Ned" and "Ned" so as to tell them apart. Gus has a pleasantly creative and surreal spirit to him, thus Play School is his favourite tv show, "because it's very creative and they make lots of things". And he and his brother had an argument (that resulted in tears for Ned) over the appearance of a forklift. Gus described it as having a black moustache, whilst Ned saw silver bumper bars. "No, Gus, that's not right!" he argued.

Spent most of my weekend in a life drawing workshop, drawing and drawing, concentrating on turning a figure into flesh, about how to use colours to create flesh, how to represent the curves and edges of a person without using lines, just shades. Even after class finished I was still thinking, pulling out a green teapot and wondering how to draw it just from shades of pencil, and sat in my garden, amongst fallen flower petals, drawing. Didn't want to leave my world of art and life and fiction. Woke up puzzled that I had dreamt of Martin, a boy from primary school who died in a car accident 8 years ago. Why him? Then I remembered it would have been his birthday this weekend, Martin who played the viola and shared violin lessons with me, Martin who was on my Year 5 school camp and voted the messiest kid ever. Martin who was a middle child and had the lovely surprising personality that comes with the kid in the middle. Watched Love My Way and puzzled over parents who outlive their chil...