by iamcrabstix | Oct 12, 2017 | Misc
Car is the one compromise we had to make to have a baby – we had a two seater sports car. However how much Mark did research into car seats being OK in this car, it was never happening!
We went and got a mom mobile – a Vauxhall Mokka I’m very happy with it. But it is no MX-5! If I could get Mark another car like this, I would. He misses driving it and as he drives for three hours a day, it is something that I know he would take great pleasure in having again!
I’m not a massive car fanatic. They get you from A-B as far as I am concerned! I had one car, a Renault Clio for years. It was almost like a brand new car by the time I got it as pretty much every part had been replaced. No one told me as a new driver that you had to check oil and water in a car – this resulted in a new engine…. actually more than once. Whoooooopsyyyyyyyy.
by iamcrabstix | Sep 13, 2017 | Misc
I don’t give my cat, Orla Kitty as much of a profile on this blog as RLT, but she is a super important part of our family. Orla Kitty is a Russian Blue x Ragdoll and came to us by chance really. Mark had cats before and missed them, I’d never had much to do with them and out of curiosity looked at a site called pre loved. A lady about 30 miles away was in need of rehoming a cat urgently. I couldn’t get this cat out of my head, she was only five months old and I had seen previously that these sites were being used by sub-humans buying up cats to rile up dogs ahead of dog fights. I was adamant that this was this cat’s destiny if we didn’t get her – so that day, we did. We turned up to a mad house of cats climbing curtains, kids crying, boxes being packed up and overflowing litter trays.
This cat needed out of there fast, the woman who owned her was leaving her husband and three kids, he gave her custody of the cats and she wasn’t allowed to take more than one to her new home. So the little one had to go. We felt incredibly sorry for the kids and cats in that house. We thought we’d just go to meet the cat that night, but off we left with their loaned cat carrier across the moors ready to take the little cat, named Mabel, to her new home after being witness to three small kids having to say goodbye to their beloved pet. It was so sad and quite an odd experience to be part of given that they were strangers.
We decided to change her name as she only responded to ‘little cat’ anyway. We racked our brains for days then suddenly I realised that as I was fully obsessed with Orla Kiely, it would be only right to name her after my favourite designer, therefore she was known as Orla Kitty from that day on and we registered her as so with the microchip people, vet and pet insurance.
Orla Kitty and I had an ok relationship, I worked close to home so I used to come home for lunch to check on her, she wasn’t particularly troublesome just always around somewhere or on your knee. She was closer to Mark than I because he was better with her, I was a bit jumpy.
All of that changed when two months after we got Orla Kitty I found out that I was pregnant, but sadly the pregnancy was progressing but the baby had not developed in around five weeks. I had to have a medical miscarriage. This broke my heart. I’m not very good at talking about how I feel, but Mark threw himself into work to cope and I sat at home feeling incredibly sorry for myself. I am not exaggerating when I say that Orla Kitty saved me from myself at that time. She never left my side at any point I was on my own, she laid in bed with me every day until Mark got home. If I cried she would sit as close to my face as possible, almost as if she was trying to wipe away my tears with her fur. I was spiralling into depression, I had some circumstances at work which were exasperating this, but this cat showed me kindness when I needed it most and I have never been more thankful to anyone or anything than I will be to her.
This was the day before I returned to work after my miscarriage.
That was almost two and a half years ago now and we have been together through two house moves, another pregnancy and a baby in the house since then. This cat never ceases to amaze me. The kindess she shows to the baby is remarkable. She is so patient and gentle with him.
Some people think it is strange that we have a picture of our cat as the main artwork of our kitchen/diner but as well as being created by a darling friend, mandascat and being one of a kind, they really don’t understand exactly how important our cat is to our family. I may joke around on social media and call her #catjerk but this cat has shown me kindess at a time when people at work and the world did not. I can never thank her enough for what she did for me at that time and for adjusting so well to RLT. So we will continue to treat her like a cat queen! Sometimes we find comfort in the places we least expect and I make no apologies for thinking my cat is wonderful in a world where not many people understand this. I guess this must make me a crazy cat lady.
by iamcrabstix | Aug 23, 2017 | Misc
Hide a image in a wordpress post
This is a helpful reminder to myself more than anyone else really, as I keep forgetting the code for hiding an image in a wordpress post everytime I try to hide a blog post image in there for my Pinterest page.
Some images look just odd on your blog, but work on pinterest. So to hide them from your blog viewers you can:
- Upload the image as normal to your wordpress media gallery
- Insert it where you want in your post
- Go in to the text tab of your wordpress post and find where the code is for the image – it should look something like <img class=”alignnone size-medium wp-image-2396″ src=”https://somemadeupblogURL.com/imageexample” alt=”” width=”300″ height=”235″ />
- add this code before the start of the image code ( the one that starts <img class)
<div style = “display:none;”>
5. add this code after the code for the image
</div>
I’ve added the code in as text above so that you can copy and paste it if you need to!
by iamcrabstix | Aug 21, 2017 | Misc
Family life is very different today than it was 50 years ago. 50 years ago, nuclear families were the norm. Today that is no longer the case – the family landscape has changed significantly over the past few decades. Families come in all sorts of shapes and sizes in 2017, from blended families to civil families, families today are very different from the ones considered ‘normal’ five decades ago.
In the UK, there are 18.9 million families; 12.7 million of these are married or in a civil partnership, while there are 3.3 million cohabiting families, and that number is growing all the time. Between 1996 and 2016, cohabiting families were the fastest-growing family type in the UK, doubling from 1.5 million to 3.3 million in just ten years. We are one of these families.
Today, more and more couples are choosing to live together without getting married, opting to cohabit instead. I love my partner dearly, and would love to share a name with him and our child, however, the notion of a big elaborate wedding has never appealed to me. I’d rather spend the money on the honeymoon – but that would upset more traditional members of family and cause potential arguments, so we’ve just never bothered. The thought of going to a registry office doesn’t appeal either, so it is just something that’s ever been on our radar. If our child has a problem in the future, I’m sure it is something we’d address then.
So, having around four years experience of cohabiting, I can share tips on how can you make cohabiting work well for yourself, your partner, and your children
Ensure there is plenty of space for everyone
Cohabiting, whether it’s you, your child, and their biological father, or you, your children, and your new partner requires plenty of space for everyone. When you are all squeezed into one small space, arguments are more likely to occur. If you want cohabiting to work in the long-term, it pays to choose somewhere that offers plenty of space. Everyone needs their own space, which is why the larger the property, the better. Cohabiting, whether you have kids in tow or not, can take some getting used to, and it’s important to realise that.
Put an agreement in place
It’s all well and good being head over heels in love, but what happens should things go sour? Would you enter into a marriage without protecting yourself with a prenuptial agreement? If the answer is no, then you shouldn’t cohabit without a cohabitation agreement either. Just in case it all goes south, it pays to use a family law solicitors to get an agreement put in place. This should state who gets the property, what happens to joint possessions and any savings that have been accumulated. Be smart and protect yourself and your children, after all, you never know what the future holds.
Respect is vital
The chances are, when you first met your partner, you tried to show them your best side. You were kind, caring and helpful – just because your relationship has moved forward, that doesn’t have to change. Respect is vital in any relationship. Don’t change how you act with your partner just because you have moved in together. Don’t take them for granted, treat them with care and respect. Pick up after yourself and expect the same from them.
Be constructive communicators
Arguments will happen, that’s just the way life is. However, you can minimise the impact that arguments have by being constructive communicators. Be fair when it comes to arguments, don’t throw things at your partner or bring up old arguments that have long been settled. Make your point and then listen to theirs, and then try to come to a mutual answer to the problem. Don’t leave fights unfinished. Talk things through until you come to a suitable resolution.
by iamcrabstix | May 15, 2017 | Misc
OPEN LETTER TO SUPERMARKETS FROM PARENTS
Dear un-parent friendly supermarkets (I’m looking at you Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Morrisons and Asda),
We are being reminded constantly that Aldi and Lidl are beating you in the food wars , so I thought I’d pass on some market research on what you can do to be parent friendly supermarkets. This research has been conducted specifically with parent shoppers who need your companies to up their game in order to get them to part with their money. Babies ain’t cheap, as you’ll know, as you price up the Ella’s Kitchen pouches and the Pampers nappies… so by making these quick and easy changes we wouldn’t be full of hell when we get to your shop and we would skip around throwing products into our trollies. Here are our ideas…
- Sort your baby trollies out
Please don’t leave the trollies with the baby seats in the area you know you have a problem with birds nesting. It is vile, my local Tesco is an awful example of this and for almost 11 months, I and others have complained about this and nothing has been done about it. It’s dirty, unhygienic and would take nothing for your staff (who are frequently stood chatting at the customer service desk) to clean them and put them somewhere covered. Would you willingly put your baby in a bird shit covered trolley and then go and spend £100 in the place that has deemed that to be acceptable practice? Thought not.
How about keeping the trollies with the baby seats under cover in a trolley park? As above, are we going to spend money in your store after we’ve had to battle with a baby who is now unsettled because they are damp due to sitting in your seat that we’ve had to wipe with whatever we had handy. Exercise a little common sense, please.
If you could also move your staff smoking area away from outside of the parent and child parking/only trolley park with baby seats in, that would also be swell.
Please also ensure the seat belts are actually working on the trolleys. Often Mummy Confessions has found trolleys with broken or no belts and it makes it difficult with a child trying to get out all the time.
2. Parking
Enforce a rule so that people who park in parent and child spaces are definitely parents with age appropriate children. Supermarkets seem willing to give tickets to those who park on their land without using the supermarket/staying too long, so why not enforce the child/parent spaces? Hey whinge pointed out that if she had parked in a disabled bay she would have been fined, but if disabled people park in P&C spaces because they are closer to the shop entrance, they don’t get fined.
It causes unnecessary stress for parents when they are attempting to shoehorn children out of cars when there are no parent and child spaces left, then they see Barry in the Range Rover pulling out of a parent and child space with no kids in his car, simply because he doesn’t want anyone to touch his precious car. Barry will continue this behaviour every time unless there are consequences for his actions, because Bazza only thinks about Bazza.
All supermarkets should have big spaces for parent & child. Mummytodex ‘s local supermarket is Asda and the P&C spaces are located near the store but they are normal sized spaces. It’s no good for her as she has to leave the trolley in the road while she squeezes her son out of the car worrying about damaging the car next to hers.
Also have baby trollies available at both sides of the parent and child parking areas if you have them at the different sides of the store. At no point are we going to unload our trolley in the car, push the trolley back around and carry the child to the car. Nor would we leave our children unattended, which means abandoned trollies for you.
3. Checkouts for people with children
We would love a little more help with the checkout at the end. By the end of a ‘big shop’ most parents have exhausted our fruit and snacks, the baby’s whiny and the parents are stressed. However, we don’t want help with our packing, we want help unloading the trolley on to the conveyer belt (we can’t do the scan as you shop thing as the baby will think the scanner is a toy and throw a strop). As suggested by Devon Mama , if supermarkets directed shoppers with small children to one or two checkouts it could be possible to provide that help. The Tesco free fruit scheme was favourably mentioned by many respondents, if this couldn’t be rolled out en masse, maybe it could be something brought in for these checkouts?
4. Sort out your home delivery
Obviously we wouldn’t need any of the above doing if your home delivery systems and networks were just a little bit better. Parents such as A Mum Full of Dreams would love to use your home delivery networks but she doesn’t trust you to provide the freshest fruit and veg or suitable replacements.
TRUST comes in to a lot of these minor modifications. If we could trust supermarkets to not put barriers in our way before we even get to the products on the shelves, maybe we would spent a little more time and a little more money in store.
Yours Sincerely
iamcrabstix
on behalf of respondents in New Mummy/Daddy Bloggers group on facebook
by iamcrabstix | Mar 21, 2017 | Misc
Dear Lewis
Today is Down’s Syndrome Awareness Day and I wanted to take the opportunity to thank you for being you.
We may have been born fifteen years and one day apart, but I really can’t remember you not being there and filling my life with laughs.
We didn’t know you had Down’s Syndrome until you were five months old, this gave us time to get to know you as a person, not as a label and I am incredibly thankful for that. Every day with you is full of laughter and fun. I haven’t always had a happy face, but every Sunday that I saw you when you were growing up, you made sure I found one. My mum had always worked with people who had Down’s Syndrome, but I didn’t know any of them really well – everyone says ‘oh they’re so loving’ but the people with Down’s I’d met, before you were born, were grumpy! I hate that, ‘they’ and ‘they’re so loving’, people with Down’s are very different to one another. Thankfully you’re only grumpy when you’re in Kevin the Teenager mode and you don’t cuddle strangers (another stupid ‘they’re so loving’ lie). You’re Lewis, not a stereotype!
You have been the glue that has held our family together since you were born, your personality is so wonderful to be around. You don’t know malice, you don’t know being nasty and I envy that – thankfully you know sarcasm! You are blessed with an amazing mum, who would walk through hot coals for you and I hope you know that the rest of us would too.
Darren and I love you as if you were our brother, not our cousin, and my heart swelled with pride when he made you his best man on his wedding day. You did an amazing job and you kept everyone in check. It takes a lot for him to get emotional, but when he wrote in your thank you card that you are his best friend and he loves you like a brother, this echoed exactly how I feel about you too.
I’m so glad you love Hairspray the Musical as much as I do, going to see it with you was a great day, for once I was not bothered about what the others around us thought and getting up in our seats to dance with you during the show, was brilliant. I’d do it again for sure, because you make me challenge invisible boundaries, your outlook on life is so great. You have taught me more about living in the moment and hygge than any book on amazon can ever do.
You’re just about to leave school and start an internship – OK social services haven’t been too great in supporting this despite you being the first person in your school to ever do this, but your family have got your back, especially your mum. Each and every one of us is so proud of you. It may be hard, you will encounter people who aren’t very nice, but don’t let their negativity have an impact on who you are. You have Down’s Syndrome, you are not Down’s Syndrome. It isn’t what you are, it is a part of who you are – an absolute legend, who is one of my favourite people in the world.
Stay you, Lewi Monk
Lots of love
Me x
