I have been making a few observations over the last few years, mainly to do with my own life - obviously - despite what is said about me, I am not really an on-line stalker!!
Before our children came along, we would eat dinner at approx 8pm every night, sometimes 9pm - we never had a lot in, but would have cupboards full of weird and wonderfull things, but nothing that really went together!
We ate mainly spicy food, lots of curries, chillis, lots and lots of mexican food....we shopped for what we wanted rather than what was necessarily good for us!
We often brought fruit and didn't really eat it, cereals went hard in their packets as they were opened for one bowl full and then not looked at again for months...
Packed lunches were made when we had time, we rolled out of bed into the shower, dressed and dashed out of the door for work....
On arrival home from work, housework would be done, a veg in front of the tv, maybe a nice long walk with the dog along the seafront...
Weekends were leisurely affairs, sleeping till we were ready to wake up, getting up to a nice breakfast, deciding what to do as we felt like doing it...living at the last minute....
Since their arrival there has been many many changes, 3 minute showers, blander foods, getting up at 5.30am whatever the day of the week, eating on the hop, so much more washing, taking more care, and much heathier foods in the cupboards...no more weird and wonderful meal ideas.
When my son arrived, for the first 3 weeks I worried constantly about fitting all the housework in, making meals for us while trying to juggle our new small baby, showering daily was such hard work, but I managed - with 2 in 1 shampoos and very quick scrubbing!! Just nipping for a wee was a challenge!
Everyone tells you to relax, let the housework slide, it doesn't last - but for me the fear that it would never get picked back up again was too much, so nap times mainly consisted of me racing round our home doing what I could in the short time I had.
When our second child arrived, I had to keep things going for the sake of the older one, meal times had to be consistant, cleaning had to be done - but by then we had established a routine, and our second child did sleep much better than our first!!
Money was always spent on whatever we wanted or needed, new clothes, new shoes, computer games, cds, dvds - now we are working on making a wonderful home for our children. Obviously there is the mortgage - the bills - we always had those, but now we are trying to make a place our children feel safe and comfortable in, somewhere they want to be. Their wardrobes are bursting with wonderful clothes, their bedrooms full of the best and latest toys, our wardrobes are ok, we have what we need, our latest toys are usually what everyone else had a couple of years ago, but then the games consoles sit unused for much of the time these days, more exciting things to do, stories to read to eager ears, toys to fix, meals to make, fruit to chop, gardens to tidy, house to keep clean and cuddles to have. Console games are all very good - but you cannot build a life around them!
As I sit here on a bank holiday Monday - its not even 7.30am and I have confiscated toys, broken up two fights, and am already on my 2nd cup of coffee - I can really feel the change from 5 years ago..
A bank holiday was just an extra lay-in during a normal mundane week - now its extra time with my two beautiful children, yes I have had to shout more in the last 20 minutes than I did in my whole adult life before they came along - yes I would absolutely love a lay-in with a cuppa and watch something on tv from the comfort of my nice cozy bed, but I wouldn't give this up for my old life ever.
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