5 months: where did the time go?

5 months family portrait

This month flew by at a speed I can barely fathom. Where did the time go?

At the start of the month, Hugo had a very important visitor. His Grandfather came to stay with us for a couple of weeks. We all had a lovely time. My dad and Hugo spent some good quality time together, going on walks along the beach or to the supermarkets where they both quickly became very popular amongst the salesgirls and I had a chance to spend some glorious hours by myself.

Time alone is becoming something I am getting a little bit used to since Chris' hours at work got cut back a little due to a sluggish economy and not enough work in the office for everyone to be kept busy. Although it's not ideal from a financial point of view, we were quick to see the positive sides. Chris is able to spend more time with us and on his own with Hugo which, in turn, allows me to make up a part of the shortfall with the work I have started do again.

In other news, Hugo continues to charm the ladies,

Aloof with Lian

inquisitive with A-Caz

And funny with Maya and Vanessa

And we just can't get enough of that photobooth!

Meanwhile, winter in Newcastle continues to be absolutely stunning and impossibly mild with most days in the twenties. I usually lament the fact that I only ever get to wear my winter coat a handful of times but this year, I am barely even wearing jumpers, let alone jackets. It looks like my beautiful leather gloves will have to wait until Christmas in Nice as well!

Putting his newborn days very much in the past, Hugo is becoming very active. His quick little hands are constantly grabbing at everything: toys, hair, faces, necks etc... He also loves to suck on his toes at every opportunity and spends most of his time in the bath with a foot in his mouth. He also seems to be getting sort of close to being able to roll over on his own. A few days ago, he grabbed Chris' hand and pulled himself over.

Lately, he has also started laughing. Not just smiling and making little sounds but real bursts of laughter. It is adorable and quite addictive, although it can be hard to predict. It seems that it happens most often when something surprising happens like if I suddenly take a toy away or if I start talking to him.

Hugo's napping is still a bit of a challenge but we are finding ways to deal with it without spending the entire days stuck in a loop of trying to make him fall asleep. I suppose I am getting used to this particular aspect being more difficult than most other things with Hugo. Some days, it gets me down but I am usually able to remain clear headed and optimistic if I've had a little bit of precious sleep. The Odyssey continues...

A message in a bottle.

Once in a while I send a message in a metaphorical bottle out to sea hoping that someone will catch it, and usually someone does.

I am lucky to have found/created a network of like-minded friends in both the physical and the online worlds which has been an invaluable source of support and given me a sense of belonging to a strong community. It feels good to know we're all in this - life, parenthood - together.

If, as they say, it takes a village to raise a child, then my village spans across hemispheres and continents, as well as across the time zones of my life. I have connected and reconnected with new and old friends. Some have babies of the same age as Hugo and we support each other as we stumble through the same stages,while others are a few months or years ahead and offer some much needed perspective.

In my physical life, I have found a small core group of friends I love and which I can organise my week around. On an ideal week, I am able to have a social engagement most days, whether it is a walk by the ocean, a coffee on Darby St. or an afternoon tea at home. Pretty simple stuff but this is what I love the most - afternoons chatting away as the sun drops towards the horizon.

Online, I enjoy the surprises of who and how people will respond. Yesterday, I posted a status update on Facebook about feeling a bit down and was cheered up by heartfelt messages of support. A friend brought me a coffee which we enjoyed by the beach. Another sent me an image of a garden inside a bottle. Another yet wished she was there to have a playground chat or take Hugo for a walk while another friend made sure I came to yoga this morning.

All these attentions, big and small, close or far, help me take a deep breath when I need it and they are the difference between being alone and feeling lonely. Luckily for me, I am neither.

"It's not you, it's him."

They're the words written to me by my very dear friend Rose when she had noticed that I seemed to be struggling on the napping front with Hugo and was blaming myself for it.

Of course, when I am perfectly rational, I do realise that if Hugo isn't sleepy, I can rock him 'til the cows come home and he still won't fall asleep but I can't help it.

I guess that I see myself as his surrogate. For him to be calm, I need to be calm. For him to be happy, I need to be happy and for him to be sleepy, I need to be ... uh, no that one doesn't actually work but you get the idea.

For the last couple of days, Hugo has been a little bit different to his normal self. He has been cranky and difficult to feed. He jerks away when I try to feed him and starts crying even though he'll still greedily suck on my hand or a toy. Maybe he's teething, maybe he is catching some sort of cold or maybe he's just not that hungry...

The thing is, I don't know and so instead, I blame myself. If he doesn't want to eat, then there must be something wrong with my milk. Maybe my supply is low or my milk tastes funny. Maybe I hold him the wrong way or try to feed him at the wrong time...

It isn't the first time he has done this and each time, it has eventually passed and he has soon enough gone back to his normal, hungry, cheery self... meanwhile, I'll just keep reminding myself that it's not me, it's him and not in a break-up kind of way but rather that he is a person who experiences the world and his body a little differently each day. All I can do is set the scene for it to be as enjoyable as possible. 

Illumination and routine.

Yesterday I went for a walk with Hugo. As he often does, he fell asleep on me in the carrier. When this happens, I usually try and walk around for a while, making sure he gets at least 45 minutes to sleep soundly. I know that if I tried to transfer him from the carrier to anything else, he would wake up so it's only fair to him.

On my walk, I decided to pop into the Newcastle Art Gallery to catch the current exhibition before it closes on Sunday and wow, am I glad I went. Illumination the art of Phillip Wolfhagen left me breathless and awed. I only wished I was able to sit down and contemplate but I had to keep moving.

Luminous is the word that comes to mind. Wolfhagen's almost abstract landscape paintings capture a quality of light reminiscent of Turner. Low horizon lines freeing most of the canvas for luminous clouds and skies over half-lit landscapes or turbulent seas.

One of my favourite works was a series of long vertical panels with a dark mass in the bottom of the canvas and the rest taken up by the sky. The work, titled, The First Five Days of April, shows the transformation through light of a single landscape, same but different each day.

I have always felt this way about living by the sea or the ocean and figure that this is why a 'view' of the ocean is such a prized commodity. A living painting, always framed the same way but different from one moment to the next, somehow always surprising, never boring.

Maybe the work of Phillip Wolfhang resonates especially loudly at the moment because this kind of variation on a theme type of routine has also become an integral part of my life with Hugo. Every day is 'same same but different', and definitely always surprising.

Apparently babies thrive on routine, and I would extend this to adults. However, my life as a parent is to try and maintain that routine for Hugo, while he catches me off balance at every turn. One day, a nap maestro (Rose) and the next, full of beans until he hits a wall of tiredness. One day calm and smily, the next a grizzly ball of dissatisfaction.

One day, the ocean is as flat as a lake and the next, it is turbulent and gusty... It's still the same ocean and it's still beautiful. It's just really unpredictable and it is this sense of the unexpected that I must embrace to thrive.