GETTING MY MOJO BACK: WEEK 1

So if you saw last weeks post you'll know that i've decided to undertake a health kick in a bid to shed the mum tum! Week 1 was actually a pretty good week, I could definitely of been slightly stricter but as a start I'm pretty happy with it really.

Eating

So I was hoping to be slightly stricter and live by a 90/10 rule but it ended up being more of the 80/20 rule. I started off the week really well having two healthy eating days on Monday & Tuesday followed by Wednesday being a no carb day and Thursday being a vegetarian day, follow. Friday was going well until I went to my cousins 21st birthday - I had some birthday cake and a couple of sweets but then I found it hard to reign it in after that. So on Saturday I ended up eating Frosted Shreddies for breakfast and on Sunday I still decided to have my 'treat' (even though by this point i'd definitely already had my treat for the week) and ended up eating two muffins. Whoops! Overall though I feel like it was a step in the right direction as generally my eating habits were far better than normal, I snacked loads on fruit & veg and I managed to stay away from the fizzy drinks.

Exercise

Exercises wise I again did pretty well until Friday. I managed to do circuits Tuesday & Wednesday, I had my mum and fit class on Thursday and I did yoga everyday from Monday-Thursday. Then I broke the DVD player on my computer so I didn't do any other yoga or exercise for the rest of the weekend. So right now it's apparent that I need to work on keeping the momentum up over the weekend.

Rules I didn't stick to...

Again I started off well with the 'drink when the baby drinks' but that soon tailed off, so next week I really need to get back on doing that again. However I did end up drinking far more water than I normally drink which is definitely a positive. I didn't manage to eat before 8pm so next week I'll be trying to eat before 9pm as that is way more realistic since most of the time I exercise after Mila has gone to bed. The food diary helped inititally but as soon as I started having treats I just abandoned it. I definitely want to try and do it again next week as I think when I'm strict at doing it, it really helps.

How do I feel & how much weight did I lose?

So after my first week I definitely feel like my clothes fit slightly better already and I feel like the water has done wonders for my skin as well as helping me to not feel as tired. I weighed myself on Sunday morning and was surprised to see that I had lost 4lbs!! So despite my treats I have managed to still lose weight and I think that is all down to the exercising and drinking more water. I definitely don't expect to lose as much as that in the following weeks but it's definitely given me some motivation.

What will I be working on next week?

So there is clearly some room for improvement with my eating habits. I think the main thing is that if I do have a treat I need to learn how to control myself and not go wild! I also want to try and complete my full circuits as right now I have just been doing either upper body or lower body. 

I'll be back next week with my week 2 update and hopefully another weight loss!

GETTING MY MOJO BACK

I'm going to be honest, i've been feeling a little bit lost lately. October was so busy as we'd just moved and I think I underestimated how time consuming unpacking and organising a flat is especially with a 5 month old baby that wants to grab everything. Mila is becoming super active, which is exciting and amazing to see but it's also exhausting and really doesn't leave much time for myself. Then just as I thought I was getting it together Mila fell ill, I fell ill and everything just kind of fell to pot really.

We've hardly got out of the house this week, something I feel like is a massive part of maintaining my sanity and even though i'm growing everyday as a mother I'm not growing any of my other interests. I haven't bought any new clothes in months let alone look at a fashion magazine and I just don't really feel like myself right now. I pour all of my time and energy into this tiny little human that i've realised I've just completely forgotten to take care of myself and I feel like i'm just getting by which isn't me at all.

So it's time to get back to myself and the way that I know best is getting back to exercise. I've totally been inspired by the lovely Kirsty from Tracking Twenty (see her post here) with her Bounce Back mission and I thought that it's time that I make a start myself. Before falling pregnant I had just completed my first 10K and i'd say I was in the best shape i'd been in for years. I had a balanced healthy lifestyle and that's exactly what I want to get back to. After having Mila I quickly got back to my pre baby weight but I wasn't being healthy, so as soon as I stopped breastfeeding I started putting weight on. One stone of extra weight later and I feel like it's time to make a change. We've also started weaning Mila and we encourage her to eat what we eat so there's never been a better time to get healthy again. So in an effort to motivate myself and keep myself on track i'm going to be documenting my process of getting back to exercise, losing a little bit of weight on the way and getting back to a healthy lifestyle.

MY GOAL

I've always found that having a goal weight in mind is a massive incentive for me to get back to eating healthily. Overall I would like to lose a stone and a half but I want to do it slowly and I want the changes I make to be something that becomes a part of my lifestyle rather than just to lose the weight and revert back.

I'm probably a little bit crazy starting a health kick around Christmas time when there's the most temptation around but for me that is something that spurs me on. I want to be able to enjoy Christmas and not feel guilty about indulging slightly and if i've been leading a healthy lifestyle I feel like i'll appreciate it far more. So my mini goal is to of lost half a stone by Christmas in the aims that I can enter the New Year having made a good start.

RULES OF THE GAME

Personally I find having 'rules' to stick to help me to make better choices and to not fall off the healthy wagon. Also for the initial goal of losing weight I do feel like I need to be stricter with the aim to be slightly more relaxed once I reach my target and focus on maintaining my weight rather than losing.

1. Live by the 80/20 rule

Overall I will be trying to loosely follow the anti-diet by The Londoner. She advocates that 80% of the time you are good and 20% of the time you are 'bad' to allow for the odd treat. I'm initially going to follow this idea but be slightly stricter for the first two weeks, more like 90% good and 10% bad. My plan is to have 2 days a week no carbs, 1 day a week meat free and once a week - most probably on a Sunday I can allow myself a sweet treat.

2. Do 15 minutes of Yoga 5 days a week

I know that this doesn't sound like much but 15 minutes of Yoga is achievable for me to do on most days and where I can I'll do 30 minutes or more. There will obviously be the odd days that I won't be able to which is why i'm aiming for 5 days but I've always found Yoga to be super beneficial in my exercise plan.

3. Do cardio 3 times a week

I already do a mum & baby fitness class once a week which is pretty intense and I want to incorporate a run once a week into my schedule as well as doing some circuits. Again I want to see how I go for the first couple of weeks and I'll try and schedule more exercise in if I'm not getting the results that I want.

4. Drink when the baby drinks

One of my major problems is that I don't drink enough water - a lot of the time I probably eat when in fact i'm thirsty. So my new rule is to drink everytime I give Mila a bottle which is around every 3 hours at the moment, that way I know that i'm drinking enough,

5. Snack more

I have a real problem where I either skip meals or leave it too long between meals and then I end up having a HUGE meal or don't feel satisfied by my meal and end up snacking later on. So i'm going to be snacking more on the right foods, lots of fruit & veg and healthy snacks.

6. No eating after 8pm

Ok so this is one I probably won't always be able to do as occasionally Joe gets home late from work and we have to have dinner around the 8pm mark, but where I can I won't be eating after 8pm.

7. Cut out fizzy drinks & sweet treats

I've always had a sweet tooth and it's most definitely one of my worst habits. So in a bid to start my journey off well I am going to completely cut out fizzy drinks and only allow myself a sweet treat once a week. For the first two weeks at least I will be completely cutting out all junk food - that means no pizzas, chocolate, crisps, takeaways and i'll be really focusing on clean eating.

8. Weigh myself and take a progress picture once a week

This is one that is very important for me as I can sometimes fall into the trap of weighing myself too much and getting too focused on the numbers. So limiting it to once a week means that is a fair representation of the week and not something I get too attached to. Also the progress pictures will help me to see what a difference the healthy eating is making to my overall appearance and will help to motivate me.

9. Keep a food diary

For the first two weeks at least I'll be keeping a food diary - there's something about having it written down on a page that helps me to not have that 'odd biscuit' and keeps me focused. I've always found this useful when trying to be healthy.

10. Only eat when i'm hungry

My last rule is to only eat when i'm hungry. I'm most definitely an emotional eater, had a bad day? Well then I must need some chocolate. Managed to finally get Mila down for a nap after an hour of trying? Well I need to reward myself with some biscuits. Even though I don't think i'll be able to completely cut out my emotional eating having a better relationship with food and limiting using it as a 'reward' or too make me feel better will hopefully help me towards achieving my healthier lifestyle.

So those are the rules that I'll be following for now and they'll probably change as I go but hopefully that will get me off to a good start. My plan starts tomorrow and i'll be back next Monday with my first update! Wish me luck...

BLOGTOBER: EVERYTHING IS CHANGING

So we are finally getting Mila onto solids! I was in two minds whether to start slightly earlier but I thought that with us changing over to formula i'd concentrate on getting her into a routine with that first and I haven't really known where to start with it all. But we got her a pack of the Ella's Kitchen banana porridge and she seemed to enjoy it which was really encouraging. Ideally I want to try and give baby led weaning a go which is another reason I wanted her to be closer to the 6 month mark so that she could sit up and develop her pincer grip.

I also went back to work today for a keeping in touch day which was actually super exciting. I still remember that first week Joe went back to work and thinking how would I ever be ready to go back to work when I was enjoying motherhood so much, but the time has slowly crept up on us and it's time to start thinking about it. My plan is to go back in January and 6 months into my maternity leave I can honestly say that I'm really starting to feel ready to go back. Having a baby and entering into motherhood is an amazing thing but I feel like myself when I'm at work. I've always been very career minded and having a baby hasn't changed that at all for me. So even though i'll miss Mila millions i'm excited to get back to work and get stuck into my career again.

BLOGTOBER: HELLO YOUTUBE

So i've bitten the bullet and put up my first Youtube video. I actually filmed this video ages ago, maybe a week after Mila was born? So in terms of links to products and things it isn't up to date and for the time of year it isn't that relevant, but it gives you an idea of what is good to put in your babies hospital bag. I for one didn't have a clue and watch SO many of these Youtube videos to try and decide what to take so I hope that someone finds it helpful.

I'm hoping to upload more videos over the next couple of weeks so keep checking back.

My Youtube Channel

BLOGTOBER: FAILTOBER

So I had a little 3 day break but I'm back! Blogging everyday is actually really hard and super time consuming when you don't have much of a plan of what you're going to post. Saturday came around and it was a busy day, we left Mila with my parents and enjoyed a baby free weekend which also involved going out, drinking far too much and rolling in at 4am. Not cool. Especially when you've had broken sleep for 5 months, my body just can't handle that kind of trauma. So i've been recovering and generally getting organised again because apparently I just don't function on a hangover.

So i'm now over half way into Blogtober and I might make up for the posts I missed I might not, no pressure but the main thing is I'm feeling inspired again and with that i'm going to take a big leap. BIG leap. Queue my Youtube channel that I've been meaning to get going for a while but I just haven't been able to face it. There's still something I find a little cringy about talking to a camera but somehow I find it much more personable & I find Youtube interesting to watch myself so I thought I'd give it ago. I'll be posting my latest video and links to it later tonight so stay tuned.

BLOGTOBER: REFLECTING ON SUMMER

Having a new baby meant we had a relatively quiet summer but reflecting on it now it was definitely one of the best. I remember the weekend that Mila was born being the hottest of the year so far and for me that's when summer started and maybe i'm seeing it through rose tinted glasses but I feel like we had some great British weather. So here's a little photo diary with some captions to show what we got up to on our first summer as new parents.

A BEAUTIFUL WEDDING

We started the summer off with the wedding of the year, Joe's sisters wedding. It was our first time travelling a long distance with a 4 week old Mila who was feeding every 2-3 hours, it was challenge but it was so worth it to enjoy such an amazingly beautiful day with a great couple.

BIRTHDAYS WITH SPECIAL PEOPLE

Summer means that it's the birthdays of some of the people closest to me. It was Joe's birthday and we had great time going to Crystal Palace Market (review coming soon) and Mila was still young enough to fall asleep in the restaurant whilst we enjoyed an amazing meal.

It was also my best friends birthday which was awesome as we got to enjoy a weekend together chilling out and eating cake (what we do best) she doesn't live close to me so it's always a special time when we get together.

BABYWEARING

Using our cuddlebug gifted to us by one of our friends I got to grips with babywearing. It was great to put Mila in the sling if I needed to pop to the shops or needed to get her to sleep as she loved it.

 STAYING IN

This picture is a very true reflection of my summer. Staying in (even on the warmest of days) with my sleeping baby, make up free, looking tired with a huge spot on my face. We spent a lot of our summer days like this feeding, changing and playing repeat. Now that Mila is so active I miss those quiet moments!

LEAVING MILA FOR THE FIRST TIME

When Mila was around 3 months old I thought it was time to see what Joe was really made of and leave him to tackle the bedtime all by himself and head out for an evening of food and wine with the girls. Having pumped a bottle of milk and not planning to be back for a couple of hours I treated myself to a glass of wine and enjoyed conversation that didn't revolve around my babies sleeping,eating and changing habits. At the end of the evening I went home a little bit buzzy after my glass of wine and feeling way more like my old self. Bliss.

CRYSTAL PALACE WALK

Started by the lovely Clemmie from the instagram account Mother of Daughters, most Mondays at 11am in Crystal Palace Park I met up with a bunch of other mamas and went for a walk around the park. It was a great way to start my week and we'd always end the walk by grabbing a coffee/lunch and feeding our babies in the park.

EATING TOO MUCH CAKE/DRINKING TOO MUCH COFFEE

If I had a pound for every coffee shop/ restaurant I visited this summer I would be a rich woman. My maternity leave has been all about enjoying the sweet treats and not caring whilst washing it down with tea & coffee but i've needed the energy after the sleepless nights right?

NEW BABY FRIENDS

A definite highlight of Mila's summer was spending time with her new pal Ludo. She wasn't too sure at first (as you can see from her expression in this picture) but they were practically holding hands by the end of the summer. Can you imagine if they got married? We aren't forcing this relationship at all. Promise!

WHACKING ON A MINI DRESS & GOING CLUBBING

Our good friends were leaving to go travelling so to say Bon Voyage we headed on our first night out as new parents, leaving Mila with her Nanna. It was strange being out - I hardly went clubbing after I left university anyway, but it was great to let my hair down, have a dance and remember the things we used to do before having a baby. At the same time it was also great to be reunited with my baby the next day, how amazing are those cuddles when you've been away from them.


FRIDAY MEET UPS & POKEMON PLAYING

Myself, my mum and my sister made it a tradition to meet up every Friday since Mila was born and it we stuck to it all summer, in fact we're still going now. Our meet ups have been spent Pokemon catching, talking about Brexit and watching the Olympics. So when I look back on Summer 2016 i'll definitely remember those lovely Fridays.

NOTTING HILL CARNIVAL & NIGHTS IN WITH FRIENDS

Having a new baby we can't always go out like we used to. Pre-baby our weekdays would be filled with dinners & drinks with various friends. Having a baby I thought it would all change and I would see my friends less but they've been amazing and come over for nights in where they can enjoy time with Mila and then with us once she goes to bed. In fact its become a bit of a ritual to cook dinner with our friends Hannah & Jack at least twice a month. But it always nice to have the odd night or two baby free, so our second baby free event of the summer was Notting Hill Carnival and it was awesome.

So overall it was a great summer spent seeing friends & family - there are definitely some things that i've missed. Having a new baby and being the first couple to become parents in our friendship group I wasn't sure what life would be like but we had a great time and I feel like we got a good balance of doing things that we enjoyed doing before having a baby and also enjoying new experiences as a new family. I can't wait to make even more memories this winter.

THE PROS OF BOTTLEFEEDING

I really struggled when looking for a picture for this post, I have so many pictures of me breastfeeding but absolutely zero of me bottle feeding Mila even though she's had the occassional bottle since she was 3 weeks old. The only picture that I have is this picture above of Joe bottlefeeding. In general I feel like the pros of breastfeeding are spoken about a lot and this post is in noway trying undermine those pros at all because they are brilliant in their own right but if I'm honest I haven't seen bottle feeding really celebrated very much. I'll be honest I felt a lot of guilt when transitioning over to bottles, something in the back of my mind telling me that I should of tried harder with breastfeeding, but it's only now 3 weeks into bottlefeeding that it is the best decision that we made and I shouldn't feel guilty for that. So for today's Blogtober I thought I'd write about the pros of bottlefeeding.

1. You can share the feeding duties

I think this is such a great pro as it means that partners, friends and family can all enjoy that special bonding time that you have when you feed your baby. 

2. You can share the night feed

Talking about sharing the feeding duties, it also means that you can share the nightfeeds. Although if your partner is anything like mine then it won't actually make that much difference, I normally have to wake Joe up and tell him to go and make a bottle at which point i'm awake so I may as well do it myself haha.

3. You can be away from your baby

I wouldn't say this is exactly a pro because it's always mixed emotions when I leave Mila but knowing that your baby will happily take a bottle takes some of the stress away from leaving them. 

4. You can tell how much your baby drinking

I found some comfort in this when switching over from breast to bottle as it was easy to know how much Mila was having, obviously it can vary slightly from feed to feed but if she's had less on one feed then I can add an oz to the next one.

5. You don't have to share your body

This is such a selfish pro but if i'm really honest it was nice to have my body back after breastfeeding. I didn't have to worry if I could breastfeed in certain outfits and I could have a couple of drinks without thinking about it and calculating when my next feed would be. 

So that wraps up my pros of bottle feeding at the end of the day feeding Mila is still a great bonding time whether she is being fed by bottle or breast. I'd love to know if anyone reading this is bottle feeding and what your pros of bottle feeding are. 

BLOGTOBER: AUTUMN GOALS

I can't believe that it's Autumn already! Every blog that I read at the moment is expressing their love for Autumn and I have to say i'm definitely on the Autumn bandwagon. We had such an amazing summer this year (in my opinion) with some little heat waves, I feel like I hardly had my umbrella out all summer and spent the whole time in shorts which is exactly how summer should be. As good as the summer was i'm now excited to layer up, get my winter coat out of the closet and get cosy under a blanket with the fire on. Autumn will always feel like a new start for me, September has always been filled with starting school/university or for the last 5 years a house move and with this year being no exception I always feel like a refresh in Autumn. It's the perfect time to start getting organised before the end of the year so I can head into the new year in the best way possible. The weather has been the most perfect Autumnal weather, with crisp mornings accompanied by a blue sky, it seemed like the perfect time to go for a walk in the park with Mila's new pram (well not new she's now in the big part of the pram) and reflect on what I want to achieve by the end of the year. With that in mind here are 5 Autumn goals that I have come up with.

1. Get exercising again

So it's official i've not exercised in a whole year! I felt so ill at the start of my pregnancy, so although I was running a lot in the first 10 weeks of pregnancy as soon as the morning sickness hit it all fell by the wayside and I never went back. My aim is to get back into exercising everyday again, whether it's a 30 minute walk, a run or even some Yoga which I used to love i'm determined to get back into it.

2. Get into healthy eating habits

My partner Joe will be the first to tell you how much cake I have been eating over the past year. It's not even just cake, it's anything sweet and it's now got to the point where I need to curb the habit. At the moment I feel like I eat sweet food even when I don't really want it so I really want to get back into it being a treat again - if anyone reading this has any tips for what has worked for them then please let me know! When you're at home a lot of the day the biscuit tin is way too inviting.

3. Get organised

Having just moved house everything is just everywhere at the moment, I can't wait for everything to have it's place but personally it takes me a while to work all of those things out. By the end of the year I would like to have worked that all out and be organised all ready for Christmas.

4. Get back into cooking

In order to achieve my goal of having healthier eating habits I feel like I need to get back into cooking more and finding interesting recipes as when I have tasty meals to look forward to I feel like I enjoy healthy eating far more.

5. Keep blogging after Blogtober

I really enjoy blogging and although it takes a little bit of time to come up with different posts being 12 days into Blogtober and having  posted every single day so far shows me that I can do it if I put my mind to it. The point of me doing Blogtober was to get me back into blogging and I feel like after posting everyday posting once or twice a week should be breeze (hopefully).

BLOGTOBER: MY GUIDE TO PUMPING

To anyone that doesn't breastfeed i'm pretty sure that this contraption probably looks like some sort of modern megaphone - at least it did to me when I first saw it. For breastfeeding mama's this little godsend is the key to freedom, a couple of hours away from baby or even just to give you a break from feeding, my breast pump was one of my best friends whilst I was feeding Mila. However when I first looked into pumping I was shocked how little information there was out there. I had zero clue when to pump, how much to pump and how long I could go without pumping again so I thought I'd compile a little list of the things that I found out when I started pumping. I am by no means an expert but these are things that worked for me personally and didn't affect my milk supply as that was always my biggest worry.

What pump should I use?

I went for the Avent pump and I found that it worked really well for me and was one of the cheaper options on the market. I would always use the pump on the medium settings, I started off using the pump on the highest setting and it made my breasts ache after using it. Once I started using the medium setting that all stopped.

What time of the day should I pump?

I would normally pump in the morning or before I went to bed as that is when I found that I had the most milk and could easily pump 3-4oz.

How long should I wait to start pumping?

I started pumping once or twice a week when Mila was 4 weeks old. The recommended time to start pumping is 6 weeks but I found that starting at 4 weeks actually helped to regulate my supply as I was making too much milk. Mila happily took to having a bottle at 4 weeks old and easily went back onto the breast after having a bottle.

How much should I pump?

When I first started pumping I had no idea how much to try and aim for to pump. I actually had the issue of having too much milk so I could easily pump 3oz from one breast and do a top up of one more oz from the other breast. In the end I would try and do 2oz from each breast to keep it equal and also in the hope that it wouldn't stimulate me too much to make even more milk. Somehow that seemed to work for me.

How much milk will my baby have?

At 4 weeks old Mila would have about 3oz and slowly worked her way up to having 4-5oz by 12 weeks old. If I was leaving Mila for the evening then I would try and pump two bottles in advance just ensure that there was enough milk for in case she wanted more.

How should I store my breast milk?

I treated breast milk the same way that I would treat cows milk - so I would refrigerate or freeze if I wasn't using the milk straight away. Otherwise I would feed it straight to Mila within an hour or two of pumping. Mila happily had the milk at room temperature but if it was frozen I would put it in a bowl of hot water to defrost. Any milk in the fridge I would use within a couple of days and milk in the freezer I would use within a month.

How long should I wait till I pump again?

This was what I struggled with the most - if I had pumped earlier in the day and Joe was going to feed Mila the pumped milk, should I pump whilst Joe was bottle feeding? In the end I decided not to on the advice of HV as she said that as long as i'm doing the same number of stimulations each day it shouldn't affect my supply. I could generally go around 4 hours without feeding without needing to pump/feed again, but I just went with how I felt. If I felt like I needed to pump then I would otherwise I would just wait until Mila's next feed.

Pumping when you're away from your baby

When I went to Notting Hill Carnival and went on my first night out I had to be away from Mila. By that point Mila would happily have formula if I couldn't feed her for whatever reason but I still wanted to continue breastfeeding when I got back. I was away from Mila for the day when I went to Notting Hill Carnival, so I breastfed before I left - (two feeds in the morning) then I missed the afternoon feed and expressed in the evening. I then expressed again before I went to bed and again in the morning, ready to start feeding Mila at her 12pm feed. It was much easier when I went on a night out, I just breastfed her before I left, pumped before I went out and then pumped when I got in and pumped again in the morning. After both of these occasions I didn't use bottles with Mila for the following week after and just concentrated on breastfeeding to keep my supply up, that seemed to work well for me. The only time that my supply started dipping was when I stopped expressing and Mila started feeding less in the day as she was getting so distracted, so in hindsight I wish I had kept up with it as it probably would have helped to keep my supply up.

So those are my top tips for pumping. If you have any questions or any tips yourself then please do let me know even though i'm no longer breastfeeding it's always great to know for future babies or to spread advice amongst other mums.

BLOGTOBER: OUR TRIP TO YORK

As I mentioned in my last post we were up in York to watch my mum run the Yorkshire marathon over the weekend. Having a mum as a marathon runner definitely has its perks as we get to discover lots of great cities when we go and watch her run (see post about Dublin here). This time we got an Airbnb which was a great idea as it was like a home from home and meant that we could all chill together in the evenings. It also provided a good amount of space for Mila to roll around, note: she does NOT stop rolling so that was a pretty important factor. We stayed at this Airbnb if you're interested, the place was great and it was a brilliant location but our host wasn't the best at communicating - but that's a story for another time.

We spent Saturday having a quick mooch around the city, followed by a lovely italian dinner at a restaurant called Caesars, I would highly recommend. Sunday was spent roaming the city of York spectating and cheering my mum on at the marathon followed by a takeaway indian from The Raj - another great find. Having been preoccupied with the marathon for most of the weekend we didn't have that much time to take in the city and all of its sights so we spent this morning having a wonder around. With it being Monday morning it was so quiet which was lovely as it meant we could take pictures tourist free!

We pretty much all ordered the full English breakfast apart from Joe who got the vegetarian version (we recently watch 'The Truth About Meat') and the food was as good as the interiors. Everything was cooked perfectly and they added a great twist on the baked beans by adding a bit of spice. I'd love to go back and try their lunch and dinner menu as well.

My top recommendation of the trip is where we ventured for breakfast, a really cool restaurant called Cut & Chase. I noticed it when we first looked around the city on Saturday and was struck by the interesting typography and slick interiors that the restaurant offered, when I saw that they also served up a great array of breakfast options I was sold.

So all in all we had a brilliant trip to York and now we all can't wait until mum runs her next marathon so that we can discover another new city, but I think York is one that we'll definitely be taking a trip back to.

BLOGTOBER: WE'RE IN YORKSHIRE

Hello from Yorkshire! The last couple of days we've been travelling through Yorkshire, taking in the sites & breathing in the fresh Yorkshire air. It's been great to get away from London and do some activities that we never normally do. On Friday we took a trip up to the beautiful Malham Cove, being the Londoners that we are Joe & I turned up for the walk in windy & rainy Yorkshire conditions wearing a Harrington jacket, trench coat, vans (as pictured) and other non practical clothing, but we enjoyed the walk and it was worth it to see the beautiful waterfall at the end. Doing such a lovely walk has inspired me to try and encourage us to try and find nice places to walk around near London, it's such a cheap day out and beats walking around the same parks over and over again.

We're currently in York after watching my mum run the York marathon, I've never visited before and it is such a pretty city, i've also been surprised at how great the food has been everywhere, I never really had York down as a foodie city but there really is so much on offer. So expect a post soon featuring my highlights of York. 

BLOGTOBER: MY BREASTFEEDING JOURNEY

Breastfeeding. Where do I even start? When deciding how to feed Mila breastfeeding was my obvious choice, it seemed the easiest way to feed her and there are so many benefits for both mama and baby. I never set myself out any aims of how long I wanted to breastfeed for I just wanted to see how it went and hoped that I would be able to do it as I know that so many women either struggle to breastfeed or can't breastfeed.

Up until 2 weeks ago Mila was almost exclusively breastfed, having the odd bottle of formula here and there. My breastfeeding journey was very up and down. In the first couple of days she latched on brilliantly and I'd say for the first 6 weeks we had no trouble at all - she was gaining weight really well and feeding for a good amount time. The biggest hurdle that I had at that point was getting used to breasfeeding in public as I realy hated it at first, but slowly I built up my confidence. So like I mentioned in Mila's 5 month update the 8 week jabs really changed everything for us. After the jabs she obviously wasn't feeling to great and over the course of a few days was feeding less and less. It got to the point where everytime I would try and feed her she would fuss, kick and arch her back. She was rejecting me and I had no idea why. So we started feeding her a bottle of expressed milk in a bid to keep her hydrated as I was starting to worry that she wasn't having enough. It was a difficult couple of days and it got to the point that she would only feed on me when she was tired so I was only able to do about two feeds a day. I was so frustrated and was starting to think that I was either going to have to pump or we would have to start using formula. We did start using formula as I couldn't keep up with the expressing but day by day I managed to slowly get her back onto the breast. I ended up having to give her the dummy and swap the dummy for the breast and that really helped. In the end we slowly built back up and she went fully back onto the breast however from then on we gave her a bottle of formula every so often.

So from that point on Mila hadn't really had any problems feeding until we hit 4 months. Then suddenly she became the most wiggly and active baby when feeding, pulling off every 2 minutes and looking around and eventually becoming disinterested. It was so difficult to get her to feed and in the end it was taking me about an hour just to try and complete a feed and I felt like I was constantly feeding! We then started noticing a change in Mila, she was up in the night more and didn't seem to be growing out of the 3-6 months clothes, my mum intuition told me that something wasn't quite right so I headed over to the child clinic to get her weighed. It turned out she hadn't gained even half the amount of weight that she should have gained within the last month. I put a brave face on but really I found it quite heartbreaking - realising that the reason she was probably waking up in the night was due to hunger isn't a nice feeling at all. So from that point on we decided to slowly transition over to formula. We still  don't know exactly why she wasn't putting weight on - it could be me not making enough milk, it could be that Mila wasn't spending enough time at the breast to access the hind milk which is the fattening milk that helps them to put weight on,  it could of been a combination of both. The main thing is that it wasn't making Mila happy, she wasn't putting weight on and wasn't sleeping well and in turn it was making me stressed out as well. She's now been on formula for two weeks and we've such a change in her sleep and her overall temperament, she's also back on track with her weight gain.

So if you're reading this and are in between or trying to decide whether to make the switch to formula, do whatever is best for you and your child. As much as I had mixed feelings about making the switch to formula in the end it's best for both me & Mila and as long as she is healthy and happy so am I.

MILA & ME - My 5 month update

My recovery 

I can’t believe that it’s been 5 months since I’ve given birth! In someways it feels like yesterday – I can remember every single detail of Mila’s birth story and I’m sure I will forever, but on the other hand I feel like I’m starting to get my pace as a mother which feels great.

I’d say that it took me about 3-4 weeks to feel completely normal again and feel healed. I remember the most annoying part being the stitches as they felt uncomfortable, itchy and tight until they dissolved. As soon as they had gone I felt so much better. I think it also takes a while to mentally recover from going through giving birth and getting your head around your new responsibility as a parent. For the first couple of weeks I kept feeling really down as soon as bedtime would approach – maybe it was the thought of broken sleep? But I always felt this overwhelming responsibility like my life had really changed and I wasn’t sure if I’d ever completely feel like myself again. 5 months in and I feel like now that we have somewhat of a routine I’m getting back to doing the things that make me feel more like myself which is great.

Weight Loss 

Initially I lost the baby weight pretty quickly, within 8 weeks I was down to my pre baby weight, which I put down to breastfeeding and the busyness of having a new baby to care for. The picture above is from 3 weeks postpartum, a great top that strategically covers my wobbly bits and is great for breastfeeding. Since then however I feel like I’ve definitely put on a few pounds. I don’t know about anyone else but having a new baby just makes me want to eat cake! Like I was saying in one of my posts everytime I put Mila down for a nap I feel like I must congratulate myself with a cup of tea and cake. So my next task is to get back into eating healthy, curb my cake habit and get back into exercising regularly.

Mind set

Like I was saying before it took a little while for me to get my head around the responsibility of having a baby. When I first gave birth to Mila I was so anxious about every little thing! I was constantly on google and worrying about the tiniest of things, but I now have so much more confidence within my parenting abilities, so I feel like I’ve come a long way. Every so often I try and leave Mila with Joe or a relative so that I can have a couple hours/day or night break to do the things that I want to do like go for dinner with friends or enjoy some time in a coffee shop reading a book. It’s the little things like this that keep me refreshed and make me feel more like myself again not just ‘Mila’s mum’.

MILA & ME - Mila's 5 month update

Wow, where does the time go? I was planning on doing these updates far more frequently, but alas, life took over and i've just been enjoying savoring every moment of my maternity leave with Mila.

Catch up
The last 5 months have been everything; exciting, hard, emotional, tiring -  I could go on. We got 3 months in and Joe & I were (foolishly) thinking that this parenting thing isn't too hard, we've got it together. We had been blessed with a pretty good sleeper, generally sleeping from 11-5am with a quick feed at 5am and then waking up at 8am from around 4 weeks old, she breastfed like a dream and I guess the only thing that I used to find challenging was getting her down for a nap as she hit the 6 week milestone. Queue the 8 week immunisations to come in and ruin EVERYTHING. Mila actually ended up having her first jabs at 12 weeks and boy oh boy were they a game changer for us. Sleep was pretty much out of the window, she started waking up more in the night which to be honest I felt like I could deal with, especially after feeling like we had got lucky in the first 3 months. For me the hardest thing was that she suddenly started rejecting the breast. Everytime I would try and feed her she would kick,fuss and generally just get worked up and fustrated to the point that I was so worried that she wasn't getting enough milk. I'm planning on doing a proper post about my breastfeeding journey so I will go into more depth there, but it was a hard time and lasted for about 10 days, at which point she was finally breastfeeding well again. I've learnt that there are always these little things that crop up and I always try to remember that i'm sure it won't be forever, and like with everything she'll change again.

I've also left Mila for the first time in the last couple of months, twice with Joe and twice where we left her with grandparents to enjoy time away with our friends. I absolutely adore spending time with Mila, but it was so good to have a break and actually be able to miss her, I think it's so important as parents to have that break because I think it makes you appreciate them more and it's definitely helped me take steps to getting back to myself.

So I think that's a good roundup of what's happened over the last 5 months, onto the update!

Sleep

After a couple of months of the sleep being a bit up and down we are finally getting to a place where Mila is starting to sleep more again at night. For the past 2 months she's been waking up twice in the night. She was going to bed at 8pm then waking at 2am & 5am for a feed. So we've now made her bedtime earlier, she's generally asleep by 7.30pm every night, waking at around 10.30pm/11pm for a feed and then she'll usually have a night feed at around 3/4am and then wake up for the day between 6.30am - 7am (bar the last couple of days where she's decided that 5.30am is her new time).
Nap wise she is usually pretty good unless we're on a really busy day when she sometimes struggles to get a long sleep in. She generally has an 1 hour and half in the morning, 2 hours in the afternoon and a 30 min cat nap late afternoon. We tend to try and get her to have all her naps by 4.30pm in the afternoon so that she is ready for her 7pm bedtime. So sleep wise I feel like we are slowly getting into a routine again which I love as it means I can plan a bit more.

Feeding

Our feeding journey is something that I want to talk about in depth, but at 5 months Mila is now fully on formula. I breastfed with the odd bottle of formula here and there up until 2 weeks ago when we took Mila to get weighed and found out that she had hardly gained any weight in the last month. Being her main caregiver and source of food I felt extremely guilty that she hadn't gained more weight and we made the decision to introduce her properly to formula. We're still finding our feet but Mila generally has 6-7 bottles a day, taking around 5oz-6oz at each feed. I don't know if it's linked but I definitely feel like she is sleeping better since we made the switch and even though we aren't completely sure exactly why she didn't gain enough I have inkling that perhaps I wasn't making enough and maybe she was waking so much in the night due to hunger :( who knows, but it could be the reason. In more positive news we are very excited to start weaning Mila, I've heard a lot about baby led weaning and i'm leaning towards going that way but would love to hear peoples weaning experiences.

Development

At 5 months Mila's character is well and truly shining through. I think the most obvious thing is how active she is. She never wants to sit down, she is always insisting on standing and marching on your legs - it's hilarious, i'm not sure if she'll ever sit up! She's rolling over confidently, she can roll front to back and back to front, but usually chooses to just do the latter and then try and crawl. She's just started trying to push back onto her back legs so I think she could end up being an early crawler. She's such a happy baby and she's at the stage where she is such a pleasure to be around. She can tell now when you're being silly and finds it hilarious, she also loves it when we sing to her. Her favourite songs are anything that include her name, we've edited Miffy the sweet little bunny to Mila the sweet little bunny and she just beams everytime you start singing it. She has her favourite toys which she smiles when she sees and puts her hands out to grab and she can't fall alseep without her elephant comforter - in fact I must buy another for when I have to wash the other one! Oh and absolutely everything goes in her mouth. She actually started trying to eat the bath water last night for fun. I don't miss the newborn stage at all as she's so much fun at the moment, but everytime I see a tiny baby I do feel that sense of nostalgia remembering how lovely those days were.

So I think that wraps it up for Mila's 5 month update. I still can't believe that she 5 months old, when I was pregnant I couldn't imagine anything past 3 months. I was planning to put my update in this post as well, but I think i've rambled on long enough, so stay tuned for my 5 month postpartum update.

BLOGTOBER: HOW TO MAKE TIME WHEN YOU HAVE A BABY

Ironically my last post was about advice that I decided to ignore being a new mum and i'm going to completely contradict myself by posting some advice on how i've managed to make time and get things done now that I have a baby. I'd also love to hear if anyone has any tips that they use as i'm always trying to be more efficient!

Shower & get dressed at the start of the day

This may seem like a really obvious one, but there are too many times where it gets to 12pm and i'm still in my dressing gown, the laundry isn't done and i've realised that i've been snacking all morning. Just doing small things like using Mila's first nap of the day to sort myself out are things that make me feel a little more together and less like a tired & stressy mum. 

Set yourself 3 tasks that you want to get done by the end of the day and that's it!

Sometimes I find that it's too easy to set myself a never ending list of things to do that ends up being so overwhelming I practically do none of it. I then get to the end of the day and feel deflated that i've not 'achieved' any of it. By giving myself 3 tasks I end up prioritizing the really important things and ignoring the things that can wait till later in the week. Normally I end up getting more done because I feel more positive about getting those 3 tasks done.

Limit your social media time

I'm really bad at this one. There are too many times that Mila goes down for a nap and i'm like 'right lets get this cleaning done' and then I realise that 30 minutes has passed and all i've done is browse instagram. It's probably one of my worst habits, so I'm still working on this one myself. On my good days I catch up with social media at feed times as it's when I have to be sat down and can't get much else done or in my 'chill time nap' which leads me on nicely to my next point...

Give yourself down time

I sometimes give myself too much down time because I don't plan my down time into my day if that makes any sense. For me it makes sense to try and get things done when Mila is asleep and take things slow when Mila is awake. However most the time Mila goes down for a nap I feel like I must congratulate myself with a cup of tea and take a little break myself. That's totally fine but if it happens at every nap I get nothing done and then I find myself trying to catch up whilst she's awake and find myself trying to split my time which means I don't end up doing either task very well. At the moment Mila takes around 3-4 naps a day so I normally prioritize one of her afternoon naps as one of my 'chill time' naps where I just take a break myself. Also the more that I get done in the day the more I can relax once she goes to bed.

Break up the cleaning

I struggled with this one so much at first. There I was with a 2 week old Mila, Joe had just gone back to work and I thought I'd try and tackle the cleaning in one of her naps. She woke up 30 minutes in and I hadn't even finished the kitchen. I'm the kind of person that once I get into a task I find it hard to stop until it's complete so having a crying baby interrupting all the time was really throwing me off. It took me a couple of weeks to realise that I was never going to have a full cleaning session without Mila waking up, so now I have two main cleaning days in the week that I try and stick to and I whiz round and do the most important things and forget about the rest.

Tidy before you go to bed

This ties into the point above. If I know I want to get a good cleaning session in the next day I try and make sure that the flat is as tidy as it can be before I go to bed so all I need to do is get stuck into the cleaning as soon as possible. I also find that it's great for my mind sight waking up to tidy surroundings.

Get things done when there's two of you

Being the one that is staying at home with Mila I often give myself too much to do. Having a baby is time consuming, tiring and definitely constitutes as a job in itself in my eyes, but because I'm at home all the time I think that by the time that Joe gets home I must have all of this house stuff done. Spending Sunday morning sorting drawers out might not be fun but you can get it done so much quicker if it's both of you. Sometimes it's my sister or mum that come over and just watch Mila for a while whilst I potter around and get some things done that I need to do, I find that works really well as well.

Ask for and accept any help from anyone

There is no shame in asking for help or accepting help. One of the best things I did last month was ask Joe to take Mila out for the day without me. I got things done around the house, washed my hair, did my nails, I even went for a swim and that was all without having to wonder if Mila was going to wake up from her nap or what time she'd need her next feed. 

If all else fails resort to TV/Youtube

Yes I am one of those mum's who said that she would never place her child in front of the TV. I'm laughing to myself about that one now and how unrealistic that was. Sometimes you just HAVE to get things done and I know that if I let Mila watch '5 Little Ducklings' on Youtube for a little while I'll be able to get on with a couple of bits without interruption. That's my mum confession over for today. 

So those are my top tips for trying to make time with a baby. Overall I think the most important thing is trying to do things that save time so that you ultimately make time for yourself and have quality time with your family. 

BLOGTOBER: FOUR PIECES OF ADVICE I IGNORED

Being a new mum everyone wants to give you their advice about how to look after your baby. As well meaning as this advice might be sometimes you just have to go with your own instincts. There are so many things that midwives/health visitors/family/friends told me to do which a lot of the time contradicted one another so today I thought I'd share the main things that I didn't follow peoples advice on and that in the end really didn't matter.

Don't give your baby a dummy

Ahh yes the age old dummy or not to dummy question. Whether it was right or wrong we gave Mila a dummy at two days old. It was our second night home and she had been unsettled all evening fighting sleep and we were both about to tear our hair out when we suddenly remembered that someone had bought us some dummies. We gave it to her and we had immediate peace and she dropped off to sleep. Some babies have a strong sucking reflex that dummies really help with and Mila is definitely one of those babies. Now that she's a bit older we try to only use it when she needs to sleep so she knows when it is time for a nap, it's also been helping for those days where she's teething a lot to divert her attention. So for us despite a lot of people saying not to give it to her so young as she might get 'nipple confusion' dummies have most definitely been a winner in our books.

Don't drink coffee whilst breastfeeding

I've done a lot of research into this and found that food & drinks can transfer through milk, however different babies react differently to certain food/drinks, it isn't a 'one rule fits all'. Of course if I kept eating a certain thing and Mila was reacting to it then I would of course stop eating it, but it's annoying when people say 'ooh don't drink that coffee she'll be up all night!' however well meaning they may be. I don't drink much coffee in general but i've never found that it has affected Mila. Neither have strawberries and neither have grapes - the other two that people love to mention!

Don't give your baby a bottle if you want to breastfeed

Again something that some advised against and others said didn't matter. We were going to a wedding when Mila was 4 weeks old and being so new to the mama game I was feeling quite overwhelmed with my feeding duties and although I loved breastfeeding it was all getting a bit too much. So despite my health visitor telling me not to, I started pumping the odd bottle when Mila was around 3 weeks old, at this stage it was never a regular thing but I remember being worried that I would end up producing too much milk and being engorged. Neither of those happened and I found that it actually helped to regulate my milk flow somewhat. At first I pumped one to test to see if she would take a bottle and then pumped a bottle on the day of the wedding for her to have in the evening. It was nice to have a couple of hours where I didn't have to think about feeding and meant that I felt confident at planning an evening out with friends knowing that Mila would happily take a bottle and go back to the breast when I returned. From that moment on Mila would have the odd bottle of pumped milk until she was around 6/7 weeks old and I started pumping a bit more regularly.

Don't rocked/held/ fed my baby to sleep

Before I had Mila I read a lot of sleep training advice and read all about those magical schedules that will have your baby sleeping 8 hours at night at 8 weeks old. Now I'm not knocking anyone that does schedules or whose baby is sleeping through the night, i'm going to be honest I envy you massively if that is the case! But for me a lot of the 'rules' just weren't very realistic. Advice like, put your baby down in the cot when drowsy and don't give them eye contact & walk away from the cot didn't work for me and I would always resort to rocking or feeding to sleep. I'm pretty sure that this whole 'self soothing' malarky is a myth as well. At 5 months old, I have probably committed every single 'sleeping' faux pas at risk of her creating bad habits, but sometimes you just need to get your baby to nap at whatever cost, because her having a meltdown 3 hours later just isn't worth it for you or her. So far Mila hasn't created any bad habits and if I put her in the cot to sleep at the right time she will fall alseep and have a good nap. So if you're a new mum and you're worrying that everytime you feed your baby to sleep or when they cry - god forbid - you go and rock them back to sleep try not to worry, they'll decide when they no longer need you to do that anymore. On the other hand if it's getting too much and you're at your wits end with feeding to sleep everytime, then by all means be a little bit stricter if that works for you, the point being just trust your instincts, trust your baby and I'm sure that all will work out.

BLOGTOBER: WE'VE MOVED!

 So it's done! We survived the move with a (nearly) 5 month old baby, a flight of stairs and a lot of heavy furniture. It was tough and I was exhausted by the end of the day but we are just so happy to have more space.  I can't take all of the credit though, moving is easy when you have two amazing friends that give up their Saturday to help you and a brilliant mum to babysit. We have lots of exciting plans for our place - nothing too extravagant as we are only renting after all but a lick of paint and a couple of new pieces of furniture will be enough to put our own touch on it. I'm going to do my best to document it all along the way, we might even try our hand at repurposing some furniture but we'll see! I'll leave you with some pictures of the little details in our new place and i'm sure i'll share some more pictures on here and on Instagram over the coming months. 

BLOGTOBER: SAYING GOODBYE

I'm writing this post with boxes surrounding me on a tiny bit of the couch that isn't being taken up from our stuff, this place has been far from ideal but there is still a part of me that is sad to leave. This was our first home together, the place that we brought our new baby home to and will hold so many special memories. It's been a challenge living in such a small place with a baby, we used all of the space saving techniques we could think of, I for one cannot wait to be able to have a bigger wardrobe in the next place. If i'm brutally honest our next place will be harder on us financially and sticking to a budget will be essential, but living in this place has taught us what we're prepared to sacrifice. Most of all Mila needs more space and we want to be somewhere that we can be settled in for a couple of years before *eventually* deciding to buy and that's exactly what our new place offers us.

So despite all of the negatives and at times feeling desperate to leave, looking back this place has been just what we needed at this time in our lives. But onwards and upwards - I can't wait to share pictures of the new place and our journey making it our own.

BLOGTOBER: FOUR HUNDRED RABBITS - South London Gems

Hi everyone! Welcome to my first Blogtober post. This is a bit of a throwback post as I'm currently in the middle of a house move so I thought it would be a great time to upload my long overdue post about Four Hundred Rabbits in Crystal Palace. Having lived South of the river for 6 months now, I cannot believe how many hidden gems there are. Before moving here I rarely ventured over on this side of the river, most of my favourite places being very East London centric, so I was pleasantly surprised to find so many exciting restaurants and things to do. 

We first ventured to Four Hundred Rabbits when Mila was 3 weeks old. It's such a memorable day for me as it was around the time we started venturing out more and it was also the first day that I ever breastfed in public (nerve wracking). Being a new mum I am always looking for places that are family friendly. Questions that run through my mind are, is it an acceptable place for a baby to cry, is it quiet enough that my baby will potentially sleep and most importantly is it big enough to fit in my pram. Four Hundred Rabbits ticks all of those boxes, it has such a relaxed vibe making it perfect for families and an ideal spot for our first meal out.

Four hundred rabbits specialises in sourdough pizzas drawing influence from pizzas found in Napoli, named four hundred rabbits as that is the temperature that the pizzas are cooked at. Not only does the restaurant offer original pizzas, it also serves up craft beer. As I was breastfeeding practically every hour at that point, I enjoyed a Karma Cola - a fairtrade organic coke, coke drinking has never been so guilt free.

We went for the beef and green chilli pizza and it didn't disappoint. The only other sourdough pizza that I have tried is Franco Manca, and whilst it is very different in my opinion it was just as good. What I love about Four Hundred Rabbits is the interesting pizza choices along with a great price, the most expensive pizza coming in at around £9.50. Mila even managed to sleep through the whole experience so I could really enjoy my pizza. So if you're ever in the area it is one that I would definitely recommend. I went back again the other day and this time indulged in a dessert, a salted caramel brownie with coconut gelupo which was all kinds of dreamy, check out my instagram if you would like to see a picture here.

Thought i'd end this post with a picture of Mila after our trip out. Wow she was so tiny at 3 weeks old! Come back tomorrow for my next blogtober post.