BABY QUILTS

So this is another catch up post about the 5 similar baby quilts I've made over the past 18 months.  They all follow Jen B star quilt tutorial downsized but were made in colours to match the recipients nurseries. But taking the photos and uploading them got me thinking about the babies and their very special Mummies that I made them for so that's what I've written about.

Jos' Quilt

Ever since I left university with an on tap supply of similar people who were available for drinks or a chat at a moment's notice, I wondered how adults made new friends.  I wasn't friendless but I didn't find it easy to make new friends and once I moved to Bath I missed my old school and university friends who no longer lived locally.  Gradually over the years I made new friends at work and I made online and real life friends who shared my crafting interests but that was about it.  When I became pregnant I wondered how on earth I would make friends to spend my maternity leave with.  Everyone said that when you had children it was easy to make friends but the idea of walking into a baby group on my own terrified me.  

My sister in law swore by her NCT friendship group and all but signed me up herself.  For those who aren't familiar with NCT its Natural Childbirth Trust who run ante natal classes in small groups for parents to be.  There is obviously a lot of focus on natural childbirth and after just one session I came away convinced I would just breathe this baby out.  (For the record I didn't breathe either baby out and took all the drugs and interventions offered!)  But most people go along pretending they are desperately interested in learning about it all whereas in reality they just want to meet another gang of parents who just might want to be friends with them.

Sally's Quilt

I also signed up to pregnancy yoga (again on the pretence of learning breathing techniques but in reality so that I could snooze for half an hour in the relaxation session at the end).  After a few weeks of talking to the same person each week we made a throw away comment about swapping numbers the following week and meeting for a coffee.  I was so excited and rang my sister in law to say I had finally made a friend.  And then the next week she didn't come to class and I joked to my husband that I had scared her off.  And then the next week she didn't come either and I honestly felt like crying.  At the end of the class the yoga teacher approached me to explain she hadn't been able to come for a few weeks but had asked her to pass on my number.  Hurrah- she didn't think I was a crazed stalker new Mum (or at least she didn't then!).  Over the next couple of months with a couple other yoga Mums we had coffee and dinner and pizza and more coffee and cake so by the time our babies arrived I knew I had a group of great women to keep me company for my year off.   Between the two groups there were 5 of us and in the summer after we had our babies we did Mum & Baby yoga (45 mins yoga, 2.5 hrs in the nearest coffee shop afterwards) and cemented our little friendship group.

Four and a half years later and these wonderful women are still my Mum Gang.  Our first year of maternity leave was spent at baby sensory, swimming, baby massage, baby cinema, coffee shops and play dates at each other's houses.  The babies every cough, wave, spot, developmental milestone and coo was admired in minute detail.  Weaning success and lows, lack of sleep, teething cures, lack of sleep , feeding dramas and lack of sleep were all mulled over and analysed.  Slowly we all returned to work after a year and I wondered if we would all lose touch.  But by then we had more than our babies in common - though all different we had enough common ground that we were now friends because we liked each other enough and not just because we had babies the same age!

Thomas' Quilt

We've been through many house moves, job changes, a fabulous hen weekend and wedding and many many many cups of coffee, slices of cake and glasses of wine together.  And then the impending arrival of second babies started to be announced.  Somehow we managed to time most of these babies into a relatively small window meaning a second year of maternity leave off together. But oh my how different it was with the seconds.  No whiling away the hours at coffee shops and baby cinema this time round.  No instead, the babies were strapped into slings while we rang after escaping toddlers at the park or forest school.  Coffees were drank in take away cups while lobbing malt loaf and cheerios at hungry toddlers.  Conversations were frequently interspersed with requests for drinks, snacks or the toilet.  But it didn't seem to matter.  Our second babies just fitted in in a slightly haphazard, neglected way (speaking for myself anyway who has spent the last 2 weeks moaning about Thomas' lack of sleep but failed to notice he had actually cut 2 molar teeth.......)  But I thought it would be nice if each of the "neglected Team B babies" at least had their own special quilt.

Sophie's Quilt

In the past 8 months, despite having busy family lives of their own, these wonderful women have been my rocks.  From practical help with childcare and food, to arranging lovely treats like afternoon tea and spa visits and magazines to read, to always being at the end of the phone or text I literally could not have got through it all without them.  Or at least it wouldn't have been so much fun!  They also just allow me to still be me - we still mostly talk about everyday life, our children, our work or moan about our husbands or mothers in law.  We still sit scoffing cake while pretending to watch our children in their gym class where everything smells like feet.  We still squeeze in nights for dinner at each others houses where there are no children to interrupt us.  And very occasionally we venture "out out". We still all have good days as mums and we still all have bad days as mums. But we know that there is someone else going through it too.

I'm so lucky to have found my Mum Gang and I was so pleased to be able to make each of them a special quilt for their second babies.  In September our oldest all start school and they are all going to different schools.  But this time I'm not worried about losing touch - I know our friendship will last.  And anyway you can be sure I'm going to continue making them all cake on a regular basis to hang onto them!!!

Genevieve's Quilt

BEHIND THE PETALS

I've been scrolling through my gallery for the last month and it is photo after photo of flowers and blossom and more flowers.  I could do an entire blog post of pictures of flowers (actually who am I kidding - tulips) and it would look like I'd spent the last month in a petal induced haven. But as we all know photographs don't always accurately capture our daily lives.  We choose what to stop and photograph, we choose what to edit, we choose what to share and post.  So I've been reflecting on just why I've taken quite so many photos of flowers and why its helped me find joy over the last month.  This does of course mean that I still get to do a blog post full of photos of lovely flowers!

We all love a photo of flowers - in vases, in gardens, petals scattered on a table, people holding bunches of flowers and gorgeous flower shops.  If you are stuck on what to put on Instagram, post some flowers, any flowers, and people are almost obliged to like it!  I wrote last month about how part of the reason I had returned to blogging was to ensure that I had a place to be true and authentic to myself and to write what I wanted.  So while I'm not about to post pictures of my dirty washing and toy strewn living room, a post full of pretty flowers without any context doesn't accurately capture my life recently.

The bottom line is cancer isn't very floral or photogenic.  True, you get given lots of lovely gifts of flowers but you can't really pretty up the realities of cancer with some creatively strewn petals or greenery.  A month ago after a really good stint on my first treatment I had a scan that wasn't as good.  Everything stops.  They act fast to change things. The old treatment that I'd gotten used to and worked out how to make fit around me was gone.  There were Consultant appointments,  discussions about next options, about funding, about blood results.  It was a very unsettling and frightening time though luckily I still felt well throughout it. 

And so in an effort to not drown in the vastness of it all I continued to embrace the ethos I've tried to adapt since last October. I turned it around. I sought out the things that made me smile, the things that made me laugh, the things that brought me joy.  I went back to the simple things, to appreciating what was around me, to appreciating the beautiful and fun things that are there to be experienced every day.  I slowed down.  I opened my eyes. I rather embarrassingly discovered not one, but two blossom trees in my front garden that I hadn't noticed before! 

And so I sought out flowers.  I got sent them, I grew them, I bought them, I stopped to photograph them everywhere.  I was also lucky enough that the past month was when all the tulips planted back in October in our new garden starting popping up.  I'm still not quite sure about why I've been particularly drawn to flowers but every time I see some I can't help but smile.  I think its partly due to their being inherently part of nature, part of something bigger than us.  The fact that they follow a natural cycle also appeals; you plant them,  they grow and then they ultimately do wither but while they are here they can bring so much joy, much like we all can too.

I've now started new weekly treatment and I'm doing fine.  I'm determined to fit this into my life and to continue my approach of appreciating the simple things in life and turning each day around.   And I'm most definitely still going to be seeking out flowers!