Julia’s Journical

In June Penny started crawling, which made life a bit more interesting.

It was also in June that we went on an adventure with mother’s group to the Maritime Museum in Darling Harbour.

We also decided it was time to move Penny’s cot base lower because she started pulling herself upright.

Penny discovered my laptop. So I installed a Penny-proof program (Alpha-baby) to make sure she didn’t delete everything.

Sierra encouraged Penny to learn to crawl and stand up, Penny reciprocated by teaching Sierra how to button mash my laptop.

Nudie photo!

Penny discovered TV

And decided that tipping her lunch every where was a good idea

In June we took Penny on her first ferry ride.

followed by some multitasking by Lindsay at Max Brenner, he ate chocolate, did on-call work and put a baby to sleep.

Penny took up sitting in her toy boxes/buckets/baskets

We went with Sierra and her mummy to a play-school concert. I think I had more fun than Penny, she was more interested in eating Sierra’s toys.

In June I bought Penny a standing toy thingy, it plays old macdonald. Its really annoying!

Penny started a new phase of chewing on cables

And Penny had her first swimming lesson! Lindsay took her in the pool for the class, along with Lilly (from my mother’s group) and her Dad Kevin.

The first lesson was a success…the rest were not so successful.

In June Penny was still not sleeping at night, and after some very stressful nights with no sleep I decided that sawing Penny’s cot into pieces was a great idea. I then tied it to my bed using stockings. (white stockings can be seen in the top left hand corner)

We joined in on a mother’s group photo shoot in June. The only way that we could stop Penny from stuffing leaves in her mouth was Olivia, Lilly’s mum, to sing wiggles songs!

Now don’t cry, there are more blog posts to come…or maybe thats a good reason to cry…

So it turns out, having a baby is so very time consuming. If you were to look at this blog before this point you would think Penny is still 4 months old. In fact, she is now 11 months old - nearly a whole year old!

How about I catch you up a bit…

As Penny became more aware of her surroundings we started making mummy and baby friends.

Sierra is one of Penny’s best friends. Sierra was born the day after Penny:

She would have naps in her funky little swing:

Then she started being on the move and would not be where you left her!

She developed a passion (addiction) for the iPad:

In preparation for a night with Nanna we tried to get Penny to drink from a bottle. She would only drink from the bottle if she held it herself.

At the begining of April we moved to the Decates household before our trip to Europe and to save some money to buy our own house. One of our first mornings in Berowra Penny sat up unaided for the first time! With her favourite uncle Jacob there for moral support.

In April she learnt about grass:

About sharing with her friend Lilly:

And how a washing basket can easily become a boat:

At the ripe old age of 6 months we packed our bags:

…and flew to Europe for 2 weeks of ‘Show and Tell’.

We visited the Troups in Yorkshire:

…then popped over to Holland to introduce Penny to the Dutch Family.

She met my Oma:

…and my Opa:

…and Elke:

She and Yvonne got on very well!

We celebrated Queens Day by all wearing orange:

We discovered that Dad as a baby looks very similar to Penny:

Penny and Marja had an instant bond:

Then we stayed in Den Haag with Penny’s ‘God-Opas’:

Lindsay and I took Penny to our favourite pancake house:

…for pancakes:

only 5 more months of updates and photos to go and we are up to date.

Peace out:

Penny is now 4 months old and I have written a total of 4 blog posts about her. I blame her. She likes to have my constant attention. And I am very very happy to give her my constant attention! This post is about what she got up to in her 3rd month, January.

In Jaurary when I last blogged she was starting to develop a real personality.

note her foot.

She worked on her smiling and started to drool.

We went on our first family outing to the architecture of air, it was amazing! More photos of that here:

She worked out how to unwrap herself after a nap:

….and developed an evil persona apparently.

And names were decided for Lindsay’s parents.

Gran and Pop! So now Penny has a very proud Nanna, Opa, Gran and Pop!

We learnt that she is very much like her father while asleep

sleeping in the same position and also sleep talking/laughing just like him.

Getting her to take naps was and continues to be a time consuming task. I often resorted to letting her sleep on my lap.

She started going out for breakfast each weekend with Lindsay, giving me a chance to sleep in, have a long hot shower and a hot cup of tea!

Penny decided that without a doubt that Jacob is the most fascinating, amazing person ever.

No matter what she may be doing, the moment he enters the room she stares and smiles at him.

I bought her a Bumbo off ebay which she only just tolerates…

She was introduced to the world of video games by Uncle jacob

Penny developed a love for tv. And by love I mean addiction.

We joined Lindsay in Brisbane for a conference (LCA) and spent a week wandering around Brisbane and spending our evenings with Lindsay at conference functions.

She was such a good girl. On the plane to Brisbane she charmed all the flight attendants. We had many late nights, but she would sleep happily in her stroller not at all concerned by the noise and people.

In Brisbane she taught herself how to squeal!

Penny squees from Julia & Lindsay Holmwood on Vimeo.

She rolled over for the first time, but then promptly forgot how to do it.

Our baby was due to be born on the 19th of October. And on the 19th of October my belly looked like this:

10 minutes after the photo was taken, my waters broke. My mum, Lindsay and I went to the hospital. I wasn’t yet in labour so they sent us home. For the next 36 hours we tried to get labour started.

Mum doing some reflexology on my feet

I would get a few contractions which would then stop. Due to a risk of infection it was necessary to head to hospital and be induced after 3 days.

We had the world’s most annoying midwife, fortunately her shift finished and the rest were lovely. After 5 hours of labouring I was examined and only 1cm dilated. I then decided to ask for an epidural because we were going to be there for a long time.

The first epidural went wrong which meant I would have a headache for the next 2 weeks. The 2nd epidural caused my back to spasm. I wasn’t able to feel the contractions but the pain in my back was so great I screamed a lot despite my high pain threshold. Every time they added more drugs to the epidural the pain increased. I had my Mum and Lindsay with me. They were both amazing looking after me. It must have been so exhausting being awake all day and all night, seeing me in so much pain. After 13 hours of labour I was still only 1cm dilated, so the doctors decided Penny had to come out via a caesarean.

So at 8.30am I was wheeled onto surgery. The anethetist put more drugs into the epidural, making me scream even more. I kept apologising for making so much noise, but then would go back to screaming. He then made me completely numb from the waist down and the pain was gone! And up went the curtains. so I didn’t have to watch Penny being cut out.

Ow

Lindsay was with me talking about the most boring work related things he could think about to keep my mind off the fact that a baby was being cut out of me. At one stage I looked up into the light above me and saw the reflection of my cut open belly. EEEK!

Mum and Dad waiting outside:

They pulled her out and called Lindsay over to have a look. Despite being a tad blue at first she was perfect.

She was brought over to me for a cuddle, she dribbled on my face and it was love at first sight.

The midwife then took Penny and Lindsay into recovery where my parents were waiting.

She was weighed at 3.505kg (7lb 10oz).

Mum had managed to talk her way into the theatre and sat with me while I got sewn up. I was then wheeled into recovery where Lindsay was sitting holding our baby girl.

He had had a few minutes to think about it and I asked him what her name was, he said ‘She looks like a Penelope, Penny’.

So Penelope it was! You can see him in the corner announcing to the world that Penelope May was born.

Our midwife came and showed us the placenta. It was awesome!

My parents, now Nanna and Opa got a cuddle,

Then Lindsay’s parents arrived to meet Penelope.

Jacob, now an uncle arrived just as we were wheeled down to the maternity ward. But in the excitement didn’t manage to take a photo of him holding her for the first time.

We were in my room only a few minutes when the flowers and presents started arriving!

Up next, Penelope’s first few days spent in hospital.