Monthly Archives: January 2006

At the end of it, I’d have to say 2005 turned out to be a pretty good year for me. It started off a little slowly, with us looking for a house to buy and going on the misguided holiday to Malta. In hindsight that holiday was just a bit of bad luck on our part, as when I went back there with work a few months later I had a much better time.

The first real highlight of 2005 would come in April, when we bought our house. Usually that kind of thing is quite stressful, but I have to say that with us it went really smoothly – perhaps because we were the first people in the chain. It was a really good move on our part, though – it’s good to have a place we’re actually investing money in and a roof that doesn’t leak.

Next highlight would have to be when Fliss discovered she was pregnant less than a month after we moved into the house. To say I was shocked at the time would be an understatement, but nine months of denial later and things have worked out alright.

When June came around I walked Hazel down the aisle, well, half way down the aisle, at her wedding to Ian on what was a great day for them and all of the assembled family.

Shortly after returning from the wedding trip I ran my first 5k and put in a fair effort, even if I felt I could have done better.

In July I turned 33 and celebrated by visiting cousin Iain in London – my first of several trips down to the capital over the months that followed. We had a really good weekend of excess in the hot weather, but it didn’t exactly help in my preperations for my second running event a couple of days after I got back. Indeed, the least said about my gruelling experience in the Sefton Park 5 Mile Run the better.

Our first few days of parenthood have gone by relatively smoothly, which is why there’s been nothing of note to report. I mean, Elisha has pretty much done all the generic baby things of wanting fed, sleeping, and doing the messy bit that comes from being fed.

Yesterday we took her out to the retail park and put her in her buggy for the first time. The fact she was out like a light the whole time meant that a fairly uneventful traipse round the shops was missed by her in its entirety. In fact, she slept most of the day yesterday, which I thought would lead to a restless night. When it came to it though, she woke at around five, I took her downstairs, fed and changed her, and we were back to bed within about forty five minutes or so and she slept until after ten. Not bad going, from what I’ve been told.

We did learn an important lesson regarding over feeding last night. We’d been told that if you over fed them they’d barf it back up. That’s entirely correct, as the stairs, Fliss, her dressing gown and all the other clothing involved can testify. Elisha seemed just as surprized by the barfing as we were, and lay there blinking in wonder as we hurried around her cleaning things up. I’m kind of glad she realised that there’s no use crying over spilled milk… even if you do spill it after consuming it.

I know I’m throwing stones from the limited cover of a glass house here, but due to the banality of the above, you’re mostly going to be getting stuff in the same vein as the Can A Lot story and the usual wry comment on anything I deem noteworthy on here.

Baby stuff, however much of an effect it’s having on our lives right now, will make only a limited appearance on the site. As her due date approached I vowed not to turn into the kind of parent who gushes endlessly about their kids, and I want to try to stick to that as best I can. It’s not that I don’t think Elisha’s wonderful – she’s certainly the most impressive thing I’ve had a hand in creating. I just think you can over egg the pudding somewhat and, as Elisha demonstrated last night, too much of a good thing can be sickly.

I’ve added some pictures to the gallery area of the site that we’ve taken over the course of the last few days during the arrival of our daughter Elisha and the various baby antics once we were at home.

Nothing ground breaking to see, really, but for those of you who are interested there are some nice wee moments.