A Week Away

Spring is here - the Magnolia trees are in bloom and it's warm enough to venture out without a coat (on some days).  Chloe and I just spent the last week down in Walton-on-Thames visiting Mom & Dad (a.k.a Granny & The Dude), as well as Auntie Kate who flew in from New York to see The Egg.  I felt a little bad leaving a poorly husband at home for a week, especially when it turned out he had severe Tonsilitis.  That means he was properly ill, not just sick with man-flu.  But leave we did, and he did survive without us.  It was the first time I'd traveled alone with Chloe and I was a little bit anxious about it.  However, I cunningly timed the flight with her afternoon nap and once I popped her into the ringsling and walked up and down the aisle, she slept the whole way.  Result.  Chloe didn't remember Mom, Dad or Kate and only wanted to hang with me for a while.  Kate was unimpressed with the sad cry-face Chloe made every time she looked at her.  After everyone made a right fool of themselves purely for her amusement she eventually relented and decided they weren't so bad after all. 

We both had a fabulous time down South.  Mom and Chloe and I popped into Kingston on Tuesday to pick up a few things for Chloe.  It was a great chance to try out another of my new slings that Kate brought with her from NY for me.  I have to say I got more odd looks from people with her on my back than I do up in Edinburgh.  

Our New Anniversary Pfau - not sure about the colour though....

On Wednesday the girls went out for lunch at the Cafe at Petersham Nurseries.  At the age of 8 months Chloe bagged her first Michelin Star - it took me 30 years!  It's such a lovely little place.  The cafe and shop are housed in an old, large greenhouse with packed dirt floors, mismatched antique furniture, rugs hanging on the walls. The food (and Rose Prosecco) was delicious.  Chloe had her first taste of dessert - Auntie Kate & Granny are very very bad influences!

Thursday was another culinary extravaganza.  As an early birthday treat for Mom, Dad took the day off work and the five of us drove just outside Oxford to Raymond Blanc's 2 Michelin-starred restaurant Le Manoir au Quater Saisons.  The house and grounds are so beautiful, the food was delicious and the little village it's situated in is adorable.  Such a perfect little corner of England.  Chloe had better not get used to that lifestyle any time soon!

Part of the Oriental garden at the Manor

Me and Mom, Awww, cute

After we thoroughly stuffed ourselves on a three course lunch, with additional delicious cheese platter and coffee with even more sweets, we decided to have some friends round for dinner!  Sophie and Johnny came round and spent the night.  Kate cooked up a lovely light dinner, I drank too much wine, stayed up too late and slept very deeply until Chloe woke me up about an hour after my head hit the pillow.  Then the hour after that....and so on.  It's like she knew.  

Friday dawned somewhat less gloriously than the weathermen led us to believe.  After a bit of a slow start Kate, Sophie and I headed up to London to do some shopping.  Chloe was left in Mom's capable hands.  I think it was longest I've left her, ever.  Felt a little bit weird and a little bit liberating too.  How often do I get to go clothes shopping with a Sis who is in the fashion business?  Certainly not often these days.  I'm in a bit of a post-baby clothing rut at the moment and really feel like I have no style identity these days.  I'd like my style to express me, not just to exclaim "Hi, I'm a mom!"  All this is to say that I was really looking forward to spending some money on some well suited pieces to define my spring/summer wardrobe.  Unfortunately neither Zara nor Topshop really wanted me to part with said cash.  Honestly, I do not know where I'm supposed to shop these days (that I can afford) if I can't at least pick up a few staples from those two stores.  Ah well, c'est la vie!

Kate stayed over in London so on Saturday it was just Mom, Dad and Chloe keeping me company.  We had lunch at the pub then wandered down the Wey Navigation on a beautiful afternoon.  

Home-made pizzas were consumed for dinner and Chloe miraculously started sleeping for decent chunks of time during the night.  And by decent I basically mean more than 3hours at a time.  And when I say "miraculously", it's really got more to do with discovering that if we feed her a lot through the day it seems to help at night.  I know that isn't rocket science but it's just in the past 10 days she has started really showing an interest in food.  I have to admit, I'm a bit sheepish about this, but the Baby-led weaning has somewhat gone out the window.  I had the best of intentions but Chloe wasn't really picking it up that quickly, which isn't abnormal.  If she had been sleeping better I'd have been happy to carry on as we were but after 8 months of little sleep I just got to the point where if spoon-feeding her meant she fed less from me at night, I was willing to give it a go.  I know increasing the volume of solids doesn't improve every baby's sleep but it does seem to be improving Chloe's.

Sunday was a day for just chilling in the garden before Kate had to leave for the airport. Like a typical British spring day, one minute it was so sunny I was worrying about suncream for Chloe, and the next minute the dark looming clouds took care of those concerns.  

Chloe and I flew back up to Edinburgh on Monday afternoon.  Sleep wasn't on the cards this time so I spent an hour trying to stop Chloe from alternating between grabbing at the very large man in the seat next to us and grabbing my glasses off my face.  It took her 8 months to figure out, but sitting in an enclosed space on mommy's lap, 6 inches from her face is definitely the best time to realise what a fun game that can be.  Fun for Chloe, not so fun for me. I could barely see through the smeary finger-prints after about 5 minutes. 

Grabbing my camera is also a fun way to kill time on a flight. 

So, a great week away, but it's also nice to be home.