Mama's Haven

I get this question ten times a day at least and I answer politely with: “I’m ok.”

Because I can’t pour my heart out time and time and time again and say to you:

1. I am frustrated

My frustration overspills into my conversations and my interactions.

To the point of ranting in Primark over toddler pants and leaving people perplexed at how vexed I can be over a pair of  pants missing from the pack.

I am frustrated with our loss, in practical terms, not only emotionally. God knows how much energy, drive and determination it took to convince Alex to have another baby. And then He goes and takes this baby away. Just like that.

As if to say, your efforts meant nothing. Go ahead, have another go. Start all over again.

Bang your head against the wall of fear and insecurity and financial pressure, of marital discord.

Put your body through another nine months of prenatal depression, puffed up everythings, weight gain, moods, tiredness. Just go ahead. I may or may not allow you to keep the next one.  But I will not remove the desperate desire from your heart either. The desire to hold and nourish and breathe in a newborn. YOUR newborn. because that’s how I rock. All mysterious and conflicting. Don’t try to make sense of it. Just you go ahead…

I am frustrated with the church. I am! I am frustrated with the lack of empathy. With the lack of action and initiative. With the awkwardness. With the comfortable approaches of “we shall let the Lord speak.” With the “prepacked” answers to life’s most painful experiences. With the lack of plans. With the lack of strategies. With the lack of understanding that for people like me, church has stopped being a social club and it is now either source of energy and strength or…the very opposite. I can’t stay in the middle anymore. I can’t “do” church anymore. I need to BE church. I am burning with the desire to be meaningful and be of help.

I am frustrated with my body and my mind. I am back to waking up at night. I am so flipping exhausted at the end of the day, by my thoughts alone! I eat to comfort myself and then I get frustrated with my bloated stomach.

2. I am lonely

I am. I am lonely in my grief. I am lonely in being the only one in my circle of friends who has lost a baby. I am lonely even in the midst of a crowd now.

I am lonely in the church. Not the building, but the assembly of people.

I am lonely in my marriage. We grieve the loss of our son but not together but in different ways and at different tempos. Always at odds with the other’s grieving process. Separated. Lonely while ever so close.

I am lonely on my spiritual journey.

We have had firemen/women Christians showing up when the going was tough. Much appreciated, indeed. When the prayer was needed for healing. When there was still life in Georgie’s wee body. Once the light was extinguished, they dissipated. Disappeared. Vanished. Hidden. Moved on to the next crisis, to the next Christian, to the next “hope.”

But you know what? Although I do not present as a crisis situation anymore I still need friends. I still need love. I still need company and a shoulder to cry on.

I feel lonely in my Christian journey. I have been burning to serve the community, the lonely, the needy, the non-crisis situations, the unlovable for almost two years now. I have journeyed through hell and I feel I have finally emerged from the fog only to find myself on my own in my desire. Why has this burning desire been put in me, why the atrocious journey if there is no leader to lead me from where I find myself now. What am I to do with myself? I can’t sit on a rock and wait for another two years until everybody catches up. What I am to do with myself meanwhile and this suffocating desire I have not created nor placed into my heart? WHAT???

Well, I will do the only thing I know to do. I will protest, I will rally, I will boycott the heavens’ gates and erode my husband’s ears with pleas until I have the “twins” I was promised two years ago. A healthy baby and a place to serve, where I will feel at home, fulfilling my calling and spilling the love that can no longer be contained into my heart.

I will not shush. I cannot. Just like Hannah, I will plead and inconvenience with my cries until I get my answer. Until I have my Samuel and until I am assigned my role in His temple.

I have spent to much on this year’s Christmas shopping, hubby has informed me only last weekend.

I did disagree with him, of course I did.

And I did defend myself, bringing out my emotional weapons:

” I only have one child left.”

“I do not want to be saving money, I would rather save memories.”

“She needs to feel loved by her extended family and they can’t really afford/can’t be bothered sending gifts so I need to fill in for them.”

“I am now making my own money and I want to spend it on her and other people, if I so please.”

But I did agree with hubby on one point. If you shop this Christmas, and you must, who can do Christmas without shopping for family, friends and grocery shopping, then try and be shopping savvy and get the best deals and the best discounts you can.

The last couple of years have seen the mushrooming of online coupon companies offering discounts for thousands of online merchants. This couponing trend had been popular in America for absolute ages, I actually remember watching American TV programs years ago, when I was still living in Romania, of popular TV programs centered on the extreme couponing habits of ours neighbours from across the pond. I also remember visiting friends in America a few years back and them making a point of NEVER buying anything online without a discount or a coupon.

Thankfully, the trend has slowly been set in the UK as well and now we can become professional “couponeers” and chasers of discounts too!

So for your next online Christmas purchase, pause before you buy and try and do some money saving at vouchersky.com or any other voucher or coupon saving website. Please be persevering, sometimes it takes a few attempts to find a valid code or a substantial discount but it will only be worth your search, the sense of satisfaction that comes from saving!

Disclaimer: we were offered remuneration for mentioning vouchersky.com in our post but the opinions expressed are entirely our own.

Emma LOVES CBeebies still. Yes, she does refer to herself as a “big girl now, mummy!” but some things are still very much in fashion in our household.

So when we were offered the chance to review the Q Pootle 5 Christmas Special DVD, I knew I was onto a winner with Emma and all the other preschoolers or reception year schoolers who would be in for a chance to win their own copy of the DVD!

As expected, Emma wanted so watch it as soon as we opened the mail.

Her honest review?

“it was lovely mummy, it had Santa in it and it was funny and it had no scary bits in it, only joy!”

Sounds like the ideal DVD to me for a small child, don’t you think so?

Her only complaint?

“It was too short, mummy!”

Some facts about the DVD:

1. It launched in the UK yesterday, 17th of November.

2. It is a short (27 minutes) but exclusive, full of good cheer, Christmas episode.

3. For your Q Pootle little fans, a new selection of puzzles and games as well as two picture books from Walker Books have been launched with the DVD, perfect stocking fillers!

Snapper Productions have been very kind to also launch a video featuring the well-loved Q Pootle characters.

In addition to that, we, as a blog, are offering one DVD as a giveaway, a lovely present to all the little CBeebies and Q Pootle fans out there.

All you need to do, in order to be entered in the draw, will be to like our Instagram page and leave a comment here to tell us who will be receiving the DVD in case you won!

Good luck, come back on the 30th of November to check if you won!

Disclaimer: we were offered the DVD for reviewing but the opinions expressed are our own. The giveaway is open for UK residents only.

I am back to my grief posts. I should have finished them in October but grief, exhaustion and the disruption of a week in Greece got in the way.

Carly Marie’s prompt for day 19 of the grieving journal was an encouragement to give a bit of us to others in the moments we feel at our lowest.

I have started a new habit with Georgie’s passing. I have taken to giving joyfully and meaningfully, randomly and spontaneously. I can’t wait for the conditions to be right. I can’t wait for our finances to be perfect. I can’t wait. Full stop.

I feel this urge to bless, whenever and in whatever way I can.

My bank account may have suffered a bashing and will take a little while to recover but I do not care. I am not greedy or wasteful. I use money for the sole purpose of giving joy to others, with any opportunity that is presented to me.

My bank account will recover. Money comes and goes. But opportunities don’t.

I know that full well.

I am so glad for every single toy and baby grow I was able to get Georgie. He enjoyed the stimulation and the comfort they brought.

And in his absence, I enjoy now giving to friends and strangers and family. Giving of me. And out of my pocket.

Because I do not know how long I have here. I do not know if tomorrow I will still be standing.

I feel compelled to do what I can, when I can.

I treasure every moment.

All because of a blue eyed baby boy who made me understand life on earth is more perishable sometimes than tinned food.

I do not want to be told of me “she was survived by a bank account” but  that “she gave out of everything she had, unconditionally.”

I love observing the passing of the seasons and I love dressing my home to reflect the changes in nature. I believe every house-proud woman does, wouldn’t you agree?
I believe we were created to vibrate in tone with our surroundings and we are influenced by what the eye sees and the heart feels.

Our house is always reflecting the outdoors and the season we are in. It is a very tangible way of teaching Emma to respect the nature, to understand the changes and to treasure and learn to recreate in her turn a sense of homeliness and comfort.

This autumn, even with Georgie missing from our midst and with my heart bleeding continuously and constantly for him, I consciously made the decision to follow through with our traditions and deck the house in autumn décor. For Emma’s sake, for a sense of security that comes from routines and constants in our lives but also from a very deep need within myself to surround myself with living and beautiful things.

We also try to celebrate the best the season has to offer, so we would bake and go to shows and stay in touch with what is in season also in a culinary and artistic sense.

The pictures below were taken last year of our living room, our Christmas plants and decorations, our home-decorated gingerbread house and the Cinderella pantomime we enjoyed close to Christmas.

Now that Christmas is fast approaching, I will be looking into decking the house again. If money was no object, I would love to be able to redecorate the whole house in Christmassy, vibrant colours.

Our living room could actually do with a new coffee table, which I would choose from the coffee table range at Cookes Furniture. I would probably go for the storage coffee table, classy yet practical when you have small children and loads of small Lego bits and dolly shoes that need stored away safely (read, be put out of sight.)

We also desperately need a new sofa and it has been on my wishing list forever. It became obvious we needed one when the midwife who came to visit us after Georgie was born nearly took off with a portion of it…I have my eyes on a corner one from Harveys, it would be perfect for movie nights and for cuddling up as a family. I truly hope hubby Santa reads this and grants my wish this Christmas!

If our kitchen/sitting room was a lot bigger that it actually is now, I would choose one of the gorgeous burgundy (and very much in fashion now) comfy fabric armchairs from Marks and Spencer as well. To have somewhere for Santa to sit his weary self and enjoy his mince pies when he visits, of course!

Now, what are the things you will be doing yourselves to dress the house for the festive season and if money was no object, what would you change about your furniture?