I apologise for the bad photo – self photography in a mirror on a camera phone is not ideal, but I keep forgetting to ask GG to take my picture when he gets home from work. Plus, slumping in an armchair and yawning are not the most attractive ways to be photographed, and that’s how I tend to spend my evenings at the moment!

38 weeks down, two to go. Although by my dating scan I’m 38 weeks and 4 days – I prefer that as it brings me nearer to Bonus Baby being fully cooked. At this exact point in my pregnancy with Cheeky I was just about to be told that I was probably going to have the baby sometime before morning. Just over an hour later, he surfed out on a wave of amniotic fluid! So, this one will be gestating for longer than her little big brother. But hopefully not as long as her biggest big brother who waited until a 41 week induction.

As you can see from the picture, I’m pretty big now. There was a much worse photo I could have used where I put my hand under the bump to show just how big it is, but I decided that no-one would believe that it could all be baby bump, so I used this one with my dress hanging down artfully! My wardrobe is now severely limited. I have two dresses which fit; this one and a black dress, although I’m trying to avoid wearing that as it makes me look a bit washed out. Then as far as trousers go, I have two pairs of jogging bottoms which still fit (stretchiness is key!). Quite a lot of my tops are still fine, although this is probably more down to the fact that they belong to my sister in law who had to accommodate her extra height in the tops, rather than such a large tummy. Oh, and my pyjamas are still good, although I’m resisting the temptation to wear them all day!

I saw the community midwife on Friday, and I’ll be seeing her again on Wednesday. I’ve been disappointed by her in that she doesn’t listen to anything I say. As with every other pregnant woman in Britain (I assume) I have my medical notes which I have to carry around and have filled in at every medical appointment I go to. All the other doctors and midwives have been very good about writing down any concerns I’ve had, or problems like the pelvic girdle pain I’ve been experiencing. This midwife though just seems to want to get through the appointment as fast as possible. On Friday I hobbled in on my crutches, which she commented on, asking if the pain was worse than before. I replied that it was getting noticeably worse each week. She then asked me how I’d been feeling, so I told her that through that morning I’d been experiencing crampy backaches and stomach aches as well as feeling nauseous. Although I didn’t spell it out (maybe I should have) this is very similar to how my previous labours (and probably those of plenty of other ladies) have started. She replied with something along the lines of “Oh well, we’re all entitled to an off day now and again”! I also mentioned how I’d not had any contact from the physio department and that it was worrying me in case I have any issues during my baby’s delivery or post-natally and there’s no-one for me to contact. After all of this, and after trying to convince me not to bother seeing her this week (despite my pointing out that the obstetrician had specifically told me to see the midwife every week) all she wrote in my notes was “No issues; seeing in a week”. Awesome. These notes are supposed to inform the hospital midwives and doctors of what has been going on through my pregnancy, especially in a scenario where I’m unable to adequately fill them in. Fat lot of use my notes from this midwife will be! What especially stuck with me was that when she tried to convince me to cancel this week’s appointment she told me that there was no need for me to be seen as I am a “healthy mummy of nearly three children”. I felt like shaking her before reminding her that actually, my third baby should be seven months old already except that that baby died for apparently no reason at all half way through the pregnancy, coincidentally almost exactly a year ago. And so please forgive me if I’m not so complacent and blasé as you seem to be about my delivering a healthy baby! But of course I didn’t, just staring at her until she told me that if I felt a need to be seen weekly that it really wasn’t a problem. So I see her again tomorrow, although if my baby decides to be born before that appointment, I really don’t mind!

I’m really hoping that I will be posting pictures of a beautiful newborn baby rather than a 39 week update next Tuesday; keep your fingers crossed that she decides that it’s time to move out and experience the big wide world soon!

I’m not going to lie, I’ll be very glad when I’m holding my healthy, beautiful baby girl in my arms. This pregnancy is the roughest I’ve had, I think. Quite apart from the pelvic problems which have put me on crutches for the last few weeks, the anxiety I’ve had for the last eight months has been difficult. However, I had a scan this morning, and Miss Bonus is growing well, slightly bigger than she needs to be but not alarmingly enormous! And apparently they can tell that she has hair already – I wonder what colour it will be!

Until last week, I had seen two different registrars at the hospital as well as four or five different midwives. with each one I had attempted to discuss the high levels of anxiety I was experiencing for the wellbeing of my baby, after losing our baby last year unexpectedly and with no explanation afterwards. Not one of them appeared to listen, or even offered any reassurance. I had been told how important the mental health of a prospective mother is; almost on a par with physical wellbeing but until last week not one of the healthcare professionals I saw took me seriously. Last week I saw my consultant for the first time who actually listened to me and offered reassurance as well as a plan which has drastically reduced my anxiety levels. I’m now seeing someone (either in the ante-natal clinic in the hospital or a community midwife in my local surgery) each week, and so I feel much happier that my baby’s health is being monitored.

My gorgeous husband is really looking after me as if I were made out of spun glass! I’m getting really tired, especially as sleeping for more than half an hour at a time seems to have become impossible with the pelvic pain, and so he’s taken on so much of the housework so that I can rest as much as possible. He drops me off at the door if we have to go anywhere, brings me drinks and fetches and carries for me. I hope that I recover quickly after the birth so that I can pick up the reins again.

Right, time for bed, then there will only be 19 days left to go! Night all!

Little Miss Bonus  has only 13 weeks left to grow now before she’s due to make her appearance in the world, as I’ve hit 27 weeks pregnant today. And so on into my third trimester. She seems to be doing fine with her job of growing at a good rate, as am I! And the stiffness in my joints (especially in my hips and pelvis) is increasing, especially at night time when I wake up aching if I’ve not moved in a while! But never mind, I’m off to see a physio next week, so hopefully I’ll get some good exercises that will make a difference to me. And if not, in three short months I’ll be able to introduce my beautiful girl to the world, and none of these minor inconveniences will matter. Also next week I get to take a glucose tolerance test. I’m not quite sure why, as although my sons weren’t small, they weren’t at the size that generally necessitates a test for gestational diabetes in subsequent pregnancies. Hopefully I’ll (or at least my insulin will) sail through the test and I’ll be able to carry on with my normal eating habits rather than having to stop before every mouthful to evaluate the sugar load!

As predicted, knitting has slowed down this month. I did get to half way on my cardigan that I mentioned in my last post, and started the first sleeve, but following the colourwork pattern requires far more concentration and general brain power than I have to spare right at the moment. I did manage to finish a cardigan for my niece, Miss M, in time for her 6 month birthday, and I also managed to design and make a hat for Cheeky. I haven’t, however, managed to find the time to get any of my projects up onto Ravelry yet. I really need to do that soon, otherwise I’m not sure when I’ll get the chance, given that I’m almost certain to be without an internet connection for at least a little while after we move.

Anyway, Little Miss Bonus is kicking me now as if to remind me that I need to get an early night in order to get some of the energy required to get through the next week or so! I’ll probably not post again until after we’ve moved, so see you soon in our new house!

Bonus Baby, judging by the size of me, is growing well (23 weeks tomorrow!). I’m getting regular internal gymnastics displays, which are really reassuring, and I’m starting to let myself plan more. I’ve got a line of jumpers and cardigans queued up, both in my mind and on Ravelry.com to make before May! My sister-in-law is hoping that I’ll be making a couple of matching jumpers for Bonus Baby and my niece – could be good, even if only for the photos we’ll be able to show them when they’ve grown up!

Next week will be all about planning for the move some more. I’ve worked out a couple more places that I could stack a pile of boxes in the flat, so I’m not quite so concerned that I’ll need to pile boxes up on the front lawn now! I’m also going to have to clear out some more rubbish, which on the plus side means I’ll have less to pack!

My three boys (I include my husband in that!) are treating me like a princess. Regular drinks and food are provided by one or the other, together with unlimited cuddles and back rubs. And when GG and Cheeky went out for bread and milk a couple of evenings ago, they came back with red roses for me. I could get used to this! It makes the stiff joints and the slowing down completely worth it!

I’ve had a lucky break with my job though. We are encouraged to use up all of our annual leave before we go on maternity leave, and so I’m actually finishing in three weeks time, although I’ll not officially be on maternity leave until April. Which means that I get two clear weeks before we move (if the date stays the same) to stay home and pack!

Already I’m 22 and a half weeks through this pregnancy, and she is kicking up a storm every day! Handsome and Cheeky felt her thumping away through my stomach at the start of the week, and they were so excited. I made her a little cardigan at the weekend, and yesterday I made some little flowers to embellish it, although I’m not fixing them on until I’m certain she is actually a girl!

I’ve been busy with my knitting recently, as I’m keenly aware that once I start packing, then unpacking and arranging, then when the baby arrives, I’ll not have very much time for crafting! So I’m making the most of January before life gets hectic! So this month I’ve also made some washcloths for Bonus, a pair of flip top mittens for GG and a shawl for noone in particular but because I wanted to knit up the yarn.

First, in September we had this;

And then, in December, we had this;

Since then, on Tuesday we had the main scan and a wriggly, strong baby is doing very well, with all the bits and pieces that a baby half way through the cooking process should have! We’re due on May 22nd, and with two birthdays in April already, this little one is most certainly not allowed to be more than three weeks early!

I’m off to plan my knitting now!

I have made no resolutions this year. I have aims, which are softer, less structured things with correspondingly less mental self-flagelation if I fail in any of them! I aim to stay happy and as unstressed as is possible (with a house move coming up soon) for the remainder of the winter. I aim to take a second before I speak and try not to snap at my children, although this will definitely be easier if I feel happy and moderately unstressed! I aim to cut down on my refined sugar intake, beginning soon. This will be challenging, especially with the amount of chocolate we have left in the house since Christmas, but I will have to try. And of course there are the yarnie challenges.

I’ve not thought these out very clearly yet, I just know I want to knit more! Last year was a bit of a non-starter for me, craft wise, and I’m hoping to pick up where I left off before the desire to make things vanished in the mist. I’ve made a good start so far this year, planning the cardigan I mentioned last week and picking out some other patterns that I’d like to try soon. I’ve also entered myself into a challenge on Ravelry to knit up 1500 yards of yarn a month. This is a lot, but at about fifty yards a day I think it’s achievable if I get back into the habit of knitting whilst I’m sitting down relaxing in the evenings. Most of the time my knitting doesn’t involve me studying a pattern to the exclusion of everything around me, so I’ll still be able to chat with GG and enjoy a couple of programmes on the TV whilst I work. I’ve already got a couple of projects under my belt.

These are slipper socks for Cheeky, who is seven and a half now and wearing (I think) size 12.5 shoes. They are made out of superwash blue faced leicester wool in a heavy aran weight on (I think) 6mm needles. The plan is to dye the socks, and Cheeky has asked that they be dyed red and yellow. Hmm, I did warn him that he might get some orange patches in between the red and yellow, but he didn’t seem to mind too much! Once they’re dyed, I have a bottle of this liquid rubber or latex or something which you apply to the soles of the socks in order to make them less slippy. I mostly knitted them at the end of last year, but I finished them on the 1st so the final ten yards can go into this year’s tally!

Next, I made these washcloths and soap bag. I bought a couple of packs of balls of cotton yarn from Lidl about two years ago and still have quite a lot of it left. So I decided that washcloths are always useful, and whizzed these up as a quick-gratification project. The soap bag is designed to prevent the problem of dropping a slippery soap. As the bag is cotton, the soap can be left inside and the whole thing immersed in water and used to wash yourself. I’m pleased with how they turned out, especially as I knit the little bag using the ‘toe-up sock’ method and so there was no seaming or grafting needed to finish it off!

On the needles at the moment is the second in a pair of flip top mittens for GG. He travels to work on a bus every day, and finds it inconvenient having to take his gloves off every time he needs to get change or bus tickets out, or fiddle with his phone (which he also uses as an MP3 player). Fingerless gloves were dismissed as the ends of his fingers would still get cold, and so he decided on flip top mittens with fingerless gloves underneath. And providentially, Ellie gave me a book of glove patterns for Christmas, along with a couple of sets of bamboo double pointed needles. I’ve put them all to good use, and found a pattern which suited GG. I’m up to the base of the fingers on the second mitten already, and hope to finish that by tomorrow evening. He tried the first one on yesterday evening, by the way, and pronounced them very comfortable and cosy! Hopefully I’ll have some pictures of the finished items soon. I’m knitting them out of a new-to-me yarn called Lang Omega which I bought in Big Knitters a little while ago. it’s a 50/50 blend of nylon and acrylic, and so they’re washable, and it is so soft. I think I’ll be buying this yarn again for future projects, so long as it stands up to wear. I’ll keep an eye on how the gloves go for a few weeks before I decide, but I’m always on the lookout for a nice reasonably cheap yarn, so this could be good.

Right, having already been awake for 2.5 hours (it’s 6.10am) I’m absolutely starving, so I’m off to find a yoghurt. I hope the new year is treating you all well!

Oh dear, I do sound old!

My knitting mojo definitely abandoned me last year. I did one large project, a baby blanket for little M, two little cardigans also for her and a handful of scarves and other small items. I’m hoping to really get back into the swing of things in this coming year, including getting back into dyeing again. Luckily I’d built up a decent collection of hand dyed yarns because I’ve not done any more dyeing since last spring. But my stocks are running a little low, so I’ll have to sit myself down and think of some good colourways shortly.

With regard to what I want to knit this year, I’d like to do my cardigan as soon as possible, so that I can get plenty of wear and enjoyment out of it before the weather warms up. I’ve been wanting to make GG a jumper for years and have never got round to it, so hopefully this will be the year for that too. I have plans for gloves or mittens for each of my three boys (GG is counted as one of my boys, obviously!) and something nice for my friend M for her birthday in September (I won’t say what on the off chance she comes and has a look!). I’m going to make a few things for little M, at least one jumpery/cardigany thing in each age range, which means at least three with the first one due in February when she hits six months old. Plus I’m planning some general non-specific items which can go on the stall once I go back to the market or can be put aside for next year’s Christmas presents. So, there’s enough to keep me busy for a while!

Reading that back, it sounds a bit optimistic. But I know that if I knuckle down, and don’t waste time in front of the TV in the evenings by having idle hands, I can get an awful lot done in a year. It will be interesting to look back in a year and see what I did achieve in 2012. Here’s to a good year!

• Christmas was lovely – time spent with the whole family, excellent food, happy children, not enough sleep. So fairly standard really!
• The house purchase is still going ahead, although the survey flagged up a couple of issues which we will have to have checked out in the new year. God willing they’re not deal breakers, as the house is fab and I really want to live there! But they would involve some serious work being done, so we need to get some experts to give us opinions.
• My niece is growing more gorgeous by the day. I’m loving being an auntie to someone so close by. Little M knows us all and beams at us as we arrive. She loves my two boys, and they adore her in return. They’ll happily spend hours acting the clown to make her laugh – long may it last!
• Speaking of the kids, they’ve been awesome this Christmas. They are unfailingly delighted with whatever presents they receive, be they small or large, and apart from getting over-excited from time to time (it has to be a rare child who doesn’t do that at Christmas!) have been very well behaved. Which makes our lives easier! Cheeky lost his second front top tooth today. The first one came out a couple of weeks ago, and so now he has a small lisp and a massive gap. But I think he looks a bit less like a pirate than when his gap was only one tooth wide. Hopefully those adult teeth will be along soon so that he can bite through food again!
• Every one of the four of us got a Lego set this Christmas – the ability to not completely leave your childhood behaind must be one of the best things about being a parent! I got a big Harry Potter set, so I’m thinking I might wait and build it once we’ve moved. Which would show considerably more restraint than the other three, who’ve already broken into their sets!
• I’m now on the hunt for new trainers (the Schuh sale let me down this year and my old Skechers are getting very shabby) so any tips for online cheap Skechers buying will be most appreciated! I’m doing my best to avoid having to go into town and fight my way through the crowds!
• Lastly, I’m beginning to line up my new year knitting and have a couple of cardigans in mind to knit. But my brain is drawing a blank on nice wools I could buy to knit them with. So help is needed for this too! I’m planning on knitting a colourwork cardigan in double knit yarn, so I want a yarn which comes in a good range of colours. And I’d like a recommendation for a decent aran. I have Christmas money to spend, and I thought I’d rather make something out of a reasonably nice yarn rather than finding the cheapest possible ones to use.

That’s about it for the updates. I know it was long for a summary, but I had lots to say! I hope you all had a nice Christmas, or whatever holiday you celebrated, and that 2012 brings lovely things for you and your families (I thought I’d get that in there in case I don’t make it back online in the next four days!).