Happy new year folks!
So new year's day has been and gone and my baby girl still isn't here. My patience is being tested like never before and baby and I are at loggerheads as to when would be an appropriate time for her to make her grand entrance. So in the meantime, I try and keep busy and resurrecting the old blog seems like a good idea.
A new year is always a good time to reflect on the one just gone. You may remember my new year's resolution back then was all about conquering my fears, great and small. On the balance of things, I have done pretty well, tried lots of new things, tried new crafting techniques... But the highlights for me will no doubt have been:
- to learn to drive on the left, with a right hand drive. This summer, I even drove all the way to Windsor all by myself, that was definitely a proud moment.
- to conquer my fear of the dentist... well almost. I've had some really bad experiences with British dental care while living in London which had turned my pre-existing fear of dentists into a proper phobia. When I needed dental treatment, I'd go back to Belgium, a highly impractical solution, but at least I knew the woman there and I trusted her. In April this year I found myself in a proper emergency situation and I just had to take it on the chin and try a local dentist. I am very lucky to have found someone great, who does a good job and who shows amazing patience in the face of my extreme anxiety. I've still managed to faint in his chair on a regular basis but I'm working on that!
- to conquer my fear of needles (the medical kind, I have no problem with knitting or sewing needles!). I hadn't really planned on tackling this phobia of mine but as anyone who's been pregnant will tell you, you're turned into a pin cushion during pregnancy so this particular phobia had to go. I did really well with my first blood tests but at my 12 week scan, things turned sour when the nurse couldn't find my veins and had to try multiple times in different places. After that, the needle phobia was well and truly back on. But isn't it amazing what despair will make you do? As my due date was fast approaching and I really wanted to try every possible method to tease the baby out, I decided to try acupuncture. I had done an attempt a few years back but it hadn't ended well. Yet this time, I managed to sit through the entire session without even feeling faint and I even put myself through a second session. Needless to say, it didn't bring baby out but hey, I've conquered another fear, that's one bonus point!
So what of this year? What will be my new year's resolution? Well, I've decided it's time for me to let go of guilt. I'm so good at guilt-tripping myself and that simply has to stop. Not an easy resolution as I'm about to become a mom and moms always seem to crumble under the weight of guilt - Am I doing this right? Should I let the baby cry? Should I go back to work?... We've all heard it before. So I am setting myself quite a big task... the good thing is if I fail, well, I won't feel guilty about it!
I also really want to get back to more making, I've really missed it these last few months and I'm hoping there will be some time for it in the crazy months that loom ahead. And I'd like to go back to my more regular blogging. I'd set myself a goal of one post a week when I started but I've barely managed half of that in 2012. However, if I don't succeed, I won't make myself feel guilty about it :-)
I'm not planning much else at the moment. My life is about to be turned upside down in a way that I can't quite imagine. This year is definitely a new dawn for me, the start of a new life and it's both exciting and terrifying. So my usual uber organised self is having to step back in favour of a more "wait and see" attitude.
Now to get this baby out...
