90. Take down Christmas decorations

It seems like 5 minutes since we were putting the decorations up, and it's so sad to be taking them down again. We did our best to salvage a good time, but having my head stuck down a toilet wasn't really how I'd envisaged our first family Christmas.

At least J-cub won't remember it, and next year when he'll know what's going on will be like his first.

All the decorations are packed back into their boxes, and they'll go back in the loft tomorrow. It looks very bare in the living room, but it'll actually be quite nice to reclaim the Christmas tree corner, and start to move furniture round in preparation for our new TV table and Billy bookcase which is arriving from Ikea on Wednesday.

When that's all sorted and put together, then hopefully the lounge will be a safe, completely baby-proof area where J-cub can be left for 5 minutes while I do stuff in the kitchen or even manage to go to the toilet without worrying that he's going to come to some harm.

We have a sappy tradition in our house of writing messages to the 'future us' from the 'present us' on the Christmas tree box. If the 'present us' could write a message to the 'past us', it would say "Get baby-proofing now, it's a bastard trying to do it with a baby crawling around your feet". I don't actually think that baby-proofing occurred to us at all while I was pregnant, which just goes to show how naive we were. Clutter+baby really doesn't work, but I hope that by this time next week, it might be a whole lot more under control.

Day 34: Mission complete.

Snow Day

Today was simply beautiful.

1. Dawn, 2. Washing line, 3. Trees,

4. Tilly, 5. Maeby, 6. Bench,

7. Icing, 8. Walk, 9. Pond,

10. Happy, 11. Frozen, 12. Bright

Clean out and reorganise cat-corner-cupboard

This cupboard is really too big just for the cat's stuff, but it had still managed to get out of hand and turn into a big old mess. In the summer, I tend to use it for gardening bits and bobs too, but all of that has been relegated to the garage for the past couple of years, since I've been too pregnant/postnatal to do any gardening.

Oh and my sewing machine used to live in it too, but I decided it was too dusty (the cat litter emits a cloud of dust every time you move it) and that probably wasn't doing the machinery any good, so it's getting its own new crafting cupboard soon.

So I cleaned, and wiped, and recycled all the empty food boxes, and stacked, and wondered why we have so many cat toys when these cats aren't cats who like to play ... and now it's lovely and clean.

Before...

After...

Day 33: Mission complete.

Three in one day - almost back on track

Today was the most beautiful day - wall to wall blue skies and sunshine all day long. We did briefly contemplate going to the beach, but knew that would take up most of the day and we desperately needed to make the house a bit safer by moving the cot base and putting the stair-gates up. In doing so, I managed to cross three whole items off the list, leaving just two more to catch up on, I think.

This afternoon while J-cub napped, we watched an episode of Doctor Who (Planet of the Dead) in preparation for this evening's sob fest when the 10th Doctor leaves us :(

After it got dark, at around tea-time, I thought I could smell burning, and was following my nose around trying to locate it, when I happened to glance out of the back door to see the garden covered in snow. We hadn't seen any weather forecasts so had no idea it was on its way, which made it even more special. It fell so thickly and silently for a couple of hours; it was so peaceful and beautiful. Even though we had a bit of snow last week, I never saw it fall, and it quickly turned to ice so didn't seem real. This evening has more than made up for it, and I've had a whale of a time standing out in it, watching it fall.

We've just finished watching Doctor Who: The End of Days part 2; I cried my eyes out.

It's been such a lovely day with which to kick off 2010.

Day 32: Mission(s) complete.

97. Put up stair-gates

J-cub has suddenly discovered that once he's lying down, or crawling, or in any sort of prone position, he can sit himself up. And from there, he can pull himself to standing. We've been greeted for the last few mornings with a baby leaning precariously over the edge of the cot, conjuring up mental images of a baby falling out of the cot, somehow being okay, but then crawling into the hall and falling down the stairs.

My first job today was therefore to lower the base of the cot (I skipped the middle position, and went straight to the bottom), so he's got no chance of getting out.

We'd been putting off fitting the stair-gates due to wanting to decorate the hall, and thinking that it would be better to decorate before drilling holes into the walls. Safety became our primary concern, especially since it seems unlikely that we'll be decorating any time soon as we can't decide on any colours.

So we fitted the first gate at the top of the stairs...

... and tried to fit the second gate at the bottom of the stairs (actually 3 steps up, as I'd read something which said children are far more likely to have accidents on stairs if they haven't been given the chance to have a go at some low ones and discover that however easy it is to climb up, it's much easier to fall down again). Despite the fact that we live in a ticky-tacky standard house with standard width stairs, the standard stair-gate is too narrow and necessitates an extension kit which we'll have to order. We therefore have elected to keep the lounge door shut (which it is anyway, to stop the cats using the front door mat as a litter tray) for the moment.

Our previous efforts at baby-proofing the kitchen with a travel stair-gate has turned out to be more annoying than not, as you have to screw the gate in each time you open and close it, so we've just been climbing over it or, more often than not, not using it at all.

I thought that the frequency with which we were taking J-cub away from the kitchen doorway, or fitting the stupid travel gate, was likely to be greater than the frequency that we'd want to shut the door into the kitchen (which you can't do with a normal stair-gate). So for now, we've put the second stair-gate into the kitchen doorway. It's only been there a few hours, and already it's far easier to get on with things, knowing that J-cub is safe.

He loves it, and today it's been his favourite place to hang out, sitting just inside the gate under a side table, chewing on a plastic spoon. Bless.

Kitchen doorway...

89. Clean and sort out laundry/phone corner in hall

The top of the stairs tends to be a bit of a dumping ground, and needed a sort out. The laundry basket is broken and doesn't get used, so it's going to be refashioned as a toy basket in the living room. Everything else doesn't really need to be there, save for a few pluggy type things. So all was cleared away, I cleaned the walls and skirting boards, gave it a good hoover, and done. I'm not intending on leaving that jumble of wires and plugs there, but until Jamie can make the phone work in the study, it has to stay there or it won't work. That'll take about 5 seconds to do, so I'd say this is technically done.

Before...

After...

69. Clean window, curtain and ledge on landing

This area has been fairly dirty for a long time, as a previous cat used the window as her doorway in and out of the house, and simply would not remember to wipe her paws before she slid them down the wall in order to safely facilitate her jump onto the landing. I've tried everything, and the pawprints and streaks of mud will not come off. Decorating the hall is on the list, so that'll take care of that, but the window itself had got very grubby, the curtain (leftover from the previous residents) was torn and grubby (and just not very nice), and the iron doesn't really need to live on the windowsill. There was also a suspect amount of mould growing around the sealant, but as that's not strictly on the list, I'm leaving stripping and resealing that for another day, when I'm using the sealant for something else.

Before...

After...

Oh and yes, that's not a proper curtain. It's a spare thermal lining, and when we decorate the hallway, I'll choose some nice appropriate fabric and make a proper curtain to join it.