January 2018 - The Dainty Moments - A Family & Lifestyle Blog

Our household has been well and truly hit by the football bug. Whatever the weather he's in the garden kicking a ball around, he reads Match of the day religiously, he can have a serious conversation with an adult about the recent transfers and he can pronounce footballers names I couldn't attempt. He's so incredibly passionate about it and its so lovely to see him develop on the pitch and be genuinely happy when he's playing.

We've entered his first year of league matches so now we have training late on a Friday night and matches kick off at 9:30am every Saturday!! Which means I've officially become a football mum...goodbye lazy Saturday mornings, hello freezing cold and wet sidelines.

I've put together a list of my favourite parts of being a football mum.

1. Asking them to get dressed as were going out for the day and be greeted by a child in full kit...including shin pads.

2.Having shares in Vanish because not only do they slide on the pitch for fun, the male(!!!) coach decided white shorts were the best option.

3. Getting drenched and frozen week in, week out. I didn't like being warm anyway.

4. There's no point cleaning the car out before the weekend because no matter how careful you are getting them back in you WILL find mud everywhere.

5. Screaming on the sideline and thinking your advice is better than the coaches will make you look stupid. Does this mean you'll stop absolutely not.

6. The new ability to hold your wee like you've never held it before. If you're lucky enough to play on a pitch that has toilets the chances are you wont want to use them.

7. Any conversation with your football mad child will only be about football, which team will win, match results who's better out of...

8. Football will magically appear on any TV in the house and it wont only be important games, any game will do.

9. Even with strict rules of no football in the house, it will happen and things will get broken. Hide your valuables.

10. Match of the day will need to be purchased every Tuesday or they will be missing important information and this is not acceptable.

With all the joking aside being part of a team means your child will make friendships which hopefully will last a lifetime and if your lucky enough you'll make new friends who share the same freezing conditions week in week out with you.

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From the minute you see those two lines appear on that pregnancy test your life has changed, you're no longer just a person, you're a mummy. You begin to think differently, feel differently and your outlook on life changes almost instantly. What you don't think about or expect is that your lives after birth may not be 'normal'.

Let me introduce this dark haired beauty to you all, this is Clara Joan (or CJ as she is also known) and she is the daughter of one of my best friends and her wonderful husband. When Acacia and Dean found out they were expecting they were completely over joyed, its something they had both wanted so badly and I couldn't have been anymore excited for them. They found out quite early on at their 20 week scan that Clara would be born with her stomach on the wrong side of her body. They were told that this would unlikely cause any problems in the future and it was just something they needed to be aware of. This was the start of their incredible strength of parenthood, it was also the start of their great relationship with the staff at the JR and the NHS, from what Acacia told me they were extremely thorough on checking everything they could to make sure they new exactly what they were dealing with.

Clara decided to come 5 weeks early and within two weeks her new life they found out that she wasn't a very well little girl. She suffered with terrible jaundice and underwent intense light therapy to help get her levels under control. Her levels roller-coasted and by doing this she kept herself in hospital.

Unfortunately that was just the start of Clara's time in the JR, on December 27th she projectile vomited a green bile which got her immediately transported to HDU for tests and monitoring, they all came back clear and they were almost discharged on New Years Day. Clara then had another attack of projectile vomiting and was then sent to intensive care where she would undergo two operations. One to investigate and remove 75cm of her bowel and have a stoma fitted and the second one to remove a few more cm of bowel and see if the remaining bowel was viable. Much to all of the professional's surprise she pulled through and the remaining bowel is viable. She is a medical miracle and has defied all of the odds the surgeons have given, she's a beautiful, strong little fighter.

In summary of what has happened she is now left with Short Gut Syndrome and heterotaxy, as her stomach, liver, and non functioning spleen are all in the wrong places.

Everyday she is proving what a determined little girl she is, she is now out of a incubator and has her very own little crib. She's allowed to wear her pretty clothes and she isn't one bit camera shy showing her Mummy and Daddy her beautiful smiles. She will be moved to the children's ward at the John Radcliffe and will spend the first year of her life there. She will learn to crawl, take her first steps there and be closely monitored for infections.

I am in complete awe of my incredible friend and her husband. They have stepped up and accepted what is happening and have shown strength and courage like I've never seen before. Clara is blessed to have such wonderful, strong and inspiring parents. They both spend their days with Clara soaking up anytime they can with her, doing as much 'parenting' as they are allowed. The staff have been incredible with getting them both to feel like they are still Clara's parents and that their involvement in her day to day life is just as crucial as her medical help. Acacia spends from at least 8am - 9pm with Clara 7 days a week now Dean is back at work, she makes sure he feels like he isn't missing out with regular updates.

Acacia is documenting Clara's journey on her Instagram which you can find here and also on her own very special blog which you can find here. Go and follow them on their incredible journey.

Apart from having the most incredible parents Clara has an exceptionally wonderful Uncle George who is doing a charity bike ride to raise money for SSNAP who support sick and premature babies at the John Radcliffe hospital. They also provide invaluable support to the parents whilst they are with their children in special care. You can donate and read more about this on his go fund me page here.

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I feel like no matter how many times I say this phrase over and over to myself I just can't help myself from doing the exact thing I'm telling myself not to do. I have such a love hate relationship with Instagram, I love sharing and seeing other peoples photos, I've discovered the most incredible small businesses from it and met some really lovely new friends. What I really do not like is how its become all about getting the most followers, creating a sense of perfect living and apparently its all about a feed theme (which I'm not sure I entirely know what that means.)

Don't get me wrong I love a good hashtag and I always use the same ones on my pictures but that's mostly because I love looking through the pictures others post on there and that's where most of the 'insta friends' I've made have been found. When did the amount of likes determine how good your life is, how nice your house is or if your parenting correctly.

I took a little social media break recently and I wasn't entirely sure I was going to re download the apps on to my phone because surely something that makes you feel down should be removed from your life immediately. My husband is my little voice of reason and he makes me see sense whenever I get a bit crazy, we had a good talk about what it was that makes me have this issue with social media and also why I love it so much. I removed certain people/things off of my feeds and decided to really limit myself from going on there so it doesn't consume my life, because at the end of the day we all know that social media isn't even close to real life.

Another reason I came back was because of my little blog, I started it back in 2013 and I really love it. It's something I always come back to and actually enjoy spending my free time working on. This year I'm going to focus more on having regular posts and posting more on topics that are relevant to me and my family.

So for anyone struggling with the world of social media, my advice would be take a break, step away and just enjoy living your real life with your family and friends.

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