Reality: I am struggling with blogging at the minute.  Recently, my blog has experienced a boom in readers...largely people I know.  When it was strangers and my mother reading, I felt like I could write whatever I wanted.  When its my friends, neighbours, sisters and work colleagues, its a different story.  I get so embarrassed when my writing comes up in conversation and I find myself deleting posts in worry.

Blessing:  I have to say that I still love this quiet corner of my life.  I love the connections I have made.  I LOVE that there are 2 other bloggy friends that had baby girls within days of Georgia. I love having an excuse to create a bit of beauty for myself and to share with others.  So I will keep on...whilst being more aware of what I say.

-----

Reality: Our dear little girl is not quite so laid back as we initially thought.  Her poor tummy hurts her after feeds and she refuses to sleep during the day unless she is in a sling.  When she doesn't like something, she is not shy about protesting LOUDLY!  We've received a few "you've got your hands full" comments about her and her fussiness.

Blessing:  Goodness, everything about this little girl is a blessing (except the baby sick).  A truly laid back child probably wouldn't do well in this crazy loud family where even the cats have opinions. Plus, I refuse to worry about it.  A trip to the osteopath has helped her stomach a bit (as I write, we are almost 12 hours baby-sick free!!) and I know very well that my attitude towards my children composes 99.9% of my ability to cope throughout the day.

-----

Reality: Georgia's presence has given us a lot of opportunities to compare our two children in conversation with others.  I have become increasingly aware of how I talk about Ellis, often unnecessarily putting him down in small ways.  When people ask how Georgia sleeps, my reply is often "Much better than Ellis does".  "Is she fussy?", is met with "Not nearly as fussy as our son".  "Does she cry?"...you get the picture. 

Blessing: Ellis is a blessing.  His spirited nature has shown us all the depths of patience and understanding I didn't know were possible.  Now we are aware we are doing this, I am hoping we can be more mindful of how we approach these questions in future.

-----

Reality:  The boiler is broken...again.  We have to run water all of the time or the whole system starts shaking.  We can not adjust the pressure to fix it as the valve is broken and the plumber hasn't returned any of our calls.  The sink keeps overflowing as the drain can't cope with the fluctuating pressure.

Blessing: Its hard to see much of a blessing in the midst of this as it is so frustrating to be at the mercy of a landlord and a plumber and so wasteful to have water running 24-7, but THANK GOODNESS, we don't have a water meter and we pay a flat rate to Scottish Water with our council tax.

-----

Reality: We wake up this morning to a hung parliament in the UK.  Politically, the divide between Scotland and England is growing with a conservative majority down south and an increase in Labour (more liberal) support up here in Scotland. 

Blessing: We'll have to wait and see what happens...

post inspired by Life Set to Words