Antipodal Adventures
Autumnal Adventures: Forest Walks - Mushroom Hunter Edition
Sunday 6th October 2019
Skipping as lightly over the 1.5 year blog absence as we did the beautiful autumnal leaves, suffice to say a few things have changed in the Kollhofsphere. One of the major ones being a move not only of countries but also hemispheres! We’re back in the north again and no-one is more excited about this than me, getting to document my most favourite of all the seasons - autumn. My second favourite is winter. Probably not best to dwell too long on why we moved to a country that is sunny all year round.
Anyway, now we live by lakes and woodland, giving me a fantastic chance to get in touch with my inner leaf-kicker again, whilst also introducing my now-nearly-2-year-old everything-kicker to something she’s allowed to put the boot to.
But what we’ve seen so many of on our walks here so far have been mushrooms! They’re everywhere and in many different varieties. None of which I know the poison potential of, so mainly walks have been accompanied by a lot of hysterically yelling “no touching”, somewhat disturbing the peacefulness of nature. But at least Lily isn’t dead, even if she does shout “no touching” and “no stepping on” at every fungi she sees now.
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Six months
Thursday 10th May 2018
Wow. You’ve been here six months already. Where the heck has that gone? Probably to the same place that mama’s ability to string a coherent sentence together went. (When exactly does this ‘baby brain’ thing go away? Because it sure would be nice to remember what I’d done in the past week - heck, in the past five minutes would be a plus).
This time last year, you looked like this:
Birth
Thursday 16th November 2017
There we were, 41 weeks pregnant at our weekly antenatal appointment, and there was still no sign of getting closer to giving birth. This is our first, it is normal, they just take a bit longer to cook. Of course, but still! Can we and should we push it to 42 weeks? The week before, the midwives had already suggested to start with the induction process on Wednesday, 10 days past due date, but we didn't really like the idea of being induced.
This was weighing heavy on Cate. She had been so anxious about the whole birthing process, but come around to be very calm and relaxed about it, so much that she wanted to avoid as much intervention as possible. It was amazing to see the transformation of her feelings towards birth throughout the pregnancy. We read a few books and took a few classes, which all helped. In the week before, we had tried all of grandmother's recipes to help things move along: eating spicy food, eating lots of dates, drinking raspberry leaf tea by the bucket, clary sage baths and showers, went for walks, had lots of cuddles - Cate even had a couple of acupuncture sessions. Stretch and sweeps by the midwifes also didn't go very far, as the cervix was just not cooperating.
That Monday was a long and gloomy day. It is odd how you can patiently wait 9 months, but once past that due date your mind starts playing tricks on you. Cate was still full of energy, very unlike being 41 weeks pregnant, though her confidence started sinking. So we went out for a walk along the cliffs. We talked a lot and I tried to cheer her up the best I could. There was no reason to worry, but the dreaded Wednesday was getting closer and closer and the induction appeared to be unavoidable. So, I let in a bath for Cate in the evening, put on some relaxing music, lit some candles and just tried to help her find some peace and a positive outlook. We still had a few more days and if nothing was going to change by Wednesday we would just go with it. Having had stillbirths and miscarriages in the family, and friends with pretty awful complications during labour, all sorts of scenarios started racing through my mind. We both agreed we didn't want to push it too far, putting baby or mum at risk.
Nine months later...
Sunday 22nd October 2017
Well, when we announced the pregnancy, I totally geared myself up to regale you all with HUHLARIOUS stories of antenatal mishaps - being sick in bins at work whilst live on air*, ridiculous things that I did/said/thought, and my waters breaking in the most embarrassing place possible, and it has all come to naught! Well, except the waters thing, which could still totally happen. I’ll keep you updated.
* Stenography is a unique profession where once you’ve started, you can never, ever stop for any reason whatsoever...
But honestly? We’ve had the most boring pregnancy ever! Except I can’t say ‘boring’, as we got frowned upon in antenatal classes when I described it this way... because pregnancy is magical and special and so very precious and all. So I mean ‘uneventful’ and ‘#blessed’ of course. I’ve had precisely no morning sickness (puking in shock at a positive pregnancy test totally doesn’t count apparently), no cravings, no exhaustion and no crazy mood swings* or anything. I’ve really enjoyed it all, genuinely - minus a slight trauma over the removal of my stomach piercing and the subsequent stretchy hole that’s developed (all hail to Bio Oil!). And now I’m on maternity leave and we have somewhere between the next 5 minutes and 2 weeks to go, and it’s all gone so quickly, but also, I’ve been pregnant for pretty much the entire year, which seems like forever, and I feel like I should probably at least write about some of it. So here’s a few things we’ve experienced over the months...
Antenatal Adventures
Thursday 11th May 2017
So for Facebook friends, I guess we posted our happy news, then I left you with a lovely picture from Uluru, with Jan contemplating his future in the corner, and we've told you nothing else! For non-Facebook peeps, uhm, hai there, Jan and I are having a baby! Surprise!
So for everyone keen to know the "usual" news - I'm feeling fine (criminally fine, but more on this later); we are 15 weeks along; everything is looking good so far; and the due date is 30 October. Which, come on, I'm totally going to cross my legs for an extra day to get a Halloween baby, purely for the joy of bringing it home in a costume. With The Omen music playing in the car. Or something.
As for the other big question, not only do we want to find out the sex, WE ALREADY KNOW! Thanks to the wonderfulment of modern science (and a chunk of cash), we had a test called the NIPT (non-invasive parental testing), which takes some of the mother's blood, whisks it about a bit in a fancy flask, and gets the baby's DNA out to test. With the added extra bonus of finding out sex! And....... Jan is overjoyed to tell you he will now be bossed about by two* women in his house! Which maybe accounts for the look of fear on his face in that Uluru snap... Or it could be the dingoes. * As in, me and Baby Girl. I re-read this and realised it sounded like we were having twins, which... PLEASE LORD, NO.