Slings and things

We took this picture on Saturday. It just makes me laugh every time I look at it! I've just got a new ring sling and was 'practicing' putting Esme in and out. Jacob looked at her in it and told me that he wanted to get in there! I don't remember the last time we wore Jacob in a sling, I think it was probably over 18 months ago that he was in one so I don't know what brought that comment on (maybe he just thought Esme looked so cozy ;)) Anyway, he was adamant that he wanted to get in so I went and grabbled the good old Ergo and told him he could get in there (no way was I going to wear his 16kgs in a hip carry position in a ring sling!!) He thought it was absolutely hilarious being in there as you can tell by the delighted look on his face!! And the beauty of the Ergo is that he didn't feel heavy at all lol.

Our new family member

Yesterday we welcomed a new addition to our family: an 18 month old angora bunny named Tiddah. She is absolutely gorgeous and seems to be settling in quite well with our other bunny, Cheeky, already. We'd been talking about getting another bunny for ages (we did have two originally but one escaped out of the cage during a thunderstorm quite a few months ago and never returned) but hadn't got around to it yet. Anyway, on Saturday we walked up to the Tecoma shops and Chris happened to see a notice on the board there looking for a new owner for a bunny as the people who owned it were going overseas. So, we rang up that afternoon and arranged to go around to see it the following morning. It turned out that I actually already knew the couple who owned the bunny, they had come to an ABA meeting when they were still pregnant (Almost 18 months ago!) and one of them works with my friend's husband! We saw the bunny and fell in love with her straight away (at least I did!) We could see that she had quite a personality instantly, she is very inquisitive. We ended up taking her home that day. It seems like fate had a big part in this bunny coming to us, it was 'meant to be'. Her owners were a little surprised that they had found someone to talk her so soon (they only put the ad up on Friday) but were glad to see her go to a family that will look after her well and hopefully we'll keep in touch with them as well! Putting the two bunnies together was an interesting event, I was worried it was going to be world war 3 but aside from some chasing they seem to be quite happy together and have been lying together today :)

Here's our new bunny, Tiddah:


And with our other bunny, Cheeky:

We love dirt!

I just had to share these photos, they always make me laugh! The first place Jacob and Esme go when they head out to the backyard is here:


Yep, it's a pile of dirt! The chooks have made dust baths here so there is LOTS of loose soil. Esme is, of course, always the instigator but Jacob is more than happy to join in on the fun! Inevitably they both end up here ;):

Letting go...

This week would have marked the 13th week of pregnancy for us. In some ways it feels like a lot of time has passed but in others it feels like it happened only yesterday. I keep thinking about what stage of development the baby would be at. This was meant to be an exciting time. We probably would have been telling people about the pregnancy now and sharing our excitement. Instead I sit here with no baby in my tummy. I feel empty. The hardest thing now is dealing with other people who don't think to ask how you're getting on. It's almost like they think 'oh, the miscarriage was ages ago now she'll be over it by now'. You just don't get 'over' this sort of thing quickly. I want to shout at them: 'This baby was here. This baby was real.' I always want to honour this baby's memory. I guess it's hard for people who haven't had miscarriages to understand and I would have been one of those people just a few months ago. If there's one thing this baby has taught me, it's compassion and empathy.

I guess it's been even harder to let go because I have been bleeding almost continuously since the miscarriage happened. We now believe that this was just one baby I lost, and the bleeding and rising HCG levels were all related to a miscarriage that wasn't totally complete. So that's made it all hard to let go of, I wasn't able to heal physically so I couldn't heal emotionally or mentally either. Anyway, our family holiday recently was the start of my healing journey. It was lovely to spend time with just us and no distractions from all the usual stuff! While Chris was on holidays I took the opportunity to see a cranio sacral osteopath who helped to remove any 'blockages' I had. I also started yoga classes which I will continue to do to help ground me. And I went to see an acupunturist as well who did some cupping and some acupuncture. He told me that this miscarriage hadn't completely carried through and gave me some herbs to take over two weeks. As soon as I started to take the herbs, I started bleeding quite heavily and this continued for the first few days. Now the bleeding has slowed and I feel like I can begin the journey to healing. I strongly believe that the combination of therapies has really helped me let things go.

Today was a challenging day but I think this indicated that I am finally starting to heal. A good friend told me she was 11 weeks pregnant. I was a bit taken aback when she said this but luckily there was a group of us there so I didn't have to react straightaway. I felt so sad when she said that but afterwards I went up to her and told her how happy I was for her. And I meant it. I cried when I said it to her (how sad am I?!) but luckily her and my other friend who were there understood and could just give me a hug! I guess I'm a pretty private person and to acknowledge that grief in front of other people was a huge thing for me. I guess all this is teaching me to trust my friends and to be more open and honest with them too, huh? Anyway, I came home and just cried and cried. But when I stopped I felt ok about everything.

I'm definately not there yet, but I can finally see how one day I will be able to let this go and know that it all happened for a reason...