Congratulations James & Kelly

Following on from my last blog, we all headed over to England for the wedding of my brother James and his fiancée Kelly.


The bride and groom

 It was a fantastic day that everyone seemed to really enjoy. The ceremony at Sopwell House in St. Albans was both beautiful and humorous, and even the reading I did ("Blessing for a marriage") went off without a hitch.

The aperitif after the ceremony was great, with delicious amuse bouches and champagne (or Pimms for the more traditional English-types). It was interesting to go from the ceremony room to the conservatory and veranda where the aperitif was held as the corridor between the two is lined with signed football shirts in frames.

It turns out the Sopwell House has been used to host various international football teams over the years (including a number of England squads), with the players relaxing in the luxury rooms and making full use of the spa treatments.

Fortunately, the weather held out for the whole day, as it was cloudy with some sunny patches but absolutely no rain (amazingly for an English wedding!). It meant the happy couple were able to take the wedding photos outside in the lovely gardens of the house.

Growing up too fast?



Lydia playing with Bugs

It's been a whole month since my last post. Lydia is now three months old and seems to change a little bit with each passing day. Time has simply flown by, and I am beginning to understand why people always say you should enjoy every moment with your child because they will be grown up before you know it.

Ok, so Lydia is still a baby. It's not like she has suddenly started walking, dressing herself, taking whatever she wants out of the fridge, and so on and so forth. She still needs us to do everything for her, and as such is still as helpless as the day she was born.

However, she is growing up fast. Over the last few weeks since my last blog entry Lydia has started to get much stronger. We can see her trying to sit up a bit whenever we have her laying down in our arms. She is also getting closer to being able to roll over. We lay her down on her back, she kicks her legs up in the air and rolls onto her side. At the time of writing, she hasn't quite managed to roll all the way onto her front yet, but I think that will come in the next few days.

Thoughts on being a Dad

It's now two months since Lydia was born. Two months since the day I became a father and my life was changed forever. The day I began a new journey that promised to test my resolve and push me to the very edge of my limits, bringing me love, anxiety, stress and delight in equal measures.

A happy, 2 month old baby

A lot has happened in those two months, as I'm sure you can imagine. I, along with my wife, have had the pleasure of watching our little girl grow in both size and in character, already going from a helpless newborn to a smiling, cheerful little lady who knows how to get what she wants from us. Seeing this growth has been amazing, and prompted me to reflect on what we have experienced and learnt from the beginning of our new life as a family, which is the goal of this blog entry.

Here is a list of some of the things I have learnt about the responsibilities and rewards of fatherhood.

Funny Faces

Having a baby is fantastic source of entertainment. Granted, it is a lot of hard work, but you can't help but smile at some of the things they do. Lydia sits (and occassionally sleeps) on a sort of bean-bag designed for babies in our living room, and it's great to just sit near her and watch as she pulls a variety of faces while she sleeps. I guess this must be her way of practising the various facial expressions that she will use as she gets older and starts to discover more about the world.

Happy baby or gassy baby?

From grimaces to smiles, and looks of surprise to looks of pain, it is often more entertaining to watch her than to watch the TV. Even though Lydia is asleep, her little arms and legs move around like they have minds of their own, giving the impression that she is dreaming about starring in a kung fu movie.

Lydia also makes a lot of noise while she dreams, emitting little squeeks and heaving tiny little sighs. She even seems to occassionally laugh in her sleep, a short giggling noise that surprised us as we hadn't heard it before. I know that at 3 weeks old any smiles or laughs are probably just gas, but it is still very cute to see.

The other day I sat next to her bean bag and asked her a question (probably something along the lines of "have you done a poo-poo for mummy?"), and she looked straight into my eyes, frowned, and then brought her clenched fist up slowly in my direction. Less than a month old and she's already threatening her father. Looks like her teenage years might be fun!

Her First Mothers' Day

Last weekend was our first experience of a commercialized holiday as parents, as Sunday was Mothers' Day in Switzerland. Thinking that, at 2 1/2 weeks old, Lydia might be a bit too young to buy some treats and pamper her mum, her dad stepped up to the plate.

What did I do?

Well, I spent most of Saturday evening and Sunday morning preparing an Indian feast. We had invited Christelle's sister (Caroline) and her fiancé (Pascal) around for the meal, and they had been piling the pressure on my shoulders in the build up to Sunday by saying how much they were looking forward to it. As someone who doesn't really know much about cooking indian food, it seemed to be an enormous challenge.

I scoured the Internet for recipes, printed off a few that I liked, and went out to the supermarket to get everything I needed. My plan was to do a proper three course meal, consisting of starters, a main course and a dessert. Deeming this to be somewhat overambitious, given my limited skills in the kitchen, Chris thoughtfully offered to provide the dessert, so that was one less thing to worry about.

My preparation started on the Saturday evening, as I spent roughly 3.5 hours chopping onions, garlic, chilli, ginger and peppers, and carefully filling Tupperware with spices for each of the dishes I had planned. I know I often make fun of Chris for her love of Tupperware - she has loads of plastic containers that have taken up box space during 6 separate house/apartment moves, some of which has never (to my knowledge) been used - but on this occassion I was truly grateful, as I used just about every pot and bowl in our cupboards to hold either vegetables or spices. I lined the containers up in small piles according to which meal they were for, and stuck the printed recipes on the cupboard doors in the kitchen for reference the next day.

Exhausted, I went to bed. Lydia woke us up during the night for a feed, and I made the mistake of trying to rub the sleep out of my eyes. I wouldn't normally consider this to be a mistake, but as I had not washed my hands properly after chopping chillies I soon regretted my actions. My eyes felt like they were on fire and became redder than a robin's breast. Ouch! I had to lay down with a cold flannel over my eyes to try and soothe my pain.

The next morning I woke up bright and early to get cracking with the remaining preparations and the cooking. Thankfully the pain in my eyes had gone and my eyesight was intact, so I was able to concentrate on what I needed to do.

Life's Greatest Gift

On Thursday 21st April at 11:49am, a new little person took her first look at the world, as Lydia Reed-Peck was born. She had certainly kept us waiting - she was born nine days late - but it was well worth the wait.

Trying to write a blog that captures in words the feeling of becoming a parent for the first time is not an easy task, but I will do my best!


Our gorgeous little girl

I remember a whole rollercoaster of emotions washing over me as the nurses placed our little girl into the arms of her mother, from delight and elation of becoming a dad, through to doubt and anxiety over how we will cope.

The most prominent feeling I can remember is that of sheer love, and the knowledge that even though I had only known her for a few minutes I would already do anything for her.

As soon as I held Lydia in my arms, I was overwhelmed with pride at having such a beautiful little girl, and immediately felt my protective dad instincts kicking in. I cut the umbilical cord (which was tougher than I thought it would be; I had to give a couple of good chops to get through it), helped the midwife run through the initial baby tests to check her reflexes, and also gave Lydia her first bath the following day.

When will it happen?

In our attempts at preparing for the moment when our family grows, we have got absolutely everything ready for the baby: a fully-furnished and decorated room, plenty of clothes and toys, a pushchair, car seat, a baby bath and various creams and products to clean and care for the little guy. The only thing that is missing is the baby himself.

At the time of writing, the baby is now two days overdue. Not that I blame him* for that, however, as I can understand the attraction of staying in the warm, comfortable home that he has made inside his mum instead of forcing his way out into a big, scary world, especially when you have to squeeze your entire body through a tiny little hole (possibly the equivalent of us trying to fit our head into an empty toilet roll?).

We had the nine month control checkup at the hospital this week (on the due date), to make sure the baby is well and that there are no problems. I think that we were both secretly hoping that they would say to us, "we need to induce this baby NOW" so that we could finally meet the little guy. Instead, they basically told us that the baby is doing well, and to come back in a week's time. That, my friends, is a very long time to wait.

Carnaval

When I left my house this morning to go to work I had a brief moment of bewilderment - after glancing at the road ahead of me, I thought it had snowed.

This would not normally be such a surprise in Switzerland, given that it is April. However, after being blessed with glorious sunshine and temperatures of over 20°C for the last couple of weeks, one could forgive the feeling of surprise I felt at the prospect of snow on the ground (especially as I didn't bother to put a coat on when I left the house).

Glad I'm not cleaning this up

The shock didn't last long; after a comedic double-take, I realised that it was not a dusting of snow that lay on the ground, but it was in fact confetti. The annual Carnaval de Bussigny took place this weekend, with marching bands, guggenmuzik, fairground rides, beer, churros, and - most importantly - confetti canons (hence the debris shown in the picture).

These air-powered pumps are designed to spread the carnaval atmosphere to onlookers and innocent bystanders in the streets by showering them with tiny bits of paper cut into little stars, hearts and other assorted shapes.

An Anniversary Treat

April 6th is a special day for Christelle and me, as it was the day we first got together all those years ago on Fraser Island in Australia. It may have been an alcohol-fuelled beginning to our relationship, but even then there was something much deeper that has kept us together ever since.

Chris enjoying our dinner

This year marked our 6th year as a couple. When I look back over our time together, it is remarkable to see just how big an impact Chris has had on my life; if it weren't for her I would not be in Switzerland now, for example, nor would I be impatiently awaiting the birth of my first child.


Cheers!

It has been an exciting journey full of ups and downs (mostly ups, fortunately), but I have the feeling that the real journey will begin when the little one comes out to meet us in the very near future.

 

We decided to treat ourselves to a meal in a nice restaurant for our anniversary, which would also be the last restaurant meal as a mere "couple" before the baby arrives (after which the romance might be somewhat disturbed by the presence of a screaming child flinging food everywhere).

We chose to book a table at Les Chevreuils, a restaurant we know well - it was where we held the reception after our wedding in 2009.

A bit too much sun...

Last weekend the weather men (and women) all predicted clear skies with lots of sun and temperatures of up to 24°C. Given that it was chilly and wintery only a few weeks ago, this was the perfect opportunity for us to get outside and really enjoy some fresh air.


Enjoying the sun and the
view at Signal de Bougy

So, Chris and I headed to a place called Signal de Bougy, which is north of Rolle in the Canton Vaud (and roughly 20 minutes by car from where we live). Chris had been here in the past with her family when she was younger, and remembered it as a very nice place to spend a few hours.

She was right - masses of open parkland, plenty of outdoor playgrounds and games areas for the kids, a restaurant and several wooded areas make Signal de Bougy an ideal place to come, especially for kids (must make a mental note of this for future reference).