unprecedented

so, since we visited the craniosacral therapist (a.k.a the hippy lady) last week, 2 things have happened: 1 - emma is now pooing every day (thanks hippy lady for 'fixing' her lazy digestive system, i really miss only having to change one nappy poo-splosion a week, and am relishing her now-daily doings.) 2 - i think the sleeping might actually be getting sorted :). we have had some DAY sleeps this week, in OUR COT! sure, they aren't a regular occurence yet, and sure, they only last about 25 minutes (thanks bogan neighbours for freewheeling your supercool noise machines outside our house at every available opportunity) but i'm happy to take whatever i can get. and thanks to these snippets of 'me' time, i've been able to have a go at making some things again. see, for example, this birthday card for jess' upcoming 2nd birthday...


i feel vaguely more human and, goodness, is that ... happy?? geez.

relactation can work!!

im guessing that if you have found this post you are looking for hope, inspiration or encouragement to start, or carry on with, an attempt to relactate. i know that when i was trying to get my milk back i spent hours and hours attached either to a pump or to my baby, trawling the net for evidence that relactation was possible, and that i wasn't wasting my time. i didn't find much of the positive reinforcement that i really really needed, so if you are going through the same thing please know that it can work, but it takes a lot of time and effort. here is my story...

before emma and i even came home from the hospital, when she was 3 days old, i knew that breastfeeding was going to be very tricky for me. i was already in a lot of pain, i was seriously confused about what was going on, and i had no clue if i was doing it 'right' or not. it didn't help that every nurse had a different opinion, thought i should try a different position etc... one nurse even told me that i was starving my baby and that i should give up because 'it would never work'. i came home having had no sleep since emma was born - completely stressed, thinking she was starving and with nipples that felt like they were being sliced by razorblades! i was dreading every feed as the pain of latching emma on was unbelievable. oh my god how it hurt! my nipples were so ravaged they were essentially just two giant scabs, and emma would routinely spill up milk streaked with blood. i would feed her, and then sit staring at her anxiously fearing the next feed. the whole business effected the way i felt about my little girl - i was scared of her because she caused me so much pain and i could think of NOTHING but this horrible cycle that i was caught up in. i wasn't bonding with my baby and i felt dreadful. finally, after 3 weeks, my midwife made me give up on breastfeeding. i had had next to no sleep for 3 weeks, had barely eaten (i lost 16kg!), was completely exhausted and on the verge of being put on medication for postnatal depression. so i stopped and we went onto bottles. after another 3 weeks my nipples had healed and i was feeling 100% better for some sleep and some food, but i was consumed with guilt - every time i gave emma her bottle i was in tears. i felt like a complete failure and i knew that i was missing out on something very special. so when emma was 6 weeks old i put her back on the boob - and it didn't hurt! it would have been a miracle - except i had no milk to give her, it had all dried up and all i could express over 1/2 an hour was a couple of drops. so i found myself an excellent lactaction consultant, started on domperidone (initially 90mg/day, then increased to 160mg/day, now back to 90mg/day), began taking fenugreek and naturopharm 'milkflow' spray, drank copious amounts of ginger beer and began a rigorous schedule of 2 hourly feeding, expressing and topping up with formula. it was hard hard work but i was a determined hormonally-crazed new momma and nothing was going to make me give up! thankfully, by the time emma turned 12 weeks old, things were all go, the formula top-ups were a thing of the past and emma was thriving! now 17 weeks old, my wee girl is exclusively breastfed! and i am super proud of myself :) yay!

My good friend has just started a blog - which reminded me that I have this old one sitting here doing nothing. I haven't drawn anything in aaaaaages so I've had nothing to post. Although I did make this...

which I am quite pleased about :)

Hello! It's been quite a long while since I last posted on here. I've not been doing much drawing at all - the pictures below are a couple of exceptions, they're drawings I did for a first birthday card for my niece and a graduation card for my brother...

But I do have a good excuse - another creative project that I've been working on has been leaving me very exhausted (sleep has been taking major precedence over anything else for about the last 14 weeks!). :)

An update of sorts

Man - this new job was a big mistake. Since I started, I’ve been feeling really blue and I’ve been exhausted all the time so haven't had any energy (or inclination) to do any drawing. I've signed up for a life drawing class though - starting next week - so that should put things right (I hope). I did try and pull myself out of the slump the other night and made this guy … I made his face in Illustrator and printed it on to fabric transfer paper. There is something very satisfying about giving something a face :)

And I’ve got some ideas for a drawing I’d like to do for a one-year-old’s birthday card, so I just need to get cracking really.

Also – I am completely impressed and besotted with a new book that arrived from Amazon recently called Bow-Wow Bugs a Bug. The bold but simple and awesome drawings tell the story (there are no words) and I JUST LOVE IT.

Illustration Friday - 'Fierce'

As I mentioned in another post, I had a job about 8 or 9 years ago that was REALLY boring, so I'd make silly drawings (using MacPaint and my mouse) to pass the time. Since my current job is CRAZY BUSY and isn't leaving me much time for creativity, I thought I'd post a couple of those old drawings for this week's Illustration Friday theme. Here goes ... (apologies for the poor quality - these were done in the olden days!)

sewing ... parts 2 and 3

I've been playing with the sewing machine some more. I'm trying to get some skills so that I can make something half decent for Jessie's first birthday. I've got a way to go, but it really is fun - I can't believe I've been so scared of sewing up until now! For the girl-doll, I adapted the miss buttons pattern and added a face, which I drew in Illustrator and printed onto iron-on transfer. The other thing was an experiment. It was supposed to be a cat ... but I forgot to add whiskers or a tail, and it's green, so, hmmm ...

Illustration Friday - forgotten

Here is a forgotten drawing - one I started months ago and never finished. It looks like she knows she's been forgotten too...

sewing...

introducing miss scruffy-pants... a soft-toy i made today. i've never used a sewing machine before (i am a disgrace when it comes to the womanly arts), and i thought it was about time i gave it a go. so i bought this very cool pattern and, despite my extreme lack of patience and skill, i don't think she turned out too badly (as long as you don't look examine her too closely, and only look at the front!) - it was surprisingly easy (and fun too).

now, of course, i'm thinking of other projects i'd like to try.

Illustration Friday - 'baby'

This is an illustration I drew to put on a card for my sister and her husband when they had their first baby last year. Turned out I drew far too much hair on the baby - she was a wee baldy!

Illustration Friday - worry

I think he's a bit worried that, even though he tried really hard, he's not quite dressed appropriately for the conditions.

Also, if you have a moment, you should check out how cute my niece is:)

Illustration Friday - 'seed'

Not a portrait this time :)

Illustration Friday - 'Wrinkles'

I seem to be preoccupied with portraits lately.

This is my dad being sleepy, and possibly a bit grumpy. Truth be told, he doesn't actually have that many wrinkles - in fact, he's in very good nick for an old bugger (back when I was about 15 - which would have made him almost 50 - a friend of mine mistook him for my older brother!).

Soggy

I have just arrived at work soaking wet thanks to the freezing, windy, sideways sleet that I was greeted with when I left the house this morning, and which rendered my umbrella pretty ineffectual for most of my walk. Weirdly, when I reached the library everything changed and it was all peaceful and sunny blue skies – so I guess I looked pretty strange when I turned up in the office all wind-blown and sodden.

Anyway … I had a go at another portrait last night. It is us. I found it odd drawing myself – I’m not sure if it looks anything like me.

And now I’m off to stand under the hand-dryer in the toilets for a while.

What a slacker.

Oh dear – I’ve not posted anything on here in ages, and I don’t really have any excuses for being so slack. Except, I was quite busy for a while there doing CVs and letters and interviews for my NEW JOB. Yay! Oh, and I’ve also been trying to be very good and go for lots of runs (sort of pre-training for the half marathon). So I guess it’s okay that I haven’t done a single drawing for over 2 weeks. Hopefully the Illustration Friday topic this week will inspire me to do good things. I’m kind of feeling like I might want to pick up an actual paint brush and do some ‘real’ painting – just because it feels so satisfying applying paint to a nice smooth surface. And I also want to do some more digital portraits, because they are excellent fun. Oh, and my sister has asked me to draw some more bugs for my niece. So, actually, I have lots to do and I should just stop talking and get busy!

The end.