storbarnsförälder

Those of you who have been knitting since the early days of Now All-New, All-Trendy Knitting - or even earlier than that - will no doubt already have discovered this, but it's new to me and it's changing my life.

When knitting with two colours, put each ball of yarn in a small plastic bag within the knitting bag, so they don't tangle together and the correct one unrolls tidily when tugged.

Linnea's winter coat is begun. Stocking stitch, 3 ply acrylic on 3mm needles, to be lined with polyester fleece. This ought to be washable and warm and fairly Linnea-proof, I think. I hope. It's planning to be red and yellow stripes, if the yarn holds out. Other colours if it doesn't. The original patches plan didn't work as it was too fiddly and I started to dread the sewing.

3 inches done. Another 10 or so to do - and then the front and sleeves... but they're going to be smaller.

Oh - I have no pattern. I'm planning on using the "all clothing is rectangular" method of creation. Anyone want to place bets on whether I'm going to finish the project?

Lungs

So my cough has been getting better - I was still bringing up green phlegm but I could generally breathe ok. Except when I took my pills - the antibiotic to cure the infection. Those of you who have been following this and taking notes will recall that this is the second antibiotic. I took the pill, I felt a bit off, and gradually it became harder to speak, and I felt short of breath. I thought it was a coincidence at first - I knew taking the pill made me feel queasy, which is hardly unusual with an antibiotic, so sort of dismissed the speechlessness. But it happened again. Twice going from feeling well to feeling ill because of a pill, I thought, might be a coincidence. Three times seemed a bit much - and it was definitely linked to taking the pill. So I whispered to Rob to call NHS Direct and he whispered back that he would but he had to deal with Linnea first and then he whispered "Why am I whispering?" and then he spoke normally, which was a relief..

He soothed Linnea, fed her 14 oz of water which is astonishing, and called NHS Direct. They asked him two questions and he told them my symptoms. So they sent us an ambulance.

Ugh. I still feel bad about this. But NHS Direct asked if I had any objection to an ambulance being called, and of course I said "No," because I thought it was part of their standard chit chat before putting you on hold and having a nurse call you back. We use NHS Direct a lot. But no nurse - they put Rob straight through to the ambulance control room. He did emphasise that I was fine, I could sit up and do everything except talk, but they came anyway.

They were lovely and explained that just because the reaction wasn't bad when we called didn't guarantee it wasn't going to get worse and that it wasn't a waste of time. They waited to be sure that the reaction was getting better instead of worse, checked my pulse and blood pressure and listened to my lungs (Paramedics know how to do this without having me take my clothes off, yah boo sucks to the GP) told me not to take another dose at 6 o'clock this morning, and were lovely and amusing. There was a man called Colin and a woman with an ordinary name and the most gorgeous Welsh accent. They asked if I wanted to go to hospital and I said "No, I'm sure it's a lovely hospital, but I'd really rather not." Turns out that on Saturday the haven of calm and efficiency that gave me PTSD turns into a nightmare scene of hooliganism, thuggery, violence and beery vomit. The paramedics apologised for the way they smelled, but Rob and I couldn't tell - they had washed, so I suspect they could still smell whatever it was that bothered them even though it wasn't actually there any more, like me and banana flavouring. I can smell banana flavouring if I know it's in the room I'm about to enter. And Colin asked how long this was goin on and remarked that Rob must think there was a God after all, if I was speechless for hours at a time, and the woman agreed that if I threw a plate at Colin she'd treat him... eventually.

So this morning early we got a friend who habitually wakes at 6 am at a weekend and gets up and does things, instead of waking at 6 and crawling around the hosue moaning and drooling like a normal parent, to drive us to the weekend drop-in clinic, and saw a doctor there who has given me the ok to stop taking the antibiotics for now, for while I am most grateful. He also said it couldn't be a reaction because I'd have noticed the inability to speak and the breathlessness as soon as I took the first pill, but I still think that the fact that I was more or less speechless and unable to breathe pretty often anyway could easily have masked that.

Knitting

We got the bus back from hospital, which means a change in the town centre, so we stopped for breakfast and went to John Lewis to get Linnea's feet measured. I accidentally passed the knitting needle display and now have two more sets of bamboo needles, one larger and one smaller, which seems about right to me. I have a Plan for the next project, too, to be started very soon now. I've just finished the third quarter of the current project (hitherto known as the Thingie) and more or less decided what to do about the finishing touches or trim. I also bought a fabric tape measure, since all our others are metal ones for DIY, and a couple of sewing needles in a convenient package labelled "Knitters needles". The Thingie will need to be stitched together, after all. And it may well need buttons, though I have some Beads of the Month that I think will do admirable service as buttons for it.

Mothering

Linnea's feet haven't grown much in the past 8 weeks, so we can probably get away with getting her wellies in the same size as her sandals for the summer. I can't imagine taking her to Aran without wellies. I got a pair of cheap lightweight crochet-effect slip-on shoes to wear to the wedding with my nursing dress; they won't be very visible or noticable, but if anyone sees them at least they're not red DM Mary Janes. And we bought a one-litre thermos flask for our picnic rucksack; the 1.5 litre flask we currently use won't fit in the bag, so we have too much to carry, with the buggy and the nappy bag and the picnic bag. It will be much easier and more pleasant to picnic with her now and we will probably do it a great deal. We used to have lots of picnics before she was born.

And I have a new friend - a new mother about the same age as I am who is breastfeeding her baby and has taken the sensible step of finding supportive people since her family are kind of far away. If you're reading, hi! It's always nice to know there's someone not bored rigid by my breastfeeding advocacy. Someone referred to me as a "militant" breastfeeder recently, which I found surprising. I don't feel very militant. I don't feel like I'm fighting, or aggressive, or anything else I associate with the word militant. Except passionate - but I'm just passionately enthusiastic about breastfeeding. I love it. Militant, to me, implies that I passionately feel that I need to fight against something - and I don't feel any passion about formula feeding, which is the obvious "enemy". I've never been attacked by a bottle of formula, and I know several babies who have definitely benefitted from it, directly or indirectly (babies benefit from sane mothers too, you know).

So yeah, maybe I am a "militant" breastfeeder. Perhaps I'm a "militant" stay at home mother, too. And a "militant" feminist. Because I think those are three fine things to be and I like to be them, and if that makes me militant, I'll go shop for a gun tomorrow. Nothing's open on a Sunday afternoon in this town.