Two much. Not enough. Date night.

I'm taking the rare opportunity to write, because both of them are napping (the universe was looking out for me today, and gave me a much-needed respite from the chaos).

I swore up and down, before I had kids, that I would be the mom who would never yell. I would be the mom that would have the serene patience that other mothers would envy. I would never be shrill, never be stern, always teach my child the rules by being strict but ever so fair. I would be the mom that would always look like the boho-chic she was before kids, hair just-perfectly-messy, with dewy cheeks and sinewy body.*

Yeah. Hear that laughing? That's fate saying "Duh. You expect too much and it always comes back to bite you in the ass."

I'm tired. I'm working off of 2 hours' sleep pretty much every night at the moment, and though I'm so blissfully proud of my little family, my patience is being tested on a regular basis. What's easier about having another baby is that it's not the "unknown" anymore, so I can pretty much handle who needs what, and when and why. But it's the emotional burden that I have currently with L, my beautiful baby girl, my heart that lives outside of my person. Her needs are much more difficult to manage and figure out.

L is having a bit of a tough transition. She's teething, and on top of the new baby brother she has that requires a lot of attention, she has been on edge lately. It's really uncharacteristic of her to be like that, because she's a happy, giggly, tough little girl. But her personality cannot be labeled, and as such, she's needing some space to vent and show her frustration. I'm there for her whenever she needs me, and when I can be, but sometimes the opportunity for her to cuddle with me is met with "in a minute", and "wait a second", and "we can do that later, I need to...". It's met with a rather adult reaction: crossed hands, sitting down on the rug, reading a book, chanting "WAYt... WAYt..." with disappointment. I try and sit with her and read whilst feeding the baby for 45 minutes, I try and get her to draw, to interact, but she doesn't want it. She sits and waits until she has ALL of me to herself. It breaks my heart.

We went to the playground yesterday. Sun shining, snacks at hand, I was prepared. Except for the fact that the baby needed feeding at a certain time, and I forgot the bottle. Shit.

We were there for 40 minutes, and then I had to tell L we needed to get going. He heart was set on being on the swings for much longer. She was glued to the seat. I asked her if we could go because we needed to get home. Cue the unholiest, whirlwind of a tantrum I had ever seen come out of her. She was screaming, crying, throwing herself on the ground and pounding the grass with each heaving sob. I tried to comfort her, she pushed me away. I tried to lift her up, she melted away from me, dead weight (all you parents out there will know the "toddler melt".. it makes it that much harder to pick them up, and makes it look like you're dragging them). I had to scoop her up and put her in the buggy. As I was strapping her in, she was still screaming/moaning/making wild animal grunts and growls.

Now this buggy is a double, a side-by-side Baby Jogger that L absolutely loves, but in this moment, strapping her in was like the death sentence for her. She was kicking the footrest, trying to rip the straps off of her body. The mothers in the park gave me all-knowing smiles and sympathetic glances, but it was embarrassing. I gritted my teeth and walked away quickly, across the field, back to the main road. L was still screaming, and at this point, I broke my patience. I broke my vow of never yelling.

I stopped the buggy and knelt down at her height, grabbed her arm and yelled "STOP it! Enough yelling, you do not yell to get what you want!!" (the irony of that statement is so apparent). I sounded shrill and angry, and it was really unbecoming. She kept crying, but calmed down a little bit temporarily, before having another screaming tantrum 10 minutes later because she couldn't have ice cream before leaving the park. I gave up listening at that point and just soldiered home.

Did I get what I wanted out of her? I'm not so sure. I snapped her out of her self-induced hysterics, but does that do any long-term damage? Will she use yelling to get her point across when she's with friends? Will I become the mother who loses her shit just because of a wee tantrum? What does that say about me?

It's a constant juggle in my brain and in my spirit of trying to give L the patience she deserves, the time she needs, the mom she craves, whilst also tending to what my beautiful new boy needs. My two beautiful creatures are dividing up pieces of me, and though I try and tell people I can do it all, in reality, my heart feels sad that I can't satisfy both of them equally.

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We had our first date night in a long time last night. And though I reluctantly left L and the boy with Nana, it was so good to put on some leather boots and a sexy short dress.

"Wow... I thought to myself who is that standing there..? You look really beautiful." he said as he strode up the stairs to meet me at the entrance to the subway.

He kissed me.

I blushed.

He held my hand as we walked to the theater.

We had a drink and talked... we saw a show, we talked some more afterwards, and he put his arm around me as we walked home.

Though sometimes it's hard stepping out of the house and leaving the kids for a bit, it gave me butterflies to feel his hand on mine and see in his eyes the love story that we're still writing.

*Luckily, this I can still pull off, to some degree, so at least that's one (vain) victory.

Humbled. And sore.

I am awed by my capacity for love. And adoration. And exhaustion.

I have had my soul destroyed by falling in love with a tiny new fragile little person. I feel protective over him, in a much different way than I ever did with L. (And ironically, he is NOT a tiny baby, weighing in at just under 9 pounds).

I have also had my heart ripped out from an awesome weight of guilt on my shoulders, seeing L's reaction to the new person. She's confused, concerned, protective of me, of him, of her father... she paces the room, not knowing what to do when the baby cries, because she's not old enough yet to know that she can't just run up to him and hug him. She pats him and then hangs back, waiting for someone to put him to the side so she can focus on playing with us. It devastates me.

I hold him as he sleeps, and she'll sit next to me, with her own bottle of milk that she's requested, and I feel that she's half with me, and half trying to be independent (maybe forced to be?) and distant so she can show me that she's a big girl now.

But she's still my baby. They'll all be like that until they're 18, I'm sure. All my babies. All my beautiful unique little creatures.

I'm sure I'm reading into it, and months down the line our new perfect will have emerged. But the sleepless nights at the moment, my sore body, my heart that is spilling over with love and fear and joy... all of this is a hard test of transition and balance for us.

But at the moment, I do not take for granted how I'm blessed. And the tears running down my cheeks are unmistakeably filled with love (though the exhaustion seems much more apparent).

The end... and almost the beginning.

Today is May 1st, a gorgeous, sunny and crisp day.

Two days ago, we celebrated 5 years.

Today we might be celebrating day 1.

Keep you posted.

Just us (well at this rate, I feel like I'm 3 people in one, so it's a big group.)

This weekend marked our last one as 3.

Lots of things are happening in the coming week(s).

I'm starting to get the dull, hazed, clumsy look of a pregnant woman now. It's as if a switch has been turned on (or off, really) in my brain. I'm clumsier now, more cumbersome. I'm walking slower, getting more Braxton Hicks (I call it the "bowling ball belly", because it feels like someone is stretching my skin over a bowling ball), and my hands, feet and face seem to be getting puffier. I get more out of breath when I run around after L, and it's frustrating. I know I should be relaxing, but if you know me, you know that that's a really hard thing to ask me to do.

He took a picture of me and L in the park this weekend, and holy shit, I look like I ate another person. He says I look beautiful, bless him, but I think it's because he's afraid I'll sit on him and break him in half. I feel so attractive and healthy and glowing... as long as I don't pass a mirror.

We went to the park. We did finger-painting. We had snacks. We hugged. We did IKEA-building (well, he did, really.). We organised. We cleaned. We laughed. We played. I had a few emotional-pregnant-lady meltdowns, but nothing that wasn't solved with a piece of chocolate and a hug.

It was a beautiful, poignant moment as a gang of three, before the new round of chaos, family and emotional whirlwinds.

I savoured every single second of it.

Adoration: Part 2

When I was young, I imagined him to be like my father. Tall, dark hair, funny, loving and kind.

In highschool, I had my fair share of boyfriends (though I use the term loosely because nowadays the stuff that kids do together is so much more, umm, sophisticated than what happened then). Two of them were my first serious crushes.

At college, I fell madly in love. Or, what I thought was love at that very young age. But whatever it was, it affected me pretty badly. Both in good ways and in destructive ways.

I moved to New York City when I was 22, to live the life of a singer/actress/waitress and then subsequently fashion journalist. I met and dated lots of men/boys along the way, most of them were good guys, but didn't tick all the boxes. I still had an idea in my head of what I wanted, and preferably, I wanted him to be British. Why? No idea. I just felt like I was destined to live there. Somehow. A small part was probably this thing I had for Colin Firth/Christian Bale, and I thought the perfect guy would have everything that I had wanted when I was a young girl, plus live in a country that I had always dreamed about. That was my perfect, and my friends always made fun of me for being so picky.

I met a guy. We had a long relationship. He was a good guy. Did he do "it" for me? Not entirely. But I got married because, well, that's what you do when you're with someone for 4 years, right?

Mistake. We both knew it.

Luckily, after a year of torturing ourselves in the marriage, we both recognised that we needed to split. And though it felt pretty bleak at the time, it made me who I am today. It happened for a reason. It placed me in a perfect spot on that evening in June, 2005, when I went out to a work dinner for my new job.

I met him. Him. He was it. I knew it. Very tall, achingly handsome, funny (and, yes, British)...and I felt like I knew him from somewhere, oddly. Really knew him. I shook his hand, and the rest of the evening became a blur of smiles, conversations, drinks and what ifs...

3 months later, we talked about marriage.

8 months later, he proposed.

10 months later, we were married.

Not a day goes by where I don't get butterflies when I see him walk down the street to greet me, with that cat-like, long stride of his. He still kisses me the same way, after almost 6 years together, like he did when we were dating. I love the way he looks at me from across the room, head cocked to the side, like he's trying to memorize that star-like freckle on my cheek. He still places his hand on exactly that spot on my lower back that he knows will make me blush.

I took this picture the other day, and through the tears filling my eyes, I was radiating with so much happiness over what our love story created.

I found him.

And through him, I found her.

Adoration

L is a bit fickle.

Unlike her father and myself, she likes her own space and isn't very touchy-feely. It tortures me sometimes, because we'll shower every part of her with kisses and she seems indifferent to it, and sometimes actively pushes us away if we're in "her space".

She's also quite tough on herself. If she falls and skins her knee on the pavement, she'll pick herself back up, kisses her hand with a "mwahhh" sound (as if to kiss the pain away by kissing her own hand), and runs off. If I ask her "are you okay?" she'll nod and say "yeah".

She does realise if she's hurt us (she's going through a hitting phase) and when she's scolded, because she says "sorry" and makes these sad eyes that break my heart into pieces, and then gives hugs and kisses, so I do know that she has a tender side to her.

I'm constantly amazed and equally confused as to who this little person is. She's a little like me in her open-mouthed wonder at little things, and a little like her father in her intensity. But 90% of her is completely unique and different, and independent. It makes me realise how quickly time passes in front of my eyes, and how I'm chasing her ever-increasing-in-height shadow down the path.

Yesterday afternoon, after being in the park all day in the sunshine, she was exhausted, so I sat her down on the rug and put on a favourite movie of hers and curled up behind her. If I'm honest, it was less of a way to calm her down and let her decompress before bedtime and more of a ploy for me to get in some time just watching her.

I curled up, making a C-shape behind her, whilst she sat in front of me by my chest, legs crossed, turning her head to smile at me every once in a while.

I let myself soak in the shape of her long limbs, the translucence of her pale skin showing her veins, the length of her eyelashes, the golden colour of her hair that shows just a hint of strawberry. I ran my hands down her back, amazed that it's not as tiny as I remember it to be. I wanted her to put her hand on my head, or my arm, and just stop fidgeting for a moment, wanting her to adore me like I do her. I know it'll come in time, but for now, I have to be sneaky and find these moments, where she's mine, all mine. And I get a second to worship her.

37. Tick tock.

It's starting to feel very real.

It's sinking in how lucky I am to have been blessed with a handsome husband who's my running partner in this crazy ridiculous adventure, lucky to have a healthy and very happy little girl that constantly says "mama" with pure adoration, lucky to have a job, a house, some pocket money to spend. I never want to take any of this for granted.

This pregnancy has flown by, and though I've stopped to take it all in, take in each little swirl of anticipation and fear and joy, take in how amazing I feel and how much I've loved this second time around even more, take in each kick and stretch that the little one does in its little place under my ribs... the time is unforgiving in how quickly it passes.

L is growing so quickly and constantly testing my patience lately, and like every mother, I worry that I let my frustration and impatience eclipse the amazing feeling of her little hand touching mine. It won't be so little and pudgy forever. I need to remember that. In the chaos that is about to erupt in our house in a few weeks, I need to remember that L will always have her place as my first. My beautiful, independent little girl. My baby. The one that had a bit of a rough start in the world the first couple days, but managed to kick ass and take names. My little travelling companion that never tires of looking out the window on a road trip.

My life, our life, seems to be exploding in each direction at the moment: business, toddler, travel, baby, finding a bigger house.. and we perversely thrive on that kind of energy. But there are moments where we have very little left to give and have to dig really deep to find some light and laughter. It's there, I know it. It just needs a bit of a nudge to bring it to the surface.

Maybe if I remember how much I need to be thankful for, and how to breathe in these beautiful moments... maybe, just maybe, I'll find a way to slow the ticking clock a little bit. Can't hurt to try.