Meabh's christening!

At long last we managed to get the Hulls (well, most of them), the Fergusons, some godparents (most of them) a priest, another priest and a church all in the same place at the same time. On September 13th Rosa Meabh was christened (or baptised, or, from Meabh's point of view, held awkwardly over a bath while 4 pints of cold water were poured over her head).

Meabh seemed to enjoy getting dressed up in her fineries, and the wonders of the sat nav miraculously guided everyone to the church on time. Father Gerry did a grand job of explaining what the whole thing was all about, even managing to bring over an impressively large picture of Jesus which he'd borrowed from a friendly parishioner's house in Ireland to explain what we were all there for. His slight mishap with the sharp candlestick was resolved by Mum's ever-resourceful handbag and some plasters. Although Meabh didn't exactly 'enjoy' the experience, after a mere 1 hour 48 minutes all was well, and we all emerged into the daylight again ready for some lunch.


Huge mountains of food and far too much bubbly then ensued, and everybody seemed to have a good time (especially Marie-Claire's Uncle Paul who snuck off to the pub to catch the second half of Liverpool beating Man Utd 2-1).

Here are some pictures of the day, including some great ones of Meabh in her super-hero cape, and one of the three us (with a very tired-looking Mummy and Daddy!) at the end of the day.

Nic and Doug's wedding

We've just been in Peterborough for the weekend for Nic and Doug's wedding. After a two-week build-up of stag dos and hen dos, the big day finally arrived, and my big sister married my mate Doug at Orton Waterville church on Saturday. Marie-Claire had made at least 372 hats (including two for herself), the best of which I think was Meabh's big pink flower. She managed to keep it on for at least 20 minutes, before getting cross and wriggling out of it - just long enough for us to take some photos to embarrass her when she's 18.

The day went really well, thanks to loads of carefully laid plans (and patios), and an amazing set of caterers who seemed to spend most of the afternoon doing the washing up. Well done Dad for the speech, and Meabh says sorry we missed it, but she really enjoyed being wheeled around the streets of Eye by her slightly-over-dressed parents trying to get her to go to sleep. In the end, the succession of almost indistinguishable bungalows and front gardens lulled her off and we were able to head back and get a few glasses of bubbly with everyone else.

It was great to see everyone, and to swap lots of baby stories, tips and suggestions with all the other Mums and Dads - something I never imagined I would enjoy doing until 4 months ago!

Here are some pictures of the happy couple too - currently on their Honeymoon in Cuba and having a great time no doubt. Congratulations to em both!

Morecambe and Meabh

I got soaked today coming home and York was plunged into chaos with roads closed and mini flash floods springing up all over the place. To cheer everybody (and me) up, here's another video of Meabh enjoying the bouncer (taken at more or less the same time yesterday, lest you all think we dress her in the same clothes everyday -tempting though it is). In this one, she gets a good jig going with the feet, or maybe she's tap dancing? It must be all those Morecambe and Wise videos we watch.

As we speak, Meabh is going back in her bouncer as she refuses to sleep so we thought we'd experiment in wearing her out. We'll let you know the results... The next step will be one of those perspex hamster rollers.

24Legs...Relaunched (and bouncy)

24Legs are back - relaunched, reloaded and, er, refreshed from our little break from blogging. The last two months seem to have been a blur of bottles and babygrows, and in the meantime at least two of our legs seem to have grown bigger and longer. Meabh's insatiable appetite seems to be getting her somewhere and she's growing up super fast.

Last weekend, we collected a baby bouncer from Granny and Grandad Hull and have then spent much of the last two days laughing at our funny daughter working out how to bounce up and down. I'm sure we should be looking on admiringly, but frankly she's just funny. After bouncing for about 10 minutes she then gets bored and frustrated and the more she gets restless the more she bounces, and the more she gets frustrated - endless hours of fun for us! Here's a new-fangled video of her bouncing, and a good ol' fashioned snap.

Meabh is now exactly two feet long, and according to the latest measurement weighs in at a hefty 14lb 9oz. Hopefully the baby bouncer (and the doorframe it's attached to) will survive the onslaught a bit longer...

In other news, Mr Jelly and Jamjar have taken to sleeping out all night now - dirty stop-outs. I'm not sure what they get up to but they come in starving in the morning and covered in vegetation that doesn't seem to be evident in our garden anywhere.

Paranoia.........

Recently Meabh has been telling me that she feels a "presence" - as if she is being stalked by something. Personally, i think she's imagining things!

The egg mystery is solved

Phew. More dastardly tactics by the Hull Hens have resulted in a drying up of the egg supply in recent days. Either Meabh has secretly mastered the art of walking and has been collecting and then eating them during the day when I'm not here, or the chickens have been trying to create a little brood by hiding their eggs again. Sharp eyed 24Legs readers will note that a clutch was found (and recovered) by the pond 2 weeks ago, however, they've turned to new corners of the garden. The trouble is there are now about 48 corners in the garden as the nettles and bindweed take over the nether reaches and create stretches of jungle. After 4 days of searching over the weekend, a long period of surveillance yesterday morning (in the rain, in my dressing gown, I might add) eventually detected Bernadette (pictured) skuttling off behind a pile of paving slabs and an old patio door. I had to wait until the rain had stopped to shift all this out the way, but there lay an impressive nest containing seven very shiny well-sat-on eggs. Unfortunately for Bernadette, these were never destined to hatch little chickens and are now in our kitchen.

In other news, Meabh continues to guzzle huge quantities of milk, and has been doing lots smiling. On occasion, and in the right light, she might even have started laughing. She'll certainly need her sense of humour living in this house.

Meanwhile, Naomi claims that the blog has yet to feature a picture of her, so here's a picture of her in our garden a couple of weeks ago (with Chris and Eddie), about to bravely head down to the village hairdressers for a trim. Rather her than me.

Meabh socialises (sort of)

Meabh had the Rimes-Dougalls to visit this weekend, and at last met the last (or first) of her cousins. Here's a picture of Olivia holding her, with Meabh looking a bit uncertain about the whole thing. Her only-slightly-older cousin Alexander showed off by being extremely well-behaved and smiley all weekend, while Meabh decided to see how loudly she could cry on Saturday night. She managed an impressive 1048 decibels, for about 90 minutes, and then decided that she'd demonstrated her mightily impressive lung power for long enough and then had a good long kip. Phew!

Olivia and I battled through the end of the garden and finally found where the chickens had been secretly laying some of their eggs. We then mounted a brave assault on the nest, risking life and limb through the nettles and across the pond, and smuggled three eggs away before they noticed.

Here are some pictures of the Rimes-Dougalls and Meabh...

Lots of visitors!

Sorry we haven't reported on blog duty in a while. Life seems to have become very busy all of a sudden, with me back at work and lots of visitors coming to stay. Meabh's had a very sociable time, with Granny and Grandad Ferguson last weekend, and Granny and Grandad Hull during the week. She's really looking forward to the Rimes-Dougalls coming this weekend, so at last she can meet the final cousin - the oldest one meets the youngest one.

Meabh's been having her passport photo taken this week. Not a straightforward task as she wasn't keen on complying with the government regulations of eyes open and mouth shut. I think we got there in the end. Here's one of the attempted pictures, with Meabh doing a very cool 'black power' salute.

Meanwhile, the other 18 legs continue to thrive, with the cats catching doormice and frogs in the sunshine and the chickens laying eggs like it's going out of fashion. Here's a rare picture of Mr Jelly inside the house, looking a bit grumpy.

The Hulls come for a visit

This time, it was the turn of Meabh's uncle Simon and auntie Lorraine to come for a visit, with Freddie and Romy. Meabh slept for most of the afternoon, and then when we all squeezed on to the sofa for a family picture Meabh cried for just long enough for all the cameras in the house to run out of batteries, and was then completely fine. She seems to have developed an aversion to cameras, just like her Mummy, so here are some pictures of Si (looking like a thirty-something Dennis the Menace), Romy and Freddie. It was great to see them all. It's Romy's birthday tomorrow, so I had spent the morning attempting to cook a big pink birthday cake, complete with hundreds and thousands and twelve candles, only to discover that I hadn't cooked it for long enough. Disaster!

Uncle Tim and auntie Toni are also down for a visit from Edinburgh too, so we'll see if we can extract some pictures from Tim's camera of Meabh.

She's three weeks old today, and has now met three of her four cousins - just Olivia to go and then that's a complete set...

Meabh and Mummy go to the hairdressers

Meabh and Marie-Claire had a girly day today, going to the hairdressers. Though tempted to have a full colour and bubble perm, Meabh opted instead to sleep throughout the whole visit, leaving the hair treatment to her Mum. After that, they went for a walk, visited their friend Guy, and went home.

Rumours that the chickens had escaped again proved unfounded when they were discovered at the very end of the garden. After all that excitement, the ladies retired for some more sleeping. Phew!

Here are some pictures from the weekend, including photographic proof that Meabh might actually enjoy having a bath now...

And so, to Morrisons

Bravely, we strapped ourselves in for our first visit to the supermarket with Meabh. Alas, crushing disappointment descended as we realised that all the baby and toddler spaces were full. For years I've wanted to feel smug, pulling into one of those nice wide spaces right next to the door of the shop, as everyone else struggles with the 'normal' spaces 2km away - but it wasn't to be.

So it was that we headed off into one of the spaces for mere mortals, and then discovered why those big wide spaces were invented. After assembling a rope and pulley system with several winches to get Meabh and the pram out of the car, we stared perplexed at the range of 'special' trolleys for babies. They generally look like terrifying torture devices, but after seeing some other babies using them, we might be even braver and try one of those next time...

Down the pub again

People will be gossiping about that Meabh Hull, down the pub again yesterday. This time, with Granny and Grandad Hull for a swift half before dinner. They've been visiting this week and getting to know their latest grandchild (in a long line of at least 432 grandchildren, at last count!). She seems to sleep peacefully at the pub (or in fact anywhere outside the house), and then wakes up nice and refreshed ready for a night of shouting. She wasn't toooo bad last night, although decided that 5am was a perfect time for us all to be up trying to work out why we were all up so early. Having tried all the usual solutions, I resorted to taking her downstairs to help me make a cup of tea. As usual, a nice cupper solves everything and she went to sleep - for another 45 minutes at least.

Anyway, here's a nice picture of Meabh with her Granny, and a close up too. She really seems to have changed over the last week or so. Now that she's got over the traumas of being born, and having rashes and blotches all over the place, she's now turning into a really beautiful wee thing (not that I'm biased...)

Meabh meets the Fergusons

It was a whirlwind weekend, with a besotted Granny and Grandad Ferguson and Auntie Fiona flying over from Ireland to meet Meabh for the first time. She was very excited about the visit, and fell asleep especially - she was snoozing away happily when everyone arrived, and missed all the great presents they'd brought over for her.

Next day, we packed Meabh off in her pram for a long walk round the village, while the two of us finally caught up on some sleep. There was no rest for Meabh though - as soon as she got back she discovered that the Posh had just been promoted to League One, and was jumping up and down with excitement. She's really looking forward to next season now.

On Sunday, Meabh persuaded us to take her on her first outing to the pub. At one week old she was allowed in, but stuck to the soft drinks (largely milk, in fact). There were lots of admiring looks from the other pub-goers, and she behaved herself very well.

After managing to separate Meabh from her Granny, we then waved everyone off to the airport..

Worn out

Mum and Meabh are worn out after a busy day getting ready for more visitors. But after an afternoon nap, both were raring to go: Meabh had another bath - which she enjoyed just as much as the last one, and then there were lots more pressies for her to open.

Meabh meets the family

Yesterday, Meabh met Granny and Grandad Hull for the first time, and auntie Nic and cousin Alexander. As you can see from the pictures, she was bowled over by the experience, and could hardly contain herself! She says thank you to everyone for her presents, especially all the clothes as she's going through around 12 outfits a day at the moment.

It was nice to finally get the chance for a photo of the three of us too. Tonight, the Fergusons arrive from Ireland. Meabh tells me she's very excited about meeting them.

I lost my husband to a woman in a cable knit cardi.........

Well, it was bound to happen i suppose...she's younger than me and she's prettier than me - not so sure about her taste in hand knitted cardigans though! Dan is completely besotted, they seemed to be joined at the shoulder as you can see from piano lesson No.1 - bit ambitious i think....but you know Dan!

All the parenting books advise that the daddy should not be made to feel left out after the birth - not much chance of that here....i just make the milk!

...but not dry

It seemed like one of those 'parent for the first time' things to do - taking our new daughter out for a walk in the pram. We got her all dressed up, worked out (eventually) how to work the pram (sorry, 'travel system'), and then struck out on an adventure. However, our 10 minute walk around the village soon became very wet when the heavens seriously opened. I'm sure we looked like terrible parents as we wheeled Meabh along in the pouring rain. She didn't seem to mind though, and remained fast asleep throughout the whole experience...

And then came the bath - also for the first time. I'm sure I read somewhere that babies love having baths. Unfortunately, this one didn't, and instructed me in no uncertain terms not to do that to her again, thank you very much.

Home

After lots of waiting around for the right paperwork to be done, I finally brought Mum and baby home yesterday afternoon. At last we had the space to think about names, and we've decided to call her Rosa Meabh (pronounced 'Maeve' for all the non-Irish out there!) The two names seem to go well in that order, although we'll call her Meabh, rather than Rosa, day-to-day.

Here's a picture of us strapped in and ready to leave the hospital, and then two of Meabh once she'd arrived.

Initially, she seemed quite impressed by her home and new surroundings. However, by midnight she was fully awake and ready to try out some full-blown crying. She must have been very amused as we ran in all directions for the next few hours trying everything we could think of to settle her down.

Eventually, by 4am, all was peaceful and quiet...

Day Two

We're unlikely to keep this up for the next 6,568 days, but for the first few weeks anyway we'll try to put up some pictures of our new daughter every day. She's already changed, and (thankfully) looks a bit less battle-scarred than her first day.

She (who remains nameless) spent the night tormenting her mother by crying loudly and demanding to be fed. She must be a persuasive character, as she managed to wake up all the other babies in the ward and prompted them all to demand the same thing. I'm not sure mum (or any of the other mums) got much rest. She seems to be louder than all the other babies - I hope that's a good sign.

I swanned in at lunchtime to find a quiet, contented baby, building up some strength ready for the next night of shouting. Anyway, here's another picture - a bit fuzzy as it was taken on a mobile phone.

Two more legs...

At long last, after a mammoth struggle lasting a whole week, Marie-Claire gave birth to our daughter last night.

If it was the raspberry leaf tea that did it, it took its bloody time. It was horrible seeing the one you love in pain for that long, but the whole thing was worth it in the end.

A strapping great 9lb 15oz girl arrived at 1.55 this morning, all happy and healthy and shouting with life. Here are some pictures we took today - both Mum and baby are a bit bashed about, but doing well.

The picture at the top shows her about 40 minutes after birth, after carefully being dressed back to front in her vest by Dad.

Here's Marie-Claire and her sleepy daughter sizing each other up, and Dad trying not to drop her as she yawns at him.

Now the tricky task of coming up a name for our new set of legs.

Raspberry leaf tea

Well, the due date was yesterday, so we decided to be drastic and reach for the raspberry leaf tea. Powerful stuff, apparently, so Marie-Claire sipped cautiously at a cup while I started the car and got ready to phone the hospital.

It looks like we might need a few more cups though. As you can see, the effect hasn't exactly been dramatic. The bump remains firmly in place and I've switched off the car. For now anyway...

The bump cometh (almost)...

Here's Marie-Claire doing some waiting, while drinking tea and eating one of our endless supply of hot cross buns. Does anyone want one by the way? We seem to have about 400.

The baby's due this Friday. If it's not here by noon, we're planning on a very hot curry and some trampolining...

Still no news...

Happy Easter everyone!

Still no news on the arrival of the bump. We went to see the midwife this week, and all seems well. A week to go until the 'due date', so I guess we'll have to be patient and wait for it to decide it wants to make it out into the real world.

Meanwhile, the spectacular snow this morning seemed to completely fox the cats, who were not keen at all on venturing out, but didn't phase the chickens at all. They struck out bravely from their coop as if 4 inches of snow was part of their normal routine.


After an abortive attempt to put in an appearance at mass this morning (we got the wrong time), we spent most of the day trying to execute an extremely detailed recipe for hot cross buns, and waiting...

Here goes...

This is our blog. It's for our family and friends to look at so they can see all the funny things that happen in our little house. We have a new member of the family on the way who will no doubt have a lot to say here as he or she grows up. In the meantime, we'll put plenty of pictures up here for everyone to see and will tell embarrassing stories for as long as it's too small to blog for itself...

You can help by posting comments and pictures too, so eventually we'll have lots and lots of happy things to look back on, all those years ago in the spring of 2008.