Drawing Breath

Just nine days until my Dan grading, and now my left knee is so painful that I can’t put any weight on it. I’m icing it, resting it, and pinning my hopes on a fast recovery. I need to be able to start training again by the end of next week, or I’m in the [...]

All Edward eats is milk, so how on earth does he manage to produce orange pooh? And I don’t mean a bit orange. I mean bright, lurid, visible-from-space orange.

Having a baby just a few weeks before my Dan Grading is certainly proving to be something of a double edged sword. On the downside, getting to the training sessions three times a week is difficult; Edward keeps us very busy, especially at night, and a continued lack of sleep isn’t a recipe for feeling [...]

Edward seems to have a poorly bellybutton at the moment. It’s a little swollen, and has a bit of an odour to it (nice, huh?). Elaine phoned NHS Direct this morning, and they advised us to sluice his bellybutton with warm, boiled water, dry it with a lint free cloth (not the cotton wool we’ve [...]

After a quick trip to the Registry Office this afternoon, Edward James Smith now has a shiny new Birth Certificate. As we were in town already, we dropped in to Full Fat to introduce (read: show off) Edward to the folks I work with. As always when he meets new people, Edward was fast asleep, [...]

Today saw our introduction to the health visitor, who came to check on Edward’s progress, and make sure that we are all doing well. She was very helpful, gave us plenty of useful reading material, and reassured Elaine that she and Edward are doing extremely well. Elaine has been struggling a little with breast feeding, [...]

When Edward was born, the paediatrician who examined him told us that he had a loose hip joint, and might need a splint to hold his legs in place while the joint formed properly. This was obviously a major worry, and we’ve been fretting about it for the last week or so. We had to [...]

Well, there have been no more unexpected expulsions for the last twenty four hours, so we think it’s safe to assume that whatever upset Edward’s stomach has passed through one way or another.

Today was our first trip with Edward to see the doctor, after he was sick a couple of times this afternoon. Elaine was worried that she was overreacting, but she phoned the midwife and they advised us to get him seen by the GP just to be sure. The doctor we saw was great. He [...]