Break ins, Baby Dragon, Husband Man and due date...

Ethan often says I have lovely ability to always see/assume the best in the world that sometimes borders on naivety. For example I posted our address on Facebook the other day thinking that it was okay as no one would come to Spain to stalk us or whatever, Ethan immediately convinced me it was a bad idea and I deleted it. There are lots of other examples that admittedly I can't think of right now so I might add them as I think of them... But I generally like to disagree with Ethan's opinion on this however over the last couple of days I've realised he might actually be right!  

A few days ago Ethan and I were having lunch and we heard this strange bang sound by our front door and then it happened again. Ethan went to the door to check it out and had a look through the little eye hole to find a man crouched by the door! He covered up the eye hole as he saw/heard Ethan go to the door and then RAN down the stairs. When we looked to see what he was doing we discovered holes that had been drilled/hammered into the door and door frame in two out of the three areas where the locks were on the door! Safe to say we were pretty freaked out and have started checking the door at most noises now..

The good news is we have the world's best landlord! They arranged for a new (VERY sturdy) door to be put in and are paying a LOT of money for an alarm system to be added as well! We would have been happy with just the lock being replaced but they have gone above and beyond!

However it did make me realise that maybe the world isn't quite as much of a nice place as I thought it was. I thought we were completely safe in our lovely apartment and would never have imagined that someone would try to break in! The damage that was done to the door suggests that it was done over a period of time rather than just the other day that made us wonder if the person that had done it had been watching our comings and goings so as to be able to 'work' undisturbed. In reality that probably isn't the case but it has made me very aware of the information I put online, particularly with having a blog. I use to think the whole thing with having pseudonyms for family members names was a bit over the top, especially for me as the majority of people that read my blog are people that know me well anyway so when Baby Dragon was born I was going to use his name on blog as I just didn't think it was a big deal. But now I think why take the risk, espeically not with our beautiful Baby Dragon! So post birth he will remain being called Baby Dragon and Ethan from now on will become Husband Man, which is a phrase I've used for a while, there is no reason behind it other than it just came out one day (it was actually sweet husband man, but that's a bit gushy to be using all the time here...) So I'm going to have to go back through my old posts and change his name in them all at some point.

In other news it's my due date today. No need to ask if I've had the baby yet, I'm not planning on keeping it a secret from the rest of the world, no news means there is no news...    

The final countdown!

Our due date is a week today!! It still doesn't seem real, I think it's because it's something so life changing that I just can't imagine until it happens as it is going to be COMPLETELY different to anything I have ever experienced in my life before.

I had a dream last night that he came and it was so wonderful and cute! He was the smiliest little baby you've ever seen :) It made me even more impatient for him to come! That said I think I'm starting to get a cold, Ethan has had manflu for the last week and I'd managed to completely avoid it and now he's been better for the last 2 days I'm starting to get it! Doesn't really make much sense, but it would be better if that cleared up first over the next couple of days then Baby Dragon arrive. No one wants a new mum or baby with a cold!

In the last week I've been craving chocolate and general baked things like brownie and tiffin like nothing else! I think part of the reason is that I feel I should make the most of indulging now and then when baby dragon comes I can be super healthy, then indulge again at Christmas on all the wonderful British things that I have been missing out on! Either way, I've eaten a lot of chocolate this week! 

Other than my high chocolate consumption life has been pretty uneventful, no 'I THINK I'M GOING INTO LABOUR' moments recently. I've been doing quite a bit of walking in the hope that it will encourage Baby Dragon to come but no success yet. We are going to the Valencia Open 500 tomorrow, an ATP tennis tournament which we're massively looking forward to so maybe the excitement from the matches might get him moving... We cannot wait to finally have our little baby!!

We went to a little cafe last week and enjoyed a little montaditos (small sandwich thing)

Not quite chocolate, but still scrummy!

A baking nightmare!

I have a new blog! It's new and beautiful and 100 times better than this one but I'm not going to start using it until after Baby Dragon is born, you'll understand why when I do start using it. I'm also still in the process of transferring all my old posts on to it so it's not quite ready yet.

My reason for mentioning is that when Ethan started designing it for me (he's a very talented man) I told him when we moved to Spain I would write a post each week featuring the recipe of something I'd baked. However, this definitely hasn't happened. Baking is a nightmare here!

One problem with baking is the fact that we don't have any weighing scales here and because we are only here for a short amount of time I don't see any point in buying a set that we only have to leave behind anyway. This has led me to using CUPS when cooking! I feel this goes against everything I have ever believed :l But I know it's only temporary at least...

Another problem is that it's borderline impossible to find the same ingredients in Spain that you get in the UK. It took two attempts to buy yeast and even then I think it's a slightly strange version, yesterday we ended up buying some liquorice tasting liquid rather than golden syrup and had to buy hot chocolate powder instead of cocoa powder as that's all they had. It's all quite distressing really!

The main issue is our oven doesn't work properly! When you turn the main oven on the grill automatically comes on too so within no time at all you have a burnt top of whatever you're cooking, and an underbaked middle and bottom! This has led to a number of quite burnt dinners to start with, but we're slowly getting accustomed to it. However it does mean that it is impossible to actually cook anything like cakes and meat as the middle would just be completely raw still!

The first lasagne we cooked with a burnt top!

Due to these very unfortunate and distressing problems, baking and I have had to come to a compromise. But thankfully we have had some slight success despite these terrible afflictions... Yesterday we made tiffin which didn't need to use the oven at all (you can find the recipe here), and brownie works quite well as the middle is suppose to be gooey! (Although I do have to cook it for a couple of minutes in the microwave too).

Lets hope Italy is a little more baking friendly as I want to bake!

We think we know best...

Prior to moving to Spain we spent a long time looking at flats online and found quite a few. The one that stood out the most to us was a very reasonable price, seemed close enough to Ethan's university and had EVERYTHING included like towels, bedding etc. Because there were quite a few flats available and it was quite a big decision we decided we should pray about whether that flat was the one we should rent. We did that and both felt good about it so we bit the bullet and paid the deposit and first months rent etc. 

Once we had done this different things kept on coming up that made me worry that maybe we had been a bit hasty with our decision and should maybe have looked around a bit more. For example, it was on the fifth floor with no lift, which I thought being heavily pregnant I might really struggle with, church was a good 45-50 minute walk away which again I thought would be pretty tough and it was quite along way from the beach (certainly not walking distance) which seemed quite a shame when living in a city with a beach! Also we didn't even consider which health centre we would come under, where the closest shopping centre was and whether we'd be able to cope with having to walk everywhere if these things weren't close by.

It turns out my worrying was silly, we had prayed about it and had felt that we should rent that flat. Although we hadn't taken everything into consideration, Heavenly Father knew what we would need when we were here and had us covered far more than I could have imagined.

- The 4 flights of stairs are really not a big deal, they make your legs ache a little bit but even with my extra baby weight that I'm carrying I can still go up them all without stopping and my body has got a lot more use to them.

- There is a bus stop 30 seconds from our house that goes straight to where the chapel is which is amazing, and we have actually walked to church twice which is quite a pleasant (though long) walk.
- There are only two trams that go directly to the beach, as it happens one of these trams has a stop at the end of our road so we can go straight to the beach really easily!
- The health centre is two streets behind us (a 3 minute walk), with two of the lovelies midwives who love taking all of our many questions about how giving birth works in Spain and ask if I have understood what they have said to Ethan in Spanish.
- The hospital we come under is the newest in the city and is therefore one of the best, and they also happen to have a British midwife who works there, so our midwife at the health centre has said they will arrange for me to have her if she is on duty when I go!
- There is a taxi rank right next to our flat with at least 3 taxis permanently waiting, so we know we can get a taxi to the hospital as soon as we need to.
- There is a Mercadona (A supermarket about the size of your typical Aldi) on our street and a big shopping centre with a Carrefour (the continental Tesco equivalent) 15 minutes (10 for Ethan) walk away that has a big variety of shops like clothing, homeware, sports, food etc.
- The flat is big enough that my family of 5 were able to come and stay with us for 6 days and it wasn't cramped at all and they all had their own bed (except poor Pete) and more of our family and friends are able to come and visit us over the next few months and have rooms to themselves! 

In conclusion we had no idea really when we 'booked' our flat just how perfect it was going to be for us here, but Heavenly Father knew our needs. I'm so grateful that we are able to pray and get answers to our questions and that we have a Heavenly Father who loves and cares about us so much and takes care of our needs often before we even knew what those needs were!

The beautiful sunset from out kitchen

  

Two and a bit weeks to go!

I've not written a blog post in a little while, mostly because I have about 10 things I want to write about and I couldn't decide which to start with first... so I didn't start with any!

So I thought I'd do a short and sweet one instead. This Friday will mark the two week count down to baby dragon being born! How crazy! Part of me thinks where has the time gone and the other part thinks two weeks still feels ages away. That said, when we were at our midwife appointment last week Ethan said we had three weeks to go, to which she replied 'Or one, it would be quite normal'. Admittedly I'd love it if he decided to come this week, I feel I've done my fair share of waiting now, although seeing as both Ethan and I were 10 days late I'm preparing myself to go over due. The exciting thing is that in Spain they induce you after a week of being over due rather then 12 days in the UK (from what I remember), so at least we don't have to wait as long as we might have done back in the UK.

Over the last couple of weeks I've been convincing myself that I'm going into labour. The other day my back started hurting like I use to get with period pains which is apparently a sign of labour for some people and I was like 'I'M GOING INTO LABOUR!' and then it died down and that was the end of that excitement haha

So I currently have nothing to report on any baby news other than he seems just as happy and fidgety as ever, lets hope he decides to make an appearance soon! (Ethan and I decided this Friday would be great then Ethan wouldn't have to miss any lectures for the first couple of days, although I don't think babies really take convenience into consideration when they decide to arrive...)

                                                            A little bit of life at 37 weeks :)

Are we too busy to notice the beautiful things in life?

Ethan and I went to Madrid this weekend in celebration of his birthday. We only saw a very small amount of the city but it was amazing, the buildings are beautiful and the plazas (squares) were filled with entertainers like in London which was such fun!

With the heat and being 35 weeks pregnant, we took the occasional little break to sit down and rest our (my) tired feet. Whilst walking around the city we came across a group of four men playing the violin, keyboard, cello and double base. Together they played well known classical pieces which sounded beautiful so we decided we would have one of our little breaks and enjoy the music. We ended up staying for over an hour! (We probably would have stayed longer but they finished playing).

While we were enjoying the music Ethan and I also watched the different people that went by and both noticed something interesting. There were lots of families with young children that walked past and almost every time a young child would walk past they would slow down and only turned away from the musicians once their necks could not turn back enough to see them. Often however, the parents didn't seem to notice the child's reaction, let alone notice the music. This was the same for the majority of adults, they didn't seem to notice the beautiful music at all as they were too busy getting on with what they were doing (shopping for most people). The children, though being very young (often around 2 or 3) seemed to notice that something beautiful was being created by those musicians.

The difference between the children and adults got me thinking, I wonder if we allow ourselves to be so busy that we don't appreciate the beautiful things that our around us. Ethan and I were in no rush and the young children were not concerned about quickly going from one shop to the next. There were also a number of older people who would stop and listen for a while. 

I wonder if the busy lives that we lead in this generation have caused us to 'tune out' the beautiful things that the world has to offer, particularly with the distractions of mobile phones etc. I wonder if we have taught ourselves to get on with our hectic lifestyles rather than to slow down and be able to open our eyes and ears to all the beautiful things that we are surrounded by but don't let ourselves appreciate. I wonder what things I've missed out on that could have enriched my life just that little bit more because I was too 'busy' to take the time to notice it. It reminds me of the article I read* about a professional violinist who busked in disguise in a busy American metro. Normally people would pay a lot of money to attend his concerts, however out of the 1100 people that walked past him only 7 stopped to listen to this FREE performance. I bet there were a good few people who kicked themselves for not stopping to listen to him once it came out in the papers. It just goes to show what we miss out on when rush from one thing to the next. I know I'm going to try and take life a little slower (or maybe stay taking it slow, pregnancy seems to do the slowing down for you) and let myself appreciate the beautiful things the world has to offer :) 

* this is the article http://www.theguardian.com/music/tomserviceblog/2007/apr/18/joshuabellnoordinarybusker

This is a big post office apparently!

Us enjoying the music

Baby on a budget - maternity clothes

I don't like spending money on clothes, they always seem far more expensive than they're actually worth which is why a lot of my clothes are things that I've bought in sales. Call me cheap but there is something very satisfying about knowing that some of your favourite outfits cost less than someone else paid for just a top.

So pregnancy and a growing belly potentially posed a problem for me as maternity clothes are even more expensive than regular clothes yet I'm only going to wear them for like 6 months! However over the last 8 months of being pregnant I've discovered ways of having clothes that fit without having to break the bank, so I thought I'd share them :) 

1. Just because its not a maternity item doesn't mean you can't wear it whilst pregnant. 

In fact the majority of my every day clothes that I have worn throughout being pregnant have been clothes I already owned that happen to accommodate a big bump (right now I'm wearing all normal clothes just with the addition of a belly band). I actually haven't bought a single maternity specific top, although I did buy a top that was a slightly bigger size that I saw in a sale, I didn't need it but it was pretty :) 

Again, no maternity clothes, only a
belly band. I've the had shorts since
 I was about 14!

None of these are maternity clothes, just stretchy!

2. The essentials
In my opinion there are only a couple of items of clothing you really need in maternity size. The first is a belly band, it meant I could wear any of my normal trousers whilst having a big bump, and I'm still using it now at 8 months pregnant! (There is also something very liberating about walking round with your trousers undone and no one else knowing...). That said, a pair of maternity trousers or two are definitely nice to have, they are so comfy! With being pregnant over summer and in Spain I decided pretty quickly that I would need some cooler clothes than trousers (we've been in Spain nearly 3 weeks and I've only worn trousers twice for midwife appointments, (I didn't fancy lifting up a dress). So for me, and anyone else pregnant when it's hot, my essentials have been a couple of dresses, but again these don't have to break the bank if you check out point 3. Likewise if I was pregnant during winter a jumper or two would probably be my essential rather than dresses. I also thought I'd need things like a maternity swimming costume, turns out my regular one still fits fine (it's just a bit more effort getting on and off!). Another VERY important essential is a couple of maternity bras, my ribs would have died without them and they are 100x more comfortable than underwire bras when pregnant! 

Maternity dress, turns out I don't have a good photo of my favourite dress.

3. Maternity clothing still have sales! 

My two favourite maternity dresses I bought in the sale for literally a quarter of the price they should have been! I also got my favourite maternity trousers in the sale too. The only difficulty with shopping in the sale is that they are very time specific, which is where a little forward thinking can come in handy. We started 'trying to conceive' in January, the same time a all the big sales, so I thought why not have a look at some maternity things in which I found my 2 favourite dresses. There is always the risk of buying things in advance that you'll go off them or you'll buy more than you need etc. I guess it's all a matter of being realistic about what you'll need and not going crazy just because its a sale.

Maternity dress that was in the sale

Favourite maternity trousers for £10! (not that you can really see them very well)

4. You don't have to get maternity specific clothes.

With many clothes, particularly tops, you can just get a bigger size than your pre-pregnancy size and they fit over your bump a treat whist costing a fraction of the price! 

Admittedly before writing the post I thought I had more points than just 4, but they are 4 quite useful points in my opinion. They just go to show that being pregnant doesn't have to cost the earth. In a few months time I may do another 'Baby on a budget' about things you need to buy in preparation for a baby as that is something that people go way over the top with when they don't need to, however I figured I should probably wait until baby dragon arrives otherwise I will probably end up adding to it or changing it slightly. So you have that to look forward too! ;)