Melting moments and rare things

Hard to believe our daughter (still getting used to the idea) is one month old. The days and weeks have flown by, and yet we have been aware of every moment as it has passed (sometimes painfully). A is clearly not a great sleeper, although things are going very well on the feeding front. I suppose that balances out. There have been momentary meltdowns from all members of the family, right down to the cat, along with sweet moments when we have glimpsed smiles and laughed together, and other hours that have seemingly vaporised into nothing. Such is life with a newborn, when the days all blur into each other and you enter into this strange time warp.

We do get tugged back to real time several times a day by the need to maintain some sense of normal routine for the other youngster in the house. A youngster who wants to play and eat and read and draw and bake (and ideally not go to childcare, but the world, sadly, is not ideal). I'm all too happy to try to bake something every now and then, particularly if it involves playing with my new kitchen toy. So we have somehow found some time to do so:


Melting moments from Janet's wonderful collection of recipes at Eater (which has just moved to blogger- must update my side bar). I've blogged about these before. They are simple (especially with a stand mixer to do the hard work) and delicious.


And some Rare Things (as I like to call them, or Coconut Macaroons according to the recipe). Deliciously chewy cookies requiring only three ingredients, two minutes to mix and 10 minutes to bake. I used a Donna Hay recipe that called for you to simply mix together 2 cups dessicated coconut (I used shredded) with 1/2 cup caster sugar and 2 egg whites- there was no mention of beating the egg whites first.

To ensure that I could involve both my kitchen helpers, KA whipped the eggwhites to soft peaks first, then C poured in the caster sugar into the mixer for some more whipping, and finally the coconut was gently incorporated on a low speed (Yes, I have watched the DVD now, and am dreaming about one day making my own sausages as well as home made ice cream. May need to buy a bigger freezer first). Makes a fairly small batch (probably good for my waistline). You could easily play around with this kind of cookie- adding nuts, chocolate, spices, dried fruit etc. Hopefully these won't be so rare around here in times to come.

Same too for longer baby sleeps at night, and those sweet, fleeting baby smiles.

snatching moments in the kitchen

I cannot get over how much easier life is with newborn number 2, in comparison to life with newborn number 1. There are added complexities and demands to be juggled, but somehow we seem to be managing things OK.
It helps that my darling husband has taken over kitchen duties while he is on leave. He's doing a fantastic job at it too, along with the laundry and keeping the toddler entertained (Christmas Lego is helping with that). It leaves me free to deal with nappy changing, baby feeding and settling, plus napping myself.
Things are going so well that I'm having moments of lunacy.

Like when we went to the market last week and I bought 1.5kgs of cheap apricots thinking I could make some jam. After getting home and going what was I thinking I managed to muster up the energy during one of little A's naps and produced a delicious batch of apricot jam, albeit on the runny side- perhaps I should have used the thermometer like last year. (Recipe from Stephanie Alexander's "Cooks Companion")
And then I bought my birthday present.

A new kitchen helper (not that my other kitchen helpers aren't fantastic). So far it's made it out of the box and onto the bench. It may take me a little while for me to get around to making anything with it, but in the meantime I can daydream. Especially about buying the ice cream attachment to go with it.

Firstly...

The first week of the new year. (Happy New Year!)
Our first week at home as a family of four.
Our first week at home with a daughter, Little A. (Yes. A GIRL!)
The first girl born into my husband's family in known history (nearly 300 years on the family tree).
A singularly wonderful, delightful, amazing, astonishing, blissful, delightful, immense surprise to end the year with. (Such a perfect surprise. So glad we hadn't found out the sex. Although it would have saved hours of time deliberating boy name options. And I suspect we wouldn't have believed the doctors if they had told us we were having a girl. So many friends have been happily boasting "I told you so!")

The second time around we're coping with a tiny newborn much better. Much less anxiety. Much easier to accept the difficult moments (hours, days) knowing that whatever-it-is will pass. She's been a much better feeder right from the first attempt in the delivery suite. She's happy to nap in the sling. I am even coping with the influx of pink better than would have I expected. Must be hormones. Or the sleep deprivation.

So there is a second birth story to by shared here sometime soon. A good birth story, but with less knitting than the first one. When I find some time for blogging.

I will be sorting through the baby clothes for a second time, and I will be buying some new girly Japanese pattern books for the first time (to go with the lovely bundle of fabrics a wonderful crafty friend gave me).

In the meantime, I'm busy feeding, napping and nappy changing.  My darling husband is busy cooking, cleaning, and toddler entertaining. And we're all marveling at Little A's new presence in our lives.

[I've also changed my comments system back to Blogger. Hope that makes commenting and replying a bit easier in the years to come!]