31+4 and first day of maternity leave!

Ah this is all very nice. I'm on the sofa with a warm pain au chocolate, Country Living magazine, Classic FM playing and nothing to do until 2pm.

I certainly want to make the most of this time. I have already washed, ironed and put away all the baby clothes we have bought and been given. I have done a bit of batch cooking and have frozen one beef casserole so far along with some portions of lasagne. My hospital bag and the baby bag is packed. The nursery is ready for action, the dining room is set up for changing the baby when I am downstairs and is a great place for the pram to be out of the way. The moses basket is set up in our room with the monitor and the house is organised beyond all belief! My mum put 'strategies' in place so that the house works for us in a more efficient and effective way.

What I do still need to do is make some Christmas decorations! Christmas for A and I will definitely be at our house this year if not for the rest of my family too unless I am in labour!

I have decided to only plan one thing in my diary a day so that I have plenty of time for just resting and sleeping if I need to. I'm not going to have this time again so I need to make sure I don't over do things now just because I have lots of free time. It's not free time, it's planned in rest time!

This morning I had a friend from church here who is a La Leche advisor on breastfeeding. It was such a useful time as she was able to go through what was normal and also talk with me about the ways in which I can try breastfeeding if my joints are in a flare. It is lots more technical than you first think. You can't just ram the baby on to your breast! She reiterated what I had already been thinking about most parenting books..... Burn them! I am increasingly coming to the conclusion that I need to trust my own intuition and instincts and I need to remember that my baby is clever and knows when it needs feeding or changing. I need to become adept at reading my baby's signals.

I have looked at a number of parenting books that give you routines and advice that seems counterintuitive to what I feel you ought to do. I don't doubt that these books are helpful to some people but I don't think that I want to use them to rely on. I would hate to be in a position where I am holding my baby in one hand, and the book in the other and so busy reading the book and clock watching that I don't 'read' the baby's signals! Also, the baby won't have read the book!