After Anabelle

This will be my last post of 2011. Tomorrow we are travelling to a friends down south to spend New Years weekend. Something we could not have entertained doing last year. 

We started our Christmas Traditions. The ones for Alexander. On Christmas Eve night we dressed him in new Christmas pyjamas, we helped him hang up his stocking and read him 'The Night Before Christmas'.

Christmas morning we got up and opened his stocking presents in bed. We came downstairs and surrounded him with his gifts. Infact the presents in the photograph are only about half of what he received; by the time grandparents, aunties and uncles had given too he really was super spoilt. 

Too much probably; but where is the harm? The joy of being able to buy for our baby this year is immeasurable; its no wonder we got a bit carried away.

Christmas Eve: The Night Before Christmas bedtime story with Mummy

His current favourite is definitely his new playmat. As soon as he was led on it for the first time he was cooing away, flinging his arms and legs around and haphazardly knocking the hanging toys and taking great delight from it.    

There is so much else left to explore too, when he has finally opened it all. At this rate it could very well be January before we've managed it! Just as well his birthday is 10 months away; I think it will take us until then to play with everything from Christmas! 

Happy Christmas beautiful boy; even though you'll never remember it I hope you had a very special day. Despite your mother's mixed emotions; you've no idea how precious you are and how precious it was to be able to spend Christmas this year with you. Our baby, on his first Christmas. 

The build up to and few days after celebrations and important dates at the hardest. Over the last 18 months I've learnt to expect the actual day to be easier than the days either side. Yesterday was no different. 

We are quickly approaching the midnight hour and the beginning of Christmas Day. This year the build up to Christmas has been so bittersweet. We are of course very excited about Alexander's first Christmas; there is a new joy this year. But it doesn't stop the hurt that Anabelle is not here for this Christmas, last Christmas or any Christmas. The familiar bewilderment and pain is ever present. 

Last year we created traditions for Anabelle, the rituals of remembrance and inclusion for her that saw us through. Made her first Christmas bearable. I believe I described last Christmas as painful but perfect; after the horrendous build up to Christmas day, for the most part it was quiet and peaceful. We got through it because we had a plan. 

The plan for Anabelle stands this year, as it will every year. 

For Anabelle we will always put up a little pink tree in her garden and her special pink tree in our home. Each year we will buy a new angel decoration to add to our tree. Each year we will have a 'Anabelle' personalised cracker and namecard to be part of our Christmas table, a candle will be lit for her throughout dinner; a symbol that she is always included in our family.

Tomorrow morning before we join my family for dinner we will visit our beautiful girl. Last year was particularly beautiful with the snow on the ground. Magical somehow. Last year we took bubbles, this year we have two little presents to open while we are there with her; a 'That's Not My Angel' book and her new angel tree decoration. Presents that she can then share with her brother. A present that will hopefully help him to feel some connection some day. 

But this year, alongside Anabelle's Christmas, we also have to create new traditions. Traditions for Alexander too. Traditions for our whole family. 

For Alexander we started tradition making last weekend when we took him to see Father Christmas the weekend before Christmas. Every year I want to take him somewhere different to see him, somewhere magical and exciting.

Today he dressed up as Father Christmas, I think I want Christmas Eve to be fancy dress day, at least until he feels he is too old to dress up. Tonight Alexander went to bed in new Christmas pyjamas and he listened to me read him 'The Night Before Christmas'. That will be our Christmas Eve tradition.

Tomorrow he will start his first Christmas Day in bed with us opening his stocking presents and cards before going downstairs to see the magic of the presents under the tree. And finally each and every year he will have a special new outfit to wear for Christmas Day. Tomorrow he has a little top to wear that says "My First Christmas" 

These are going to be our family traditions. This is what Alexander will learn to expect from Christmas; both his traditions and Anabelle's. I hope when he is grown he will look back on our family Christmas's with fondness. I know I have many happy memories of my childhood Christmas. 

We used to climb in Mum and Dads bed and open our stocking presents. Then we would wash, brush teeth and sit on the stairs waiting for everyone to be ready before going into the living room altogether. I'll never forget the magic that was created walking into a living room awash with gifts. We were 'spoilt' - I want to create that same magic for Alexander.  I wish I could create it for Anabelle. 

This year I feel like I'm living two Christmas's, at two very different ends of the spectrum. 

Anabelle's Christmas. Alexander's Christmas. Tomorrow they will have to meet somewhere in the middle, but after last year I kind of expect the build up to be worse than the actual day. 

I kind of expect it to be perfect in the only way it can be, just as it was last year. 

And so, as I approach Christmas Day in a very different place to where I was last year, but in so many ways exactly the same, I want to wish all my readers a happy and peaceful day. 

My handsome little man is now two months old and continues to be a delight every day. He is becoming more and more aware of his world all the time; now his little eyes follow me around a room, he stretches his head right around to look at one of us, he notices when something passes by him. 

When awake Alexander does not stop moving. His little arms and legs are all over the place, a proper little wriggler. He loves floor play and is getting used to being on his tummy for longer periods of time. Already trying to lift his bottom when on his front so I think he going to be eager to get on the go as soon as possible! A proper little nosy boy and into everything! 

Alexander's favourite activity, other than being cuddled by Mummy all day of course, is bath time. He smiles, coos, kicks his legs, even tries to roll on his side in his bath seat. He loves being sat up. This boy is going to love his Bumbo as soon as he is big enough to use it - he just wants to be able to look at everything. 

And his favourite person? Definitely Daddy! He saves all his best smiles for his Daddy! I'm positive his eyes brighten up a little bit when Jon comes in from work and he realises Daddy is home again. 

Ah we're just so in love with him. Alexander brightening up our lives, ending 2011 with rainbow colour in it. 

This week I've a huge wobble, as I've already said.  The whole breast-feeding issue came to a head, I still need to resolve my feelings on this on another blog another day. Anabelle's year and a half birthday has got me, that is today. The Christmas build up has got me,  but I at least have the knowledge this year that the build up is likely to be far worse than the actual day.

I used to concentrate on every 21st - counting the months during her first year. Of course I still think of her every 21st, I know how many months old she is; like I know Alexander is 2 months old (although I'm still counting his age in weeks really!) But as I predicted after a first birthday the months become less significant; when asked how old you can say they are one year old, not X months old. Instead the half years become the new significant. Well that is how it seems to me anyway. 

Today our daughter is/should be 18 months old, a year and half old. Another milestone. The day she becomes a toddler.  Yesterday I once again walked down the baby clothes aisle in the supermarket and mentally picked out what I would buy for her now she is getting bigger, should be getting bigger. Jon says I should stop tormenting myself with what should've been and concentrate on what is. Concentrate on Alexander and what I can buy for him.

I know he is probably right; but Xander is my son and not my daughter. It is different.

I still hurt everyday for Anabelle, but it isn't the constant all-consuming type hurt. It's there in the background. Granted; it catapults to the front frequently, like with the supermarket baby clothes yesterday, but I go about most days without crying, in fact sometimes a whole week. Meltdowns in comparison to a year ago are few and far between. Well, averaging monthly apart now at least.

If someone had said to me 18 months ago, or even 12 months ago, I'd be in this place today I wouldn't have believed them. I didn't believe anything would ever be 'better'. Today I know things are never going to be better, not like they should be; but I'm willing to accept this might be as good as it gets, and some of it is very good. I have a good marriage, a good husband, a beautiful son.

December is just a harder month than most.

Happy one and a half birthday my beautiful girl. I would love to see how you've grown.

An unexpected pressure is building. A few times over the last few days I've been aware of a distant panicky feeling, anxiety rising. Its been a long time since I've had to take deep breaths to quell a meltdown. It seems its getting noisier. 

I seem to be approaching a wobble.  I'm suddenly not feeling totally myself. 

Yesterday we visited Anabelle. All week I'd been worrying about her tree, a nagging suspicion that something wasn't right. I knew I had to check on it before Christmas day. We got there and there was no tree; cue tears from me. I found it destroyed in a ditch and soaked in mud. It had to go in the bin. It was nobody's fault, just some shocking UK weather, but it seems to have prompted the nearing wobble. 

I'm anxious that there is no sign of Christmas in her garden; I need to get up there and decorate it again, but the weather and time is against me. I feel I'm neglecting her because Alexander takes up so much of my attention. 

And now in all my excitement about Alexander's first Christmas I seem to be hitting a downer. A downer because Anabelle is not here. Scratch the surface of me it seems and her glaring absence this Christmas; like every Christmas to come, boils over. Suddenly Christmas is feeling pretty huge again; and not in a good way.  Now I have to reconcile Anabelle's absence against her brother's first Christmas. 

And I will do it. Because Alexander's first Christmas matters. And I will do it, because her garden will be Christmassy again; and then I'll feel much better. Like things are ready for them both. I'll have done enough for both of my babies and then I'll feel more like myself again.

But please give me a few days - this week there is her 18 month birthday to get through too - another milestone, the moment my beautiful girl should've officially (in my mind) become a toddler. 

'Rollercoster' doesn't come close does it.