Being a mum at one

I toyed on whether to publish this post. Not for fear of being judged by others, but fear of being judged by myself for being honest.

Since turning one it's felt like Colby-James has overnight turned into a toddler. He's learning how far he can push me and what feels like to me, understanding what really is 'right and wrong' now.

The past two weeks have been a rollercoaster of emotions, when it's good it's good, when it's bad, well, lets just say I start searching for his receipt and unarchive the Ebay listing for him.

Colby has always been rather vocal, to be honest he doesn't stop, he'll chat to anyone and anything (the hoover, a chair, a bottle of shampoo to name a few!) Right now as I am writing this it's 6:30am, I can already hear him in his cot talking to his teddy bears, it sounds like he's saying SOWWRI! SOWWWRI, maybe they've also lodged a complaint of noise disturbance?

It's all cute and heart warming, but I'll set the scene from yesterday. I'm sitting waiting for a blood test (already feeling anxious), the room has about 20+ people in, Colby is fed, watered, happy. He's got all his toys with additional snacks, but no, oh no, that's not enough, instead he wants to roar, not cute baby dinosaur roar, but tyrannosaurus rex roar, until he goes purple in the face, can't breath, starts coughing/crying and then repeats x5. 20 minutes later all is forgiven as we're having cute cuddles and heading off to the local soft play, somewhere I can go to lay face down on a soft surface whilst my child safely throws himself down slides!

Once home, the dinner plans go out the window, apparently starters aren't his thing, and if they can be rocket launched at head chef (me) to make his disappointment known of how long he's been waiting for his main, then they will be! We then breeze through dinner, my darling, cute, well-behaved little boy eats the majority... until like a switch has been flicked he picks up the left-overs and starts hurling them, bowl and 4, yes 4, baby forks are also darted.

I'm now sitting here feeling silly I let these situations make me want to cry because they are actually so trivial and Colby is just entering a new phase of learning. I like to remind myself when he used to vomit on me as a newborn, he wasn't doing it on purpose to upset me, he was learning.

Sometimes it hits 6pm and I look at myself, my clean clothes are now banana mushed, pesto soaked, my eyeliners gone south and my hair resembles a birds next. The house looks no different to how it did when Ben left this morning, yet what he won't realise is I've wiped and hoovered the floors 5x and replaced every item Colby has moved.

I think this post was more of a self-help message to myself! It's just a phase, he isn't broken, and yes, it's ok for me to feel the way I do. It's making sure I manage them in the style I want to parent. For me it tends to be a calm walk out the room, a little tear, some deep breaths and re-entering like nothing ever happened, usually when I walk back in the room Colby's toothy smile lights up, my heart melts and I'll swoop him up and let him cover me in pesto kisses.

I also want to give a little thank you to my '999' instagram mums. Always there in the DM's, never judging.

Reality of this photo, Colby dunking a rice cake in my coffee