Home » New Year

Category Archives: New Year

It’s About That Time Isn’t It?

Posted on by | 6 Comments
A Danish Christmas tree illuminated with burni...

Image via Wikipedia

We’re about 6 weeks into the new year, the middle of February. Most of us are back at work or whatever our usual daily grind routine is. Long behind us now are thoughts of presents & stockings*, jolly fat bearded men dressed in red**, tinsel, baubles, decorated trees, reindeer, wall-to-wall chocolate, competing with the neighbours to be the first house to simultaneously drain the National Grid & be seen from Space, fighting with drunk Aunties who insist of cheating at Cluedo (I mean really: who cheats at Cluedo?!)***, & dreams of a White Christmas.

Life for most of us has pretty much returned to normal after the mad excitement (or otherwise) of the holiday season.  Plenty of time.

When / if we think about it some of us may be pleased & annoying, others of us disappointed & annoyed.

What am I on about? New years’ resolutions!

By now I reckon those of us who made any will have figured out if we’ve been able to keep them or not.

I, as I often do, found myself doing it backwards****. I didn’t resolve to do anything differently, but found myself doing things differently anyway & kind of realised I was acting out my non-resolutions. I then wrote about them, as you do.

So how am I doing?, I hear you cry.

I’m still not active on twitter, apart from posting links to blogs (yes, mostly mine). TICK

I’m using facebook more. Although not much more. And the main family members I have who are there just don’t use it that much! HALF TICK

Blogging. Most of any spare time I’ve had to myself this year has been spent blogging. I’ve found, read  & subscribed to loads of great blogs.  I’ve taken part, both in posting & reading / commenting, in great linky blog-hops like The Gallery & Silent Sunday. I’ve Gok Wanned my blog, & learnt a few tricks of the trade. Although the main reason I blog is for my own enjoyment, it’s nice to know that others appear to enjoy it too, & my posts have had many more views & comments than last year, & more subscribers. (Thank you). I managed nearly a post a day in January, although I wasn’t aiming for that. I think then that that’s a TICK

I’ve realised though that I simply can’t maintain this pace! I’m pretty sure that in 1 weekend I read & commented on every single post in that week’s Gallery & Silent Sunday. Some of you may have noticed that I’ve been commenting on blog posts from a week ago & longer: that’s because I’ve fallen behind in the blogs that I subscribe to, & I do like to read every one. And that’s just the email subs, I’ve hardly looked at my Yahoo Reader! (I vastly prefer subs by email, by the way; if the option is there I take it. I find RSS annoying by comparison). Also: I’m tired. And there are some signs of writer’s block. And I have a sore arm. And… (internal censor: Shut Up!)

The upshot: something’s gotta give. I can’t stand to be anywhere near my TV in case I glimpse its “Why are you neglecting me; I thought you were my friend?!” accusatory stare. And I miss playing Guild Wars.

I will definitely Carry On Blogging though, just maybe not as fervently.

So, all in all, I reckon I get a ‘B’ for my early-year non-resolution-keeping exam.

And you, dear reader…?

* Well, except it was Valentine’s day yesterday…

** ditto…

*** Sorry, getting a bit too personalised there

**** Well, it was – oh, never mind


Related Articles

Some Babies Are Bigger Than Others

Posted on by | 7 Comments

We went to our first Baby Sensory of the new term today: it was a slightly surreal experience.

Last term we weren’t able to go to the one closest to us, this term we are: walking distance, so we can take the buggy & lose all the hassle of driving & car-seats. Also, it was a taster session so there were lots of parents who’d never been to one before (including another Dad – yay!).

Probably as a result most of the babies there were very young: y’know, the really small ones who can only lie on their backs & look very cute, sometimes smiling sweetly. Before they cry / fall asleep / soil themselves /all 3.

The weird thing is: that’s how ours were when they did their taster session last term. It seems like yesterday! And yet it seems a world away now.

It was really strange seeing ours as some of the oldest & biggest there, amidst all those tiny little babies. They’re so mobile now that a lot of the exercises, obviously being mostly aimed at the little ones, where a bit beneath them. They were a little bored! They just wanted to jump & crawl about & explore & play.Which they get to do at halftime, by the way: there are loads of great toys there.

Seeing them so active, animated & yes, noisy (in a happy way, mostly), amongst all those tiny little immobile babies, just lying there on their backs trying to make sense of it all, of anything, was quite the reality check.

There was a row of three babies of around 7-9 weeks in front of Jake & me: all lying facing the same way, all with their heads turned towards us staring sweetly & intently at this strange big baby noisily bouncing up & down. It would have made a fantastic photo, but I was a bit loath to ask.

It was a bit like when you start High  / Secondary School at the bottom rung: “Turds” (for ‘third’ former) as they were affectionately known in my school days. Getting told to pull your socks up if they’re down, or down if they’re up etc.  Then you suddenly wake up to find yourself in the 6th or 7th form & realise you’re at the top of the pile. So of course you go around persecuting Turds, telling them to pull their socks – you get the idea.Not that I’m suggesting that our little angels do that, of course. They play Nice :)

Ellie especially has spent a lot of today standing up unsupported & unaided for increasing lengths of time, before she falls on her bottom. It won’t be long before they’re walking – and then the fun really starts! Or so I’m told…

They’re growing up – fast!

Daddy! We're holding up the wall!!

 

Related Articles

I am Resolved

Posted on by | 14 Comments

New Year’s Resolutions. I don’t make ‘em, as I don’t keep ‘em.

I only made 1 last year:  to make no New Year’s Resolutions. Which I immediately failed, obviously.

This time of year there are inevitably lots of blog posts of New Year’s Resolutions, & I’ve read quite a few good ones.

This one though, ‘My Online Resolutions‘,  from the excellent Him Up North’s blog made me realise something: I seem to be carrying out my New Year’s Resolutions without actually having made any.

“Huh?!” I hear you say. It’s OK: I get that a lot.

Well, I’m doing things differently this year. And it’s because I’ve decided to do so. I guess you could say I’ve resolved to do so.

I haven’t actually sat down, as I have done in the past, & said to myself: “Right: this is what I must do with my life this year”. That does, however, seem to be what is happening in practice.

So here’s what I’m doing differently this year, at least in my online life:

1) Twitter. I’ve always had a love/hate relationship with Twitter.  “I love it; it hates me”? Maybe! When you have responsibilities though you can have too much of a good thing. Twitter is fabulous fun. I’ve met so many fantastic people there, we’ve shared jokes, sad stories, music, films, I’ve laughed, I’ve cried,  participated in & even started hashtag memes, & generally had a great time.

‘Time’. There’s the rub, as my mate Bill once said. Working from home, & at present being pretty much a SAHD, (someone really should come up with a better acronym for stay-at-home Dads…), Twitter is always there, always available, on my office PC, on the laptop, on my iPod Touch. And there’s always something happening. It is a constant distraction; & I’m easily distracted. With baby-care taking up so much of my time I have to make the most of it to do what must be done. So often Twitter has eaten up too much time. I’ve tried just lurking during the day, the ‘no-typing’ rule, but that only had limited success.

I believe it’s known as ‘Twittaddiction’.

In the evenings I also found that a lot of the really fun messing about also resulted in my not getting on with other interests I’d had lined up for whatever spare time I’ve had.  It’s very easy to get carried away, especially after dark. All work & no play may make Jack a dull boy, but all play & no work can make Jack a bit over-excited ;)

So I’ve had to re-evaluate where my priorities lie, & as a result I’m taking a break from twitter.

I’ll still be sending tweets from my blogs when I’ve made new posts, auto-tweeting music links from my iPod, & my automatically-produced newspaper is still about. But that’s it.

Will I go back? How long will I be away? I don’t know.

Will I miss it? Yes: everything about it. What I’ll especially miss though is the daily contact with the so many terrific people I’ve met there.  So to all of my friends there: Thank You. For Everything.

I am still about online though, which brings me to:

2) Blogging. I’m doing more of it. I’ve been looking for & have found some great blogs, especially ones similar to mine: Dad blogs, parents of twins blogs, & have linked to them in my ‘Blogroll’.  I’ve subscribed to more blogs, I’m commenting more. On my own blogs I’m posting more, & linking up with other blogs & blogging resources.

And you know what? It’s great fun. It’s sociable, it’s a creative outlet, it’s therapeutic, I’m learning about other peoples’ lives & loves – some similar to mine & others very different  – & in more depth. In short, it’s enhancing my life. And that can only be a good thing.

3) Facebook. Yes I use it. I’ve never enjoyed it as much as Twitter. I have a much smaller circle of friends there, & I want to keep it that way: quality not quantity. So I’m using it more. And that leads to:

4) Family. I want to keep in touch with my family more; not easy when most of them live so far away. Many of them use Facebook. I have noticed that some of them even have telephones. And houses, with addresses attached. And emails. All of which I want to use more.

Ultimately that’s what this is about: doing the right thing by my family, especially for the sake of my beautiful twin babies. And of course being nice to my wife. I’m sure she must read this sometimes… ;)

So: keeping my New Year’s Resolutions without making any? I reckon I could be on to something here!

The Lady & the Twit: My New Year’s Eve

Posted on by | 4 Comments

New Year’s Eve. Jake was asleep upstairs with his Mum, but Ellie was restless. At first I resented being deprived of my annual date with Jools Holland, such a lovely man, such great company. I still aspire to play the piano even just a little bit the way he does.

With my eye on the clock as it veered towards midnight, I was wondering if my restless daughter would deprive me of the Hootenanny moment when the clock struck midnight.

Then I realised how dumb I was. I was being anxious about not seeing in a new decade alone with just the TV for company! It was one of those “Does the word ‘Duh’ mean anything to you?” moments.

I couldn’t want for better company. She wasn’t crying, nor unhappy. She just wasn’t sleeping.

So for 2011 we looked outside at all the fantastic local firework displays & I opened the window a little bit so we could hear them too. She loved it & so did I. She was fascinated: looking this way & that as each spectacular display was let off.

I realised that far from being deprived I was actually a very lucky man to be able to see in the new decade in the company of such a lovely little lady, the Lady Eleanor. I mean, how can I resist this face?:
An old New Year’s Eve tradition seems to have been replaced with a new one. And I’m not entirely unhappy about that.  Maybe in years to come the twins will want to watch Jools’ Hootenanny with me? I hope so.

So how was your New Year’s? Did you party like it’s 1999, see it in quietly or just go to bed with a nice cup of tea & a biscuit? Were you as big a twit as I (nearly) was, or did you manage to ‘count your blessings’?

However you saw the new year in, or not, may your 2011 be even better than your 2010.