Dear Isaac and Flora You are 4 and 1 (Flora, you will be 21 months old tomorrow). I have a window today where the worlds of nap time and nursery have collided, and instead of having a doze myself, or catching up on emails, or reading, I am writing this. I was sitting here […]
Musings on Motherhood
My Night Owl
She calls out for me with a shriek that yanks me from sleep, scattering my forty winks. She’s sitting up in her cot, arms outstretched. Hold me please. Hair sticking up in tufts on the top of her head, big eyes blinking. I pick her up and cuddle her, but she flaps around in my […]
Now She’s One
A year now. Days that have passed in a blink; like the pages of a book left open in the wind. I cling to the here-and-now, before it’s another do-you-remember-when. Now she is one and he is three. The nights are long but I know this time is brief and oh-so-precious, and I try, in the […]
Dear Flora
Dear Flora This is the first time I’ve written about you since you were born, 11 months ago. I don’t have a record of your early days like I do for your brother. I don’t have pages after pages of journal scribbles and regular blog posts to record all the milestones. You haven’t had hours of my […]
Hello from this mother…
As this is my first post on my new blog I wanted to say a little hello and tell you a bit about why I’ve started This Mother. I’m Emma, living in Aberdeenshire, and still adjusting to life as a working mother of two. I first started blogging after I became a mum to Isaac in 2012. […]
Where I’ve been…
There was a post on our stay at the fabulous, family-orientated Crieff Hydro. There was a half-finished piece on lovely Lunan Bay in Angus. There was another on Easter egg hunting at Crathes Castle just outside Banchory. Since the last post here in February, there have been a number of draft posts that I simply […]
Your Working Mama
What you know about me at a year and a half: I am mama, I like cuddles, I love books, I love nothing more than to cuddle and read books with you. You know my smile, my laughter, my smell, the rings on my fingers, the lines etched beside my eyes, my not-so-in-tune singing. You know […]
The Game I’ll Always Play
Your sudden cry has pierced an arrow through my dreams (like every other night this week, or so it seems). Bits of shattered images rattle in my head as I shake the weariness that clings to me and stumble to your bed. I don’t know what troubles you at this hour (I don’t think you […]
Friends
We greet each other with a grin (hello), shuffle closer (how are you?) and embrace (so nice to see your face again). ‘ooo’. ‘meh’. ‘mmm’. We build sounds together in a tower – stack them up, click them any way that fits, then rearrange again. String them together and pull them along, take them apart […]
The Move
Recently your world has changed – tipped upside down, then rearranged. Same room but not. Same cot but different ceiling overhead. Same things but in a different space. Confused, you stared – where is this place? The house we left was our first home. You’ll have no memories of the farm next door, the […]