I’m not, generally speaking, such a fan of writing bullet point posts. However, having been away for the best part of the month I feel like it’s a good way to get us all up to speed so that when I refer to things in later posts I can go “you know, I mentioned it in that bullet point list” rather than have an explanatory aside.

Or, I’m feeling a bit blogging lazy. Here goes.

• We (by which I mean my mother, with my dad, Ramona and me on board) drove to Greece and back. Ash joined us by plane for the bit in the middle. We went to Athens and Kefallonia. The drive had its high and low points (I’m planning posts on the practical elements for BitchBuzz), but overall it was worth it and we all enjoyed the sun and food!
• Ramona grew a tooth! It’s still working its way up, but now looks like a large grain of rice has settled on her gum. As if overnight, it solved a lot of her feeding problems and she’s now happily settled on finger foods with three milk feeds a day. Now to switch the milk to cups, which I’m hoping won’t be horrendous as she’s been using her cup independently to drink water since she was seven months.
• I just had to interrupt this as Ramona had somehow managed to get hold of a bottle of Bio-Oil, open it, and spill it all over herself.
• Books are her favourite thing ever. She loves Winnie the Pooh and the Trouble with Bees so much I can recite it from memory without the book and she grins at all her favourite bits before they happen. A book will keep her occupied longer than any toy.
• Oh, actually, Peekaboo is the best, best thing ever. And when I say “Ramona play Peekaboo!” she ducks down and pops up, giggling hysterically and mumbling “pah!” “bah!” or “ee-bah!”.
• I haven’t run in a month and feel thoroughly guilty. I’m also slightly amazed at how much weight I haven’t gained eating everything and hardly moving. Even in the sea I didn’t exactly do much swimming!
• And speaking of the sea, Ramona adored it. She cried for about half a minute the first time she went in from the shock of the cold water, but adjusted far more quickly than we did. The second time she just complained for a few seconds. The third and fourth time there wasn’t a peep, just excited leg kicking! After that she started to get a bit irritated by the ring she was in and if we’d had more time I’d have graduated her to arm bands. Time to start taking her swimming. I meant to ages ago, right from when she was born, really, but somehow it just didn’t happen.
• I’m back at work on 1st August, so I’m starting the process of getting Ramona settled into nursery this week (we have a mixture of nursery and grandparent care set up for her). I think she’ll be fine, but obviously it’s not so easy to detach myself, even if I am raring to get back to doing what I do. Being a community manager is basically aces, and I’ve missed it. I know that once I’m at work I’ll get so wrapped up in things it’ll be like I never went away, and there’s lots of people I’m looking forward to seeing. I’m just a bit bowled over by how quickly it’s all gone!
• So yes, my ‘baby’ is almost a year old and won’t be a baby for much longer! It’s both slightly sad and very exciting. I’m looking forward to first words, first steps (I don’t think that’s very far off) and lots of other brilliant firsts, but I’m also stunned that I’m months away from being mum to a toddler.

I think those are the highlights. And now, I’m off to another child’s first birthday party. Because that’s what parents do at weekends.