little white truths

It's nearing the end of the month, which means it's time for the usual round-up posts and the first one I wanted to write was my monthly positives.

It's been a pretty tough month because my newborn boy has his days and nights mixed up - he sleeps during the day and then he's up all night feeding and wanting to play - so we're shattered here because there's really no relief from it. My toddler sleeps well at night but is up and super active in the daytime, and she's never been one for day naps so between her and her brother, they've got us covered 24/7. Argh! What do you do?!

You survive, I guess. Nothing else for it.

Thank god we moved house

This time last year, we'd been in our new house for around a month. It had been quite an exercise, selling our old joint and finally finding this one, with a six-month-old baby in tow who was going through the sleep regression that happens when they're that age.

But we knew that we'd need more space since our old joint was big enough for a marriage and no more, and now the effort has paid off because we're here and we've suddenly got this outdoors space that's been a god-send. I used to take the dog and my daughter to the park every day, but the double pram is heavy and hard to negotiate, and I can't chase my daughter around the dog park with that huge thing so my husband has been walking the dog in the evenings for now.

Long story short, my daughter spends her days in our backyard and she loves it - she doesn't need to go to the park every day. We didn't have much yard in our old place so lord knows what I'd have done to keep her entertained!

I'm facing Christmas with new eyes

I've hated the festive season for a long time. Bah humbug and all that, but I've long seen it as a time when the privileged get to enjoy their privileges (time off the jobs that they're lucky to have, money to burn on presents that no one really needs, families they must see under sufferance - but at least they have families), and those that aren't so lucky are reminded of this every time some idiot drives past with reindeer antlers on his car.

I still do feel this way and probably always will because I feel that the unlucky ones are forgotten at this time of year, but this Christmas, my brother and his family will be over from Amsterdam and my husband's mum and sister will be down from Mexico and Sydney respectively, so it will be the first time we're all together and I'm happy about that.

On top of this, it will be the first Christmas that my daughter and my brother's son will actually be aware of (they were too young last year), so I'm looking forward to making the festive season about them while still remembering that I'm lucky to have kids at all. Christmas should be a time to celebrate what we have, not to focus on what we want - because so many of us have more than we realise. That's what I reckon, anyway ; )

I've finished my first eyeshadow pan

This will sound a bit ridiculous to some, but I've been doing Pan that Palette since July (it's my first time doing this particular challenge) and I've finally finished my first eyeshadow pan. Huzzah!

Turns out it's a lot harder to finish an eyeshadow pan than you might think, or at least it is for me. Perhaps it's because I don't do strong eye looks and I also don't have a lot of lid space (I have hooded eyes), but it took me so long to finish this one pan and I had to double-duty it as a facial contour powder, so the fact that I've finally done it feels like a major achievement. Ridiculous I know, but thank god for small victories ; )

I haven't gone crazy with the festive releases

I had quite a few items on my seasonal wishlist and it's so hard to turn a blind eye to all those beautiful releases, but so far I've only bought the Hourglass Surreal Glow palette and I may well limit myself to that because I just don't need any more stuff.

Being restrained may be easy for some, but when cosmetics purchases are one of your few outlets (there's no time for anything else these days!), keeping your purse strings closed becomes harder and harder when the beauty community is rife with amazing new things. Fingers crossed I can maintain my halo firmly in position as we come into 2017 ; )

My daughter's (mainly) adjusted to the arrival of her brother

We weren't sure how Izzy would react to the arrival of her little brother, and to start with she wasn't happy. Who was this thing that had taken her parents' focus from her?! People kept giving her toys that looked like babies and she started bashing them up and throwing them away: 'No, no moh!'. You had to see the funny side but of course we felt for her too.

Now she's gotten over all that and she's started bringing him his dummy when he cries, and putting a blanket over him when I'm breastfeeding. So cute! She's still not sure quite what to make of him but she's accepted him as part of the household and I can't wait to see how their relationship grows.

In sum

That's all from me! I hope you've had a good month with plenty of positives to see you through to the madness of December and all that comes with the festive season.

Here's to finishing off 2016 with a smile and a bang : )