I Am Woman, Hear Me Kick Butt

Renee BartonLeave a comment

Recently I have found myself being amazed and inspired by all of the strong women I have crossed paths with.

I’m not surprised by any means that the world is full of amazing, talented, strong women. But since I began my Kangatraining journey, I have been exposed to more of them than usual.

During the week long course in Melbourne a few weeks ago I was struck by the diversity and talent among the nine other attendees as well as the presenters, all experts in their fields.

Among the other mums, some of whom I was lucky enough to connect with on a personal level (it’s so hard to make friends as an adult!), there were some incredibly smart and capable women. From backgrounds including teaching, engineering and medical professions we all had one thing in common. An overwhelming desire to be with our babies. Not one of them saw becoming a Kanga Instructor as a ‘step down’ but rather as an opportunity.

I know I certainly see it that way. As well as all the obvious perks of being able to have my baby with me while I work, it also scratches my entrepreneurial itch.

I have been wowed by other entrepreneurial women as I met with the owners of venues for my classes. Again they were strong, smart and talented women kicking butt in the business world.

I think even now, especially among men, a woman creating a small business is seen as just that; ‘small’. But I assure you it is anything but! With the stats about small business proving that many fail in the first few years, it proves the hard slog that is, starting and building a successful small business.

And I must say, mums are nailing it. There is nothing like the dread of leaving our little ones way before we are ready to get the creative juices flowing. And now our world is full of awesome ‘mum-preneurs’ kicking some epic butt. And my amazing mum is no exception. She has been running a successful home-based business for as long as I can remember. And although it hasn’t always been smooth sailing, sometimes she needed to hold a job on the side, she has never quit when the going got tough! My sister has also started a successful small business and now my sister-in-law is going into business for herself. Goes to show what a good example can do!

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The best part is that even if you have the desire to go into business but have absolutely no idea what to do, there are loads of successful platforms out there already that you can tap into.

Anyhow, I digress. My point is, women are awesome (as are the men that support them)! So thank you to all the wonderful women out there for inspiring me.

Keep kickin’ butt!

x

Footage Friday: 7 Month Milestones

Renee BartonLeave a comment

Okay, so it’s Saturday but better late than never right?

Jesse’s seventh month was quite eventful with two of the most adorable little teeth you’ve ever seen making an appearance as well as mastering how to sit up on his own.

We had a few hiccups whilst recording the video but hey, they do say never work with babies or animals!

Enjoy.

A New Year, A New Adventure

Renee BartonLeave a comment

It’s hard to believe but the first month of 2016 is almost over. I know, right!

It may seem like the year has taken off and left you somewhere around December 27th last year but don’t fret. It’s not too late to plan your year and get back on track. Don’t let another year just slip by leaving you wondering when time started to go by so quickly.

Already, this year is not what I had expected. After 9 months of maternity leave I should have been returning to my job this week but instead I am embarking on a new adventure and starting my own business as a licensed Kangatraining Instructor. The successful boutique consulting company I worked with for the last five years are closing their doors to allow for it’s people to pursue other opportunities. Including me.

As fate would have it, I had already started down the Kangatraining path and was planning to do both part time when I found out there wasn’t going to be a job for me to return to. Strangely enough I didn’t freak out. I strongly believe in the mantra ‘everything happens for a reason’. And thankfully I have a super supportive husband who also didn’t freak out and has been nothing but positive and encouraging.

I have found that women don’t need the support of their man to be successful, but it sure bloody helps! Guys, you might think your lady is a super star capable of anything she sets her mind to, but have you told her that lately?

Anyway, as I type this I am gearing up to take my instructor exams and putting in place all the finer details to get this new adventure up and running. And I can’t help thinking about how often thin threads can completely change our direction in life.

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One minute I am spending 40 hours a week sitting in my home office in front of a computer screen… okay, let me digress for a minute and address some of the working from home questions that have no doubt popped up in your mind…

Yes, I worked from home. Yes, I often worked in my pyjamas. No, I never worked nude or whilst in bed. And yes, I may or may not have taken the odd afternoon siesta on the lounge, particularly while pregnant. And while I’m on the topic of working from home, whenever I talked about returning to work after having a baby everyone would say “oh but you work from home, how convenient, you won’t need day care”. Seriously?? I don’t know about all of you other mums out there but I can barely get my hair brushed or the dishes done let alone have a productive work day when home with my baby.

Now, where was I… Oh yes, one minute I’m spending 40 hours a week in front of a computer screen (working very hard), the next I have a baby who requires my attention around the clock and doesn’t like it very much when I sleep and now I’m about to become a fitness instructor (I know, I can’t say it with a straight face yet) where I get to play with mummies and bubbies and live out my dream of being a (sort of) dance teacher.

I feel so lucky to have found something that allows me to be with my baby whilst contributing to our household finances AND combines my love of dance and fitness with my passion for baby wearing and helping other mamas.

So, my point is (if in fact there is one amongst all of this sleep deprived rambling) if January has slipped past you, stop right now and set yourself a goal for February. As big or as small as you like. But don’t let this next month be just another 28 (or is it 29?) days of the year. It is never too late to change direction… get back on the wagon… or insert other witty cliché here.

Dare to dream

x

 

 

So sleep regression is a thing?

Kaine Barton3 Comments

So, sleep regression is apparently a thing? A thing that happens to babies!

I never knew this…

I know about it now though. Not because I’m losing a lot of sleep. I’m losing some, but not a lot.

But I know about it mostly because poor Renee over the past nearly two weeks constantly feels like she has been run over by a truck. And she certainly isn’t shy when it comes to letting me know about it.

So with that, it would appear that Jesse is currently going through the 8 – 10 month sleep regression cycle. It’s common. But it’s tough.

Our once (fairly) good sleeper, has now turned into a monster when it comes to sleeping through the night. Monster is a strong word to use. But you get the drift.

Jesse had almost gotten to the point of sleeping through the night, waking maybe once or twice for some boob and then going back to sleep. Now however, after we think we’ve finally got him down for the night, he will wake up nearly hourly. But he doesn’t just wake up… he wakes up screaming and crying!

I hear him on occasions and it will wake me up. But poor Renee, is the one getting up to him to give him boob to calm him down. To give him cuddles to comfort him. To put him back to sleep only for her to have to get up again in another hour and do it all over again.

I know what you’re going to say, “Why don’t you take over for a night? Give Renee a break?”

I would… but it’s hard when Renee is the one with the boobs and that’s the only thing that’s going to calm him down at 3 am in the morning!

So with all that preamble, what I do want to say is this… Renee, I think you are amazing!

I think it’s amazing that you get up to him all night every night without wanting to wake me for help. I think you’re amazing that you can survive on so little sleep throughout the day without much complaint. I think you’re amazing for not blaming Jesse through this rough period because like me, you know he can’t help it. He’s just developing.

I think it’s amazing that you are able to do this night in and night out, when I would most likely have already cracked. I think that you’re an amazing super mum!

But I wan’t you to know that I am here for you. You can call on me for help. I want to help. Even if that’s just taking over Jesse duty throughout the day so that you can have a rest.

Don’t let it get you down though… this period will pass soon enough. And then we will have our sleepy bubba back.

I love you.

Sleep Regression

Diary of a Lonely Dad: Day 1

Kaine BartonLeave a comment

Dear Diary,

This morning, I dropped Renee and Jesse off at the airport.

They are heading down to Melbourne together for a course that Renee is doing for her new business that she will be starting in February.

This is the last photo I have of them…

Airport Drop Off

So far today, without them, my day has looked like this:

  1. Played some GTA V on the Playstation.
  2. Took a trip to Bunnings.
  3. Sprayed Weed and Feed on the lawn.
  4. Picked up the dog s***.
  5. Washed some clothes.
  6. Vacuumed and mopped the floors.
  7. Played some more GTA V on the Playstation.
  8. Went to Dan Murphy’s for beer.
  9. Updated my 365 diary.
  10. And now writing this post.

I’m kind of lost on what to do now. Do I play more GTA V? Do I watch a movie? Do I drink in the dark by myself, wallowing in the misery of not having Renee and Jesse here.

COME BACK… PLEASE COME BACK!!!

No, I’ll be fine.

NO, I MISS YOU BOTH TOO MUCH! I KNOW IT’S ONLY BEEN LIKE 8 HOURS, AND I’M GONE FOR LONGER WHEN I’M AT WORK… BUT I NEED YOU.

Nope, It’s fine Kaine. You can do this. There’s meals in the fridge. You’re going to work all week. So that will keep you occupied. You’ve got seasons 1 to 5 of Game of Thrones to watch. You will be fine.

BUT I MISS THEM!

Come on… Pull yourself together man!

I’M TRYING!!!

Try harder!

OKAY.

Good… Now, go grab yourself another beer, and go watch some Game of Thrones or play some more GTA V. You love playing GTA V. Go on…

ALRIGHT… BUT ONLY BECAUSE YOU SAY SO.

Geez… What a loser. Only the first day and he is carrying on like this. God help us by the time we get to Wednesday!

-K

Photo Friday: Don’t Wake Grumpy

Kaine BartonLeave a comment

So this past week in the Barton household has been a tough one.

We’ve had teething issues… We’ve had high temperatures… We’ve had heat rash… We’ve had loss of appetite… We’ve had uncontrollable crying… We’ve had tantrums… We’ve had pushing bottles away… We’ve had up the backers…

We’ve had a cranky, tired, unsettled bubba who was quite obviously not dealing with the nasty effects of teething.

All that said though, when he falls asleep… He still looks like the cutest, most peaceful, wonderful little man I ever lay eyes on!

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We can’t wait for the poor little guy to get through this rough patch, getting back to his usual, happy go lucky self.

Stay At Home Mum Life: the good, the bad and the ugly

Renee BartonLeave a comment

Being a full time mum may seem like its all Netflix and coffee dates – swanning around the shops in your active wear sipping on a skinny chai latte. But they really are right when they say being a mum is the hardest job in the world. And I’m only 7 months in!

Okay, so there might be a fair bit of Netflix. Especially in those early newborn days. And yes, coffee is now a food group all of it’s own in my current diet… but there is more to it. We parents work bloody hard. Especially those that have jobs and kids to take care of!

So what’s it really like?

I’m gonna start with the ugly while it’s fresh in my mind. Yesterday was ugly! Our usually fairly chilled bub had suddenly become some sort of possessed, teething monster who only operated on two extremes. Screaming and inconsolable! Or snugly and super clingy! Okay, so the snugly clingy part wasn’t so bad, but it was the several plus hours of the inconsolable screaming beforehand that was the really ugly part. It’s the part of parenting where you pretty much lose your s*** but then feel really bad because you know its not their fault. You know your little one is not purposefully sending your blood pressure through the roof. They’re in pain.  And they need their mummy. Thankfully, these really ugly days are few and far between.

And then there’s the bad. Hmmm, where do I start? Well, there’s the ongoing sleep deprivation. If you really want to mess someone up just wake them up every three hours. EVERY. SINGLE. NIGHT. There are times where they let you go right back to sleep… But then there are times where they just smile up at you and giggle and make you play with them for an hour. When you get one of those “It’s 3am and I’m wide awake” smiles, it is incredibly frustrating and ridiculously cute all at the same time. And then there’s the poo under your finger nails, the vomit on your shirt just as your about to finally head out the door, the thinking you can hear the baby cry every time you get in the shower, and the song Peppa Pig sings about finding a friend for her pet goldfish Goldie that you JUST CAN’T GET OUT OF YOUR HEAD!!! “Fishy fishy fish fish, swimming in the sea. Who will be a fishy friend, for my fish Goldie?”

But then there’s the good. And it is, oh… so… good! It’s that uncontrollable urge to plant an inappropriate amount of kisses on that squishy face whenever it’s in close range. And what is it with baby feet that just makes you want to (ever so gently) bite them? Its the tiny warm body that fits perfectly on your chest as his gently rises and falls with each breath while he sleeps. And even the now not-so-tiny body that still manages to fit just right. Its the chubby little arms that learn to reach out for his mama whenever she walks by. Its the chubby little legs that kick out as you tickle him under his neck and arms. And that throaty laughter that may just be the sweetest sound in the world.

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There is oh so much good. And the best part is, you only need one good moment to outweigh a whole day of ugly moments (and thank God for that, otherwise we’d never deliberately procreate!).

But with all of that, and despite the fact that being a parent really is the hardest job in the world… we  wouldn’t trade it in for anything would we mum’s and dad’s? I love the fact that I am a stay at home mum. And I know there will come a time when my boy will be grown and no longer need me to give him my everything so I will try to treasure it all, the good, the bad… and the ugly, while I can. It sure is tough, but it’s also so incredibly rewarding and fun.

So hold your heads up high stay at home mums and dads… You have the best job in the world!

A (not so) terrible case of misktaken identity…

Kaine BartonLeave a comment

Ok… So you know that Delta Goodrem song ‘Mistaken Identity’? Yea… You know the one, where she croons to everyone that “it’s a terrible case… of mistaken identity.”

Well, that’s been our life for the past week. Although, I wouldn’t exactly call it a terrible case of mistaken identity… I’d probably call it a ‘not so’ terrible case of mistaken identity. Get it… not so terrible case… not so secret life… Okay, I’ll carry on.

So it all started one morning. Jesse woke us up, like normal. Well, I’m still on holidays so Jesse woke Renee up, like normal. And I slept in, like normal. Renee and Jesse came in to wake me up, like normal. We had breakfast, like normal. Jesse was glued to ABC Kids, like normal. Renee started telling me about how we had gotten a sh*t tonne of likes on our Facebook page overnight, not like normal.

Hang on, what’s happened here? Not only were we getting all these new likes on our Facebook page, but they were coming from all over the world. Canada. USA. Germany. Brazil. Mexico. UK.

We couldn’t figure it out. Then we got this inbox message to our Facebook page from one of our new likes, “OMG, I loved your blog about parent sex.”

And then the penny dropped.

Okay, so you may have read this little post about ‘parent sex’ recently. You know, just a little post. Nothing too major. A funny little ditty about trying to sneak in a quickie while the kids are occupied.

Oh who am I kidding… the SUPER ULTRA MEGA VIRAL POST Annoyed emojiabout ‘parent sex’! Insert ‘jealous that we didn’t come up with said post’ emoji here ->

So… as I was saying. This ‘parent sex’ post went mega viral just this past week, so much so that nearly every news network on the internet, worldwide, picked up the story and reported on it. News.com.au, Huffington Post, Tech Insider, Essential Baby, Pop Sugar, The Guardian, Lad Bible, The Sun, The Daily Mail… You name it, they reported on it.

Well, it turns out that the author of the parent sex post, has a blog on WordPress called… wait for it… ‘The not so secret life of us’. And it also turns out, that all the articles that have been written about this post have mentioned said blog. And it also happens, that our blog has a very similar name, ‘Not So Secret Life Of Us’ (there’s no ‘the’ at the beginning).

Well, after receiving that message over Facebook, we decided to head to Google to type in “the not so secret life of us blog” to see what happens. And as it turns out, our blog (what you’re reading right now) and our Facebook page turn up in the top 3 results.

So as a result of all these articles, our Facebook likes have increased by over 100 in the past week… Alas, our not so terrible case of mistaken identity.

The funny thing is, we constantly brain storm ideas for our blog posts, and one of the things that we always talk about is how great it would be for one of them to go viral. Well, it turns out that we went viral without even lifting a finger. How funny is that!!!

Now I know what you’re probably thinking… How dare you piggy back off someone else’s work? Well, while we may be receiving some benefits of this small case of mistaken identity, the actual authors Facebook page has risen by tens of thousands of likes, so the measly 100 that we’ve picked up, is hardly a blip on the radar.

We also wrote a post on our Facebook page letting people know that we weren’t the authors of the parent sex blog, and linking the actual author in the post too.

So as far as all these new likes go, we are happy to take them… and we can only hope that they see value in the posts we write and the content we produce.

So after all that, and after the likes on our page have trickled back to a a few new ones a day now, all I can say is… Renee and I are off to have some parent sex of our own.

Oh, and if you haven’t read the original parent sex post, check it out on the authors Facebook page here.

Footage Friday: 6 Month Milestones

Renee BartonLeave a comment

Before we got sucked into the void that was Christmas and New Year’s we recorded Jesse’s six month milestones video.

We reckon it was our hardest month yet that we’ve experienced as parents. There were tears and tantrums a plenty and that was just from us!

There was a leap, teething, bottle refusal, cluster feeds, night waking (more so than usual) and a screaming match before bed almost every night.

But, we made it through. Check out the video below.

What kept you sane during the tough months?

We’re back: Christmas & New Year Wrap Up (no pun intended)

Renee BartonLeave a comment

And we’re back!

We kind of fell off the radar for a while there amongst the Christmas and New Year black hole. Those two weeks where you don’t even know what day of the week it is and you wind up eating and drinking waaaay too much!

So here’s a little catch up…

Jesse’s first Christmas was so enjoyable. He received loads of pressies from family and friends though he mostly just enjoyed eating the wrapping paper! He got an extra special gift on Christmas morning… the most adorable, (and sharp!) little, white toothy-peg peering up from his bottom gum.

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We followed that up with our annual New Year’s trip to the Bunya Mountains. We basically ate ourselves stupid for 5 days and enjoyed the company of some family in one of the many beautiful houses there. See what we got up to here.

Let me just say, staying up until midnight to greet the new year is certainly a lot more difficult these days. Perhaps the last seven months of broken sleep and a significant decrease in alcohol intake has something to do with it!

Despite that though, we did manage to ring in 2016 and it is shaping up to be an incredible year.

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We have already kicked off the year with some spring cleaning (is it still called that if it is in 30 degree summer heat?) at home starting with our home office. After it being the place I spent eight hours a day for the last five years working as a business consultant (before becoming a Mum), I will not be returning to my job next month as we had originally planned.

Instead I will be embarking on an exciting new venture with Jesse as my business partner. More on that to come but we are very excited and for us as a family, it feels like one of those opportunities that crops up at just the right time and though completely different to the original plan, ends up being a perfect fit.

We also have some big plans for NSSLOU this year too. We thank you so much for supporting us so far. With so much content on the interweb we really do appreciate you taking the time to read our little diddies and share your personal experiences and words of encouragement with us.

When we started this project we wanted to create something unique. A space to not only share our parenting experiences but also bring together all elements of our life: parenthood, married life, work, fun, travel and adventure as a collective that is the ‘Not So Secret Life Of Us’. In the hopes that we might be able to bring a little bit of sunshine to your day, make you laugh (or cry) and maybe provide us all with a little bit of comfort that we aren’t the only ones when it comes to life’s many twists and turns. So hopefully we are doing that and can continue to as we embark on the second half of our first year as parents.

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We are so excited for the year ahead. We hope in amongst all the festive season fun you too have found some time to reflect on the year that was and plan for 2016. Give yourself permission to dream up some weird and wonderful goals for the year and make it your best year yet!

Happy New Year!