I’ll only see 39 again if I come back as someone’s front door

As Mr D has taken a few days off, it’s officially a long weekend in our household from tomorrow.

Today isn’t marked on the calendar, mainly because we don’t tend to do that sort of thing much. It’s the end of my 30s. Goodbye to a decade that saw three houses purchased: one joint, then thankfully released to one on my own and then finally just two weeks after I became Mrs D, the purchase of what has turned out to be a very happy family home. Even if it’s growing more ramshackle by the day.

This little terrace and my life is filled with a metric ton of plastic crap, more Ikea furniture than I’d ideally like but hey, it does the job, much sleeplessness due to teething at the moment, and two amazing men (one grown-up, one miniature.)  I could never have predicted how my situation would be at 40 and it’s vastly different to how my 30s started – and I’m so grateful. This city, London, is a constant but lots of other things have changed and only for the better. Apart from my knees. I’d like my 30 year-old-self’s cartilage back please.

Todays’s also significant for the celebration – or not, they keep it fairly low-key – of my parents’ 42nd wedding anniversary. I think it’s significant that when my father doodles mindlessly on the newspaper, it’s always the digits 27, which I ascribe to this day. My mother always snorts lovingly when I say that and rolls her eyes, bringing forty-two years of experience to bear. 

Tomorrow they’re flying over to spend the weekend with us – ostensibly for my birthday. Mainly to visit Sproggett. We will spend the weekend child-fussing and gardening, I’d say. Not exactly an exciting stay in London for them but actually the best pressie I could wish for.

There are birthday plans in there too – most of them are secrets still – and then on Sunday it’s the maternal motherlode – a family birthday lunch which also neatly brings my husband and I together with our respective mums for Mothering Sunday.  Sproggett gets two grannies (and granddads) to coo at.  He may actually implode with excitement. I predict him being like a metronome, not knowing whose attention to aim for. I am more grateful than ever for a mother who’s a best friend and a gift in the form of a mother-in-law. It’s not always the case and I count my blessings.

Monday is a secret escape and our first night away from the wee man. I am still conflicted about this – desperate for the sleep and getting to be a grown-up with my husband for a whole night; grateful he’ll be looked after by people who love him best and will spoil him rotten; infused to my core with guilt for not being there when he wakes in the morning.

Of course at the rate he’s been going he may just stay up all night. So that will solve the problem, right? 

 

 

Photo from Leo Reynold’s photostream under a Creative Commons Licence