So I am reactivating the blog, really how many times have I gone off the blog and then back on it. At least a million, if not a million and one. Anyway here we are back again. I feel like i need to give a quick update of where I am and what I am doing now.

Here's a quick profile, like you would find on match.com so mostly real if not a little embellished to make me more attract to you, my reader.

Age: 35, this is not a lie. Is 35 considered old or young these days? I feel like my 25 year old self would think I was old but my 65 year old self would think my life was just starting. So philosophical question really.

Build: I am built awesome, fit my clothes feel pretty good, all over.

Eyes: Blue and slightly wrinkly.

Hair: Wait for it, Greying gracefully! I am growing our my grey proudly.

Hometown: Auckland, New Zealand but this might change. stay tuned! did this sound a bit attention seeking and dramatic? Well it was meant to!

Interests: Well, I run a lot, I spend hours wasting time on the internet, I try to cram a whole lot of TV into my time. And I read.

Children: two beautiful little sausages. Okay in the interest of honestly, my oldest throws stage 5 level tantrums and my youngest favourite word is no and still likes being breastfeed to sleep. But I love them unconditionally, I can't help it, it's part of my DNA.

Life Motto: This changes daily and really who can sum up life in one motto? I try to live honestly and be the best example I can to my kids.

So all this is going on, i will upload a picture soon to show you my grey hair which my be one of my best achievements achieved with the least possible effort!

Love to all my long time listeners and my new followers. I guess that brings the total to 2 people, one being my dad.

Grey hair first attempt

I know what you've all been thinking, how is Andrea going with her grey hair growth. Well I don't want to keep you up at night so here is update number

One.

I let it grow for about 8 weeks and because I had a perm, yes a perm, long story with an unhappy ending, it was in terrible condition so I decided to chop it off which I figured would help it grow out quicker and also get highlights and lowlights (my superstar hairdresser inLondon  reccomended this, shout out to Louisa) to blend  the grey with the one color, one dimension dark. I felt like I had two black curtains hanging either side of my head.

Below is a picture before my hair cut/colour.

Can I just take a minute to explain the styling? Olive had scratched my eyeball hence the need for sunglasses, I can't say why it just sounded like a good idea. And the gnormous plaster was because I had a massive zit of my own making that got out of control so I salvoned it up and put it in quarantine. 

And below is after. My hairdresser Bex, who comes to my house, put loads of highlights in it and cut it short. It covers the grey quite nicely and I figure ill just keep on highlighting and cutting until all the dark brown has gone. 

You can still see some grey which is quite cool looking with the highlights . Looking forward to more grey coming through. Excitement. 

You can also see how grey hair spiral up out of your head like pubes, not a good look.

At home company

So usually I am at home by myself with the kids and because Mackay is at kindy a few mornings a week, usually it's just me and Olive and we chill out and do our thing.
Well our new house is old so we have to get it re-wired, which is burning $4000, because it's money you never see and the insurance company are making us do it. Mega frustrating, I would much rather get my sofa recovered because I am afraid one day I will sit on it and go straight through.

Anyway for two days I have electricians in my house fiddling around with the wires and lights. Which means that my at home behaviour is under the spotlight. I feel a bit self-counsious sitting down and watching Jeremy Kyle and pissing around the internet while my baby is rolling around on the floor putting dangerous things in her mouth. (not that I would ever do this, in fact i have never done this, ever, forget i even mentioned it)

So now in order to appear more housewifey and less lazy I am doing housework while they are here, this morning i have tidied the kitchen, done all my laundry including putting it away in the drawers, tidied my bookshelf, gone through my stationery drawers and chucked stuff out and picked every single thing up from the floor, it's only 10:21 and i am exhausted and fast running out of things to tidy because i am restricted to the areas where electricians aren't working.

Olive and I are going to go out for a long walk when she wakes up it's just too stressful pretending to give a shit about how tidy my house is.

Also do I offer the electricians tea and coffee? Is this still the done thing? What's the etiquette here?

2013=change

I didn’t do this last year as my head was too full with the details of moving half way across the world and I think I was also in the early stages of pregnancy where I had my everlasting migraine and found it difficult to look at a computer screen let alone type so here it is for 2013, I’m taking some questions out, because some are just stupid.

What did you do in 2013 that you’d never done before?

Gave birth to a baby girl, although the labour was remarbaly similar to the time I gave birth to Mackay, both the buggers were around the wrong way and got stuck. Big heads run in the family.

 Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?

I didn’t have any this year, I just wanted to move home with as less drama as possible.

This year I’ve got some goodies.

Loose all 25 kilos of my baby weight.

Grow out my grey hair

Get into regular exercise again.

Did anyone close to you give birth?


Me!

Did anyone close to you die?


My step-mothers mum died at the very end of 2013.

What overseas cities/countries did you visit?


Disneyland!, Fiji, Sydney and given that we have just bought a house that is the last holiday we are having  probably, ever.

What would you like to have in 2014 that you lacked in 2013?


The ability to fit my pre-pregnancy clothes, as soon as I got pregnant I was instantly too fat for anything in my wardrobe, apart from leggings. Also I was thinking about this last night and I think before I gave birth I was a good 120 kilos.

What dates from 2013 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?


3^rd of July, my lovely Ollie was born, I tried to hold out for the 4^th of July so she would have her own theme tune.

What was your biggest achievement of the year?


Pushing Ollie out it was flippen hard work, the thing with labour is that you are in the middle of it and are thinking it can not get any worse than this, there is no more pain in the world I can feel but then 2 minutes later you realise there is and you can and you are feeling it right now.

What was your biggest failure?


Look i didn’t have on, I never really have one, I might take out this question next year, it irritates me.

Did you suffer illness or injury?


Apart from being the size of a baby hippo and unable to bend, no.

What was the best thing you bought?


My husband upgraded my engagement ring it is a right big conker, which I wore for about a month before I got too fat for it, still can’t fit it.

Whose behaviour merited celebration?

My husband was pretty awesome again this year also Mackay has had so much change this is year and has been such a trouper. He is also such a big help to me around the house, he tries so hard to help me and picks up his clothes it melts my heart.

Whose behaviour made you appalled and depressed?

Sometimes I just can’t believe how badly woman are treated all over the world, even progressive countries are slowly stripping away woman’s rights. This is my new bandwagon, watch out you’re probably going to hear a lot more about it in 2014.

Where did most of your money go?


Settling into NZ buying assorted furniture and a house, a whole house with a garden and everything.

What did you get really, really, really excited about?

We didn’t know Olive was a girl and I would be doing night breastfeeds and still say to myself, ‘I have a baby girl!’ I just couldn’t believe it.

What song will always remind you of 2013?


Blurred lines

Compared to this time last year, are you:


happier or sadder?


Happier yea!

thinner or fatter?

Fatter boo!

richer or poorer? 


Poorer boo!

What do you wish you’d done more of?

Exercise, I promised I would with this pregnancy  but couldn’t be bothered. I would just sit in the gym café and eat my second breakfast.

What do you wish you’d done less of?


Eat, I over ate so much this year blaming pregnancy but really I was just greedy.

How did you spend Christmas?


With family for the first time in 10 years, excitement. But also Mackay woke up at 5:00 on Christmas morning and I was knackered the whole day. Next year we are having a 6:00 rule.

Did you fall in love in 2013?


Love, infatuation, head over heels,  all of it with my little Ollie.

What was your favourite TV program?


Girls, it took me a while to get used to the uncomfortableness of it but I love it.

Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year?


I’m deleting this question too. Irritates me also.

What was the best book you read?

I read lots of great books this year because of the many hours I spent breastfeeding, my favourites were Where’d you go Bernadette and Life after Life. The problem is I read so much I have forgotten what I have read. This makes me sound like an intellectual but don’t worry I read lots of trash too. That’s the great thing with as kindle you can be reading Jackie Collins and no one knows.

What did you want and get?


Healthy baby. Done

What did you want and not get?


Easy labour not possible ever, and if you had one I don’t want to know about it.

What was your favourite film of this year?


This questionnaire was obviously aimed at a different phase in my life because I do not watch films. Am I bitter? Yes, am I lying? Yes. I saw lots of movies at home this year but I like to play ‘I’m too busy looking after my children’ card

What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?


Had a family afternoon tea, I was 34, and I feel 34 and a good 34.

What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?


God not to have to go to about 6 house auctions and miss out by,$5000, $3000, $6000 I’m not joking we were so close so many times it killed me.

How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2013?


Leggings, god that’s so depressing.

What kept you sane?


Knowing that through all the change and madness there will be a time when everything slows down and we are settled again.

Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?


Now this is a question from a different era, no one this year. Sadness

Who did you miss?


All my friends in London, like a lot, way more than I thought. I was lucky enough to make some really good friends who are really good people and I miss their company.

Who was the best new person you met?


Ollie

Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2012

Just keep swimming, my life was really hectic last year I just kept going and going putting one foot in front of the other.

It's a long journey ahead

I've been doing some googling and measuring my head with a ruler and realised it will probably take me about one year to grow my dye out and let the silver (okay that's glamming it up a bit, lets just call it grey) grow in.

Wow, this is going to be a long, long journey. I will have to seriously investigate a headband type situation.

I am also on a post-baby weight loss exercise where I am aiming to loose 24 kilos to get back to my pre-baby weight. With mackay the weight melted off, probably due in a large part to stress but with olive it has stuck to my bones like superglue. I tried to be all zen with it and accept myself for who I am, but 24 kilos is a lot  to accept. My clothes weren't just a little tight I could't even get my fat jeans over my knee (true story) I had to do something or I feared i would be one of those morbidly obese woman who gets stuck on the toilet (this happens a lot in the UK and they have to call the fire service to get them off) So i joined weight watchers and now am trying my best to try to shift it. So far i am loosing about a kilo a week which is good progress and also doesn't interfere with my milk supply, so it keeps Olive happy too.

Do you know that Jamie has been the same weight since high school? he complains if he puts on 3 kilos, I tell him 3 kilos is the equivalent to a really big poo, also embarrassingly for most of our relationship his clothes have been too small for me, his waist is teeny, tiny and mine is not. I wonder if that's half my problem if Jamie was bigger it would make me feel smaller, it would definitely help the balance in photographs, i'll tell you that much.

Grey week 5

Grey hair after 5 weeks of no dye. Also the iphone is not mine, it's jamie who is simultaneously an arsenal supporter and a chav. You can take the boy out of London ...

Grey power

So in an effort to re-start my blogging and as a kind of challenge to myself I have made a decision. I am going to grow out my grey hair and ill blog about it! Fun. 

I decided last week so stop dying my roots (although I haven't ruled out highlights so I'm kind of doing it half arsed) because I'm writing this on my iPhone and my fingers are getting RSI or possibly early onset arthritis I will outline my reasons in succinct bullet points.

* I have to do it a lot to keep on top of the grey, in my twenties it was every 12 weeks then every 8 and now really I go about 5 before its really noticeable.

* I just don't think it looks good dyed I have to do it myself because of budgetary constraints and it just looks blah

* I'm sick of spending time dying it, spending time worrying about it peeking through my hair, sick of worrying about what people will think if I have grey hair. Seriously why am I even embarrassed about grey hair? Weirdo.

* I have been dying my hair pretty constantly for 15 years thinking about doing it for another 50 bores me and I'm sure that hair dye isn't all that good for me

* lastly and most importantly there came a time when I had to look in the mirror and say 'my name is Andrea and I have grey hair' self acceptance man, its the first step.

So here starts my journey to grow out the grey hair. I have no idea how far I will get or how long I will take but I'll be taking lots of photos.

Also if its grey enough I'm totally putting a purple rinse through, Jamie thinks this is ridiculous I think it is awesome.