First Mother's Day - from the Lost Blog

It was one of those days that felt dreamlike. That snow-globe-village-feeling that as a child, you wanted to climb inside because it looked so perfect. It was silly how good it felt – cinematic and pearly with rays of sunshine twinkling on the water and pale mist through the trees, making everything look soft. Like a memory.

Mother’s day has always been a little bit of a difficult day for me in the past. It always reminded me of the strained relationship with my own mother. The knowing that she’d be expecting to receive a present. The pressure to give her something. The guilt when I didn’t. But mostly the hurt that entailed whenever I tried to make sense of the complicated emotions that surrounded my relationship with her.

Being Lyra’s mother has been an incredibly healing experience. It’s been like opening a brand new sketchbook and painting and drawing up new ideas and emotions of what it is to be a mother. I’ve been able to do away with all my previous ideas of what it meant and realise that we don’t have to do it the way our parents did it. We can write our own destinies and fortunes and write our own motherhoods too. I have never loved anything quite like I love Lyra and she brings me so much endless happiness. Her smile is quite possibly the biggest sweetness and joy in my life and being her mother is a privilege I hold dear and never realised would fix so many broken bones.

When I woke up that Sunday morning, it felt a little like my birthday. I’m going to be honest, although I feel awkward being the centre of attention I secretly adore any reason to celebrate and on a small scale, some attention and being lavished with treats is actually pretty great. Jon had taken Lyra downstairs to play like he does most mornings so I could lie in because I’m a nocturnal sloth-toad who doesn’t do mornings until she’s had two cups of earl grey, breakfast and shuffled around like a zombie in my pyjamas for 3 hours. By then it’s the afternoon anyway. I do those, just about.

I made some obvious ‘I’m awake now noises’ like stomping about in the bathroom and flushing the toilet to attract the attention of my loving family downstairs. Sure enough, a curly haired herbivorous gentleman with a smiling babe in his arms came shuffling into the room with a fresh consignment of cuddles. We call these 3-person-cuddles a ‘Ruddle Puddle.’ It’s what you get when 3 Rudds come together for a cuddle 

Jon hurried away and returned with the BIGGEST bouquet of wildflowers I’ve ever seen. It was amazing and totally unexpected* I also had a delicious breakfast prepared for me and was quickly supplied with one hot cup of black earl grey. I’m sorry but it would really be a discredit to Jon to downplay his thoughtfulness. I am thoroughly spoiled and so lucky to be with this sweet sweet Hufflepuff and I know that humbleness is incredibly important and that we must tiptoe carefully and respect the feelings of others who might not be having such a good time and I’m really cautious of sounding like a privileged brat but the fact is being married to him is a privilege- one I cherish and when you’ve kissed some frogs, boy you want to celebrate when you have something worth celebrating.

*I might have tagged him in some mother’s day flowers ads as a gentle hint and talked loudly about how great flowers are and how people should give flowers more often 

Because we’re grannies we’ve both got National Trust passes. I mostly use mine for the beach carparks and I’m probably not really getting my money’s worth out of it but as it was a beautiful spring day, we hopped in the car and headed to Glendurgan gardens over on the Falmouth side of the Helford river. Today was the first day where I really felt like spring was in the air. Many trees are still skeletal but with so much in bloom and with the cow parsley beginning to unfurl in the hedgerows, colour was returning to my beloved countryside.

Glendurgan gardens are dreamy. In fact, the whole of the countryside around that part of Cornwall is crazy picturesque. The trees are so tall and mysterious, there are so many quirky little river beaches and if you visit them at night – you may be lucky enough to witness the phosphorescents (the glow in the dark algae) that lights up in the water. This is something I’m desperate to experience and would love to come and see one day. I’ve heard it’s incredible.

There are pathways that snake through the gardens which slope down into a valley. The great magnolias were out in bloom, raining their soft petals down onto the pathway and the giant trees were peeping through the mist throughout the gardens. Tiny streams ran down the swooping valley and emerged babbling next to the pathways, bushes of rhododendrons were blooming and even a few bluebells were starting to raise their weary heads. We followed the pathways along and watched people make their way through the beautiful maze from our place on the hill. We headed downwards towards the village to seek out the beach for a picnic.

In a few weeks, Glendurgan will be awash with bluebells so I may have to come back for another visit.

At the bottom of the path lays Durgan village. Small, quaint with a tiny shop that sells ice cream and snacks and a stony beach at low tide. It was not low tide on this occasion and people were crammed onto every available spot of sand* (I had actually forgotten it was mother’s day already at that point and was puzzled as to why it was so busy.)

*Stone shingle but stones just doesn’t sound as good

We continued up the hill through the village seeking out the next beach over, Grebe, where I was sure there’d be some more beach left and is actually (in my opinion) the better beach anyway. It’s such a lovely walk down through the tiniest of woodlands and the views along the river are truly breathtaking. I know I keep banging on about the trees but honestly, the flora and fauna here are really something special and there’s secret caves hidden all along the river.

This sort of scenery conjures up scenes from Daphne Du’Maurier novels.

Sure enough there was much more beach at Grebe. Some people had rocked up in their boat and others had started a bonfire going and had a full on feast underway with crock pots and billycans. Others were taking paddle boards out and it was a really fun spot to see all of the goings on of different people out on this fine spring day.

We put out our picnic blanket and laid out our own feast of cake, filled rolls and biscuits. We’re on a ‘no eating out’ rule at the moment because we’re poor and saving up for our wedding blessing next year so we’ve decided to opt for picnics instead which are actually a ton of fun and make me feel very romantic and whimsical. Growing up poor as a kid, we only ever had homemade picnics when we went out and their one of my favourite memories as a child.

We paddled about in the sea (The Helford is a tidal, salt water river) and the water was really pleasant. Lots of people were even swimming and I was quite envious. I hadn’t brought my swim tog though and nobody wanted to see my naked bottom (There were families on this beach) so I just stared wistfully and kicked about the waves.

We could have sat on that beach all day long. Lyra has learned to roll and has been perfecting her technique and so she was quite enjoying rolling about on the rug making grabbies at the picnic food. We had to get back though to see Jon’s dad who was popping over to visit and it was a good hour’s walk back to the car so after an afternoon of extreme zen time, eating tasty snacks, playing with the sweet babe, paddling and feeling thoroughly whimsical, we reluctantly made our way back through the gardens.

Lyra is such a smiley babe. I love that she’s a mumma’s girl right now although she does adore Jon. She doesn’t like being held by other people much at the moment though but she likes babbling to them from a safe distance. I’ve found myself dressing her up more and more in ridiculously twee baby outfits but I just can’t help myself. I’m not one for putting her in jeans and miniature version of grown up outfits – I love dressing her up in bonnets and rompers and cute homemade knits which I’m sure she’ll tell me are severely uncool when she’s much older.

I have the worlds biggest hoard of knit wear. My Nan is a pro knitter and I LOVE what she makes. I’ve hoarded a ton of it plus other things I’ve picked up over time from having worked at Seasalt and Fatface in the past (love their knits too) and the result is this giant rat-king of jumpers that flies out from the top shelf and attacks myself and Jon whenever we open up the wardrobe. When I tried to create a capsule wardrobe and part with lots of clothes that just weren’t getting worn enough, I assigned several knits to the charity shop pile. Said knits quickly found their way back to the cupboard, because you know… you never know when you’re gonna need 3 fairisle jumpers and an oversized aran fisherman’s sweater.

This friendly fellow came so close and then flew just over my head skimming my ear with his wings.

I was obsessed with the moss and lichen on these branches and the little ferns growing out of them.

This post is baby spam heavy. I’m sorry… but I can’t help myself. I mean, that face!

It’s going to be so difficult for future mother’s days to live up to this one. It was picture perfect and I’m grateful to have had such a special first one. If I was only allowed to live for one day and was told it could be however I liked, it would be just like this. Sweet babe snuggles, spring walks through hazy gardens, paddles on the beach, picnics and spending quality time with my little family. I feel awful for gloating about how wonderful it was when I know there are other people out in the world that like me, have very difficult associations with a day like mother’s day. My thoughts and love is with not just those wonderful mothers out there doing an amazing and incredible job, but to those yearning to be mothers, those who’ve lost mothers or not known mothers and all in between. Women, you are strong and courageous and wondrous and I’m proud to be among you.