Goodbye Rockie

A little while ago I worked with a premium cat food brand. Part of the campaign was that they were sending someone over to meet our cats and tell me what they were thinking. In PR speak they called that lady a cat phychic or something along those lines and I was SO excited to hear what she had to say. I was imagining she could literally 'speak cat' or read their minds or whatever and I was going to ask her so many questions like 'what was it like being show cats before we adopted you' or 'do you really sleep for 22 hours a day or are you actually living secret lives when we are out'. I had so many questions! Turns out she was a animal behavioural phycologist and she couldn't really tell me specifics on my cat inner thoughts but it was fun to chat to her regardless.

Anyway, because it was for a advertorial piece I roped in my photographer friend Lauren to do a mini shoot whilst she was there. I'm so thankful for that now to look back on, as yesterday our lovely cat Rockie died.

He was 13 although we had only known him since he was 5. We adopted him and our other cat Maddie together from a lady who used to breed their pedigree and also enter them in shows. Rockie had so many rosettes, no wonder the handsome little fur baby. I mean look at him!

We got our cats before we had kids, so they were our first kids and they made us a family. Rockie was very much part of our family and we are so heartbroken to be without him. I'm only glad we were with him when he got ill, and Tom was with him when we had to put him to sleep at the vets less than an hour later. I can't even imagine how awful it would be for him to have been in that way alone.

Because he wasn't ill at all before then it's come as a massive shock to us, the vet even said he couldn't believe he was 13 as he looked like a much younger cat. He had a sudden heart attack and lost movement in his legs within a couple of minutes, we were in the room when it happened, it was traumatic to see him fight for breath but at least we were there to stoke him and give him comfort.

Thank you so much to everyone who left us messages yesterday on my instagram post. Thank you for not trivialising his death. He was a very special member of our family and we miss him so much already.

Other posts about our cats :

The night we went to pick them up 

My happy list

The cats birthday party

We love our cats 

These sillies 

Bristol Volksfest and why I'm finally loving festivals!

Hey Guys! Hope you all had a great weekend? I wasn't planning on blogging about ours but I ended up taking so many pictures I couldn't bare not sharing them. Even if its just to look back on when I'm old :)

If any of you know me you'll know I'm not a massive festival person. I love my home comforts (a nice mattress) being able to take off my make up properly and have a hot shower and soft towels. I also have a fear of large crowds, of losing the kids, not having packed for enough eventualities, it raining..the list goes on.

I sound like such a joy don't I! ;)

Anyway this weekend we decided to brave a small local festival, one that we could go home afterwards to our beds and wasn't too far to travel (20 minutes) and guess what? We loved it! We had such a brilliant time we are definitely going to go next year and it's even made me feel like I might be brave enough for trying out others too, ha!

I wanted to share some of the many many pictures I took.

FYI the wet patch was my attempt to clean up an ice cream spill haha

The weather did get a little chilly and it DID rain (that pictures of me and Tom was after the downpour if you can tell from our hair) but only for a short while and we survived. Mabli slept in the sling for an hour which was long enough for Wilf to play on some of the rides that she wouldn't have been able to go on which definitely helped. I think Mabli is starting to get to the age where she can join in with things in the kids area and as we've stopped breastfeeding is becoming a bit more independent from me.

It's been a reminder to me to try new things and also that as the kids get older things get simpler. It's reinforced my feeling that we are definitely done at two children and it's made me excited for all the fun we can have together over the summer!
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Disclaimer * we went to Bristol Volksfest as part of an Instagram campaign (see here) with F&F Clothing. There was no requirement to post anywhere else but I really loved our experience and wanted to share these pics over here too. 

Sadness and blues after breastfeeding (specifically PMS)

I wanted to write this post as I know its the time of post I would have wanted to have read when I was a first time mum. Actually it's a post I would have wanted to have read as a second time mum who four years later totally forgot about the whole ending breastfeeding blues.

I'm not going to go too much into the hormones the couple of weeks after breastfeeding as I touched on this before. Mainly that your body is still working things out and you'll likely feel pretty teary and off balance. What hit me hard was the heightened feelings before my first period after stopping breastfeeding (if that sentence makes any sense!). Annoyingly this week fell into half term week and not putting two and two together I generally came to the conclusion that half term was awful, I couldn't parent two children and my husband was driving me insane. I spent the whole week, down and depressed, not being able to muster up much positively or feeling annoyed the point I needed to go take deep breaths to calm down.

It wasn't until I came on that I realised OH! So it was PMS but times like 10?! Apparently one of the reasons for feeling down when breastfeeding ends is that you are withdrawing from all the lovely Oxytocin that nursing brings. I honestly felt like I was so down tired and anxious in that week that I would definitely agree with that statement. I wish it was something that was spoken about more because I genuinely thought those feelings were normal and started to question my life choices ha! Like am I happy in my relationship? Am I a good mum? Am I comfortable in my job? Then the week afterwards feeling like everything was actually OK with the world again.

My skin also flared up pretty bad and I have had more ache than usual, I feel like pregnancy & breastfeeding really sorted my skin out for ages and the hormones since since have made it so bad. Hopefully this will just be temporary though.

I've also been suffering from headaches, extreme tiredness and general 'meh' I've been super forgetful as well, basically my body was just freaking out. Although I'm feeling generally OK again now I'm not sure how long after stopping my periods and hormones will be this intense for but being prepared for that makes me feel a little better and like I'm not going totally crazy.

Anyway I really wanted to share this just incase anyone else is going through the same thing and reading this makes them feel less alone or suddenly starts ringing bells for them.

If anyone knows of anything that calms these symptoms down a bit I'm all ears, I'll share as much as I can find out myself. Isn't it funny how even if this isn't your first time at this it can feel so new again? Growing and raising babies can be full on hey!

5 Things I love Friday (umm on a Saturday!)

Hey all! I wanted to bring back some 'old school' posts on the blog, following on from this post on how Instagram and Instagram Stories has changed how I blog.

I used to do these kinds of posts all the time and looking back it's really funny to see how my taste has changed over the years!

1, Did you hear Crayola are doing make up now?? I mean it's probably a bit style over substance but who knows they might be great products too. Chances of me buying some and the kids using them to draw with are pretty high though ;)

2, I'm obsessed with this top from Urban Outfitters, isn't it perfect?

3, These semi precious stones necklaces, only £12.99 as well which is brilliant for handmade jewellery.

4, These simple black sliders, perfect with most outfits and they look so comfy.

5, Lately I switched to using net bags for my shopping, they are like a tardis they fit so much in. Even Tom is impressed and asks to use it when we go buy groceries! Love this one from h&m.

Have a great weekend everyone!

*affiliate links are used in this post