I just attached his Whoozit to the chair, and lo and behold, he stared at it for ages and actually sort of tried to play with the dangly bits! Hurrah for developmental progress!

I was originally really worried about what would happen when Mark went back to work. This happened on Monday and it was a non-event in the end. It’s actually sort of a relief – I get up when I want to (or when Oliver wants me to), I don’t feel pressurised to get anything accomplished (not that he was pressuring me; it was of my own accord), and I am kind of enjoying having the house back to myself. Now I just need to re-organise the kitchen cupboards back to some sensical order as he managed to just throw things in at random when unpacking the dishwasher.

Plus Anne made everything wonderful on Monday, my first day alone, by coming up from London bearing gifts of wonderful food, a plant, and Oliver’s first picture book. As I said on Monday, she was like my surrogate mother and insisted on unloading and loading the dishwasher, and washing other stuff in the sink! On top of this she soothed a fussy baby in her much experienced way. It was a great afternoon.

I often think of myself as inherently lazy, but right now any spare moment (okay, bar time spent online) I am getting when Oliver is sleeping is taken up by tidying things around the house – not because I have to, but because I want to. I am finding great pleasure in doing things like cleaning the kitchen somehow. Very bizarre.

Last night, the boys watching tv:

We’ve been in a bit of a paperwork frenzy for the last few weeks; here’s what’s in process:

• Oliver’s UK passport, which arrived yesterday. Yes, my one month old son already has a passport including photo which is probably already dated. We are going to Spain at the end of April so we thought we shouldn’t delay getting it.
• My Canadian passport, which expired this year anyway, plus I needed to change it to my married name.
• A Child Benefit application, which when granted will give me a paltry deposit in my bank account once a week for Oliver. Somehow, despite the fact that 9 out of 10 families in this country are also due Child Tax Credit, we are not. Apparently this means we are rich. Then why do I feel poor? Oh yes, because we live in the south-east/were in London.
• I needed to change my name on my National Insurance Number, which I remembered while doing the Child Benefit application, so I’ve had to send that back with a marriage certificate.
• Mark’s driver’s licence – as he was still using the old style paper one, he now needs to catch up and get a photocard.
• The biggie – Mark’s Canadian residency and family-class sponsorship application – which is in bits and pieces right now. He’s had his medical and we have the paperwork for that. He’s getting a police check type thing and we are doing the paperwork for that. He had to get about 20 passport size photos taken and we’ve got those. The forms themselves, all about 30 pages, are almost completed. I had some photos developed of our honeymoon (where there are no pictures of us together but just us individually and the dog!!) and the wedding to include as we need to prove that we have a relationship. We should be able to submit it in the next few weeks, and it should take no more than 6 months (as the Canadian government prioritises family class sponsorship) if everything is in order. This means that we would be on track to move in the autumn if everything else goes to plan.
• Also, next up will be Oliver’s application for a Canadian citizenship certificate, which I understand could take ages to get. Seems very silly to me as I was able to get UK citizenship on the basis of applying for a UK passport. He can’t even apply for a Canadian passport until he gets his certificate.