Mum-ology 101

Being a first time Mum is, among other things, the hugest of learning curves.  It's not until you bring your little bundle of pinkness home from the hospital that you actually realise how much you have absolutely no idea what you're doing. There's so much to learn and, as many people before me have said, babies don't come with an instruction manual.

The good news is you'll pick things up pretty quickly - you have to in order to survive. Every single day you'll learn something new, and before too long you'll feel like you've got at least a primary school level of understanding about your little poppet.

But every so often you'll discover something you had no idea about, or something that you really should have known all along...

Here's a few things I've learnt recently.

Nappy free time is great for clearing up nappy rash.
Nappy free time when your baby has the runny poos which caused the nappy rash, is fraught with danger.

Beware nappy free time!

Providing your baby with finger foods is essential for their development.
Cous cous is most definitely not a finger food.

Vegemite has just as much staying power as firm hold hair gel.

Even though your big, manly husband can happily rip the guts out of the stinking fish he just caught, he'll baulk at even the merest whiff of a dirty nappy.

Just when you think your baby can't produce any more poo. She can.

You can't rely on your pet dog to clean up all the scrambled eggs thrown on the floor at breakfast.

It is possible to have an entire conversation with a stranger about your baby's poos. Sadly.

So there you go, a few life lessons. Scary how so many of them relate to poo.

What have you learnt recently??

The best wedding invitation you'll ever receive.

I came across this this morning on my usual facebook cruising and thought it was just wonderful.

When I was planning my wedding the thing that really struck me was how there were not a lot of truly "original" and "unique" wedding ideas around. I guess with millions of couples having been married before me, most things have already been done at least once or twice

And while I know that this has probably already been done, I've never seen it before, so it's new to me.

It's also lovely, touching and personal. I'd be thrilled to get a wedding invitation like this one day.

As for me, the most unique thing we did on our wedding day was set up a photo booth for guests to write their wedding messages, rather than use a traditional guest book. I know it's passe now, but two years ago the photo booth was still cool and (relatively) unique. And while I would probably never go back and read a book of quickly scribbled messages, I've gone back to look at these photos a few times over the past two years. Here are a few of my faves...

Other great unique wedding moments I've witnessed? A bride wearing her absolute favourite already-worn fuschia pink ballgown as her wedding dress, another bride arriving at the ceremony in her Dad's Mack Truck, and personalised bookmarks as placecards for a wedding held in a library.  All unique (to me) and all cool for different reasons. The first, because my awesome friend was smart enough to know she didn't have to spend $2000 on a white dress to look beautiful. The second for the sheer novelty of the situation. And the third because I love double duty products (nevermind the fact that I didn't pick up on the bookmark/library connection until the next day!)

What's the most unique thing you did, or you've seen at a  wedding?