This one time, when I was very pregnant…
When I was around 38 weeks pregnant my Twitter friends starting taking bets amongst themselves as to when Millie would arrive. This caught on and there was a hashtag (#babykendall) and it was all very funny. I made a joke about the prize being a present for Millie and we all laughed and moved on.
The dates ticked by and still no M. There was one date that I thought to be so incredibly far fetched (and a little mean - I mean, who wants to be 40+10?) that I laughed and inwardly groaned. And yep… she was off by an hour.
So I stayed in hospital and tweeted many pictures of Divine Miss M and the world kept turning.
When Millie was almost two weeks old when Andy went back to work. On our third day at home alone we had a terror of a day, where M wouldn’t stop crying & I couldn’t settle her. She and I cried together from 8.30am-1pm. Eventually the gods smiled and we both got settled and had a snooze (mine brief, hers not so brief thankfully!). Just before sunset I shuffled down to the mailbox - and there was a parcel from RedBubble.com.
I eagerly opened it and inside were three GORGEOUS onesies made by Hobart artist SameDog, who is also a good Twitter friend. One was Puss Invaders, which I’d expressed a nerdy love for, the second was a custom made three legged creature called Millie the Wombat, and the third was a take on my band logo for Amy Kendall & the Kitchenhands. I figured my Twitter mates had something to do with this, and I’d been keeping it together fairly well until I spotted Baby Kendall & the Tender Hands - the sweetness and thoughtfulness did me in.
I’m completely floored by the kindness and generosity of my friends, some of whom I’ve never met in real life. The effort that they all went to to organise this, and Rory (SameDog)’s illustrations are nothing short of amazing.
In conjunction with the RedBubble parcel Lou Dalton dropped off a gift bag to Andrew that had a bottle of Bream Creek Schonburger wine (my favourite that I’d mentioned in passing to one of my Twitter friends) and a $50 massage voucher to my favourite massage centre (organised by another Twitter friend), along with a babysitting voucher from yet another gorgeous friend.
Sometimes the world seems huge and scary, like when you’re holding a baby and you’ve got NO idea what to do next. Then things like this happen and you know that it’s all going to be okay.
Thank you Ash, Brad, Fi, Dani, Geoff, Mel, Em, Lou, John, Lauren, Nigel, Barb, Andrew and Rory. Or, @ashnoble, @brad_gunn, @chick_wana, @elissma, @emity, @fifimacks, @gobalmy, @GPRollins, @johndalton, @Lauren_Lolly_, @NigelHoney, @NorfickChick, @quinnal and @samedog.
We can never thank you enough for your thoughtfulness. It’s really been a lovely shining light in the first few highly charged weeks.
