Author Archives: sophieblovett

P is for pho

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Often people ask me what I miss most about not living in London any more, and the answer’s always the same. There’s the people we left behind of course, but actually in some ways the physical distance between us now means that we make more effort to see the people who really matter. It’s amazing how knowing someone’s only half an hour away can turn into an excuse not to see them yet the opposite becomes true when meeting up’s a real mission.

But I digress. The thing I really miss about not living in London any more is the food. It’s not like there’s not good food in Devon: the potential for really fresh, really local ingredients is of course much higher than in the city. But without the melting pot of cultures that I used to feel privileged to be a part of, our menu is much more limited.

Where we used to live in London we were surrounded by fantastic Vietnamese restaurants. There was a big Turkish community too, so the kebabs were out of this world. Not to mention the Punjabi lamb chops at Tayyabs, the Sunday dim sum at Yi Ban, the Argentinian steak at Buen Ayre and the special-occassion sushi at Soseki.

It’s Vietnamese food I always seek out first when we go back though. There’s something about the fresh herbs, the slippery noodles, the seafood. And I especially love pho. It’s like the best sort of comfort food, warming and flavourful and healthy. I miss the ritual of the little plate of basil and bean sprouts and chilli, alternating spoons of broth with digging around with chopsticks for more substantial morsels of deliciousness.

When we were on honeymoon in Vietnam I had it for breakfast every day. We’ve tried to recreate it ourselves to varying degrees of success, but without the authentic ingredients it’s never quite the same. The bowl above was devoured moments after the photo was taken in Tre Viet, a restaurant I’d heartily recommend if ever you find yourself hungry on Mare Street.

P is for pho.

 

Joining in with The Alphabet Photography Project over at PODcast. 

A return to writing with the virtual blog tour

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We’ve had a great summer: lots of exploring and adventures and hanging out with friends and family. Leigh’s had his last really long, lazy summer holiday as a student so we felt we had to make the most of it – as of next year things really start heating up with this training to be a doctor business. I’ve just about managed to keep things ticking over on the blog, but my other writing has been on hold for what feels like forever. And to be honest, much as I’ve had a wonderful time, there’s a growing part of me that’s looking forward to September and getting back to my book.

So when I had an email from Mummy Tries asking if I’d like to take part in a virtual blog tour for bloggers with writing projects on the go I jumped at the chance – I figured it’d be the perfect opportunity to regroup and remind myself what I was doing with all those hours spent on Scrivener earlier in the year and get ready for the next phase of crafting my novel.

But first just a little bit about Mummy Tries…

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I came across her blog through various linkies we’ve both taken part in, and not only did I love her writing with its perfect balance of wit and sincerity but we also seemed to be very aligned in the way we think about parenting, education and the wider world. She’s recently finished the first draft of her first book, a self-help book which draws on her own difficult childhood to support people in moving away from dysfunctional pasts. You can read more about this project in her post here.

Back to my book though! Regular readers of this blog will know that I wrote my first novel, ‘Lili Badger‘, in the first few months after my son was born. It’s still doing the rounds with publishers, but rather than sitting around waiting for it to be picked up I’ve been working on a second, and that’s the one I’m going to tell you about here…

What am I working on?

The working title of this novel is ‘A Little Dream’. It explores the darker side of relationships, fitting quite nicely into the relatively new genre of ‘chick noir‘ though I hadn’t even heard of that when I started to write it. The story unfolds from the perspective of Grace, a twenty-something media type living in London. Right from the start we have the sense that something’s missing from her life, and it seems that she’s found it when she starts to dream of the mysterious Drew. But then he comes into her life for real – at least she thinks he does – and everything starts to get a lot more complicated.

On one level the story can be read as a psychological thriller, but that very much depends on whose version of reality you come to believe. One of the things that’s pleased me most about the feedback I’ve had from my initial readers is that their interpretations of what’s going on vary wildly, which is precisely the effect I’m hoping to achieve.

How does my work differ from others in the genre?

The books that seem to fall under the umbrella of chick noir vary quite a lot in their treatment of relationships, but what they have in common is an exploration of the darker aspects of humanity and the dysfunctional relationships that can be born out of them. Two of my favourite examples of the genre are S.J. Watson’s ‘Before I Go To Sleep‘ and Gillian Flynn’s ‘Gone Girl‘ – both are brilliantly unsettling in the worlds they create, leaving the reader unsure of where reality lies until their shocking twists are revealed.

I think I am beginning to achieve something similar with ‘A Little Dream’ – it’s definitely a key area I want to work on during the redrafting process. There are some aspects of my story that really set it apart though. My protagonist is younger and more naive than the wives in other examples of the genre, and the relationship she finds herself in is younger too. It’s full of the intensity of youth, and all the insecurities that come with that. There are elements of Grace’s experience that are quite strongly autobiographical, but fortunately not all of them given how things turn out for her!

Why do I write what I do?

With ‘Lili Badger’, I had a strong sense of wanting to articulate the experience of young people I had worked with as a teacher, and in particular my fears for their futures in a world which rarely gives teenagers the respect and credit they deserve.

With ‘A Little Dream’ my inspiration was more personal. I’ve watched too many brilliant women fall under the spell of dangerous men, men who make them question their own sanity as they chip away at their self-esteem. There are so many pressures on young women today to achieve it all – the perfect career as well as the perfect relationship – and for some women I think society’s demands can begin to really cloud their sense of self. Grace struggles with all of this, as well as depression and other mental health issues. As the story has developed this aspect of it has grown, and I hope it might prompt some necessary discussions about mental health, something which is still sorely neglected in our society given the number of people affected by it.

What is my writing process?

I’ve blogged quite a lot about different aspects of my creative process – you can read more about it here. In terms of this novel, I’m so far following a similar process to with my first.

At the end of last year I made loads of unstructured, barely coherent notes capturing the ideas for the story that had been swirling around my head for a while. These gradually began to take shape, and I mapped them into chapter summaries which formed the backbone of the novel. After some additional research into areas I felt less confident writing about I set the project up in Scrivener. Working with a deadline of Easter I ended up with a daily target of about 1500 words – and then I just made sure I wrote them!

I wrote for a couple of hours each day whilst Arthur napped in the sling, though often I’d still be in the midst of it when he woke up and he’d have to entertain himself in my study which inevitably resulted in an almighty mess… He was remarkably patient though, and I couldn’t have done it without him.

I finished the first first draft just before Easter, and let it sit for a while before going through and correcting my most glaring errors. I then got ten copies printed out which went to my trusted first readers – a combination of friends and family – as well as my agent.

I’ve collated all their feedback now, and am ready to start some serious redrafting. That’s what I’ll be getting down to next week, and I’m very much hoping I can find the same level of productivity as I had earlier in the year!

So that’s where I’m at with my writing right now. I’ll keep you posted as to how that redrafting goes…

Meanwhile though the next stop on the virtual blog tour is littlee & bean. I came across Steph’s poetry through the Prose for Thought linky and was immediately impressed. She has such a fantastic way with words, and her poems are powerful and evocative without a hint of tweeness. I was really excited to find out that she’s writing a book, one which explores her experience of being forced to convert as a teenager to a very strict form of Islam. I’m fascinated to find out more about it, so make sure you hop across to her blog next Monday to see what she has to say.

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There’s someone else I’ve invited too but in the craziness of summer I haven’t heard back from her yet… I’ll let you know if she decides to join in as I’m very excited to hear more about the book she has brewing.

 

 

Mama and More

Becoming a mum: sleep

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It’s been a while since I’ve written in my ‘becoming a mum’ series, but I couldn’t leave it without tackling the all-important matter of sleep.

I’ve actually been putting this one off for a while now. I think I hoped that perhaps, being almost twenty months now into this whole parenthood business, I’d be able to write and say that I’d finally cracked it: that we were all getting enough sleep, at the right times, and maybe even that we’d achieved the holy grail of sleeping through the night.

Though it’s probably more appropriate that I’m getting these words out through the fog of exhaustion that’s been my general state since somewhere near the start of my third trimester of pregnancy. So nearly two years ago, if we’re counting. Two years since I can say I had a decent night’s sleep.

It’s not that Arthur doesn’t like to sleep. In fact, in the beginning, it was all he really wanted to do. It took all our energy to persuade him to eat – and I wonder sometimes whether his waking in the night since is payback for those early weeks when I had to rouse him religiously every three hours, tickling his toes and blowing on his cheeks just to get enough nutrition in him to enable him to grow. You can read about the start of our breastfeeding journey here – we’re still going strong with that as it happens, so watch this space for an update on the joys of breastfeeding a toddler!

But I digress. That happens quite a lot nowadays – sleep deprivation, probably…

We’ve had Arthur in a bedside cot since the night he was born. We started with a Bednest which we loved, and when he outgrew that at four months old we were by no means ready for him to move to his own room. So we graduated to a larger cot made by Troll – he’s still in it now for most of the night, and I’m hoping he’s not going to grow too quickly as I haven’t quite worked out what we’ll do then.

All of us – me and Leigh and Arthur – have become quite attached to co-sleeping. We often spend much of the night snuggled up together, but it’s great to have the space and security that the bedside cot affords. He’ll roll across when he wants to stretch out, and (usually) I can slide him across too if I’m really shattered. But knowing he’s there, hearing his breathing – that was invaluable in the paranoid early months. There’s something about it that feels so natural. And there is literally no better way to wake up than to hear his giggles, or more often nowadays to feel his hands on my shoulders as he peers into my face to say “Hiii!” before a request for booba or to walk and play.

I mention all this because I’m pretty sure that, were we to turn our backs on co-sleeping, then saying goodbye to night nursing and night waking wouldn’t be far behind. But as of yet it’s not a sacrifice we’re willing to make.

That’s pretty much the bottom line, really, when it comes to how we’ve handled the whole sleep issue. I know even without seeing the raised eyebrows of friends as I describe our ‘routine’ that our approach has been somewhat unconventional. But, tiredness aside, it kinda works.

Arthur goes to sleep late – 9.30ish usually – a time that came from watching him and listening to him and seeing when he started to get tired. We’ve finally made the leap to him going down in his own room so we get a couple of hours to ourselves, then he’ll wake up hungry sometime between midnight and two and we’ll bring him up to our room. He then usually wakes me every couple of hours to nurse – I’m not sure he really wakes up himself to be honest, but he makes his intentions pretty clear – and that continues until either I need to get him up or he decides it’s time to start the day.

I’ve read all the books on ways we could get him to sleep through the night. I know I couldn’t bring myself to go down the cry it out route – even though he’s older now I’d be afraid of what emotional connections would have to break in order for him to accept that no-one was coming for him rendering crying futile however lonely and afraid he was feeling on the inside. I know as well that there are a whole raft of gentler options, ones which I might be willing to try if it weren’t for the fact that, deep down, I’m not really sure I want things to change.

The later bedtime allows him to see his dad for a few hours at the end of the day – we get to all sit down to dinner as a family, and we all benefit from that. The payoff for me is that he generally wakes up for the day at around 8am. I am not, and never have been, an early morning person, so that suits me just fine. And then there’s the naps: when we’re not rushing around too much he will still have two decent naps each day, between one and two hours each. Bearing in mind this is usually preceded by a feed, and it all happens in the sling, it buys me a good few hours to sit and write. I can’t imagine how I’d get anything done otherwise – and as I’m burning to start work on redrafting my second novel as soon as things get back to normal in September I’m really hoping he doesn’t start dropping those naps any time soon.

He’s flexible too – he doesn’t need darkness or quiet to sleep, which is a real bonus for travelling. And if he stays up even later one night he makes up for it with a lie-in the next morning.

And on top of all that, our unconventional routine seems to suit him – he’s happy and healthy, growing well and hitting all his milestones. There are days when he’s tired and I know we need to slow down a little – days when we all have an early night. But once those batteries are recharged he’s ready to go again.

So whilst I know on the surface it looks like we’re doing this sleep thing all wrong, and whilst it sometimes feels like I live for my morning coffee and I can’t help but moan occasionally about that two years without a decent night’s sleep, I know deep down that I wouldn’t change a thing. I guess it’s like everything else in this whole parenting lark really – it’s ok to know the rules, to read up on other people’s theories and talk about what works for other kids. But ultimately you have to do what’s right for you.

Now excuse me while I go and have a little nap…

O is for ostrich

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I’ve never especially been one for zoos. Peering in on caged animals has always felt just a little bit distasteful, and the crowds in London were enough to put me off entirely.

Since we’ve moved down here, though, I’ve become quite attached to our little zoo in Paignton. It’s not actually so little – most of the animals seem to have plenty of space, and they’re all pretty chilled. The conservation work the zoo’s involved in is widely advertised, and suddenly that makes a lot more sense of what they’re all about. Watching Arthur meet animals up close that he would otherwise be unlikely to ever see in real life is quite magical too, and I can see that as he grows the zoo is going to be an important part of his education about the wider world. 

We’ve become members of Paignton Zoo, and try to visit as often as we can. It’s great getting to know the space and the animals better, not feeling like we have to race round it all but instead being able to focus in on particular zones. There are some areas that I’m becoming especially fond of.

There’s the camels’ enclosure, where as you watch them lolloping around you can gaze out past the neighbouring houses to the sea beyond. I often wonder what it must be like to live in one of those houses which back right up to the zoo. The noises that fill the air after all the visitors have gone home must be quite surreal – more like being on the African Savannah than the English Riviera. 

At the other end of the spectrum I love the petting zoo too. We only discovered it on a recent visit, but Arthur loved being able to go right up to the animals, sitting and chatting with a goat as if it was the most natural thing in the world. 

My first favourite spot though, and one that still makes me smile, is the one where the ostriches and zebras hang out together. Of course in the wild animals wouldn’t be segregated as they are so often in zoos, split up into their own little areas with information labels to make them easier to identify. I realise there are probably all sorts of complications with integrating different species of animals more fully in captivity, but still it’s lovely to see these two happily sharing their space. I’m not sure you could get two more different creatures side by side either, though they are pretty well colour co-ordinated!

O is for ostrich. 

 

Joining in with The Alphabet Photography Project over at PODcast. 

Fireworks on the water

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One of the many awesome things about living by the seaside is that fireworks are not just for November and New Year’s Eve – there seems to be a display every other weekend at the moment, and whilst we’ve been busy enough to miss most of them we finally made it to a pretty special one last week as part of the Salcombe Regatta.

It was particularly special because, being just up the estuary from my folks’ place, we were able to go by boat. I’m not sure Arthur had any idea what we were up to as we bundled him up and set off down the valley at just the point we would normally have been winding him down to go to bed. He predictably got very excited when he saw the water, taking advantage of the heavy cool bag Leigh was carrying to make a beeline for it.

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 We had time for a bit of all-important stone throwing and high-fiving…

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And then it was into the dory to pootle across to Bombay Duck.

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I think Arthur was still a little bit sceptical at this point, but he definitely perked up once we made it on board.

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After a rainy start to the day it turned into such a beautiful evening. The light is always so stunning at that time of day anyway, and being on the water is especially magical. We found ourselves a buoy with a good vantage point and set up our little picnic. Arthur was a bit too excited to eat much but the rest of us tucked in.

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As we ate, more and more boats began to gather in anticipation, and once darkness fell the fireworks began. It wasn’t the first fireworks display Arthur had been to, but it was the first where he didn’t just retreat to the boob as he tried to compute what on earth was going on!

He watched wide-eyed as colour filled the sky, calling out ‘boom! boom!’ in echo of the bangs. He was still a little shell-shocked, but I’m pretty sure he loved it.

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I hope so anyway – I turn into a big kid whenever anyone mentions fireworks so we’ll be going to plenty more displays over the coming months and years.

I took lots of pictures, but most of them are blurs (I blame the rocky boat…) This one captures what it was all about for me though – balls of light and colour exploding in the night sky, illuminating the boats below as the reflections shimmer across the water with the lights of Salcombe town twinkling in the distance.

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Country Kids from Coombe Mill Family Farm Holidays Cornwall    photo 93142f35-6d39-479f-b3de-d94dbca68162_zps58499252.jpg

N is for now

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We have very few family photos that aren’t selfies, and I particularly love this one. It was taken this week, on the afternoon of our second third wedding anniversary, just before we headed out for a romantic dinner for three.

Earlier in the day Leigh had surprised me with a few hours in a nearby spa with massages and facials and pedicures for us both – hence the general aura of relaxation and polishedness we’re exuding.

In a summer of adventures, of looking forward and looking back, it was a moment of savouring the now. Our little man is growing up so fast – I know we’ll look back on this snapshot in another year and he’ll seem so small, and already I keep catching myself wondering where my baby’s gone. Which makes it all the more important to remember, in amidst the memories and the plans, to focus on our very special present.

N is for now.

 

Joining in with The Alphabet Photography Project over at PODcast.

Brmm brmm baby

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Last night was our last night in Barcelona. And as well as saying goodbye to our wonderful friends who we see far too rarely for my liking, Arthur had to say goodbye to his favourite new toy.

Every time we went over to our friends’ house Arthur would gravitate towards the girls’ toy pram and baby Clara. He liked to give her cuddles, but also I think the pram was an extension of his growing love of anything with wheels – cars, buses, tractors, motorbikes. Accordingly he christened her the brmm brmm baby.

Arthur spent hours pushing her around the living room and terrace, his evident delight both adorable and more than a little bit amusing. He doesn’t have any dolls yet: I’ve been thinking about making him one, and may need to make that a priority now we’re home. I’d like to encourage this nurturing instinct he’s developing, and it would definitely help focus the imaginative play he’s increasingly leaning towards. I guess I’ll need to give him the option of a pram as well as a sling to transport his baby too!

There were lots of brilliant things about this week – standby for a longer post about exploring Barcelona with a toddler – but one of the best bits was watching him play with the two little girls who, through their mum, were really my first introduction to motherhood. They were remarkably patient with him, and very good at sharing their toys – especially the brmm brmm baby.

 

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