Day Release & Waiting for the cheese

When our son was four months old my partner and I decided, to keep the flame alive, and to keep ourselves alive - we would spend one day a month away from our little cherub. One day and one night to be precise. I felt confident in leaving him with his Grandparents for one day and so we took our chance and booked a hotel near by. We would spend this one day and night doing everything we couldn't do in the 29 or 30 other days of the month. My partner mostly slept... whilst I took several long lava hot baths with a bottle of wine. I also stopped calling him a Bastard for the day.

"Here he is Mum, Dad: Now I'd rather you didn't take him out in the pram because you might forget to hold the safety strap. I'd rather you didn't go out at all. I don't want you to give him a bath because he's just too heavy and too slippery and I can barely hold him in the bath and I'm in my thirties - so he can go one day without a bath. Always check his nappy before you put him in his jumperoo or the result of poo plus aggressive jumping is pretty catastrophic. Don't take your eyes off him for a nanosecond. PUT ON YOUR GLASSES for Gods sake! Here is his food, here are his bottles, here are his spare clothes... text me every hour to let me know all three of you are alive... ok... GO!" 

My partner and I would then leap into a taxi waiting outside like two criminals in a get away car.

Last weekend was our third day out on day release for good behaviour and to add excitement to our day off I booked us onto a wine tasting!

We arrived at the stylish bar and met the other wine tasters. It felt like our first 'date' in well... forever. It all felt exciting and new and I felt in love again - or at least I did by the third sample. The portion sizes were ridiculously big considering how little we had paid. We had a GLASS of wine with each 'taster'.

First came the Chenin Blanc.
Then the Sauvignon Blanc.
Then a white Rioja (beautiful).

"Any Questions?" the wine expert said
"Yez" I said, my hand shooting up like the Teacher's pet "I waz told there woulds be cheese?"
"Err... yes, the cheese is coming"

Then it was a large glass of Prosecco.
Then we started on the reds.
First it was a Beaujolais,
then a Chianti...
glug glug glug.
I had lost most of my taste bud usage by this point.

"Doose we gets ze cheeses now?"
"Yes ... soon"

Then it was some other red - don't ask me which one...

I was now waiting for the cheese like I once waited for my little boy to arrive. And it felt as long as those two extra weeks of pregnancy. How desperate I was for my little guy to arrive. Now desperate for cheese!

Gosh I love wine. Wine is sooo nice. Why didn't I start a blog all those months ago about wine? Not pregnancy! Not babies! I should have written about wine - then people might have sent me free wine to taste and write about - imagine that! I could have been the next Jilly Goolden! I could have been a Master Sommelier! Yes - I should have written about Vino! Yummy scrummy wine - not babies! Babies? Bleeurgh.

There were two married couples to my right. One of the women asked me if it was a special occasion? Birthday? Anniversary?

"Noes..." I said "we has a baby nearly six months agoes an we ave ONE days off a month"

"Oh my Goodness!" the lady exclaimed before announcing to the table
"They had a baby five months ago! A toasts to the baby!!" as my partner whipped out an impossibly cute picture of our son. The table raised their glasses to our child.

The corners of my eyes welled up. God I missed him. I couldn't wait to get back to him. Our little angel. We should be at home with him. Yes I know I am with him 24 hours a day and this is our only break but I miss him - look at his perfect little face. We should go back right now......

"ooooh yeasys! The cheeses are heres babes! Babes.. babes.. don'ts falls asleep.. BABES?
mmm... I loves cheeses".

bbbbrrriiinnng 
"Hello Darling! Just to let you know, we have had to give him a bath - we had a bit of a jumperoo incident ..... and the poo was up to his neck. Nothing to worry about dear, see you in the morning!"

It would seem we have come full circle.