Willow is a fan of watching Milkshake! in the morning and I let her pop it on whilst I sort breakfast and milk for the girls and get us ready for the day. At Christmas I decided I wanted to plan and book a few things to do in 2019, that would be engaging for Willow, but also suit us as a family of four with a baby and toddler to consider. Our local town hall puts on shows and acts throughout the year, but we'd never made a visit, so it was first on my list of things we could do together.

Having a caesarean can be a daunting prospect, especially if you're unprepared, and now that I have had two drastically different caesareans, I wanted to share a post with the kind of information I was looking for both after my emergency caesarean back in 2016, as well as my planned gentle caesarean in 2018.

One baby product which has always piqued my interest is the Sleepyhead. They look fabulous, parents absolutely rave about them and they seem to be an incredibly popular item on the baby market. When given the opportunity to put the famous Sleepyhead to the test with Hadley, we were super excited to give it a try - would it be as amazing as everyone says it is?

I've been a mother of two for nearly 7 months now, although it sometimes seems like just yesterday I was carrying Hadley, these 7 months have gone by so quickly, I've barely had time to take it all in. I knew our lives would change once we went from a three to four family unit and I have loved every minute of it, but for me, it's turned out a little different to the expectations I had whilst pregnant with Hadley and wistfully thinking of the future when our family would be complete. Here are a few surprising - and some not so surprising - things I have learnt in my first 7 months as a mother of two.

We were expecting Hadley to start teething quite young, as we'd experienced it with Willow, who ended up with teeth before she started weaning at 6 months old. With Willow, we used some of the classics, like Sophie la Giraffe which I really treasured buying for her whilst pregnant. This time, I wanted to see if there was something just as good, but without the little hole that squeaky teethers have, wanting something I can feel more confident using, hygiene wise. Hadley started showing signs of teething around 9 weeks old and I had seen Matchstick Monkey reviewed a lot, so we decided we'd give it a go to see how she got on.

I can't quite wrap my head around Hadley being six months old. The last update I shared was One Month of Hadley, and as you can imagine five and a bit months later, she has drastically changed since her newborn days.

I recently invested in a new Kindle. Whilst I do have the time to read at night, I don't like to turn on the bedside lights to read physical books, as the lights disturb Hadley; our almost 6-month-old who is happily still in our room (until she outgrows her crib!). Using a Kindle makes devouring books much easier, being backlit, it means I don't need to worry about disturbing anyone's sleep. Perfect timing, too, as Rachael, Amy and I thought it would be great to start an e-book club, putting our e-readers to good use and making the most of the selection of books available at our fingertips.


Each month we are going to select a book which is either free or very low in price, available on e-readers. There will be a mix of genres, selecting one book per month to read and at the end of each month, we will be sharing blog reviews featuring our thoughts on that month's read.

Of course, we would love anyone who loves reading and uses an e-reader themselves to join us each month. There's no pressure, no obligation to take part if you don't fancy reading one month that's absolutely fine. You won't be expected to share a review and you certainly don't have to have a blog to take part; we decided that to help make our book club as inclusive as possible across platforms, we would use a hashtag, #TheLiteraryAdventure, where we could share, check in and chat about each month's book.
You don't have to have a Kindle. Any device that works as an e-reader, where you can access the monthly read, works good enough for us!
We're keeping it budget friendly. That means either free or super cheap books will feature in The Literary Adventure, and, if a special book comes along that is slightly more pricey than usual and not something you want to purchase, you can skip that month's read.
Amy, Rachael and I will each review that month's read on our blogs. You don't have to have a blog yourself to take part - you can share with us via social media, too! This is not a book club just for bloggers!
Make sure you use #TheLiteraryAdventure across social media so we can connect and discuss as we go through each month. I'll be sharing on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook where you can find me @TattooedTealady!

We're kicking things off in May with The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid. I would love to hear if you like the sound of The Literary Adventure and whether you'll be taking part! I'm excited to get stuck in and be introduced to new authors and possible literary favourites!