So now that my friends have told me it’s perfectly okay to be a stalker, I’m off for a few days to lead a course on Writing Commerical Women’s Fiction in Stroud. This course is a little different from the one I did last month with Kate Walker; it’s more generally about writing women’s fiction than writing romance, you use the participants’ work as examples and exercises, and I’m teaching most of it alone! Yikes!

It should be good, though…the participants are very talented and I’m looking forward to meeting them.

Fecklet is being looked after by his father for three days. I think they will have a great time, but I’m anticipating coming home to a happy baby and a weary man. My husband has never been the 24-hour single parent before.

Meanwhile, Fecklet has discovered a packet of sanitary towels and is scattering them all over the dining room in a jolly fashion.

See you all on Wednesday.

He is eight and a half months old.

1. The mischievous look he gets when he rips off his bib mid-breakfast and then deliberately drops his toast on the floor.

2. Watching him commando crawl over the floor. He prefers to slither around on his belly, rather than actually crawling.

3. Baby kisses. Big, sloppy, drooly ones.

4. The way he hoots like a monkey when he sees something that gets him excited.

5. Playing “eensy-weensy spider”.

6. His single-minded concentration when he is, for example, trying to eat the nose off his teddy bear.

7. Those fifteen minutes in the morning when he lies in his cot talking to himself, singing and playing.

8. The unashamed greed with which he eats.

9. Baby hugs. Usually involving hair pulling.

10. How proud he is of himself when he pulls himself up to his feet using a piece of furniture.

So Dave and I had this horrendous and very fast-acting stomach bug on Sunday but the Fecklet showed no symptoms and was all cheerful and happy even when his parents had to take turns to run and puke. Tuesday he was still feeling well, so I took him to the child minder for the afternoon so I could write. Then, yesterday (Wed), the child minder tells me her daughter has come down with the bug. I also find out that one of the people the Fecklet was playing with at the Festival on Saturday has come down with it, too.

So essentially the Fecklet is fine while all around him people are dropping like flies.

Have I got a disease-carrying baby? Or is my friend Jenny right and the Fecklet (whom she calls Dr X) is actually an evil genius and this is his first step to taking over the world?

My baby has started to be obsessed with playing with stray hairs he finds on the floor on his ramblings. He picks them up, stares at them intently, strokes them, holds them up to see how long they are, passes them from hand to hand. He ate some yesterday–I know because I found them in his nappy. Babies are weird.

I should also perhaps clean more.

My writing goal every day is 1000 words, squeezed in while the baby is sleeping or when he’s at the child minder’s (or with his dad, when his dad is at home, which he isn’t this week). Sometimes I have to stay up late to get them done; sometimes I finish that much while the Fecklet has his morning nap and I can therefore watch TV or read in the evening.

Today the baby only napped for twenty minutes in the morning. He wanted to play, full of energy: he discovered the waste paper bin, tipped it over, emptied it, and chased it all over the floor. In the afternoon we had to run errands. Got back in time for tea and for playing and bath; then, unusually, he didn’t settle down to sleep at bedtime but instead cried for an hour, needed cuddles, needed singing, needed Calpol. He’s teething and has the tail-end of a cold, and this has made his eczema flare up, too.

Energy, teething, virus, skin: I’m exhausted and have managed 396 words. I’m calling it good and going to bed.

Someone’s discovered the joy of reading.

Or, more likely, the joy of pulling the books off the shelves, drooling on them, and chewing their corners.

There is no better expression of total, all-encompassing effort than a baby who is trying to poop.

The Fecklet is six months old today. Gosh, has that gone fast.

He celebrated by having toast and butter for the very first time for breakfast (he loved it), but I think he’s teething because he was overtired and fussy for most of the rest of the day. However, at bathtime he perked right up and when I was trying to dry and dress him he squirmed off the changing mat, grabbed the tub of E45 cream, and had a great time rolling it back and forth on the floor while he chased it.

After sending my revisions in on Monday, I’ve taken this week off from writing. In theory that should make me more relaxed but in fact it only means I’ve been spending more time watching Canada’s/Britain’s Next Top Model (Living TV seems to show the two countries interchangeably). I have no idea why I find this fascinating as I hate shows like this; perhaps it’s the sadistic thrill of watching stick-thin, beautiful girls being humiliated doing stupid photo shoots and being criticised.

This seems particularly thrilling on a day when I bought a pair of M&S magic knickers in an attempt to make my six-months-from-birth body look acceptable in a rather form-fitting little black dress.

As celebration for finishing my revisions I’m posting a photo of the Fecklet trying to eat my phone camera.

School finished at 2.00 today, and I didn’ t have to pick up the Fecklet until 5.30, so I had three hours to work on revisions, and I’m 1/3 of the way through typing the changes in. I also wrote a scene where the heroine reads aloud the subtitles of a film about Danish wife-swappers.

I’m very proud of the following line, which I think sums up the entire book quite neatly:

If you couldn’t accept unpleasant truths about yourself when you were up the duff from an anonymous one night stand, when could you?

The Fecklet made a Father’s Day card today with my wonderful childminder, of which I am inordinately proud, although his actual contribution consisted of having his feet painted with red paint and then pressed against a piece of paper while he sat and sucked on a rattle. I can see already that I am going to be the type of parent who has her child’s artwork up all over the house.

To bed. Again.

All went well, except that I was so eager to see my little boy by the end of the day that I had to restrain myself from bolting out the door and breaking all speed limits driving to the childminder’s.

Also, Fecklet refused to drink milk out of a bottle or a cup (we’ve got the plastic handled sippy-cup that the health visitor gives as a first cup). Maybe this is because he wasn’t hungry/thirsty enough; maybe it’s because he doesn’t know how; maybe it’s because he only wants warm human flesh. Anyway I’m worried that this could become a problem–especially after all my frantic pumping of milk!–so if anyone has dealt with this problem, I would love any and all advice.

Tomorrow, I’ll actually do some blogging about being a writer rather than being a mommy. Including (in case you missed it) the fact that The Sun is giving away copies of my book SPIRIT WILLING, FLESH WEAK on Saturday!!!

The new breast pump is a GIFT FROM THE GODS. It is quiet, effective, and comfortable.

I won’t be chucking this one down the stairs.

The Milkmaid tea is also delicious.

And Fecklet loved the baby rice. He devoured it as if he’d been waiting his entire life, grabbing the spoon and kicking and making happy noises and eating every little bit that happened to make it to his mouth. Little chowhound.

I’m going to bed happy. Oh, and Happy birthday, Mom!