America’s Next Top Model or write this….?

So, we are back from the Cote d’Azur, the South of France, Callian to be precise! ‘Where?’, I hear you ask! Callian, a lovely medieval village perched in the hills in Fayence , more importantly for you all about 20 minutes by car from Cannes, 30 minutes from Saint Tropez both of which only received fleeting visits from us during our two-week villa break.

‘Another holiday!” I hear you say. ‘Didn’t she just come back from Morocco?’. Well, yes and no. Morocco was in April and I needed to get away before I grow too large to travel! (That was my excuse anyway). And ( never start a sentence with ‘and’ they taught in school), I got an AMAZING deal, through an agent no less, unbelievably. A villa with pool normally EUR2200 a week for EUR1650 for two weeks. Even you must admit it’s worth going for that. The only problem with late availability booking is finding anyone to share the cost. We rattled around in a beautiful five bedroom villa for all but four days when my mum flew out to join us. We drove there, in our classic Aston Martin (no less!), my husband’s dream, with faulty aircon so windows open all the way  and it was fun.  Stopped off for one night each way and with the help of my trusty Michelin guide ate like a king and queen at Bib Gourmand restaurants almost every day. We are both foodies and for EUR28/head you get Michelin Star quality food.  If only the UK had the same abundance of restaurants of quality and value. The car, however, was the star. I cannot believe the attention it got. Photographs, waves, thumbs-ups and we don’t have the (more) expensive model either.

We came home with bags full of Petit Bateau babygrows too. Amazing value out there and I’ll be selling some on Ebay at some stage but if anyone is interested do let me know and I’ll send details. Just another thing on my long list of to-do’s which just gets longer and longer even though I have more time on my hands now than ever before. Typical.

Anyway, back from holiday, 23 weeks pregnant now ( I still can’t believe how quickly it is all going) and I’m growing. I now weigh 8 stone 10 ( from 7 stone 6) !!! I went to pilates yesterday and I’m convinced that I’m the same size as a 30 week pregnant mum!! (yuk, hate the use) in the class, albeit at least a foot shorter than she is at 5″2!  We had the anomaly scan on Tuesday and baby is fine, if not very obstinate, making me have to go for a walk and eat something sweet (hardship!) in order to make it  pose for pictures or more precisely turn over so that all relevant body parts could be accounted for-they were, eventually! We (Mr Pregnantcitygirl) have decided to wait to find out the sex of the baby so it was extremely frustrating having to look away at times. I agreed to this against all my control freak judgement because once in a blue moon I can’t expect to have my own way and I suppose it will be a nice surprise (if it’s a girl – I want a girl, Ok, I will love it whatever it is, don’t worry).

Two updates, as my short attention span is waning, despite the fact that I have so much more to say. Trofolastin. This one’s from a while back. The stretchmark cream that I am using (once a day) that I bought from Spain as it isn’t for sale in the UK, is working. I’ve been using it now long enough to judge. I had pretty bad stretchmarks on my otherwise quite nice bottom from having gained and lost weight in the past and these have faded significantly, to almost nothing. I’m using it on my cleavage (a massive one having gone from 32c to 34dd!) and chest and I have noticed that the crepiness between my massive boobs has gone as well. I wish I had taken before and after photos as that’s what a blog is for isn’t it but I was lazy and it’s too late now. Sorry! So, top marks for a cream which actually work. As said before, it is manufactured by Novartis so really should be effective.

Lastly, to work. Well, I’m still in negotiations with my firm. I’ve been made officially redundant (as of mid June) but it’s taking a long time to get what I’m entitled to which is a hard job in itself as of course they do not want to tell me what I am entitled to and as a so-called ‘partner’ my situation is complicated. I’ve consulted ACAS a couple of times (useful by the way if ever you need) and I am holding off on expensive legal advice (it cost me £3000 to get my initial contract agreed) as unbelievably or believably, as the case may be, I am broke!