Lily's Frillies

9 August

In the afternoons we go walking. Lily sleeps as soon as we set off, with her head bobbing on my chest. I peek at her under her hat every two or three paces, so peaceful and fragile, like a porcelain egg. Lily is the Imelda Marcos of millinery. She must have thirty hats: frilly and flowery, beanies, bonnets and berets. Another arrived from an old friend in the post this morning. She is very well loved and she sports this love today, in the form of a flowery cap with a pink brim.

I point out birds and trees, woodpeckers, rabbits and otters (ok so not otters but there were rabbits and a woodpecker). The truth is the world is a very exciting place now that I have someone to show it to.

It strikes me that in the hinterland somewhere between discovering the truth about Father Christmas (and I was embarrassingly late at cottoning that one) and having your first child, everything is fairly predictable. Not boring, not for a second. But you generally know what's coming: exams, marriage, drunkenness, dentists, parties. There are the odd moments of turbulence, forty minute free falls, but on the whole it's pretty prescribed. Then along comes a baby and you know nothing of the future. How will she look, how will she sound, will she be a pianist, a gymnast, a florist? Will she take after her father or her grandmother, will she survive, will she ever get bored of the Peter Rabbit mobile? Suddenly it's all as unknown to you as it is to her.

I love this child so much it roots me quite literally to the spot. This morning I woke to her burbling and peered into her basket. She clocked me, gave a massive gummy grin and then nearly blew her own trousers off. Daisy found me laughing and crying all at once ten minutes later.

It wasn't always like that. It's been creeping up on me over the days. They say you bond immediately a baby is born. Well that's not terribly helpful to those of us who don't. I couldn't take her immediately (because the hospital gave me drugs that I had warned them I was allergic to ' perhaps the topic of another diary when I'm not feeling so forgiving), so she was able to cuddle her daddy for the first few hours, coming only to me when she was hungry and crotchety. Besides this I was exhausted, terrified and beginning to grieve for my old life. I didn't feel anything resembling love, just a sort of wonderment.

But as the days have passed this huge torrent of love has filled me and spills over on to her. Her daddy is so deranged with it that all sense of style has deserted him. He dresses her in the mornings and today she resembles a convict wearing a huge frilly pair of pink shorts and to finish off this look, a pair of knee length shamrock socks (we have been given many, many presents).

Last night I was finishing the illustrations for Lily Green and the Tree Fellers and Daisy was sketching Lily. Two big kids and a little one. I love us.