Yesterday was just the prologue… today she was sick for real. Nose so runny and clogged that at times she could barely breathe through it, sneezing (mostly onto my clothes), plus fever with all its associated tiredness and misery. She even looks obviously unwell, with a puffy face and icky eyes. And during our walk she didn’t even mind lying down, when she would normally try to sit up all the time – instead she just lay there with half-closed eyes and occasionally moved a hand a little bit. Poor thing.

Just in time for the weekend, Ingrid has a cold: sniffles and a bit of a fever.

Whenever I go out among people with Ingrid, especially if she’s in the buggy and not a baby carrier, inevitably someone will walk up and touch her. “Ooh, look at those cute little toes!” and they finger her toes, or her cheeks or her hands. Almost always without asking me, they just walk up to her and start pawing.

It strikes me as very impolite. You wouldn’t do that to an adult, so why do you think it’s OK with a baby? She’s not a toy or a pet. I’m more and more tempted to reciprocate… pinch their cheek while leaning in really close and cooing at them. I imagine they would find that a bit indecent, and perhaps that would make them realise that I find their behaviour indecent, too.

And it’s always women. Women of a certain age, and I would guess it’s women with no children of their own.

Ingrid’s last day at the nursery at work. Next week she will be going to the “real” nursery, close to home.

Murray Perahia at the Barbican. First time we left Ingrid with a babysitter in the evening. Success from our point of view but not from hers.

Work. Conference call with unhappy baby, and remote debugging while holding wiggly baby.

I’m happy about having gone back to work. I enjoy my job, I enjoy getting out of the house and doing something other than caring for a baby, I enjoy having adults around me during the day. The days are quite rushed now – I need to leave early in the evening in order to get Ingrid home in time, so she can get her meal and bath before it’s time to go to bed. I also take 2 breaks for breastfeeding during the day. So I try to get to work as early as I can, which means the mornings are hurried as well.

And part-time work suits me very well right now. After getting 3 days of adult company and intellectual stimulation (and 1 day of working from home), I can really enjoy my 3 days with Ingrid. I enjoy my days at home much more than I did before I started working.

Today was my first day working from home and it went about as well as I expected. It was hard to concentrate on work with Ingrid demanding attention. Nevertheless I got just over 4 hours’ worth of work done, most of it while she was napping. This leaves about half a workday that I need to make up for during the weekend.

I think I will have to plan my Fridays very carefully – above all to make sure that I can spend all of her naptime working, so that I don’t need to use that time for eating lunch for example. The next best time for working is after she’s woken and eaten – she’s relatively happy to play on her own for a while. As we get closer to the next nap, she gets more tired and wants more and more attention.

Took Ingrid to Stepney Green and introduced her to grass.

Took Ingrid to meet my colleagues. They liked her chubby legs. The legs seem to be her most popular part.

Ingrid’s first full day in the nursery; my first full day in the office. Navigating the Tube in a rush hour with Ingrid in the Patapum and her stuff in a backpack turned out to be quite doable.