I READ AN ARTICLE IN GO, The Irish Times' travel supplement, last week by a colleague who spent three days in Vegas and managed not to place a single bet. It reminded me of the afternoon I spent in Ikea last year when I managed not to buy a single piece of cunningly designed, competitively priced Scandinavian booty.
Not so much as a lamp or a watermelon-scented candle or a Swedish meatball violated the empty
expanse of my giant blue and yellow shopping bag that day which, correct me if am wrong Mr Ikea,
must surely be some kind of record. The restraint involved in this anti-retail therapy was herculean. As I sit surfing eBay and seriously contemplating the purchase of a 1950s-era wooden tray with an inlaid owl decoration, I wonder where all that restraint has gone. My ability to hold back (from food, emotional outbursts, mid-century furniture, anti-Government rants, joining Twitter even though I've no intention of ever twittering, and did I mention food?) has plummeted as my baby bump has expanded.
I comfort myself with the thought that at least the $10 owl tray is not a €1,000 sideboard. To my utter
relief, I was outbid on three retro sideboards last week, none of which I actually wanted or could afford and this, I can only conclude, is my own typically skewed version of that thing they call the nesting instinct.
The instinct has gone into overdrive thanks to the pregnancy and the fact that unlike pretty much
everybody else in the country, we are doing an extension to our house. Back when everyone else was blathering on about their decking and their extensions and their water features, we were merely
dreaming of the day when we'd have a bathroom that wasn't freezing and a bath that actually filled with hot water. Then, when it looks like the country might be in a little bit of financial trouble, and I discover I'm up the duff with twins, we decide to knock down and rebuild half our house.
Go figure, as they say.
The nesting instinct. According to my main adviser in this pregnancy (Google, obviously), for most women it manifests as the urge to clean and organise everything in sight in preparation for the new arrival. Speaking of which, a couple of readers have asked me to mention the west Cork company Lilly’s Eco Clean (www.lillysecoluv.com), which provides natural cleaning products that contain only good stuff such as coconut and lemon oil, perfect for those women with genuine cleaning nesting instincts.
Interestingly, with only nine weeks to go, I’m still allergic to cleaning as far as I can tell. For me, the
nesting instinct seems to centre around an impractical urge to create a home environment inspired by the minimalist interiors of 1950s to 1970s Finland, rather than a place that might be conducive to nursing two babies and cleaning up their puke.
My rare and frankly puzzling strain of nesting manifests itself in trawling design websites and lusting after chairs designed by people called Eames, who had never seeped into my consciousness before.
I’m all about chairs shaped like eggs and fashioned from wire mesh, which will be about as useful in the process of baby rearing as a 1950s owl tray.
Nesting, for me, seems to mean an urgent impulse to paint all the floorboards white, because I saw it in a magazine. It means purchasing two giant pink chandeliers online, which are going to make the place look more like a bordello than a baby haven. It means my once nonchalant attitude to interiors (“that one, yeah the magnolia, goes with everything”) is gone and I now come off like Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen back when he bestrode Changing Rooms like a bouffant-haired Colossus. The other day, when we were in a crafts shop, my boyfriend entreated: “Step away from the stencil kits”. Lucky for these children I did, or they’d have misshapen stars- and planet-themed nightmares for years.
Not surprisingly, all this nesting activity means he’s been getting it in the neck even more than usual.
Sample conversation:
Me: "I can't do everything by myself. Carry these babies andvisualise the colour scheme. Can you even imagine how hard it is for me to work out which grey to paint the walls? Pavilion Grey. Charleston Grey. London Grey. They all have subtle differences, you could at least try to understand. And do you have any idea how impossible it is to source lime-green, hot-pink and electric-blue striped runners for the hall, stairs and landing, colours inspired slightly by Missoni with a hint of Conran. Well, do you?"
Him: “Well no, because I’m colour blind.”
Me: “I CAN’T BELIEVE YOU WOULD USE THAT AS AN EXCUSE. I AM CARRYING YOUR UNBORN CHILDREN. THE LEAST YOU COULD DO IS BE ABLE TO DISTINGUISH BETWEEN ‘SKIMMING STONE’ AND ‘CAT’S PAW’. YOU ARE SO UNFEELING.”
It’s not much fun, I don’t mind telling you. Especially because he’s the one in charge of the finances. This means I have to field regular phone calls querying mysterious purchases that have been
appearing on my Visa bill. A sewing table which I plan to repurpose. A vintage magazine rack. A couple of pieces of Clarice Cliff. “We’ve barely enough in the budget for a fitted carpet in the nursery and you are off buying art-deco milk jugs,” he points out reasonably.
“CREAMER, it’s a CREAMER, there’s a big DIFFERENCE,” I clarify before slamming down the phone, demolishing a Victoria sponge, six slices of bacon, a roll of white pudding and two pears. I’ve calmed down now and am relaxing with one of my hourly flicks through the Ikea catalogue. I have my eye on a leather sofa, some dining chairs, a few floor lamps, two beds and an Eames-style lounge chair with possibly a large portion of Swedish
meatballs and strudel on the side. (What??? What???? I’m NESTING! Jeez.)
