My style (I use the term loosely) has been through many evolutions over the years. As a teenager I embraced goth, skater, geek and shy-bookish-girl-blending-into-the-background. Not all at once, mind you. I graduated from art school with paint on my jeans and chipped nail varnish and university saw me try to adopt a ‘grown up’ look. Not that I knew what that was at the age of 19. (I’m still wondering now.) My hair has been every colour under the sun, I got tattoos and piercings and wore heals so high my legs would burn for weeks…And then I got pregnant.

Before I had a person growing in my uterus I lived in skinny jeans. I loved them, I would have slept in them if I could, so passionate was my affair. Thankfully I found some amazing maternity skinnies (thank you H&M) – add a few floaty tops and I was set right up until all I wore was pyjamas and biscuit crumbs while I sat on the sofa and awaited the imminent arrival of a baby.

 There’s nothing like having a baby to make you totally lose your sense of self style. I’m not ashamed to admit that I spent two weeks following the birth in leggings, bagging at the knee, and an oversized hoody or pyjama top. Because when is there the time to do anything when you have a newborn to feed/change/coo over?

It’s taken me a l-o-n-g time to get used to having my body back. It’s freakishly like my old one, but there’s something about it that makes it feel really alien, something hard to put my finger on. The edges are softer, my waist thicker, my proportions altered somehow. Putting clothes on for the first outing as a family felt really…weird. Possibly because I had spent fourteen days in my jammies. But my bump was gone, my boobs were bigger and WTF I’m a mummy now.

I started to assess my wardrobe, head cocked to one side while a scathing eye roamed across the remnants of wilder days gone by. Can I still wear short shorts? How will they look when I am bent over the pram puffing and panting it up a hill. I’m guessing not flattering. Or dignified.

I have nothing to wear. Nothing.

Not only that, where exactly do I shop? How have I never noticed how LOUD all the shops are?! And all the clothes are so short/see-through/low cut/horrible. I wasn’t ready to shop in grown up shops, but nor could I find anything I liked anywhere else.

Since then I have slowly started to rebuild my wardrobe. Not an easy task when shopping time is limited, money is usually spent on a certain younger fashionista before I can get my paws on it and changing rooms are totally non-negotiable with a pram in tow. I pick up bits and pieces here and there and very occasionally have an online spree when the urge takes me. And I still love my skinny jeans and oversized t-shirts.

I still have absolutely no idea how to dress my new body (self?) but I’m getting there.

Little girls are far easier and much more fun to dress anyway.

Beans is growing rapidly at the moment – seriously, 1 1/2 inches in four days. FOUR DAYS! It’s inhuman! – so I’m finding that I’m picking her up something new to replace something one week old that’s straining at the seams. I love polka dots and bright colours and try not to dress her in pink all the time. A feat harder than it should be when everything for little girls comes in only various shades of pink. Her signiture style has become layered t-shirts and leggings – her short arms and legs mean that jeans are often a pain because they need rolling up sixty times before they stop catching under her feet.

I love when she is wearing mismatched patterns or clashing colours, when else can you get away with that in life?!