Holidays

I do not have a paying job. I am a stay at home mum who tries very hard to stay out of the home for as much of the day as possible. Partly that's because we live in a comfortable but very tiny flat, but also because I feel very cooped in when I stay inside anywhere too long. But that's not the point.

What I'm getting at is when you don't have a job with working hours going on holidays is quite different. I contemplated this last week. I was very excited to be jetting off but I felt slightly remiss that this trip didn't conjure the same thrill of escape that a break from work once did. This is probably because in my current line of work, the office (as in my daughter) travels with me. So, I was thrilled for the adventure and for time with my family but I wasn't anticipating the traditional holiday trappings. Fun? Absolutely. Relaxing? Not so much.

I am happy to report my understanding of a holiday was wholly mistaken. It dawned on me this week that a holiday is any break from what you normally do. When you go to an office each day, a week staying at home is a holiday. When you're a stay at home mum a week in Spain - even with a labour-intensive portable office - roaming around Gaudi's masterpieces, eating tapas, exploring markets, travelling on insanely scary and dangerous roads, is a holiday because that's not how I tend to roll in the working week.

It's been so much fun but equally restorative. What I love is some distance from my norm has given me time to reflect. It's been invigorating, possibly even especially invigorating because I've shared it with my lovely work-in-progress.

Raising a baby is many many things. Most of those things are wonderful but one thing that is not so wonderful – depending on the day – is that it is relentless. You don't wake up one morning to discover that after all of your good work the day before, you've been granted a day free of meal preparation, feeding, cleaning highchairs, changing clothes, washing clothes, changing nappies, bathing, putting to bed. You don't even get weekends.

The best you can do is negotiate, with whomever you can bribe, for some time away. I recommend doing this as often as you possibly can. But even then you'll return – in my case always happier for it - and pick up exactly where you left off.

This is not to say it's not an utterly rewarding and privileged pursuit. It is. Unbelievably so. But still, it's tiring. I have a husband who has both the time and inclination to do absolutely his share of parenting and household logistics, but even with that support, it's still not all Huggies ads.

Occasionally in the haze it's possible to forget the big picture. To forget that you're not just feeding, cleaning, dressing and caring for a baby, day in day out. That you're actually raising a little person.

This break has magnified that. Away from my daily reality all I can see is the absolute wonder that is my baby. Naturally I appreciate this wonder is blissfully subjective. It's universally true that every parent has a love for their children that is beyond words and bounds. I don't love my daughter any more for being away from home but I am seeing her in a different light.

In every smile, giggle and indecipherable word, I can see so clearly all the love, time and devotion that is poured into her by so many people, but especially by me and my husband. She's a delight, and at least some of that is probably because of what we spend our days doing.

Which is lovely to discover. It is also true that at eleven months', she is at something of a halcyon stage. We're past the teeny baby stage but not quite at toddlerhood. She's an open book…blissfully easy to read, fascinated by the world around her and incredibly fun company.

Reading that back now it could be read as a promotion for people taking their work on holiday. I'm not entirely sure that taking your blackberry, or even your boss for that matter, would invoke quite the same wonder as an infant child. I suppose it could but I wouldn't like to promote it. Ok I have to run my blackberry baby is awake.