Trapped toddler parents: puddlesuits splashing towards spring

[WeSearchedHereWeSearchedThere]

All guardians of toddlers welcome, we offer ideas, activities, and a shoulder to lean on when it all gets too much. We’ve conquered winter, next stop spring!

Continuing from www.mumsnet.com/Talk/_chat/4105179-trapped-toddler-parents-of-the-fabled-winter-2020-2021-puddle-suits-at-the-ready-hello-christmas?pg=1

There was a huge amount of toddler knife chat on the first thread. There's a Swedish company whose name begins with K that do them. They have dog faces on. Someone will know who I mean.

www.kuhnrikon.co.uk/kitchenkinder-dog-knife-with-teeth

Personally we use such blunt knives that I give the toddler one of our own.

Thanks for all the knife ideas! She's recently started kicking up a fuss at meal times that we have two pieces of cutlery and she only has one (spoon or fork) so we have just been giving a normal toddler cutlery knife which she just holds and doesn't do anything with! I'll check out all the options, thanks!

Not toddler activities as such but may I ask for some main meal inspiration? Currently we tend to cycle through:

Beef stew
Beans on toast
Fish fingers alphabets and peas
Chicken stew
Chicken creamy pasta
Spaghetti bolognaise
Curry and rice

I need to get back on batch cooking for ds now that dh back at work so we will all be eating less together (things that I also will eat though as ds likes when we eat the same thing). Ds not an egg fan which is a shame as omelette was a previous go to!

Dh as mentioned is back to work (sxhool) today and think ds has Deffo noticed as he's a bit clingy and easily frustrated, plus when we video called he told dh not to be at school because he works in the office ( at home). Poor bub. On the plus side, ds stayed in bed till the sun came up in his clock today which is real progress!

I really haven't caught up on this thread in a while DS2 is now managing at nursery 8-12! He really loves it there which is brilliant.

So sorry for your loss @Motherofmonsters, it’s a particularly tough time to lose someone at the moment.

Kuhn rikon knives are great! I rate the scissors they do too - great for smaller things like green beans. I tried quite hard to cut myself with the knives and scissors before giving them to DS and wasn’t able to, so I’m very content with him using them. But they’re still stored out of his reach, with rules about using them supervised and only at the table, for general knife safety reasons.

We spent the weekend in the garden again. DH putting up a chicken shed, which seemed to involve a lot of hammering foundations with a sledgehammer. DS had a small hammer and went around tapping everything too... he also has a toy electric drill, so has to check all the screws on furniture etc are in properly with that! I’m currently stalking marketplace and eBay, trying to find more cheap outside toys. The way our garden is set up there’s a bit near the house which he can be in on his own (me keeping an eye from the kitchen), but then the veg/chicken/pig area is further away, so I need stuff to keep him occupied in each bit depending on where I need him to be.

I think we’ll get the paints out today. Does anyone have an apron/coverall they’d recommend? We used to use close pop in ones, but they’re now a bit small, plus DS2 is weaning so using them for him.

@meow1989 I’m in the habit of a chicken bake on Mondays - chicken thigh fillets, whatever veg is around (normally courgette, peppers, aubergine), stick it all in a dish with olive oil and either garlic or Schwartz season all, roast together. I got a soup maker for Christmas so I often make soup on a Sunday, basically with whatever veg is looking a bit limp in the fridge (as Monday is our shopping day). I do need to do some batch cooking for DS2 now he’s eating solids, he is a bit too fond of toast and melty sticks!

@meow1989. We're in a bit of a meal rut here too, but here's a few of our usual suspects:

• Salmon, new potatoes and green beans.
• Chilli con carne and rice
• Jacket potatoes with leftover chilli.
• Pasta or risotto dish - for pasta, either pasta bake, carbonara or alfredo. For risotto, we either like seafood or bacon and tomato. Often do this in slow cooker.
• Fishcakes (either homemade or shop-bought if I can't be bothered) and cheesy veg mash.
• Pizza night (usually homemade but supermarket pizza if I'm tired or fed up).
• Sausages and chips
• Sausage casserole
• Omelette or scrambled eggs on toast
• Roast chicken
• Cold chicken and couscous.
• Chicken, barley and vegetable stew
• Cheese sandwiches and carrot sticks. This is my "I have no inspiration left" meal. It's surprisingly popular.

Morning all, DS1 ran to school this morning with his friend from the neighbouring flat

BertieBotts glad to hear your DS is finally properly at nursery - I remember your really long settling in sessions.

Ooh I love talking about food!
We always have a roast on a Sunday, and pizza on Saturdays with a film.
Pesto pasta quite a lot - I mix it with cream cheese and peas too.
Quorn bolognese (we're not veggie, I just prefer the taste, it's less stodgy)
Once a week we do chicken and rice, we like the fresh kits in the supermarket with marindade and peppers, and bulk it out with a packet of tenderstem brocolli
Our lazy lunch is hummus sandwiches and pepper sticks/cherry tomatoes.

DS2 is also a big fan of carbs/puffs/fruit...luckily he likes chicken and green beans as 'proper foods'

Hope everyone with older children finds the return to school goes smoothly today.

We also have the same food rotation, and thinking of it now it's just the usual things;

Roast chicken/beef potatoes and veg (Sunday, and the chicken is a cook in bag one).

Salmon, broccoli and potatoes or salmon and chicken pasta melt with cheese and broccoli and peas , mozzarella and tinned tomatoes.

Cod/haddock fillet , potatoes and veg.

Stir fry noodles (they love them) with stir fry veg and chicken or Turkey (no sauce).

Corned beef hash!

Chili with rice.

Bolognese or meatballs with pasta.

Jacket potatoes with tuna peas and sweetcorn.

Freezer food, waffles, alphabites, potato smiles, fish fingers.

Sausages, mash and onion gravy!

Chicken fajitas and rice (they love tortilla wraps)

Pizza or quiche and salad.

Easy peasy pasta (as seen on Bing!) Pasta, peas and grated cheese.

Slow cooker casseroles.

Food chat: HOORAY

Roast on Sunday and again on Monday by heating up left overs.

Avocado pasta
Curry
Chilli
Bean stew (bloody gorgeous)
Tomato pasta
Lentils and bread crumbs (sounds sad)

Everything always two nights.

Then one night meals are
Pizza
Burgers
Jacket potatoes.

In other news I had a two second cry at not knowing how to get through the day and now look it's 2pm already. Not wishing our lives away but also Christ it's hard. Sat in the sun in a park whilst freezing to death. Thank god for flasks and lunch boxes and mumsnet.

Heading home soon which is an hours walk. What's everyone doing today?

@footprintsintheslow. Yes, 2pm already!!! Better days will come, and until then we have and .

We built a huge train track on Saturday and made toasties and waffles on Sunday. Meant to get outside and do some more sorting in the garden but we went for a lovely walk in our nearest woods instead and ignored the garden mess. DS found an abandoned den which he enjoyed playing in with his cars.

Ideas for this week -

• Today, we're having a "Gingerbread Man" themed day. No actual gingerbread, but DS has been decorating cardboard gingerbread men with pompoms and sequins and other bits and bobs. We've re-read the Gingerbread Man and watched a couple of Youtube versions. We might try to build a cardboard "Gingerbread house" later on in the week and paint and decorate it but tomorrow is a work/nursery day and I've been creative enough for today!
• Paddling pool - we have a small folding one that doesn't need to be inflated. Filling it with a few inches of water and finding something that can act as a ramp or a bridge, with a few plastic cars, is always a huge hit, especially when they fall in the water.
• Bath activities - DS always loves being in the bath and it calms him down so it's good for doing activities which he wouldn't otherwise want to stay still and do. He's not a huge fan of colouring in or crayoning, but I've ordered some bath crayons in the hope that being in the bath will make working on those skills more appealing.

Mm food, I'm loving cooking at the moment so have been doing a lot of new things. Lots of ideas on here already but some websites/people I get good ideas from are:

Taming twins - some delicious one pot and slow cooker meals (honey and mustard chicken is my personal fave)
What mummy makes - lots on her Instagram but she also has a decent cook book, the chicken satay dippers are delish
BBC good food has some decent 'family meals' sections

Some other usuals here are:

• puff pastry pies and tarts, really easy to change fillings based on what's left over in the fridge
• pasta bake
• salmon and noodles
• chicken pieces and rice
• roast veg and cous cous
• pulled pork either with buns or nachos
• roast dinners, always do double and it makes lunches/soups afterwards

@MessAllOver love the gingerbread ideas, such a nice idea to have a theme day, will bank that for when DD is older!

Spent a good afternoon at the local waterpark today, DD managed her longest walk yet, is shattered now and I'm aching all over as well!

We're going to try some more sensory activities this week with oats, water and edible cereal type things. Hopefully kill some time!

Thanks for all the ideas! Looks like I'm going to be busy!

Ds asked for toys in ice at the weekend so have upped the stakes for tomorrow with dinosaurs in a big bowl of dyed blue water with leaves and glitter and jewels. Plus have shaving foam and pom poms for morning chaos.

In the afternoon going to meet our support bubble friend for a walk.

A special mention goes to pil who kept ds a bit later today and bought him back bathed, pyjama'd and asleep!

Sorry for your loss @Motherofmonsters, I hope you’ve got some good support and lots of cuddles.

I’ve dipped out a bit lately, 4 month sleep regression has hit hard and frankly I’m a miserable bastard because of it. Not getting anything longer than 1.5-2 hours sleep at night and I’m somewhat tired.

I’ll return when we’re on the other side of it.

@MonkeyPuddle, sending you . Sleep regressions are truly awful as is sleep deprivation, no wonder it is used as a form of torture. Feel free to moan and we will be here to listen.

Good morning all, hope everyone is ok.

Yesterday I was limited on the activities ideas (at one point I got out old comics and we ripped them up and made them into balls to throw), it was a low point of the morning and it was raining, so I am hoping we can go outside a bit more today for fresh air and get some energy and inspiration.

Hope everyone has a good day.

Sorry for your loss Motherofmonsters. Hope you can find some time to look after yourself.
Good luck with the sleep MonkeyPuddle. Impressed with your themed week ideas MessAllOver
I have been so fed up this week, especially with the baby stuff, which seems so boring and relentless without any of the fun things you can usually do with a baby available. However with the toddler we did this masking tape painting from this book and I thought I’d mention it as its a super easy to set up idea for anyone also lacking energy right now! for all - hope everyone has a good day.

Ds is really enjoying playing with coins at the moment. He's just found a load of old holiday money in my jewelry box and has set himself up with a bucket and some pans from his play kitchen as is happily pouring and chatting away. Only just convinced him to break away to make some cakes for us to ice later!

Busy morning here doing a big toy clear out and overhaul. Toy storage had become a bit overflowing and as I was sitting in all the mess I really wished I hadn't started the job But it's done now, all the 'baby baby' toys separated for when number 2 comes along and all DD's switched around. She's already found some that had been buried in boxes to keep her entertained so think I might have to try switching them round more often!

Does anyone have any ideas of toys for 18 month olds? Would like to get some happy land type things but any other ideas would be much appreciated!

@drumst1ck this magnetic game in the photo is good. It's out of stock on Amazon right now but it comes back vey so often.

Also duplo, tuff tray, Grimms rainbow, simple jigsaw, threading, cheap buggy and doll

@Lostthetastefordahlias I feel the baby sadness too. I actually feel lonely at the moment. I do have people I know with babies but real friends are all busy with work and my H has been working all day and every evening and weekend. It's just me and a baby who cries a lot and a toddler who has turned into a terrible tyrant.

@drumst1ck, what about some pretend play? Toy Hoover, or a cleaning set, or toy kitchen? We've got a pretend Henry Hoover and Melissa and Doug cleaning set, youngest DS likes them (few months younger than your DD).

@Lostthetastefordahlias, @ Footprintsintheslow, it's so hard at the moment, hopefully things might get a bit easier when more things/places to go open up.

A few activities we have some over the last few days;

Made a bird's nest in the garden out of twigs we collected.

Made a dinosaur world outside with toy dinosaurs, stones and pulled up some weeds and lumps of earth for the dinosaurs to eat.

Its raining today, always makes things more difficult I think. We drew a Noah's Ark and read our Noah's Ark lift the flap books and stuck some animal stickers to our Ark picture.

Also cleaned patio doors with water bottle spray and cloth and Melissa and Doug cleaning set, they like the water spray so much, me less so.

Not sure about the afternoon, torrential rain out there....

@drumst1ck DD absolutely loves potato heads, I got a load second hand and she's been playing with them for days. She puts the pieces in and also will just carry them around. She loves Duplo as well, mostly she just likes pulling the pieces apart.

DS has been back to Preschool this week and he's enjoying being back. DD is liking being able to do what she wants without DS getting involved.

DS is currently in his room turning his bedding into a 'hovercraft'. Preschool told me he was tired today, he's been full of energy the whole time he's been home and doesn't seem to want to go or sleep... I'm just glad I don't have to sit in his room while he messes about

Kuay popping in to catch up and want to say thabks for all the fab food ideas. Ive written next weeks meal plan and it's the most excited I've been for ages. Every meal on it is something we've not had in what feels like absolutely ages.

I hope all the slightly bigger people have had a good first few days back at school.

I feel like today has whizzed by which is odd as we haven't even left the houae but equally lovely as some of the days recently seem to have dragged. Although I do feel like I've read the same 5 page book about 1000 times.

No idea what kuay means...it was supposed to say just

Thanks all for the toy ideas! I'll have a good look at them this evening. Although she spent a good half an hour just playing with my cookie cutters today so why we spend so much money on them I don't know!

Pouring with rain here and couldn't face going out so today was an indoor day. Got lots done though and now to rest my swollen ankles with a large hot chocolate. (I wish it was wine..)

@Same4Walls great that you feel excited about your meals, being in a rut is the worst. Let us know how they turn out!

Just dropping in to say tomorrow we’re going to do teddy zip line and splashy tray tummy time with the baby which once she’s bored of that DS can have to do with as he like.