We will have a serene, pain free, uneventful pregnancy and birth and will BROOK NO ARGUMENT on that.

[scarletfingernail]

New thread.

Wants its in the sale at winstanleys pramworld for £249 plus free britax baby safe carseat with it???? In red.

Free p+p

No idea for going looking though, sorry, on phone, this is best I can do!

Already sat with upset dd...

Oh- its not black chassis wants, oops. They've got the purple britax-4 though with black chassis- could you be tempted?!

I'm feeling weepy over my poor dd being so grotty again, hate seeing her wake up distraught, she's not a big cryer. Blaming exhaustion and hormones as she's clearly going to be fine, any day now, for ages!!!!

wants I had a look earlier for you, but could only find it with online retailers. I've no idea where you can go to actually have a look at it. If you have any independent retailers in your area it might be an idea to give them a ring as they don't all have websites, so might not come up on a Google search.

dream so sorry to hear about your poor DD. It beggars belief. Are you going to take her to get her checked over at the doctors? When DS has been ill in the past and Calpol and Nurofen have both failed to bring down his temperature, we take him for a walk outside. It works wonders at bringing down the temperature. I remember one time taking him out for a walk at midnight in the snow and his temperature went down from 40 to 36.5 within half an hour. Poor thing, we did wrap him up as normal and he was half asleep but it did the trick. That was following advice from NHS Direct which I did not believe would work.

LOL, you could come up north to wigan and look at these in the flesh wants but think you're down south!!

Her temp is down to 37 now scarlet, so I'm going to bed quick! Will see how she is overnight and maybe take her tomorrow.

Thank you dream and scarlet for doing research especially looking after poorly DD aswell. DH is willing to travel but possibly not that far! I will look at Winstanleys website.

Can I ask a random question? I've spent the evening internet shopping for baby stuff (as usual!) and I've totally confused myself on the breast pump side of things. Have any of you ladies used a breast pump you would recommend?

The only reason I want it is to enable DH to take on some of the night feeds. Also, if it goes well, I could rely on expressed breast milk rather than mixed feeding. I can't face the idea of a manual breast pump, it sounds far too much like hard work! So out of the electric options I was planning to get the medela swing - but despite all the glowing reviews from people who've just recently bought them, there are numerous reviews from people who say it breaks down within a few weeks of use. For a hefty £100 price tag I'm not thrilled at the idea that it'll break down within a couple of months! Does anyone have another recommendation, or perhaps has used the medela swing and it DIDN'T break down on them?

Sorry to continually use this thread as my sounding board - I'm just a little scared of the rest of MN! Please feel free to ignore me, I want to hear all about everyone's weekends as well!

On a separate note can I just say I'm in awe of Dream's memory!! I hope your DD feels better soon, she's just had such a rough couple of months. I hope her temperature stays down and she stays in bed tonight!

I know this isn't a high street store and it doesn't include the carrycot, but I just wanted to flag this offer to Wants in case it's of any interest.

scream I used the medula swing for 16 weeks expressing every 3 hours all day every day and it didn't break. The only thing I replaced was the boob shield thing and that was less than £5 I think but i used it a lot so I guess I recommend it although would live to shoot the bastard thing and would be happy if I never saw it again

Hi everyone,

I can't believe Dd is ill dream! I usually end up cosleeping part of the night when my Dd is that ill, because I usually wake her up checking on her! Worries me a lot. I have got a bit blase about temp as she gets on of about 39 at the slightest sniffle, but it is awful :(
Thanks for commenting on my baby name thread, I think now I am confronted with it being his name I am having doubts! I would also like to have a short list as we certainly hadn't decided Dds name so precisely before she was born.

Scream my baby cafe used the swing to rent out, now we can't any more as there is the issue of them being an 'open system' so can't be shared due to the risk of contamination. Now due to this my cafe is now selling new ones off (reasonably priced)and some second hand ones for dirt cheap! Give me another Pm if your interested as I am happy to pick one up and post to you.

I couldn't express at all well with any pump I tried. The swings are supposed to be good, I think it just depends a lot on if you can relax and get the let down. Generally speaking the double pumps are more efficient but there are a number of ways to help get your milk flowing.

Biscuits I am brooking that there will be no problems and all these GTTs will be all clear, how lovely that you ans Scarlet can meet up!

Ninja we quite often get the blood horror with Dd, I am fairly nonchalant though as it is not a patch on my sister, who ended up getting her nose cauterised at 8 yrs so I don't really worry! Just had to have loads of bedding for the cot bed to keep up with the changing, hence Ds is going to have loads of lovely pink embroidered bedding and the like.

I hope I haven't missed out anything/anyone obvious? :)

Pushchair talk is very exciting and I get mine in a week or so as my Dad is bringing it down when he visits, I have bought Dd a footmuff for it so will be taking it for a spin before baby is here... Naughty!

Thanks for the recommendation Hawthers, I'm so happy your DS came through alright after such a difficult time for you all. It must be a totally different experience with Farley this time around! How is everything going?

Purple you are like my baby shopping fairy godmother! PM'ing you right now!

scream totally different experience apart from the very frightening meningitis episode which was all too familiar.

It is particularly different re feeding as with ds1 I stubbornly stupidly expressed for so long yet I never felt the let down reflex but still managed to express enough to feed ds1, fill a freezer with expressed milk and donate masses as well.

This time i've def been feeling the let down and so far been successfully exclusively bf though we have another weigh in on weds so hopefully f will have gained a suitable amount.

All going fairly well although its a whole other level with two. Had to look after then both on thurs and Fri all day and pit ds1 to bed on my own both nights. Ended up singing at the top if my voice to try to keep ds2 calm on the first night. And on the second night I had ds2 on one leg sucking one of my fingers ds1 sat on my other leg drinking his milk leaning all his weight on me and stayed that way for 20 mins. Christ my back hurt but felt I'd been initiated into the mum of two club. Mind you the sleep deprivation is something else and having to d/w ds1 pushing the boundaries is not so much fun....

Hawthers how lovely to hear from you again! It sounds like you're doing an immense job there looking after 2 of them - well done you!!

I am super impressed too by your sterling expressing efforts with DS1.

I had an Avent (? I think?) electric pump but we never really got on. I don't think that was necessarily all down to the pump though. I never really got a very strong 'let down' with DS when feeding. I'd never really associated that that wouldn't have helped when trying to express. I guess babies are more efficient at getting the milk out than a pump so you'd need the milk to be as free flowing as poss to express?

I never really persevered though with the expressing as it took us ages to get DS to latch on properly so I didn't want to introduce a bottle and confuse him before he'd got the hang of it, and by the time he had got the hang of it (after his tongue tie snip) he then never wanted to take a bottle. And to be honest, I couldn't be arsed to persevere with the bottle thing by then as he was already cutting down his night feeds of his own accord, and I was just so relieved that feeding wasn't so hard anymore.

I seem to recall that the HVs told me the best time to introduce a bottle to avoid nipple confusion was 6-8 weeks?

DS had his tongue tie snip at 8 weeks and the HV told me this little nugget when he was about 8.5 weeks . I did occasionally use the pump after that to get some expressed milk for making stuff up when I started weaning him.

Anyway, that isn't supposed to put anyone off expressing - I think it's a great idea to have the option of a bottle. And actually for us it would have been very useful when out as I found it very hard to find comfy places to feed when we were out and about so had I been able to perhaps take a bottle instead that would have been good. It might have even meant we'd bf for longer if I could have used bottles some of the time. I never really thought of expressing for our about and by about 6-7 months starting using formula from a cup when we were out, so started to cut down the amount of bf.

If you'll excuse the pun, I'm of the 'suck it and see' camp this time to see what happens with the feeding. I'm relaxed about what'll happen and will just see how it goes.

All this pram chat is exciting. I feel left out just getting mine down from the loft! Although quite when we would be finding time to look at prams I don't know! DH has been working like a mad man. It's his busy time of year and he is desperately trying to keep on top of things as the weeks go by so he's in the best position poss when things happen. It's really hard for him to schedule everything around a massive, but completely moveable, event! He's already at work in the office today . Although DS is still asleep so I'm enjoying my lie in / MN time.

Now, can I ask your advice on something? I'm currently 30 and a half weeks. At 33 and a half weeks we had made outline plans to visit my BIL and SIL with my PIL. BIL and SIL live a 3.5-4.5 hour drive away. DH has promised to come even if he has to work that weekend at their house so I wouldn't have to drive all the way, and if anything did happen he could drive us back. It emerged yesterday that my parents are really about me going so far at that stage. They think it's too big a risk - highly unlikely that anything would happen while we were down there, but if it did they think I should be closer to home.

What do you think? We were going because BIL and SIL are also pg, due in May so they likely won't get up to us once ours is born (unless it comes early, as they'll be needing to stay close to home) and we won't get down there very easily once theirs is born. We did see them at Christmas though.

I've agreed with my mum that I'll ask the mw and the doctors at the hospital. I can't really see that potential GD or the kidney thing would make the baby any more likely to come early? I don't know what they'll say / do if it isn't GD but just a big baby?

Sorry this is such a huge ramble. Well done if you're still reading .

Is everyone having a nice weekend? I'm off out for a Chinese NY thing tonight (without DH and DS though, just with my parents and their friends and their families) which should be really nice but is flipping miles away and will be a late night.

Right, DS here for a snuggle. Laters preggos xx

Also (because my last post was so brief!), Scream how is your SPD / sciatica now you're not having to get into the office? Where did you get to with the crutches thing? Did you get all your work finished yesterday? Hope so....

And how is DD Dream - hope her temp stayed down, poor wee thing .

Dream, I'm so sorry to hear DD's ill yet again. The poor thing - she's really suffering! I hope her temperature's stayed down... also impressed by your super memory!

Biscuits, I'd have thought you'd be ok at 33.5 weeks and a half weeks? I think asking the MW and doctors is a good idea though. I mean, you'll have DH, and if anything did happen I'm sure you'd take your notes so you could go to a local hospital (obviously not ideal, but if something happened incredibly quickly it's always an option!). I wouldn't have thought the kidney or potential GD thing would be a factor in that all, but then again I don't know much..! Have a lovely night at your Chinese NY thing! :)

Hawthers, lovely to hear from you! So glad all's going well - although I can imagine you're exhausted! I'm sure things will only get easier as you all fall into more of a routine (and as DS1 stops pushing boundaries!).

I'd like to cheekily hike onto Scream's breast pump question with a follow up! My plan is also to get a pump purely to allow DH to take some night feeds here and there. I've picked the pump I want (a Philips Avent like Biscuits, but a manual one - electric scares me!), but I'm a bit baffled with regards to bottles. More specifically, teats. Are there any specific teats that are particularly good to use if breast feeding? I've been looking on Amazon and there are sooo many...

Quiet day today - off to see my MIL and SIL (and her new other half!). Popping to an outlet village en route though that has an outlet Mamas and Papas - hoping for some baby clothes bargains.

musical we use tommee tippee closer to nature with DS, and he never had any confusion. i EBF, but expressed a few times for DP to be able to feed him, he also used to drink cooled boiled water mixed with gripe water from them, we might just have been lucky with him, but he would happily take milk from me, milk from a bottle, water from a bottle. When he was v sick and threw up lots (v refluxy baby) and i had nothing left to give him, he even took Aptamil from a bottle and has never shown any signs of rejecting boob because of having bottles. Still BF now at nearly 15 months, and still he will take bottles or boob happily.

And i just used a manual tommee tippee one, electric ones made me nervous too, and it didn't take that long to express. Although if i had to express for every feed i think i might have tried electric.

I got on too well with my expressing thingies (an event manual and a little medulla electric one) and expressing and feeding a bottle took an hour vs an hour and a half min feed if off the boob. So I did too much expressing early on which led to the odd bottle which led to stopping bf or expressing earlier than I wanted to ideally.

This time I'm going with just boob for a good few weeks (well, that's the plan anyway!). I am a little worried at how upset I feel I might be if bf doesn't go as I want for the second time. I do feel it could be a bit of a major issue for me.

Biscuits - We travelled a similarish distance (slightly less) to visit PILS when I was 32 weeks. I think if I were you I'd probably do it but be very clear it won't be happening for a looooong time. I have no plans to travel to family until dd2 is at least, oo, 12.

Dream - Hope she's feeling better. I cannot believe the run of illnesses she's had poor little thing.

Morning! Well the vomit has been cleaned from outside which is good.
I borrowed an agent hand pump and we bought a cheap medela pump which were both good. And we also used the tommee tippee closer to nature teats but SD never bf. I expressed for about 3 months though I think.
I shall have to make do with buying bits for my bugaboo rather than the pain of pushchair shopping (thankfully). Good luck for all those choosing, its such a difficult choice!
biscuits am sure you'd be ok to go that far if you take dh and your notes.
dream how was your night in the end?
Lovely to hear from you hawthers you sound like you're doing brilliantly.

Oooh, Ninja what new bits are you getting for your Bugaboo? Don't think we can justify anything new so am a bit . For some reason I really fancy purple covers this time

Biscuits I am sure you are fine for travelling, I travelled 200 miles away last pg at 33 weeks for 10 days and it wouldn't worry me to go away again now I am 33 weeks.

Now the introducing a bottle in the 'window' is a load of bo*cks! Actually comes from clever marketing via, formula companies.
The earliest you should introduce a bottle is 6-8 weeks to ensure that your milk supply and bf is well established so it is less likely your baby will suffer nipple confusion. Unfortunately introducing a bottle at any stage can affect feeding in some babies, it is a gamble as many are of course fine.

And a baby is much, much, much better at extracting milk from the breast than a lump of plastic! It is not uncommon to get a Mum panicking
as they can only get X amount of milk and then they worry their baby is not getting enough milk because they haven't been able to express much.

In terms of a teat, you need to use the first/newborn teat in any aged bf baby as they are not used to the fast flow if stage 2/3 .etc

Sadly, Pomme we do see that happen and also expressing is really hard going so people who are exclusively expressing sadly, can find it hard to keep going and no surprise! I am full of respect for people who have extended expressed Hawthers.

In terms of introducing a bottle you are better off doing it in the day, I know expressing for a night feed is the favourite option, but if you do that too soon it can impact on your supply. Feeding in the night you have higher levels of the hormone Prolactin, which kind of places your order for the milk you need the next day. (So skipping a feed here can lead to a drop in milk supply.)
So just make sure your supply is well established if your doing it for social reasons. And newborns can take milk from a cup/syringe or a spoon in preference of a bottle, if needs be.

And please find out about your local support groups as knowing these can really help with your success. :)

Wow more spelling mistakes there than expected. Just got phone back after 3 weeks being fixed.

That should be avent not agent and ds not SD. For a start! Sorry!

Ninja Biscuits I have sold my cam! Biscuits are you on facebook? There are Bugaboo buy/sell pages where you can find bits second hand at good prices. You could also sell your existing cover to help fund purple?

Ninja What colour are you going for? It is exciting buying new covers for your bug, I have had a slight problem with this lol

we need a new small wheel (for a chameleon), a new raincover and possibly a new hood (or 2!). We have a grey base and a black canvas hood and also a summer fleece & gauze orange hood which is now a bit minging and not sure washing will sort it out. Don' know what colours we shall go for yet, there is a good pplace near where I live to see them and then will look online for cheapest I think. I am also going to make myself a selection of new ring slings I think, just need to choose some fabric.