Summer holidays are over, the PESH are bringing their bumps and baybees back to school

[TheOriginalWinkly]

Pack your giant pants in your satchel and maternity pads in your pencil case, it's the antenatal thread for BESH graduates

CRESH

Faith - pinky faithlet arrived 14th April 2013
Pinkr - suitably pinky one arrived 25th August 2013
Jethro - blue one arrived 23rd September 2013
Noks - pink one arrived 12th January 2014
Frankel - large pink one arrived 10th March 2014
Merks - pink one landed safe and sound 21st March 2014
Sinky - Stubborn blue one arrived 26th March 2014
Driz - blue one arrived 12th June 2014
Kat - pink one arrived 21st June 2014
draf - pink calf on 1st July 2014
winks - a pink one dragged out kicking and screaming on 4th July 2014
euro - a pink one in a hurry to see the world, born on 17th July 2014
dor - a pink one born at speed on 28th July 2014
ginge - completing the ESH Summer of Pink on 23rd August 2014

PESH
Buggerlugs - Buglet due 20th October
Fankle - ESHlet expected 4th January
Cunty - Minichops expected 7th February

Glad the breastfeeding cafe was good Bugs and that things seem to be getting easier. You can relax a bit till the next growth spurt in about 3 weeks time

It does feel strange to be planning another one, but we always said we wanted more than 1 if we could and HWHNN is 40 next year so getting twitchy about being an "old" dad. If our plan works out there will be about 2 years between, which is a nice age gap.

Glad the cafe was worthwhile. That's some weight gain but i guess P has some catching up to do!

snort at two years being a nice age gap! Wel, i guess it will be when they are bigger but the baby days are hard. We were the same, didn't want to wait due to age. And i do think siblings close in age will be nice long term.

We have a 19 month gap and I am finding it ok. Some days are fucking awful but mostly we are muddling through.

We don't particularly have a routine with The Little Miss. She often gets bathed with The Little Mister and then she will have some boob when he has his moo milk. She then tends to go either in the bouncy chair, or the Moses basket, or as is happening tonight over The Mister's knee because she is really fussy.

She will come to bed with me when I go to bed and we will nurse as needed and then hopefully she will go to sleep! She wakes 1-3 times a night depending on whether she is hungry/cold/The Little Mister wakes her up!

I wouldn't worry about any routine. They don't know day from night till 6-8 weeks and with P being early she might be on the later side with the body clock. E stays downstairs till we go to bed. I cba to bathe the kids every day, we do that two or three times a week. She also used to be fussier at night but she was a nocturnal creature in the womble so i guess it takes time to adjust if you are used to 4am disco sessions. She is much better at night now, does not expect to have awake time, just wakes, feeds and goes back to sleep. Only difficulty is getting her out my bed and back in the crib

Those with girl baybees, where to buy tights? I got some from h&m, age 2-6m so ought to be perfect for 16 week baybee. They arrived and they are so big i reckon i could dress a toddler in them!

Oh I don't doubt that having kids close together is hard in the early years, I know my friend has struggled at times with her 2 who are 20 months apart.

As for evening routine, I started E's just before HWHNN went away, so she was about 9 weeks. Before that we just kinda muddled through though she'd generally fall asleep in the carry cot in the living room at about 8.30 and sleep till I took her up to bed at about 10.

One advantage of close age gap is not having to be out the house with fed and dressed kids by half eight each morning for school run. That's what you get with a 4 year gap. At least i can stay in if i want to!

True, one of my neighbours has a 7yo and a 3yo, I often hear the 3yo screaming and tantruming around 8.30am as her mum tries to bundle her into the pushchair/car to get the older girl to school.

Bugs we started a bedtime 'routine' about 6/8 weeks. Bath (every other night), pj's on, bottle & story & then bed. He soon started settling in his cot & sleeping until 10.30/11 when we'd do a dream feed. Not everyone agrees with routine but it really worked for us.

kat MiniWinks is in Tesco tights mainly, they don't come up stupidly long.

Literally this week I've started an earlier bedtime routine. Before now, she was getting a clean nappy, grobag and feed to sleep at whatever time I was going to bed, but she was tired and ratty in the day, so for the last few nights I've started bath - clean babygro - grobag - feed at around 7pm. The latest she's gone to sleep (by which I mean properly asleep, in the bednest) is about half 8 and she's still waking up for the day around 7.30am. She wakes up an indeterminate number of times in the night for a feed. I trail her into bed, shove my nipple in her mouth and go back to sleep. Don't even bother trying to put her back in her part any more, not worth the effort.

I think a routine when you do same things in same order to wind down the day is a good thing, they will learn that these things mean its nearly sleep time. We always used to finish on the same book, it was peepo baby out of the bookstart pack. Ill do the same again with E when she moves rooms. With M we then moved onto "is it bedtime wibbly pig" about a pig who doesn't seem ultra keen on going to bed. The main important thing for me has always been the time interval between the last nap and going down for the night. With E she is still pretty much on a 90 minute awake time routine, hopefully that will go to 2 hours soon. But leaving it too late results in very fussy bedtime indeed.

One night, one glorious night when we were in NI she slept for 7 solid hours. Whyyyyy won't she do that again???

I'm feeling a bit useless at the moment. Can't get her to go back to her bednest. Can't get her to take a bottle or a dummy. Can't get her to nap anywhere except on my lap or in the ergo. She hates the car as well, starts screaming almost every time we drive anywhere. I thought it would be better by 14 weeks so that it could regress at 4 months On the other hand, she is a smiley wee thing when she's awake and not hungry so it could be a lot worse.

I think 2 years is a nice age gap for the children rather than the parents.

In some ways it was easier when she was a newborn. People don't expect anything off people with a newborn.

Oh kat don't even bother with M&S for tights, I was in a large branch yesterday looking for long sleeved vests and tights and there was fuck all. Tights that came with outfits, yes. Cashmere bloody jumpers ( cashmere?? For a baby??) But long sleeved vests or packs of tights? Not a chance.

Yes. Too true. By 3-4 months for some reason people expect you to have your shit together. No idea why, newborns are tiring but at least they are keen on naps. By 4 months your whole bleeding day has to revolve around when and how you have guessed they might sleep. You still are knackered from broken nights but you have fat chance of getting to sleep in the day.

Poos at night are rare after 2 months. E now gets maximum of one change per night and that is only if really soaking wet. Otherwise changing nappy wakes her up too much

Some bf babies hardly poo at all. m used to do one a week after the first month until he had solids. Saved a fortune in nappies but when the poo came it was a major event!

I hardly ever change at night. She usually wake with a very heavy wet nappy!

I like Jojo for tights. Expensive but lovely quality and funky colours.

We used to change at dream feed. MiniJeff (even tho FF) rarely poo'd at night. He's like clock work now!

Another one who only changes dirty nappies at night. No point in waking them more than necessary

Winks, sorry you are suffering. Could it be early sleep regression? I find the Sleep Lady website useful.

I "only" changed dirty nappies overnight, but nocturnal R loved his nighttime poos (post feed poos really). The low point was 9 changes overnight. Now we go from 7ish till 5-6 ish when I haul off his sodden nappy.

Agree with expectations and failing to get shit together. I let down a friend with a 3 week old baby AND a 2 yr old because I couldn't get out the door with my, single, 6 month old .

R is currently beside me in bed. This own room cot sleeping thing is going really well.