Due Feb 2009- Posting Queens, See The Bump, On The Facebook Screen, oh yeahhh...

[MarkStretch]

TinkerbellesMum DC3 (3rd baby. Lily-Hope born 20 weeks 28-29/9/05, Tink born 31 weeks 17/7/06, age 27, Birmingham) Official due date 01/02/09 but expected from early December
florrieandme DC2 26/01/2009
laidback DC4 27/01/2009 (age 34, North Devon)
nkweto DC2 30/01/2009 (age 34, West London)
oooggs DC4 30/01/2009 (age 34, Cornwall)
MamaGoose DC3 30/01/2009 (age 32, Spain)
MissMitford 31/01/2009
Plethora 31/01/2009 (age 37, East London but moving soon)
Ethelredtheunready (age 40, 2nd Baby, Tilly born 19/2/06, DC2 01/02/2009- Currently Chichester, soon to be Epping)
AngelDoll DC1 01/02/2009 (age 31, Sheffield)
Supersteph DC2 01/02/2009 (age 24, Torbay)
jenandbean DC2 02/02/2009
ruthmollymummy 02/02/2009
Tummytrouble 03/02/2009
jamescagney 03/02/2009 (aged 33,Clare, Rep of Ireland)
Pregnantpopcornprincess DC3 04/02/2009 (pregnant with twins)(age 31, West Sussex)
MsLucy Boy 04/02/2009 (age 38, North London)
PinkTulips DC3 04/02/2009 (age 24, Roscommon, Ireland)
Davidsmom DC2 04/02/2009 (age 39, Cheshire)
MissDelighted DC1 05/02/2009
m2alyssa DC2 05/02/2009 (age 30, Isle of Man)
idontbelieveit DC2 06/02/2009 (age 31, Leeds)
Jelliebelly DC2 06/02/2009 (age 37)
Swampster (HasAWarmFuzzy) 06/02/08 (age 40, south London)
Guitargirl DC2 07/02/2009
Aila DC2 07/02/2009
Littlemissnorty DC2 08/02/09 (age 39, Kent)
Biscuitytrousers 08/02/2009 (age 31, Thames Ditton)
MarkStretch DC2 07/02/2009 (age 29, Norfolk)
KT1983 09/02/2009
Tinasan DC2 09/02/2009
Herbgarden 09-11/02/09 (age 38 Berkshire)
Ewemoo 07/02/2009
Singingintherain DC3 10/02/2009
KazzaL DC2 10/02/2009 approx (age 34, Ciren, Gloucs)
littleboyblue DC2 due early-mid Feb (age 27, Surrey)
Jenniferturkington DC2 11/02/2009
thehouseofmirth DC2 11/02/09 (age 38, Wimbledon)
Clarabumps DC2 12/02/2009 (age 27, Glasgow)
BumpVLump 12/02/09 (age 29, Surrey)
Louisebunny 13-15/02/09
Mapleleaf 13/02/2009 (age 38, Cambridge)
Nadssss 13/2/9 (age 29, living w. london)
Jelliebaby DC2 14/02/2009 (AGE 29, Cheshire)
Loopylula DC2 14/02/2009 (age 28, Sussex)
Francesrivis 15/02/2009 (age 38, Devon)
onwardandupward DC2 second week of Feb (age 35, south west)
Americas 16/02/2009 (age 32, London)
MrsThreads DC1 16/02/2009 (age 36, Cheshire)
shubiedoo DC3 17/02/2009 (age 37, Canada)
NervousMouse DC2 17/02/2009 (age 36, Berks)
Pluto DC2 18/02/09 (age 38, Kent)
Fruitstick DC2 19/02/2009 (age 32, London)
Imaginewittynamehere DC2 19/02/2009 (age 32, Cambs)
McDreamy DC3 19/02/2009 (age 37, Cyprus but will give birth in Bucks)
Dinkystinky 19/2/09 (age 31, London)
Rachrox DC3 20/02/2009 (age 28, Glos also!)
Calico1 DC2 21/02/2009 (age 40, West Herts)
Mentalpup DC2 21/02/09 (age 30, Glos)
Rosieposey DC4 21/02/09 (age 36, Wilts)
Winemakesmummyclever 23/0/09 (age 34, Lancs)
Neeerly3 DC3 23/02/09 (age 31, Mansfield)
LardyBump 24/02/09
Spottyshoes DC2 24/02/09 (aged 28)
Chilledmama DC2 25/02/2009 (age 31, Hampshire
Nellstar TBC
zikel DC2 TBC (23, Coventry)
Cocodrillo DC3 26/02/2009 (age 34, south london)
MrsBick DC2 26/02/2009 (Age 25, living in Surrey)
charlie7 DC2 28/02/2009 (Age 33, living in the Inner Hebrides)
dd1ofcolandgerry DC2 25/02/2009
theSuburbanDryad DC2 (age 26, living in South Bucks)
Babyignoramus DC1 27/02/2009 (age 27, Brighton)
Blinamouse
Elkiedee
Questionkid DC1 3/2/09 (age 33, living in Wallington, Surrey)

Good evening.

I am a football widow.

I have had a great day. We went Irish dancing and one of the mum's there invited dd to come and practice with her dd who is 8 which dd was thrilled about.

Then went to see my mum who fed me plenty of food and we picked blackberries and apples from her garden which I will turn into something during the week.

Then my step dad and I discussed the possibility of putting power in our shed.

I can't believe how thrilled I am about that.

It means I could have a tumble dryer and a second freezer. At the moment I have to dry all clothes on airers in the spare baby's room and our kitchen is the size of a postage stamp so little room for another freezer.

AND my mum said I could have her timble dryer when she moves.

Result!

Oh and Hi Rosie! Nice to have you back

Wow MS, a timble dryer? Where can I get one of those?

Ha ha bugger off Mrsy! It was the excitment! It made my fingers go to fast!

To add to my thrilling story...

My Dad just rang. I told him the exciting plans I had discussed with my step-dad. Well apparently that's not the way to do and then he started about wiring things to the mains...

When, oh when will I learn?

I just made mini-scones [lard arse]

Tink's story. Thank you all for your thoughts. They're now sending her to a specialist - in about 8 weeks they've said. TBD said the X-ray was showing a lot of old scarring from all her old infections and the intubation so this isn't going to go away, I don't think they can ignore it anymore.

I'm finding it particularly hard because it's Lily-Hope's birthday. I got back to Mum's tonight and there was an orchid plant from Mum and TBD has left me a bunch of lilies.

Kazza, the only WoW widow at the moment is me from WoW while I've been here! TBD had to get a laptop so he could get a look in Looking forward to WotLK coming out, already have characters high enough for me to have a Knight. I've stopped playing my lvl70s cause I'm waiting for the top to be raised.

Hello all - just typed a huge message then computer ate it!

Tinkerbellesmum - so sorry to hear Tink is so ill. It must be an anguishing time for you - sending you lots of hugs and also a big virtual bouquet of lilies in commemoration of Lily-Hope's birthday. I really hope Tink gets better soon hon.

MrsY - it is normal to feel down, etc when pregnant - those bloody pregnancy hormones dont help! Sorry you're having an awful time with sister (who is just not listening to you saying you want to be there for her but cant do the single girl partying being there for her), back and neighbour from hell. Hope this week is much better. My top tip from when felt like that with DS is to do something nice for you - a haircut, pedicure, whatever - so you feel pampered and like a human being for a bit. Meditation (calm music, visualising a relaxing beach somewhere) also helps. Hope you feel better soon.

MsLucy - drink lots of water! Headaches get worse if you dont drink enough. Paracetemol is fine to take if you have to in order to function.

Am NOT having a good day today. Laptop at home and dvd have both died over the weekend, DS is ill (flu I think) and crazy mother has managed to mortally offend motherinlaw (who she normally gets on with brilliantly) by refusing to do xmas down in Brighton this year (having alternated for xmases for the past 4 years!). So that means yours truly has a 300 round trip between the inlaws at xmas - fabulous...

Morning all,

Goodness, it's been an eventful weekend for everyone.

Hope Tink is doing ok today, and that you're feeling more positive still mrsy. I think everyone can relate to how you're feeling. This is definitely the best place to come and rant.

I've got an 'Am I being unreasonable?' question for you all. My DP is Scottish and all his family still live in Scotland. I found out through the course of a conversation last night that he had presumed that when LO is born, that when his Mum and Dad come to see him for the first time (they're divorced so we're talking about separate visits) that they'd be able to stay at our house. We have a small 2 bed house so whilst we do have a spare room, it will become the baby's room once he's born. But completely aside from that, I can't believe that he would think that we could have guests within weeks, or even a few months of the birth? My parents live in Devon, so this wouldn't just apply to DP's parents, I'd expect my parents to either stay with friends or pay for a hotel. I also 100% believe that my mum and dad wouldn't expect to be able to stay. They would make the connection - new baby + new parents = disruption, exhaustion and so no room for house guests.

My DP said something along the lines of 'I can't expect my mum to have to pay for a hotel' - um, YES YOU CAN!!! What about me? What about how utterly exhausted I'm going to be, how stressed out and tired I'm going to be, how having house guests will be the LAST thing I need. It really annoys me, he always thinks about his family before me. But this time he just can't. It's not helped by the fact that I have probably spent a total of about 10 hours with his mum and maybe twice as much with his dad the whole time we've been together as they live so far away, so I don't really know them very well. Having house guests can be hard enough, but specially hard when it's people you're not 100% comfortable with.

Sorry about the length of this, but am I being unreasonable?

mslucy - DH is a dwarf palladin - TBM - he only is allowed to play one character which fits in with his mentality too in that he has to have the best of everything.

He got back at 11pm last night from his geek-filled day - I was already asleep after watching Sex and the City whilst doing the ironing.

QK - you are a long way from being unreasonable - I've told my family that they are welcome to come to us for xmas, but i am not doing anything and expect to be waited on hand and foot. I would make the spare room completely ready as the nursery, so if they ask to stay then the option is an airbed (not many GPs willing to do this) - you'll need to be getting stuff from the room even if LO isn't sleeping in there once born

QK - I had MIL stay for 3 days when DD was less than a week old (and I'd had a crash CS).....to be fair, I did say it would be ok thinking that it would be useful as she could help.....that was SO not the case (she done NOTHING) and baby blues / after pains had kicked in big time and I felt AWFUL......(although DH was very good I have to say)........so YANBU!

TBM....hope she is home x

QK.... it would depend on their financial situation really wouldn't it?

we had 2 kids in a small 2 bed apartments but our parents (both sets) and anyone else visiting always stayed with us as there was no way we could expect them to pay for accomodation.

we're closer to my parents now but dp's parents would never see the kids if they couldn't stay here.

you'll be surprised how quickly you get used to having a baby and it stops being an all consuming 24 hour job. if the in laws are only coming one at a time i really can't imagine they'll cause you too much bother, remember, they've had babies once too, they're going to understand how you're feeling and how exhausting it can be and the bedroom issue won't be one as baby will still be in with you for months so baby's room will be just baby junk storage for ages, if you really don't want the hassle of setting it up as a guest room for a few nights how about picking up a cheap sofa bed or camp bed to set up downstairs?

Tink, happy birthday to Lily-Hope. she'll be in my thoughts for the day. i'm sorry poor tink is ill and can't be home with you for this day of all days. {{{hug}}}

Thanks KazzaL & LittleMissNorty, I'm glad to hear that so far you don't think I'm making a fuss over nothing. I think I'm just going to have to bide my time on this one. I need to think through my reasons in my head and wait until I can explain it all to him properly, because at the moment I know that he just doesn't get it. And I really don't want us to have a row this week because we're getting married on Saturday and it might put a dampener on things! There's still plenty of time for me to make him understand, because I'm really determined that I'm not going to end up being pushed into a corner on this one - it's too important to me that we have our space in that time.

PT - you're definitely right, and if money was very tight then I wouldn't be making such a fuss about it. But his mum has just retired at the age of 50, with a big payout, and is now looking for pocket money type work. So she could definitely afford a hotel. And where I live there's plenty of cheap hotels like Travelodges. And the silly thing is, that I think if I talked to her and explained she would completely agree with me. But DP would be seriously unhappy if I interfered so I just have to rely on him understanding.

I'm not going to let this turn into a huge issue and am sure I'll get some perspective on it, but I just don't want him to presume that it'll be ok. Who knows what it's going to be like for us? I don't want to commit to his whole family coming down for separate visits in those first few weeks. If they want to plan their trips in advance, then as far as I'm concerned they need to have hotels booked, as I won't know until LO comes whether I'll be willing/able to put them up or not.

QK - plenty of people ban visitors entirely for the first few weeks. You only want someone to stay if (i) they are going to be 100% supportive, (ii) are going to look after you and the baby and keep their "oh, you dont want to do it that way, do it this way" remarks to themselves and (iii) will happily keep an eye on baby for 15 minutes so you can have a shower etc. My friend had her inlaws from Canada stay after crash CS of her DS and hated it - they did nothing to help and criticised her breastfeeding attempts! Make the ground rules v clear to DH (so he can get them clear with his parents) and again to your parents. Also, a week is far too long to be entertaining people - make it a couple of days only for each visitor until you and the baby are ready for it, otherwise you're going to be fretting every night when baby is crying about waking up other people (which is not conducive to a good nights sleep for anyone).

Oh, and to top off my crappy Monday, think may have athletes foot and surprise surprise, nothing can be taken to get rid of it when pregnant. Wonderful.

Morning - had a great weekend at my firends wedding and my speech went down well, so I'm relieved to have that over !

Tink - hope little Tink gets well soon, it's such a nightmare when you can't do anything to make things better isn't it ? Also thinking of Lily-hope on her birthday.

Questionkid - I think it is an individual thing as to whether people have family/friends to stay after a baby. Personally I don't mind it as my mum is great at helping out with the other kids/ironing/cooking etc and her partner is a dab hand with the lawnmower etc. She is coming over for a month mid January as she lives abroad. The In-laws quite useful too !

I think it depends very much on the relationship/size of your house/things that you need help with. If this is your first baby and space is a premium, then I think you are wise to stake out your boundaries. As you say, B and Bs/ cheap hotels are probably not going to be an arm and a leg if booked now - and I giuess you can make them feel involved and welcome in other ways .

Dinky - pee on your feet when you are in the shower, apparently it get rid of athletes foot

I think that all comments re family staying are fair.....I let everyone come over and see us after DD was born.....and in the 2 weeks DH had off work, we didn't have a SINGLE day to ourselves.....which in retrospect, is a bit of a shame.....when DD was about 15 weeks old, we went on holiday for a week, just the 3 of us.

Have to say though, having my mum staying is a very different prospect to MIL....just just becasue they are different types of people....she just isn't MY mum IYKWIM.

But QK....concentrate on your wdding .....it'll all sort itself out!

not just becasue I meant

It probably doesn't help that I don't count my Mum in the list of 'guests not allowed to stay' - she's offered to come and stay for 4-5 days when DP goes back to work and I've jumped at the chance. But that's because 1) she's my mum 2) I know she'll work like a trooper - she'll want to cook, clean, look after LO, make sure I get some sleep etc etc. I can shout and scream at her if I need to, or cry on her shoulder, or have a cuddle if I'm feeling overwhelmed etc etc.

So DP probably sees that as double standards, whereas I see it as a different thing altogether. Oh the logic of a pregnant woman!!

LMN - you're absolutely right, this week is for concentrating on the wedding. Only 3 days of work to go, and then I'm on full wedding countdown and then off on hols for a week - can't wait!!

I have actually got my MIL coming to stay for the whole of Feb, she is wonderful - whenever she comes, she irons, cooks, washes up, does the sewing, gardening etc - Sorry but she's not available to hire

Whereas the idea of my mum coming to stay at all fills me with dread & nervousness.

I have them both coming for Xmas - MIL is turning up early to do the shopping & prep needed and then will cook on Xmas Day, whereas my mum will arrive and expect to be waited on hand&foot and not even make herself a cuppa.

Sorry to hear about Tink being poorly. Hope that she's getting better soon!

DH is WoW addict too... It's funny how he does not have time for useful stuff after work but can always spare a few hours to WoW "to relax"...

My parents came over and stayed in my flat for a week when DS was about 10 days old. It was painful, with everything being so new to us and having had a section and MRSA and problems with BF to start with. DS was nearly two weeks late and my parents had bought their plane tickets ages ago so there was not much we could have done about it.

This time CM will look after DS when the time comes but we've been thinking about selling our car. Has anybody gone to give birth in a taxi or a minicab? Do minicabs take ladies in labor? Seeing the credit crunch developing we figured it might still be possible to sell the car for a reasonable price but not for long...

Taking a taxi to hospital is pretty common America - is what am planning on doing this time round. You can dial a blackcab if you want (there was a thread on it somewhere in mumsnet) as has more space in the back and use towels etc in case you're worried about waters breaking, or you can go for Minicab (though blackcab drivers have seen it all generally, minicab drivers may be slightly more nervous about labouring mum in the back).

Laidback - may just have to resort to the wee remedy: if I can figure out the logistics that is

Ooops, I hadn't even thought about not being able to use athlete's foot cream whilst pg - what about germoline do you think? But then what the difference between a chemical in one of these cream medicines and say the chemicals in body lotion or shampoo