Tips on keeping toddler entertained while mum recovers from illness?

[knittingmama]

Hi everyone
I've just been discharged from hospital with a viral infection. As a result I am exhausted, dizzy and in desperate need of rest. Unfortunately I have only been able to get childcare for three days/week (excluding weekends) for the next few weeks. Can anyone give me ideas of how to maximise my rest time with a 17 month old in the house? Toys, calm games, survival strategies... any advice appreciated!

I've just called a cleaner, and will be calling on friends when I can, but we've no family in the area that I can depend on.

Thanks everyone!

exhausted knittingmama

I know how you feel. I've been ordered to rest until my baby arrives but my 20 month old has other ideas.

I go to sleep when he naps at lunchtime, read lots of stories to him and have resorted to childrens TV. Something that I swore I wouldn't do. I have to cope with him 6 days a week and make DH take him out one day at the weekend.

DH's idea of a rest is to take us all to the seaside this weekend and walk our feet off so he really doesn't get it. I wish I could get childcare a few days a week but our finances don't allow it.

Ah, DVD's. Must train her to watch TV. Wish I started training her young. She watches for 5 minutes and that's it. Let the TV watching begin.

Give him a brush and a bucket and let him 'paint the house'. From the outside, of course.

My LO is a live wire too. He won't watch TV for more than a few minutes either but he keeps going back to it which is better than emptying the cupboards, flooding the downstairs loo, removing all the knobs from the kitchen cupboards, etc. His other activities when mummy tries to rest

a large cardboard box provides hours of entertainment.. !! throw in a blanket as well... and some teddies.. to spice things up a bit!

I was really ill when I was pregnant with ds2. One thing i did everyday was take a big bubble bath with ds1. I could wallow and he played and splashed for a good hour.

You could also get a bottle of bubbles and lie on the sofa and blow them whilst your toddler chases them or sit in garden.

play dough was another favourite

bubble machine

Ds can spend an hour chasing bubbles...

blocks - simple but popular.

other chidren! especially of the older cousin variety. Else, sitting limply in a sympathetic playgroup for a couple of hours in the morning might burn off the energy without much input from you and without trashing the house.

Au pair? Or a local teenaged 'babysitter' to play energetic games while you nap in the next room?

thanks for suggestions... liking the cardboard box and teddies idea. the telly makes me feel ill- trying to avoid it because of the vertigo I have. arrrrrgh. might ring the babysitter too- luckily its still summer hols! x

Can your dh get any time off for family leave, or at least work from home, so he can give you 30 mins/an hour break during the day when you need it.

I had a broken hip and spent a year in a wheelchair when ds was 3, and we used afternnon nursery, DH working from home wshenever possible, and I employed a student as a mother's help to fill in around those times.