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2013 ist schon da! A new Kaffeeklatsch thread for the New Year - living in Germany and Austria
922 replies
LinzerTorte · 08/01/2013 11:48
OP posts:
outnumberedbymen ·
10/01/2013 10:30
Hello weissdorn I don't think we've 'met'. I'm fairly new here . Congratulations to your new baby. And wow at her already sleeping through (from what time to when??). Ds1 didn't sleep through until he was 20months!!! And ds2&3 were about 5months old which I thought was really good...
LinzerTorte ·
10/01/2013 11:22
Hi weissdorn, lovely to see you on here again. I'm another one who's very impressed at your DD already sleeping through. DD2 slept through at 6 weeks. Once. Otherwise, the DC all took at least a year before they started sleeping through on a regular basis (DD1 and DD2 were 13 months; I'd lost the ability to keep track of milestones by the time DS arrived, but I'd probably remember if he'd been much earlier or later 
).
admylin Yes, if DD really wanted to go to the threatre and other friends of hers were going, I would have let her go. But she herself doesn't want to go as she's said it's too late. Plus there are only three others from her class going - and only one other girl, who she's not really friends with. I thought it might be a good opportunity for her to get to know her better on the last trip, but she said she sat next to someone else on the coach and I don't think they spoke at all.
Just got the first English lesson of the year with DD2's class out of the way, so I can breathe a sigh of relief - I really don't think I'm cut out for teaching! It's OK once I'm actually in the classroom, but I find the preparation very time-consuming (I'm too much of a perfectionist) and never look forward to the lessons beforehand.
OP posts:
TheUKGrinchImGluhweinkeller ·
10/01/2013 12:14
Sorry Weissdorn you absolutely are not allowed back if your 4 week old has been sleeping through 
Only joking, nice to see you back :o
We have been working on DS2's sleep in a hard core way for a week now he has been healthy for a couple of weeks, and his language is good enough to understnad what's going on. Self settling at bedtime is getting better (I sit by his bed in dark, turned away from him, and silence putting him back in and lying him back down as necessary but otherwise ignoring, and after much persuading and grumbling DH agreed to do the same on the nights I work) - it took 3 solid hours the first few nights, then down to just under 2, and now a couple of times he has gone straight off (if he's only had a very early morning nap). The actual nights seemed to be gradually improving - I'm doing the same thing when he wakes as at bed time, he is still waking but for the early wake ups (before about 3am) he is settling back in his own bed in about 10-20 mins, rather than me having to lie with him and him waking if I try to move, even to turn over. After about 3am it does take a lot longer to settle him, up to about 45 mins, but the improvement is enough to stick with it. Last night though he woke every singe hour, for about 20 mins each time - it was so hard not to cave and lie with him but I only doze when I do, can't sleep deeply as he won't let me move about, so I know I have to stick with it.
None of my kids slept through at 5 months, not even DS1 who was my good sleeper and just woke for feeds a couple of times a night and went straight back off - not one of my kids has slept through til I have actively night weaned. I think he slept through more often than not from about 9 months, and DD did from 24 months.
LinzerTorte ·
10/01/2013 12:48
Was just looking at WhatsApp, discovered that one of DD1's school friends is now one of my favourites (probably because she phoned me recently) and was 
to discover that her status is bus si an die bit ches (spaces in the unlikely event that anyone decides to google the phrase). Yes, I know I'm easily shocked but DD1 is light years away from using that kind of phrase - or even being on WhatsApp, tbh.
Grinch Glad to hear that the nights are improving. I found that once we'd sorted DD1's bedtime, her night wakings more or less sorted themselves out - she still woke at night, but would go back to sleep by herself whereas before, she would often stay awake for up to two hours until the next feed. It's hard at times but yes, you do have to stick with it and remind yourself that all your hard work will have been in vain otherwise!
OP posts:
Weissdorn ·
10/01/2013 16:14
This reply has been deleted
Message withdrawn at poster's request.
cheaspicks ·
10/01/2013 18:27
Marking place on lovely new thread - thanks linzer.
will be back to post properly tomorrow (when dh is back at work ).
LinzerTorte ·
10/01/2013 20:18
Antique I'm still only teaching DD2's class once a fortnight, but for the full hour now. I offered to go in every week, and the teacher said I could either do half an hour every week or an hour once a fortnight; I opted for the latter as it takes up much less time overall.
DD1 really wants an iPod Touch (the same as our neighbour) as she's not interested in listening to music and only wants to play games. As I've said before, she really doesn't need another electronic device to become addicted to (I've had to put passwords on my laptop, iPod and phone to stop her and DS playing on them all the time) so am not even considering getting her one at the moment.
I don't see much point in WhatsApp atm, for me at any rate. I text almost everyone here, without having to pay any extra, and can either e-mail or send a FB message to friends abroad (although I can see it would be better for chatting than e-mail). Having said that, it would actually be very useful if my brother had WhatsApp as he only seems to check his e-mail every few days, but he doesn't have a smartphone.
Weissdorn Good luck for tonight! Glad the Infacol seems to be working for you; my parents sent over a bottle, but it didn't make much difference to DD1 (although I was more annoyed about the $70 medicine that the paed prescribed not having much effect!).
DH is out at his work New Year's party tonight (it only seems like a fortnight since their Christmas party 
) so I'm going to have an earlyish night with my book. I've joined Goodreads and have set myself the target of reading 50 books this year - on no. 3 at the moment. I managed to read the first two fairly quickly thanks to all the time we spent on trains and planes, but finding time to read is a bit more of an effort now.
OP posts:
tadjennyp ·
10/01/2013 22:25
Hello - happy new year to everyone and loads of congratulations to nutella and weissdorn! Love that scrunchy newborn look and smell. Lush! Thanks for the new thread Linzer!
Very impressed with your dry January challenge outnumbered! It would certainly help me to lose the 20lbs extra weight I need to! I was also on the mirena for 18 months but had it taken out as I was bleeding for most of the month and was so angry all the time. We seem to be relying on condoms now which I am not keen on, so might investigate having my tubes tied.
I would be seriously considering moving back to Berlin, or at least doing the M-F thing for a while, admylin. His bosses seem so bloody awful where he is now. Was the wine nice? 
Well done on the sleep training grinch. Hope you feel the benefits really soon.
Hope everyone who has been in pain/under the weather is feeling so much better soon. Congrats on the test scores and I'm glad everyone who was away had a good time (even if there was not enough snow). I can't believe we are nearly a third of the way through January already. Our babysitter was back from uni so finally got to go and see Skyfall and the Hobbit. I do love going to the cinema! My back is really sore at the moment so need to go and take some more painkillers.
Have a lovely Friday, everyone!
Weissdorn ·
11/01/2013 07:13
This reply has been deleted
Message withdrawn at poster's request.
LinzerTorte ·
11/01/2013 08:23
Weissdorn Yay for sleeping babies! I think it took us about six months, if not longer, to get to that stage. I didn't really drink any alcohol until the DC were reliably sleeping through the night (at about 1 year), and then had a few months before I was pregnant again (and then drank none at all - I would probably be more relaxed about it now but no. 4 is not going to happen!), so my alcohol tolerance has been destroyed by about seven years of virtual abstinence!
I've also got into historical fiction since reading The Other Boleyn Girl and have another four of Philippa Gregory's Tudor series on my to-read shelf. Otherwise, I'll read most things (although generally avoid chick lit) - so far this year I've read How to be a Woman by Caitlin Moran and Everything and Nothing by Araminta Hall, both of which I really enjoyed, and am now struggling through reading The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver.
Jenny of your cinema visits. I'd have loved to see Skyfall, but it wasn't on when we were back at my parents' or in the OV-Kino near my ILs. Hope your back is better soon.
Antique No need to apologise - I don't think I'd said before that I definitely didn't want DD1 to have an iPod (and I'd be happy for her to have an iPod shuffle but, like I said, she's not really into music).
I've just had the first half of my annual medical (really only a blood test), so got the doctor to change my bandage at the same time; I just have a plaster on my finger now, which looks much better.
OP posts:
cheaspicks ·
11/01/2013 09:53
Morning!
We just got back from the UK and I've got the house to myself again. I seem to have much more stuff to sort out than normal - bills to write, annoying and stressful forms to fill in which require finding important bits of paper that dh has misplaced and phoning people who don't answer, aargh.
Nice to see you back on here, weissdorn and well done to baby wd for sleeping so well. I think dd went 6 hours once in the first few months - the night before her first(?) immunisations - and then didn't do it again until I actively night-weaned at 11 months. I hope baby weissdorn keeps it up - you'll have enough on your plate once the restaurant reopens, but enjoy the rest of Jan first .
Glad to hear the bf is going well, nutella. I found it very painful for the first six weeks, but once it's established it is so easy and convenient.
outnumbered I am strongly against recommending the 3MS, as my cycle is still not quite back to normal nearly three years later (I had one single shot when dd was 9 months). A lot of women find it causes them to gain weight as well, although it didn't in my case.
linzer I read The Lacuna last year, I think. It took me a long time to get into it as well. I think I'm currently on book 3 of the year, although I can't exactly remember when I started/finished the first of those. I bought a lot of books while back home - 9 from charity shops and another 6 full price, plus 2 quilting books, but they don't really count!
admylin difficult decision to make about your dh's work. At first I thought it would probably be worth him taking the job in Berlin as it must be so miserable working somewhere where's he's not appreciated. But I think you've said before about your dh being a workaholic - mine is too, and I know that there would be quite a few Saturdays where he wouldn't be home either, would that be the same for your dh?
antique I also discovered WhatsApp fairly recently. I guess it saves me a bit of money on texts, but my sister also has an iphone and imessages are free too. Our house seemed very echoey when we got back from my parents, which of course has carpets in almost every room. I need to sort out some more pictures to put up as well and I finished my quilt , so I can hang that as well.
jenny we finally managed to go and see Skyfall while in the UK. I really enjoyed it, dh was muttering "not as good as Goldfinger", which is true, but not really the point.
grinch I hope you manage to crack your ds2's sleep problem this time. It sounds like you're making some headway at least. I wonder what causes some children to be such bad sleepers?
Wave to anyone I've missed.
LinzerTorte ·
11/01/2013 13:30
admylin You could always get a Kindle and increase the font size! I'm finding it increasingly difficult to read the small print on packaging and find myself having to hold it at arm's length; I'm definitely getting old.
Good news about the conference and congress; it all sounds much more positive. It certainly seems like leaving it a few months before deciding about Berlin was the right decision.
DD1 did indeed get a 1 in her English test and said she was the only one. The teacher had corrected her for writing "The children have got" - she should have written "The children've got" - but at least she didn't lose any marks for it.
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AntiqueMuppet ·
11/01/2013 14:33
Hope your back's better soon, jenny. What did you think of Skyfall? I loved it!
Good news on the sleeping baby, weissdorn.
Linzer I'll have a look at the Goodreads site, it sounds good. I've been thinking about reading The Hunger Games for a while but keep forgetting to look for it. Hope the snow isn't too deep. Surely a plaster on your finger means far less sympathy than a bandage?
admylin We ended up paying double rent for a month and a half, which hurt but the half month (January) was so that we didn't have to bother decorating the bedroom or painting the doorframes etc so was worth it in terms of time and effort saved for us. Even more so, in fact, as DH went to pick some mail up last night and the new tenants said they couldn't paint over the wallpaper in the bedroom as the paint wouldn't stick so they had to strip the walls and then re-wallpaper so they could paint. It might sound a bit nasty but I'm so glad we didn't have to deal with that!
Good news about Japan. Maybe this was the kick your DH's boss needed. Boston sounds good though - will you go for it if he is offered a position?
I would really recommend the Kindle as I love mine, but if you think you'll have to pay out for reading glasses anyway then maybe it would be an unnecessary expense on top IYSWIM.
Oooh well done for finishing the quilt, cheas - that sounded like a big job! Do you have any pics? I bet it's gorgeous. Did you have a nice time in the UK?
DS' cheeky streak is really shining through this week. He thinks 'no' is the funniest thing he has ever heard. He also seems to be dropping his daytime nap. He won't sleep before about 4-5pm and then I can't keep him awake, which means he's not going to bed until about 10pm.
I think the next lot of teeth are about to come through too as I keep catching him biting the furniture and chewing on anything with a metal handle (as well as buttons, whatever he can find on the floor at playgroup and some unidentified berries he managed to dig out of the suitcase wheels as I was cleaning up a broken plant & pot he had managed to smash across the entire dining room floor.)
I shouldn't complain though as he laughs constantly and is very cute and cuddly, which makes it all better :) We have officially hit toddlerdom!
outnumberedbymen ·
11/01/2013 19:35
good evening!
I will try to catch up now, but dont even know where to start!
grinch how have the last couple of nights been? well done for sticking with it, and well done to your dh for helping you good that you already can see an improvement, so hopefully sleepless nights will be a thing of the past for you very soon. I'm keeping everything crossed for you!
admylin with ds2 and ds3 sleeping through def did not have anything to do with being breast/bottle fed. ds2 I could only breastfeed for 6 weeks as he was tiny, a very difficult drinker and was losing lots of weight instead of gaining it. but it still took him from 6 weeks to 5 months for him to sleep through. ds3 actually slept through a couple of times around 8 or 9 weeks, when he was still fully breastfed. I then had to switch to bottles as he too was losing weight 
. and strangely on bottles he slept much much worse!
re your dh, admylin that change sounds very promising. I hope his boss has realised what they'd lose if your dh left. Boston would be great wouldnt it?! my youngest db and his family may be going to Harvard for his postdoc in the summer. That's in Boston too, isnt it?
weissdorn your dd sounds adorable. and remember those noises you are describing very well . what kind of restaurant do you have btw? it's me who's doing the dry January. I'm taking part in the Cancer Research UK Dryathlon. it's going well so far, and I've got used to having a huge mug of herbal teat in the evening instead of a glass of wine
linzer have you heard back from school re that late theatre trip? oh and well done to your dd1 for a great test result . my alcohol tolerance is also very low. I had three dc within 3.5 years, then some more time added for bf...and having had two 5am risers, even when I WAS allowed to drink theoretically, I would never have more than one glass. the thought of being up at 5am plus feeling slightly hungover did not seem worth it.
jenny how is your back now? do you suffer from back pain a lot? how lovely you and dh got to go to the cinema. having good babysitters is fantastic isnt it. I've really got used to it this past year, and I am dreading when ours finish uni and move away!
interesting to hear about your experience with the Mirena. I am almost 100% sure that I will have it removed next week. actually, having come to that decision, finally, I feel quite relieved about it. also thank you linzer for your suggestion of the 3MS, and thank you cheas for sharing your experience with it! I think I will try and stay off any hormonal contraception for a little while just to see if I can manage the period pains in different ways. whichever form of hormonal contraception I have googled, the possible side effects are similar to the ones of the Mirena. and as I've had so many side effects with the MIrena, I am worried it will be the same again.
antique it sounds like your ds is in a very similar phase as my ds3! on thne hand I am really enjoying this stage. he is so much fun, his speech and other skills are really developing, and his cheekiness makes me laugh. otoh it's tantrums galore atm!
today, when we went to kiga for that champagne reception, I asked one of the teachers how ds3 was getting on. my reason for asking was that he doesnt seem very happy when I drop him off in the mornings and I wanted to know if he is happy, if he has children he plays with regularly etc...anyway, that teacher started listing one negative thing after the other about ds3; like, he doesnt listen, he refuses to tidy up, he ignores us, he ignores rules....she kept going on and on. eventually I stopped her midflow and said 'actually I was wondering if he seems happy and has friends'. I was a bit 
and that she only had such negative things to say about my admittedly strongminded and stubborn but allthesame lovely, funny, fun, clever and gentle ds3! I wonder if she has ever heard of self-fulfilling prophecy?
re reading: I was given a kindle for my last birthday. at first I wasnt so sure and missed 'real' books. now I love it! and I read so much more now than I used to. Also, if you are an Amazon Prime customer, you get to borrow one book each month for free (from the Kindle library on the Kindle shop) which is think is great!
I cant remember what else I was going to write, but my post has become another momoth one anyway!
I hope everyone is enjoying their Friday evening!
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