Tearoom 25 - Benvenute a Venezia!

[thumbwitch]

YOu find us this time in a glorious palazzo in Venice, near to St. Mark's square, and on the water. With gondolas and vaporetti in abundance to transport us around to the various sights etc.

The palazzo itself of course has marble floors and fabulous murano chandeliers but aside of that we have the usual distressed chintz comfy sofas, assorted animals, bishops in their corner, priesthole for emergencies and a single solitary aspidistra in a bomb-proof glass cage to protect it from the ravages of a certain Canadian.

All are welcome - drop by for a cuppa, a glass of something stronger and a chat and relax in the safe and kind surroundings here.

Cin cin!

EEEK, CMOT! Good luck! Anything we can do to help?

We did our civic duty today and went to vote. Our polling station is at the park, so I took Toddler to the playground and for a wander after voting. Everyone working at the polling station loved watching TS march into the station with his ball and check out the place then run out again and chatter to talk to the man standing by the door. Fortunately the old man at the door who was being talked at enjoyed it, too.

CMOT - I had to read the thead three times before I could find your reference to surgery... it was really snuck in there!!!

Good luck and I really am sorry that it is all going on so and frankly too long. Wish had a wand, ya know?

I've taken ds and the dog to our polling station on occasions

I seem to have taught TS to come and hold my hand whenever he sees a dog coming in the other way. I hope I haven't made him afraid! I want him to have a respect for dogs. There are many chavs people around here with big, scary dogs they don't keep on leads and why they may be gentle creatures (the dogs and the people, I guess) they are, at the end of the day, animals and could be easily spooked by small boy going in for a stroke/cuddle.

You could have taken a school class to our polling station when we went, it was completely deserted. Very sad. Only three candidates to choose between.
AND I couldn't vote in the AV thing, since I am an EU citizen and can't vote in the general election. Boo

Given the number of young/stay-at-home types we have around here, I was disappointed in the number of not-so-young versus not-so-old people that showed up in the 90 minutes we were there (the playground is steps from the station). In my late 30s I was the youngest voter by a good 30-40 years.

DutchOma, you can vote in part of the election but not all? Interesting.... Having paid for earned my Britishness I can fully vote here but not at home any more since I don't have a permanent place of resistance there any more (can still vote in general/national elections but not locals). Should we move home I can resume my full voting status.

I still hold Dutch nationality since the Dutch government pays me a more generous pension than the British government. So I can vote in local but not national elections. For a while I could still vote in Dutch elections but somewhere along the line that got messed up and I have been 'lost' from the voting system, if not from the payroll

ooohhhh, that's interesting DutchOma. I guess I assumed any EU citizen living here (even if you have to be here for x amount of time first) could vote here.

3 candidates, thats LOTS, we had 2. and one of those has done ZERO canvassing in the village and no one knows who they are and they don't live round here... They were standing under a labour flag. Whereas the other candidate is a local independent incumbent.

We have no elections here - just the referendum. There was tumbleweed blowing through the polling station when we went.

anyone?

::Fills Scout's glass::

Cheers!

Cheers!

Off to make dinner (MrScout late-ish tonight due to work and going to vote).

Must eat whatever is on my plate! (Preparing for the grilling about my weight at tomorrow's clinic appointment -- my cardio appointment yesterday has given me a preview of what's to come....)

Wine has calories. Have another and a bucket handful of twiglets.

Last night was the first time MrScout made a comment about my weight (besides his usual trying to be supportive and asking how do I feel about it). I think he's concerned. He told me to tell the doctor to give me pounds back.

Just curious, for those with older ones, when did you cut out the bedtime milk? I have no plans to any time soon (TS has milk with breakfast and at bedtime since he seems to have dropped all other daytime and overnight milk) but was reading something about you "should" wean them off bedtime feeds (breast/formula/cow) by 1 year or you increase the risk of childhood obesity. I say bs to that as the babies/toddlers need the milk, vitamins, calories, etc., but it did start me wondering when I should decrease the amount he gets in his cup....

Being a Vague Mummy, I can't remember. But I was still breastfeeding Girl when she was 12 months - I had Supply Issues but we kept on with the first thing in the morning and last thing at night feeds until she was old enough to tell me she wanted to stop (I can remember that conversation very clearly) - so she probably was only getting about an ounce anyway. Once we ditched the breastfeeding she used to have a cup of milk before bedtime until she was about two, I think.

Then again, this was so long ago that it's quite likely that all the advice/received wisdom has changed since. When Girl was a baby, the standard advice was to EBF to 4 months (now it's 6) and nobody ever mentioned BLW.

boy had a milk feed/ drink shortly before bed time till he was 3 or there abouts. occasionally now he will have a drink of milk while he listens to a story, esp if tea was early or he's late to bed.

Scout- incoming .... Unis lobs a handfull of choc hob nobs your way. All teh best for your apt tomorrow.

No real time to catch up but I wanted to weigh in on the milk question. Obviously LCT is only 22 months, but he still has his evening milk. I think he probably will for quite awhile as we both enjoy the snuggle in time. He doesn't listen to stories very well (I'm not sure whose kid he actually is. He likes to look at books but shows no interest in having them read to him.) but he does like to have a snuggle with me before bed.

Anyway, my nieces, the oldest whom is 11, still have milk before bed! And you could hardly call her or her sister obese.

I will switch LCT to semi skimmed at 2 years old and continue to give him milk before bed. After all, I have a snack at bed time (so my meds don't make me sick) so why shouldn't he?!?

CMOT, good luck with the surgery.
Scout, Wriggle still drinks milk on going to sleep and quite often in the morning. At 4 years old and 14 kilos, obesity is the least of our worries. (Where does that come from???)
Tea, so glad you both liked the card. Paper comes from many many paintings which never turned into anything much and go for recycling.
Another dead baby rabbit on the lawn this morning ....
Wriggle had an extremely robust view of death up until this week; something has happened to make her see everything differently. One of her favourite things was to go and look at all the fish in the market with their heads and tails on, and she and dh (very French this) always went to admire the spit roast pigs at summer fairs ...
She has been successfully very sneaky today, I have just discovered. Came downstairs this morning to tell me that "Daddy says we can have a kitten." I was surprised, but I like animals and everybody loves kittens, so, OK. Daddy went to work, I took Wriggle to buy chicken food and she told the man in the shop that she was getting a kitten. He gave her some little kitten toys. She told all her friends, her friends' mums and dads...she and I looked through the local paper, the kitten became a certainty ... and tonight dh told me he said no such thing! His very words were, 'Ask your mother.' Serves him right.

Good evening! Sorry, I have just been loitering recently and trying to catch up. I have been away for a couple of nights with work which is quite hard. Had to laugh this morning when I phoned home and was asked "mummy, are you being dangerous at work?". Goodness knows where that came from or what he thinks I do.

Scout - Small Bean still has a cup of milk before bedtime and I don't see any reason to stop - although he is a very tall boy he seems to have hollow legs and is constantly hungry at the moment. My memory is a bit hazy but I think he stopped having a bottle at 18 months.

I struggle with the whole death conversation - we were talking about grandparents and Small Bean was asking where my Granny was. I don't know a good way to explain it yet.

Hope that your op goes ok CMOT.

Thanks for all your details/info about bedtime milk. I, too, work under the principle I have something before bed, why shouldn't TS? Especially since he sleeps 12 hours straight, the boy needs something to keep going! If they need 1 pint of whole milk until they're five, when are they meant to have some of it if not in the evenings with cuddles and stories?!

I breastfed until TS was seven months old. I would have liked to go on to a year but had to weigh my options with my treatment. It was a hard decision and sometimes I think I should have put off the medicine and kept on with the boob, but at the same time I know I did the right thing for all of us. Besides, MrScout could then start collecting TS from Guides and doing bed and that's been good for all of us.

Tee, TS is the same way. LOVES books but would much rather sit on my lap and look at them himself OR read to me but doesn't do well with me reading to him. It's okay, we look at the pictures, etc. I figure when he settles down/grows up a bit story time will be more traditional.

Serp, are you going ahead with a kitten?

There is always more Scout!

Cheers!

CMOT, good luck with surgery!!! Much love and huge (((((HUGS))))).
xxJM

CMOT good luck with the surgery

Scout - I Bf OxBoy until he was about 2 - by then it was only at night - and then he had milk to drink in a bottle and then a lidded cup until he was about 4

For both he just stopped. If he wanted it again I'd give it to him, but when he decided not to wear nappies at night he decided not to drink either so he could "last"

Death - always a tough one - we've had a bit too much of it round our way recently, but OxBoy is very philisophical about it. He often checks if OxBloke is ok because his Dad has died and always talks about poor Grandpa and how we miss him....