Welcome to the Seventh Heaven Tea Room (BYOB. Biscuits, crisps and cake provided)

[Catitainahatita]

Hello and welcome to the seventh incarnation of the tearoom.

If you have found us by chance and/or curiousity you must know that the tearoom is a virtual safe haven for all those seeking a friendly word, a good cuppa and plenty to snack on. By virtue of its magic nature, no food can cause any physical damage, so chocolate, alcohol, transfat and all such can be consumed guilt- (and magically calorie-) free.

We have a wide range of soft-furnishing to relax on; a lovely garden with a swing and a ha ha; a variety of animals; a spa and (for some unknown reason) an apidistra.

Everyone is welcome, if you have one child, ten or none at all. We are a tolerant and fisticuffs-free zone. Instead we employ our energies swooning at Mellors the Gardner cum handiman thinking a silly things to get up to.

Please come in and say hello. You never know, you may end up joining us ...

I had a version of that some time in the 1990s - it was excellent!

MiniThumb went to bed well tonight and is sleeping soundly - it seems that if he has one nap in the middle of the day it buggers up his meals but sorts him for sleeping; and if he has a nap in the morning and one in the afternoon, his meals are ok but it buggers up his sleeping.
Soooo.... which is better in the long run? buggered meals or buggered sleeping? Obviously for my sanity, him sleeping well is better but I'm not sure what's better for him.

miniThumb is pretty good at playing by himself at 17mo - mostly cos I leave him to it! He likes the books the best - he can make up whatever he likes about the pictures. I caught him blowing kisses to people today, not something I have specifically taught him to do - he must have learnt it from the tv somewhere else

JM's thread is going well, I'm pleased to say - Mellors is awfully busy over there, oiling and massaging away - he won't have time to do the bushes here if he carries on playing away like this!

Donk - I have also posted on your thread but I don't know how useful it will be. Sorry to hear of your further troubles

TW - sort meals round naps - best way for everyone - your sanity is REALLY important - but he does need to be eating too!!! Hopefully it will get easier as you slip into a bit of a routine - and miniT will get used to settling down to sleep more easily.

Even now ds is 4 we still have lunch early at the weekend - he really needs to catch up on some rest at the weekend so he has some time in his room - theoretically having a nap, but sometimes now its quietly looking at some books (means his room is a bombsite when we go up later, but its worth it for some quiet time (and for DH and I to collapse in a heap somewhere for a little while))

But also if you are having a good breakfast, some healthy snacks during the morning and afternoon and a good supper, the fact that there hasn't been a 'formal' lunch shouldn't be too bad I would have thought. Ds can easily get through a slice of bread and something mid-morning, and a piece of fruit or two - and the same in the afternoon, particularly if he was too tired to be able to eat lunch properly....

well MT, that's the thing - if he misses a nap he is a royal PITA regarding his dinner/tea/supper. We already fit lunch around his naps, that's never an issue, I'm not particularly regimented over eating times - but that extra nap in the day is a major factor in him eating/not eating his evening meal.

Ooh, look, in fine Cake Wrecks tradition, two of the NMBs have produced a t-shirt reading 'Abmer is wonderflu'. Hm.

Blimey, Thursday already. Thursday is 'show and tell' at DD's school. They do it according to a sound - she is currently playing with a toy duck (well, watching the Mr Men right now, cuddling the duck) and the sound is 'q', so she's going to take the duck cos it says 'quack'. I'm getting quite good at this. 'y' was challenging - I think we missed that one, I wanted to send a yurt or a yogurt, little boy up the road DID take a yogurt, I don't think anyone took a yurt.

Thumb, I would go with the sleep, on the basis that the 'long run' isn't really an issue with a 17mo, he'll change his sleep and eating patterns before you know what anyway.

We had one of 'those' conversations at bedtime ... DD asked me if I was not going to have another baby, I said no, and she was all sad. I suggested there were good things about not having a baby, but when challenged couldn't come up with any (I self-censored the fact that they're annoying and screamy, didn't think that was constructive).

What about a yellow yoyo? Or teaching her to yodel?

Am currently very sad myself about the 'no next baby' thing - don't know where it has come from all of a suddenly. Think I will deal with it by promising pets (to add to the menagerie). Off out for a day with yet another friend with a new(ish) baby, but hoping Wriggle will have so much fun that we I will forget about that.

Just broke off there to read an e-mail from a friend whom I was going to visit on Monday. Three of us were going to meet up; friend 1 couldn't make it so I e-mailed friend 2 to say it would only be me and Wriggle, so she could change the day if she wanted to, convinced that she would not cancel because she would love to see us .... but she didn't love to see us and she did cancel!

Feel very deflated now. May have to go and look for the Bach flower remedy book.

Was going to think of positive ideas for your DD, DCMB. She is 5, isn't she? What about all the things that you can do together and all the playdates, theme parks etc you can take her to, when you might not have time with a small baby? Or the fact that she can choose friends to play with when she wants to, but she couldn't choose the baby and might find it very inconvenient when she wants peace and quiet to watch TV have quality time with her parents? Or that babies break your toys and scribble in your books?

Maybe you need to unpick the subject a bit. Is is something to look after that she wants, or someone to play with? I would go down the pet road myself. As Wriggle will tell you, guinea pigs are great companions (they can even be strapped into nappies!) and are not very much work for mummies. Or go mad and get a kitten or a puppy?

We are currenly broody for dog - but our place is to small for any breeds worth having...

So we get all now and then over it...

RS I sympathise with your e-mail... I too realised someone I thought was our friend actually sees us in a different light from the way we see her.

She is a young single Mum. Fun, energeic and a real lover of life. She has a dd the same age as Milk so we see a lot of each other. She lives with her Mum but they haven't been getting on. So she asked if she could come to stay with us for some timeout. We said "Why not?"

I was - because suddenly I realised this woman I had seen as a peer I discovered actually has a very 'teenagery' outlook on life and we ended up parenting her, her daughter and our daughter for two days. When she left I was complely drained!!! DH said - I think she thinks of us as sort of 'never say no' Aunty and Uncle figures raher than actual friends... which I think is not such a good thing.... .... tricky situation...

I suspect she will call again for a similar favour soon and I am no quite sure what to do. If she doesn't come to us - I dread to think where she will go....

Mmmm. I had a situation like that with the girlfriend of a friend of DH's. Again I thought of her as a contemporary/friend then she once said, "People might think you are my mum!" I knew she was very young (DH's friend was rather proud of that. ) but I saw our relationship, as you say, as peers. It was also pre-Wriggle and so I was extra sensitive.

She came to stay for a weekend because she was miserable in London when he went back to France and she couldn't decide whether to go too. She kept us up all night because she had nightmares (!) She made very determined efforts to come again and sent lots of e-mails. It was almost like being stalked. So I think your friend might do the same. Eventually I think we shook her off by being very very busy. It will be more difficult if her daughter and Milk are friends. Not sure what to suggest.

About dogs - the French love little tiny dogs, don't they? and they are dogs, I suppose. It's not their fault. DH, for example, keeps talking about a little pocket-sized dog.

I think my friend has just moved on. We were very close a few years ago and then she moved away. We only ever meet two or three times a year now. She has two Tibetan lamas coming to visit and wants a few extra days to de-cat the house. Valid, I suppose, but I feel I need boosting atm.

RS - Interesting. I really don't want to loose their (the Grandmother, Mum and daughter's) friendship - they have been particularly great wih Milk and they are very loving people.

re dogs - Oh yes - Parisians love rats on strings - cute looking things with vile tempers (I am talking about the dogs not Parisians) but we are gun dog and hound lovers and they neeeeeed more space than we have right now....

But... if you have any ideas of fab breeds for us - links links links pleeeeeaaaase!!!

To give you an idea... if we could we would have two dogs one like this....

creaturecomforters.net/catalog/images/english%20setter%20blue.jpg

and one like this...

www.qctop.com/articles/upload/LeBassetHound-35210.jpg

But if we can only have one (more realisic) we would like one like this....

creaturecomforters.net/catalog/images/sussex%20spaniel2.jpg

Which is a compromise betwen he two!!!!

t42 - I think you have to extricate yourself from the position of putting this girl up whenever she wants another break from her mum - perhaps you could say it was bad for Milk to have her friend there and then not, too disruptive?

I doubt you'll lose their friendship by doing that; but you run the risk of being caught between the girl and her mum if you provide a safe haven for the girl to run to as and when, and that could create problems.

Plus you don't need the extra work! having another wee one PLUS a teen-type in the house is far too much to cope with, imo!

I had an old schoolfriend come and stay with me for a few weeks to get away from her partner and before she moved into lodgings - well! I was shocked at how messy she was! And the amount of takeaway she ate, etc. I would let her stay again if she needed to, but only for a couple of nights - it was highly disruptive having her here for any length of time (this was before DS was around and before DH was here full time).
Although it all becomes irrelevant in the face of me moving halfway round the world, so pfft.

Managed to do something rather silly this morning - slipped as I was going downstairs with MJ (he was in front of me) and landed on my back, having pushed MJ down a little bit (but not much) having decided that I hadn't broken anything, was seeing to MJ's 'ills' (I think I'd accidently pushed him on the back of his leg) when I decided I was going to faint, so laid as flat as I could (on the stairs) and I think I blacked out for a couple of seconds as MJ was in front of me then he was behind me without having climbed over me (ifyswim) - dh had to help me back to bed - still feeling a bit woozy

Anyway, back to more important things - dog breeds. If you're going to have a small dog but don't want a rat on a string (also something we say, and certainly don't have - Mistledog is smallish collie sized) I think you probably need: a border terrier or a patterdale terrier - at a push a cairn terrier These are all 'proper' dogs still! I know that borders can be great with children...

MT!! that's not good - you really should get a doc to give you the once over, especially if you blacked out! Did you bang your head? Really, get someone to check you out

what about a whippet? We are going to get a whippet or a whippet cross when we get to Australia, as I am not a big dog fan but I quite like whippets - they're generally friendly little shy things.

Get thee to a doctors, MT! Any blackouts could mean a concussion to the spinal/brain fluid etc etc which is a Bad Thing.

Mr B is a terrier of some sort, and definitely a breed we never thought we'd want, but he's lovely all the same.

I know, Iknow - but I didn't black out when I bumped my head - I just fainted afterwards (all too dramatic for me at 6.50am). I feel OK - just a bit woozy - not even much of a headache, so I think I'll live....

If you get even the slightest bit of feeling sick or faint from this point onwards or a sudden massive headache, emergency service. Promise me...

My parents had two collie crosses - the second one turned out to be collie/terrier - but that wasn't possible to see when we got her (4mo) (she was a very funny puppy to look at - she walked and looked as though she had wet her nappy - she had black legs but had a white tummy and inside to her legs that showed and this just emphasised the whole thing. She was really lovely and very cleaver, although I wouldn't have trusted her an inch with a child. However, we've met lots of nice borders, patterdales and cairns. I really don't know why anyone would get a westie when you could get a cairn - so much more practical!

Amber - how does that go with having felt a bit queasy ever since I did it?

But in terms of headache etc - yes, I promise! Can't take anything for them anyway, so I'd certainly notice.

Queasy and fainting probably means concussion. It's the things dh had before he found himself in the hospital for a fortnight. It's bruising on the brain.

Definitely worth getting to see the doc, honest it is.

2nding ambers concern, queasy, woozy, fainting after a fall...does sound rather concussion like. At least phone NHS direct .

I've been concussed by objects and my head meeting with some force a few times. DH still reminds me of the day I wondered into see him at work, said I've got concussion and wondered out a again. I have no recollection of that! I thought I went home from A&E...

So the boy is still asleep- no lunch yet. He was in a filthy mood when he got home from preschool and took self off to bed becasue I would not let him go and sit on teh balcony in teh rain! I've managed to do an hours work and am now wondering about waking him up , need to do a supermarket run before tea time...

Teh "good" news is that his urine test came back negative, so probably not diabetis ( sp?) making him all sleepy.

Hi all - we're back home and a bit jetlagged... I loooooooove waking up at 5 am when my body thinks it's 8 am... hope to be more coherent later...

I am not caught up at all on what's new in my VR home-away-from-home (The Tea Room) but bumps on the head warrant a trip to the GP, IMO.

I've got a Dr's appointment later this afternoon.

UniS - good to hear about the positive. Is it anything to do with his diet? Intolerances can do funny things to the system. At one stage I was dropping off to sleep after lunch - sometimes just with head on the table - I think that it could have been the preservatives or similar in the dried bananas we sometimes had at lunchtime... And chocolate puts me into a really foul mood - which I have absolutely no control about - someone else is in the driving seat (actually, I think that one's an allergy!)

Unis great to hear that your boy's urine test came back negative for diabetes, its not something I would wish for a young boy. I was going to ask you if he also had any of the following symptoms which are a dead giveaway (along with the drowsiness)

Very thirsty
Weeing alot, especially at night
Very hungry

I'd keep at an eye on him anyway; diabetes in children (type 1) often has a long introductory period, ie child has highish blood sugar for a while (ie months) until it starts to get serious in a matter of days.

What have we here? Ooh....

My very own Star Trek beaming device!!!!!!!!!
Now I can pop over to the UK in a trice! And bring back sausages, bacon, black pudding and tattie scones for my breakfast.

Wow. Thanks all. The tearoom is truely a magic place.

Now, where is the stove and I'll get cracking on breakfast?

Toast anyone?

Mm. Bacon and sausage.

Hey. What DID Mellors do with the Tea Room giant pigs?

Om nom nom. On which subject, I have one of these in the oven! Mmm!

RS, yes, she is 5. I suspect she's just trying it on for size again. I should have told her that babies grow into 2yos who spill your bedside water all over the floor, cover the living room in sequins and then draw on the tissues in the tissue box, like her friend's little brother did yesterday ... but she might think that sounds fun!

We are now contemplating a cat.