Tea room the Eighth - sun, sea, sangria, and perhaps a sandy Mellors

[DontCallMeBaby]

Greetings, welcome to the eighth incarnation of the tearoom.

The tearoom has been, and will be again, a virtual safe haven for anyone up for rather random chat and a comprehensive range of virtual snacks. Nothing in the tearoom will make you fat, or drunk (unless you want it to) or cause an allergic reaction.

The new tearoom location is a beautiful beachside cafe (no need for factor 50, the virtual sun will just lightly tan you, bring out your freckles or simply warm your skin, as you prefer) with a range of garden swings, hammocks, sunloungers, deckchairs etc (as well as a rather incongruous, but well-loved, chaise longue). For those in need of sanctuary, we have managed to fashion a new priesthole out of woven grasses.

Our fellow residents include Mellors the rugged gardener of few-but-well-chosen words, the naked mohawk babies, a coterie of bishops, various domestic pets, and a selection of others. On the human side, all are welcome - while we live in the One Child topic some regulars have more than one, and we are welcome all (except people who put their heads on one side and tell those of us with one child that it's just not fair to have only one child).

Please help yourself to a glass of Champagne and a canape on the way in ...

ummm, know what you mean about teh tan through sun screen, isn;t that kinda the point of it tho. Its NOT sun block, that something different, regular sun screen just ups teh amount of time in sun before damage is likely.

Boy is down to factor 30 this year, he gets over heated in factor 40 or 50 as he can;t sweat through it. becomes V hot, bright red and not very happy. remove to cool place and he returns to normal in a few minutes. OR don;t use such a gloopy sun screen and he doesn;t go bright red, over heat etc.

I know - but its the ease with which it happens that I'm about!!!!

if he tans and doesn't burn, what are you concerned about, MT? I'm being a bit dim, obviously

Yes, I thought tanning is good - skin's defenses? Wriggle tans on the first day the sun comes out in April. DH tans the first time he puts his head out of the window in about March and is brown all year. I look like a peeled banana, however much sunbathing I used to inadvisedly do .... oh no, look - due to the magic of the tearoom I have got a tan! Long, shiny, slim, brown legs ... now who could they belong to?

Inspired by the tea room's new location, Wriggle and I are off to Weymouth this afternoon, after a spot of hospital visiting (friend's two-year old in traction with broken leg ). Wonder if long, bronzed legs have made it back into RL with me ... no ...

I've got one of those skins that doesn't need too much sunscreen and tans quite happily - I just have to watch it when its really strong sun and perhaps a sea breeze - either cover up some of the time or put some sort of sunscreen on - but I haven't wanted to let ds go too far ifykwim - I'd prefer that he isn't so tanned and definitely doesn't burn. But yes, I think I can probably be a little more relaxed about the whole thing now. I suppose its one of the things that I am a bit pfb about

(Dh doesn't have our advantage - had one classic example when we visited Holy Island (Northumbria) in early summer - I'd left the sunscreen in the cottage, suggested I went back for it - he said not to. I came back with my face feeling slightly tight - but it was a lovely brown the following day. Dh had blisters on his nose he'd burnt so badly )

oh I am so (proper use, not sicky) of people who tan easily. I used to work with a bloke like RS's DH - only had to lift his t-shirt and went black. He used to call me space ghost (nice - but he was a mate so after thumping him we carried on as usual )

I have just had one of my health news bulletins describing how sun through windows and anythign else that blocks UVB but allows UVA through is really bad - UVB is used to make Vitamin D (which helps to protect us from free radicals and other carcinogenic stuff) but apparently UVA can destroy it as well. here, if anyone wants to read

Really interesting article TW. Might swap MJ over to soap in the bath for the bits that really need it - at least try it for a while and see how his skin reacts (currently on that white stuff you put in thats beneficial for excema. Its really noticeable when he's been done in bubbles or something else for a couple of days in a row - but my soap would probably be OK for him)

I don't tan very well, I go a light brown and that's all, the colour won't go beyond a certain point. Am a big fan of that Piz Buin once a day stuff, VERY handy when you have a kid who hates having suncream applied when they're covered in sand! (don't we all?)

Oh look - Mellors is taking MrB for a walk - lots of tail wagging.

Morning all!!

Wow, what a great tearoom DCMB! Oh, look, I can hear your DD declaiming from here! She's great, and what an author!

I had never appreciated difference in sun block and sun cream, we got some hemp one from green baby that was all organic and stuff but DH got worried at last minute (it was for the mountains and the people on the phone couldn't vouch for it in snow/sun combo) so we use either nivea or sainsbury's baby ones - are they very bad Thumb?

I remember when DaisyBoy was born and all jaundiced poor little mite I used to pop him under the window in the hospital until the kindly consultant told me that the windows had light filters on and stopped the UVB coming through I hope I didn't in fact do him harm! One thing I had forgotten to worry about yet

Now, while it is a wonderful and clement day, here's a nice pot of coffee with charming mugs painted with ships anda carrot cake

vvvvvvvvvvvvv

that's better

Oh look, I can just see RacingPig and RacingMrsPiggy emerging from that fetching moroccan studded trunk. They are now settling down in the chaise longue

What's that RacingPig is dragging? Oh, a bag of twiglets, silly me!

And there go the NMBs! Don't they look sweet with there teeny tiny straw sombreros and there teeny tiny stripey towels over one arm and is it? Yes, teeny tiny buckets and spades in their other hands!

oh whooops, I seem to have buggered up crossed out my bunting!

WARNING! TMI FOLLOWING on poo...

I have just done the most stupid thing - miniThumb did a stonker of a nappy yesterday, poo everywhere, urgh. So last night I put it and another nappy (having just done a nappy wash, typical) into the machine for prewash to try and get rid of the worst of it (even after taking the liner out, there was still huge amounts of squishy stuff) and when I checked this morning, there is still poo there! in my machine!! so I've run it again to see if the poo goes away, otherwise what am I going to do???

Oh dear- poo in washing machine. DON'T PANIC.

remove as much poo as you can from teh machine- use rubber gloves and kitchen squares if you like. flush teh kitchen squares now covered in poo. use more kitchen squares to clean out the door seal... yes those crevices really do hold onto a lot of poo don;t they. when you have no more solids in drum or door seal, do a hot wash with an empty machine. no need for a spin. if you like you could do a rinse cycle with miltons type sterilising solution before the hot wash.

YOu may need to check your lint trap for poo. ditto teh connector between machine and drain. depending on your type of connection. ours had an anti syphon valve on that used to get clogged- till we changed it.

Good luck, its an unpleasant job but you tend to only do it occasionally.

thanks UniS - I take it you speak from similar experience?

Its when you find raisens or sweetcorn that has obviously got in the machine that way you get .

Never managed to have a problem when it was home nappies - occasionally from nursery they'd 'forget' to do anything (not envy) and the machine would suffer... However, normally found this out after the initial rinse (which was always nappies only) before anything else added for the wash.... Kitchen paper is really quite good at using for cleaning out the washing machine in similar circumstances - but you need one of the tougher varieties, not one that goes in a hole as soon as it sees water

yep. we found flushable liners didn't work well on boy till he was on solids. so used fleace liners. which a fair old ammount of poo remains stuck too.

don't miss the nappy wash at all.

UniS - we found that there was a lot of diference between different types of liners and whilst we didn't get on with some, others were great. We ended up with some that, if they were just wet, went in the washing machine and were reused - sometimes twice!

thanks ladies - just checked on the machine, after the second run - poo-free! but I think I will still check the traps as suggested (not envy either!)

The liners I use are actually drywipes that my mum had for her colostomy - she never used as many as they supplied and I've been using them from day 1 in the clothies - they flush successfully. I have washed a couple by accident and they come out intact but the integrity is gone - they tear easily.

mostly the poo does stay within the liner but yesterday was a real Special!

I hope you realise this isn't a good topic to be on when eating lunch (with or without sangria)

just thought i'd pop by the beach for a lunchtime g&t before i get back to obssesively (sorry spelling) checking my e-mail for offer of an interview. Glad to see Mellors has covered himself up a bit, do you think he can reach to apply his allover sun lotion?

I'm trying to ignore the posts about bodily waste and giving thanks that, as a mother of one, I'll never have to go through that again.

I think I'll take my lunch outside, though.

Sticky date and gingerbread snack before suppertime anyone?

yes i agree ref nappies, i'm glad i haven't got to go through that one again. Funny, i had trouble getting onto m/net earlier so i googled it to try to get on that way, in the google search came up some newspaper articles about mumsnet b*tchiness with members not inviting newbies to certain forums and not talking to them etc. I've been blissfully unaware of this so far in my mumsnet experience or am i being stoopid and i shouldn't come unless i'm invited?