Gardening in the winter sun. 40-something mums Christmas thread

[somewherebecomingrain]

40-something mums with babies of all ages - please join us. The 20-something and 30-something mums will never satisfy you like this thread.

Bbd great that you are feeling a bit better. Take it easy though! Try and find some sunshine...
Rosie isn't it amazing how everyone else knows better than you do what you should do with your baby? (Not bitter, oh no...) I can just imagine the AIBU though, everyone tying themselves in knots to accommodate MN yu-must-be-culturally-sensitive alongside MN earrings-are-evil!
Somewhere hooray that you are successfully moved. And the talking somelet! She will have you organised very soon
Drspouse that's good news about the next phase of the process. What comes next?
Catdoctor I hope your boss continues to be human!
Ah eagle, the poo stories will always win!! And proper happy birthday to baby eagle.

Sorry if I have missed anyone. Am still cross eyed. Thank you all for allowing my my self indulgent rant. MIL has defied the odds twice before but got looking good now. It's just one thing after another for her, current is. Chest infection. We will take BG down to see her on the weekend, hopefully that will cheer her up. DH doing Englishman stiff upper lip at the moment. Poor thing is also in the middle of Ofsted, god those bastards like to kick teachers until they are mangled on the floor.
Young BG is doing well. Sleeping is much better, he is starting to talk in comprehensible words as well as full BG sentences that his silly parents can't understand. He is so much fun at the moment.

Scarecrow. How are you feeling? I so sympathise on the migraine.

Oh goat it is so much fun listening to mangled words/sentences, but they get so annoyed when you don't understand what they clearly said, don't they? DS has started saying things again when we don't understand, you can feel the eye roll.

The next thing is a lot more paperwork, we should be approved to adopt in early April. Will keep you posted!

Hello bbd next weds sounds good

It's the funeral for my friend today, it's really hitting me and I am dreading it but also needing it.

The worst thing is going to be the grief of all those closest to him.

We were flat mates and I was there at the beginning of his relationship with his wife - it was such a beautiful love, they were so totally devoted to each other.

Time to say goodbye. We had a typical 20-something relationship in that we argued a lot over domestic duties - nothing rose tinted about our time as flat mates - but when his wife came along we got on better - she is superb - and he had been developing into this wonderful funny avuncular affectionate presence in my life.

Goodbye A--.

drspouse I am loving your posts

goat it sounds immensely stressful - we had a dress rehearsal for it in my family but you are doing the real thing. I hope you can find some time to have fun and relax with BG and Dh.

X

Somewhere yu are ion my thoughts today x

Somewhere, big hugs.

Big hugs somewhere xx

Thinking of you Somewhere . Sorry not to catch up properly .

Well my patients broke! ! Please read and laugh, I am laughing now, even at the time I could see the funny side, I just decided to make a point. (I was beginning to feel bullied)
So (childless 28 yo) bil is a total prat. Typheal egyptain idiot who thinks he knows everything about everything and shouts a lot. He knows nothing about anything, has never left home city and gets his money from his wealthy mother. He and dh have very different political views and do not get on at all. Bil has been living with sil at dmil house for some time and he's assumed 'man of the house status' (in his head ) i have put up with his bs for 2 week's with the knowledge that he is a prat and I'll be home soon so not worth the stress of a huge family row (oh and family rows here are a whole other level) for this reason i don't tell dh ether. (He would for sure start a huge row)
Bil and sil have been ttc for 2 years, and i am always mindful of the heartache that sil is feeling. Having rosebud here is bitter sweet for her. (And him i know but i repeat he's a prat)
Well they both LOVE to tell me what I should do. .. It goes. . 'Rose, i think you should change the baby.' Rose, i think she wants milk, you sshould feed her. Rose, she is tired you should put her to bed.' Rose did you bath her today.' Rose she needs her shoes on. ' rose you can't take her out like that, you must put a coat on her. . Get my drift. .. it's relentless.

My language skills have dropped dramatically and I'm struggling a bit with more than basic communication. Plus i don't really want to speak or understand them. Most of what they have to say is bs.
When we arrived they all took holiday from work (which they never go to anyway) and would be up till 3am and sleep till 5pm then kick off when I put dd to bed about 8 (having spent all day keeping her quite) so i let dd stay up late. SShe is now very happy to stay awake till 3am but they now have to go to (sign in at) work and want to sleep at 10. Dd is not interested in changing her new routine. I'm tired.
Yesterday bil was particularly annoying and I had been to the dentist and had a headache. The 'you must. .. you must' was relentless including 'you must give me the baby and go to the balcony and have shesha (I don't smoke shesha) )you are too stressed. ' to which i told him to f off in English and shut the door to our room. I have taken dd from him on several occasions when he has been careless/stupid with her. (Such as feeding her apple when I've said no more food as she was constipated and allowing her to bump her head on the bed and blowing clouds of fucking shesha at her! !!!! Wtf). 10 minutes later he came in and told me i had to call dh (who is Always out) and tell him to buy nappies for dd...... well that was it. The proverbial straw and i lost it very calmly. I shouted like I've not shouted at anyone in years. And I didn't stop shouting in English but the message was clear, till he shut up backing away saying sorry. Oh my joy at putting this stupid little man in his place is ridiculous :) mil was beside hrrself and sil was horrified. I bundled dd up and went down to American friend ( unescorted) DH was summoned by mil and the shouting started again i was 2 floors down (with a very large g&t) raging and laughing at everything that is shit in this shit hole of a country :)

Waters all calm again now and bil keeping a respectful distance and his mouth shut (which i can see is killing him)
Only 5 more days

Oh well done rosie, we all imagine doing that kind of thing but aren't brave enough!

Somewhere I do hope today has gone as well as can be expected.

DH back last night, reasonably good day at work today, we had a department meeting - there are about 30 people at my level and two of them are just about to go out on maternity/adoption leave but I'm undeclared (this is why my boss was happy about potentially getting more cover). I was trying very hard to look out of the window while he reported that part, and wondering how many of my colleagues could read between the lines!

Sorry been quiet (well, for me). Have to say to Somewhere I am thinking of you so hard and would love all the warmth and friendship we feel to give you just a little comfort and solace. So hope the funeral was the right mix of memory, grief and love. An unmumsnetty (hug) for today

Am a bit doolally with tiredness and feel like I have a year of organising to do before I go back to work in three weeks. Both children slept for 11.5 hours last night so my sanity is returning. Pray it lasts. Think I've come through the bad patch now, and hope I can be a better friend to you all again. Thank you for tolerating a rather whingey me for so long! Dh back Friday morning too....which should mean more help! He Skyped me yesterday to say it rained but was nice because it had become oppressively hot. Not for the first time there is no emoticon! Actually Skype been amazing : kids adore it and really helps with the missing him. Lucy sleeping better led to a wonderful sweet, mischievous, essentially good phase which I'm loving: she has v cute new thing where when I ask her to do things (or not do them!) she replies "o-Kay worry pants" with an exaggerated sigh and a really cheeky face, but does /stops it. I can't possibly tick her off for being bold because she is being funny and obedient.... Enough me-me-me, just wanted to share some good stuff :)

drspouse another one loving your posts. I completely understand privacy about where you are adopting from, but will children come from same country/culture as each other? I feel so ignorant I didn't realise you could adopt from abroad through the English system, so to speak. Will the new baby/child be a baby or older? Thinking of you lots and willing it to go well.

Thanks guys, this is a lovely corner do the garden to have discovered, so to speak.

We are applying to adopt from the same country again, though if it doesn't go anywhere we can switch to the UK, which we were considering for our second adoption anyway. Then we'd have paid the overseas fee (and we don't get it back) and we'd have to redo a bit of the home study but it wouldn't be the end of the world if we had to change that, but we'd obviously prefer this plan to work.

DS was a baby when placed and the new adoption is also for a baby. That was one of the reasons but not the only reason we chose to adopt from overseas; though it is a lot easier to adopt a baby in the UK now. The only other adopters we know in our town have a DS placed at 7 months.

Hello!

Back on the thread after a fairly long absence - this work thing is taking up quite a bit of my time

Somewhere so sorry to hear about your poor friend. I hope everything went as well as expected today and here's a big hug from me too. I read your thread on Baby Somewhere and really feel for you. She's such a gorgeous, awesome baby! I got DD checked out at the docs when she was a few weeks old as she has an infeasibly massive head - when I measure it, it was well off the percentile chart! I saw my GP to rule out anything as it just bothered me, even though she seemed fine. Got confirmation that her head is huge, but has grown consistently and is therefore fine. Hope you get some 'official' reassurance when you find time to get DD checked over.

Work going well, and am in a reasonably good routine, but no space left for anything to go wrong. DP being v good and doing his bit re nursery drop-offs/pick-ups. DD had her first birthday party on Sat - absolute chaos but incredibly good fun, and very good turn-out considering my lack of planning. Then yesterday on her proper birthday we both took the day off and took her to a local spa for the morning, and had a massage each. DP was in a bad mood about going as he felt the day was rushed and he was being made to do something he wasn't keen on. I told the therapist she was free to wring his neck when he was having his massage

Rosie reading about your adventures with great interest! BiL does sound like a plonker - so glad you were able to be Zero Tolerance Woman and put him in his place. Am [shocked] re the Dentist waiting room earrings incident. If the local cat's bum face brigade are going to be so professionally offended, you may as well go the whole hog (no pun intended) and put DD in a Peppa Pig outfit...

Drspouse welcome to the thread! I'm 42 and have a 12mo DD. Good luck with the new adoption

Goat fantastic to see you back on the thread but so sorry you've had such an awful time of late. Am really glad you've got a diagnosis re the milk protein allergy at last - not a nice thing to have, but at least you have some answers now and you can adjust BG's diet. Very sorry to hear about your poor MiL too

Scarecrow glad you've had some restorative time while the DC do epic sleeps! You've reminded me we should do Skype/facetime here with DP and DD as she would really enjoy it now (although fear DP still too upset to cope with seeing DD on a screen). DD hilarious with her worry pants expression!

Hope the meet up next week goes well. Am really missing meeting up with friends now I'm back at work . I spent most of the last year actively avoiding organised baby groups/activities and instead focused more on one to one meets with people I had things in common with. Really hope I get some time soon to see everyone again.

Bed time now - hope my post makes sense! Feeling shattered today as I've got a stomach bug and have been rushing to the loo most of the day. And I fell asleep several times in a meeting this afternoon, much to the amusement of my colleagues

PS - you know they're outgrowing breastfeeding when they've got one boob in their mouth and they're using their toes to tweak the other one

pepper pig

My local Indian Muslim friends all let their children watch Peppa Pig... and wear Peppa Pig tops... and carry Peppa Pig backpacks...

Hi everyone, baby napping next to me and the house is quite. :)
Scarecrow, welcome back I love to reading your posts, hearing about L reminds me of my girls growing up and that I have the joy of living it again with rosebud. :)
Eagle, I'm in awe of how you have so easily adapted to going back to work. Hats off looking forward to the next sw scarf club meet, (of which I elect you president as your dp gave us our name and you have the best stash! ) pudding and i will keep your your coffee warm.

Hi drspouse, you baby journey is amazing, and very interesting. I really hope you stick around so we learn more and get to enjoy your stories of baby snuggles :) please remind me how old ds is? He sounds adorable. X

Thanks rosie, he was 2 at the start of this month.

I've just been on the phone today to a couple of local HCPs to say "you know how normally for an adoption you fill in form X, please could you write us an entirely different letter about matter Y because the overseas agency has their own sweet way of doing things...

It's all good fun.

For BBD:

www.mumsnet.com/special-events/chinese-new-year-mumsnet-guide-to-mandarin

(not all of them are safe to try out with DS tho!)

Looking forward to meeting up soon Rosie - can't believe you are coming home very soon!

My return to work feels like a wobbly house of cards at times. Arrived at nursery this morning to find they've got an outbreak of 3 different serious illnesses. Feel it's almost inevitable that DD will catch at least one, but not much I can do. At least now with work I'm feeling reasonably settled in and not so scared about not being able to turn up every single day.

DD getting rather blase about nursery. When I arrived this eve, she was sat on the floor, busy with a toy. I knelt on the floor and said hello to her, and she just handed me a toy to play with and carried on with what she was doing!

Hi all

rosie you courageous woman! Blowing sheesha in her face - surely that's childcare 101 in any time or place.

Hope you can enjoy the rest of the holiday a bit. When are you back?

drspouse how old was ds when you adopted him? He sounds lovely.

scarecrow lovely Lucy story.

eagle what a nice workplace if they think its funny that you fall asleep in meetings.

bbd glad you are over your Lurgy.

I've just been through mad days (in a very ordinary way). Moving house. Then the funeral.

It was huge as funerals of the young are. So huge that we were far distant from the close friends and relatives and I didn't even get to speak to them.

It was just awful - they had pictures of him, so handsome and just like he was there in the room and I couldn't believe it - I kept looking at him and recognising someone who was alive and in our lives and it was like a kick in the guts to know he isn't.

And at our age we know that this feeling is ordinary.

Anyway I am going on about it because it is shocking but it's a relatively distant bombshell from a personal point of view. Still just abysmally awful. I saw his little daughter and there was the face of a toddler who hasn't seen her daddy in 2 weeks and doesn't know why but knows something is very wrong.

The priest was a bit rubbish but said a good thing about gathering up the fragments as best as we can.

My ds is making friends at school but having intense emotions about it which I am finding hard. Not sure how far to give in to it all.

V tired

Hugs

Xx

Happy New Year to all.
May this Year of the Horse make things go quickly/quicklier for all of us !
To DrSpouse, lots of good news on adoption, faster progress
To Somewhere's DS, quick real friendship at school and Somelet, fast walking so that Mum is less worried
To Scarecrow, to Knicky, to Eagleray, to Goat, to DrSpouse and all other working outside home, may days go quickly so that you get home to see your babies
To Cycle, quick recovery to DH
To Rosie, hope these last coming days fly so you get home very soon
To Knotty, quick, quick put on the safety gates

Thank you Eagleray for the link, interesting although a bit inaccurate as Chinese is a tonal language and all the tones are missing ....
DS' class organises a party on Sunday, it will be his first Chinese NY celebration, I want him to get excited and immersed and see the fun of learning Chinese. I'm lucky it is the year of the Horse, he loves horses and last night asked me how to say it in Chinese, phfew, it is one of the words I know ! and tonight's lesson of course referred to the new year, he was very proud to show he knew the word. For once ! Most kids have been having lessons for 3 or 4 years, it is his 3rd, he has a little bit to catch up !

Somewhere, it is ok to feel shocked, your friend was a young man and it is not ok to die young. Feeling heartbroken for his 18 month daughter.

Scarecrow, hourray, DH is back in a few hours, hope you get some help and rest. I'm very impressed by DD's elaborate speech.

Rosie, you are a saint for not losing your patience earlier. With my big mouth, I'd have lasted 2 hours in your situation, not 2 weeks as you did. The lady in the video gave me a headache, DS watched it and said his eyes were rolling :)

Eagleray, Clover's birthday at a spa was a brilliant idea ! Watch out, she will get used to luxury treatments ! My little A is showing already her feminine temper, throwing things when upset, changing 4 times her shoes within an hour, loving labels (their texture must have something, she recognises her doudou by touching the label!), holding bags on one hand...

Time to bed, lots of cooking tomorrow. Enjoy the week end !