Sept 08 - Our LO's are nearly 2, and they're hiding to do a poo (is it time for potty training, not until it stops this raining)

[ninja]

I started it!! (I'm going away to London with just DD1 tomorrow so I want to know where you all are when we get back.

3 toddler free days!!

oh yes books are good. Only problem is they can be expensive. We often have stuff from companies like The Book People in work and they often have packs of 10 books for £10. Sometimes a couple of them are a bit naff but the others make good presents- I usually give 2 at a time.

bookmarking

splish good to hear from you! sorry that dd is not settling well...its so hard isnt it?

hopefully good luck for today x

Splish Glad to hear you are back in your own house. It must be nice to have some space and peace after the refuge.

We have been decided robyn is definitely going to nursery. There is one near us which is good, I have a friend who works there. he will go for an hour at a time for a couple of weeks then up that to 2 hours twice a week. Am already looking forward to some quiet time although I will probably miss her and spend it sleeping

I just did a huge post and lost the post message button

Fanny on the presents thing the form at our nursery seems to be to spend about £10-£15. For a little boy I'd look for something to do with Toy Story as that seems to be the big thing at the moment. Although I recently bought one of DD's friends a Gruffalo floor puzzle which went down very well.

Hopefully I'm glad your DH's meeting went well and good luck for the scan.

DD seems to have picked up a little boyfriend! One of the older kids at nursery (he turns 4 in a couple of weeks) waits for her by the gate in the morning and apparently talks about nothing but her when he gets home . He's invited her to his birthday party.

£10-£15 for a present for someone you don't even know!!!! Sometimes I wonder about the reasons for a parent having a big party (or am I just getting cynical in my old age?). Although saying that I do apreciate that the parties can be very expensive.

debs that happens to me all the time, esp at home. I now try to remember to copy my message so if it crashes I can just paste it in again.

£10-15?! That's more than I spent on my own child!
Day 3 of nursery and all good...she most likely won't go tomorrow as I've got to get DH to the hospital to have his cast taken off and won't get back in time. I'm braced for a backlash from DD next week once the novelty of nursery has worn off and the tiredness sets in!

A friend told me about this incredible bargain this morning. Not sure we've got enough space to accommodate it...or enough willingness from DH to house it, but its an amazing deal!

I measured DS's height this morning - he's on 82cm, that's 2nd centile. Going on the theory of being half your adult height when you turn two, he'll only be 5ft 3, which is a bit surprising given that DH and I are both from families with some VERY tall people in. Only dMIL is short! Has he entirely got his genes from her?! He's now grown out of a lot of his 12-18m clothes but the 18-24m ones have massive turn-ups.

Quality quote from DS the other day, when trying to climb onto the sofa "you have plenty of cushions mummy"!!!

Got the age 2 checklist from the HV today (they don't do a check as standard, just send you info about where your child should be up to, and if you have any concerns then you can ring them) and the only thing on the list he can't do is go up stairs one step per foot, but that's just coz he's got little legs!

I know it seems a lot but as I say it's the norm at our nursery so I'd feel mean not spending that. It's a really friendly nursery and we mums all go out drinking a lot so I wouldn't say I don't know them.

With the reception kids where DS has just started the only parties he's been invited to so far are children he knows well so again I don't mind. We'll see how it goes though as there are 30 children in his class.

debi we still have to apply properly. I'm not sure what 'putting your name down' actually acheives other than giving the school and idea of who's going to apply, and getting yourself a guided tour of the school by the head!

Well I have worn DP with SWI . We've done it every night since Friday (TMI!!), so fingers crossed.

I have to say we're all a bit tighter with the pennies up here. I only invited children I know to C's birthday party and these were all kids of mums I'd met at baby cafe - we'd agreed ages ago that birthday pressies should be kept under a tenner and we do secret santa at xmas, so we only have to buy one each.

I think if C was invited to a birthday party by someone she didn't know, I'd only spend a fiver at most - I really don't care what is 'expected' - it's the thought that counts and I'm not into competative mums. I do read 'slummy mummy' in the Times, so understand things can be different in London!

In nursery most parents bring a cake in at birthday time, so I did a home made banana and choc chip cake, which went down so well 2 staff asked me for the recipe! .

Back to work - hoping everything went OK for hopefully today!

It's not about being competitive and I honestly don't think it's that much money but hey ho. I do also know pretty much all the children at DD's nursery and so does she.

We're not allowed to take in cakes because of allergies but the children make a cake at nursery when it's a birthday.

Back from scan, all good news! Baby was v chilled out (legs crossed at the ankles, arms behind head) and bang on for dates. V relieved

Mothers who I am friends with have got in the habit of putting 'no presents' on invites, which is (a) very nice and (b) shows what an incredibly wealthy area I live in! (we are not incredibly wealthy. Or even in the black).

hopefully that is wonderful news!!

Brilliant idea on the "no presents" on invite. We've been having a word with our friends recently to suggest we don't all give Christmas presents to all of each other's children, and it seems to have gone down well. We'll buy for our godsons (children of our friends) as that singles them out as being special, and we've suggested to our kids godparents that if they want to buy something for the godchild then they don't buy for the sibling, and they've agreed its a really nice thing to do.

D&S its probably a part of the country thing as well with amount spent (says Carrie in a huge sweeping generalisation) and as you say, you're friends with their mums, I def spend a bit more on kids who are family friends.

Congratulations Hopefully - really glad to hear scan went well

No £10 spending on presents here either. Although I swear one of my friends spends that much on her party bags, crazy . She is very sweet but my dc's don't even register what's in them, and I scoff any choc buttons.

hopefully Pleased to hear the scan went well, what's your due date?

MrsA fingers crossed (if not legs )

D&M at you going out drinking with the other mums.

Congratulations hopefully that is really wonderful news.

Meglet it's great fun. We really do get on brilliantly which is obviously great for playdates as well.

TBH I would prefer not to get anymore presents. Our playroom is full to bursting. I need to do a lot of sorting out and culling.

Fab news hopefully.

My scan is in two weeks time. I'm also shitting it!!

Yay hopefully you can relax a bit now.

I know what you mean D&S about no more toys, we didn't do a proper party for ds1 this year because 1. It costs a fortune and 2. People feel obliged to bring presents and I don't need more stuff cluttering the place up. Esp stuff that doesn't go with what we've already got and so needs it's own toy box.

No presents on the invite sounds good but unless you do it from a very young age and everyonedoes it I can't see it going down well with the children!

meglet I'll come out drinking with you. i don't have any mummy friends either who I'd go out at night with. I do have a small group of very good friends with kids the same age but we only see each other with the kids. And I've got a couple of friends I could go out with but we never do. If I goout it'swith work friends usually.

debi we've been invited to a wedding in your neck of the woods next May, I'll take you out drinking
Actually I hope I'll be far to heavily up-duffed...I'll drive!

ooo, goody carrie is the designated driver!

Actually carrie, I was going to give you a minor update on IBS (I'm sure it was you who mentioned it a while back). I ended up with only soda and rye bread in the house for the last couple of weeks and my stomach has felt a million times better. I'm not sure if it's a gluten / wheat / yeast intolerance as I'm still eating pasta and marmite but I think that I might give bog-standard shop made bread a miss for a while and see if I continue to feel ok.

Thanks meglet that's a really useful tip, will put soda bread on the shopping list! Haven't been toooo bad lately, although I'm now entering week 3 of my cycle which is when all the problems usually flare up. Eating white bread certainly helps me too.

Kept DD off nursery today and have put her on the sofa in front of tractor ted, poor love is streaming with snot and can't stop coughing. DH is at the hospital, hopefully being given the all clear to go longer and longer without his cast on (its a velcro one!)

Hello there ladies, Just dropped in to say a quick hello. Jessica turns 2 next week and its reminded me of all of you. Jessica is doing really well - she enjoys her nursery and her talking is coming on well - we are starting to get sentences now. She can throw some dreadful temper tantrums though. Her fav toy is her cuddly giraff which she thinks is a monster and points it at complete strangers and roars at them . DD1 has just started school which she loves.

I hope you and your wee ones are all doing well. Wishing you all the best for the next year.

hugs Sagecat

hi sagecat lovely to hear from you! glad your dds are doing so well x

Hello from the sicky house . The dc's are quarantined as they were sick this morning so all plans are cancelled.

Hello sagecat, LOL at your DD scaring people with her giraffe.

Not sure what to do today now, one of the girls from nursery was coming over to be a 'mothers help' for a couple of hours so I could cook / organise in peace but obviously I told her to skip this week as the dc's are ill. I don't fancy dealing with food if there are still germs in the house. I might go in the loft as the dc's are flopped on the sofa and not squabbling.

Hi sagecat, you're not the only one with terrible tantrums!

Hope the bug's done it's worst meg Did you get anything productive done today?

I measured ds2's height then checked online to see if Carrie's theory was right as I didn't believe it! I did find a website that said boys are half adult height at 2 but for girls it's about 19 months. I've no idea what ds1 was at 2 but ds2 is only 86cm which will only make him 172cm which is only 5foot 7 which is same as me. As dh is 6 foot I'd have thought he'd be a bit taller than me.

This weekend we've mostly been watching golf and rugby!