FEB 2010 Teeth, nosh and smelly bums - it's all go, six months on!!

[InmaculadaConcepcion]

Where did the last half a year go??!

Has anyone had to move furniture to retrieve their LO yet? Just discovered dd1 has made a lovely den behind some tall cupboards and then invited the baby to join her. Getting dd1 out was easy but dd2 thought it was a great game and stayed put... [hgrin] Guess I should have left her to crawl out by herself but there are cables from my parents tv down there so I had to act.

Hiya mawbroon, great to hear from you! So DS1 finally weaned himself! Do you still think DS2 will be faster to wean or is it BF for another 4+ years for you?! I think the one thing I miss because of BF is being able to take cold symptom alleviaters. And Valium if I have to fly.

As for the clocks thing, lets all compare notes a week from now and see what time our LOs are getting up...! 07.30 seems to be DD's current time and translated to 06.30, that's not TOO hideous, I could live with it. Prefer 07.00 or so, though.

I'm kind of burying my head in the sand about furniture and stuff at the mo, but crawling isn't far off, so we'll have to act soon. We've got a load of door/cupboard/drawer etc. latches, just need to fit them on the potentially dangerous ones and move cleaning fluids etc out of harm's way. I'm slightly dreading the crawling thing, TBH...!

Anyway, hasta luego... [hwink]

Hi mawbroon It's nice to have some comebackers [hsmile]

This morning DS was awake at 4am but I let him cry a bit and he settle himself back to sleep until 6am so I can live with that. [hhmm] But he slept from 6.30 until 4am in one go, so I can't complain too much.

Our mission this weekend is to fit the door latches, the stair gates were done a few weeks ago and I'm pleased we didn't had to rush to fit them last weekend when DS decided to crawl.

IC don't dread the crawl, your DD may do like my DS, discover that she can do it and then only bothered when needed!

I'm having problems with bath time as DS launches himself to get the silver chained thingy that close the bath (sorry I can't remember how it's called ) and pull it. Even if I sit him with his back facing the chain, he turns and goes for it. It's a phase, it will pass...

Very me post today. Oups!

bathplug,GF!

[hsmile]

Hello - nice to hear from you, Mawbroon.

GF It's called a plug. [hsmile]

We started putting DS to bed later about a week ago and he slept until 7.40 yesterday and 8am this morning so it seems to be working.

Last night was pretty good - he took a while to settle first thing, about half an hour then he woke up briefly at 1.30 and at 5. Both times I just fed him straight away because I've been shushing and patting and it hasn't been working and he's been getting into a right tizzy and then I have to feed him in end anyway so I thought I might as well get him back down before he is fully awake and screaming. It worked but I would love him to just go to sleep and wake up 12 hours later.

For a few days he'd wake up at 5 and be full-on grinning and bouncing for an hour and even though he'd get back to sleep I was unable to. At least that's stopped.

I can't seem to find any rhyme or reason to work out why some nights are good and others are bad.

He spent the whole night in his cot in his room last night too which was excellent.

We are going to a little halloween party this afternoon with my NCT postnatal group. The babies have to dress up - I haven't got a halloween costume for him so he's going in his bear suit and holding a plastic fish to be a scary grizzly bear. Very scary.

It was really nice to venture out of my local area on Thursday. We got the train up to London Bridge and walked through the city and met my friend for lunch. He behaved really well at the restaurant and charmed all the waitresses. I got a little bit mellow on a couple of glasses of wine - it's ages since I've been a bit merry in the afternoon. My friend is vegetarian so we went to a very fancy veggie restaurant - IC, you're veggie aren't you? If you are ever in London you must try it - www.vanillablack.co.uk/

Thanks for the plug word. I though it may be but wasn't sure!

good night for us Ds slept from 6.30pm til 6am with a winge at 1.30am. I will see how tomorrow works...

BC have a good party and good news on the sleeping in his own room.

Regarding the feeding during the night I was a few months ago adding some baby rice into his last bottle at bedtime and he stopped waking up to feed (still wake up for others reasons though). I can't remember if you BF but it may be an idea? Good luck anyway

It will pass GF, but in the meantime, I guess you could take the chain off the plug and just use the plug on it's own. Or just decided to live with him launching at it every bathtime!

I am still bathing ds2 in the kitchen sink. He gets in such a mess after his dinner that we just plonk him in there straight away and it's become part of the routine now.

I have one of those wee sleepsuits with a skeleton on it for him. We are going to a big hallowe'en bash this afternoon, so thought I would make the effort.

I fell asleep when putting ds2 to bed last night at 7.30pm and that was me until this morning!!! DH just put ds1 in the bed with me and he slept in ds1's room. I have come to the conclusion that it's dh that wakes me and ds2 in the night because i got loads of sleep compared to usual! Must try it more often

Thanks for the restaurant tip, bc!
[hgrin] at the scary grizzly bear..!

Yes, mawbroon, I tend to sleep better apart from DH at the moment...seems a shame, but it's one fewer person disrupting my sleep, I s'pose.

Out of interest, non-native English speakers (GF, mamaloco, BG) do you also post on parenting websites in your native languages, or just mumsnet? I ask because I'm dead impressed - after all, I live in Spain, but I don't post on parenting sites here, my Spanish isn't close to being good enough to understand when the hell they're going on about and to reply comprehensibly.

How's the weaning going, everyone?
I ask because just in the last week or so DD's appetite for solids has suddenly increased and we've doubled the amount of food we're giving her at each meal. Finger foods are still according to her mood, but some purees, she just can't get enough of. Prodigious turds, too [hgrin]

PS I can't "bold" your initials at the moment, GuernseyFrench.... not sure why

IC I only post on MN.

My French weaning book says that at 9 months, portion size should be increased to 150g (including 30g of proteins if given). For example, DS eats 30g of cereals with 5oz formula, his 150g portion of lumpy puree and a fruit compote or yogurt at lunchtime and dinner with some finger food and 5oz at 3pm and at bedtime. But he is on a seefood diet [hgrin] so our daily food may be too much for your DD.

DH and I haven't slept apart since Ds and I are back from hospital but most of the time, I go to sleep by myself as DH works nights.

IC my LO's appetite has also increased quite dramatically over the past few weeks. Took me a while to realise what she wanted but she's much happier now.
I only post on MN but then I have lived in the UK almost as long as in Germany! [hsmile]I keep joking that I'll do 20 years per country and will have to find a new country to live in next year!

Thanks BC re the plug filler things. The website was a bit technical for me (whilst watching a film) but will return to it this evening so that I understand fully.

Mawbroon we went to a mini-Hallowe'en party yesterday and only knew about 8 hours before that it was dressing up so DS1 went as Batman!! The only outfit I have in DS2's size is a Father Christmas outfit and thought this was a tad too far so didn't bother. Think he will forgive me in the future!!

DS2 is suddenly eating loads more too, but then he has started cruising in the last few days and I think new 'steps' in development tend to coincide with an increase in appetite (and often a change in sleep patterns).

Can't currently enter DS2 into the Next baby competition I've entered DS1 in, as DS2 has too many bumps on his head from the cruising!! This could be difficult to explain to DS2 in the future!! (cue "Didn't you think I was gorgeous too Mummy?" type comments!!)

DH and I slept in separate rooms from when I was 18 weeks pregnant with DS1 till DS2 was born so that we could share the night duties and get some sleep (did have 6 months of awful night coughing with DS1 to get through). I didn't like it much, but DH is very proud of the fact that we managed to conceive DS2 even though we weren't sleeping in the same room [hgrin]!!

How did the interview go Stoof?

As far as all the sleep issues go, I am much more chilled about it this time round and yet, if anything, the amount of sleep I'm getting is less than with DS1 (as now we have double the chances of getting woken!!) I have concluded personally that DS2 will sleep through in the end (as DS1 often does) and that the more I concentrate on it, the more it bugs me/stresses me out. By trying to accept it as a phase that will eventually pass, it seems easier. Not sure this would work for the rest of you, but for me, it has helped.

My DS loves watching the water go own the plughole at the end of his bath, and poking his fingers down to catch it, very sweet!

Food intake varies a lot day to day, but his weight gain is steady so I'm just feeding him to his appetite, seems to be working for us. He had Porridge with fruit this morning, Omelette for lunch and pasta with Tomato based sauce for dinner. We're on big grownup pasta now, the teeny stuff is just mega expensive and he likes putting it in his own mouth better anyway. A very messy but happy boy :)

Went back to work last week and I have to say I feel really depressed about it. I only hope it gets better or I win the lottery...

Still no teeth here...just teething symptoms!

Sorry, all about me, hugs to everyone

Hi all, feels like I've not done a proper post in a while, so this may be very long me (well LO) one. We're still a week away from being 8 months.

Still no teeth here, but thankfully no teething symptoms in a while (so guess we're overdue for some). I think this is having a impact on solid intake. She is very good at chomping on finger food, just can't break it all down. There is quite a bit she can have though (porridge, fruit). Or course going away for the long weekend threw a spanner into things. Wasn't much food for her around and since she's never had purees I was reluctant to buy those pouch things.

In fact recently her appetite has gone down. She's got over her cold, but now out of nowhere has a hoarse voice and has been a bit unsettled at times.

She took up for 30secs the other day, but as soon as she realises (because she gets engrossed in what she's holding and let's go of things) she promptly sits back down again.

We do have the plug things, as the sockets aren't like the UK ones, but that is all we have (apart from moving certain things out the way, including the toilet brush [hhmm] )

Sorry about your return to work sunny. Mine has been mega busy, lots of out of office hour stuff. Am starting to really hate expressing all of a sudden, hopefully just a short blip.

She has a comedy walking style (holding onto our hands). One giant left stride and a normal right. Though it becoming more normal. She still crawls one knee, one foot.
Oh and she has started making a very cute puckering/sucking noise/action.

Sleep, more good nights than bad. Last two have had feeds at 10, 2 and 5. Very respectable. Our clocks don't change for a few weeks yet.

that was suppose to be 'she stood for 30secs'

DS woke up at 5.30am (new time) but I took him with us and he slept until 6.30. So not as vad as I was anticipated, but he was more unsettle during the night so I guess we can't have everything.

Have a good Sunday

I'm very grumpy because I posted a long message and then my internet connection went down...

So in summary, hello all . We didn't do anything special (and never have) for the time change. DD1 was sent back to bed with the usual instruction to stay there until it said seven (we did this just before she turned two and it has worked a treat), and DD2 woke up at 7:15am. So all was well.

We haven't done any childproofing. We didn't with DD1 and never had any problems, and are crossing our fingers that DD2 will be the same!

No toothbrushing here as still no teeth! Food still going OK - a mixture of purees and normal food. She seems to actively dislike very rough purees (voms), but copes OK with the constituent parts not mushed up (but eats very slowly and runs out of steam so doesn't eat enough), so I'm going with the combo at the moment.

I've been quiet on here recently as DD1 turned four a couple of weeks ago, and we also went to my parents' for half term.

Sorry for lack of personal responses. My failed post had lots on, but disappeared. Grr.

Hi mawbroon! Nice to hear from you again. In fact a couple of weeks back was just thinking about all the advice you gave me 9 months ago re BF-ing :)

Someone asked about xmas ideas - we're doing what we've always done. Xmas gifts are personal, homemade gifts. Better anyway, means xmas not commercialised, and avoids us spending ridiculous amounts on presents. And we buy any more expensive stuff after xmas during the sale!!

urgh?. cold, cough and fever (DS) period (me) HURRAH!!

interview not til friday? pretty much finished powerpoint presentation yesterday?

spent £70 i don't have at M&S on a tailored skirt (can't remember last time i wore one!!) some tights (ditto) a new bra and a pair of those magic 'get rid of your gut' knickers - in an effort to reduce the baby apron?.

tried the combo on with my knee length boots (not worn for about 6 years!) DH said 'very nice' and DD said 'what's that mum??' anyway? i feel better about the interview now but can't decide if i look like an old, grey school girl (did i tell you i got id'd at tesco last week?!?!) or the manager of a foyer (this is the look i'm going for!!)

me me me? sorry!

hope you all have a good week? probs no more from me til after 9.15am friday?. xxx

ooh, forgot too - i got a tax rebate friday - £640 woo hoo? have turned the heating on!!!

and nice to hear from you mawbroon!

really am going now? should pay my youngest child some attention!!!!

stoof sending good luck vibes and hugs your way. Really hope things start to settle down for you. Sneak some extra hugs to the LO from me.

sunny Sorry work is so crap. Hope things improve.

CC Glad sleeping is improving.

Stoof Aww, triple whammy! Can't remember the last time I wore a tailored skirt either - I'm sure you look great. V envious that you got IDd. Great news on the tax rebate. I got one a month ago but I think I spent it all on tat for DS. Good luck for Friday.

I am having a one-to-one Italian lesson here at home today. Felt like my brain was atrophying and I haven't studied for a couple of years and I've forgotten so much and thought it would be good to do something for me.

Unfortunately DS slept badly the last couple of nights. He woke at midnight, one, three and five last night. At 5 after feeding him and him not settling I sent him and DH downstairs because he will sleep in the pram.

We have such a small house that wherever I go if he's crying at night I can hear him - we wouldn't leave him to cry alone for any length of time but if one of us sits with him he still gets into a right paddy if not picked up so then the other one can't sleep (even if we go downstairs). I don't know what to do because when woken all befuddled all I want to do is use the quickest and easiest route to getting him to sleep. He ate a really good lunch and dinner yesterday and he poos all the bloody time so I'm sure it isn't hunger that's waking him.

I fed him every time he woke last night and now I feel daft and soft because it seems obvious that he's needing the breast to get back to sleep because it's what I do. We try with the shushing and putting our hand on him but it makes him more furious. Every time I say "right, no more night feeds" I can't keep it up past a few hours.

Despite all that I am feeling really, really broody. I have vacillated about having another one because my pregnancy was so horrible and high risk and everything with the pre eclampsia and growth problems - it was almost like holding my breath/having a panic attack for the duration. My periods haven't returned - I guess due to all the blimmin' night feeding. We had IVF for DS in the end and I'm 37 now and we've said we won't do IVF again so I don't think there's a great chance but I would so love another baby - not more than one! But, yeah - I'd love to have two kids. Don't know where we'd put the other one, mind!

Sorry for huge self indulgent essay but it helps to write it down...

Ooh, sounds ace - good luck, stoof

Hope it picks up for you soon, sunny

Please can you send me your sleep secrets??!!

DD woke at 06.00 this morning, which wasn't too bad - she went to bed at 19.00ish last night and woke twice in between times, so had had her usual 10 hours or so required sleep - hence 1.5hours later I persuaded her to have half an hour's more kip and she woke at 07.45. Not sure it was worth the effort, but hopefully getting up time will settle down in the next week.

bc - well, if you want another DC, give it a go! Having a child can often kick-start sluggish fertility, so you may well be able to conceive more easily than you would expect (once your periods return).
But the prospect of a baby when your first isn't sleeping well??!! I'm faced with the same dilemma, but will just have to bite the bullet and hope DD's sleep habits settle down in the meantime...

...on the subject of which, bc I found that making sure DD was definitely awake when I put her down at bedtime made a big difference when her overnight wakings started creeping up again. I had been getting lazy and putting her down asleep. Once I stopped doing that, matters improved.
Also, if DD wakes before midnight, I don't feed her, but hold her until she's soothed enough to go back to sleep. My shoulder is often black and blue with baby love-bites as she makes it clear she wants to be attached to the breast, but I keep calm and hold her until she stops wailing and starts to fall asleep again (usually takes around twenty minutes). That also makes a difference to later wakings.

Now DD generally unattaches herself after the bedtime feed and lies back in my arms to indicate she's had enough and is ready for sleep. Her eyes are still half open when I put her down and often I hear her muttering to herself for ten mins afterward, but mostly she then gets off to sleep without protest. It's still novel enough that it's like magic to witness!!
Last night she did a pre-midnight wake, but after that, only one more before 06.00. She unattached herself and self-settled after the second awakening too.

I guess what I'm trying to say, is you could probably still feed to re-settle as the night wears on(it's nature's way, after all!) while continuing to encourage your DS to learn to settle himself, especially earlier on in the evening.

Sorry, obsessive minute detail about sleep stuff.... [sheepish emoticon]

Has anyone started picking up some of their LO's mannerisms? I noticed myself doing a sort of panting-through-the-nose thing that DD does when she's excited about something earlier today - or maybe she got it off me??

Hi everyone

I haven't visited for a while because I found all your stories about how advanced your lovely DCs are rather dispiriting as I thought my DD was being rather slow on the uptake.

Anyway - she started crawling last week and I've cheered up and stopped being such a miserable moo. I'm loving how she now makes a beeline for the most lethal item/area in any given space - like a danger-seeking baby missile. I lost the front part of a stud earring today - it could have been anywhere in the house, in the library or anywhere in the half hour walk between the two - but DD found it and I spotted her just before she tried to eat it. She also loves ends of wires, particularly if they are plugged in and plastic bags to chew. The final reason for her to start crawling was a mad dash to try and get her dad's iPhone before he picked it off the floor.