March 2005 part 3 - Support for the sleep obsessed!

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Which of course, we all are

so i gottough last night.....

he slept in his cot ALL night
woke at 2:30,, had a little feed then went back to sleep in his cot with me masaging his tummy...

woke again at 5:30.....back off to sleep after a cuddle...slept til 6:45
I woke up like dolly parton

I have had a wonderful few days with DH and the children. Yesterday we went to Muddeford beach (near Bournemouth). DH and DD spent the day catching crabs (and seaweed) whilst I sat on the beach watching, playing with Harrison and reading whilst he was sleeping

Today, we went to Windsor Castle and St Georges Chapel. I took DD to look at the Dolls House and the State Apartments whilst DH walked around the grounds with Harrison fast asleep in the buggy. Afterwards, we sat by the River Thames and had coffee and fed the ducks

Unfortunately, our nights have been nothing to 'seal my lips about' but although he's woken 2-3 times, he's been much easier to settle. Here's hoping we'll get through this soon.

On the development front, Harrison is a non-starter really He's only just learnt to sit up, I'd fall down in shock if he crawled anytime soon (and I mean months not weeks) and he doesn't 'say' anything except 'uuurrgghh' 'ahhhh' and 'mummummummummum' Not at all bothered as I want him to be my baby for as long as possible

Off to carve up our pumpkin face now ready for Halloween and who knows, I may even rustle up some scrumpy soup with the contents

left Caleb playing in the front room whilst I ran upstairs to the loo, came back down and he'd dragged himself into the kitchen and was happily eating cat food! Whiskas chicken in gravy to be exact, his breath stunk of cat food!! can't put him down for 5 mins without him giving me a heart attack!

Congrats on getting tough popsy, hope you get another decent nights sleep!

Shalaa, my sister's DD used to do that all the time. Cat food, the water, even the cat litter once And people wonder why I'm not doing anything to encourage Harrison to crawl

Busy - You and I seem to be the only two left with non-crawlers! I'm not in any hurry either.

jambot - Iris is not crawling either - but is on all fours, bum in the air, shouting with frustration as she goes nowhere! It's getting a little wearing.

shalaa - had such a good chuckle at the cat food!

I was doing something with dd1 the other day and noticed that Iris kept coughing, after about 5 minutes I realised that she'd been playing with a big sticky label that was folded over and she'd been chewing it and it had vanished! After hanging her upside down and then looking in her mouth, I finally fished it out. Felt very negligent!

Staying with the in-laws at the moment and doing some crafty internetting, but better go and help out!

harry isnt crawling and not showing any signs!!!
only just mastered proper rolling.......but can get about with a combination of rolling and tummy spinning

Oo Jambot - isn't that stiff legged thing that they do when you try and sit them down really annoying?! Freya loves standing and bouncing, and when my arms are about to give up and I try and sit her down she goes as stiff as a board and will not sit down! TBH tho her legs are so chubby she could do with the exercise!

Ohhh yes, standing, that's what Harrison likes doing too. Can't hold his own weight though so no danger of him pulling himself up or anything remotely clever like that yet

Harrison had fish for the first time today (in cheese sauce, as that's always a sure bet to get him to eat anything). He loved it so that's another success for the freezer. He also had pumpkin soup for tea (made by my very own hand, I was soooo proud of myself) and he wolfed that down. Just as well as the pumpkin we had for Halloween was rather on the large size so I've made enough soup to feed a small army

Hoping like mad that Harrison doesn't wake tonight (chance and fat spring to mind) as I've got a racking cough and when I get up from being in bed, I get a terrible attack. Also aware that the clocks go back tonight so tomorrow could be a long day!!!

Sleeping vibes to everyone, especially me

Well, thanks to the hour change I am up and about . DD1 came into us at 6.30am (even though dh had changed her clock) and told us it was 7.30am (he hadn't changed his!). Told her it was too early and to go back to bed - she is now reading.

Grace is awake (I think) as I can hear little murmurings from the monitor - not calling me yet though so I'll leave her a bit longer!

Shalaa - at the catfood!

Grace not crawling yet, although she got the closest yet yesterday afternoon - managed to move about 2 feet but more of a wiggle and shuffle rather than a proper crawl.

We went to a Halloween party with her yesterday - 6 babies all dressed in costumes - the mother of one of my friends lives in the States and brought a load of costumes over with her a couple of weeks back (Halloween is a bit thing over there). Grace was a cow and we also had a giraffe, chicken, Tigger, leopard and strawberry! I will put a picture on the photobucket - they looked so cute!

Popsy - glad to hear the new "get tough" regime is working! Fingers crossed it will keep getting better for you. I think out of all of us you have had the hardest time so deserve some decent nights!

Had our first 'wave bye bye' today. Rather random waving, but it's the first thing that Lauren's ever copied me doing. Very sweet.
She's been amazing this last week. Sitting, lifting arms to be lifted, first basic word, and now hand waving. No wonder she's been so tired during the day - she must be exhausted from all this new activity.
We have a major flea problem. Can't seem to get rid of the damn things - the cats are now flea free, due to various potions, and we did one of these room fogger things, but they are still jumping all over the place. Can't stand it, especially when I find bites on my child. Any bright ideas?

Oh Jambot, she's such a clever little thing. I remember waving for the first time being one of my favourite memories of DD when she was little. Don't have any advice about fleas I'm afraid. I rented a property once that had them but we got someone in to fumigate and that sorted the problem. How horrid for you

Lauren's new pictures on the photobucket are really lovely, what a smiler. And Bonym, love Grace in her cow costume. She's really pretty isn't she with her big blue eyes

Pidge, we need to see pictures of Iris.

Love the Halloween picture of Grace - she'll love you for that when she is older!

Yes, that photo is adorable. I added one I took of Lauren this morning, with her peekaboo game cloth still on her head - looks like an Arab.
Yes Pidge - we need some more up to date pics of Iris.

I am hopeless - we MUST sort out our photos. To be honest I am so brain addled I can't even remember how to access the photobucket. And I'm the one who works in IT. I swear I'm being a total techno-failure tonight - I just had three attempts to email my baby tea group, and screwed up every time.

Might be something to do with our 5.30 am (new time) rise and shine this morning!

That waving thing is amazing. Can't imagine Iris managing anything so sophisticated. In the nicest possible way she is completely clueless and just grins her gummy grin at everyone!

Don't get me wrong - it was hardly the 'royal wave'. Presently just a rather vague flapping!

Just dropping in quickly! I realised today that I have been back at work for a month now and have very little to show for it so trying to be more focused and surf the internet less!

Pidge, I also work in IT and am technically hopeless (that only started when I got pregnant though ). I'm now doing some development work again and its really shaking my confidence!

BusyW - Niklas also likes cheese on everything. AKs recipes always say to use cheddar though, I haven't found an alternative over here yet so add parmesan or gruyere or any other swiss cheese we happen to have in the fridge, some are quite strong , but he seems ot love them so who am I to judge!

Not much new going on with him at the moment. He is just adorable and very happy. I am doing my best too stuff him full of food before he goes to bed at night so he sleeps for longer, there was some improvement last night......

Popsycal - great to hear you had one better night with Harry, it must have been the best nights sleep you have had in at least a year !

Lol about the cat food and sticky label. I confess I have fished leaves, paper, sweet papers and cardboard out of Niklas's mouth.

2 AK sucesses - Fish with a trio of vegetable and Lentils with red peppers (although I think I will miss out on the red peppers next time as his lovely little bottom ended up the same colour!

Must look up that recipe for the pasta with mushrooms, I can't find it in the book.

Yes, it would be great to hear how 3mummy is doing. And some of the other mums as well that we haven't heard from for a loooooong time!

Well that was not so quick, typical me waffling away as usual !

My lips are sealed, my lips are sealed, my lips are sealed, my lips are sealed

Harrison was a little horror all day yesterday (even worse than he had been for the whole of the week before) and kept bursting into screaming fits. I was expecting a neighbour to knock any moment to see if I was trying to murder him Took him to our baby group but had to bring him home in the end as he wasn't happy even there with lots to distract him. He screamed when I put him down for both naps, when I put him in his highchair to feed him, when I changed his nappy and whenever he couldn't see me (which was a few times when I was in another room taking deep breaths before facing the onslaught again )

BUT ..... put him to bed at 6.30pm (which was a job and a half) and then my lips were sealed until 6.00am

Seems much, much, much happier today so don't know what the past week has been all about. I'm expecting a tooth to appear any day as he has the reddest of bottoms Poor thing must be in sooooo much discomfort.

Still waiting to hear back from work about returning part time in February (I head up the Customer Service department of a Publishing company). The longer it goes on, the more I think they may be working on a redundancy package for me. Fingers crossed it's enough to convince DH we could manage without my income. Totally sympathise though with the lack of confidence you feel when you return as I remember that with DD and she was a really good sleeper. Don't know how I'd cope if I went back now with Harrison often getting me up in the night still. I'd struggle to have a coherent conversation with anyone, never mind making important decisions or dealing with problems.

Have a good day everyone

Pidge, I'll CAT you with the username and password for the photobucket and then you have no excuse

Hi everyone,

I hope all is well, sorry but I have been away from here so long I cannot read all the messages.

I am thinking of changing my name to snowedunderMUMMY . I had to take a break as I am heading for a breakdown

Kieran is doing well, now crawling and eating anything you put in his mouth (loves fruit), but still no teeth. Better get back ladies.

I do hope you guys are all well and the babies are still as "sleepy" as ever. Take care all.

busywizzy - you are a star - I've got your email and I do now have no excuse! Well I just need to get our digital photos off the camera and onto the computer and then I PROMISE you one. Actually I could just post one of my older dd at this age because they look identical - it is positively spooky! I don't think I could tell them apart myself sometimes.

Norash - hope you are doing ok - it sounds like things are stressful. Sometimes life just gets on top of you and it's time to try to slow it down - easier said than done.

Leogaela - I found my confidence was shot when I went back to work first time too. Didn't help that I work for a consultancy and couldn't get a project to work on for 8 months. Even now I feel sick at the thought of going back in January.

I have just about had enough of Iris and her sleeping - or should I say NOT sleeping . She had been improving and going through till 3am ish from 7pm, but the last five nights she's been up at 10, midnight, 2, etc etc. I haven't had more than 3 hours sleep in a row. The bore is that often all it takes is for me to turn her onto her front again and stroke her back for a minute and she'll go off. But by that time I'm out of bed, wide awake and can't get back to sleep for another 30-40 minutes. I'm only actually feeding her twice, and then only for 1 minute a time. My other whinge (might as well get it off my chest whilst I'm at it!) is that she thinks 5.15 am is a good time to get up. The only way to get her back to sleep is to breastfeed her in bed with me, and I don't sleep all twisted round trying to keep boob in her mouth, as the moment she pops off she's awake and chatting and that's the end of the night's sleep. Hmmmmm ...

We were doing really well with our strategy of reducing feeds in the night - and that had a definite good impact until 5 nights ago, but now we seem to be going backwards again. So not sure what to try next. She has put herself to sleep at the start of the evening beautifully for months, which is supposed to be important. She's on 3 HUGE meals a day, and 4 good breastfeeds. My only other thought is to get a bit more organised about her putting herslef to sleep for daytime naps. She always does it in the evening, but in the daytime she sometimes requires 5-6 return visits from me to settle, so maybe if I teach her to go down more smoothly in the day she'll know what to do when she wakes at night.

Sorry ... major rant and stream of consciousness drivel from me there! You can see I'm a woman obsessed. I've said it before, I'll say it again, boy were we lucky with dd1 and her guaranteed 12 hours per night, which all happened with no effort from us! Little did we know ... !

Pidge - does she have something in bed with her at night? Dummy, blankie, soft toy etc. Lauren's little tag blankie really works a treat.
When I put her down now I don't even have to give her the blankie. She takes it off the side of her cot herself and cuddles it. Whenever I go in to her in the morning, she is always cuddling or chewing it. If she does cry in the night, I put her blankie close to her face, shush her once or twice and that's normally it. I don't think its' too late to introduce something, especially if she associates it with mummy and cuddles etc.