*~*~* August 2010 *~*~* where does the time go?

[CherryPie3]

Only 5 spaces left on the old thread - wonder how long it'll take us to fill ths one up?

Happy chatting :)

Hello hello hello...

Weehector? Is that you? Wooooo welcome back missed you too! Sorry to hear sleep isn't happening well for you, I l have faith that it will be long before 2013 that you get your full 8hrs tho :)
Glad to war you and lo are otherwise well.

Cjdamoo - is it possible you need the Antenatal Thread for August hun? We've all had our babies here :). Congratulations on your pregnancy!

Neenz - best of luck to day hun, let us know how it goes!

Vix - poo for AF :(. Hope she buggers off soon!

Don't normally eat breakfast but am really hungry this morning! Off to hunt for food scavenger stylee co's there's not much in until asda come later this morning. And I neeeeed a coffee!!!

That June finishline is looking veeeeeerrrrrrrrryyyyy far away [bugrin]

Hooray - there you are Hector! Glad you're doing well, sleep aside. Bah, who needs sleep? Although, uh oh for your OH. Bet he won't bloody forget next year!!

Well, I'm pretty effin knackered after being out until 11 (woo!) (in a beer garden!) and a baby who started the day at 5.30 today. Zzzz. Three pints last night didn't help either! But it was SO nice to get out. I must say, my NCT group was so brilliant. Really have made such great friends through it.

Weather bit hazy/cloudy in London today, and breezy too, but still loving sitting in the garden with E asleep next to me in the pram. Such unbelievable April weather. Hope you're all up to similar!

vix I had that milk blister thing constantly from 2 weeks til 24 and it was agony. One day it just disappeared but I'd gone to the doc's and one of them offered to 'stick a pin in it' having admitted they had no idea what it was Have you had a look at the kellymom website for any tips?

weehector welcome back! We'd wondered where you'd gone. What sort of things do you cook for your lo? I'm in a rut with S and often end up giving him weetabix/porridge twice a day.

We spent the day in the sun, S stood at the sand/water table and got completely soaked and then crawled through the newly planted lawn and got covered in mud but he enjoyed himself. Hurrah for hand-me-downs that we don't care about

Good luck neenz

I've not got AF yet, it took 8.5mths with L and I'm on 9mths now so it's a new record.

Ditto. In such a rut with meals for E. Any successful recipes welcome!

So food, my favourite subject. Weaning was a complete head f ache for the first few weeks here but we're pretty relaxed about it now. We've always fed ourselves well, cooking from scratch every day so its not much extra work really. We're pretty much BLW with spooning for the things adults would use spoons for & I've been working my way through the Annabel Karmel recipes.

Things going down well here...add pears to everything below. Every meal needs a bit of pear at Maison Hector.

breakfasts - porridge & bananas, weetabix banana (said in a singsong voice here), french toast & strawberries, yoghurt & a dollop of stewed fruit (I mix up a batch a couple of times a week and keep in the fridge)

lunch - scrambled eggs & toast, cheesy toast fingers, bread & hummus &
veg sticks, cold chicken & half soft apricots (we need another mortgage to keep us in apricots (£3.19 a bag!) & blueberries)

supper - steamed veg finger food 2 or 3 e.g. courgette, broccoli, carrot + a portion of a meal eg. AK stew, popeye pasta (Philly, gruyere, spinach, onion, pasta = fab), cherub's cous cous, roasted sweet potato

gotta go...

...I'm back, the boy must have known I had been gathering others to my bosoms as he took buckets of milk there...

Chulita - my ace card (or last throw of the dice depending) at dinner, when A's thrown too many bits of broccoli on the deck or we've got into a spoon fight that no one wins, is semolina. Super easy - a tablespoon of semolina, 120ml of milk, on the hob for 2 mins or so stirring til it thickens, add a pinch of cinnamon, some diced pears or apple stew & a teaspoon of maple syrup. He tends to wolf it down regardless of what's come before & I can be happy he's got something warm & filling in his little tummy.

Lovely day in Hectorland. Been out for hours today, walking the prom, chatting to mummies, talking to the birdies in the park, an impressive go on the swings, a sail on daddy's boat complete with dancing porpoises...

weehector your day sounds absolutely lovely! Things continue to be a bit mixed here. After a much better night, waking at 11.45pm then 6.45am, last night E woke an hour after going down, crying inconsolably - still crying while being cuddled etc. Offered a bit of boob but she kept pulling off and crying more, so we got out the calpol, cuddled her for a bit, then I fed her and put her down awakeish and she slept til about 12.30am (although then woke AGAIN at 4am). I am feeling a bit under the weather myself, and went to bed about 9.30pm - when my DH joined me an hour later I had already fallen asleep, unheard of!

E is still a bit off solids after being ill but generally we do for breakfast porridge with some form of pureed fruit, scrambled egg, yoghurt or bits of bread(last resort if she is not eating!). Lunch is finger food and we've done broccoli, carrot, mandarin segments, banana, blueberries, green beans, babycorn, breadsticks, rice cakes, avocado, sticks of cheese, chunks of mango.. Dinner is usually pureed stuff, so it's usually some kind of whizzed/mashed up protein (I've done lamb and apricot, chicken and asparagus, pasta with cheese and broccoli sauce or tomato and cheese sauce, beef and ale stew, v mild chicken and coconut curry, lentil and veg stew) then I usually add a bit of veg puree as well, or sometimes I'll grab a selection of veg puree and grate some cheese on top. My freezer is full of random cubes of food! Would like to try meat as a finger food, any suggestions?

Hi Weehector! Lovely to have you back. Sounds like you are loving life atm . Glad to have been of help re the BFing!

The job interview went OK but I think maybe I didn't emphasise how I would put across the benefits of BFing. I think from being on MN and living in a middle-class area I just assume people know BFing is better than formula and that the biggest barriers are information and support. But the area where I would be working, I think they find in their AN classes that people think there isn't much difference, so one of the big aspects is convincing people to give BFing a try. My presentation was more based on how to give people all the info they need to succeed. Anyway I think I got across that I knew about the issues and I said at the end 'I hope I have managed to show how passionate I am about Bfing' and they all said 'oh yes you have definitely done that' . I figure if it's meant to be I will get it and if it;'s not I won't. The hours are mostly evenings and weekends and I do wonder whether I want to give up a day of family time each weekend... so if I don't get it I think it might be for the best. If I do get it I will accept and see how it goes. I will hear on Wednesday!

Food here is beans and lentils mixed with sweet potato and spinach, or leftover spag bol or lentil stew with rice or pasta. Chicken or cod and potato and broccoli. A protein, potato and veg mostly. I give him a sandwich and a yogurt for lunch. Apricots are a big hit here too (with my DD too) - ours are £4.99 a bag tho! Unsulphured ones which are healthier (with a price tag to match )

bellygazing S absolutely loves fish fingers.

weehector I think my trouble is that I can't give S dairy so a lot of stuff I used to fall back on with L I just can't do (leek/cheese pasta was a classic!) I'll give semolina a go though, DH loves it so it won't go to waste.

neenz good luck! fingers crossed for good news on Wednesday.

S seems to be self-settling ok at the moment which is lovely, I'm thinking about coaxing him out of night feeds...hmm, we'll see how my resolve goes on that one. He's such a happy little boy, I love his big cheesy grin and the excitement he has when exploring. Feeding's a bit hit and miss but lentils always go down well so I'll just have to keep feeding him that I suppose.

chulita AK's lovely lentils with pitta? That's a good 'un too...

Morning, what another lovely day? Very unusual for April however...

weehector Your recipes sound fab, loving the semoline tip too...Corey often gets too fussy/grumpy to actually eat a lot. Corey's absolute favourite food is strawberries - he will never turn them down. In fact I have been known to mush them onto toast [in place of jam] for him. Don't like giving him jam, feel like I'm going to rot his teeth before they're all here!
Sounds like you had a lovely day out on Thursday too :).

neenz From your post it looks like you definitely made an excellent impression - fingers crossed for good news on Wednesday! :). I know what you mean about giving up a 'family day', hope you can work something out.

belly Sorry to hear you're feeling unwell, get well soon hun. With regards to giving meat as a finger food, I just cut strips of whatever meat we're having and pop it on his highchair/baby walker/bumbo tray - chicken works best for him.

chulita Have you started cutting night feeds? How did it go?

nat Way to go staying out on a school night . Glad you had a good time :)

We went to Blackpool yesterday, weather was beautiful!! I haven't been there since I was about 9 and I wasn't allowed to do a lot of things then as we didn't have a lot of money - so I absolutely spoiled my dc's yesterday doing all the things I couldn't do when I was younger. It was awesome!
Best bit was going on the 'ferris wheel' (as my dc's call it) on the Pier, it was a very clear day and the views were amazing! Of course the kids didn't appreciate that, and nor would I have at that age.

My lucky dh today has been whisked away to Nottingham races today for a stag do - dropped him off at pick-up point at 9:45am, won't see him again until 5pm tomorrow. Which is why I'm actually allowed to be on MN (he hates me being online when he's at hom . He'd better win big if he's gonna be putting bets on.

Off to go make lunch now - I've switched the kids (and dh ) onto wholemeal/wheat everything so we're trying wholewheat tortilla wraps today with chicken strips and oven chips. Jacket potatoes and salad for tea.

x :) x

Just popping in to say thanks for the great food tips. I'm seriously getting out my pen here and making notes. Lentils have gone down well here too, and I've finally cracked the pasta conundrum here (in that E seems like like it, but struggles to keep it in his mouth). Mini pasta shells! With Bol sauce. I've got a bit lazy about BLW weaning recently, after starting v gung ho. Must get a bit more adventurous.

Going to watch a DVD now - woo! Loving having our evenings back.

Happy Easter all!

Nat - is it the Annabel Karmel pasta you've used? I found them to be fab for C, the stars especially :)

Wish we had our evenings back....Corey is refusing to go to bed!! So he is up, with me, because I don't have the energy to fight with him tonight, I've spent the day doing lovely things with the kids while the weather's been nice (storm forecast tomorrow!) and have been very unconcerned with the housework - and now I'm very concerned as my house is a mass of folded laundry awaiting being put away. Kids bedrooms aren't looking very tidy either.
Gonna be a looooong night of fixing this before the Easter Bunny comes tomorrow... Aaah well...My kids are more important than a perfect house!

:)

cherry only dull women have perfect houses. That's what I've been telling myself anyway as I've been pulling on my sunglasses & flip flops & heading out the door with the buggy this week. This being Scotland, that's probably our full quota of sunny days used up for the year..:)

Well that's the cot finally lowered. The extra stretch won't be great for my dodgy hip but Little Lord Hector is pulling to standing from sitting very casually these days & his little pal took a header out of his this week so I'm happier that there's one less thing for him to get up to. He's a very busy boy - nappy changing is a complete fiasco, he won't sit anywhere anymore (anyone else's baby just want to stand in the bath?) & my back is breaking from all the bending to 'walk' him about the house. I think he honestly thinks he can walk..it's so cute to see him cruising & then putting his hands up for a walk but at the same time it's maddening that he's starting to think that his Jumperoo is a bit lame. It used to be the best thing ever & my way of securing him if I wanted to make a cup of tea or whatever but now he howls whenever he's dropped into it. I need a new strategy for containing him..is a playpen/travel cot my only option because I can't see that going down too well with my little er, explorer...

nat/cherry Asda do wholewheat mini pasta shells - same as my beloved AK but a million times cheaper. (need all my pennies for apricots..:).

Lying in bed with the windows open and feeling a bit tense that the neighbours are partying when I need to be getting some zzz in. I'd probably party too if I'd just netted £7m in a takeover. To be fair to them, they're very modest, I only know they're minted because I read about it in a business profile..not that I'm jealous or anything when they're drinking chilled wine outside whilst I have a bedside glass of ribena & apricots are £300 per bag & there's three of us living on Mr Weehector's salary...:)

Hello everyone, glad to see pample and weehector back :)

We've had a lovely week staying with my parents in sunny Devon. We went out for our first evening meal since J was born while my parents babysat but then proceeded to wolf down our meal at top speed - absolutely no need to, we've just got into the habit.
The night before we went away he actually slept 10.30-6.15! First (and only) time ever. Hoping he might do it again once we get back into a bit more routine at home.

vix I haven't had AF yet but am not looking forward to it, and not enjoying the fact that I have absolutely no idea when it'll come.

pample I can't believe how waitrose treated you, that sort of thing must happen all the time. I nearly did it yesterday in WH Smiths (picked up a drink, wandered around looking at chocolate, decided it was all overpriced and then nearly walked out without paying for the drink)

Happy Easter :)

Ooh, so your neighbours are minted then, Hector? I think I would be a little cross at al fresco champers clinking too. I have no idea whether I'll be able to get my part-time hours at work or not. If not, I'm jacking it in. DH has finally decided that he can't stand his job anymore and is going to jack it in. He used to be his own boss before, so I have total faiththat he'll make a success out of whatever he chooses to do next. But still! It's going to be hairy for a while. I'm not the most relaxed person in the world at the moment and am struggling a bit to 'go with the flow'. And meanwhile our crappy rented house is full of damp, mould, mice and moths. Wish we were just a bit minted. And yes, on that note, supermarket mini pasta ftw! I'm sort of afraid of Annabel Karmel. All of the photos of her are circa 1991. Has she been frozen in time, like something out of Dr Who?

Marzi congrats on the epic sleep! E doing much better still here, but he wakes up at completely different times every night to feed. Utterly random. Not complaining about two wake ups, mind! He was waking up every 2 hours less than two weeks ago!

nat hope they agree your hours and you find a way to make the work stuff work - if that makes sense. But lovely you've got your evenings back, it made such a difference to us. With pasta, I must admit I use whatever I've got in the house and then whizz it up to manageable size.
hector your little one sounds like a lovely handful - pulling up and cruising already, that's amazing! Elodie is still not crawling, although on the sofa or the bed she sort of does...
marzi yay for long sleeps!
cherrypie Housework? What is this of which you speak?
chulita did you start with the night weaning?

E has finally regained her appetite and is mostly much better - although she now has a horrible barking cough and sometimes I think it hurts her throat so much it makes her cryr - but she's all croaky and can't do it properly which just breaks my heart I also keep losing my voice and coughing up all manner of delightful stuff so I think we are all on a par with each other. Provided she is fully recovered (and I think this is a sign of her getting better actually) I am hoping to stop doing night feeds next weekend, as my DH is off Friday til Tuesday which gives four nights when he doesn't have to get up and go to work. Am I right in thinking that they tend to cry for a lot longer in the night rather than at the beginning of the night? I am planning to leave it 5 mins first off, then go in and offer water and a cuddle, then put her down and if still crying, leave it 10 mins, then 15 and so on. I'm back to work on May 31 and really could do with not getting up in the night by then - but won't be able to do it if she's still a bit poorly.

Have had a lovely weekend, visiting my parents, going out for lunch, meandering in the sun in the local park, visitng some gardens and having a picnic. Love the sun

belly A is definitely a handful but I just get in with it because I don't know anything else...but my RL mummies (all the babies are about the same age) confirm that he's easily the most physical & the swimming teacher lady commented on it today (tries not to get too paranoid or start googling hyperactivity). He's usually charming & all smiles with it but yesterday I had a vision of my future toddler hell when he went into a complete meltdown & tried to get out of the trolley in Asda as he wanted to be carried. An old lady literally walked past & then came back to, in her words, 'save me.' The old 'Judgey pants' me - who silently tutted at out of control children in public - would be horrified. After a couple of aisles hunched over the trolley dementedly singing 'the wheels on the bus', attracting sympathetic smiles from mummy-types & slightly frightened/startled looks from everyone else, I chucked it & slunk home to lick my wounds with a fisher-price telephone, some ham, wine & thankfully the right ingredients for last night's tea. As Asda is 25mins away, that's thrown our household organisation (a bit of a game of jenga at the best of times) into further disarray. No teabags, no porridge, no kitchen roll to clean up the mess...it's a curious mix of nuclear bunker stockpiling (about 20 tins of tomatoes & chickpeas, sacks of rice & pasta, 200 nappies) & Just (not) in Time ordering (never any butter or milk) at Maison Hector these days.

When you consider the 2hrly feeding overnight & the 4 little teeth marks left on my bleeding nipples, all in all, yesterday was not my finest hour of motherhood.

However, as sure as sunshine follows rain, today is a brand new day. A lady taking her kids swimming stopped me in the changing rooms earlier & said 'I hope you don't mind me mentioning it but you have a really beautiful baby', his appetite is back, he's 95% happy & he went to bed 3.5hrs ago without a fight. Fingers crossed for more sunshine, metaphorically, as we have a busy day followed by a 6.5hr roadtrip south as soon as DH gets off the boat at 5pm tomorrow.

What are we all doing for The Wedding? Champagne, shouting at the telly or ignoring the whole thing? My inner princess is quietly getting quite swept away by the whole thing..have been negotiating with DH & I'm hoping to spend a child free morning/early avo with my SIL & niece with party food & champagne. I'm quite glad I'm actually away from home as I'd probably have blown the year's apricot budget on bunting & run myself ragged hosting a party.

for hector's annual apricot budget. Confession here - most of the fruit E gets comes from tins - we do fresh bananas, avocado, blueberries, mango and apples but apricots, pineapples, pears, mandarins are all from tins. As for your stockpiling, provided you've got a few spices sounds like you've got all the ingredients for a delicious chickpea and tomato curry. Mmmmm. Bleeding nipples sounds horrible! I have tiny scratches all over my boobs but as no teeth yet I haven't had that to contend with so far...
WRT the Royal Wedding - Ms Middleton actually comes from about 2 miles away from the village I grew up in so it's all a bit weird. I want to see the dress and the dramatic, fairytale kissing bit, but other than that not too fussed - will prob have it on in the background.

Hello lovely ladies!

lovely to see you again weehector

Had my 12 week scan today and it was really lovely. Bow (what we're calling baby for now!) was very very wriggly. Arms and legs all over the place and rolypoly's galore. Belle hardly moved in her 12 week scan apart from a bit of waving so it was really beautiful to see Bow playing around and being really awake. A really special moment.

Feeling really great this afternoon but wondering how long it will be until the fear kicks back in. A bit all over the place emotionally but it was always going to be like this.

Going to upload the picture of Belle's little brother or sister onto my profile if anyone wants to take a look! :) Next scan 13th June for an 18 week doppler scan Should have date for my 20 week "flavouring" scan by next week too! (Although hoping they'll tell us at my 18 week scan!)

bellygazing I forgot S woke up at 4am and I just rushed in and shoved boob in mouth before I fully woke up. He still woke for the day just before 6am and I left him to grizzle for ages a tiny, tiny moment and he fell back to sleep til around 8. I'm doing it tonight though for sure, dreamfeed at 10 if he hasn't woken up and then nothing til 6am at the earliest (except offers of water that will be rejected).

weehector I'm not doing anything for the wedding. It'll most likely be on while we do other stuff. I'd love to chill out with my girly friends and enjoy it with some vino but seeing as they all live 100 odd miles away or further, I can't. fwiw S is a really 'cuddle me mummy or I'll scream so you can hear me from the other side of the shop and not stop til you come back and cuddle me mummy so freaking cuddle me mummy NOW' baby. We went to Dunhelm Mill the other day and I wandered off to actually look at something and he screamed, I gritted my teeth and kept going upstairs into the dark, distant depths of the baking section and I could still hear his piercing shriek slicing through the air like a finely sharpened paring knife. I gave up and rescued my rather wide-eyed and desperate-looking DH and went with S on my hip as usual and couldn't look at anything properly one-handed with him grabbing at it so it was a waste of time.

cazandbelle lovely that little Bow was having a good old wriggle, time's ticking along isn't it?! Just to let you know that I pray for you whenever I remember, hope you don't mind! (even if you did I still would, I just wouldn't tell you )

Thanks for redirecting me chulita

Lying in bed next to a SCREAMING Tilly ..
Has been sleeping 7-7 and Obv decided that wasn't nearly as fun as waking up to scream..
Have done calpol + milk and now nurofen but she's not stopping.

The other two wil be up soon so I guess it's just the three ish hours of sleep for me tonight..

Caz- glad things going so well. Looking forward to hearing what you're having

Things here not going so well. As I had a very light period before I realised I was pregnant the gp sent me for an early scan

That was at what I thought was 6+2 but they couldn't see anything except a sac no heartbeat or anything else.
They were fairly negative saying I should come back in two weeks to re scan and in the meantime I would bleed more and lose it or need a scrape.

Other chance was that it could become a viable pregnancy..

Totally confused by that really!
Anyway I feel very pregnant , want to puke all the time and have a growing stomach so whatever is there is definitely doing something

Wait is over at last nearly and have my scan tomorrow.
Looking on here it's not unusual to not see a heartbeat at 6 wks.

Talking about baby development Tilly can only just sit on her own and is 9 months now. She waves when she fancies it, rolls/ swims to reach her destination but barely puts any weight on her legs at all.

And of course says dada ad infinitum but no mama

Right she has given in so I may get ten mins bef the others wake

gya good luck for your scan tomorrow, I hope the little one is growing well. The waiting must be so hard! I had an awful night here too, S woke up at 2 and cried til 5 then woke for the day at 6, lucky me...

gya as just thinking about you today, must be a bit scary re your earlier scan but if you feel really pregnant (and no more bleeding) then hopefully you still are. Thinking of you
Lovely to hear from you caz, Bow sounds lovely, I can understand emotions must be v difficult but hope you can continue to enjoy your pregnancy.
chulita sorry for rubbish night, hopefully it will just be a one-off.

Yesterday was a good day - after a not brilliant swimming lesson last week, E was back on form, and her appetite is properly back again. And as well as being smiley and happy, she woke for a feed at about 10.15pm then slept til 7.30am, happy days.