March 2005 part 4 - The nights are getting quieter.....

[BonyM]

Not that I want to tempt fate...

Well done Bonym !

We also had a much better night last night, Niklas slept from about 8.30 to 5.45 and then dozed in bed with us for another hour.

I've still got a cold but just been out in the icy wind for a run and I am now feeling much better! The snow has just been a dusting, but I also get really excited about snow (not only for snowboarding, its just lovely!)

Yes I got an outfit for the wedding. I am such a boring clothes person though and hoped to find something a bit more exciting. Its a dark purple chiffon skirt with the same coloured vest top and cardigan. very sensible december outfit I think , sensible, boring, mum-like and middle aged , so I bought loads of silly cheap beads to liven it up with and... of course its not a waste of money as I can wear the clothes after !

Well done Caleb!

Bonym, go for the meal and just leave early! I pushed myself to go for work drinks last week and surprised myself by enjoying it, but was still in bed by 10.30 though ! Lol at Grace being scared of your mum! A friends baby is the same with my dh, but he also gets a bit over excited and I guess he scares her!

Busy, hope you had a better night last night. Thanks for advice about the shoes. I will make sure he only uses them when we are outside. The nursery seemed quite pleased that he has shoes so he the don't have to carry him when he is in the gardn with the other children. I'll have to look at the daisy roots ones.

Jambot - Niklas also loves to lick his stream of snot if I don't manage to wipe it away quickly enough! Luckily he is also over his cold and the runny nose has almost gone as well.

We have our tooth at last Popped through this morning just as I expected, so now we are up to four. Harrison seems so much more cheerful today and we even had a good night. Was asleep by 6.45pm and didn't wake up until 5.30am when he came into bed with me

Unfortunately, I had a rubbish nights sleep as I was on the sofa {DH's snoring was unbearable and I didn't want to risk disturbing Harrison by going into the spare bed in his room}. Hmmmmmm Really must think what we're going to do about this.

Still haven't heard anything from work so have spent the morning ringing childminders on the assumption that I need to start planning for going back to work end of February. Feel a bit sad today as a result

Well done Caleb. Can't believe how advanced he is. Harrison is still pushing onto his knees from sitting but then just collapses in a heap on his tummy. Has now started screeching whenever this happens, which is about a million times a day so I'm suddenly very keen for him to master crawling, just like Jo and Freya

Leo, think you're outfit sounds great - very sophisticated, not old. Know what you mean though, when I get out of bed sometimes, I feel like my bones are about a hundred years older than the rest of me

Bonym, any improvement with Grace's feeding?

Hope everyone is having a good day and glad to hear you are all feeing better from colds etc.

Lauren's cold has relapsed. She's had this runny nose for a week now and it doesn't seem to want to totally clear. Also a bit niggly the last two days. Doesn't want to be left alone and winges during meals. Wonder if it's not all related to her top teeth coming in. Also think she's starting to get frustrated with not being that physically active. Wants me to play with her all the time so that I can help her get places. Lovely summer's day here today, although they have started renovations next door and the jackhammer hasn't stopped all day. Thought we'd finished with building noises, what with us taking a year to do ours. All our plants for the garden arrived today. Can't wait to get them planted - it will make the house look less like a building site. We are nearly finished and I can't wait to start using the whole house. My husband is already talking about selling and buying 'up' as the time is right in the market at the moment. Told him to forget it. Haven't had a proper, fully functioning home for so long and can't wait to unpack every single box. Still haven't unpacked our wedding presents and that was nearly two years ago! I'm not budging for quite a while, especially now that we have a little one. Easier to be more flexible when it's just the two of you.
Welcome back Calebsmum. Caleb's very active. Lauren doesn't even look like crawling for quite a while. I only walked at 15 months, so she may be a late starter like her mum.

Leo - your outfit sound lovely - I think dark purple is a gorgeous colour - very classy and very "in" at the moment. Am very impressed at you running - the most exercise I get is pushing the pram back and for to the school twice a day, and even that's not such good exercise any more as the new pram is much lighter to push than my old one!

We have Daisy Roots for Grace - only put them on her when we go out and it's cold though.

Glad you had a better night Busy. about your work situation - is there any chance still that redundancy might be offered, or have you ruled it out now?

There is a slight improvement in Grace's feeding - I managed to get her to have a feed before her morning sleep today (and she had quite a good one at 5am), so that's better than yesterday.

Jambot - sorry that Lauren's still not feeling too great. At least you have good weather though! It's foggy and freezing here today . We've been wanting to get our loft converted for a while but couldn't face it when I was pg and can face it even less now that we have Grace! Just don't know that it's feasible as long as she needs to have daytime naps. Told dh we would probably have to wait a couple of years!

Bonym, glad to hear about Grace's feeding. They could worry you to death couldn't they

Really don't know about work, just haven't heard a thing so I don't know if that's because they're not entertaining the idea of redundancy (in which case, I would have expected to hear about returning part-time) or whether they're working on a redundancy package and it's taking some time.

Just in case it's the first, I'm starting to look for a childminder as I know what my boss is like and he'll announce out of the blue in January that he wants me back and I'll have done nothing !! I told him I was pregnant when I was 16 weeks and he told me 3 weeks before I was going on maternity leave who was replacing me ....... and I had to train them up

Leogaela - Well I think your outfit sounds funky and stylish. Personally I live in jeans and vomit stained tops these days. Really must invest in something more interesting when I'm earning again.

And well done on the run. I'm a bit disappointed to miss my two running slots this week due to this cold. I'm much better, but because I'm asthmatic I have to be a bit careful after getting a cold. I'd got up to a 50 minute run last week, so am really keen to get going again.

Busywizzy - congrats on the tooth. Can't believe Iris is STILL all gums! Have you tried earplugs for sleeping? I used them when Iris was snorting and sniffing through the night in our room. You can still hear a certain amount, but it just cuts it down enough to let you snooze. Depends how loud the snoring is I guess!

Congrats to Caleb on his activities!

Pidge I join you on the living in jeans and vomit tops! Feeling quite frumpy at the moment but am too knackered to do anything. DP godmother sent over a santa's outfit for Caleb, little black booties a santa hat and tunic, it's really cute will post a picture.

Your wedding outfit sounds nice leogaela, purple's my favourite colour.

Busywizzy congrats on Harrisons 1st tooth! We still don't have any teeth and i'm convinced he's teething all the time!

Another good night from Harrison (6.45pm - 5.20am) and another night in the front room for me. Luckily, I was sooooo tired from being up with Harrison for a few nights whilst he was cutting his teeth and then not sleeping well on my new 'bed', previously known as the sofa that I zonked out and didn't stir until Harrison woke up.

Pidge, I've tried everything in terms of DH's snoring - it's loud beyond belief!!!! I've tried every kind of earplug going and when I finally found one I was really comfortable with, they stopped making them. I wouldn't be able to use them now anyway as I wouldn't hear Harrison and I'd never trust DH to hear him and wake me We've also tried nasal strips but no joy.

This week, we've been trying a spray I read about on another thread but it's made no difference at all. DH really needs to loose some weight but he loves his food so much that he's finding it really hard and now the weather has turned cold, it's even less appealing to eat salad!! Ho hum, we'll perservere.

Have a good day everyone

Well, we have had two good nights in a row now. Although it's taken about half an hour each night to get her to sleep (much crying and wailing) - once she has dropped off she's slept until 4.30/5am, had a 10min feed and then gone back to sleep until 7.30-ish. Still can't understand why she makes such as fuss initially as she is absolutely fine going down during the day.

Enjoyed my "girly' night out yesterday (although was late getting there because Grace was crying so much when I put her to bed). None of us was late though - had a lovely meal and then all left about 10.30pm! We must be getting old .

BoneyM - if I make it to 10pm these days I'm doing well! I used to be such a night-owl too.

Whilst not wishing to tempt fate - we're doing well on the sleep front too. Iris has gone down without a murmur at 7.15pm every night for months now. And for the last fortnight she's more or less reliably gone through till 4, or even 5 or (today!) 6am without waking. Not that she's always too keen to go back to sleep afterwards mind you. Which is fine when it's 6am, but not so much fun if it's nearer to 5am.

Iris is snoozing at the moment - having a very early nap today, as I need to get her up and out by 2pm to look at another possible school for dd1. How grown up it all seems.

I will make sure I put a photo up of Niklas (and maybe me if there is a good one) in his wedding outfit.
I am also a jeans and t-shirt girl, but making more of an effort on my work days (meaning black trousers and a black pullover!), wearing shoes with heels was really difficult to do again after slopping around in flat shoes for so long, but I'm getting used to it now!

Busy - about your uncertain work situation. I have to say that working part time is really, really fine though and hope at least that works out for you, I am very happy and enjoying my job again. I've got used to leaving Niklas now and I am sure he is happy at the nursery.
On the snoring thing - Dh sometimes snores, but now if he wakes me I give his head a shove to the side, if he doesn't stop I prop his head up or roll him onto the side, if he still doesn't stop he gets woken up !

Well last night Niklas, like an angel, went to sleep without too much fuss at 7pm , but cried a bit at 11.30, dh jumped out of bed, picked him up, dropped him on top of me and feel back to sleep again! I was up an hours swearing at him and trying to get Niklas back to sleep. Niklas then woke up for the day at 4am, went back to sleep around 6, but whe had to get up at 7!

I was very annoyed with Niklas at the time, but now when I think of how cute he is in the morning, climbing all over us in bed, his cute little happy face... can't imagine why I was annoyed !

Shalaa, I think they can suffer with teeth on and off for ages before they come through. Niklas has been having problems with his top ones for ages and they are still not through.

Jambot - hope Lauren is getting better, could be the teeth making her miserable as well. You did really well to suffer the renovations while pregnant and while Lauren was so tiny, I'm not surprised you aren't keen to think about moving again!

Hello on this thread too. I had got to the end of your post, BonyM, but I must have got confused between the various windows open and replied to the wrong thread. We're off to Woodcraft Folk tonight so won't have time to catch up now. I'll get back later.

Last night we put Sylvia in her cot and she slept till 4 when i brought her in for a feed. I slept SO well. I think she did too, she was sprawled like a little starfish in her cot.

I'm getting slightly worried about her weight (7.4 kg, 16 lbs) and lack of appetite for both solids and milk. I think i'll get her weighed every 2 weeks or so for a while.

Well, I could just cry today Harrison woke at 4.00am, I went to him, stroked his face and he settled back down. 15 minutes later we had a repeat performance and so on until 5.00am when he started full pitch screaming. I stayed with him until 5.30 (by which time he'd woken the whole house and my ear drums were shot to bits), and then had to leave the room as I was so stressed I think I was adding to the problem. DH took over as we were worried he was going to wake the neighbours (it really was that loud) and within 5 minutes Harrison was asleep but also !!!

Unfortunately, he woke again after half an hour so up we all got

I have no idea what the matter was as his tooth is fully through the gum (maybe still sore though?) I can't believe he was hungry as he hasn't been taking his morning bottle until 7-7.30am as even when he wakes at 5.30, I bring him into bed with me without feeding him and he goes back to sleep.

I feel today like I just can't take another night of this but knowing how he is, he'll probably be good for a few nights now. Aaaarrrggghhh

Leo, I laughed and laughed at the thought of you poking your DH's head when he snores If I did that, poor DH would probably suffer permanent damage from the amount of pokes he'd get. I can just imagine the headlines 'Sleep deprived Hampshire woman causes snoring husband brain damage'

Off to try and get a few winks before Harrison wakes up. Have a good day all and keep an eye on those headlines

Cristina, maybe Sylvia is just made to be a little one Is your HV worried as well?

At last, Harry has started to pick up in terms of illness.! Still wheezing and coughing but much more smiley and content to play for a while. More interested in food again and of course his beloved milk!!!

Discovered a third tooth today - the first upper one. He has spent the day biting my boob which I am not happy about. Hoepfully this will only be until he re-adjusts his latch....

Nights.
Hmmm.
Makes me chuckle to hear you all being sleep deprived with your 4am waking lol!!!!

I am about to give up on ever getting any sleep!!!
I put him in his cot after his 10pm feed and either he just wont settle from about 12am so comes in the bed, or i wake at abotu 3am and find him in bed with me, not rememvering how he got there, with my pyjama top wide open and him hitting my chest!!

The next stage has to be getting the cot out of our bedroom to avoiding the half asleep stagger!
That means though, clearing the spare bedroom, decorating it, moving ds1 into it and then ds2 can go in the boxc room
a lot of effort
hmmm

busywizzy - at the poking snorer headlines!

We had a lovely day doing soft play with dd1 and a friend this morning, even Iris joined in crawling around in there! Then making pizzas for lunch, though Iris was just an observer for that . Then another friend of dd1's and a fellow baby for Iris to play with this afternoon.

Most excitingly whilst making my friend a cup of tea I turned to put something in the sink, and there in the dishwater where I had left a baking tray to soak was a small, rather sodden MOUSE, clinging to the aforementioned baking tray! I did a cartoon classic shriek and leapt about 3 foot in the air. The mouse was spied in our kitchen a couple of nights ago and has been evading dp's traps, and this afternoon had obviously shot along the work surfaces straight into the sink. My friend heroically extracted it and the kids joined us in the garden to watch it limp forlornly into the bushes - probably to be claimed by the neighbour's cat!

Pidge = at the mouse! We had one a couple of years ago - dh managed to catch it on camera one night! We eventually caught it in a humane trap and gave it its freedom in a nearby field!

popsy - glad to hear that Harry is feeling better, but sorry that he's still not sleeping so well. Can fully understand how it must seem just too much hassle to get the spare room sorted - the thought of doing any sort of major job in the house just feels like too much to contemplate when you've got a little one doesn't it?

Busy - at your bad night -fingers crossed that tonight is better for you.

Christina - glad that you had a decent night. As Busy says - perhaps Sylvia is just going to be little - has she dropped on the percentile chart? If not, then probably no need to worry.

Well, Grace hardly slept at all today! I made the mistake of going for a coffee with a couple of friends after the morning school run which meant that she didn't go down for her morning sleep at her usual time of 9.30. By the time I got her to bed it was about 10.30 and she wouldn't settle so I gave up in the end and took her to the supermarket. To cut a long story short she also wouldn't settle this afternoon so had about an hour in total all day. Anyway - she actually went down ok tonight so maybe the key is to not let her sleep during the day!

She was so funny at tea-time. I have been having terrible trouble trying to get her to drink out of any sort of cup (or bottle) so she generally just has breastmilk. I had tried a couple of times with an ordinary plastic beaker (with no lid) but she still didn't really drink anything. Anyway, this evening, I tried again with a beaker and she suddenly got it - you would have thought she'd struck gold or something, she was beside herself with glee, squealing and wriggling with delight and kept grabbing the cup and pulling it to her mouth to drink more! She drank almost all the water (although quite a bit went down her bib as well!). It was such a great moment, I couldn't stop laughing, she was so funny .

Hope everyone has a peaceful night .

Uuugghhh, I hate mice or anything rodentey looking so I would have had a fit closely followed by a heart attack if I'd found one in my sink

Bonym, what a lovely picture I now have of Grace being so chuffed with herself for drinking out of a cup. Moments like that really make it worthwhile don't they

Well, we had another awful night although I'm back on form now, so don't feel desolate about this as I did yesterday - tell you why in a moment !! Harrison went down no problem as usual but woke at 10.00 and it took about half an hour to settle him (usually only takes a few minutes anytime he wakes prior to about 2.30am) He woke again at 1.00 so I fed him as he hadn't taken much of his bottle before going to bed, woke again at 2.30 when I gave him some medicine in case it was his teeth, woke again at 5.00 when I brought him into bed with me and woke again at 6.00 when the newspapers got pushed through the door and landed on the floor with a very lound thump We have the worst newspaper delivery service in the world usually and consider ourselves very fortunate if they've turned up by lunchtime so how typical was that !!

Still don't know what's wrong although on closer examination of his mouth yesterday, I'm not sure his new tooth is completely through so I'll put it down to that and hope it passes soon. Supposed to be having friends over tonight for a curry and copious amounts of alcohol but can't see the latter passing my lips the way things are going

Anyway, out of the blue yesterday, I got a phone call from my boss asking was I serious about wanting redundancy (no, I just said it for a laugh !!!) To cut a long story short, he isn't making me redundant as he needs to fill my job but he is prepared to consider paying me a settlement to leave of my own accord This means that I can effectively now choose if I want to leave or not once I see how much money he comes up with

DH and I did the sums last night so we know how much we need so now it's just a matter so seeing how much money my company comes up with and then making a decision. What a nice position to be in I'm not overly confident they'll pay enough but at least I'm a step ahead of where I was earlier this week when I just had no idea what was going on. So fingers crossed for me girls, I could be a SAHM yet

Sorry really long post but just had to tell someone.

Have a lovely weekend all

We had a mouse in our flat a few months back. I have no idea how it got in, maybe through the chimney. We put Annie our cat onto it and watched her hunt him and take him out. She was still playing with him on the balcony 20 minutes later. We occasionally find mouse and bird guts on the balcony. Annie is now with our SIL and niece for the forseeable future.

Sylvia ate more yesterday than she did all week. I hope it's a turning point. She seems to like semolina. She's down on the 9th centile weight-wise and 25th for height (starting from 50th and 75th, respectively).

Sylvia likes to play with a piece of cloth, hiding her face behind it and pulling it suddenly. She's so sweet to be initiating games. She's also discovered yesterday that she can drink from a beaker.

I'll be interested to read possible solutions to snoring - for myself

Cristina, try not to worry about Sylvia's eating (easier said than done, I know) as they seem to pick up so easily on our concerns don't they. I'm sure she'll pick up soon and as you say, she had a good day yesterday so maybe she's suddenly 'got it'. I know it took Harrison quite a while before I'd actually say he ate a meal rather than a few spoons of stuff I managed to get down him

You, a snorer Poor DH, he has my sympathies

Bonym - we have not been putting Niklas to sleep during the day over the past few days(except if he just drops off to sleep), he has been sleeping about 1 hour a day and is doing very well on it. He is very happy, has huge amounts of energy and has been going to bed earlier and without any fuss - except tonight, but he slept longer today and has just gone off to sleep now(at 9pm).

Busywizzy - good news about the job! I hope they come up with the package you want. What are your plans? be a sahm for as long as possible?

Cristina - from what you say Sylvia seems to be developing really well, so even if she is small and not eating much it still seems she doing fantastically well and as Busy says maybe she is just small.

Busy & Popsycal - hope Harrison and Harry both have good nights tonight and you get a little more well deserved sleep. Sounds as if you have both had too many bad nights for too long.

I visited a friend and her week old baby yesterday. Its is so amazing and quite shocking how quickly a baby develops and how much it grows in 9 months! Her ds is a little bit lighter (but same height) as Niklas was when he was born, but I couldn't imagine he was ever so tiny, I had to check the photo album. It made me a little tiny incy wincy bit broody.....!

Well, that's me off to bed!

BW - Good luck with your settlement from work. Here's hoping it's enough for you to stay at home.

Here's a question for you all. Freya is really going off her milk. She has 3 b/f a day. Mostly she is ok with the morning and evening feeds (though that is by no means certain), but she is really fussing over her mid afternoon feed. She seems really disinterested. I can't decide whether to switch her to a cup of milk mid afternoon instead of b/f, or perhaps to give a snack and water instead? I know milk is still really important to babies though. DS1 went through the same thing at this age, and in the end he stopped b/f at 11 months and has refused to drink milk ever since! I am keen to avoid this as you can imagine.
I could post this on a feeding thread, but really don't want to start off a whole b/f v bottle feeding type argument!

Anyway, Freya is STILL not crawling and it is now really driving both me and her mad. She has landed on her nose more often that I can remember! She is getting very good at standing though, she just holds onto the sofa with one hand and looks very pleased with herself! (then she falls over )

Anyway, off to iron DS1's school uniform - what fun (but the alternative is watching Top Gear with DH)

Oooh, I'd definitely like to meet up with you all. I can drive now too. A Saturday or Sunday would probably be best for me, as I imagine we'd have to travel a bit and I also have DS who needs picking up from school during the week. Where are we all based? I'm in London. I don't have any plans yet for any weekends in the new year. We are going to a concert on Feb 3rd (Bauhaus), so I might be too tired on the 4th, but otherwise no plans.

Sylvia has been eating better today again - third day in a row, I feel so much better about it. She isn't BF as often and tonight I've just put her in her own cot again.

Another game she likes playing and initiated herself is to lie flat on her back, I raise her to sitting position, then she hurls herself back again to repeat it over and over. Dominic loves doing this with her too. Sylvia also likes rocking on a rocking horse. She's quite funny when she does it as it's an uncoordinated/desperate movement rather than a smooth back and forth.