Feb 2010 - we're stroppy, sassy and splendid (and that's just the mums!)

[BigBadBear]

New thread!

Just a quick reflection on having two, on a good day... It is absolutely priceless when they make each other giggle so much that they are rolling on the floor with laughter . Usually I can't see the joke at all but I can't help joining in the laughter even if I have a bad day and don't feel very cheerful.

Having said that, dd2 has completely refused to have a lunchtime nap today, making me feel rather stressed because she is going to turn into a little monster by about 4 pm...

How lovely to hang out in a cafe with a sleepy newborn, PA! These are the things we tend to forget when chasing after our toddlers...

Sorry to hear about the nap-dropping, BG, SB..... argh. Thankfully DD is still sleeping between 1.5 and 2 hours at lunchtime, I'm hoping she won't be ready to drop that habit any time soon....

Mous so sorry to hear about your DH's redundancy. Damn.

Well, we had DH's birthday curry lunch today and it was lovely. His DSis and her DH came along bringing loads of yummy goodies to go with my spiced rice and dahl....also another couple came with a chard aloo dish and it was all delish. Plus DD obligingly stayed asleep until we were onto the coffee, then was delighted to join the party.

Also, DD surprised me by enthusiastically eating a bit of spiced rice I gave her as an experiment, so much so that I mixed a little egg to bind it and made her some spiced rice cakes to have for her dinner. She loved them and ate two. That's the first time in ages I haven't had to add cheese to something to make it palatable! It's also the first time she's had rice willingly in something other than puffed form. The rice tasted strongly of garlic and ginger and also had onion, garam masala and a pinch of cayenne pepper in. It also had a bit more salt than I usually cook with, which might offer a clue to why she was so keen... Anyway, I'm not knocking it, it's such a nice surprise when she goes for a new flavour/texture. The naan with almond butter and some with cream cheese and a little cucumber also went down well, so all in all a good food day

IC sounds like your dd is getting quite adventurous . dd1 was quite keen on Thai curry when she was young - possibly because I had a craving for that when I was pregnant with her. Haven't tried my two on curry for a while though after dd1 refused even mild curry saying it hurt her mouth... Your post makes me think I should maybe try again, perhaps at lunchtime just for dd2 (or at home, too, because I just remembered that dd1 happily has curry at school... little monkey).

dd2 came out with 'I don't know!' to something I asked her this morning. It made me laugh out loud, so now she uses it a lot to amuse me... . She is also getting a bit territorial now and shouted 'my room, my bed' in German when dd1 dared to play in her room!

Second day in a row that dd2 refuses to have a lunchtime nap . I feel a bit cruel to leave her in her cot in the hope she will drop off, but she's not crying, just chatting to herself and jumping around, throwing teddies... I'll give her another few minutes and then get her up again. Sigh. Here goes my plan to do something useful eg mop the kitchen, which I can't do with her racing around (wet tiles do not mix well with crazy toddlers)

BBB Happy birthday to your dd1

Happy Birthday to you DD1, BBB!

Ha, typical MN jinx - DD wouldn't go near the spiced rice today. AND she took ages to settle for her nap, serves me right for being so smug about it

Bad luck, BG
Is it worth trying to put her down a bit later?

IC You may be right... she went to sleep at 1.20 in the end so I have a few minutes to be on MN clean the house . I may try to give her lunch a bit later and then put her down later. If I give her lunch at the usual time and then wait with her nap she gets over her 'full belly' tiredness and gets very cross indeed if I suggest it's sleep time

Hurrah for nap success BG! Nap time is the best time of the day. All the MN housework that can be done...

Happy birthday DD1 BBB!

Shame about the rice-refusal today IC, but not surprising! These LOs are tinkers...

We're having a bit of a food-refusal week here. She has apparently gone off bananas, toast/bread and pasta, i.e. all the carbs she was previously eating. Oh and baked beans. She doesn't (or hasn't for weeks) eaten rice or couscous, so I'm at a bit of a loss at to what to feed her She is living on eggs, cheese, meat/fish and fruit at the moment. Not a terrible diet, I guess, but certainly not brilliant. Any ideas?!

scones don't worry, it's normal for them to have stages of eating mainly one food group. DD is still in a carb one, I was happier when she was in the protein one.

scones for carbs have you tried quinoa (also full of proteins), peas, lentils, rice cake (rice but under another format), sweetcorn (if I remember well)? Does she eat potatoes?

Happy birthday BBB DD1

Or noodles? Pasta-y I know, but she might go for them, Scones. DD seems to love them, she'll eat them straight (or she did last time she had them....)
Does she eat breakfast cereals/porridge? There's a nice recipe for flapjacks with no added sugar, they're sweetened with dried fruit and apple juice. Would that tempt her?

Scones what do you give her if she refuses a meal? Our little darlings are very very clever at this age already and if you give her alternatives she knows she can refuse pretty much everything and still get her favourites. It's a bit of a vicious cycle.

I second BG's assessment - that's exactly what my DD was doing. She knew she could rely on being offered fruit and yoghurt, so she stopped bothering with other stuff and her repertoire got smaller and smaller.

Once we stopped offering the fruit and yoghurt if she hadn't eaten a reasonable amount of her main course, she's been a lot better. Not perfect, but much improved and her repertoire's growing again, albeit slowly.

Mind you, it's a tough one if she refuses supper, because she'll usually wake up horribly early and not get back to sleep because she's hungry. So it's hugely tempting to make sure she eats something to try and prevent that...

Thanks for the feedback guys.

There is no way she'd eat quinoa SB - she doesn't like the 'smallness' of rice or especially couscous Ditto lentils, eats peas or sweetcorn very rarely and only 3 or 4 then. She really is a pickle. She won't eat potatoes unless they are chips - I've tried everything I can think of - won't touch wedges for instance. I suppose I haven't tried bought potato shapes yet

BG and IC I am very strict with her especially since she's become so super-picky, if she doesn't eat her dinner she gets down hungry. I hate doing it but don't want to 'train' her to refuse food either.

I'd love the flapjacks recipe please IC. She hasn't yet gone off cake

A more pressing concern at the moment though is sleep. I feel at my wits' end with her (yet again). The early wakings have settled at about 6am which is just about bearable as DH is now setting his alarm for 6.15 (although pretty horrific at the weekends but we take that in turns). However she seems to have settled in the habit of waking for her dummy evefy 1.5-2 hours. A lot of the time I'm awake anyway so just pop it back in, but I'm aware this isn't the answer. It is often there beside her but she doesn't look for it, she cries until we go in and do it for her. Other times she has thrown both dummy and snuggly out of the cot and we retrieve them and stick them back in.

I'm due in 4 days and can't face a dummy battle right now and I also don't tink it's the right thing to do, to take it away when there is going to be a big change anyway. But what on earth can we do to stop the night waking. She has slept through in the past so I know she can do it, but not for weeks now.

Just so tired, and so despondent, I feel we've gone all wrong with her.

Oh and on the subject of food, yesterday on advice of RL mother-of-a-toddler I tried her on a bought toddler meal for dinner. Of course she ate the whole thing with no protest at all. So what does that say about my cooking?!!!

It is not the answer - too expensive for one thing.

Oh Scones you really have a lot on your plate right now (no pun intended). You are quite right that now is not the time to get tough on food/dummy issues. Wish I had some advice because it won't help right now that picky eaters usually get better in time... I think to save my own sanity, in your case I would stock up on a few toddler meals as a stand by. Also wonder if she would notice if you mix your food with bought food for a few weeks? If she eats more she may not wake up in the night? Could she be hungry?
You really have a little madam on your hands! But incredibly cute!!

scones you are not doing anything wrong . You are enormously pregnant and tired and have a toddler to deal with.

I agree with BG that getting a few toddler meals in won't be a bad thing. Maybe it was the change that she liked! Re potatoes, have you tried jacket potato? My DD2 doesn't like potatoes, but will reluctantly eat a few spoonfuls of mash, and will wolf down a jacket spud with beans and cheese. What she is eating at the moment really doesn't sound too bad, and I reckon if you keep offering carbs she'll start with them again when she's good and ready.

As for the sleeping, does she go down to sleep at night with a dummy? DD1 did the same with waking through the night for a dummy, but when we stoically started putting her down at night without it she stopped waking through the night, mainly because I think she learnt to resettle without it. It wasn't great, but it wasn't awful (though she was much younger) - the first night required 30 minutes attendance at bedtime, the next night 10 minutes and the thrid night she went down without complaining. Other than that, I have no suggestions, I'm afraid.

If it helps at all, I found it considerably easier having a newborn and another child than being pregnant and having only one child. Don't underestimate how pregnancy can make you feel both physically and emotionally.

I was worried about DD as the week before DS arrived she was in our bed most nights. She's only gone one night since without waking, but knowing there isn't the choice of putting her in our bed I think has helped in how we deal with her (i.e. more determined and consistent). Also only DH is going in now. He is currently having to go in once or twice, but the other times we hear her wake and she is taking herself off again. She often wakes when our light is on, so I'm wondering if that bit of light helps her to find her dummy and carry on.

She's been saying her own name all morning (sometimes with the extra syllable) and has mastered her shape ball thing (although it's colour coded which helps). She also has a good effort at blowing her nose (she doesn't have a cold but like me seems to get stuffy quite often)

Scones it's not an easy time for you and it sounds like you're doing all you can with the food issue. I promise that wasn't an implied criticism of your methods, just thought I'd mention what we'd done with DD in case it was of any help. I sympathise with the dislike of "bitty" things - DD is the same, hence my amazement that she ate some rice the other day. I usually give her quinoa whizzed up in soups and things.
PM me your email and I'll send you the recipe for those flapjacks

WRT the dummy situation, is it worth trying her with one of those dummy holder toys like this? Maybe she'll be able to find her dummy in the night then?

DD is still calling your DD's name, PA! This morning, in fact. She remembers your DD "borrowing" her bath - also that she helped with the laundry pegging and that you played "peek-a-boo". You both clearly made a big impact on her!
How is the new little man doing?

I'm very impressed that she has that kind of memory, that's amazing.

I'm having a house and PJ day so DS is spending a lot of time snuggled on my chest. He feels the cold easily so we get to hold him loads.

Aw......!

Yes, I must admit DD's memory impresses me too - she doesn't get it from me (!) but DH has a generally excellent memory, so I think she's inherited it from him. Today we had stir fry and noodles, about a week since we last had it. DD kept pointing at the bits of Quorn I'd thrown in and asked if they were tofu, as I'd put tofu in the previous week's stir fry - the first time DD had known what it was. I thought toddlers were supposed to have ten minute memories!
(Needless to say, she didn't eat either the tofu or the Quorn...!)

Can't really advised about the dummy but DS used to wake up for it in the middle of the night before we removed it completely. Have you try putting seveeal dummies in her cot? Or getting a fluorecent one? Or as IC saudone of those holder? I think you're right not to upset her world too much but if it is getting worse which evil will you choose?
Good luck

Just to prove to me she is not remotely predictable, dd2 went to sleep at 12.30 without protest and is still sleeping now... And this after several days of her refusing or not sleeping until 1.30 and then getting cross when I had to wake her to collect dd1 from school...[wanders off muttering if I'd known she'd sleep I could have used my 'free' time more wisely...]