March 2005 part 6 - Toddling towards summer!

[leogaela]

And her it is!

UMum, I have Ukraine in our office World Cup sweepstake so I'll be mainly supporting England (of course) but also silently hoping Ukraine do well so I can win £50

Leo, lovely to hear from you but sorry Niklas is still having breathing problems. I haven't heard about broccolli causing skin problems but I know ziltch about health things. Hope he's better soon and good luck with the soya milk.

BonyM, lovely for you to have Phoebe back and how cute is Grace with her 'purple'

Harrison is definately back on form although still having the odd major tantrum. I can't tell you how reassuring it was to hear other babies are the same. Hannah never had them and nor had Harrison up until recently. Thought I must have bred a monster, now I feel reassured he's just a normal boy. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Oh yes and welcome back Georgiesmum, I was wondering if you'd left us. Nice to hear from you again

Cristina, Harrison is the same as Sylvia, wanting everything Hannah has. He's like a little pet dog following her around wanting to play with her toys, eat her food, have a drink from her cup. I too feel very bad sometimes that he always gets what he wants but shes such a sweetie (usually) and says 'Oh Harrison, you're such a piggy wig' before offering him whatever she has.

The only 'forbidden' is her bedroom, so of course, he's like a boy possessed trying to get in there all the time

Busy - Grace is always trying to get into Phoebe's bedroom as well . Of course, it's full of things she shouldn't get hold of! If Phoebe is in there she will close the door and poor Grace stands outside rattling the doorknob and crying until she lets her in!

I wonder if second children are more "vocal", shall we say, because we have less one-to-one time to spend with them. I know with Sylvia that I let her get on with things by herself, whereas with Dominic I was always hovering over him, playing with him etc.

D&S share the bedroom but DH and DS had to shut themselves in the bedroom last evening to play a bit of Monopoly. This morning Sylvia climbed into Dom's bed again all by herself. That's 5 steps up a very steep ladder. Little monkey.

Good point cristina. i think that Freya is more vocal cos she needs to demand attention.
She too follows Ethan around all the time and is constantly trying scavenge food from him - normally when he has a treat that she is too young to have!
Freya's ambition in life is to get into his bedroom and swallow all the tiny lego pieces, chew on the Knex and rip all his pictures up. She has an inbuilt radar system that can tell if the door is open, and then she is off!

She also has perfected the 'stroppy little madam' routine, as I sometimes call it. We were at Jo Jingles music yesterday and they had some tambourines out. The only real rule is that the toddlers are not allowed to walk around with the instruments cos it is not safe. The instructor suggests removing it from them if they try to do this and then sitting and playing it yourself so that they realise it would be better to go and sit with mummy. Good theory - they haven't met Freya. She walks off with tambourine into middle of circle of beautifully behaved babies. i take tambourine from her (after a bit of a fight for it), and she then throws herself to the floor screaming and kicking. She was so loud you couldn't hear the music, and I was left trying to ignore her whle all the other mums looked on in amazement. Please tell me it will be their child next week!

Hope everyone making good use of the lovely weather.

And ............ Come on England!
(Sorry, couldn't resist it )

BTW - Anyone fancy a third?!!! Do you think they are even louder??

Jo, sorry but I laughed out loud at the picture of you and Freya fighting in the middle of a ring of mums and babies. All us second time mums know that if it hasn't been you yet, it will be some day, so never, ever, ever look smug

Harrison's been lovely today, although he's taken to looking like a street urchin as he loves the garden and is constantly filthy. And I mean really, really filthy. He keeps coming up to me, putting his head in my lap and saying 'arrrggghh' like he really loves me. It's probably code for 'I want something mum' but I like to think that I'm his favourite person in the world Makes up for the fact that when he crawls away from me (yes, still no walking), I'm covered in snot and muck.

Come on England and {whispers quietly} Ukraine

I've just uploaded a couple of new pictures of Harrison onto the Photobucket.

Georgiesmum, didn't know if anyone had done it yet, so have e-mailed you the username and password.

Blimey Jo - what well behaved babies! There is no way Grace would still in a circle . Mind you, nat the Tiny Talk class we go to, most of the toddlers spend half the time wandering around the room, rather than sitting still while the mums sing the songs! Luckily the woman who runs the class is very laid back, and doesn't bat an eyelid!

Cute photos Busy - lovely to see all the babies growing up. Of course, they're not babies any more, they're toddlers .

Does anyone else's child still put everything in his/her mouth? Grace is a devil for this, particularly in the garden. No sooner have we managed to extract one thing then she pops something else in - daisy, grass, bark, twig, you name it, she wants to eat it. We're starting to get a bit worried as we don't really know if any of the plants we have are poisonous, and it's impossible to watch her every single second. I thought they were supposed to grow out of this at around this age?

Oh - inspired by Busy, I have also added some new photos to the bucket - not sure why the portrait ones aren't rotated though as they are on my computer. Anyone know how to fix this?

Aha - done it!

Love the new photos of Grace and Harrison.
They are all looking so 'grown up' now!

Harrison looks so grown up Busy. Must look at the ones of Grace now. Finally put a pic on of Lauren up the ladder, with Daddy standing guard.

Love the pics of Harrison.

In an unprecedented bit of efficiency, before getting chivvied, I have also updated Iris on the photobucket

Had a great day today - softplay in the morning, clothes shopping for dd1 on the way home, with both kids in tow and no tantrums. Then this afternoon paddling pool at our local park, not to mention ice creams AND a trip to the play ground! Am worn out now. But two very happy kids went to sleep like a dream at the end of the day.

Cute photos of Iris, love the chubby legs in the swimsuit piccie

You are all making me nervous with this talk about second child being more difficult, loud, demanding than the first! We are thinking about a second, but Niklas has been really hard work, can't imagine having one harder work than him! I am hoping for a nice, calm, quiet, sweet little girl (like the ones I see in Zürich being pushed around in bugaboos by their perfect, not tired, no snot on clothes looking mums!).

Bonym - Niklas knows what 'not in your mouth' means, and has got better at not putting things in his mouth (I only worry in the garden or out somewhere). I think he gets worse when he is teething.
Teething however, I am happy to say is almost over! Niklas's last two milk teeth are just pushing through :)!

We have completely cut out his dairy food and he seems much, much, much better, and his skin has also cleared up. It could be coincidence but....!

We went for our first weekend away with our caravan this weekend. It went really well and was a lot of fun. Niklas had a great time! We couldn't take our eyes off him for a second though, he would be walking into someone elses tent, or climbing into someone elses caravan or camper! He was so funny waving at everyone that walked past us saying 'hiya, hiya', he made friends with everyone! He also slept well, although the second night he worked out he could crawl out of his bed by himself and got really excited about it. It took me hours go get him off to sleep, everytime I though he was asleep his head would pop up again and he would start shuffling backwards off his bed! I ended up getting so mad with him, spoke so sternly to him that I made him cry , he went to sleep straight away after that though :)!

leo - I have three friends who had a pretty challenging first child (all boys, though I'm sure that's coincidence ) and each of them has ended up having a very, very easygoing, placid second child (all girls, though I'm sure that's another double coincidence ).

And even though Iris is much harder work than Cleo, she is an utter joy. Actually at the moment she is on great form. Trotting about, chatting away in her unique fashion! She's just started to put two words together, though only in two very specific contexts. She says "dadden (=daddy) gone" and "mama gone". But even cuter, after I've fed Iris at night Cleo comes in to give her an 'extra' goodnight kiss, dp doesn't come, as he's said goodnight to her already. But now Iris has started saying "Dadden mwaaah" (= daddy kiss!), to ask for him to come too. And last night when I was feeding her she kept popping off to say "dadden mwaah" and every time I said "Yes, daddy's going to come and give you a kiss, she would give me a huge toothy grin and then resume feeding!

Oh Pidge, that is so cute!!!

Niklas is also an absolute joy, I love having a very active child and I'm really proud of him. I guess no 2 children are the same, who knows what we will get (if we get) with a second one.

You all avoided the question regarding a 3rd child :o!

Oh I am definitely on for number 3. Call me a fool. In fact I totally freaked dp out the other day by mentioning the number FOUR!!!!! But that really isn't an option - too expensive for one thing. So next one will be the last. And I think we'll wait a year or so before thinking about trying.

Am loving my work at the moment, which is a bit of a novelty. Very, very frantic trying to cram everything into my 3 short days. But good fun. All the senior people on my team have left, and this has meant I'm getting stuck into some interesting stuff.

Pidge - Love Iris's kissing routine. Very sweet.

Freya is very funny with the phone. She kinda holds it up (quite crookedly) to her ear and says 'hiya' and then continues with 'Yeah, yeah'. It really makes me laugh, and also makes me think that perhaps I shouldn't use the phone so much!

Freya went to a 1st birthday party today. She had a lovely time, ate loads of food (which was lovely cos she doesn't usually at lunch time) and then had a lovely sleep when she got home. Unfortunately I had to wake her for the school run, but she chilled out in her buggy and remained in pretty good humour.

Also, our new play house has arrived. Ethan and Freya both love it. Ethan has said it is his police station and he keeps on arresting Freya and making her go inside. She kinda plays along 9cos she doesn't really know what is going on) and then Ethan gets to chase her when she 'escapes from custody' Will post some photos of them playing in it later.

Just having a catch up with everyone's news and I'm just filled with a feeling of how gorgeous they all are. Iris and her kissing, Niklas and his waving to everyone and Ethan and Freya playing cops and robbers. How fantastic are our children

Leo, Harrison is as easy as Hannah was apart from how long it took him to sleep through the night, but that's a whole different story. He'll quite happily sit and play with things for ages and ages, quite content to move things from one place to another or building piles of stuff. He's quiet as a mouse in the garden putting stones into a bucket and taking them out again. He went through a disgusting phase a couple of weeks back when he was cutting so many teeth in one go but now he's all back to normal. He is louder when we wants attention but just as everyone has said, I think they have to be to get heard above everything else going on

Pidge, glad you're enjoying work - I am too. Very, very busy but hugely enjoyable too. How's it going for you these days Leo?

Pidge, just seen your new piccies and Iris is such a cutie. She gets more and more like Cleo

Oh my goodness, how could I forget ......... Harrison's walking Just let go of the furniture the other day and walked across the floor. Very, very chuffed with himself and is now clambering to get down all the time and walk everywhere.

I can already sense how much longer it's going to take us to do anything now

Congrats on Harrison's walking. He must be so pleased with himself.