June 2013 (3) - teething & not sleeping!

[rrreow]

I broke the old thread! Step this way, step this way.

Sarah, that's rubbish, so sorry to hear it. Get looking elsewhere if you can.

Sarah - that does really suck. In my experience buying a home is bloody stressful here in the UK - doesn't matter which stage you're at, the whole process seems designed to cause as much angst as possible!

At home in Australia you can walk into a place, like it, buy it and be moving in a couple of weeks later, if you want.

Have a long second interview type thing with the consultancy firm I did my previous work for in the early autumn/late summer - it goes for HOURS, way too long to pull in any little babysitting favours. Is on Monday and have been at a loss as to what to do for childcare and then several (quite fussy parent type) people recommended sitters.co.uk - seems ok so far - lots of personal contact and they're currently finding me someone for Joe for Monday. Shall see how it goes. Bit nervewracking to be honest, but I don't have a lot of choice.

First tooth keeps getting bigger and whiter, no sign of the second yet but the drool proportions are now floodlike.

we are bored today, already been to town in the rain and waiting in for a builder to look at the leaky bay windows. played with all the toys and read nursery rhymes. what now ?

Curlyclaz - get some different clothes out made of different fabrics, put them on the floor and let your DC enjoy touching the different textures.

or - sliver/gold/red paint, paper/card, make hand/foot prints, cut out and use as your christmas tags (Grandparents love this sort of thing, perfect for a rainy day) or even cut out and stick on the front of cards for christmas.

Or - sing some songs

or stick on the radio and dance up and down the kitchen with your LO (also a good work out, DD smiles like a loon when we do this).

ooh good ideas, currently trying to get him to sleep but will see how we go. I need to buy paint ready for next time.

I bloody love the paint idea! Think I'll be using that one. I'll pop to The Range for paint next week.

oh Mrs B - sprinkle some glitter on the paint before it dries as well!

Other ideas, you can do your own puppet show with teddies behind a chair.

Or bubbles, really interesting, but do make your floor slippy.

Or, interesting smells, cut up fruit, freah herbs etc and let baby smell them.

I'm kind of out of ideas now!

Gosh DontMind you sound like a great fun mum. Want to adopt me?

DH has been on night shift so have been holding the fort on my own this week. Thankfully Lil has started sleeping better at night again so it's not been as painful. I have turned her to drugs though as she's had a cold and is teething so I've been giving her calpol which seems to help her sleep.

Tomorrow we're off to a wedding that is child free. My sister is taking Lil (and is extremely excited about it) for the day which is my first child free day since i had her. I'm not sure if I'm excited or apprehensive. The thought of having to pump in the toilets or my dress will explode is also not filling me with joy.

Sunny it might be worth asking the hotel if there is more suitable than the toilets, I would imagine there is a room that you can use that is a bit more relaxing. Enjoy the day !

Don'tmind you have reminded me to get paint! I keep meaning to and always forget. It's on my list.

Dsds came to us after school today, their dm informed us it's fancy dress next Friday as super heroes, and told the girls daddy will love to make the costumes with you. Apparently she knew before half term, when we had them for two whole days and could have sorted things. DP will of course side step this and I will end up sorting it out so the girls aren't disappointed.
just like I'm the only one who bothers de-nitting them

Dd been a star today, caught up on her sleep enabling me to get lots of housework done. She is currently babbling in her crib self settling. Love this time, gives me a real chill out bit, if I was sensible I would get an early night too.

pink bear - make life easy for yourself, amazon, buy costumes. Get them delivered by Monday...

Re stuff to do with babies - now's a pretty good age to start putting treasure baskets together :) just get a container and fill it with different textures/sounds/etc and let LO play with it. Household things are good to go in so long as they're new - washing up brushes, pan scourers, those body scrub thingys you use in the shower, a flannel, a wooden spoon, hair brush, etc etc.

Sit them in a high chair and let them play the kitchen drums (saucepans and wooden spoons) - though the neighbours might not love you for it :o

Make some jelly and let them play with it/poke it. When they're a bit bigger, make jelly with plastic animals or similar in it, and let them dig through to excavate the animals.

Put water on the high chair tray to splash in (best done in warmer weather tbh, ideally outside!).

Don'tmind I think you are right, think that might be the best all round. And far easier and less stressy.

Good morning!

Can I pick your collective wisdom please?

We're going to look at highchairs today. My criteria are:

• foldable
• easy to clean
• removable tray (not just one that flips up)

Am I missing anything else?

I don't understand why some are so £££, let's face it, it's always a highchair at the end of the day.

Hope mummies and babies are doing well today

The ' ikea high chair is supposed to be good but doesn't fold, the legs come off easily though and its about £16.

Friends have the ikea one as back up. We have the Polly magic and wish we'd got it sooner as it sees you through from baby to three years old. 100 quid on amazon.

I have a bog standard highchair from asda for both my girls. The first one we have had for over 2.5 years and it's still absolutely fine so just brought another for dd2. Some of the one's I have seen are crazy money!!

My friend had a mothercare one that she was more than happy with, that saw her two through and is now at my mums for when we are there with dd.
Can't help on anything more current as my granny (93) wanted to get her great granddaughter something that would last her, and a friend had told her about the stokke trip trap, and so as in a case of keeping up with some random I have never met, gran insisted she brought it for us. Don't get me wrong I love it, and so does dd, but it doesn't fold down so useless if you need space, luckily we have a corner of the room it can sit in when not in use.

Wow. Lots of choices already! Thank you! We don't need the space at home as such but want to be able to stick it in the car for overnight visits to all the grandparents...

When we had a quick peek in John Lewis recently, the sales assistant struggled to promote any above c£80...!

Mrs81 - you might want to get a different one for taking out and about with you. You can get really cheap plastic ones that come with a tray. We used one for ds, and took it to restaurants as well as to relatives. It was light enough we even took it on holiday. Something like this though I'm sure you could find oen second hand.

My top tip for high chair. Dont' get one with a lovely comfy cushiony seat as it's a right pain to clean in all the folds. It's going to get covered with crap, look at what would be easy to clean.

We're getting the Ikea one as recommended on here previously - I hadn't even thought about needing one to take away with us to visit family! I don't think one will fit in our car with all the other stuff we need to take for a few days away (especially for the Christmas trip, with presents etc)!

I'm the opposite, curly; between feeds and naps I don't seem to have enough time to do everything that I want to do with baby!

Mrs81 - learn from my very expensive mistake last time round. I bought a gorgeous oak high chair that matched our dining furniture (I know, I know!) but it doesn't have a bar between the legs, just straps, that means that when you put them in, you have to grab the straps and do it up quickly before DC slides through the bottom... I will be replacing it with a cheaper one with a bar that if I forget to do up the straps, isn't dangerous. (This is, if I can convince DH to buy another chair after that stupidly expensive mistake) Oh and it's got lots of twiddly bits food can get stuck in.

I'm debating getting the Ikea chair.

oh and for visiting family, we've got something like this - far easier to fit in the car!

Aren't you a wise bunch! (except maybe Dontmind with your expensive mistake )

I'm now looking at them with a clearer eye so thank you. A booster for travels is an excellent idea!
We went to Mothercare, who in their wisdom had decided that Saturday lunchtime was a good time to rearrange the entire store so only had 2 options on display

The internet should sort it out now, thank you muchly.

Thanks for that, Dontmind - very helpful as I didn't realise you could get anything like that.