June 2013; Toddling into our second year!

[BeanCalledPickle]

New thread ladies:-) I think we filled about ten threads when pregnant and this is only our fourth post natally!

I was planning on waiting til summer too...didn't quite work.

She hammers on the bathroom door shouting 'wee!!!'

Business with BA is worth it for the lounges alone (plus the last flight we went on was last year and DD slept on me both ways so the extra room was handy). Makes it a much more relaxing experience. And I like unlimited 'free' food and drink! We've only flown BA for the past number of years, long haul and short haul.

Looks like 'the window' is here, HH, you just have to go with it! Have you got a mini seat?

I love that DD can finally tell us about her dreams. She had a nightmare and was able to tell us that she thought a big green snail was in her cot! But it was 'just dream' so she was ok!

Sorry, just noticed that you have got one, hungry!

I grew up with my dad flying for BA but they are diabolical compared to most airlines these days. Emirates are amazing in comparison. I think BA do well off people feeling more like they can trust them.

Our potty just gets used as another seat. She pulls out a changing mat when she's done a poo but never before. She talks about wee but I've no idea if it actually coincides with her doing one! Also her poo is still so utterly disgusting I just can't stand the thought of that escaping anywhere. It's rarely solid. Just kind of a big mess. is this normal?

So really is potty training about when they are ready or is it about when we are ready?!? I'm not ready. Could I maybe put her into nursery full time for a month and delegate to them?!

I have no idea about potty training DS doesn't communicate the state of his nappy, other than to occasionally pull at it if he's done an extra big poo. His poos are, errr, more two-dimensional than three and the idea of that in a potty, or crucially NOT in a potty is a bit gruesome. So I'm happy to wait for now!

I might ask nursery sometime soon for their wisdom. Afterall they have been involved in the potty training of hundreds of children. We have been involved with none.

Yeah my theory is that they would probably tell us if she was showing signs of being ready as, like you say, they've way more experience at this game than us.

We've always had excellent experiences but the person who books our flights has been a very frequent/long distance flyer (often first class) with them for many years and seems to get us VIP treatment.

DD has seemed ready for a while but we haven't got around to buying a seat yet! Bean, DD's is rarely solid either! Nice! And part of the reason we'll be missing out the potty stage! From what I read you shouldn't leave it too long if they seem ready as they can go past 'the window' and it can end up taking far longer than necessary. No idea how often that's the case though.

The seats are £15 on Amazon right now, cup, which is the only reason I've got one to hand!

I was going to wait until I was ready to do it, but as DD seems keen it would be a shame not to have a go. I'm not too worried if she doesn't crack it now, but it's worth trying at least.

Her poo is very teething, but most of the mess comes from it being welded to her arse because she's sat on it, so getting it in the loo would be a bonus!

I have no experience of anything above cattle class sadly!

Oooh. I might have a look at Amazon Hungry! Ta

I bloody love ds's nursery. I phoned this am to say he'd be off today. As soon as I said who I was, the manager (who'd answered the phone) asked me how ds was doing and had his spots started to clear up. Given that they have 80-odd kids on any given day, chickenpox doing the rounds with abundance and they're about to open a second nursery up the road, AND it was 8am, I'm jolly impressed!!

Thanks, I'll have a look at the ones on amazon. My friend recommended the cheapy boots ones (£7.99 I think) so I'll see what the difference is. We have an odd shaped soft close seat so I'm not sure if they'd all fit.

Cattle class is my only experience too! I'm sure the space in Business Class is excellent, but not an option!

Wow re the training, Hungry! I'm impressed. No signs of DS telling us anything about nappy contents yet - I think we have a way to go there.

We only go anything different because it's paid for. DH would be happy to never go on holiday. Other than our honeymoon we've only ever gone away when it's been paid for by someone else! I'm lucky that I have very lovely in laws!

Wow, cuphat! Lucky you !

Here is the step / seat we have: www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/B002PCNZBM

She's not been as enthusiastic today about weeing...small steps (she still loves sitting on the seat!).

Wowzer that seat is something isn't it! Is it easy to shift when someone else wants to use the loo?

Everything we've got is at least 11 years old because that's how old my oldest nephew is . We've got an old fashioned step which Lil calls her 'up high', a potty and a couple of soft seats that sit on the loo. All seem to be part of her toy stash though and are hilarious good fun.

It's really easy to shift and folds in half to store it. She loves it.

She's only doing a few wees a day in the loo, but that's not so bad. :-)

Thanks for the link; I didn't come across that one while looking them up.

I need meal ideas. I'm now admitting we have a bit of a problem. I was passing off her fussy eating as a phase but its been going on months and months now.

She used to eat anything and everything but dinner time is now limited to so few meals its driving me crazy. She will eat
pasta and pesto
toast and humus or pesto or cream cheese
cheese on toast
fish fingers
sweetcorn fritters
tuna fish cakes

occasionally she'll also eat egg fried rice, paella and mushroom stroganoff.

Help! What are your failsafe meals that contain actual vegetables??

DD loves a 'fish pie' made from fresh fish, potato and various vegetables. Your DD might like that if she likes fish. As a vegetarian, I don't eat fish myself but I imagine the fish would disguise the veg somewhat.

Other favourites are spaghetti with tomatoes, peas, sweetcorn and chickpeas, although I guess the vegetables are more obvious in that (ok for DD as she will literally eat anything - she even tried the stairgate this morning!).

And broccoli and cauliflower cheese, which might be more acceptable to your DD, especially if you don't make the veg too chunky.

I don't do cooking so my DH batch cooks a lot of meals and freezes them! We don't often eat with DD as he usually gets back from work after her dinner time.

She also loves jacket potato with beans and cheese. According to some sources beans count as veg (they're good for you anyway) and we buy the low sugar and salt version so even better.

We are quite limited too. One thing I'd recommend trying is m and s or Sainsburys ready meals so you can see if she actually likes cottage pie, chili, all the various things they do. And if she does you can then cook it yourself. Polly quick likes a mild curry with veg etc. broccoli and cauliflower cheese baked with pasta is good as the broccoli disintegrates so is disgusted and cauliflower looks like pasta:-)

Alternatively let her get peer pressured into eating veg at nursery and don't worry too much at home. I don't want to worry too much about what she's eating and I don't want it to be a battleground. Does she eat fruit? I will give her a bowl of chopped up grapes, blueberries etc which she will demolish.

Mushroom risotto is a failsafe here. DS is still funny about potato (makes him gag) which is a pain in the arse but he will grow out of it.

Veg pasta sauce: finely chopped onion & pepper, chopped toms, anything else that's knocking around. Has the advantage of being easy to freeze in small portions.

Discovery at the weekend: saag paneer & rice. Def the healthiest thing he's eaten at home in ages. This might trigger a whole host of various mild curries and rice!

Tuna, sweetcorn & mayo pasta.

He eats a smattering of other things but not much.

It's hard though. I want to make his diet varied and interesting and introduce new things. But I also want him to eat something and time in the day is often not in our favour.

We've started making dinner at the weekends for all three of us to eat together, early at 5 (that's when ds has tea through the wk). It's the only time we can eat together so we make sure we do and that we all have the same thing.

Joe is also a fusspot when it comes to vegetables. He'll eat any fruit grown on the planet but veg? Evil!

So I often chuck 2 beaten eggs, whatever plain yoghurt or creme fraiche or ricotta I might have left lurking about, cheese, grated zucchini or pumpkin or cauliflower or any other veg into a bowl, whisk and pour into a shallow muffin tin, greased. 15 mins at 180C and they're done. They're good warm or cold. He eats those almost without fail.

Fishcakes are good, as are premade filled pasta which I get - veg or spinach versions - and serve with any type of pesto, like Aubergine or basil. Whatever, he'll eat that.

Seconding Bean's recommendations - we get 3 Little Dishes via our weekly Ocado order. He loves those, they're a good standby and actually really high quality. With some seasoning I'm happy to eat them! Best are the pasta ones, chicken & butternut risotto, lamb hotpot and pirk balks and beans.

And I'm not-as-ashamed-as-I-should-be to admit that his probably fave after pasta is the Sunday night special if posh fish fingers and not posh at all McCains Smiley Potato face things. Awful!

Obv anything on our plates he wants. As soon as it moves to his it becomes disgusting.

Can Joe now eat as 'normal' or does he have any left over complications from his surgery?

Though sounds like he is eating much the same as Polly these days! Are you working at the mo? Do you just pick up whatever contract suits you as and when?

Hi Bean. He does eat a lot of what other kids his age eat but he has to have it served up in pretty small bits - so a filled tortellino will need to be cut up into four, for eg. Or if we get sausages from the butcher I take the skin off and crumble it fairly small. It's not as bad as six-twelve months ago when I was having to do slightly crazy shit like peel and quarter grapes, or poach chicken so it was really a bit over-moist. Those days sucked. He still has 'stickies' most meals, where things get stuck in the narrow bit of his oesophagus. Bit grim. As he gets older he can sort a lot if it out himself by making sure he chews really well, and drinks to push things down. At the moment he chokes mostly due to cramming too much in, not concentrating, general 2yr old behaviour.

You'd not know by looking at him that anything was different, though you light when he coughs or laughs - sounds like a 50-a-day smoker! Often old ladies stop me when we are out, if they hear him cough, to whisper to me that 'your wee boy has croup I think'. Thanks, ladies.

Yep still self employed, negotiating couple contracts at moment, think I've identified my preferred one so all going well will start that one in a couple of weeks. I pick and choose, def! Money, location and commission v crucial!

How's the final countdown going?

I read our last couple of June baby threads from 2013 earlier today - actually amazing to read bout all the babies arriving. Not sure I imagined I'd still be here on the threads 2yrs later. Aces innit.

Final countdown fairly grim. Think had blocked out all the horrors of last time. This time has seen a resurgence of morning sickness in the final weeks which is obviously very welcome. And there is a distinct correlation between my needing to sit down and Polly throwing a shit fit. I think nursery three days a week is my only saving grace!

Section next Friday. Cannot wait to be done. Absolutely never going through this again!

Glad things going well at your end. I envy your kitchen on a daily basis.