March 2016 - I can't think of a pithy title because I'm too sleep deprived :/

[DomesticAnarchist]

New thread?
Sorry, really couldn't think of something humorous!

marmite doc I am the filling in your back to work sandwich - back in 2 months. Technically part time as only 4h at work but sadly the commute is 2h each way so full day. I found a nice nursery for DD to go to 2 days a week with DH and mum doing the others and I am looking forward to using my brain more (if it is still up to it!)but I'll miss her.

You've all reminded me of my Ellas kitchen voucher - now to find it. I plan mainly BLW - the dogs can't wait - but some purees could be useful too and I'm a sucker for a freebie.

Dotty there was a fair bit of talk of debriefs on the pregnancy board and consensus was people found them useful if the birth was traumatic or there were decisions/interventions they hadn't understood. Probably worth looking onto. I can remember very little of my birth experience and that is fine for me.

Sainsburys nappies are crap dom! We're in the aldi ones but the Boots ones are also good. But yeah, stock up on pampers while you can! We're almost in a 4 too Q but I'm feeling sad about my baby getting so big and I still have a shit load of 3s left so am not moving her up yet. The 3s go up to 20lb and she's not even 16, so I think we have some time.

I don't want to think about going back to work I hate my boss and am dreading it, but I can see it hurtling towards me. I need a new job really but don't know when to start applying as I don't want to end up with less maternity leave than I could have, especially since this could be my last child. And I'd need to find childcare with a date in mind. Maybe I should go back and start applying for stuff from there.

Another screechy baby here, she looks happy when she's doing it so I suppose it's OK. Lots of raspberries too. She's such a spitty baby, we go through so many bibs and they all look disgusting.

Hi everyone, just checking in.

sher welcome back! Sorry to hear things have been tough for you.

Has anyone else found this stage (4 plus months) harder work than the newborn stage? I find DS such hard work at the moment - he's so whiny and never sleeps. The controlled crying worked so well for about ten days and then we went on holiday and he still slept well so I thought fab, we've cracked it - but no, we came back and his slept has been heinous ever since. We've hired a sleep consultant now as I'm sure part of the reason why he's so grouchy is he's tired!!

His naps are all over the place too.

The newborn stage was a breeze compared to this!

We love Sainsbury's nappies in this house, no overnight leaks at. Lets see how they cope now we have started weaning. As soon as there are leaks I move up a size so C is in size 4 (I actually have no idea how much she weighs - think a trip to the clinic is in order on Thursday!).

I'm really hungry but now my usual sofa breakfast has been replaced with the table and weaning I'm putting it off for 5 more minutes while C happily rolls around on the mat. Don't fancy dealing with weetabix mess today so think we'll try toast and sugar free jam, yum yum.

swear I also have loads of size 3 aldi ones so going to use those through the day and a pampers on a night to stope Leaks

X post maybe, my friend had a sleep consultant and she said it was worth every penny so hope it works for you. The only thing I would say is that she encouraged a VERY strict routine which really limited what she could do in the day as naps had to be at home, in the cot at the same time every day.

Sainsburys nappies working well here too (just overnight, reusables in the day) - maybe something to do with her very chunky legs. £3-4 for almost 50 and we get internet deliveries from Sainsbury's so handy not to have to go anywhere else.

At the moment I genuinely don't care if I never leave the house again as long as I get more than 2 hours' sleep

For those with leaky overnight nappies, you can try putting a reusable waterproof wrap on top. It'll save the clothes from getting wet. The Motherease air flow brand are amazing. I use them over cloth, but they're totally fine over disposables too.

Yy to the screeching and raspberries! It's great that they're expanding their "vocabulary", but sometimes I wish there was a volume dial.

T's enjoying her mix of finger food and a little mash/puree/porridge. She demolished a rusk this morning. Slime everywhere! I'm still working on the bottle refusing issue. She tries it most days. We're up to her at least accepting the teat in her mouth, but not drinking yet. She only has

Have you been the one trying to feed her mship? Maybe if you went out and left dh too it for long enough she'd take the bottle.

I've just booked onto my first exercise class since God knows when (pregnancy aerobics does not count as it didn't really do anything for my fitness!). And it's body combat, I bloody love body combat! S is consistently going to bed by 7 so I feel a bit freer to plan stuff. What are the chances tonight is the night she won't go down?? I'd forgotten quite how much planning goes into this kind of thing - I've pumped in case she wakes up, I'll be cooking early and eating with the boy (it's bad but I normally eat with dh once he's in bed, dh gets home too late for us to eat together in the week), going to sainsburys to get dh something to have as it's a great opportunity for him to have something gross like liver, getting my sports stuff out of wherever it's all ended up... Oof, I miss the days when I could just go!

Argh, stupid auto correct, if you left dh to it!

Interesting nappy experiences - DS2 is in size 4 (he's somewhere around 7.5kg).

I remember this happening with DS1 for months and no nappy brand seemed to work.

Re: back to work. I'm back again on the 5th. We're both back FT and have no family within 200 miles so DS2 will be with cm 3 days (she's like an auntie, it'll be like being with family really) and nursery on-site (I plan to go down there to BF twice a day) the other two days.

Like someone else said - I'm the main earner. And we're at the point where we need a bigger house, so I need to keep earning with that goal in mind.

And I much prefer working to childcare! (Although, I'm finding this baby far more enjoyable than DS1 )

DS2's off for a taster session with the cm this morning. Better get us ready...!

Oh maybe, I have huge sympathy.

Good luck for tonight, Swear. I'm supposed to be going to a class too, but DH is away. I'm thinking of taking DS2 in his car seat and hoping he sleeps (DS1 is with DH), but it's so hot here today I'm thinking of bailing...

I can't believe how quickly maternity leave is going, that it's time to think about work already. It's horrible having to leave them but it feels so freeing to be able to have proper conversations with other adults about things which aren't baby related. It does make the days you have at home with them even more enjoyable too.

I'm in the same situation as Swear - don't want to return to my current job but I don't know when to start looking for something new. My friend was telling me her sister applied for a new job as soon as she started mat leave and just told them the date she could start was when she finished mat leave. I don't think I would be quite brave enough to do that but I was thinking of applying for things maybe 3-4 months before I need to go back. It's a shame because I saw a job advertised that I really liked the look of a couple of months ago but I thought it might be a bit much to tell them I couldn't start until 2017 .

Sorry to hear the cc isn't working any more maybe. I've only heard good things from people who have used sleep consultants so I'm sure things will improve soon. Who did you go with?

I've found sainsburys nappies best for ds2 (and they're on offer at half price at the moment) but I've had to switch to the 4+ ones for nighttime to stop the leaking. He still has leaks occasionally if he's in one for more than 12hrs. We're still mostly co sleeping so we have lovely fresh sheets every few days here .

We started weaning today. No purees/spoon feeding at the moment because I want to do things at his pace iyswim? I just gave him some banana to play around with. He had lots of fun smooshing it and then putting handfuls of smooshed banana in his mouth once he realised it tasted nice!

swear DH does one or two attempts on Sundays (his only day off at the moment) and I try the other days in the mornings while DS is at nursery. MIL does the occasional weekday attempt too. The bedtime routine for both kids starts as soon as DH is home and T is usually frazzled enough by then that we haven't been brave enough to try it with DH at that time! I actually have better luck than DH or MIL - T usually just screams at them. It may come down to me just having to go to work and leave them to it. I can't imagine she'd refuse the whole 9 hours I'd be gone - and I'll only be 1.5 miles away, so if DH gets desperate he can bring her to me for a feed.

Love the pic trinpy!

So, dd2 has cut her first tooth! May explain the nap refusing and screeching recently. Currently trying to get her to sleep but failing, and have already given medicine and a feed so out if ideas. It's far too hot to put her in the sling so just trying to sit with her and hope she drops off wishful thinking. Am a but surprised at the tooth as she's not even 23 weeks yet and dd1 was six months + when she cut her first teeth and has been very slow to teeth (still has two teeth to go and she's 3 in a couple of months).

Hope the sleep consultant works out for you maybe. I think unfortunately some children are just crap at sleeping, I've always been a rubbish sleeper and woke early (5am) as a child and dd1 seems to have inherited that from me!

We often have night time leaks and moved dd2 into size 4s in an attempt to stop it, it's been mostly successful but we still get the occasional leak. It's annoying but I cba to try out different brands and Aldi nappies are so cheap!

Re: going back to work, part of me is looking forward to it but I'm the main earner also so have to work full time and am at a point in my career where I am under pressure (from myself but also work) to get a promotion. after having had two kids my career has definitely stalled and I'm going to have a lot on my plate when I get back. If I could go back three days I'd be happy to but that's not an option

Wow the thread has been busy today!

DS is absolutely fine now thanks Dotty. He still has spots but they're well on their way to healing up completely.

Re debriefs, I've considered one too, as my birth was pretty traumatic. But I'm not sure it would be that helpful, as I do know exactly what happened, when and why. The staff were brilliant in explaining everything to me. So I'm not sure a debrief would add much. For me personally I think it's just time that's needed. I think debriefs can be really helpful for other people though, one of my friends is having one and is then having some counselling (the hv referred her) to try and help her get over her equally traumatic birth.

Cute pic Trinpy! I'm doing purées but have tried to give some finger foods too, which DS hasn't been impressed with so far. One friend recommended offering eg a broccoli floret alongside the puréed broccoli so I might start trying that to get him more used to the idea.

I'm in the same boat as many of you re going back to work. DH and I earn roughly similar amounts at the moment but I have very good promotion prospects and am likely to overtake him. I'm not going back until January though so feel very lucky that I still have 4 months left to enjoy with DS.

Ds's naps are all over the place at the moment. He's never really had much of a nap routine but it was generally 3 with the last one being a late afternoon catnap. Lately he's been skipping the catnap but then gets really grizzly because he can't make it through to bedtime (even if I try an earlier bedtime!) I guess he is naturally dropping from 3 to 2, but I need to work on the timings.

Hi everyone. Long time lurker here but with 3 kids (ds1 3year old, ds2 2 year old and dd 5months) I never seem to get a minute to post! Hope you don't mind me joining, love reading about what all your babies are doing x

Another screecher here! He also seems to be increasingly frustrated at lying down, and cheers up massively when we pull him up to standing. Might be time to get the door bouncer down from the loft...

Lovely pic Trinpy! Think we might try DS with a bit of banana as his first 'meal' this week - I'm very excited!

Mship, is it an option to go straight to a sippy cup and skip bottles altogether? We never got DS taking bottles (didn't really try hard enough!) so am thinking of giving the odd milk feed via cup once he's got the hang of it.

Maybe, sorry to hear sleep is so rubbish Hope the consultant works miracles! Did you follow any particular programme with CC? Currently trying to work out whether to give it a go or not...

Hello skye! I'm also new to the thread. Gosh, you've got your hands full. DS is my first and we definitely want more but can't get my head round managing a newborn plus toddler yet so I am full of admiration for you!

peggy yes we followed the Ferber timings...Google search them and you should find them :)

Sleep consultant was lovely. Will receive her plan tonight and then will start to implement once the weather cools down a bit. Will report back!

Peggy I've got several sippy cups kicking about from DS, planning on trying that in a couple of weeks once T is sitting independently for longer than a minute or two. She may well like that. But we might be getting somewhere: I've just done today's bottle trial at 5 while DS was eating tea and she sucked a little!

I still have C in size 3 nappies - he's 21 weeks, was 7.4kg at 19 weeks but he's very, very long. Will probably move him to size 4 soon, the nappy is starting to feel a little short on him and he had quite a few leaky poos lately.

Flew back to London this afternoon, he was good on the flight again. Slept at the start but woke up when food arrived. He reached out a little hand when I started to eat the dessert, grabbed the spoon with it, mashed his other hand into the bit of blackcurrant cheesecake on the spoon and tried to put it into his mouth!

Got all the way home, dropped the bags and headed over to Costa... where he slapped my lovely mint choc chip cooler across the floor :(

Ds went through a stage of screeching too luckily he's forgotten about his ability to do that now!
As for nappies we are still on size 3'as and tend to stick with pampers as every other brand I've tried have leaked loads, tend to sniff out the offers though so doesn't work out too bad.
Tri- I would have been gutted about the Costa! I'm a sucker for the caramel latte coolers.
Mship- when I went to the breastfeeding counsellor when I was looking at weaning off boob she mentioned a sippy cup instead of bottle (although we are lucky and ds will take bottles) she said sometimes it's easier to get them used to it, haven't tried yet though.
Maybe- sorry to hear about the sleep troubles, fingers crossed your sleep consultant works wonders:) you will have to let us know how you get on! DS the last 2 nights has not been sleeping really which is proving to be rather exhausting- hoping it's just a phase!
Hi Skye, I second what Peggy said I'm a first time mum and do plan on maybe having one more but the thought of a toddler and a baby at the moment fills me with fear so hat of to those of you with more!
Trin- cute pic bless him! I went to a NCT weaning workshop yday and plan on weaning soon nearly 25 weeks here been pureeing left overs when had them and freezing them.

Who says baby led weaning is messy??? This is a combination of rice cakes, hummus and fromage frais! She's loving it though.

Urgh, anyone have a wide awake baby in this crazy heat?

I survived my first exercise class! Some things I have learnt:

• a 29 degree day is not a good day to attempt to get back into exercise
• I am not as unfit as I thought, but it was still harder than it should have been
• it will take at least half an hour and some Scooter for any endorphins to kick in
• my stomach muscles are shot, but my pelvic floor held out
• idly wondering if the baby is still asleep and remembering pumping just in case will make my boobs fill with milk and hurt for the rest of the class.

But all in all, great success!