++March 06 ++Birthdays Ahoy- thread the third++

[UniSarah]

Ok, I think I have spelled everything in teh title correctly. shout at me if i havn't.

Happy St davids day March 06 mums and tots.

hello gothic- long time no read. nice to see your still with us. How is work/ study going? You would be proud of uni boy, he now has a black T-shirt all of his own and some black jeans to go with but with his blonde short hair looks as un-likely a goth as his daddy did ( also a blonde goth).

Hi all. RL was a bit busy over w/end. visited SiL & BiL also saw MiL & fiL, managed to Avoid having to vist GMiL as well. Boy liked going for a toodle round the farm S&BiL live on, he got to sit on 2 tractors and saw a telehandler in action.He ended up a filthy dirty and tired but happy little boy.
Now we are home so its back to mummy and daddy not giving in over food - eat what your offered or nowt and your certainly not having an oatcake if you havn't eaten your veg. veg soup goes down well tho so no major battle today.

Astro, those moments are great aren't they, but yet so rare hmmmmm great places for a day trip out, actually I enjoyed Rufford Abbey a few weeks ago, Nottingham to Doncaster road, up near Ollerton. Nice lake to walk around, birds to spot, swans n ducks to feed. Two shops, Woods, play area, good cafe. Clumber park is also nice, though haven't been for years. If you fancy a trip into Lincolnshire, Belton House is nice, has a fab adventure playground, nearly as good as Chatsworth if I remember rightly, although again haven't been for years n years, they may well have a website for you to check it out tho??
Do you know if you can Maude or not yet? if its nice we can all picnic afterwards and catch up!

Hi Gothic, hope your coping ok with study and kids? we have 4 teeth and walking here

Uni, I wasn't picturing ds as a Goth! He;s getting picky about food now then eh? dd2 has decided she hates solid cheese here?? what's that about then? can still sink a banana in record time though, its a rare talent

I can't really say anything at the moment girls, but keep your fingers x'd for my cousin.

Frizbe fingers crossed- Uni my ds is blond too blond goths can be distinctive though. Work and studying going well , just really tired still not much longer then it will just be work which wil be more managable (more MN time as well)

Yep- picky over food, tho its not that he refuses to eat things totally its more that hes picky about HOW he will eat them. some days veg can be spooned in neat, other days he has to feed it to himself others it has to be hiden in mash spud. Tea time today he ate all his pasta AFTER he had had the last 2 spoonfulls in a fruit pot from mid afternoon. He could see it on teh table and was insistant that was what he wanted. a mix of sign and pointing is making him quite good at communicating his wants.

maude - as in come into teh garden , maude.?Or I am getting confused .

Just catching up as RL seems a bit busy at the mo and am neglecting MN.
Good to have you pop by Gothic and can't believe that Gothicboy is walking too! Kiah is still just at the 'hands free' standing on occasion stage. Actually it would be good if she could walk 'cos then I could do some gardening without having to turn her trundle truck around every two minutes when she runs out of straight line.

Tilly has been staying at my parents for two nights with sis and BIL. They took her to Knowsley Safari Park yesterday, the highlights being the baboons who wee'd on the car in front and waved their willy at Tilly!

Maude is refering to the Mile for Maude Uni, which reminds me that I haven't signed up yet...Astro are you going? Picnic sounds like a good idea....

Friz, fingers crossed here but tell us more when you can eh?

LL I've spent all day in the garden trying to stop dd2 killing herself on the 2 steps we have, as obviously she's drawn to them she stopped eating as many stones now she's found these make the most of trundling!
How you feeling at the mo then hon? any more news on cous? Has it been fun with just one child for a few days?

Uni, lol at the eating, dd2 has been trying it on here too. Last night she'd only eat her cottage pie with petit filous on top she ate the whole bowl, but refused a plain spoon of it, had to have yog included Tonight she ate tea a treat, but threw a fit, when dd1 got a banana and she didn't (she'd had her's at lunch, and had already eaten her pudding of blueberries and yog) dd1 ended up sharing it with her to stop the noise

Gothic and everyone else, hello!
Hope you all have a great Easter, I'll be away working for the weekend, so have fun!

Have a great weekend Friz, even if you are working.

My cousin had her chemo at Christies today and NHS have agreed to pay for her treatment if she promises not to go back to Cambodia! An NHS worker asked her last week, on the phone, what she would do if they wouldn't pay and my cousin said 'well, die I suppose'.. She's lived in the UK for 30 odd years and works for a landmine charity in Cambodia FFS Grrrrrrr......

for your cousin ll, that makes me grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr I can't tell you, particularly when the NHS spend a lot of money treating none british nationals who are only here for Uni or whatever, they can surely treat a British Citazen (SP?)

Here here, damn those bludging foreigners!

Fingers crossed for both your cousins, LL and Friz.

DS a bit fussy on the food front too - hysterical pointing and cries on 'dardar!!!!' accompany each meal as he only wants to eat bananas! He did eat halp a punnet of blueberries today though, so should be fun nappies tomorrow. Eeewww!

UniS, sounds like you run a very tight ship - my DD dosn't even have such strict rules! We have an 'eat 3 mouthfuls' policy, and then if she is still fussing she is allowed bread, fruit or yoghurt and nothing else. She has really come on in the last 6 months though - gone from a non-veg eater to eating carrots, spud, peas and sweet potato happily, so they do get there eventually!

Having a nice relaxing sunny weekend here, hope you are all doing the same

vaugly tight- its eat what your offered at mealtimes or nowt, but we're not fussy if he has pud 1st or if he doesn;t eat much. theres always another feeding oppotunity round the corner anyway. smaller tea just means bigger breast feed at bedtime. We did at one point give in and allow him to have oat cake if he refused real food but he cottoned on and oat cake was all he wanted. tonight he finger fed himself chicken & chips and a small ammount of veg, last night he spoon fed himself cottage pie with help. When ever we can we are having family meals as he seems to eat better then.

friz- remember that twinkle star toy? Boy has just worked out how to pull the shaker triger for him self, its driving us batty again. he quite keen on it.

Another day out in the garden, boy busy climbing stairs, pulling weeds out of the bucket, stones out of pots and gennerally "helping" . Dh has replanted our potted herb garden in the veg bed and i've re done teh pots to hopefully have night sented stock and love in a mist on the balcony. fingers Xed they come up. Out on the bikes tomorrow if all goes to plan. Yesterday we went for a walk and explored the fringe of teh city just west of our house. Its been really nice to have DH around during teh day for a few days.

Hey Uni, I was talking about you today as we bought a double trailer for the back of our bikes!! DP took the girls on a trial run down the farm lane and Kiah thought it was fab.

We have some green fingered friends coming for the day tomorrow so hope to get at least some planning done in the garden whilst their older kids keep ours entertained. Just working out a free food meal to try and undo the indulgent week I've had so far. Breakfast this morning was coffee and easter egg...

Uni, am I being too optimistic to think that there might be a magical website somewhere dedicated to people with small children in trailers, full of hints, tips and trailer friendly routes????? I can see no point in posting on MN when we have an expert in our midst.

Oooh, will be interested to hear how you get on LL (and uni) - we are thinking of getting bikes and trailer too. Were planning on them for Europe trip b ut might as well have them for summer 1st.
...DH calling - kids in the bath being rouges...

Do I have the only non walking 13 m/o who thinks climbing frames and slides at teh park are fab and clambers all over them. He's even getting himself onto teh slide correctly and coming down it by him self - I'm never far away tho, incase it all goes pear shaped.

Trailer routes- I'm not aware of a magical web site, but if I find one I'll let you know. An unmagical one that might be interesting to look at would be sustrans (.org or .org.uk IIRC). The NCN routes are planned to use minor roads where ever possible- even if that means a major detour to avoid 1 mile of A road.
DH and I don't really bother with pre planned routes, we use an OS map and a destination. Yesterday we visted Escot in East Devon mainly via minor country lanes but with a bit of major B road ( in V bad nick too, poor boy got a bit bounced) to get out of town.
With traffic free routes its worth remebering that not all access points are equal. some acess gates on to paths are not wide enough for a trailer ( or double buggy or wheelchair) If you encounter problems you can try and whinge at teh relevent county/ district council and they MAY eventully do something about it. Friends whinged about one last year and its just been remade.
Trailing is not for teh shy ! I've lost count of teh comments we get, some rude people even slow down when they are along side just to stare at boy in his chariot. Any time we are hitching up or changing wheel modes and there are people around we get questions. Our trailer is one you can use as a pushcahir, but this means changing the wheel arrangments.

Uni, you've made me feel guilty as I haven't even tried Kiah on a slide yet but I do remember that Tilly was like this before she could walk. Poor second child gets to do nothing exciting although she does go on a potty each morning and does a poo or wee to a great round of applause and much whooping.

Our trailer turns into a buggy too, the wheel folds underneath....my poorly bike is arriving from my parents tonight so hopefully with a bit of TLC we can have a family ride out on Sunday.

Well this week I've been really down and shouted at the kids something rotten. I'd sorted out a childminder which then fell through and that made it all seem worse. Anyway today I'll phone some more childminders and am going to do some gardening as therapy whilst I am kid free. I'm not even ging to look at anything work related!

Hope you've not all OD'd on chocolate this week - I don't have great hopes for Slimming World this week as I've been helping the girls with their easter eggs - Flakes and Creme Eggs are not intended for toddlers IMO!!!

LL- do you know what make/model of trailer you have? I'm curious, that folding wheel sounds sensible. we have 2 buggy wheels that bolt through teh front bumper, you have to undo teh big nut and replace them facing up before towing. We do have a single large front wheel as well for off road pushing with a front fork arrangement, but that is bulky to carry and so we only use that sometimes. Ours is a CTS chariot ( single), about 6 yrs old , we got it 2nd hand on e-bay.
Slides- it wasn;t so much that I tried him on it, more he climbed up to it and sat down. I am encouraging him to climb tho, nearly had kittens this morning when he tried to climb on a bit of teh climbing frame I couldn't reach easily and then put his foot through a gap, I had visons of him falling 4 foot to the ground and me having to explain WHY my 13 month old had managed to do that.

Hello again! I am so glad that you are all still here...

I cannot believe that all of our babies are toddlers. How did that happen?

We LOVED our bike trailer when DS1 and DD1 were little but we sold it many moves ago... Do you think that there would be one big enough for a 5 year old and a 1 year old? DS2 is really tall but only weighs 16 kg so the weight is less of an issue.

I was thinking about just a seat on the back of my bike for Cadtoddler. That is what we had for DS2 and he loved it.

Uni: Cadtoddler also loves to climb everything in sight to include but not limited to any and all stairs and ladders (especially to one to DS1's loft bed!!) If she is out of sight and quiet for any length of time we know that she is going 'UUUUP!' something. She has only starte to walk as her primary mode of travel over the last two days. She can crawl far more quickly towards danger!

Hi Cadmum, nice to hear from you.
trailers- a two child trailer would probadly fit your two. but it may be cozy. friends have their 4 and 2 yr old together in one, but the kids are pretty tight together. Can you hire one some where near you to try it for a day.

Hello Caddy - you still in Vienna or have we missed another move? You sound perky (if poss on a computer!) so hope things are looking up for you. Reckon a tall one could fit in our trailer with folded knees!

Uni, well we went out today, bout a 12 mile round journey to the homemade icecream shop! My bike gears are knackered so need to sort themout, only the little cog at the front so uphill was OK but couodn't get any speed up on the flat. Anyway, our buggy wheel fell off so maybe your design is better after all!! We will get on to Halfords for a replacement as we did everything right and lost it on the first outing. The girls had fun altho both are poorly - Kiah has gunk coming out of her ear (bleurgh) so I guess an ear infection but is happy as larry. Tilly OTOH has a raging temperature and was up all last night (Kiah slept thru) but just feels tired and cuddly. They are both Calpoled and in bed now.

Kiah learnt to stand up on her own today whilst eating with both hands full in the garden - she was well chuffed. Then she climbed into the washing up bowl full of water they were playing with and sat down, again much to her delight. DP has given the Have I Got News call so catch you soon....

I am still in Vienna. It is almost growing on me... Still only kind of hate it here iykwim!

I have had a rather crap week so I am glad that I come off as chipper. It took some effort on my part not to whinge.

Our house is such a tip that I have to wade through detritus just to get through the front door. DD2 is still up (tis 22:11 here) teething/nappy rash causing her to behave like a barnacle today and we are expecting DH's boss for dinner tomorrow. Why oh why do I do this to myself?!?!?!

DH is running round finding the floor and it will all end in tears (mine mostly!).

Caddy stuff the tip, sure dh's boss will understand as its him that sends dh away such a lot Glad to see your sounding 'chipper' even if your not totally feeling it, did you get anything in the post?
LL hurrah for trailer
Astro
So I've been away last weekend, drove ss home on Tue, and monged out for rest of the day, then have rented out friends house, doing the handover on Monday! so have spent most of week, sorting getting rid of remaining furniture, getting references, catching up with friends who are teachers and whom I never get to see during term time!! but I'm back on for this weekend, then off again next week

Welcome back Caddy - still planning on visiting us some time? Hope the dinner with the boss went well.

Bother about the buggy wheel LL - what type is it ? (so we know what not to buy )

Friz, the house we are moving to (some time in the next 6 weeks hopefully) belongs to s friend of ours so we are doing a private lease rather than agent. They say its our responsibility to pay for the contract to be drawn up, and that its £150 - does that sound right to you (assuming you know all about these real estate thingies)? I'm sure in Australia it cost $10! Any tips re private renting?

DH has had this week off and its been nice. We went to Yorkshire SP and had a lovely day there, then dinner at PizzaExpress at Meadow Hall - -will def be back there for a shopping trip when I get thin (which reminds me, you, LL, and amazing for loosing all that weight, keep it up! I, on the other hand, and slack and idle and my diet starts tomorrow, again. Any tips?).

Yesterday we went to Warwick Caste for the day which was great - we take the kids jarmies and they fall asleep in the car on the way home - has been working a treat

Must sleep now - a friend had her 2nd baby yesterday and I think we are minding her DD for her tomorrow so she can get some rest - so 3 kids for me tomorrow - a trial run! Anyone tempted to go for another yet btw?

Astrophe: Is that an invitation? Do you know that we have 4 children? Perhaps if we do make it up for a visit my crowd will put you off the idea of bigger families all together!

Maybe dd2 and I should come on our own!

Well we survived the day. DS2 had T-ball this morning and DS1 and DD1 had baseball just after so we didn't even get home until 1:00pm and DH was hard at work cleaning and tidying but it only came together in the last 5 minutes as we were changing into presentable clothes and closing doors to hide messes.

Too bad I hate having people round because it is nice to have a tidy house and there is NO other way to motivate any one to help me otherwise...

Frizbe: Do you mean the card from Munzie? How have I not even thanked her yet? I really need to get my act together before life passes me by...

My top weight loss tip- cycle up hill regulary towing a small child in a trailer! I'm sure its that not the once a week run or the total lask of diet/ self control with chocolate. I've found a bonus to boy now having a forward facing buggy- he can;t see me eating ice cram and "beg" for it.
I've just entered a 5km race! OMG . what have I done, it's in 3 wks time. I went out for a 5km ish run last night , survived but was knackered.