Sept '07... I'm forever blowing raspberries and my cheeks ache from smiling so much....

[PurpleLostPrincess]

Here we go! (or should I say here wii go!?). I'll try doing a link too...

Incidentally, I had a dream last night that Cerys suddenly learnt how to blow proper raspberries! Don't know where it came from but it could be that she has been trying since she was about 4 weeks old and did it entirely by accident yesterday!

PLP xxx

Twit, hope you had a nice pudding for him afterwards.

Thanks kinki, the next step is to have her colostomy reversed and we've been told that is mid-February so not long to go now! To be honest, I'm wandering if its just that we have finally had some time at home to get used to our own daily routine and Cerys has discovered that she likes sleeping without being disturbed. Saying that, she really did seem unwell today - if she hasn't cheered up by tomorrow I'll call the doctor. Its so hard to know isn't it!? Thing is, I know from experience that babies have their off days so I don't want to jump to conclusions...

The expanding seems to be worse at the moment and I'm wandering if its because the stitches are becoming dislodged - out of about 20 of them, only 2 have fallen out so far and they must be sooo uncomfortable. When I change her nappy now, her legs go stiff and she clenches her bum cheeks together, its just awful! And the thing is, she is on a size 12 and 13 candle at the moment - when size 14 arrives I've got to start using that one! I don't know how I'll get it in when she already freaks with the 12 and 13!! I'm using lots of lubricant but it crossed my mind that I could be agitating the stitches or even pushing/pulling them up into the bowel!?

I don't know how long we will have to continue doing it for - I'm hoping to find out when we see her consultant at the clinic later in January (date tba).

I tried weaning her off the calpol a week or so ago but she clearly needs it every now and then or at least before we expand each day - I do hope she doesn't become dependent on it.

Sorry I've babbled again haven't I , sorry to ramble on! It is very reassuring to know that we're not alone as far as the sleep is concerned though xxhugsxx

PLP - You have my deepest admiration for what you are doing, I really don't think I could cope even though you know its for lo's best interests in the end. {{HUGS}}xx

Thank you MrsFish, to be honest I don't feel like I am coping - its all a big front lol! I guess we just get on and do what we have to really, like you say its for her best interests in the end... xxhugsxx

I'm with Mrs Fish on that one PLP, Cerys is a very lucky young lady
I have also found if Arben sleeps well during the day he sleeps much better at night, if he misses his naps or sleeps for less he is up much more during the night.
For those whose LO's sleep thru, how much do they sleep during the day?? Do they have sleeps in the day aswel?

I second the sleep thing. Paul had his worst day's sleep yesterday, and one of his worst night's sleep last night [bleary eyed emoticon]. Kelm, he generally sleeps from 7pm until 7am (with a dreamfeed at 10.30pm), although from about 5.30am onwards he's a bit up and down. Daytime naps are a major battle, though - he fights them like anything, but if he doesn't have them he gets exhausted. On a good day he'll have 45 mins at about 9am, 45 mins at lunchtime, and 45 mins (sometimes a bit longer) between 3pm and 5pm. For some reason he's incapable of staying asleep much longer than 45 mins during the day, which I can't work out. I always make sure he's awake from about 5pm onwards so he's tired enough to sleep at bedtime.

In total Liam is probably awake only for about 6-8 hours during the day. An average day would be something like this:

7/8am wake up
9am falls asleep on school run
11.30am ish wakes up, sometimes stays awake for a few hours now, sometimes dozes on and off.
3pm falls asleep on school run again
6pm -ish wakes up
8/9pm bed time. For the last couple of weeks he's been sleeping through till morning

Ben will only sleep for 20-45 mins a time about 3 times during the day, but at least he sleeps well at night.

plp you are great. so is everyone else but mostly you [tee hee]

babytwit may or may not have a snooze at school time, he has started having an hour [or 2] after dinner with dd and may or may not have a snooze at school time again, and goes to bed with dd and sleeps til morning [when I wake him up with a feed]

Have taken the bull by the horns and have given him babyrice for dinner [as well as his notmal feed] can't be doing with all the arsing around waiting with him fussing and grumbling and demanding me every second.

Hi all, haven't been on here for ages but managed to skim the new thread. Not sure if you will remember me and little Anna??

Anyway, my DH had a bad motorcycle accident on 3rd December. Terrifying at the time as he had a neck fracture but that turned out to be fine. he has a broken hand, very badly smashed leg and had some nerve damage in his shoulder which has healed. his leg is in a large steel frame for probably 2-3 months. He was in hospital for only a week and is now at home until the surgeon clears him to return to work. A bit of a nightmare but could have been much worse. needless to say, it has been insane looking after 3 children plus DH but he is much better now and able to help out a bit.

my little Anna is almost 4 months, still fully bf but may try a bit of formula in early evenings soon to try to get her to sleep a bit more then. She has only just started going down around 8pm rather than 10 or 11pm. I am trying to wake her at 10.30 or so for a feed but she is SO sleepy. Normally she sleeps through until 6am or so but today was up at 5am - yawn!! She finally likes her bath which I now do most evenings with my boys .

Good luck Edie, hope it is all good news for you....

Hopey, if you read this you can just say "I told you so!!!"

Happy new year to everyone!!! I hope I can keep up a bit more now....

Canadianmum - so sorry to hear about your DH's accident - you must have been so worried ! Hope he's on the mend now and lovely to hear from you again !

PLP- how is Cerys today ? Maybe she just needed to catch up with sleeping alot for one day ? ((Hugs to her and you))Sorry my worries yesterday must have seemed so trivial compared to what you are dealing with Thanks for asking - the HV came over and said BF all looked fine and maybe I should try and feed her up more in the evening before she goes to sleep and hold off on weaning for another couple of weeks - DD1 had bad excema as a baby and DD2 has asthma !

love to everyone - DD's want computer - gotta go xx

Thanks everyone. Well I don't know what I was worrying about, doctor reckons there were hardly any abnormal cells when he had a look but sent a biopsy just to be sure. Didn't even feel it!!

Could have kissed him afterwards!!

Oh and I have a quick question-what are your LO's nappies like? As I said before, Millie used to have loads of dirty ones in a day, now it's just one every day, sometimes every other day. Is this normal?

Hi Edie, glad everything went well today and wasn't painful for you
Arben's nappies have recently changed aswell, he used to go every 2-3days but in the last couple days he has been going every day, i think his tummy finally settling and getting used to more formula milk.
How old is Millie?

hi everyone - to those who are giving lo's food....i am soo confused on this subject. is milk really enough til 6 months? i just dont know what to do on the weaning front. ryan will be 18 weeks this week, was planning on waiting til the advised 26..oh i dont know!

edie - glad your check went well.

cmum - so sorry to hear about your dh

plp - you and cerys are doing so so well.

twit - great to see you back.

kink - am not surprised at the long 10 mins!

re the naps - ryan tends to wake between 6-7. is normally back down by 8.30 for a morning nap for anything from 1 1/2 - 2 hrs (he has started waking 45 mins into it, but i just have to persevere at getting him back down. Then back down around 12.30 for another 2 hrs. Then 30-45 min nap around 4.30. Then into his cot between 7 to 7.30

Re the nappies - ryan has gone from going once a day (after his 7am feed) to once every 2 days now.

hope the more experienced of you can give me some wise words on the weaning front.

hugs to all I havent managed to reply too.

Well Ben has only slept twice today for about an hour and a half this morning and 20 mins this afternoon and that is it. Put him to bed at 7.30 so we'll see how long he sleeps tonight

Dal21 - Reg weaning. With DS1 I waited till he was six months old before introducing food, as a first time mum I did everything I was told by the HV. As soon as he had food he started sleeping through the night. Now with Ben I am going to start weaning at 4 months which will be the 5th of Feb. He is a good weight, 16 pound at 13 weeks so I feel he can take it, he is averaging 30-32 ounces of milk a day, I really don't think it is going to hurt him to give him a couple of mouthfuls of food a day. I will start slow as I say, on his afternoon bottle I will introduce a couple of mouthfuls of pureed food for the first week and from then on just add a bit more at a time, I'll just judge it as I go along

dal just go by your instincts, if he's ok with you then stick it out. A dr or h/v will tell you 6 months but my bigger dstwits were both started on baby rice at 16 weeks [4 months] as was recommended then. As I said babytwit shoved his hands in my dinner and then sucked the food off, and so far he's been fine [odd seeing as how dh cooked it .....]

cmum hope your dh is continuing to recover.

fio what's wrong with petit filous? [awaits the response nervously as have fed all three petit filous] I'm hoping it's not along the same lines as fruit shoots lol

Oh, regarding nappies Ben goes at least once a day on the formula.

hi mrsfish, how are you?

Canadianmum - sorry to hear about your DH's accident, I hope he makes a good and swift recovery, for your sake as well as his

Hi Twit, I'm ok thanks, still got my cold that I had before christmas but its finally getting better. Also started my diet properly last week as I haven't lost an ounce other than the birth weight weighed myself this morning and have lost 3 pound, I'm well chuffed

How are you?

Don't know much, but can share with you my nappies and weaning experiences I had with my other 2.

Nappies: Ds2 has always been a regular once a day kinda guy, even from the really early days. Ds2 on the otherhand used to go every 7 days, sometimes up to 10 days. He never went over the 10 day threshold, the hv told me anything up to 10 days is normal for a bf baby. Funny thing was he usually went on a thursday evening - while I was waiting for ds1 in his karate class. He was like this from months 2-6, then when I weaned him he went immediately to once a day. Ds3 is in between the first 2. I'd say on average he's once every 3 days.

Weaning: imo there is some degree of latitude in when to introduce food. The current line is start at 6 months, as per WHO guidelines. I did this for ds2 and all was fine. When ds1 was a baby the guideline was 4 months, so we all started at 16 weeks. Again, all was fine. The only difference in my 2 was that ds2 took to it a lot easier, probably because he was that much older. If someone asked me my advice, I'd say try hold off till 6 months (if only because you'll be dishing up meals for your little darling for the next 18 years, so give yourself a break before you start!). HOWEVER, I don't know your babies, only you do. I got a little slated for saying this next bit the other day on another thread, but I really believe that you should follow your own maternal instincts on when you feel it is best to start introducing food. Almost every other species do this and I believe we should too. Little sparrows don't have books or the net to refer to. They do what nature tells them too. I think we should try to tune into this too. I'm waffling again. Time to shut up.

You talk much sense kinki