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

Quiet in here today! What have you all been up to?!! Busy after the long weekend maybe?
I've been feeling really tired all day, despite an amazing lie in yesterday (DH let me lie in until 10:30! I was blessed! )
I've now got a headache coming on and a cold that's clogging up my nose (but nothing coming of blowing my nose ), ho-hum!

DH went to the Job centre today and signed on (he signed on for me too aparently so there's a little extra there!) I've looked on the local journal website but there's not a lot there (they don't have the same jobs online as they do in the paper and we didn't get one this week but DH's parent's told him about a couple that were in there, so we've missed on those, will get the latest one on Thursday though).

Anywho, at the very least we're going to have a little extra coming in, and I think they backdate it to when he finished working, but it shouldn't be too long until one of us gets a job (I hope). DH's brother was saying, the other day, that, where he lives, you can walk into town and get a job there and then, and pretty good money too aparently (averaging about £10K better) but that doesn't help us much as he lives nearly an hour away, but it might be worth trying to weigh up whether it'd be worth DH trying to get a job there and figure out if the extra money is enough to cover the extra petrol needed to get there , or, I suppose, we could always move. . .lol yeah right!)

So, how's everyone else doing? x

hey everyone - tis quiet indeed. am making the most of mum being here and popping out and doing bits and bobs. was in town yesterday - checked out the new banana republic store and had lunch with DH.

Ryan is doing fab - touchwood, now loves yogurt, chicken casserole and chickpeas. Next is lamb hotpot and fish lyonnaise...excitement!

Hope everyone else is doing well.

Yes Hopey I love the car seat.

Halfords are doing it for £200 instead of £230...

Hi Ladies!
Just popped on to say HI!
Hope you are having good weeks, am hoping the lack of posting is due to business!
Arben slept well last night - went from 10pm til 5am. Hoping it was more than a one offtho i'm not convinced
I also added some new pics

Hello all, I have been busy today, only just managed to get on the laptop. Talk about multi tasking at one point I was baking a cake, making fish pie to be pureed for Ben, making cups of tea for the plasterers, feeding Ben to try and shut him up from crying and having Sam hanging off me wanting to be picked up and cuddled, phew! who says being a sahm is easy?

I am so looking forward to having a spring clean in a couple of weeks, the upstairs has been in a complete mess since christmas with DH's tools everywhere, we have knocked down walls, blocked up doors etc, today the plasterers have been in so that should be the end of the real mess for a while, just then need to wait till we can get the painters in to finish off

Wow! MrsFish sounds like you've been having great fun!

Arbensmum Aww bless him, he's all grown up in his tie! Shouldn't you be dressing him up in a bonnet and romper in the hope that he will stay a babe longer? (Do you think I've been doing this to Lolly? You'd be right! )

Not a lot gone on today, got Lolly to the dietician, things are looking fine and plans for weaning are all good (knew there was nothing to worry about!) but I'm going in to see the HV tomorrow anyway, it'll give me a bit of fresh air and we can discuss DD1's bowel problems too.
Got Lolly's length done today too, she's 64cm long, about average but now I know I can look at sorting through her clothes at some point (I must must must get it done, there are clothes all over the spare bed in her room!! They've been there for a good few months now! Still, it's not like anyone needs that bed is it?! )

Anywho, I should go to bed soon, have got a stinking cold and feel like I need to sneeze all the time
Night all x x x

Just popping on to say - love the picture of Arben in his shirt and tie!!

Dal, hope Ryan enjoys his gourmet cooking. Paul had AK's fish with vegetables in a cheese sauce today. It's ridiculous - I never spend that long preparing my own lunch! And his tiny bit of fish cost £2.36!!! That will teach me to send DH to Waitrose for Paul's food - he came back with super duper prime cod fillet. Whereas I'm not sure Paul's palate is quite sophisticated enough to tell the difference between that and something a bit more bargain basement . Though at least it's not as bad as some super-wealthy friends of friends of mine, whose three year old son's favourite foods are olives and scallops .

Sorry I haven't been on for a while.

WARNING THIS IS GOING TO BE A MEGA RANT!

I'm feeling really and and and ed at the moment, oh yes and a bit of

As you know PIL visited this weekend (THE WHOLE EASTER WEEKEND). I'm SO upset. I'll try and make this as brief as poss,.

They arrive Saturday lunch time with shitty ratty dog, dump their stuff and I give them lunch.

My first 'complaint'
I have already prepped dinner, chicken maranading in fridge for chow mein. I tell FIL, and he says it is free range chicken isn't it, because if it isn't I'm not eating it. Um, no it isn't, free range chicken is HORRENDOUSLY expensive here, even then, they have hock burns on them. So, he has to have a separate dinner.

Sunday, I do a roast. WHILST not feeling well, full of a head cold, feeling like crap, did I get any help??? NO. So I'm cooking a roast, whilst looking after Niamh, whilst feeling crap.

By now, the house is in a tip, despite me making sure it was SPOTLESS before they arrived.

Monday, I'm making a dish with gnocchi and parma ham. BUT FIL won't eat parma ham. So again, he needs a separate dinner making. SO yet again, whilst feeling ill AND looking after Niamh I am in the kitchen cooking our dinner and his dinner. I serve up our dinner with a bowl of olives, sun dried toms, dressed salad and sliced french bread. We all sit down to eat, but MIL is still watching her tv programme, so came in when it finished WTF/ THEN, she says to FIL, 'I DO hope YOU cooked that dinner for yourself' to FIL, who replied, 'oh yes, I did' DOUBLE WTF!!!!!

second complaint..
DS1 was being a complete bugger over the weekend and being really argumentative and having tantrums.

On SUnday, I'm in the car with MIL, DH and Niamh and we drive through a village, I say to DH 'there's a really nice pub in Hinton'
'don't you mean Evenly?'
'no, Hinton.'
'no, i'm sure you must mean the Red Lion in Evenly'
'NO, IT;S HINTON! I've been there for a meal three times with friends, you've never been there'
MIL, from the back of the car says....''oooh, you sound just like DS1 HOW DARE she liken me to my 11 yr old son who has been behaving like a shit.,!!!!!!!!!!!!

Later on the same day, DS1 has another strop and stomps off to his room, MIL remarks, 'he;s just like his Mum'

On Monday, MIL asked me if I had any baby photos. I told her I did, but I was a really ugly baby because I had massive ears!! My Mum was a bit mean to me about my ears when I was growing up actually . MIL then turned to NIamh who was playing happily on ehr mat and said, 'Niamh's got slightly bigger than average ears hasn't she........ oh but but but she is beautiful' I wanted to cry

I've spoken to rl friends who are furious with them. They feel quite protective of me and can't believe this treatment, they also said I am SOOOOOOOO not an argumentative person, and I don't 'always ahve to have the last word' etc etc.

THANK GOD FOR FRIENDS HUH!
(Going out now, be back on later)

sob sob

Hopey - I am totally about your PIL - what a stressfull weekend ! I can't believe they are so rude - especially after what you've been through you'd think they'd be ready to help you out ! Don't do it again!( I haven't had my PIL for lunch since my MIL pushed the bowl of home made soup away from her with a disgusted face !) Just ignore all comments and think "this will soon pass ...."
Does your DH notice or does he think its all in your imagination like mine ?

Dal - have to ask your advice ! (and anyone else who has dropped dream feed !) Now that Eloise is sleeping from 6.30 til 5.30 (roughly) with a dream feed at 10pm I'd like to drop the 10pm feed - do I just stop or reduce it gradually ?? What did you do ?

Sophus , Mrs Fish and Mrs Bumblebee - am very impressed by your lo's eating fish - must try some for Eloise - have only done chicken so far and she had some lamb on Easter sunday .

Lolly - good luck with the job search for your Dh - hope something turns up soon

PLP and Kinki - how are you ? Did you have nice Easter ?

Eloise is doing well - nearly sitting up and rolling on her tummy pushing up (thinking of crawling !) but she has no teeth yet ! How is everyone else's baby doing ?

Hi ACMum, DH is totally with me on this one. But he hates confrontation so is reluctant to say anything to them, even though I wish he would/

MrsBumblebee My DD1's favourite foods are olives and avocados! Not that we can afford such luxuries very often but I reckon she'd even choose them over chocolate! (They were first introduced to her on a market day, I had picked up some avocados and then went to Starbucks for a panini for lunch, she had the avocados out of the bag so thought I'd cut one open for her to try, and she pinched the olives form my panini so from then on gave them to her every time, and the avocados she requested at any point we were at the market! Not that she'd always get them but there you go! ) Children are much more willing to try strange and wonderful things, they're not too fussed about what it looks like. As for scallops, not sure I'd give DD1 those even now (at 2 YO).

Hopey Sorry you've got such crappy PIL's, is there nothing that your DH can do/say to them to get them to be a bit more respectful towards you? Sounds like they're getting a bit of a kick out of it all, the way they've been going on at you all this time!
I'm the sort of person that, if someone's disrespectful to me like that I'm always tempted to be even more so to them (I.e: "MIL then turned to Niamh who was playing happily on her mat and said, 'Niamh's got slightly bigger than average ears hasn't she........ " I'd've been tempted to say "Well, it beats being ugly when you're an adult. . . " and just glare at her in an insinuating way so she'd get the message that you'd mean her! ) I'm also not a dog lover so would spend the whole weekend giving the rat a sly kick here and there! (Would I? I don't know but it makes a good mental picture either way )
(Just read your last post: Give him a kick up the bum! If he doesn't like confrontation then he wont like what's coming. . . there's no way in the world you can bottle things up and expect to not explode at some point! And, by the sounds of things, it will be soon my lovely!)

Thanks ACMum DH has got a temp job lined up, he starts on Monday, but it's working a week at a time so not very secure but it'll do for now. Also, he's now with an agency, they've got a couple of warehouse manager jobs in mind for him too so should get something soon.
Still haven't had his P45 through yet and nothing from the new benefits either (they're bound to all come through at once and make us nigh on rich just after a really bad struggle, that's usually the way! The people who run the benefits departments aren't very good in urgent matters are they? )

Still, we're surviving for now!
x

Hopey, my jaw has been dropping further and further towards the floor while reading your post. Your PIL are ABSOLUTELY UNBELIEVABLE !!! How can anyone be so rude when they're a guest in someone else's house?? I just can't think of anything else to say - I'm still in shock.

Lolly, great news about DH's job, though I hope something more secure comes along soon.

ACMum, re the dreamfeed, I did what GF advises: dropped an ounce at a time every couple of days until he was down to 2oz, then just stopped giving it. Paul gave it up with absolutely no fuss, which made me think I probably could have ditched it ages earlier . Oh well.

Is anyone else's LO getting a bit mummyish? I'm beginning to get slightly concerned about Paul, who's definitely getting clingy. Today I was carrying him in the backpack carrier and he started screaming - I'm convinced it was because he couldn't see me, because as soon as MIL took the carrier he was absolutely fine. And a couple of times recently I've left him with someone else for a few minutes and he's become hysterical. He spends his time gazing at me adoringly, and looking around to see where I am, which is obviously lovely, but I'm worried he's going to become very difficult to leave with anyone. It's a particular concern because we're planning a weekend away without him in a couple of months. Anyway, is this just normal baby behaviour? And is there anything I can do about it??

Mrs Bumblebee I have read that they do go through that phase at around 6 months, get clingy and cry when you leave the room, Ben has started doing it. I just keep making sure I go out the room for a few minutes, ie to hoover a room etc, then go back in and make a fuss of him, just so that he knows that if you do go away you will always go back. The phase will pass though
Also that AK fish recipe is the same one I made for Ben yesterday too, and yes it is time consuming

hopey - that is ridiculous, i thought my PIL were bad but at least they refuse to come and stay, my FIL won't even eat a meal here - but that's mainly because he's a right weirdo!
Mrs BB - Linus can be clingly and will get more so, it is totally normal and natural. Play lots of peekaboo with him, take favourite toys away and bring them back. Leave him for a bit and come back - it's all aprt of him realising that he is a separate entity to you. When i leave Linus with the childminder, we don't make a fuss about saying goodbye, she takes him off to huint for cats and i slip away.
Moving Linus to his own room has worked really well, has slept through 7.30 to 7.30 past two nights - not done that since before christmas. Now that i've got over the hurdle of not having him with me, i feel that if we have a bad night then it's jsut a bad night rather than a BIG DEAL which needs to be sorted out.
He's trying to crawl - has just learnt to move each of his legs independently of each other but then forgets about his arms and falls flat on his face, but he can go backwards at a rate of knots.
We started on finger food yesterday - so far he's gummed some cooked pieces of carrot, broccolli and butternut squash, some melon and some pasta shells.

DP calling, gotta go

xxx

MrsBumbleBee: Lolly's been quite "mummy-fied" but DD1 was like that leading up to teething so maybe it's the same with Lolly. She's also just had a hard poo and all she wanted afterwards was a big mummy cuddle, poor little thing It was a lovely cuddle though
Maybe try the coming-going technique (like you would to let him go to sleep by himself), leave the room for 2 minutes, than come back and make a big fuss of him, then leave for 4 minutes, come back etc and double the time spent away each time and see if he learns that when you do go away it's Ok cos you'll be back to make a huge fuss! (& now I've just read MrsFish's post, but yeah same lines, totally agree )

Not a lot gone on today, Dh picked up a bike for me from a Freecycler, so I should be able to start that exercise that I've been promising myself Made myself some rather comfy trousers and received a gorgeous coat from my mum so am feeling rather spoilt today (although still have a stinking cold and constantly feel like I'm about to sneeze, but never do )
Still
x

Morning all!!

MrsB - Fish Lyonaisse got eaten - not the most fave dish, but eaten nonetheless. Re. the mummyish behaviour - I do a little of what mrs f says - leave him alone - Ryan whinges, but then I come back in. Plus I have mum with me at the moment, so am leaving him with her a few hours a day. I have also started to make sure that DH gives most feeds on weekends as Ryan has started to play up unless I am the one feeding. I now get out the room and let DH get on with it - if chaos erupts, so be it. Mummy is not going to be on 24 hour call - Ryan needs to get used to that. My SIL has a little girl of 2 1/2 who refuses to let anyone aside from my SIL get her breakfast. She hasnt had a lie in since she was born. I refuse to let that happen.

Hopey - am totally aghast at what happened. I think your manners are second to none, your patience is unbelievable and well - you are a very nice person. Something would have been said by me causing ww3. Your DH sounds perfectly normal - anything to avoid confrontation. to you. How you feeling today?

Amyclaramum - what is your last feed consisting of? Once Ryan was 6 months, I moved his supper to 5pm and give bedtime bottle around 6.30. It was only once I moved food before milk that the dreamfeed got dropped. The way to do it is to keep offering the dreamfeed and reduce it by an ounce every 3-4 days. If they keep sleeping til their normal time, then keep reducing it by an ounce or so. DH was down to offering Ryan only 3 oz when one night he refused it completely. After that we left it and now he goes til 5am once he goes down at 6.45 (touchwood) - give him the dummy and he goes back to sleep for another hour and a half. Gets his morning milk feed by about 6.45. HTH

Lolly - hope things work out for you all. to you also.

Thinking of arbensmum and kinki. Hope you are both ok. Kink - please post - havent heard from you in a while.

Am at the rubbish weather again - oh well, wont let it spoil my plans, DH and I are out tonight and tomorrow night, so hopefully will have some fun.

Have fab days all - off to have my run (this last 7 lbs STILL isnt shifting, ok well 1lb has, but am really starting to get hacked off by it). I asked DH if you would let me get lipo . I took the look on his face to mean no. Oh well.

Hopey - meant to say, (came out wrong) that your DH sounds just like mine, in wanting to avoid confrontation. Most times, that quality actually works in my favour, but on occasion, it cannot be the most helpful of attributes, especially when I am ready to throw something at someones head.

Morning, am feeling a bit brighter today. Thanks for your messages

Kinki, how are you doing?

AND, PLP haven't heard from you for a while, hope everything's ok?

Dal, hope you enjoy your run. I was talking to a friend the other day who is CONVINCED that it is much easier to lose weight once one's baby is a yr old, she thinks it maybe something to do with metabolism ... I'm really struggling to shift the weight.

I see we're coming to the end of our thread here.

Need a new name.

I thought of one in the shower a sec ago... as you do...

'I'm sitting..I'm sssitting....I'm sssssitting......I'm ssssssssssssssssitting...... THUD!'

I'm still here. Things are chaotic so haven't had much time to post. But also things at home are still no better and I'm still no happier.

Hopey. Sack 'em. (The grandparents I mean). If they can't remain civil, polite and gracious then don't invite them round anymore. Poor old dh stuck in the middle. But poor you having to put up with rudeness. I have seen Niamh and she is the most stunning little lady. She is beautiful in every sense of the word. I probably saw her ears and I don't remember anything about them, and I'm very 'ear aware' because one of Liam's is a bit sticky outy. So mil clearly doesn't know what she's talking about. Niamh is gorgeous and very engaging and captivating. Don't let anyone let you think otherwise. And what a joke about you having the last word. Conversation with you was so easy and pleasurable. What a load of nonsense. Hope you can see that. Sorry to hear about ds going through a bit of a phase. I'm sure it'll be short-lived - you and dh come across as such loving and attentive parents, I'm sure things will be back on track in no time. He was probably like that because the pil were there!

Ds1's big day on stage tomorrow. He's been practising his Queen act incessantly. After tomorrow if I hear 'don't stop me now' one more time I won't be responsible for my actions! Joking aside, I'm very proud of him and impressed that he is up for it. And before the show tomorrow I've been asked to do some official photos of his football team. So its busy busy busy here. (Not forgetting the loads of origami models I've made in the last few days so he can sell them at school today for sports relief).

Any way I must go. I came on here to stall for time. I'm going back to work today and I'm very very nervous. It seems so long since I was there and I'm worried I might have forgotten it all. I'm sure it'll be ok though. Dh could have been a bit more supportive imo. Not a single word of support or good luck or anything. Maybe I expect too much. Maybe expect nothing, then I won't be upset so much. He just doesn't do empathy.

So send your vibes this way please. Work ones for me in half an hour and some rock and roll ones for Sean at about 3.30 tomorrow. Cheers!

kinki, so lovely to hear from you and THANK YOU for your lovely words x x x

Sending you some work and some Freddie > for tomorrow x x x x x x x

Hopey - like the new thread title....very apt! Ryan is sitting quite confidently, but shows no signs of wanting to crawl. And still doesnt roll from his back onto his stomach, always stops on his side. One of my friends also said that she found after 9 months the last bit would shift. No matter what she did before that wouldnt work. My run certainly wasnt fun, but makes me feel better to know i am trying.

Kink - so good to see you posting. Good luck at work today - you'll be fine! I have a work night out next week, so think that'll be a nice way to keep my face in the picture and keep up with all the news.
Also Good luck for the performance tomorrow.
Sorry things arent any better at home.

Hugs, hope everyone else ok.

also - did anyone see the pics of JLo a month after having her twins! she reckons she has lost virtually all of her 50lb weight gain. HOW??????

Hopey I love the thread name! That's genious!
Dal thanks for the hugs, I need them right now am feeling a bit more today, more to do with this stinking cold though, blargh!

Dal JLo has money, that's how!!

Kinki ((((vibes))) I know they're a bit late but you'll still get them anyway

xxx

even started a thread on AIBU about it!

jlo

cannot get my head round how these women do it. money or no money. must have willpower like no other!