August 2007- The one where we miss our plonkable babies! They're licking the pram wheels as we type...

[JamesAndTheGiantBanana]

New thread!

Fingers crossed for you Conker.

Thanks my2weegirls. Can't remember who I was discussing hats with before we went as Caitlin wouldn't keep one on. However as you can see from the pics we managed to get one with ties on (a £2.99 bargain from H & M - I love their baby's clothes) and after realising she couldn't pull it off she gave up and kept it on no problem.

Had our 8 month check yesterday - all fine. She's on the 91st centile for weight and 98th centile for height - definitely a tall girl.

She only woke once last night (at 12.15) so hopefully she's getting back into her normal sleep pattern.

Hi everyone

hope we are all well. i have had a quick skim read, but not taken much in TBH empty head syndrome!

knickers - congrat's on the little boy

conker- hope the house happens, i'm sure it will work out for you

lizzie - at dh not changing any nappies, they have it good some dh's,

MAJOR achievement. we got LL to take a bottle yesterday and today. it only happened because I went out at night a LL finally decided to take a bottle, it has taken weeks.I was getting quite worried as i couldn't get water or anything into him, and I'm sure i'm not making enough milk now.
I also have a cut nipple, from his sharp teeth, so it's not much fun bf now.

We had ds's birthday on the weekend he is now 3 so grown up already. he had such fun and is already planing his next party, all the kids were so well behaved thanks to dh's game coordinating, but i'm still exhausted after all the food i cooked, next time i'll be tempted to just throw frozen food in the oven!

Meandmyjoe - my baby free day was lovely. I got to spend some quality time with dd. I had to threaten her with not going swimming to get her to make her dad a father's day card though I missed ds but it was nice to be able to relax for once and not have to worry about him falling over or getting hold of something he shouldn't.

Well done Callum for walking. Alex is standing holding on lots and seems to forget that he can't stand or walk by himself - he has fallen over several times leaning to reach something.

Congrats on the job tasha! Maybe you should start this job and then look for something else later on.

Glad you're better Lizzie. Hope you have a great holiday. How did Lizzie enjoy visiting school?

James - dh got nothing from me for father's day and I don't think he really cared. Dd made a card and a strange 'chocolate in a baby food jar with a bee on top' present at pre-school. I know it sounds awful but I was really feeling like dh does very little when it comes to the kids. I'm on duty constantly and I have to ask him to watch the kids when I want to do something. I had a morning out with a friend on Saturday and I felt like he resented me for making him babysit. He was in such a foul mood. I was only out for a few hours and he couldn't stand the thought of having to stay indoors with them so he went to his sisters. He made me late going out because then I had to help him get the kids dressed etc

Great news about your ds taking a bottle uki. Ouch about the cut though. Hope it heals soon.

He did it! He can finally crawl!!

Congratulations LLB! You must be very proud! I was ridicullously excited when Joseph finally cracked it after months of going backwards . Anyway, welcome to the 'missing your plokable baby' club. I have to say, I don't miss it AT ALL!!! Joe is so much happier to be mobile and I don't have to carry him around all day now! Although I did catch him tipping over the dogs water bowl earlier but managed to catch him before it went all over the kitchen floor.

Me and Joseph made a home made pizza today (well he watched a bit, then scurried around my feet playing with some tupperware) but it's a good meal for him cos he loves it and I make everything so it is salt free but yummy!

at your dh gill, I know what you mean. My dh is good with ds but I always feel like I have to ask for him to keep an eye on ds when I go out the room and never really like asking for a day out without ds. I know he works hard and all that but I work just as hard only I'm on call 24/7. It pees me off that the days dh is at work, I do EVERYTHING for ds, if he gets up in the night, I deal with it, then have to get up at 5am with him, get him his breakfast, dh stays in bed. Which would be OK if he got up with him on his days off, but no, that's HIS DAY OFF! Hello, I've only had 9 hours off in 10 months!

Anyway, rant over sorry .

Enjoy your holiday Lizzie. I'm rather fancying a nice holiday myself. I think me and dh may take Joseph to the Lake Distict or something cos it only takes 1hr 45 mins to get to in the car, which hopefully Joseph would sleep for most of it. I'd love to go back to Cornwall but I don't really fancy a 5 hour journey with a baby in the car!

Uki, well done on the bottle, hope it continues. I'd deffinitely go with the frozen food next time, far too tiring cooking for lots of people!

Conker, how did the house offer go? I'm keeping my fingers crossed for you!

My2weegirls, Joe is always getting bumps and bruises . It's strange but now he's pulling up and taking the odd steps, he seems to get a new bruise everyday! The really embarrassing thing is that I don't even know how or when he gets them. He doesn't cry as if he's hurt himself, I guess he's too busy to notice.

Anyway, better go put Joseph to bed x

Thanx. I'm so pleased, but also a bit sad of the growing independence.

LBB - Congratulations on the Crawling, my LO started crawling on Saturday for the first time, he had only been pulling himself along before which he seemed quite happy with but now, whoosh he is gone, im bloody knacked! Thought i had a reasonable child friendly house, i do for any children over the age of 2! - all i have said sine Saturday is No - He even shakes his had with me an Laughs!

Lizze - sorry to hear about you granddad, how did it all go?

Conker - good Luck with the house stuff, we are having to put mine on the market in January as we are upping sticks and moving to west midlands (or there) - all very scary as we dont know NO ONE but husband job is relocating abouts., i am nervous but my self confidence has grown over the last few years so i will just have to get out there and meet people!

GillL - sorry to here about DH, i must say that mine can be great at times, am off on a Hen weekend in July for 3 days so love to se how he will cope then!

Tash - congratulations on the Job offer, are you taking it?

HELLO to everyone else and sorry if i have missed anyone! I am trying to keep up,you are just all so chatty!

Hiya Pink, I know what you mean, I've mean saying no all afternoon!! It was ok when his movement was limited coz you knew you could pop out the room for a minute and he'd be fine, but now he's straight under the table with a plug in his mouth!

Thanks for asking about grandad, the doctors have said he has a blockage in his intestines which they will be able to clear, but they are uncertain if he wants to get better.

Congrats on the crawling lbb, and welcome to the stage where you now have to look where you are putting you feet otherwise you will stand/trip/fall(delete as needed) your child .

hi everyone.

pink - i reckon if you have to move somewhere that you dont know anyone, going with fairly young children is definately the best time as you have an immediate in with groups to go to etc and people are much more friendly and likely to chat - sure you will make new friends very quickly.

congrats on the crawling lbb - ds is like joe - much happier now that he can do what he wants.

didnt get the house we wanted - the guy is holding out for 20% over the offers over price and we could only go to 10% which is normal at the moment in that area. his house has been on the market for months too and he's dropped the price once, but still - think the estate agent thought he would take it, but its up to him. anyway - found another that we like at a slightly lower price - more interest in it though so might go for higher, but we have sold our own - our neighbours are desperate to move into ours and they are not looking at anything else so its an offer on the table for as long as we want which is quite a luxury at the moment.

gill - shame about your dh - really think its them thats missing out by not taking a fuller part in things. but that doesnt help when you have almost all the responsibility.

Well done LLB and Pink's babies for crawling. Ds is nearly there but he can move a lot quicker commando crawling so I don't think he's in any hurry to properly crawl. My house is the same as yours pink - child friendly for an older child. I'm going to have to move all of the dvds this weekend. We don't get time to watch them anyway.

Sorry to hear about the house Conker. Hope you get this one. From your experience it sounds like the housing market isn't in as much of a crisis as they're reporting. Or are the problems specific to England?

I agree with you conker about dh missing out. I'm sure he'll be fine once the dcs are older and he doesn't have to worry about feeding, tantrums and naps etc. He's fine if they're happy and well behaved but the first sign of a whinge puts him in a bad mood.

i think that the housing thing is worse in England than in Scotland - there are definately fewer sales going through as our firm, (and every other one I know) are a lot quieter than this time of year normally, but there are still people buying and selling and those that are up here are still sometimes looking for a fair amount over.

A year or two ago, you could get 15 - 20% over the offers over price, and now you'd be lucky to get 10% over, but some people are still looking for more.

Thing is, the offers over price is set by the Estate Agent after discussing it with you, so its just a false number based more on what you want to get than the value of the house - a stupid system in a lot of ways.

thought i'd killed the thread again there - seems like Wednesdays are the days that everyone else is busy, and I am stuck at work bored.

Sorry about the house conker. The offers over system is Scotland seems odd to me - why can't they just price the house at what they want to sell it for and be done with it.

We grew yet another tooth yesterday and finally it's a top one. It did seem to hurt her though and she fell asleep in my arms at 8.20 last night after a comforting scoop of ice cream and some baby nurofen (which she much prefers to calpol) and luckily we didn't hear a peep out of her till 7.50 this morning.

She also began backward crawling yesterday, but think she was actually trying to go forward so ended up further away from the toy she was trying to reach much to her frustration.

Hi, sorry haven't read the thread at all, hope everyone's ok I'm just so busy, got 7 pieces of work building up, but just wanted to say AARGH I just found a hair bobble in James's poo! The covered elastic, held together with a bit of metal type. Oh god I had no idea he would/could eat them!

Was it tied in a nice neat bow .

the housing market round my way seems to be as strong as ever...funny how it all works. we got this house 2 years ago for a few grand less than the fixed price that the owners wanted.

conker will you be able to save on fees and do some of the solicitor work yourself - that would be a big big saving (think we were about 5K for all ours).

james - he'll be fine (was going to say something about him trying to do a 'fern' but that's bad taste ). dd2 picked something up off the floor and ate it last night and i have absolutely no idea what it was - i just saw something yellow go in, get chewed (with the yum yum noises) and before i could get my finge in her mouth it was gone. they all do it.

lizziemum - how's your grandad? hope they are taking good care of him

hersetta - won't be long before she starts to go forward.

llb and pick lo's - well done on the crawling!

dd2's latest trick is to reach out for something she wants e.g. dd1s hobby horse , look at me, grin crinkling her nose up and saying 'bah'. very cute.

i've got the dentist tomorrow to get a cracked tooth fixed . the lignocane doesn't always work with me so i'm getting nervous.

gill - sorry about your dh. mine is very good at helping with the girls, but sometimes i wish he wouldn't as he gets crabbit and moaney when too tired (as we all do). whereas i (the martyr that i am ) just get on and do it.

hope everyone else is ok?

My2weegirls, good luck at the dentist, hope everything is properly numbed for you.

Lizzie, hope things are ok with your grandad. No the bobble wasn't tied in a bow! I'm watching the little sod like a hawk now.

Hersetta they go back before they go forward, she might only be going backwards for a few days before she gets it. Sounds like she's got loads of teeth, still two here but lots of red cheeks. Great pics!

Uki owww @ your cut nipple, that must be sore, congrats on him taking a bottle.

LBB, Congrats on him crawling, hope your house is babyproofed and stairgated. About two hours after they start crawling they can manage stairs, it's scary!

Pink, it's a shock isn't it, what they can find to fiddle with. My lo has a particular fondness for the oven as he can see his face in it (trollop)

Meandmyjoe, glad your dp liked the cup, I think my dp guessed because I left the box on a low shelf and he doesn't miss a trick so (Mega mega geek alert!) I suspect he googled the company address printed on the side of the box and saw it was snapfish then went to their website and looked what products they sell in a cup sized box. I have no proof of this but yes he IS that geeky. Anyway, he loved the cup and that's all that matters!

Gill, once again your dh sounds a lot like my dp. They mind the kids "for you" and "as a favour to you" - I was so frazzled and stressed out the other day by the time dp got home from work I didn't want to talk, I didn't want a hug, I just wanted him to take over looking after James for an hour while I had some time to myself and regained a bit of equilibrium, I explained this but he still got in a big shitty mood, took it personally and stropped because I asked him to watch James. Perhaps they'd prefer us to be snappy end-of-tether harridans, eh?

Conker sorry your offer on the house wasn't accepted, must be a stressful time for you. How are the chickens?

Tasha, are you taking that job? How are the boys?

I'm off to mums n toddlers shortly. REALLY don't want to, I regret it every time but James gets no contact with other children at all so I should, for his sake. I hate sitting there with no-one to talk to, though, feel like such a massive loser!

Back later x

wow am impressed james and my2weegirls - proper posts catching up with everyone - i am never that organised or cant remember what i meant to say to people by the time i get to post.

my2weegirls - yes i will do the work myself, but its the stamp duty and estate agent fees that are the big ones - but will save up to 1k on solicitors fees for sale and purchase combined so yes will be a bit of a saving.

i love the way their personalities are coming out and sounds like your dd2 likes to make people laugh. ds does too - he's constantly on the lookout for somebody to talk to when we are out and about - he takes after dh that way rather than me.

james - hope toddler group is ok - is there anybody else sitting on their own that you can chat to or is it quite cliquey? dh always finds that if he takes ds to playgroup, and he (dh with ds) starts playing with some of the older children, eventually some of the mums talk to him cause they see their kids having fun with him - you could always try that?

had a second viewing last night but we are non-smokers and they have been smoking there for 19 years so would take quite a lot of work and carpets going out etc to get the house smoke free. but will think about putting an offer in.

its our anniversary today so going out for lunch - something to look forward to as i sit bored at work. la la la.

sorry - a bit all me me me again - i must learn from james and my2weegirls example.

lol at your dh james working that out.

hope the dentist isnt too painful my2weegirls but suppose its better to have it done now and get it sorted.

agree about the annoyingness of men thinking they are doing you a favour by looking after the kids. dh is very good (and stays at home with ds 2 days a week) but he said yesterday that since he's got up the last few nights every other time ds woke, he was going to have a night off getting up . Did wonder when it was going to be my night off given that he's woken every three hours or less (apart from one or two fantastic nights of five hours sleep in a row) since he was born overnight - and dh only started helping when ds turned 10 months.

wonder where some of the others are. havent heard from mamamila or sagpuss for a while.

anyway sorry rant over.

Conker, 90% of my posts are big selfish ones, I just try and catch up with everyone now and then when I've been awol a day or two. Got lots of work going on at the moment which is a good thing but I'm having to deal with things like tax returns which isn't so good, and as usual the housework is piling up around me!

lol at your dh having a night off from getting up with ds- bless his little cotton socks, eh!! I didn't get to sleep til 4am last night because as I was going to bed James woke up and just wouldn't settle, I put him in bed with us and he still wouldn't sleep, kept standing up against the headboard and smacking the dividing wall and then he had me up at 7.30, little swine. There should be a bleary eyed zombie-parent emoticon.

Went to mums n toddlers, it was ok this time as there were less people there. There were two distinct "cliques" today but I gave them a wide berth and got chatting to a nice woman with a 14 month old dd, and James got a birthday party invite from a guy I've met a few times there who has a dd turning 1 tomorrow. I said yes as I was caught a bit off guard, and then realised after we are off to south wales tomorrow so won't be able to go. Don't have his surname or phone number, but I'd feel rude not turning up so might have to drop a card round instead. And I can't remember his dd's name either, I'm so crap!

sorry havent been on much its hectic here. lo has started saying hiya lol and they thought he wouldnt be able to say words until his palate is repaired. im gonna see how the boys get on without me when i go to college in sept and if they get on ok then ill consider going back but i think ive left it till ds2 is at a awkard stage for childminding as hes with me all day every day and is a real clingy mummys boy. ok im sorry im gonna have to catch up when i get the kids to bed. hope everyone is wellxxx

Hi all. I'm soooooo glad it's Friday evening. I've been moved to a different team where the work is much more varied and reactive so I've been really busy. I guess it's better than the hum drum of my previous team where every day was the same. I'm also at a desk now where everyone can see my screen so no sneaky peeks at mumsnet outside my break.

I've been very clumsy lately. In the last few days I've smacked my head on the boiler and the desk in our office (2 different places but on the same day), bruised my hip on the car and hit my leg with the bottom of the safety gate. I think it's hormonal though. Hopefully it will be over soon as I've got so many bruises now.

at the hair bobble in James' poo! Dh put some beads in his mouth at my mum's the other day. Fortunately dh noticed before he swallowed them. This morning he pulled dd's bowl of cereal off her little table and grabbed a handful of soggy cornflakes. I'd only just dressed him and had to change all of his clothes and clean the carpet.

How did it go at the dentist my2weegirls?

I don't really like going to mum and baby/mum and toddlers groups as I'm not very good at making conversation. I had intended on going to some for dd's sake when I was on maternity leave but I could always find something better to do. I did stay for the stay-and-play after ds was weighed each week though if dd wanted to play.

Happy Anniversary Conker. How was lunch? When I need to catch up I open Notepad and type replies one by one as I read so I don't forget what I want to say.

James - hope you manage to get all your work done. That must be a relief after worrying it was getting quiet. I hope they're not taking advantage of you again. Did James sleep better last night?

Tasha - that's great news about ds3's speech. Will you be at college full time? Kids normaly adapt well to being with other carers once they get used to the fact that mum's going to be at work/college regularly. Dd loved her last childminder even though she was definitely a clingy mummy's girl and cried every day when I left her for the first couple of weeks. She hates it when I turn up at mum's in the evening. She always wants to stay there with the other kids.

Wow, sorry about the long post. Didn't realise I'd typed so much!

conker what a shame about the house.

congrats on the crawling babies!

my2weegirls hope the dentist went ok.

thanks for all the congrats on the job it was a big boost.

bloody hell im really trying to catch up here but ive been doing the whole super nanny approach and have done laps up and down the hall for the past 2 and a half hours with ds2 aaahhhh gonna kill him and ds1 keeps waking up with coughing and high temp that wont go down ive diven him everything he can take.

back soon ds1 crying ive put new pics on profile

Gorgeous pictures tasha. Ds3 looks cheeky Hope ds1 feels better soon and you get to sit down.