Feb 08 - Never mind my wrinkly tum, look what's come out of my baby's bum!

[Gill79]

done it

Hey all. DS making me laugh this afternoon. He's kind of learnt to crawl but can only go backwards, so he keeps crawling off his playmat and getting wedged under the sofa!!!

Omy, my DH just seems to be genetically imumune to baby noise at night. I also ignore DS as long as possible although last night I did feed him at 6 and went back to bed. DH took DD downstairs and I got to lie in until 9 - bliss LOL at your DD filling up on crumbs!!

Gill, lucky you on holiday. This time last week I was airborne flying back from France and it already seems like a lifetime ago. Am impressed that you are out running.

Omy ds3 loves the remote control too. I would just let him play with it except that he always manages to press the right button to change the channel or switch it off! I'm trying to ignore him when he wakes but I'm finding that after about an hour he winds up and won't settle without a bf. He slept from 7pm to 5.30am last night though then went back to sleep until 7. ds1 and ds2 weren't up at all although ds1 was up at 5.45 (again).

Is anyone doing anything exciting this we? dh is on a nightshift again tonight so the x-factor's about as good as it's going to get for me.

am ashamed to say that x factor is as exciting as it gets around here too! Though DH and I did nip to the gyn for a sauna earlier leaving the babes with the teenager!
Said teenager has been 'getting ready' to go out with her friend for the last 2 hours! How long can it take to find the shortest skirt in your cupboard and cinch in your waist with a primark stretchy belt! I am so old I remember the last time those belts were in fashion!

I remember those days, makes me feel old.... Oh yes, I am old We don't even get as exciting as x factor.

Evening all - everyone else got wintery rain and wind outside? Its awful!!

Well ds1 finally turned 4 on wednesday. I can't believe he's that old already, its just gone so quickly. Bless him he actually forgot at first!! He came into us as usual when he woke up and I started singing him happy birthday to which I got this 'my mums a nutter' look and why are you singing that? When I reminded him it was his birthday he got so excited and immediately started looking for presents. Out of everything we got him, his fave one was the 99p pack of soldiers I got for his xmas stocking that he discovered at the bottom of a bag that he wasn't supposed to have - typical!!! He had a lovely day and he's got a party tomorrow - we have 18 kids between 1 & 5 turning up at a small softplay - thank god they can just run around and then go home!!

Ginger - sorry to hear you've all been poorly and hope you're feeling better. Its horrible having to go to work when you know they're at home poorly.

Glad those who have had hols enjoyed them, not jealous at all....much!!

MissNat - hope you're feeling better. Food poisoning takes a while to get over and leaves you very battered afterwards. It's soooo annoying when parents (in laws or otherwise) think they know better when it comes to your own children and just do what they like instead of what you ask so totally understand you being pissed off.

Ds2 has started to kind of crawl and its the funniest thing in the world!! I'm so surprised cause he's still quite dinky. He does this kind of half shuffle half drag. Its funny cause he loves being on his tummy but after a while gets a bit frustrated so you have to move him. But now, if he wants something bad enough, off he shuffles!!! We;ve had to tell ds1 now that if he doesn;t want ds2 to get to somehing, he needs to move it out of the way!!! Don't think he's gonna know whats hit him bless him!!

Getting a bit annoyed/concerned as people keep commenting to me that ds2 is quite small for his age so I'm starting to worry now!! Especially as he doesn't seem to want to increase how much he's eating. Some days he'll eat loads, some days not so. He's still having about 22oz of milk split between 2 large and 2 small feeds but he rarely finishes a bottle these days. I did wonder if it was to do with his teeth as they've still not come through but I just keep thinking he is quite small. Then I think well actually he is but he's ok development wise so maybe I'm just being silly. God I don't know, you think you'd be less neurotic second time round!!!!

Now also getting to that time of year where the calendar starts filling up, countdown to xmas, I'm studying for a tax exam and getting ready to go back to work!!! I think I'm going to need some advanced stress counselling...eek!!!

On a plus note, got ds1 into Willy Fog and his 80 days around the world and we're now watching mysterious cities of gold - so fab being able to watch them all again!!!

Hmmmm sorry for the long post!!!

Strawberry re the locket thing for your little girl ,i dont the same with my little girl she had a picture of her brothers and her in one side and a piccie of me and her together in the other convinced her then that we would always be together when she wore it-it worked a treat.
Egg im soooooooo glad to hear you too can get through 15 nappies a day ,people look at me in disbelief when i say the same!!We,ve had a rough few days with our 2,more so jack he seems to be reacting really badly to having cows milk in his weetabix,we just recently started giving them it but his poor wee bum looks like it was burnt he was in agony,since stopping the milk he has cleared up !!!!
Doesnt help mind you that he is cutting 2 more teeth ,he seems to cutting them in 2's which isnt funny at all !!!

Milestones -- who said they should be pointing by now? DS3 didn't point until 16 months... I think girls point earlier than boys, as long as it happens before 18 months I wouldn't worry. No babbling here, either.

Poo-eating - they all do it, given the chance!!

Meals -- I offer DS4 food every time we eat, not really sure how much he eats. He gets much happier if I give him left-over crisps (another BM (Bad Mother) alert). He produces dirty nappies only every 3 days or so, so can't be ingesting much non-milk.

He's just such a grumpy sod, in general, I'm finding DS4 very trying (last month or so). Only happy when held, and even then only sort of happy. Running around after the others plays havoc with his nap times, poor guy. On the positive side, DS4 is cruising, and pushing a trolley across the room. He loves that.

C sections someone I know was told by her surgeon to "pack 'em in", so she had 3 dc (all by CS) in the space of ~3.5 years but I don't understand exactly why, admittedly.

Tyaca -- congrats! Cross my fingers it all goes well for you. There are plus sides to having them close together, especially if same gender.

Nights -- ours are a nightmare, woke up...5x last night, between 9pm to 9am.

Runts -- I have 2 small dc, Count2Ten, seems like we worry now matter what size they are. At least the clothes fit for longer, eh?

hey ladies, all better here thank goodness.

have ds trying to press keys so can't type much. hope all well

Naps are suddenly becoming a problem - she doesn't seem to want to go to sleep any more! And when she does sleep it is for 45 mins instead of an hour and a half! - probably doesn't help that she can hear her sisters through her bedroom door making a racket!

I wonder why? - no teeth yet.....hmmm

tax exam! my god count - I am impressed your brain can cope with facts - mine is mush!

Hi Everyone

Feeling a million times better now. Im so glad its over. Ive never done so much pooping in my life .

Im really excited. My little sis is in labour as i type. Mum has just phoned to say that shes gone from 1cm to 4.5cm in 1 hr!!. It is her 2nd baby though. Hope shes ok. Shes in more pain this time. Cant wait to meet the new arrival, although im going to have to wait until next weekend as i live 90ish miles away .

Has anyone been to toys r us this weekend? They've got some fab deals on the fisher price toys and buy 1 get 1 free on the "in the night garden" stuff. Henley loves in the night garden so we bought him the singing, makka pakka, iggle piggle and upsy daisy and the toew blocks. There all going away for xmas though. My house already looks like a toy store. Im dreading all the toys that hes going to get bought for him.

Hows everyone elses weekend been?

Forgot to say. Henley has cut another tooth. He now has the 2 bottom ones and 3 on the top. Dont think it will be long before the the 4th comes through. I can feel it so i know its there.

Hes driving me insane today. I cant take my eyes off him for 2 minutes. He was crawling in the living room this morning, i went to answer the door and when i turned around to come back in the living room he was behind me and i blardy fell over him. He has got so quick at this crawling business.

Glad you're feeling better MissNatalie.

How did the party go, Countto10 (or maybe counttoalotmore this afternoon) .

On another note, I spoke to my niece-in-law and mentioned that her mother had said that she could'nt help when Katie was born cos my niece would be jealous. My niece denied this, and rang me this morning to say that she mentioned this to her mother, who said that she had said it to avoid looking after Katie. I told my niece that I understand that her mother has had enough of looking after other people (she is the oldest of six children), but that to me, it was wrong to involve another person in her lie. My SIL hasn't rung me to apologise, mind you, she didn't apologise for blocking me in on my driveway a few months ago.

I don't want any contact with my SIL - she makes herself out to be a good observant Jewish woman!

Count - how do you do it all?
I have enough coping with one child.
Tax exam... Wow. Lots of luck with studying and passing.

I used to be a lot more capable.
I dunno, i think a lot of it is DH telling me how capable the women in his family are.
NB: All they do is clean. I want to smell the roses, not clean them!! [grin[

Tyaca - sorry if i've been negative about your news. I've been talking to mums and professionals in RL who have all told me that my experience isn't typical. I feel better on hearing that but also furious that i've had such a lousy time.

What's it like being pg this time around?

Rozzy - Katie loves the remote control so i bought her a toy one to suck .

tyaca it all makes sense now what with your dh being around for the summer. it'll be brilliant, clever you. definitly worth doing with the small age gap if you'll have the summer.
well done on those of you that have gone back to work.
am feeling lousy-have had a snotty cold and sore throat and headache but worst of all have felt really miserable and grumpy. took dh's head off for no reason. i think dd and ds may have same thing as both moody and clingy and snot nosed.
ds is crawling but not as you'd know it, more of a commando heaving-looks exhausting. he still only has two teeth and is struggling horribly with teething. am worrying about his speech. he still doesn't do much babbling and can't seem to copy any sounds. dd was saying dadda by this point. i know they're all different but i just have a gut feeling that his hearing is not brilliant. i rescheduled his hearing test because it was on the 31st dec and we won't be around, but now only available one is for may.
we are going to centre parcs in elvedon forest for a long weekend in november, have some of you been there?

missnatalie --- any news from your sister???

hello all. goodness, it is so hard keeping up with this thread if i dont log on for a couple of days.... given up trying to even follow may 09 AN thread for moment. there seem to be fifty posts a day.

countto10 - i loved cities of gold as a kid. and the theme tune . magic. how does it stand the tests of time. it seemed to last forever and i still cant recall whether they actually found the gold.

gill - your holiday sounds lovely. do you fancy a free entry into a half marathon in november? its your part of the world. well kind of - north london all being much of a much muchness to us southerners.

rozzy - we too are x factoring. saturday nights with a bottle of appletizer and itv 1. rock and roll! bless dh he is good at not drinking when i have to be sober. my favourites are all the girls (but esp kooky blonde diana) and the band JLS. oh, and the former drug one who i reckon is probably going to have her life dragged across tabloids poor girl. BUT that northern irish boychild's got to be favourite i reckon. we give dd her own remote (from old stero)so she doesnt change channels.

princess - not that kind of summer i'm afraid. we lucked out sort of... first ovulation dates after dd moved into her own room. very calculated rather than loved up and lusty! am that ferdy can commando shuffle. as ever i am afraid i use him as a benchmark for dd's progress and as ever she's not up to the mark. darn.

omy -- naps become a big problem here suddenly. its frustrating and now she's going to lots of her groups in trhe morning in a foul mood. dont know what to do - shes also wise to the fact that dummy means we want her sleep and becomes incandescant with rage when we try to give it to her in cot during day. if i work out a solution i will let you know ....

lovemymum - i'm doing good thank you! still not feeling sick. you did not sound negative at all and thinkit sounds like your birth was awful so i dont blame you for feeling like you might like to pace yourself for any future appearances . oh god, ignore your 'orrible SIL - silly woman and such petty nonesense.

ljkk - nice to hear from you and sorry to hear your nights have been tough. yes i agree about the developmental stuff. i think it was rozzy who put it very nicely about not worrying in advance and even then not really worrying. rozzy was a lot more eloquent tho'!

well i have managed to hurt dd in two sepearate ways this weekend. now she's eating lots of solids we've been gradually weaning her off the gaviscon in her milk for her reflux. the other day i gave her a fruit pot thing and she chucked loads of it up and made various screeching noises and rather than think "hmmm.... acidy sweet fruit pot making her sick without gaviscon, must not give her loads of that again" i totally forgot the reflux and blamed it on new brand/flavour. bought new type - i gave her an entire pot after her tea yesterday and screamed with pain til just after 11pm [sad ] . it was awful. she bonkers with tiredness too.

then today i was giving her water in her beaker and god knows what i did but i think i knocked her gum and drew blood inside her mouth. cue second mum induced cryarama of the weekend.

to top off my woes, dh is on day one of a 17 day in a row working stint. six of days of which are til 11pm . we've got really unlucky with the way some of his extra duties worked...

am name changing guys, when i next appear i shall be called swottybetty. its my pregnant name! am very pleased with it....

lovemymum - just saw this birth trauma support thread in childbirth bit of MN and thought might be of interest to you.

I have a shiny new nephew. Sis has named him Damon James and he weighed in at 7lb 3oz. Her DP has just sent me a pic of him but cant really tell what he looks like at the moment. He just looks like one big wrinkle . May sound quite bizzare but im suddenly VERY broody . Just said to my DP "if we BD tonight there is a good chance that i will get PG this month" .

Note to self: must not get PG. Ignore the broodiness, it will pass

Congrats to your sister MissNatalie!

Thanks Tyaca. Will have a look at website.

Why have you changed your name and why to Swottybetty?

Have had to wash the sheet we change Katie on (on the floor to avoid her rolling off the bed). She peed on it - i told DH to put a pampers bed mat under her!

Hello all. COngrats on becoming an Auntie Missnat!

Had to collect DS2 from nursery as he now seems to have the stomach bug that DD had last week. Poor little boy. He is asleep now. He has been asleep most of the day. No temp though.

Your poor ds2 egg, hope he gets better soon.

where did you get your toy remote from Lovemymum I'm getting sick of DS turning channels over or putting the volume up to full whenever he gets the chance

Lots of commando crawling hee too, he hasn't worked out that he needs to lift his torso to crawl yet!

Brill news on your new nephew missnat

How was the skin prick test strawberry? The boiling poo thing is for reducing substances, you add benedicts solution and look for a colour change. If any of you did a level biology you might have done it with a sugar solution instead of poo - much nicer smelling

Hi everyone. Too many posts to respond to but everyone seems to be doing well I think.

lljkk - I really sympathise with the bad nights. Individually none of my dc are that bad but collectively it can be bad at times. Went mad at ds1 and ds2 yesterday when they appeared at 5.30am - I mean that is NEVER going to be a reasonable time to get up - and it was SUNDAY fgs. AND ds1 CAN tell the time and has a watch with a light so no excuses for him. Anyway much better last night so I'm not so grumpy today.

I also have a grumpy lo lljkk. I've spent the bulk of the last 8 months carrying him around with me (happy as larry whenever he's being held). I've been blaming it on teething for around 5 months but as yet we have none. His grumpiness has gone up a notch now though (didn't think that was possible and I can feel a tooth so hopefully it'll cut through soon.

Egg hows your ds2? Poor thing - poor you too I know how precious your Mondays are.

Missnatalie - congrats on your nephew. I too have been feeling quite broody but I think that's because I know we're not having anymore - you always want what you can't have don't you? And I have really enjoyed having a little one again (despite the grumpiness). But 3 boys is enough me thinks.

Count - which tax exams are you doing? I'm a CA but its 8 years since I did my last exam - don't think I could cope now with studying and the kids - good luck.

Glad you're doing well tyaca/swottybetty.

Anyway better go and make the boys tea. Take care all.

I got the toy remote in Fenwicks toy department in Brent Cross. It's made by v-tech and is called "Tiny Touch Phone". Whoops - not a remote after all but it stops Katie eating ours!

Just about to go teach evening class!

Congrats on nephew missnat.

Sorry tummy bug is reaching all corners of mumsnet now. DD1 called today, she has it and so does half her uni by the sound of it. Notice up at nursery about it too. Hope we don't get it a third time .

We have given ds a broken remote (it didn't work after it went through the washing machine!! oops!) and a key board (computer type), he loves both of them lots. Why do they do that? All the lovely educational things and all they want is the remote/mobile phones/ keys and wet wipe packets! Ah well!!

Had best go have 5 mins to get to classroom!