March 2008:A new thread before they start crawling!

[turtle23]

Thought it was about time....

copying from other thread...

mm- my dd can just about do 2 hours of awake time- but it's about 90min sometimes. Sounds about right to me. They need lots of sleep!

My DS sounds similar. In the morning he can definitely go no longer than 2 hours without getting way too overtired and he's then a nightmare to get down. He usually lasts another 2 hours before another nap. Usually 1-2 hours long for one nap, and one hour long for the other. He has also recently added back in a 30 min nap in the late afternoon (4.30-5ish) which seems to get him through his bath and bed routine in a much happier frame of mind.

My LO wakes sometime between 6-7, stays awake for milk and chat for about an hour, then back to sleep again until 10 normally. Up for milk and breakfast (now on 3 feeds a day on advice of HV). Then tends to fade by 12 and really grumpy if kept up later. Sleeps for 3 hours then up until 6pm when crankiness sets in again. If I break the routine by going out to shops or anything pleasant like that, he is one unhappy bunny.
So we went out shopping all day yesterday!

god are some of these dads living in the dark ages, jfly i cant believe those comments i have always been really lucky with dp, i think as we had ds1 when we were both still at uni he was about alot and learnt to be hands on and that has continued with the other three and as he had to look after them all for a week whilst i was in hospital he now knows EXACTLY what is involved in looking after 4 boys and running a house. i have to say the house was a bit of a state when i got back but we are getting on top of it now and dp is being a start, washing and sterilising bottles, doing laundry and hoovering, he can even put all four boys to bed on his own etc tho he still hasnt mopped the floor ever

with sleep ds4 sleeps 12-13hrs at night and then has a big nap from 12till 2or 3 and then a shorter nap from 5-6. if we go out tho he will just cat nap and be a then when we get home he is a grumpy beast till we get him in bed, but he is SOOOOOOO good generally that i cant complain at all

thankyou for the hugs and the kind words, i had visit from my MH team today and they are now visiting every other day instead of everyday, they have been keeping a close eye on me but i am getting there

Oh my goodness - I KNEW that little Ff was a crazy wide-awake child! She wakes up at half 7, and occasionally sleeps from 9.30ish to 10am, but only if we go for a walk with the dogs, otherwise she is happy to play. Down at 12, and always awake by 13.10, then down for another hour or so at between 3 and 4.30, and then she is awake until bedtime at 7.30pm. I have tried putting her down for longer, taking her for walks etc to see if she wants more sleep, but she seems perfectly happy with the sleep she is getting. And, if I'm honest, if it means she will continue to sleep until half seven in the morning (and occasionally til 8, such a considerate child...) I am reluctant to meddle!

freckle face my ds is most similar in routine to your lo, but as dd never slept day or night for any period of time it seems like tons to me!

MB something to consider :
www.second-opinions.co.uk/arthritis.html

also, do you drink lots of diet drinks? Aspartame is heavily linked to a lot of conditions including RA so might be worth cutting out for a while to see if any improvements? I gave it up ages ago when ttc, but one of my friends recently bit the bullet and has noticed a vast improvement in her mental faculties as well as skin condition

Ffreckles, what do you do with her all day to keep her amused for so long?!!

It's reassuring to hear other LO sleep patterns are similar - wasn't sure if DS was just a sleepy (aka grumpy) baby, but it sounds like he is fairly typical

DH and I went out for dinner last night, and unfortunately LO woke up at 11pm and screamed when MIL tried to give him a bottle feed. He had taken a bottle from DH on Wednesday and Thursday night after refusing them the previous week so we had thought he would be ok. Luckily we were just 20 mins away so we could race back to feed him....not sure that MIL will be offering to babysit again any time soon though.

hi all, thank you for the encouragement, it's a real boost. sorry this is a flying visit. having a magic time, ds1 is at nan's for long weekend, we've had builders in last week, swapped study, ds1 and ds2's beds into shared new room. ds2 has just gone to sleep in his new big bed for the first time...i am sleeping in ds1's bed in same room tonight, ds1, back tomorrow...eek...i will then sleep on sofa bed in next room for a couple of nights to help them settle....how will he take it i wonder. think you're confused by the above? wonder how he will feel

oh well, i remember fondly when bed hopping was a wee bit more fun than this

hope all are having good weekends, notwithstanding atavistic menfolk and the dread PND. 4MB, all power to your coping so well. it must have been extreme for you to have to go into hospital, i hope things continue on the up for you now. though the return to the school run is a challenge i bet. i'm getting nervous about doing it for 1 boy in 2 weeks time!

Morning all. I think we might be trying the baby rice today (DS a few days shy of 5 months). I've been trying to hold out, but he has been increasingly fussy and unsatisfied on milk over the last 3 weeks, and is now waking at 11, 3 and 6 rather than just 11 and 5, feeding every 2.5 hours during the day. I just tried to express pre-feed to get out some milk for mixing with baby rice and could barely get an ounce - the boy is ravenous and my boobs can't take the strain on their own any more!

DH and I spent Saturday at the wedding of two of our best friends without DS (my parents babysat). It was a really fabulous day - the weather was surprisingly lovely and the day was full of warmth and laughter, and even surprisingly good vegetarian food (the bride is a veggie!) And it was even more special to be able to have a smoochy dance with DH at the end of the night without a baby sandwiched between us

I'm really not sure why the bride being a veggie warranted a ! in my previous post - being vegetarian is hardly that unusual, is it? My brain is like a teenage girl's nowadays - full of fluff and bad punctuation

ds has been very grumpy and windy so we are bacjk on dentinox which he hasnt had since he was a month old or so

I am very upset about some 'vandalism' (sounds overdramatic hence the '') but if you know about pushchair repairs please check my thread so i dont overtake the board with my miserableness

have been room swapping here too, ds sharing with dd and so far a big sucess, she has always been a terrible sleeper but is better with her baby bro looking after her!

Hey littleducks, sorry no idea about repairs, but hope you're feeling ok and not too rattled.

Hq, how did the feeding go?

Hi! I've been lurking these past few weeks. We started on solids when Matthew was just short of five months because he started waking up in the night again for feeds, wanted a bottle at least every three hours in the day and was fascinated at the sight of us eating.

I started him on a quarter of Farleys Rusks mashed in milk. After he had his first taste, he snatched the spoon from me and jammed it in his own mouth!

He's on baby porridge at the moment, which he has at about 6pm. It definitely helps him to get through the night. Although he still wakes up, it's because he's looking for his dummy, rather than a bottle.

Morning! Feeding was greeted with supreme indifference and no eating by DS so I think I'm going to be leaving him a while longer (although I guess maybe he hated the baby rice - I tasted it and was underwhelmed ). We'll try again next weekend.

We're having a nightmare at the moment with him TBH - waking at 11, 3 and 5.30 at the moment rather than usual 11 and 5, and started newborn cluster feeding again. Yesterday was farcical - fed at 3.30, 6.30, 8.30, 11, 1, 4, 7, 9 and 11... Increasingly faffy feeding has been going on for about 4 weeks now - combination of virus, growth spurt and now I think teething (very sore gums and shrieking a lot), plus he is pooing a lot which is very unusual for him and he keeps waking up from naps because of it. As DH said before staggering out to work just now - this is way worse than when he was a newborn. Because there just seem so many things going on, I'm a little reluctant to try and wean him until he's a little happier, although he may not get happier if it is actually food he really wants... So I'm in a bit of a nelly with it all at the moment.

I knew DD was a wakeful baby- I am sooo jealous- she is up at 7-ish, awake till maybe 10 ish, asleep for a paltry half hour, awake till maybe 1, another half hour sleep and as often as not that is it for the day. And she gets so grumpy by 4 but if I try to put her down she just screams. She's asleep now because she has a stonking cold but I don't imagine it'll be for long. On the plus side, when she is awake she's relatively low maintainance. At the moment her favourite thing to do is to sit in her bouncy chair throwing her arms above her head a la mexican wave making the bouncy chair... umm.. bounce. She sounds like some of the other girls as well- very minimal rolling but a whole heap of sitting up. I put her in the baby nest the other day and she thought it was fantastic. What with sounding like her momma after a night on the Gitanes, and sitting up concentrating very hard on picking something up like her momma after a night on the wine, I have quite a clear mental image of her at 16 .
5 months old today- not weaning just yet as the night feeds have dropped back down to one or maybe 2 and she is so faffy during the day.

On the feeding front, I'm not starting to wean properly until around 26 weeks, but I have been giving him a little taste at lunchtime. So far he's had a taste of pureed pear, carrot and sweet potato. The carrot was a bit stringy I think and put him off, but he wolfed down the other two and nearly made himself sick by grabbing my hand to get the spoon further in his mouth!

Still BF, and after unsuccessful attempts a couple of weeks ago to replace one or two daytime feeds with a bottle, I'm now really not sure what I'm going to do. We had a few nights recently of having feeds at 7pm, 11pm, 3am and 6am (which is fantastic for him), but last night reverted to 7pm, 10pm, 1am, 4am, 6am...yawn... He's also not settling after feeds quite as easily as he normally does at night.

On one hand I feel I want to wind down BF now, but on the other hand it's such a palaver trying to get him to take a bottle (has to be at the perfect temperature ) and the thought of trying to heat it up etc when out and about..

So, I'm hoping he'll drop a feed or two once he's on solids properly. Ideally I'd really like to just keep his bedtime feed and any nighttime feeds going and use bottles for the rest.

Anyway, it's pouring down here and LO and I have an exciting trip to the supermarket this afternoon so better dash

fit - she is nice and easy to keep amused to be honest. We've got two rottweilers, so have plenty of walks and dog stroking. She is so close to crawling now, so we spend lots of time on the floor playing. I do find myself frantically trying to get stuff done during her two sleeps.

ds2 also makig frantic crawl/swim attempts. roars with anger when he can't do it! feel scared, won't be long before have 2 to run after. ouch.

Not been on for a while. Ridiculously busy at the moment.
Rather about my miscounting of weeks in last post. But, DS is definitely 6 months tomorrow, 28th Feb-28th Aug. Where did that time go?
DS is now on three meals and four 8oz feeds a day. We're doing a combination of the odd stage 2 jar, slightly mashed family food and finger food. Asparagus goes down very well and makes me feel like a good mum .
We bought a Baby Einstein activity station on ebay last week. It's fabulous to put him in as DS now cannot be left anywhere unrestrained unless closely supervised. He can basically get anywhere he likes now through a combination os 360' rolls and forward shuffling.He also has fun in there, although not sure I can bear the "music" for too long. I looked at the Leapfrog Learn and Groove but we thought that we would be driven bonkers in a matter of seconds with the sounds.
We have also been treated to some fine dispalys of frustration. He starts hitting us or growling and goes red in the face. I think it's usually because he can't get his food quick enough, even when I spoon feed him. He also has a spoon and is pretty good at putting a loaded spoon in his mouth. I'm still not sure how much food to give him. We haven't reached a point yet where he has refused to eat any more. I'm reluctant to give him too much as I still want him to have his milk. Any tips?
Oh and something scary/exciting. DP and I have booked to go to Amsterdam for my birthday in December. And we are going sans enfants . DD will go to her Dad's as usual but DS will be going to DP's sister in St Albans. Will have to start leaving him there for short times soon and build up to the four day slot in December. WE're only going for 2 nights but early Fri flight and Sun even flight home mean that DS will be there from Thurs till Mon. I'm sure he'll be fine but I'm already feeling anxious. Someone tell me he'll be ok and I'm not a neglectful mother.
Hope everyone is ok. And that those of you with wakeful babies get some respite soon. DS doesn't tend to sleep lots in the day, an hour in the morning, sometimes 2 in the afternoon but I'm not complaining as we still have the 12 hours at night. If anyone feels at that, perhaps I can redress the balance by saying that I have lost no weight since the baby was born, in fact it's highly likely I have put it on. Oh well, going to try and lose a stone (ha, only five more to go) before Amsterdam.

oops, also meant to say to littleduck that I'm sorry about what happened. I'm not surprised you're feelong miserable. DP went out to his motorbike parked in a bay around the corner this morning to find it tampered with and covered in saliva. . There are a lot of boys round here who just hang around (the Fieldgate Massive, ffs).

littleduckS aggggh. That's what happens when you're rushing.

Thanks glam

today is not our best day, ds had his last set of jabs yesterday and has been grumpy since last night with a temp, i am knackered and got no sleep last night as ds needed to be rocked constantly to stop him waking everyone

and now ds has been crying because i gave him calpol and dd has been crying because i didnt give her calpol [sigh]

Saturday night I let DS go to someone for 24 hours. He'd only met her that afternoon. First time he's ever been away from me for more than 2 hours, even with DH. I cried like a lunatic for 3 hours, hiding in a wardrobe. Am I nuts?
*needless to say, he had a grand old time.