September 08 Remember what we were doing this time last year?[wink]

[Debs75goldrings]

So what were we all doing this time last year?

Starlight glad you managed to have a good time despite the pox and the horrible airline staff

Barnpot - your mil sounds a bit of a strain. Can I join you in a rant? P's parents returned the Christmas card I sent cos it wasn't special enough for grandparents, especially bearing in mind the sacrifices his mum makes, having dd1 round many Sundays (I thought she enjoyed this, as she's always asking to have her visit), and how when she helped out when I was in hospital with dd2 when she had bronchiolitis, her 'own family' suffered (her daughter away at uni? Or her husband who wrote the letter with the returned card?? This from people who didn't even give us a card for dd2's birth!!!

So, anyone got any magic cures for cradlecap, especially ones which will preserve her hair??? I bought some shampoo today, but she doesn't like the bath much still. I've been trying olive oil but it doesn't seem to help much. This evening I smeared aveeno on her head - poor thing looks so greasy nowadays! Thank goodness she can wear a hat when out, as she's got greasy hair full of flakes of scalp - poor thing!

starlight - glad you had a good time despite chicken pox and stupid airline!

splish - sounds like the apple didn't fall far from the tree with DP and PiL!
only used dentinox shampoo, but M's only got a couple of very light dry patches...

Splish - Jesus Christ, your post about the card being returned has astounded me, that is totally unbelieveable. What are you going to do? I personally would cancel all contact and tell them to shove it when they next want to see your DD1, reminding them that you don't want their 'life to suffer'. I am outraged!

Oh dear that makes my IL's seem like a dream (.....well sometimes!).

Splish I was recommended Dentinox shampoo for cradle cap but to be fair, it did not make that much difference and just plain water and no fuss was much better. Olive oil also made no difference, but junior oilatum was ok (just very greasy looking!). After a few weeks, it has seemed to have disappeared.

Starlight thanks for the link, although I did not join the Sept 08 group until mid-Jan, it was nice reading the excited/nervous posts, and a little sad thinking about those babies that may have not stuck.

Welcome back Starlight, glad most of the experience was good.

Thanks for the condolences - I think my Dad's OK while he's busy. I imagine it'll hit him after the funeral. We've all just been remembering the influence she's had on our lives.

After the night from hell the night before - M managed to do 7 hours last night (8.30 to 3.30) I went to bed at 9.30 so didn't wake her when I normally do (unfortunately she was wet so I had to change her and then she was WIDE awake and cooing for about an hour - very cute though)

Splish your PIL sound astoundingly awful!! Am impressed you bother with them at all - you are far nicer than me!

T has minor cradle cap - we treat it with some GreenBaby essential oil stuff, but it's only improving very slowly, and if we don't use it for a couple of days it gets worse again.

I think the cradlecap's been there about 3 weeks now, and it's not getting any better, though maybe when she's lost all her hair it will be! It looks a bit red and sore where it's peeled off, and it's definitely itchy, as she rubs her head against me or the sheet sometimes.

She's been sleeping peacefully for nearly 3 hours so really i should be in bed too, but I'm stressing about stupid p and money and can't sleep. Her waking seems to be wind related, she doesn't want to sit up to be winded, starts crying protestingly, then I worry dd1 will wake as we're in the same room - sometimes i end up wandering round the house feeling desperate till she regurgtates then she can settle again. I think it is all a plot to sleep on my chest as she's happiest there but I'm not!

Lolli - I was shocked at them returning the card too, and pretty furious at such rudeness too. I've written back but not sure if I'll send the letter, it's all so ridiculous. I want to say never make any sacrifices though - see dd1 if you want but don't then make out it's some big sacrifice of time and energy! She's only in her early 50s for goodness sake

Ninj really sorry about your gran. Mine died when she was 98, and from being a very active lady into her 90s, the last few years she was totally helpless after a stroke and life was miserable, so I know it was the best thing for her, but it's still a big loss. I remember my gran for all the delicious home baking she did - lovely hot cross buns, jam doughnuts, apple fritters, how she loved to watch sport on tv, did the pools, and had a great sense of humour

splish that's a ridiculous thing for your MIL to do. Don't stoop to her level, they're clearly not worth it you have your lovely DDs to think about. I hope you find some way to extriate yourself from P soon.

starlight glad to see you back!

barnpot ignore ignore ignore MIL, sometimes these old cows just say these things beause they're incapable of polite conversation.

ninja there must have been a memo go round, A also slept a good chunk last night.

A was fed to sleep by 8pm. After 2 or 3 wake ups that turned to 20 minute screams. DH hs finally realised that sometimes A isn't asking to be picked up when he has a little whinge...being picked up makes him more upset and takes him longer to get back to sleep. So we tested 'leaving him to whinge' next time he sounded as though he was waking up. He grumped for about 2 minutes then went back to sleep. Result!

Only thing was he slept through till 2 (rather than 11:30) by which time I was so full that I absolutely had to feed him. He had one more grump at 6am (which we ignored) then didn't properly wake til 7am. So he fed 7:30pm, 2am and 7am. Which potentially means only one night waking for a feed! Have my fingers crossed for further improvements tonight!!

extricate

digigirl, can you get A to send that memo to Diego?

T did not get that memo! He wasn't too horrendous, fed him at 10:30, he woke at 2:45 and had a bottle, and then woke, totally ready to start the day, at 6am.
DP and I have decided if he is still being difficult next weekend we're going to introduce a 'core night' period (probably midnight to 3am initially) in which we will not feed him. We will then extend that period every few days. I am stuffing more feeds than normal into him during the day, and I really get the feeling that the night waking isn't a hunger thing, it's just that he doesn't know how to get back to sleep when he wakes sometimes.

I am so not good with lack of sleep . No coping ability at all. I can already feed myself getting edgy about when DP goes back to work on Mon.

Talk about edgy hopefully... I am so zombified and tired that I just went into a rage and jumped up and down on top of the breast pump packaging. And D is crying again. And I'm not even showered. And I only got 30ml. Sigh.

Digitalgirl Did you follow my happy new year link? It's the first thread and you feature loads.

Splish IMO throw the letter away. Never mention it. Don't react and put it out of your mind. You have greater worries and lack of response will wind them up the most.

PILs are stupid to rile the mother of their grandchildren if they want a relationship with them. Whilst I'm sure you wouldn't use them as bargain power, the threat is always there.

cradle cap Both mine had/have it. I do nothing. I believe that the body has it's own way of regulating the skin chemical balance and if you interfere it will over-compensate. I don't scrub it either but will remove any obvious loose bits. I don't like the greasy look either (which can be dangerous in summer). BUT both my kids have had lots of hair so only noticeable when close up.

pacita My predictable advice would be to do nothing and just go with it. All these things are a phase. When you are happy to sit on the sofa for prolonged periods then allow it, if you have to get up/go out etc. then release as soon as you feel you can get away with it. It won't last forever and it won't set any bad habbits.

As for Baby Starlight, - well she's got jet-lag.

cradlecap i recently put one application of dd1's hydrocortisone on it and it is gone.

Okay, so I've tried to do some rubber-necking wrt the Moldies thread, but can't make head nor tail of it, and have only come across watery pea soup so far.

So if anyone can point me to the meat that's be great. Failing that, explain it in a nutshell.

Ta!

I got onto it far too late, I believe all the threads were deleted except for the one which Twiglet started so all that I think happened was that some older mn users started their own forum to meet on and only invited people they felt comfortable talking to, and most decided to sack off mn completely. However some then came back whinging that mn hadn't missed them (i didn't see this tho so could just be a rumour). Lots of ladies felt shunned when they heard various mates had gone off without them. It was also suggested that the members would put forward names and then vote either yes or no to whether they should be invited to join, again could just be a rumour. Oh, then it got reported in a couple of papers but the write-up was shite and everyone got quotes attributed to the wrong people, which put Rev in some hot water as she was quoted with some awful swearing which she thought could put her job in jeopardy.

Splish, can't believe the cheek of your pil demanding a special card. I second the advice of completely ignoring it.

Katie also has cradlecap but it's not itchy so I'm not doing anything about it, I'll just wait for it to go by itself.

I'm feeling really nervous, I'm applying for a teaching job and it starts end of february! DH is going to be taking care of the girls anyway since he's unemployed and unlikely to get anything that pays as well as teaching. It still seems so soon though. The job is in our town so if I get it I thought I could arrange for dh to bring Katie over each lunchtime for a feed =)

LOL - Thanks! Sounds amusing.

Probaby a good thing that I didn't see the names of the Moldies then coz I would have probably been judgy the next time I came across them (but only for a week or so coz I'd quickly forget knowing me).

The whole thing sounds very silly. Perfectly fine to start own exclusive forum of likeminded people to validate your opinion of your own importance if you want to, but showing off about it in a 'you're not as 'special' as me' way on another forum isn't even silly, - tis boring.

Won't be wasting any more time looking for it then!

Cradlecap, I'm with starlight that it's best for the body to deal with any excess sebum production without interference to avoid overcompensation, however.... I did get rid of Diego's cradle cap, (which was about one inch thick and smelled of cheese) with a magic product I bought in Spain. It's called Kelual lotion, and it's produced by a company called Ducray, which is french. The stuff was magic. You can also use it in the face as it is designed to help the skin regulate sebum production. It's found in pharmacies.

So yes, I'm a bit of a hypocrite...

I've uploaded photos of Diego. It's crazy how quickly our DCs are no longer newborns, but chubby, dribbly, adorable babies...

starlight I just read the last 50 posts on that thread, it seems like a world away that I got that BFP. I feel like a completely different woman having been through pregnancy and childbirth. I knew I would change, was slightly scared of losing the old me...but the new me ain't so bad - impressively patient, a lot less selfish and able to function on very little sleep.

Best of luck with the job app sassy sounds like it could be very convenient.

I got in touch with my employer - testing the ground to see how busy they are. Things are looking very good there which is a relief, was wondering if I would have a job to go back to. Thinking of going back when A's between 7 and 8 months, hoping he'll be a bit more settled into weaning by that point. In some ways I'm scared I'll miss out on important milestones by being at work, and also miss my little boy terribly. In other ways I think it'll be really good for my head to be back in the workplace (even if it's only 3 days a week).

Saying that, DH and I have been discussing when would be a good time to start ttc#2

DG and Sass DP and I are just doing the maths to see whether we can afford for me to be a SAHM. I am feeling a bit as I slightly think we may not be able to afford it, so need to think about flexible working request etc. Can't believe we're having to contemplate work already, still feels like we have newborns to me! Seems insane that on DP's reasonable salary (not quite a higher rate taxpayer, but not a billion miles off) we can't afford to maintain some some of our lifestyle choices (no holidays abroad, no major indulgences, but organic food and the odd bit of new clothing). Need to have a real think about things.

Urgh, am contemplating more formula. Am so sick of this growth spurt. Determined to make it to 16 weeks before introducing another bottle, but just don't think I can face weeks of growth spurt after really feeling we were settling into our day to day life so nicely over the past month.

Hopefully Do what you need to do, but I'd just like to remind you that once through the 16week growth spurt the real benefits of bfing TO THE MOTHER begin. When it's usefulness in terms of a whole host of things OTHER than feeding make themselves known.

You're on the count down to solids too, and that will reduce the no. of bfs a little.

Just a little pep-talk since you've come so far already. Introducing more formula now will be unlikely to ruin the feeding you continue to do, but it does make me sad that many women get to the 16 weeks regression to newborn hell and throw in the towel when just the other side of it is a much better quality of life usually.

Have YOU read the thread I linked to? You were there too!!!

Hi all, welcome back starlight, funny to read that thread now - who did allwillberevealed turn out to be? I can't remember now...feels like forvever ago doesn't it??
Good luck with the job Sassy it must be weird thinking about going back to work for some of you - with DS1 I went back this week (when he was 19 weeks old) but I had a restaurant in Nottingham back then & the manager left so I had no choice, strangely my DH got made redundant the same week, so it worked OK and was actually quite nice for him...this time, I never really had time off! When I came out of hospital, we had guests in the gite - lovely MN'ers coincidentally! So although it's only cleaning once a week, I've still had all the ironing/advertsing/admin to keep on top of which has been hard at times, but at least I don't have the wrench of leaving LO's now...
Hopefully I'm so with you on the bottle thing, I really do know how you feel - I'm totally drained with the amount of feeding this last week or so...however, Samuel won't take a bottle at all, so I've no choice but to persevere until he is old enough to drink from a beaker I suppose

Jenpet you have a gite? where in france are you?That sounds like a lovely lifestyle...

I am determined to get to 16 weeks without any more formula, and see how I'm coping. If I feel in control of it, I'll carry on. Hoping to limp on a bit longer with the 'one more day' strategy. I Know it will get easier if I battle through this, but I just don't know how prepared I am to abandon this nice life we've settled into - I've started cooking properly again, we go for nice long walks without panicking about feeds, I'm going to another group next week.... The thought of regressing to where we were a few short months ago is sooooo depressing.

I do enjoy my life Hopefully, we've met some fab people who came on holiday here - it's not really like working at all - we're in Brittany, 10 minutes from Vannes. Am slightly concerned that the pound/euro parity will affect my bookings this year - although they are on a par with where they were this time last year - I have a theory that everyone who previously went to expensive exotic places will downshift to France and one of the most excellent aspects of living here is the French aspect to children, it really is - in my mind - the perfect place to bring children up...