June 2008: Nine months in, nine months out

[Essie3]

Here's to the next nine months!

AMber i wish I had a secret double life, just a tiring one so can only cope with MN as my escape from reality, if I added another nothing would get done.

right must crack on, have removed all my old books etc from my parents house they are moving next week, must go empty laundry basket refill and sort out more washing and then go grab Sebastian back from the lady over the road. Very tempting to leave him there

Hello,

RE water ds doesn't drink very much, he likes to get alot in his mouth anfd then fire it out! DD2 wasn't a big drinker either.

libra sorry about your nan.

I have a breadmaker but it's quite old. I tend to use it just for the dough cyle and then I shape it, let it rise again and bake in the oven.

Josey Glad to hear it was nothing serious with Oli. I still can't believe how much hair she has, looking at the fb photos some bables have none at all!

Jamie doesn't drink water very well but dryinks lots of diluted prune juice (very good for poo). Maybe this could be worth a try?

Sponge my dd was walking by 9 months and also went into her (late) 8 month check under own steam. She did look a bit odd though as she was so small. I guess we are going to be hitting that stage soon, J is cruising well and starting to let go and try to stand unaided. He is also a demon crawler now, I plonked him on the mat yesterday and went I turned around he had legged it into the dining room and was pulling books out of the bookcase!

Forgot to add, Josey, so glad to hear Oli is going to be ok.

GRRR don't talk to me about breadmakers - went out for walk with friend leaving strict instructions with dss to answer door while I was out as breadmaker due to be delivered before 1...got back to find a delivery note - he claims he didn't hear the door as they didn't ring (am not sure whether to be as that may be true) but anyhow no breadmaker, I'm buggered if I'm wasting another day (cos that is all you can do on their computer helpline)waiting in for this.

And it would have been a panasonic one with raisin/nut tray...whcih are meant to be good.

re 8 month check I've not had a note abotu it yet (apparently they're dead short on hv) but concerned as edie doesn't really do sitting up ...

Poppy she will do it in her own time. I thought ds1 would never roll over. Other mums babies were rolling all over the place and he just lay on his back and waved his legs around. He was just chilled out! He got there eventually so try not to worry too much, Edie will too.

thanks sybil - wasn't worried as she seems fine in every other way but last thing I want is some hv stirring it up on her test.

Have reordered breadmachine on before 10.30am delivery - is it sad that I was really looking forward to playing with it this afternoon (poor old dss got it in the neck ).

plus need some stodge to feed my cold ....

Breadmachine - I bought one once. I only ever managed to make breeze blocks in mine. It smelled great but what came out of it could only be used for housebuilding. I don't quite know what I did wrong!

Libra - so sorry about your nan.

Luke uses a cheapo tomee tippee cup and does well with it. He seems to love water and gets through loads but he does let it fall out of his mouth too. I think it just feels nice. I stick one of those catch all plastic bibs on him and it catches all the dribbled water. I have put handles on his bottles too and he feeds himself now - I guess he likes to have the control.

Luke is becoming a right little speedy gonzalez with his crawling too - very cute especially since he has such a miniscule bum! (doesn't get that from me

Libra, sorry abour your Nan, mine died a couple of weeks ago I still feel sad.

I am also a bit tired and that always makes me feel down. T and E are being very demanding right now cos they are not quite crawling, they can move slowly backwards but get frustrated and I think their teeth are bothering them so they are just pretty cranky and demanding right now! Usually I can just put them down on their play mat and they are happy for ages. Hoping to get back to that soon!

I get bitten sometimes during BFing, usually by E. I just shout 'no!' and she usually lets go (it hurts!) and then I say firmly 'no, that hurts mummy' but it is usually when she has had enough and is getting a bit bored/distracted.

Essie, I have to start at 7/7.30am now too but it is OK if they have slept through. I was up once last night with T, but E slept through. I went to bed at 9.45pm and got up this morning at 7.45. Still feel tired though! Can't be bothered with anything and feel very lazy! But I have a friend coming this afternoon so really need to sweep this floor .

Work rang me (finally!) about going back. Unfortunately he hasn't done anything about finding out if it's ok for me to do one day. He is now going to talk to my line manager (couldn't he have done that four weeks ago?) to see if it is viable but is already saying 'there's an obvious business need' ie for me to do more than one day a week. If I can get two days I'll be happy, and I was thinking the other day sod doing compressed hours, I want to work my normal hours (10-6) have an hour's lunch break as normal and get home after T&E's tea and bath. I could arrive home at 7pm just in time to give them a little cuddle before bed. Now that would be a nice break!

Sorry for your loss libra, hope you are not too swamped.

Neenz you would not be human if you didn't feel tired once in a while - you certainly seem by far the most holding-it-together of the twin mums I have known! Sorry I've forgotten - what are the childcare arrangements going to be for T and E? Definitely coming back once all the work is done is the way to go if you can - otherwise you end up doing 'second shift', coming home to do another round of work before you can chill out. Much nicer to come back to a pair of clean, happy, well-fed children in time for lullabies and bedtime story cuddles!

I have the reverse tonight - dp is working late so I have to pick up both kids myself (we normally do it together), get recalcitrant toddler in and out of car and walk home while baby is in carrier on my front, feed both of them and do soothing-baby-bedtime and crazy-toddler-bedtime somehow at the same time - argh! wish me luck guys!

neenz sorry you're tired - its a killer when you're used to sleep. I've posted a video on fb to cheer you up -I don't think a future as a sleep guru beckons

Love the vid poppy!

Have just posted something in our FB group cos can't post on here as think person involved reads my posts .

However, slightly concerned at thread title I used - as it's a closed group will it show up on anyone's page who isn't in the group?

Have asked another RL friend to check and she says no. Sorry, I'm waffling. Incident upset me.

Hope all is well with everyone. Had an email from my IVF consultant today which slightly brought me back down to earth with a bump as she says the HCG results do not preclude an ectopic . Only a scan can do that.

Back to the waiting game . . .

Evening all, just a quick read to keep up to date before I get back to the studying.

Sympathies with those that are feeling very tired - S finally seems to have gotten over his short phase of waking at 4-ish and not really going back to sleep, but ironically now I've had one or two nights of decent-ish sleep I feel worse!

Neenz - I'm with you on 'sod it' to compressed hours. I thought about it and decided against (although tbh I dont think my boss would have gone for it). My worry was that if I did compressed hours, there would be no slack in the day at all. Before mat leave if things were hectic or there was a bit of an emergency then I could take a short lunch or work late but if I was doing compressed hours I'd be doing that already. Too stressful for me. I'm about 45-mins to an hour door to door each way as well so not enough hours in the day. The road closures for the tram works are going to really affect me too - there is no way at all to get to S's nursery without going through one of the worst affected areas .

SA good luck with the bedtimes!

8 months check - have been told that we dont get them here and he wont get a check now till he goes to school . Is anyone else in Scotland getting an 8 month check? Also, for those that have had them - what do they check?

No crawling here. We tried gymbabes yesterday which looks like it would be quite fun for babies that are clambering around by S absolutely hated it so I dont think we'll be going back. I was looking for an activity for my day of with him, but I think we'll stick to jo jingles which he loves!

Right, need to get cracking - sorry for not chatting enough with everyone. Haven't even had much of a chance to nosy at people's pics on fb!

bdq I think it takes about 2-3 days to catch up for every night lost.

and think you're right re hours - had mate who started by doing mornings only and ended up swopping as said it was always ending up in her geting caught at wokr or rush to get home...

also thanks for heads up re gym- was thinking about it for edie but sounds might may be too early.

sponge I think our fb group comments limited to just members. but have replied to your post -have similar delicate issue

Changed the name of the FB thread!

Sympathies with all those who are tired and/or having problems with work. I think they make it as difficult as possible for us to go back cos truth be told most employers don't want p/t workers .

BDQ, 8 mth check: head circumference, motor skills, hips, pincer grip, discuss sleep/eating, health of the mother. Coverage of 8 mth check seems patchy even in England.

BDQ no check here either. I invite my friend who's a paediatrician round for coffee regularly then fire questions at her!

sponge no-one who's not in the group can see anything but the name of the group and the picture if I understand it correctly - that's why I chose those settings! I have slightly de-privacied a bit so that people can find me, as I was feeling un loved with no friend requests...

Libra sorry to hear about your Nan, hope you are bearing up OK.

poppy hope your breadmaker arrives tomorrow. I am also with delivery people. I am expecting 3 parcels and none of them arrived today when I am off work. We've order a bushbaby child carrier for C and I was really looking forward to playing with it. I am such a child when it comes to parcels, the bigger the better!

SA hope bedtime went smoothly.

right, I'm full of the cold, Lottie is full of cold and I am considering having a gin and calpol. (thanks for suggestion Sponge)...

is it too early to go to bed?

would agree on gymbabes - total waste of money for non-mobile babies IMO, our NCT group went and decided not to bother until the babies were at least crawling

thats so annoying isn't it viva esp baby carriers as I like playing with my many slings. Esp as Edie has very bad anti push chair phobia at the moment - serves me right for naively thinking I wouldnn't be one of those mothers who had to push a wailing baby ..hubris can really bite you on the bum.

x-posted!

viva, I'm your friend now cos I relaxed my settings too!

Lol at your friend the pediatrician! Useful contact!

Yeah, I think I might hang on till he's much more mobile and try again then sponge and poppy. TBH we didn't really do much more than we could do at home and he was getting really frustrated that he could do stuff. The only time he was happy was when I pushed him around on a ride-on and I can do that without leaving my front door. Also, I wasn't that keen on the venue - I needed to feed him straight after and no cafe. No cafe to hang around and chat - no baby class that's my rule .

Still not done any studying. Have put my tuppence worth on fb too sponge. Will try and do some now. Don't talk to me if I come back before 10.30pm.

I've not been posting much for the last few days but have been lurking. I am going through a phase of not being able to "compute" everyone's news and post meaningful responses. I don't want to upset people by not responding to them, so lurking and the odd "me, me, me post" it is for now. Hope that is ok with everyone.

I think we are making progress on the sleep front . This is without doing CC . I have taken on board some of the Jay Gordon ideas that Deb linked to as well as the NCSS stuff. Basically when P wakes I keep him in his cot and sing "I've been working on the railroad" to him, and hey presto, he goes back to sleep within a few minutes unless he is genuinely hungry. The first time I did this it happened because I was fed up of bf to sleep, so I just took him into my bed and hugged him very tight whilst singing with DH chiming in for good measure. P was non too impressed but went to sleep within 15 minutes. Since then I have been able to repeat this except leaving him in his cot. Last night he woke at 11pm (got fed). Then at 1.30 he got sung to, then he slept till 4.50, tried singing but it didn't work, fed him, put him in his cot, but he was awake. One repetition of "The Song", left him awake... and he woke up at 7.15. This is so different to the last month or so that it is utterly amazing.

I have a nosey question for Sponge: who have you told about your pg in RL? I am assuming that you would have told your Mum, but then thought that because your MIL is a PIA you might have avoided telling both to be fair to them

Thanks for the heads up on baby gym I have been meaning to give it a whirl, but haven't got round to trying it out. Will wait till we are crawling I think.

We don't have an 8 month check here either. I saw the HV last week and she said the next proper check was at 12 months for us. She gave P the once over anyway, and seemed happy with everything.

Has anyone given any serious thought to schools yet? I haven't at all, apart from assuming that P will go to our local primary school if we don't move house in the next few years. However yesterday this was a major topic of conversation with my NCT group. I was a bit about it TBH, especially as a couple of them were seriously thinking of getting their babies christened into a denomination that aren't their own so that they would be able to get into better schools. Someone even said they wouldn't mind going to church "for a bit", but that seems completely hypocritical to me. I was quite depressed by the whole thing, but was wondering whether I am just behind the curve on what parents of 8 month olds should be thinking about at the moment.

Also - I have a couple of FB Friend requests that I haven't been able to accept yet as I get error messages, so don't think you are being ignored, I am just having technical trouble!

aliits fine to be stuck on me mode..glad cc is going better (that sounds really good idea to sing to p - I do that with edie).

re schools edie has her name down already for somewhere from 2 -7 but we've had same thing re school. Its actually put me off being christened (there is a church school at end of road so very popular church ) - you have to do 3 months plus promotion and an interview wtih vicar then he'll think of christenign your lo (but only once a month with the 5/6 others). I can see his point re checking people take religious bit seriously but refuse to go on fact its none of his fucking business (sorry not very christian language there) where I send edie to school. suppose tis timely though as reminded me why I don't go to church

Schools - yes but we are having problems at the moment as our whole school system is being upheaved. We are also starting to look at senior schools for Edie and whether we can get a bursery for her as we can't afford the fees but the local school is not good. Always good to start early.

Ali, that's great news about the sleeping - well done!

Um, as for telling people about the pg - I've told quite a few!! Told my NCT group cos I see them about 3 times a week and I need them to know (not doing buggy fit, etc) and also for the support of being able to talk about my anxieties.

I'm not very good at keeping things secret about me - I wear my heart on my sleeve, and I have told all those people who I know would support me through anything going wrong too . Although, have just been told on another thread that apparently I'm being 'self-indulgent' and a 'pg bore'! Guilty as charged! If you can't be self indulgent when you're pg then when can you be FFS!

Ali, pay or pray as I've said before is the ethos for alot of places in terms of schools now. Parents can start obsessing about it very early. I am in the camp that believes you are far more important to your children's education than their school but then that comes from personal life experience.