JUNE 2008- tantrums, shrieking and lashings of Gin (and that's just the mums!)

[pureeandpearls]

Thread number 123 or something like that

neenz I'm going back 22.5 hours a week spread over five mornings - the equivalent to three days of work and pay.

Amber there's been two other crashes , one here due to pilot error where everyone survived (so not too scary) and then one in Canada where only one person survived. The Canada one was heading to a asset partly owned by the company DH is with so it hits close to home for me too (and I've a good friend living there although they're academics).

Rolf hope the kids are better today - poor you! Two sick and two healthy sounds like a really heavy load! (deb hope S is improving too).

The 2 invalids are curled up in the sitting room with hot water bottles. DS1 is asleep in bed. Thea is covered in yoghurt and clutching a severed thumb (latex, from a joke kit!). I think we'll have a quiet day today!

Just realized the thread has dropped off "threads I'm on"

Spent the weekend continuing with our home improvements. Bought a new fireplace on Saturday and on Sunday we painted over the new grey walls that we had painted last week in our kitchen because I had chosen a colour that looked rubbish. It is white now and certainly an improvement even if it doesn't look as good a finish as our friend who did it originally managed. He is finishing up with the woodwork today and then the 18 month kitchen makeover will be completed!

AH and Josey - so sorry to hear about the tragedy in your community.

Rolf - good luck with the invalids and with the healthy children

Deb - hope the viewing went well and that DS2 (or was it 1) continues to perk up.

Deb - we got an offer on our flat that was so low I wasnted to punch the man.

Rolf - hope your day is still quiet and peaceful.

Ali - still no news from agent, ds1 is better - he went skiing this morning and is eating so, back to normal!

Amber - how insulting , getting such a low offer. Where do you want to move to?

Oh no Amber, how disappointing, but to be expected in this market I suppose? He is probably just trying it on and will hopefully come back with a higher offer.

Rolf, hope your LOs are better soon, good news on Stefan tho Deb.

Ali, don't you just hate it when that happens? The paint never looks quite as it is supposed to once it is up on the walls does it. Whenever I have done that I haven't had the energy to re-do it, altho it has never been so bad that I hated it, just not as nice as I thought it would be iyswim.

Nothing much going on here, E cruised a few steps yesterday holding onto the babydan room divider and T pulled himself up for the first time, which I missed of course. I still haven't seen E pull herself up to standing either . I'm having a lazy afternoon which is nice

Deb - if he is skiing he must be better

Just met up with essie and penguin for lunch. It was good to see them and their boys. Ryder is wonderfully smiley and crawls very fast. Iestyn is showing impressive language skills: when essie asks him "where is the light" he points at the ceiling. Penguin and I were dead impressed by this, although we did have to take Essie's word for it as the conversation was conducted in Welsh.

Where is everyone today?

X-posted with Neenz. My theory is that it is annoying on the paint, but, not as a annoying as being reminded of the mistake everyday for the next umpteen years. In theory a white kitchen should look good with grey walls, but in the end the grey looked a bit lilac which was all wrong.

Ali that made me laugh - You're right Essie could be saying anything! Extremely impressed that Iestyn can point at anything though - especially to order. No pointing for Luke. He does seem to like a new game though where I hide things and he goes seek. Very sweet - like a little doggy! Has everyone else got babies that hold things in their mouths while they crawl about?

Neenz - I am resigned to the fact that Luke will do all his first stuff while he's at nursery. You only need turn away for a second and they've done something new! I think they wait for you to look the other way or for you to have a babysitter - little rascals!

I'm there with the paint. Thankfully I got loads of those pots to test out and none of them looked anything like the colour on the tin or the chart!

Deb/Neenz - the offer was £100,000 less than the asking price. We have already lowered it by £150,000. I think that puts the offer in a little more perspective and might therefore make punching him in the face a case of severe provocation!

100,000 less , I can imagine why you felt the need to punch him!!

Paint - we painted our hallway once, had just about finished when we realised that even though the paint was called the same colour and from the same shop, bought at the same time, it was a different bar code or item number on the tin - result - half the hall a lovely sunshine yellow - half orange. We had to redo the orange!

Ethan only points at food

hi all -sorry to those on sick duty (although deb sounds like stefan on teh mend) but did giggle at your description of thea rolf. amber can't you teach luke to be sick on command on those that make derisory offers? Am impressed with iestyn's skills -edie points randomly where she wants to go when being carried by dada (I'd like to say she knows the word dada -which she does -however it is a general use noun/adjective).

Feeling knackered as got 3am start thanks to madam (who is very hyper at teh moment) -she slepte at lunch but I didnt as had stuff to do so hoping she'll go down ok tonight.

Ah the five morining thing sounds lke a good compromise - I'm doing 4 days - tuesday -friday but asked to do 8.30 -4.30/5- its not actually in my contract (my contracted hours are 9.30 -5.30) but HC said such a small variation shouldn't make a difference..will just have to wait and see. Getting bit annoyed with those saying it'll be really hard, you'll really miss her - I know its well meaning but reminds me of all the well meaning commenst before they're born. Its not like I hadn't guessed I'd miss her or there would be some tough days . Sorry bit grumpy -think its the early start... sorry to anyone I missed.

oh and had bad mummy moment but felt vindicated as I wasn't the worst money - E had screaming fit as tired whilst I was out at lunch time so gave her a chocolate button ( I know bad mummy but I'd not eaten since 6am and was starved).. however Was not as bad as woman in front of me who lit up a cigarette whilst obviously six/seven months pregnant . Was - just proves I live a sheltered life as not sure I've actually seen a pregnant woman smoke ( I know it goes on but I suppose I'm judging by fact I'm so careful).

mummy/money - I hope going back to work/some sleep reverses my failing brain

Evening all

Its hot here too but we have "calima" which is african hot winds and sand from sahara so makes it all yucky bit like being in a hairdryer!!

Hope agent contacts you soon deb

Fleur also cruising here to and pulling up, we now have bye bye too!! and she points the remote control at the tv if we let her play with it oops maybe we do it too often!

Eating and sleeping better thanks for all your help guys.

sponge Im better thanks all gone enjoying 2 weeks hols now! will have been away 5 weeks when i go back

Fleur is mega hyper too Poppy

Ok need your help have set up seperate thread but maybe you guys will know
Ok Dp is into his hummers He has a collection of about 200, not real ones!!!! He has never actually been in a real one
As you know we are getting married in July I would like a humvee to pick us up from registry office in Cambridge, drive round Cambridge a bit and then drop us off at reception venue.
Ok I know i can hire a limo hummer from various companies but DP doest like these he likes the H1, H2 H3 normal one. I can also hire these but only for a day at 500 pounds!!! which is toooo much. So question is? Does anybody have 1? haha! Does anybody have a friend who has one' Know of one? or company etc that is willing to hire one out or pick us up for a decent price?
Thanks a bunch!!!

Hi all, just quickly marking my place as have my folks down for the week so can't be anti-social!

Also impressed with Iestyn's pointing skills, although also laughed at the idea that this was some bi-lingual joke on Essie's part!

Hope all well x

[gasps] Amber 100K- ouch!!!

Paro- can't help with the Hummer I'm afraid.

Sponge- have Granny here too, so little time.

I ended up going in to work today as I didn't get invited to the meet-up! [sniffs]

Now off until after my op next week. (I do have a lovely new car to be transported home in and a lovely bedroom to recover in though)

Ow, Puree! Sorry! It was all rather last minute, with texts being exchanged at 9am. But I will text you next time. Doing anything Wednesday? I'm out to play then as well. Actually, I'm around any day, including tomorrow, and would love to meet up. Out on a limb, my mobile is 07974310412. Guys, no text spamming, please!
It was lovely to see the boys and girls - but won't go on about it!
Iestyn's pointing to order was an attempt to keep up - no teeth, no crawling! (Actually, he might crawl v. soon, as he goes on all fours and rocks, and goes backwards. Hugely inconvenient as we have home improvement issues and lack of safety.)
Paro now there was a hummer parked on a big hill near me in Anglesey, with an ad on it but what for, I don't know. I've googled it but not found anything. Anyhow, Anglesey, Cambridge...

I should have talked more to Ali today - we're considering painting our kitchen...grey! Ali, tell all - what was the colour? We're looking at Crown Silver Spoon. Maybe I should get Amber, Neenz and Ali around! The kitchen looks lovely, but the living room now looks a bit shabby, and is a disaster in terms of safety. It would be better if there wasn't a great big dishwasher in the middle of the room. But it sold on e-bay today for £350!!!

Essie it was Crown "soft steel". I would recommend Crown "toffee apple" though which is a red colour that we have put on one wall. However this is running the risk of going the way of one of those baby name threads where the OP says: "I like the name Adrian" and someone replies "well call him Gustav". What colour are your units?

Purée - sorry you missed out today. Nothing personal, it was discussed on the thread at the end of last week and I didn't think anyone else could make today. Sorry if I overloked a post from you. As Essie said we only finalized it at the last minute this morning.

Amber that's scary, if someone offered us 100K lower than our house is worth we would nearly end up paying them to take it! We are going to see a house on Saturday that has already been lowered by 80K - bringing it just into our price range - one we've loved for ages but haven't ever dreamed we could consider. Maybe your experience means we could still risk a lower offer on it ... [ponders]

Caitlin can point, but only to her Daddy (anyone seeing a theme here?). She is also obsessed with opening packets of wipes and pulling them out one by one. And I stupidly taught her 'uh oh' for dropping things which she thinks is fab so drops everything, all the time now . I'm loving 'mama' though which I'm getting lots of.

Her sleep has been AWFUL though. Tried controlled screaming at the weekend and after initial success it all went disastrously wrong as she seemed to develop a phobic reaction to sleeping full stop and woke up every 1/2 hour panicking for 2 nights. So we have given up again for now. I'm doing gradual withdrawal at bedtime (quite nice actually as I can sit next to her and read while she drops off), doing whatever gets us through the night, and resorted to Medised last night which gave me 5 hours in a row and left me feeling just barely human again. I think she is teething though so maybe just short term [hopeful emoticon]

Systems, we had controlled screaming here last week as well - I think it was E discovering a new sound rather than mega distress. She also screamed for 10mins flat when my mum was getting her dressed after he bath on Saturday. The monkey . I've been there with the Medised (as you know )! Theo had a cold a few weeks back and kept waking at 4am, sounding snuffly, so I'd give him 2.5ml. But then I realised that his cold was gone, he was still waking at 4am and I was still giving him medised to get him back to sleep . Thankfully he just started sleeping through on his own but he was awake screaming at 4am last night (he did sound in pain - maybe teeth?) - but I resisted the medised and gave him 2.5ml Calpol (holding back 2.5ml so I could resort to the Medised if necessary!). Anyway he went back to sleep after about 30mins, had another little cry at 6am and then E woke at 6.30am. So the worst night we've had in a while.

Nice colour Essie, looks like the colour we have on our kitchen walls actually (maybe a bit darker).

V. quick one - Iestyn is crawling backwards and keeps going under the TV unit where there are cables. He's also refusing to nap so I'm going to have to go to Sainsbury's. (Feel totally guilty at my inability to get my son to nap, and the sheer cop-out of coinciding trips to the supermarket with his nap times.

Deb that happened to my brother, with the house I mean. He was a first time buyer last summer, and managed to get a house at 65k less that the original price. Not through haggling, but because the developer was desperate to sell. He's living there now! Great news really because my brother is poor!

Thanks for all the help with the colours, especially Ali because we were considering Soft Steel!! I'm after white with a hint of grey, because our units are white, and our tiles are white, black and grey. Neenz do you think ours is darker or yours? I'm concerned about grey walls really because of the gloom etc. (And hearing of Ali's incident means I'm less likely to say 'oh sod it, let's give it a go')

And Systems sorry about the sleeping.

p.s. our kitchen sounds disgusting now that I've re-read that, but it's not, it's lovely!

Who knows, maybe soft steel would work in a different kitchen. If I ever get back onto the big computer maybe I will post a photo of the newly decorated kitchen to give you an idea of what ours looks like.

Systems and Neenz sorry to hear about your horrible nights.

We have also had the basement redecorated and just had a new carpet laid this morning. All a bit chaotic, but it now looks lovely.

Hope all the painting goes well - definitely get the little tester pots if you are going for a grey. I bet they come out a lot darker than they look.

I am tired out today. Has second night in a row of baby with a cold non sleep. He was also sick in the night and I had to clean all his bed things and put him in new. Feeling super sensitive today as a result.

I am very impressed with mamas, pointing, uh ohs etc. As much as Luke is quite coordinated physically there's no speaking, pointing or the like. In a way I'm glad 'cos I feel like he's growing up so quickly and I want him to stay a kitten for a bit longer. Saying that though, he is desperate to walk and gets very frustrated. God help me when he does though as I can barely control him as it is!

Systems - don't offer too low - you might get the same reaction as I gave and the police might be called!

Essie - are we meeting on Monday?