Sept 08: They're under starters orders .... and they're off .... well, some of them!

[ILikeToMoveItMoveIt]

I thought I'd use this title as not all of our delicious babies are on the move yet, including mine

Oh splish . I wish I had a nice big house and you could come and live here and we could all muddle along together . I think my life will get easier as the dc's grow up, ds will be doing more nursery soon so he'll have more fun and I'll get a break. In a good way they don't stay little forever do they? Enjoy Homestart, I've heard other posters say its very good, especially having the children in a different room so you get some peace!

I have been thrifty this evening and been cutting the feet off the old, carrot / banana stained sleepysuits so dd can get a few weeks more wear out of them. I figured that I won't be passing them on with stains on so might as well wear them for a while longer then chuck them on the rag pile.

Digi DS was 2.5 when Effy was born and it some ways it's been ideal. He's just been that little bit older so he can understand and help out a little bit - so he'll fetch things for her or give her a cuddle or play with her. I do have to key an eye on them as he gives her the occasional dig, but overall it's been a really positive thing.

Poor Effy is still not good. She had a temp at nursery yesterday and then another this morning and they've just called me to say it's gone up again. She keeps going really cold and shivering and then really hot. I've got a call out to the GP as they have no appointments - surely they should find time to fit a 9 month old in.

Sunshine that's awful that they can't fit in a little baby - my GP's (the joy of being in the sticks) will always always make an appointment that day for a baby.

I am very of my childminder. Her first mindee arrives at something like 7:30am, and she is always totally polished and professional, in matching clothes with her make up done. She also gets her own 2 children off to school every morning. How?!?

poor Effy and that doc won't fit her in.

lol hopefully I know what you mean, I can never understand how childminders get through the day in 1 piece, never mind while looking good. I'm having palpatations just thinking about next week when I have to get the boys to the childminder for 7.45 because dh is away (he normally takes them). I'll probably arrive at work in my pjs.

hopefully I was thinking the same thing about childminders the other day. It takes me 2 hours minimum from waking up to getting out the house with my two and thats on the days ds has nursery so i just come straight back home and have a late breakfast. Normally it's 3 hours from wake up to out the door. I console myself with the fact I am 'good' at bedtimes and they are tucked up by 7:30.

sunshine can you pester the gp's again? Maybe you just got a grumpy receptionist?

ikwym - our childminder often looks calm with 3 or 4 kids in tow. She walks everywhere has a 16 and a 14 yr old of her own and looks a lot younger than me

Sunshine that's crazy

Hi all - the GP called me and when I told her what's been going on she asked me to bring Effy in to see her.

She's thinks that poor Eff has a nasty bacterial infection coming on - hence the shivering - and has prescribed some anti-biotics. Effy's at home with me now and seems ok, although it's not helping me get on with my work!

sunshine Sorry to hear poor Effy is still suffering (and poor you too - its hard when they are ill isnt it?)

I have a 5.3 age gap between my two - long story but I have had 6 pregancies - and in some ways its great; ds1 is at school and can do lots of things for himself (although he is quite immature compared to some 5 year olds) and he loves to play with ds2, but the downsides are school run twice a day in all weathers (which was great with a newborn and when suffering from a bad 2nd degree tear and anaemia!!!) and the general difference in their needs...ie. ds1 wants the TV on whilst I am feeding ds2; ds2 wants his nap whilst I am trying to get ds1 his breakfast/lunch/tea etc etc

Its very hard - but I knew it would be. Like meglet I find the baby stage pretty unrelentingly boring and hard.....but it doesnt last forever.

On the other hand my sis had a 15 month gap between her two and although she really struggled (and it caused behaviour problems in my eldest nephew)they will both be at school come september

Dont know about the rest of you, but cant remember our home/family now without ds2

Sunshine glad you've got some treatment for Effy. Hope she begins to clear up a bit now.

I think I'm partly tempted to have a small age gap because (barring any major accidents!) we only intend to have two, so I'd like them to be close in age, and to get the hideous newborn stage out the way as quickly as possible.
I am actually planning to have my CS as late as humanly possible if I get pg again, just because I cannot bear the thought of adding an extra week or two to the newborn stage!

hopefully have you been advised a cs with no.2?

for anyone with toddlers these are cute (just noticed them on active convos). nature walk checklists for children

www.naturedetectives.org.uk/download/summer/

Yes, because of the third degree tear. They said I could give birth naturally if I felt strongly about it, to which I gave a hollow laugh and said something along the lines of 'I'll take the major abdominal surgery, thanks"

Is it sad that I think those downloads look fun for me?

glad they have given you the choice already hopefully, must be a big weight off your mind.

You could have a practice run with the nature checklists for when ds is older.

I'm just printing one off now .

I have a similar gap to becaroo - it's lovely to be able to do the newborn things again in the day, but the differeing needs can be a challenge.

DD1 can be a great help, but I think she's suffered a lot from the change in attention.

I think really it's my duty as a responsible mother to print off the checklists for my next walk, to practice them for T.

I was soooo relieved when they said I could have a CS. I literally had discounted the possibility of having more unless they said I could have one.

Hmm... Random 1am waking last night. We are firmly back to having night wakings after few lovely weeks of sleeping. I think he's genuinely hungry, so trying to gently up his daytime intake and (apart from freak night last night) it does seem to be pushing the waking later. Think last night may have been teeth, as he had a runny nappy, rash and general misery yesterday eve.

He is currenly having his morning lie in in the pram

hopefully I can totally see the point in having a small gap and getting the horror that is the newborn stage out of the way!!!

I didnt for 2 main reasons...severe late onset PND after ds1 (he was 15 months when I fell apart) and 2 terminations and 2 mc....so the larger gap wasnt eaxctly planned IYSWIM? I would have been happier with a gap of 4 years but it wasnt to be

Off to docs next week as I have decided that actually, I cant manage well bleeding for 2 weeks a month and in pain like I have been for the past 3 months....trouble is, I know what they'll say..."pill or coil madam?" and I dont really want either!

Have a great weekend ladies....ds 1 is 6 tomorrow and hw are having a party for 19 x 5/6 year olds...pray for me!!!!!!!

Good luck becaroo done that and it's ....... fun

uurhgghhh..... dd was up grizzling from 3:15 to 5am this morning . She has 3 teeth coming through so the poor little mite is hurting. She had calpol but even that didn't seem to help her that much, mind you after an hour of on / off crying and me going back and forth cuddling and re-settling she started perking up whenever i went in to her room and decided it was all a great game . Mummy, however, was not amused. Mummy was using bad language under her breath.

The nice news is that ds got a good report at nursery, he has been singing songs to the class and is good at counting. Its such a weight off my shoulder to know that professional opinion thinks he's doing ok, after the split from his dad i was worried he would suffer but he seems to be fine .

becaroo Be strong, how hard can 19 young children be .

I also want a smallish gap between DD and number 2, then that's it. (I have warned DH about the snip. He's not taking it well. ). My reason for the small gap is my age. If I want to have DC2 before I turn 42 I have to get PG within the next 6 months! I also like the idea of a small gap anyway though. Not sure why... maybe better for the DCs to play together? The only thing holding me back is I need to get fitter and skinnier before TTC. I have lost 18 kg (did I mention that? ) and now have another 8kg to go before I can TTC, or 10kg if I want to be the weight I was when I met DH!

I feel a bit sad that the consensus seems to be that the newborn stage is horrid. For me, the PG was such hell on earth that the newborn stage was joy beyond all measure in comparison! And I will def have a CS for the second one. Don't fancy VBAC, even if the SPD is not so bad second time around.

I can also report that the new evening routine thing is working really well. Wed night was a record: asleep at 7:15, woke for a bottle at 1:30, then slept through to 9:00am!!! She is also eating a whole lot more and having a regular 2 hour sleep in the middle of the day. Methinks she has found herself a routine (with a bit of a nudge from a very shocked and surprised Mummy and Daddy).

However, I am now getting upset about interruptions to evening routine bed time. e.g. tonight DH is playing cricket after work. It would be nice to collect DD from nursery at 6pm and go and watch for a bit with a little picnic. But then we won't be home until 8:30 which completely messes up the night time routine. I really don't want to be one of those people who doesn't have a life because of kids' nap times or whatever, but do I now find myself accidentally becoming one? What do others do in situations like this?

ponymum i wouldn't worry about having an evening at the cricket. Your dd will probably be nicely tired when she gets home and sleep anyway. Even though I am a mean gf mummy my two have never been unsettled by a change of routine, usually because we've done something that wears them out a bit so they are shattered by the time they are in bed. I just give them a bit more food to keep them going if it's late, and we have INTG on the digital tv recorder so I can do a 'fake' bedtime and they can wind down.

meglet Ooo! tell me how you use INTG in the bed time routine? Do you do this before or after the bath? In the living room or somewhere else? Before or after the last bottle? The one problem we have is that DD gets really excited by the bath, so maybe a dose of INTG is what she needs to calm her down. I have never tried it at bed time so not sure what to do.

Ive added a new vid to our facebook group

I have a 2.10 gap with dd1 and ds would of loved to have it less. In the same time my friend had 3.
Between ds and dd2 is a 9.7 gap! That has been a huge shock. I forgot how hard it is with a tiny baby and trying to fit in 3 routines took a lot of getting used to. Feel a bit sad that Robyn has no little bro or sis to play with but she is our last so she wilkl have to get used to being on her own