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

they found our car!!!!

Don't want to make the aft feed earlier as that'd mean waking him up. But will start cutting it back I think.
But yes I was thinking that as for all 3 of those nights he has slept until his usual 6.30 (6.50 this morn) and been happy to wait till 7 to be fed that I probably don't need to worry.

Am at work, got given a laptop as soon as I came in and have been thrown in the deep end with 4 lessons to teach today. Most of them are doing tests though so that makes it easy enough (and means I can be on here). There's a school trip out all week so a lot of staff out so lots of cover for me to do.

good news on the car digital. Is it ok or has it been damaged?

debi I admire your dedication MN-ing from work . I am on the sofa while DD is exploring, DS is at nursery this morning.

excellent news, digi!

pacita I've e-mailed you

Great news digi! debi I realised I never replied to your question about the morning feed - I always feed from the right, then offer the left. Right boob was always morning boob so I've just stuck with it! Ds only takes about 1-2oz formula at bed time, his afternoon bottle is 4oz at 3ish, and tea is between 5 and 5:30. I've cut back on amount of dinner to try and pursuade him to take more bottle but it didn't seem to work. He still won't drink from a tommee tippee beaker so only gets his three milk feeds and as much water as I can pour over him get into him from the doidy cup, which is usually just a couple of slurps. Nappy output seems ok though.

Back to the house moving chat...can someone explain to me how it works?
Ok so I can't put in an offer on a house until we've sold ours, but can I still go round and look at them so that as soon as we have a buyer we can put in an offer, or is that ridiculous because we'd fall in love with houses and never get them because we didn't have a buyer? I just have no idea what order you do things in! When we bought this house we were first timers and the hosue was empty - we lived in it 7 weeks from viewing it, it was so easy back then....!

thanks carrie think I might do that do. I get confused about which side he should be on and then change him half way through when I realise he's on the 'wrong' side which doesn't go down too well!
Good to hear your ds is similar to mine with his feeds. I thought about cutting down the food but then part of me thinks if he's not drinking muh milk then he should eat as much as possile instead.

Well 1st day and I taught 4 out of 6 periods, had a meeting with the county scince inspector and a department meeting! Oh and tried some negotiating with head of dept about my days from Sept. Think I'll go home now.

We seem to go from one disastrous illness to another. It appears that DD now has tonsilitis. She has been running a fever since Sunday night, vomiting, refusing feeds, and crying constantly. We practically have a permanent slot at the GP now, and know the NHS Direct phone number off by heart! GP is pretty sure it is tonsilitis so she is now on anti-bs (again ). She is now taking little feeds often and is mostly keeping them down.

DH is having a hard time coping, as he is still carrying most of the load since my appendectomy. I think he got about half an hour's sleep last night as DD was terribly upset and temperature was way up again. Thankfully I think I am now coming right and will soon be able to lift DD by myself and do a bit more. Sorry I seem to only ever post on here with bad news about us and all our illnesses. Honestly, enough already!

digi Is your car OK or is it damaged?

debithescot When I was doing one BF a day it ended up just being on the right breast. I tried to finish off with the left each time but there seemed to be nothing there, so I stopped using it. Then 3 days ago I thought, what would happen if I just stopped altogether? So I did. No leaking. No sore breasts. So that's it then. DD is officially weaned off the breast. I am a bit surprised that we actually managed this with a week to spare before my target date of 9 months!

carriebo well I can comment on the house thing if you like, as we have seen it all. You can put an offer on a house any time you like, but it won't be regarded as "procedable" until you have an offer on yours. At first we were really careful about making an offer, being sure we were 100% ready to proceed. But then we realised that everyone else (like our buyers, for example) were throwing offers around all over the place with little or no intention of proceding. Once, our purchase of the most gorgeous cottage of our dreams fell through because our "buyer" pulled out 3 weeks away from exchange. It turned out they had had another sale agreed on a different house for weeks, and were just using us as a back up! My conclusion is, you decide according to your own conscience. Legally you can pull out any time you like until contracts are exchanged. My approach is to be totally honest with agents and say, we would like to make an offer and this is our situation. They can then decide how firm / attractive your offer is. It all gets so confusing when everyone else in the chain has similar complications. Then you might end up doing what we did - sell and move into rented while you look for another place (still looking 2 years later... ). Please feel free to send me links so I can share the house snooping hunting with you!

Ninja - you said about trying before buying, but have both the gypsy mama slings gone? Wanted anything cool,but thought gone already?

Digi - great news about the car - is it OK? Got dd1 shouting in my ear about a non friiendly monster & how thirsty she is,so must go, haven't caught up yet either

sorry Splish they have gone now. I had a sudden rush on them this morning.

If the funds don't come through for the gauze wrap i'll let you know

hi all els had a work up yesterday and hes now 14lbs, so still not on the chart, for his weight, but wait for it hes on the 9th centile for his height, yay, looks like hes going to be tall like his daddy and have a small frome like me, only mine has a lot of fat on it now!!
swimming with the physios today, he just loves it and has started screaming with joy, we couldn't even get a smile out of him a few weeks ago.
hope your car is ok digi?

Great news about Els barnpot x (how tall is his dad btw?)

blimmin eck ponymum you guys deserve a lot of good fortune (perhaps in the shape of a beautiful house) to make up for all your illnesses. Hope your DD makes a swift recovery now she's on ABs.

go Els!!

Please everyone stop talking about house moves. I would love to move to a 3-bed in readiness for DC2, but we've already spent so much on doing up this house and we'd need a serious increase in income to move up the ladder round these parts. May end up building on top of the extension in order to gain a third bedroom at this rate.

Our car was found in Northampton, on a trailer with a Porsche (!) on its way to Europe. They arrested the guy driving the trailer, but he claims to know nothing and that he's just the courier. No evidence to suggest he's connected to our burglary. The insurers are going to have a look at it before we can to let us know what shape it's in. But from what the cops say there are a only a couple of scratches on it...

DS is getting better and better at crawling everyday. It's amazing how quickly he's picked it up now that it's clicked. He's also a lot less clingy now that he can busy himself with various objects around the house.

My freelance project comes to an end next week. I've got nothing in the pipeline till August when I've got 5 weeks of full-time work. I think it's safe to say I will definitely be giving up the daytime BFs then. I suppose DS will be nearly a year then, so not a bad innings.

Sympathies Ponymum, hope your DD improves soon.

Well, I think I have decided not to go back to work. I just kept going round in circles about it and getting depressed that (a) I'd be earning almost nothing for an awful lot of work and (b) it would be even harder to do any freelancing, and therefore move towards what I actually want to do.
Money will be pretty tight, but I'm doing some work for my dad, and I've got a reasonable amount of annual leave owing from work, so that will keep us going for a few months.
The relief I'm feeling at the decision also tells me that it's probably the right one.

DG how exciting - your car is practically part of an international crime ring! Not what you want, I'm sure, but at least it's a good story (better than 'it was found burned out in Milton Keynes')

T was randomly up for an hour at 3:30 this morning, first time he's been up in the night since he started sleeping through a few weeks ago. He's also started waking at 5:30-6am, which is a pain in the neck. Going to try later dinner for a few days and see if it helps. Blacking out room doesn't seem to help...

Becaroo DD1 bit me a couple of times so I took her off my knee sat her on the floor and told her 'no'. At the time she couldn't stand back up so she was prob 8-10 months old. She never bit me again. Don't fall for the old 'bite them back' that's just barbaric.

Astounded at some of the 'bigger' babies. Robyn is still in some 3-6 month stuff but starting to get her some 6-9, although the 6-9 babygros from asda are huge and her feet pop out the presstuds.

Have ordered a 1 tog grobag so when the sun comes back will try her in it. I left it off last night and she was a bit cold so had to put it back at midnight.

Good news on getting the car back digi

what a story digitalgirl hope it's not too damaged.

Good news about Els barnpot - tall and slim can't be bad. M is definitely on the short and dumpy end of the scale

Well DH definitely does want more kids when I told him how well I was doing selling wraps and nappies he said 'aren't you going to save them for our next one ...'. I think it's 'cos M is so lovely and part of me doesn't want her to be my last. But I'm not sure I can go through it all again, especially the inevitable arguing between DH and I and his eternal 'we don't all stay at home all day...'

no-one pregnant yet?

Lolly your kids are lovely.

Ninja No not pregnant yet.

Should read not pregnant again ever. 3 is enough and we aren't trying.

I househunt out of my league. If it doesn't have 5 or more bedrooms 3 bathrooms stables and acres of lands I don't want it.

Back to reality we live in a 3 bed council house which we are starting to outgrow. Well when we win the lottery

Starlight how awful of your dad to say that to you. Some parents just don't know how to be supportive mine included).

Effy now has two more shiny new teeth - I noticed them yesterday when she was crying. Nursery also say she's pulling herself up more and more. She keeps trying to stand by herself but can't quite manage this yet - I think she's a bit of a daredevil!

I also got a letter from the HV saying that she's overdue for her 8 month check so I called to arrange for her to go in a couple of weeks. Find it laughable that they chased me given that they were useless when she was having all her intolerance problems and that we barely saw them as you self way round here!

Starlight that's what it feels like - like I'm abandoning all the 'sensible' things I should be doing, but choosing the right option. Just composing my resignation letter!

T is bloody enormous - he's not hugely fat, but long bodied and very sturdy. He is fitting into M&S 12-18 month baby grows and vests (although the reusable nappies give him and extra centimetre or so!).

Urgh, 2 horrendous nights. T was up for over at hour at 12:30 and again from 5-6am last night, as well as brief waking at 3. Gave him a bottle, calpol, teething gel and changed his nappy both times, but he just screamed and screamed till he eventually nodded off again. The second time he ended up in the pram as it was the only way I could get him off, so I had it next to the bed rocking it with one hand while I dozed... hoping he gets over it by himself, no idea what to do about it. Maybe it's teeth or something.

Please tell me about your LO's daytime sleep!! T's sleep is all over the shop at the moment, and I'm wondering whether it's contributing to the bad nights (he is totally, ridiculously over tired when he gets to bed as he is struggling to nap during the day).
He is currently having (on average) 45 mins at about 7:30am (after getting up at 5:30-6), 45 mins around 11 and 45 mins around 4. So about 2 1/4 hours, and then sleeping from about 7:30pm-5am. It doesn't seem like enough, and he is definitely not happy, but not sure what I can aim for.

starlight you certainly don't come across on here as a pushy parent. You come across as someone who loves and cares for your children sooooo much and you want to try and do as much as you can to help him achieve as much as he can. That's love not pushyness.

hopefully poor T (and you)being up so much last night, sounds like something was bothering him, that's what I find hardest about having a baby- having to guess what's wrong with them and sometimes not having a clue what it is or how to help.
DS2 sleeps for about 40mins at about 10am and about 2hrs from about 1.30pm but he does also sometimes do the sameas T and have a 30min nap at 6.30 if he's been up early.
I don't know what to suggest. Do you get him up as soon as he wakes? Sometimes ds2 wakes for a couple of mins in the middle of that sleep and by the time I think about going up to him he's gone to sleep again.