Jan '09 'All we are saying is give peas a chance....and carrots and broccoli and cumcumber and........'

[hongkongzoe]

...here we go ladies, right I'm off to catch up!

qumps i AM around next mon/tue if you are in Chelt. that does sound interesting and I can beat HKZ and Missj at number of meets . FB me if you fancy a meet in Pitville park or something! Always looking for stuff to do in the summer.

ray house in the country sounds lovely, DH wouldn't cope that far from civilisation, needs a paper shop within walking distance or he gets a bit twitchy!

HKZ Oh no! hope you don't have pig flu. getting married over the internet would be no fun at all . My nephew very sweet, but not at all broody, actually kind of glad that i won't have to do that first 3-4 mths again . LOL at Jude tipping the table over, I'm sure Zach would too!

Mass meet-up, Hmmmmmm. so somewhere central with good transport links, lots for kiddies to do?? maybe it should be London or something? How difficult is that for everyone? i'm still voting for midlands though as closer to me

Oh, and HKZ sorry to hear about your mother. Sounds like a hard time, what with Lily being tiny also. Nice that you felt that 'energy' though. my mum had a similar feeling when her father died, she just kkind knew it had happened.

I grew up in Bradford and lived in Leeds. Now I live in a packed town with city problems but no city perks [i.e. a normal cinema, NCT, Primark, Monsoon,..... It's a bit of a cultural void for me, as I am such such a city woman.

But dh was here, he had a house and a job, I could commute and we needed a family home - so I moved. Commuted 2 days a week the 60 miles to Leeds. The moved jobs after 4 years doing the commute in November last year, and we moved house - so commited to the town big style.

Then dh got made redundant so we needn't have bothered. If I'd waited with work and we'd waited with the house, just 6 months, we'd now be moving to Leeds. To work oppurtunities.
Ah well, I love my house and am making friends here slowly but surely. I just miss the multi culture and diversity, lifestyle and large scale-ness I think.

My ideal would be a small country town/large village near a city. Weatherby for example.

Dunno why I'm drivelling on about this tonight! Bit hormonal today maybe.

HKZ Hope you are okay - am sure you'll be better before the wedding. How long now? A couple of weeks?

Hmm, not sure about no.3 being less painful. IME No.2 was just as painful, but all the pain was concentrated in a much shorter period, making it worse and better.

Nooooo, not London - 4/5 hours from me. Too far with DD, she is a terrible traveller. Although have family in Oxford so could coincide a visit to them and break the journey. Am hoping to make it to the Natural History museum before DD starts pre-school in Jan, DH isn't so keen on that plan, he hates London with some passion. Bless him, country bumpkin.

Oh Tree, it's horrid when you miss an opportunity like that. I felt trapped before we moved here. I hated the house, knew no one and felt a bit lonely. I'm only 10 minutes up the road now but settled and know people so it obviously does come good with time. Your Mum in Leeds then?

Just ouside Tadcaster, so half way between Leeds and York. Lovely walks etc, and good tree's to climb

Argh! trees to climb.

Tree That's the set up I'd like too. When we lived in HK we lived on a little island 30 min ferry from central HK...so had island paradise and then big city on door step which worked well. Am a bit at the thought of two more years in London, I like it but I also like fields and beaches and sky and fresh air... especially for the DCs.

Lenni You are welcome to crash here with DD if you make a trip to the natural Hist museum. We are, hopefully, going to the butterfly exhibition there on Thursday.

Meet up somewhere central would be doable... would have to plan in advance to get cheap train tickets....during school hols would be good too!

I'll step back and let you all decide.... I would prob drive to wherever we meet, so as long as isn't TOO far- i'll be there.

Pat We have a little village Hamlet about a 15 mins walk away with a little shop in. Not badly stocked and decent opening hours for emergencies, so we aren't TOTALLY cut off!

think it unlikely that i'll be able to join you all for a meet - will be there in spirit though... we are coping here with the after effects of flying, c very unsettled this evening. mind you, i think she is definitely doing her 26 weeks wonder week at the moment so i guess that would cause her head to melt a bit too - we have consonants, copying gestures, is connecting names with people, and while she ain't crawling, i think mobility is just a spit away. it's like someone flicked a switch at the end of last week and she decided it was time to get going with the growing up.

i grew up in the country, so i think it's fine place to visit for the weekend tree, that's foully bad luck with the house buying/job losing time line

hkz - shit, hope it's not sf. a passing head cold, i'm sure.

pat, is there some danger chance that you could be pregnant???

MissJ and hkz, I've also met 3 of you - you two and fourlittlefeet (at a May 2007 meet up in July of that year).

Stripey Thats cute that C is suddenly doing all sorts. Esme is sitting, albeit wobbly, but no signs of crawling. But, i wouldn't be surprised if she didn't bother crawling & went straight to walking. She stands holding onto things, and is beginning to take stompy steps while holding onto furniture. shes extremely strong on her legs. uh-oh.

Has anyone tried the black out blind in a bag from Gro? Thinking of ordering it for when she sleeps at In laws (don't seem to have caught on it might be nice to have some curtains in the room they expect her to sleep in ) Am i being unreasonable to think that perhaps to buy a few bits to have at their house would be nice? I'm having to take a travel cot, our highchair folded, the WORKS everytime i go to them!!!! Its not a finance thing, they have ample disposable income, i think its just thoughtlessness! (Sound mean don't i?)

Lenni i think it would be nonsense for us to meet in London, given that i think thats no where near central for the majority of Mners. Also, the gov recommendation is to avoid crowds/busy places with this Swine Flu - So i think London would be a BAD idea anytime soon, should prob meet somewhere not city centre ish. But then i guess we begin to have a travel issue. Hmm.

Morning everyone.

Midlands works for me - also London. Just let me know when and where and I'll be there!

hkz hope you feel better this morning. Last night I was convinced I was going down with something terrible, but have woken up this morning just feeling tired (as usual). Strange and lovely about your mother. I had a weird thing with my beloved grandfather when I was 16 - said goodbye to him when we were over there for our usual sunday lunch, and had overpowering feeling that I would never see him again - it was my 16th birthday the next day, and we were woken up at 5am with a call that he had a heart attack. He actually survived with a major bypass operation, and is still going strong! So premonition wasn't quite true - but would have been without modern medicine iyswim.

ray your house does sound lovely. I0 minutes to nearest newspaper shop here- 10 minutes drive. The village is only 15 mins walk away but there is no shop - bit of a crap village actually. I grew up in a very lovely village in the wye valley, with a community farm shop and a theatre and a tiny school, all way ahead of it's time! All the parents used to have big parties every weekend, all us kids would be upstairs playing until we crashed out, and the parents would be downstairs getting pissed. I have major envy of that set-up now! I think they were all having affairs left right and centre.

stripey Sounds like C is going through a super interesting phase. LOL at the phone directories on the floor for the jumperoo - at least you know she's got a lot of time left in it!

Off to the Royal Welsh agricultural show today - woo hoo! Is actually really lovely with lots of rare breeds and vintage tractors (am I selling it to you yet?!). OH loves it anyway, and I will get a nice organic lamb burger for lunch, so I'm happy enough.

x-posted with you ray. Maybe you should take the opportunity to unpack the car with lots of deliberate huffing and puffing, and then muse over tea how perhaps you and OH should leave some stuff with ILs to make it easier next time - perhaps then they would take the hint!

missj No need to imitate huffing and puffing, there is ALOT of huffing and puffing! We bought a travel cot, which has ended up staying at theirs as no sign of a cot arriving - when was shopping with MIL the other day bought travel cot sheets, and hinted that we would need second sets of bits and bobs for their house. Its like banging your head against a brick wall. Think am just going to order stuff and tell them its turning up at their house, as they are quite clearly never going to get the just. Have you picked up jumperoo? Does Nye like it?

Stripey Wow- C must be much shorter than Esme. Esme is on height level 2, as her feet were flat on the floor on level 1! Funny how they grow at different rates.

Morning all. Shocking night here. Stanley awake from 3 to gone 4am and then cried at 5ish off and on until 7. Alsooep now though and ds1 watching Thomas. S has a rash all over him this morning though but no temp and doesn't really seem out of sorts, well no more than normal. Looks like a viral rash though. Good job I didn't cc last night as would have felt terrible today. Took teetha, bonjela, calopl and milk to settle him though Kitty more sleep dust needed.
pat love to meet up in Pitville Park. God I love Chelt so much and really wish we were raising our kids there in the future. St Margaret's where we live though is fab too as on the Thames and has a real village feel, with Richmond only a 15 min stroll along the water. Can't remember who you are to fb!
Ray I have spare everything at my parents and mil. Def makes life easier but we are at both houses alot. Mine jut bought stuff though and got given stuff by other people.
HKZ hope you feel better. How long until the wedding? LOL at skyping your own wedding. We could def meet up somewhere in London once the wedding is all done. Maybe at one of the museums of Princess Diana playground?
My mum was there when her dad died and she said a white bird flew into the hospital room and hten out again. I def believe there is something in it all. Tree intruiged by your night shift story but not sure if I want to know as sounds very scary.
Right off ot google rashes...
Oh nearly forgot Moose I love the aquapod. It's mad ebath time sooooooo much easier as always on my own. Thank you so much for the tip.

Sorry terrible spelling this morning. Will do a scientific test to see if chocolate helps and report back later.

ray we had a similar problem with MIL, I made her get a booster seat by buying one second hand and just leaving it there. For DD's first xmas at 6 mths old they bought her inordinate amounts of crap toys, so when we went home we just left them all there. We have repeated at every subsequent xmas so now she has loads of toys there and they had to buy a toybox (neat-freaks). They never got round to buying a cot so had to take travel cot, but at least its only that! She even has pants, socks, toothbrush and toothpaste there now in case of emergency.

I kind of like where we are too as it has a country feel, minutes to walk to cotswold way or loads of national trust land. But at the same time we are in a very small town that has all amenities, Stroud and supermarkets are a 5 minute drive, Glos and Chelt are 20 mins by car, Bristol 30 mins and Birmingham only 1 hour away. in fact London Paddington is about 90mins by train and we are on the mainline. Only thing that gets to me is its about a 45min drive to the coast and having grown up by the seaside this gets to me in the summer. Oh, well by the seaside now until sunday but can't bloody go there as its raining and cold...typical!

MissJ LOL at having affairs left right and centre.....was it a commune??

qumps i am Natalie on fb. i will send you a message if you like. You are Clare.A I think?? Sorry for the bad night, hope S better soon. We had a bit of a shocker as I kept falling asleep with Zach in bed and then waking up to put him back down. Can't stay awake at the moment! Think I'll just co-sleep tonight, saves the hassle!

tree bummer about moving and everything. can't believe you did a 60 mile commute for 4 years!! i get pissed off at a 20 minute one!

stripey C sounds like she is doing well. zach is doing this weird thing with his hand which looks like a precursor to pointing (sort of rotating his wrist) and we are getting lots of ooooooohs and ahhhhhhhhs. Favourite game is crawling to DD and pulling her hair .
Oh, and noooooooooooooooooooo, please lord no! in answer to your other query. would have to be some super-commando sperm that can crawl across from DH's side of the bed if so . they have been a few explorations in no-mans land but have taken precautions. i think it may be that my period is about to return, could have sworn i was ovulating the other week. We shall see, but you have sufficiently worried me enough to buy a test if its still not here by next week!

Sorry for mega-post, off to my friends in a mo. hope this weather gets better!

hello everyone, missed you all loads!
Our move went ok, have rubbish internet connection so not on it very much as pages take hours to load (pah to dongles). I'm not even going to try to catch up - I'd love to but you just all talk too much .
We are in the house of pestilence at the moment, all have swine flu. ds got it first, about a week ago I guess but we persuaded ourselves it was just a bad cold . Kept him back from nursery, thank god, but didn't give him any tamiflu. Apparently now it's too late to give it. dh got ill next but seems to have shifted it really quickly, and then Rosie and I both started feeling bad yesterday. Gp came out to see her and prescribed tamiflu for both of us. She has liquid stuff which at the mo I'm mixing with calopl and squirting into her mouth, which makes her really really unhappy . Not sure what to do when she stops needing calpol, you're supposed to mix the tamiflu with something but not sure what. Guess I'll just express some bm?? if anyone has any ideas I appreciate them, brain really rubbish with this flu..
I thought my tamiflu would come out in my bm anyway so bit concerned that she is gettuing her dose and some of mine but I guess I should trust the GP??
anyway. I'll try to dro pin a bit more here and catch up with you all
pat I'll give you a ring later but reckon a meet up is off the cards now BOOO. GP thought we'd prob no longer be contagious as long as we're not sneezing or coughing but even if we are better by Fri might be too much of a gamble..

xxx

Good morning! Quick pop in whilst A-R sleeps.

Serious BF guilt happening. She refused her morning feed again today, 3rd morning in a row, so ended up with a bottle. I'v only been bf morning and night anyway as she refused to during the day since weaning began. The guilt comes because I'm actually quite glad as BF hasn't done me much good (makes me really dizzy) and she bites me a lot so I get quite tense when she feeds.

I was wanting to carry on till she was 6months but thats not till the 31st. Also just in case of SF so I could pass on antibodies.

Do I try to get her to BF or just let her have the bottle?

qumps sorry you had a bad night, will order sleep dust now.

stripy thats so cool, its really exiting when they take a developmental spurt.

HKZ bless honey, I hope you feel better soon.

spink good to hear from you! not so good to hear you are all ill EBM idea sounds good to me, maybe check it out with GP/HV first though. hope you all recover quickly.

Ooo, DD waking up!

dog now thats just jammy!

Spink where are you? If Pat and I meet up in Cheltenham next mon or tues could you join us? Bit worried I might be a huge disappointment in the flesh!
Dog not actually sure I can speak to you!

Off out now, will be back later!

Qumps Ohhh i have the Aqua pod- haven't used yet though. Still in her sort of laying thing, although much too big for it, and trying to sit up in it, haha. So prob time to get the pod in the tub!!!

Dog till 9am! Wow! I am MEAN/ military mummy obviously- as i always wake Esme by 7.30am to feed, although she is like a little alarm clock herself and usually wakes about 7.25am! else the rest of the day is out of Sync. I take my hat off to those of you still having night time feeds! Am hoping Esme wont start waking in the night through teeth.

Was just wondering where Tink is, but then realised she is on hols in Centre Parcs. Lovely.

Spink Great to hear from you. so sorry to hear you have SF though! I think the reason the GP had perscribed tamiflu for her to is that they THINK it doesn't pass in the BM. I assume its researched enough, i doubt they would risk double dosing her if there was any chance of anything Adverse happening.... i hope !!!

I think the EBM is the only thing that pops to mind for putting the tamiflu in? Unless she has water from a beaker- perhaps you could mix it with that?

Kitty When you say 'bottle' do you mean of formula or Expressed? I think from the way its written its formula. I REALLY wouldn't beat yourself up about it.. you have done the best thing by bubba for feeding as long as this, Many babies/mothers can't be breastfed and turn out absolutely fine. She will be stood in good stead immunity wise. I don't think BF is any help RE: Swine unless you both actually CATCH SF, only THEN can your body make antibodies. This is my understanding of the situation anyway- feel free to correct anyone who knows more than moi !

Off to get some blank canvases to do a bit of Footprint artwork when a friend of mine comes over tomorrow. Then to give Wedding notice. Exciting. Have got to get on with save the date cards soon. Intending to send only to V.close friends, family who would i would be gutted if were double booked. Everyone else will just recieve their invited in due course.